Pagan Origin of Partialist Doctrines

by John Claudius Pitrat

"'Behold what took place in regard to the judgments, tortures, and rewards. After each one of those souls had spent seven days in the meadow they left on the eighth, and arrived, after a march of four days, at a designated spot, wherefrom was seen a light crossing the heaven and the earth, as straight as a column, and similar to the rainbow, but brighter and purer. They reached this light in one day's march. There they saw that the extremities of the heaven meet at the middle of this light, which united them fast, and which embraced all the circumference of the heaven, in nearly the same manner as the beams which girdle the sides of galleys, and which bear their frame. At the extremities the spindle of Necessity hung, and determined the revolutions of the celestial spheres.'"

Here Her describes the spindle. This description we omit, for it does not relate to our subject.

Her continues:—

"'Near the spindle, and at equal distances, sat on thrones the three Parques, daughters of Necessity, Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos, dressed in white, and their heads crowned with a bandelet. They united their chant to that of the Sirenes; Lachesis sung the past, Clotho the present, and Atropos the future. Clotho, now and then, touched the spindle with her right hand, and made it revolve externally. Atropos, with her left hand, impressed motion to each one of the interior whirls, and Lachesis, with both hands, touched now the spindle, and then the interior whirls. When the souls arrived they appeared before Lachesis. First a Hierophant assigned a rank to each one; then taking from the lap of Lachesis the fates and the various conditions of human life, he mounted on a high stand, and spake thus:—

"'This is what the virgin Lachesis, daughter of Necessity, says: Voyaging souls you are to commence another career, and return into a mortal body. The genius will not choose for you: each one of you shall choose hers. The first one that fate will designate shall choose first, and her choice shall be irrevocable. Virtue has no master; she clings to him who honors her, and flies from him who despises her. The error of the choice shall fall on you. God is innocent.

"'Thereupon the Hierophant casting the fates, each soul picked up the one that fell before her, except myself who had been forbidden it. Each one knew then in which rank she had to choose. Then the same Hierophant placed before them callings of all kinds, whose number was greater than that of the souls who were to choose; for all the conditions of men and beasts were assembled therein. There were tyrannies, the ones were to last till death; and the others were to be suddenly interrupted, and were to end by exile, poverty and indigence. Also there were seen conditions of illustrious men, the ones for beauty, for strength, for fame in the combats; and the others by their nobleness, and the great qualities of their ancestors; there were seen also obscure conditions. There were destinies of women of the same variety. But there was no regulation for the rank of the souls, because each one was necessarily to change of nature according to her choice. Besides, wealth, poverty, and diseases, were found in all conditions: here without any mixture, there in a just proportion of advantages and disadvantages.'

"But this is evidently, my dear Glaucon, the redoubtable trial for mankind.... The Hierophant added: he who chooses the last, provided he be judicious, and then be consistent in his conduct, may hope to be blessed in life. Therefore let him who is to have the first choice, be not presumptuous; and let him who has the last choice, despair not. When the Hierophant had thus spoken, he to whom the first fate had been devolved, hastily advanced, and took, without any deliberation, the greatest tyranny; but when he had considered it, and seen that his destiny was to eat his own children, and to commit other enormous crimes, he lamented; and, forgetting the recommendation of the Hierophant, charged upon the fortune and the gods, with the wretchedness of his fate. This soul was one of those who came from heaven; she had previously lived in a well governed state, and had been virtuous more from temper and habit, than from philosophy.

"On the contrary, the souls who had sojourned in the subterranean region, and who had both the experience of their own sufferings, and the knowledge of the misfortunes of others, were cautious in their choice. This experience on one side, and that inexperience on the other, together with the fate which decided the rank for the choice, were the cause that the most of the souls exchanged a good condition for a bad one, and a bad one for a good one. He also said, that it was a strange spectacle to see in what manner each soul made her choice, nothing was more extraordinary, nor more pitiful; the most of them were guided in their choice by the habits they had contracted in their previous life. He had seen the soul of Orpheus choosing the condition of a swan, from hatred to women who had killed him, and from whom he did not wish to receive birth. He saw the soul of Thamyris choosing the condition of nightingale; likewise he saw a swan and several other birds choosing the human condition.

"Another soul had chosen the condition of a lion; it was that of Ajax, son of Telamon, who, remembering the offense she had received in the judgments rendered about the arms of Achilles, refused to take again a human body. Then came the soul of Agamemnon, who, from antipathy against mankind on account of her past sufferings, chose the condition of an eagle. The soul of Atalante, desirous of the athletic honors, chose to be a champion. The soul of Epee, son of Panope, preferred the condition of a woman skillful in handiworks. The soul of the buffoon Thersite came one of the last, and entered the body of a monkey. There were, Her added, souls of animals which exchanged their condition against ours, and human souls which passed into bodies of beasts. The souls indistinctly passed from the bodies of animals into human bodies, and from human bodies into bodies of animals; those of the righteous into species of a higher order.

"When all the souls had chosen their new condition of existence, according to the rank determined by fate, they came to Lachesis in the same order. She gave to each one the genius of her choice, and this genius was to be her guardian during her mortal life, and was to aid her in the accomplishment of her destiny. This genius first led her to Clotho, who, with her hand, and with a revolution of the spindle confirmed the chosen destiny. When the soul had touched the spindle, the genius took her to Atropos, who rolled the thread in her fingers, to render irrevocable what had been already spun by Clotho. After that, the soul proceeded to the throne of Necessity, under which the soul and her genius, or demon, passed together. When all had passed, they went to the plain of the Lethe river, where they were oppressed by an intense heat; for there was in this plain, neither tree nor shrub. The evening came and they spent the night near the river Ameles, whose water can be contained in no vessel. Every soul was obliged to drink some of its water. They fell asleep; but at about midnight the thunder roared, and all the souls suddenly waking up were dispersed, like shooting stars, towards the various places where they were to commence their new life.