There is another point in the platonic philosophy, which Virgil has made the groundwork of the greatest part in the piece we are now examining, having with wonderful art and beauty materialised, if I may so call it, a scheme of abstracted notions, and clothed the most nice refined conceptions of philosophy in sensible images and poetical representations. The Platonists tell us, that the Soul, during her residence in the body, contracts many virtuous and vicious habits, so as to become a beneficent, mild, charitable, or an angry, malicious, revengeful being: a substance inflamed with lust, avarice, and pride; or, on the contrary, brightened with pure, generous, and humble dispositions: that these and the like habits of virtue and vice growing into the very essence of the Soul, survive and gather strength in her after her dissolution: that the torments of a vicious soul in a future state arise principally from those importunate passions which are not capable of being gratified without a body; and that on the contrary, the happiness of virtuous minds very much consists in their being employed in sublime speculations, innocent diversions, sociable affections, and all the ecstasies of passion and rapture which are agreeable to reasonable natures, and of which they gained a relish in this life.
Upon this foundation, the poet raises that beautiful description of the secret haunts and walks which he tells us are inhabited by deceased lovers.
"Not far from hence," says he, "lies a great waste of plains, that are called, the 'fields of melancholy.' In these grows a forest of myrtle, divided into many shady retirements and covered walks, and inhabited by the souls of those who pined away with love. The passion," says he, "continues with them after death." He then gives a list of this languishing tribe, in which his own Dido makes the principal figure, and is described as living in this soft romantic scene with the shade of her first husband Sichæus.[187]
The poet in the next place mentions another plain that was peopled with the ghosts of warriors, as still delighting in each other's company, and pleased with the exercise of arms. He there represents the Grecian generals and common soldiers who perished in the siege of Troy as drawn up in squadrons, and terrified at the approach of Æneas, which renewed in them those impressions of fear they had before received in battle with the Trojans. He afterwards likewise, upon the same notion, gives a view of the Trojan heroes who lived in former ages, amidst a visionary scene of chariots and arms, flowery meadows, shining spears, and generous steeds, which he tells us were their pleasures upon earth, and now make up their happiness in Elysium. For the same reason also, he mentions others as singing pæans, and songs of triumph, amidst a beautiful grove of laurel. The chief of the concert was the poet Musæus, who stood enclosed with a circle of admirers, and rose by the head and shoulders above the throng of shades that surrounded him. The habitations of unhappy spirits, to show the duration of their torments, and the desperate condition they are in, are represented as guarded by a fury, moated round with a lake of fire, strengthened with towers of iron, encompassed with a triple wall, and fortified with pillars of adamant, which all the gods together are not able to heave from their foundations. The noise of stripes, the clank of chains, and the groans of the tortured, strike the pious Æneas with a kind of horror. The poet afterwards divides the criminals into two classes: the first and blackest catalogue consists of such as were guilty of outrages against the gods; and the next, of such who were convicted of injustice between man and man: the greatest number of whom, says the poet, are those who followed the dictates of avarice.
It was an opinion of the Platonists, that the souls of men having contracted in the body great stains and pollutions of vice and ignorance, there were several purgations and cleansings necessary to be passed through both here and hereafter, in order to refine and purify them.[188]
Virgil, to give this thought likewise a clothing of poetry, describes some spirits as bleaching in the winds, others as cleansing under great falls of waters, and others as purging in fire to recover the primitive beauty and purity of their natures.
It was likewise an opinion of the same sect of philosophers, that the souls of all men exist in a separate state, long before their union with their bodies; and that upon their immersion into flesh, they forget everything which passed in the state of pre-existence; so that what we here call knowledge, is nothing else but memory, or the recovery of those things which we knew before.
In pursuance of this scheme, Virgil gives us a view of several souls, who, to prepare themselves for living upon earth, flock about the banks of the river Lethe, and swill themselves with the waters of oblivion.
The same scheme gives him an opportunity of making a noble compliment to his countrymen, where Anchises is represented taking a survey of the long train of heroes that are to descend from him, and giving his son, Æneas an account of all the glories of his race.
I need not mention the revolution of the platonic year,[189] which is but just touched upon in this book; and as I have consulted no author's thoughts in this explication, shall be very well pleased, if it can make the noblest piece of the most accomplished poet more agreeable to my female readers, when they think fit to look into Dryden's translation of it.