But as we insinuated before, This Root of Superstition diversely branched forth it self, sometimes into Magick and Exorcismes, other times into Pædanticall Rites and idle observations of Things and Times, as Theophrastus hath largely set them forth in his Tract περὶ δεισιδαιμονίας: in others it displayed itself in inventing as many new Deities as there were severall Causes from whence their affrights proceeded, and finding out many φρικτὰ μυστήρια appropriate to them, as supposing they ought to be worshipt cum sacro horrore. And hence it is that we hear of those inhumane and Diabolicall sacrifices called ἀνθρωποθυσίαι, frequent among the old Heathens (as among many others Porphyry in his De abstinentia hath abundantly related) and of those dead mens bones which our Ecclesiastick writers tell us were found in their Temples at the demolishing of them. Sometimes it would express itself in a prodigall way of sacrificing, for which Ammianus Marcellinus (an heathen Writer, but yet one who seems to have been well pleased with the simplicity and integrity of Christian Religion) taxeth Julian the Emperor for Superstition. Iulianus, Superstitiosus magis quam legitimus sacrorum observator, innumeras sine parsimonia pecudes mactans, ut æstimaretur, si revertisset de Parthis, boves iam defuturos: like that Marcus Caesar, of whom he relates this common proverb, οἱ λευκοὶ βέες Μάρκῳω τῷ Καίσαρι, ἄν συ νικήσῃς, ἡμεῖς ἀπωλόμεθα. Besides many other ways might be named wherein Superstition might occasionally shew it self.
All which may best be understood, if we consider it a little in that Composition of Fear and Flattery which before we intimated: and indeed Flattery is most incident to base and slavish minds; and when the fear and jealousy of a Deity disquiet a wanton dalliance with sin, and disturb the filthy pleasure of Vice, then this fawning and crouching disposition will find out devices to quiet an angry conscience within, and an offended God without, (though as men grow more expert in this cunning, these fears may in some degree abate). This the ancient Philosophy hath well taken notice of, and therefore well defin’d δεισιδαιμονία by κολακεία, and useth these terms promiscuously. Thus we find Max. Tyrius in his Dissert. 4 concerning the difference between a Friend and a Flatterer. ὁ μὲν εὐσεβής, φίλος θεῷ, ὁ δὲ δεισιδαίμων, κόλαξ θεοῦ· καὶ μακάριος ὁ εὐσεβής, ὁ φίλος θεοῦ, δυστυχὴς δὲ ὁ δεισιδαίμων. ὁ μὲν θαρσῶν τῇ ἀρετῇ, πρόσεισι τοῖς θεοῖς ἄνευ δέους· ὁ δὲ ταπεινὸς διὰ μοχθηρίαν, μετὰ πολλοῦ δέους, δύσελπις, καὶ δεδιὼς τοὺς θεοὺς ὥσπερ τοὺς τυράννους. The sense whereof is this, The Pious man is God’s friend, the Superstitious is a flatterer of God: and indeed most happy and blest is the condition of the Pious man, God’s friend, but right miserable and sad is the state of the Superstitious. The Pious man, emboldened by a good Conscience and encouraged by the sense of his integrity, comes to God without fear and dread: but the Superstitious being sunk and deprest through the sense of his own wickedness, comes not without much fear, being void of all hope and confidence, and dreading the Gods as so many Tyrants. Thus Plato also sets forth this Superstitious temper, though he mentions it not under that name, but we may know it by a property he gives of it, viz.: to colloque with Heaven, Lib. 10, de Legibus, where he distinguisheth of Three kinds of Tempers in reference to the Deity, which he then calls πάθη, which are, Totall Atheism, which he saies never abides with any man till his Old age; and Partial Atheism, which is a Negation of Providence; and a Third, which is a perswasion concerning the Gods ὅτι εὐπαράμυθοί εἰσι θύμασι καὶ εὐχαῖς, that they are easily won by sacrifices and prayers, which he after explaines thus, ὅτι παραιτητοί εἰσι τοῖσιν ἀδικοῦσιν, δεχόμενοι δῶρα, &c., that with gifts unjust men may find acceptance with them. And this Discourse of Plato’s upon these three kinds of Irreligious πάθη Simplicius seems to have respect to in his comment upon Epictetus, cap. 38, which treats about Right Opinions in Religion; and there having pursued the two former of them, he thus states the latter, which he calls ἀθεΐας λόγον as well as the other two, as a conceit θεοὺς παρατρέπεσθαι δώροις, καὶ ἀναθήμασι, καὶ κερματίου διαδόσεσιν, quod muneribus et donariis et stirpis distributione a sententia deducuntur, such men making account by their devotions to draw the Deity to themselves, and winning the favour of Heaven, to procure such an indulgence to their lusts as no sober man on earth would give them; they in the meanwhile not considering ὡς μεταμέλειαι, καὶ ἱκετεῖαι, καὶ εὐχαί, καὶ τὰ τοιαῦτα, ἀναλογοῦσι τῷ κάλῳ, that Repentance, Supplications, and Prayers, &c., ought to draw us nearer to God, not God nearer to us; as in a ship, by fastning a Cable to a firm Rock, we intend not to draw the Rock to the Ship, but the Ship to the Rock. Which last passage of his is therefore the more worthy to be taken notice of, as holding out so large an Extent that this Irreligious temper is of, and of how subtil a Nature. This fond and gross dealing with the Deity was that which made the scoffing Lucian so much sport, who in his Treatise De Sacrificiis tells a number of stories how the Daemons loved to be feasted, and when and how they were entertained, with such devotions which are rather used Magically as Charms and Spells for such as use them, to defend themselves against those Evils which their own Fears are apt perpetually to muster up, and to endeavour by bribery to purchase Heaven’s favour and indulgence, as Juvenal speaks of the Superstitious Aegyptian,
Illius lacrimae mentitaque munera præstant
Ut veniam culpae non abnuat, ansere magno
Scilicet et tenui popano corruptus Osiris.
