[324] That this truth is one which appeals to the Imagination more cogently than to the Reason, resembling in that respect the belief in the soul’s immortality, is evident to Plutarch. It is on this account that he illustrates it by Myth instead of arguing it by Reason, and takes every precaution to prevent his readers from regarding it as a complete and final presentation of a logically irrefutable belief.
[325] Non posse suaviter, &c., 1101 B, C.
[326] 1101 D.
[327] 1102 B.
[328] De Audiendis Poetis 34 B.
[329] Conjugalia Præcepta, 140 D. Champagny sees a reference here to Christianity. But why not also in Plato’s Laws, 674 F, and 661 C?—It is quite in harmony with Plutarch’s love of openness in Religion that to the general reticence displayed by the Greeks on the subject of their religious Mysteries, he seems to add a personal reticence peculiarly his own. Considering how anxiously he hovers about the question of the soul’s immortality (see above, p. 118, and cf. Consolatio ad Apollonium, 120 B, C: “If, as is probable, there is any truth in the sayings of ancient poets and philosophers ... then must you cherish fair hopes of your dear departed son”—a passage curiously similar in form and thought to Tacitus, Agric. 46: “Si quis piorum manibus locus, si, ut sapientibus placet,” &c.), it is remarkable that only once—and then under the stress of a bitter domestic bereavement—does he specifically quote the Mysteries (those of Dionysus) as inculcating that doctrine (Ad Uxorem, 611 D). His adoption of an unknown writer’s beautiful comparison of Sleep to the Lesser Mysteries of Death (Consol. ad Apoll., 107 E), and his repetition of the same idea elsewhere (see above, p. 118), may also be indications how naturally the teaching of the Mysteries suggested the idea of immortality. But he most frequently alludes to the Mysteries as secret sources of information for the identification of nominally different deities (De Iside et Osiride, 364 E), or for the assignation of their proper functions to the Dæmons (De Defectu, 417 C), who are regarded as responsible for what Mr. Andrew Lang (“Myth, Ritual, and Religion,” passim) calls “the barbaric and licentious part of the performances” (De Iside et Osiride, 360 E, F). We should perhaps conclude, from the few indications which Plutarch gives of his views on this subject, that he regarded the Mysteries in a twofold light; they were a source of religious instruction, or consolation, respecting the future state of the soul, and they were also a means of explaining and justifying the crude legends which so largely intermingled with the purer elements of Greek religion. Though, as Plutarch hints, many of these barbaric legends were not suited to discussion by the profane, yet the mind, when purified by sacred rites, and educated to the apprehension of sacred meanings, could grasp the high and pure significance of things which were a stumbling-block to the uninitiated, and could make them an aid to a loftier moral life.
[330] “Das eigentlich einzige und tiefste Thema der Welt- und Menschengeschichte, dem alle übrigen untergeordnet sind, bleibt der Conflict des Unglaubens und des Aberglaubens.”—Goethe, Westöstlicher Divan (quoted by Tholuck).
[331] 165 C.
[332] 165 D.
[333] Bernardakis adopts Bentley’s emendation βαπτισμούς, which might be an allusion to Christianity, but would more probably refer to such a process as that already described in the words βάπτισον σεαυτὸν εἰς θάλασσαν. We have previously discussed the general question involved (see p. 45), but may here add the opinion of so unprejudiced a Christian writer as Archbishop Trench, “strange to say. Christianity is to him (Plutarch) utterly unknown.”—(See also note, p. 202).