Though all this while I would not be understood to condemn too severely all servile fear of God, if it tend to make men avoid true wickedness, but that which settles upon these lees of Formality.
To conclude, Were I to define Superstition more generally according to the ancient sense of it, I would call it Such an apprehension of God in the thoughts of men, as renders him grievous and burdensome to them, and so destroys all free and cheerfull converse with him; begetting in the stead thereof a forc’d and jejune devotion, void of inward Life and Love. It is that which discovers itself Pædantically in the worship of the Deity, in anything that makes up but onely the Body or outward Vesture of Religion; though then it may make a mighty bluster; and because it comprehends not the true Divine good that ariseth to the Souls of men from an internall frame of Religion, it is therefore apt to think that all its insipid devotions are as so many Presents offered to the Deity and gratifications of him. How variously Superstition can discover and manifest itself, we have intimated before: To which I shall only adde this, That we are not so well rid of Superstition, as some imagine when they have expell’d it out of their Churches, expunged it out of their Books and Writings, or cast it out of their Tongues, by making Innovations in names (wherein they sometimes imitate those old Caunii that Herodotus speaks of, who that they might banish all the forrein Gods that had stollen in among them, took their procession through all their Country, beating and scourging the Aire along as they went;) No, for all this, Superstition may enter into our chambers, and creep into our closets, it may twine about our secret Devotions, and actuate our Formes of belief and Orthodox opinions, when it hath no place else to shroud itself or hide its head in; we may think to flatter the Deity by these, and to bribe it with them, when we are grown weary of more pompous solemnities: nay it may mix it self with a seeming Faith in Christ; as I doubt it doth now in too many, who laying aside all sober and serious care of true Piety, think it sufficient to offer up their Saviour, his Active and Passive Righteousness, to a severe and rigid Justice, to make expiation for those sins they can be willing to allow themselves in.
ON THE FACE WHICH APPEARS ON THE ORB OF THE MOON
A DIALOGUE
INTRODUCTION
Plutarch’s Dialogue on The Face in the Moon is not a scientific treatise, and its author would have disclaimed any intention of writing to advance science. It is discussion for the sake of discussion, the ‘good talk’ of which Plutarch wished that Athens should have no monopoly, any more than she had when the Boeotian Simmias and Cebes were among the trusted friends of Socrates, or, later, when ‘plain living and high thinking’ could be exhibited in lofty perfection in the Theban home of Epaminondas. A mixed company, which includes an astronomer, another mathematician, a literary man, and professed philosophers (there is no Epicurean here), with Lamprias, Plutarch’s brother, for president, discusses the movements and physical nature of the moon, from many points of view. Reference is made throughout to a previous discussion at which Lamprias, and Lucius, another of the speakers, had been present, when a person called ‘Our Comrade’ had dealt faithfully with the Peripatetic view, endorsed by the Stoics, that the moon is not of substance like our earth, but is a fiery or starlike body. This discussion had wandered into mystical theories as to the moon’s office in the birth and death of human souls, and her connexion with ‘daemons’. Sylla has joined the present company with a myth to relate bearing on these deep subjects, which had come to him at Carthage as a traveller’s tale. Its production is delayed until the end of the Dialogue, which it closes after the manner of a Platonic myth; the phrases with which it is opened and dismissed may be compared with those of the Gorgias. This double device, of referring part of the matter to a former conversation (as the E at Delphi is a recollection of an old discourse by Ammonius), and part to a new and strange tale, skilfully relieves this elaborate Dialogue. Some difficulty is caused by the imperfect, or doubtful, condition of the text of the opening chapter, as no complete explanation seems to be given as to the place or time of the former discussion. Probably this abruptness is intentional, but the text requires careful attention.