the Gods from men ,1 noxious angels % will alone remain , xvho being mingled with human nature will violently impel the mise¬ rable men [of that time\ to war, to rapine , to fraud , and to every thing contrary to the nature of the soul. Then the earth shall be in a preternatural state, the sea shall not be sailed in, nor shall the heavens accord with the course of the stars, nor the course of the stars continue in the heavens. Every divine voice shall be dumb by a necessary silence , the fruits of the earth shall be corrupted, nor shall the earth be prolific, and the air itself shall languish with a sorrowful torpor. These events and such an old age of the world as this shall take place, such irreligion, inordination, and unreasonableness of all good. When all these things shall happen, O Asclepius, thenlhat lord and father, the God who is first in power, and the one governor of the world, looking into the manners and voluntary deeds [of men], and by his will which is the benignity of God, resist¬ ing vices, and recalling the error arising from the corruption of all things, washing away likewise all malignity, by a de¬ luge, or consuming it by fire, or bringing it to an end by dis» ease and pestilence dispersed in different places, will recall the
* Proclus finding that this was partially the case in his time, says prophetically in the Introduction to his MS. Commentary on the Par¬ menides of Plato, τούτον tyw φαιην ay τύπον φιλοσοφίας ιις ανθξωπους ιλθιιν cr’ ιυίξγισια των TijSt -^vy^wv, α,ντι των αγαλματων, αντί των ιΐξων, αντί της ύλης αγισταας άντης , και σωτήριας apyyyov τοις yi νυν ουσιν ανΟξωποις, και τοις %ισ ανθις γινησο (Λίνοις. i. e, tc With respect to this form of philosophy [viz. of the philosophy of Plato], I should say that it came to men for the benefit of terrestrial souls; that it might be instead of statues, in¬ stead of temples, instead of the whole of sacred institutions , and the leader of salvation both to the men that now are , and to those that shall exist hereafter ”
a i. e. Evil daemons.
shortly happen, and others which would take place at some greater distance of time, viz. when the boy
world to its ancient form, in order that the world itself may ap¬ pear to be an adorable and admirable production, and God the fabricator and restorer of so great a work, may be cele¬ brated by all that shall then exist* with frequent solemn praises and benedictions. For this geniture 1 of the world, is the re¬ formation of all good things, and the most holy and religious restitution of the nature of it, the course of time being accom¬ plished ; * since time is perpetual, and always was without a beginning. For the will of God is without beginning, is always the same, and is every where eternal.”
Of this very remarkable extract, it is necessary to observe in the first place, that it was principally made by me from the edition of the Asclepian Dialogue, by Ficinus, as he appears to have had a more correct manuscript in his possession than any that have been consulted by more modem editors. Of this the learned, and at the same time philosophic, reader, will be immediately convinced, by comparing this extract with the same part of that dialogue in the most modern editions of it.
1 By the geniture of the world, the greater apucatastasis is signified, as is evident from Julius Firmicus; which restoration of things to their pristine state is, according to that author, accomplished in the space of three hundred thousand years. This great period compre¬ hends in itself, according to Petosyris and Necepso, six less periods, the last of which is under the dominion of Mercury, and abounds with improbity of every kind and inventions full of evil. “ Quia nobile in- genium in homine,” (says Firmicus) u unum vitae cursum servare non potest, ex variis institutis moribusque confusis malitiae crevit improbi- tas, et vitae scelerum flagitia, gens hominum hoc tempore, facinorosis machinationibus, et invenit et tradidit. Hac ex causa, ultimum tem¬ pos Mercuric tradendum putaverunt, ut ad imitationem istius syderis, inventa plena malitia, gens hominum conciperet potestatem.”
α i. e. A mundane period being finished.
Horns would chuse as his associate in battle^ a wolf instead of a lion. But who the wolf is3 is a
In the second place, that this dialogue is of genuine antiquity and no forgery, is, I think, unquestionably evident from neither Lactantius nor Augustin having any doubt of its authenticity, though it was their interest to have proved it to be spurious if they could, because it predicts, which is the third thing espe¬ cially deserving of remark, that the memorials of the martyrs should succeed in the place of the temples of the Gods. Hence Augustin concludes this to be a prophecy or prediction made instinctu fallacis spirit us y by the instinct or suggestion of a de¬ ceitful spirit. But that this prediction was accomplished is evident, as Dr. Cudworth observes in his True Intellectual System of the Universe, p. 329· from the following passages of Theodoret, which I shall quote as translated by the Doctor. Si Now the martyrs have utterly abolished and blotted out of the minds of men, the memory of those who were formerly called Gods." And again, “ Our Lord hath now brought his dead (i. e. his martyrs) into the room and place (i. e. into the temples) of the Gods ; whom he hath sent away empty, and bestowed their honour upon these his martyrs. For now, in¬ stead of the festivals of Jupiter and Bacchus, are celebrated those of Peter and Paul, Thomas and Sergius, and other holy martyrs." Antoninus, the philosopher, also, according to Eu- napius, predicted the very same thing, viz. that after his de¬ cease, the magnificent temple of Serapis in Egypt, together with the rest, should be demolished, and the temples of the Gods be turned into sepulchres, και τα ιερά τάφους γενησεσβαί* And in the fourth and last place, the intelligent reader who compares this prediction with what is said about the philoso¬ phic stranger by Synesius in the foregoing extract will imme¬ diately see, that the former wonderfully accords with the latter.
sacred narration, which it is not holy to divulge, even in the form of a fable.3’
Typhos, however, through his tyranny, was at
length dethroned, and Osiris recalled from exile ;
and Synesius towards the end of this treatise ob¬
serves, “ that the blessed body which revolves in a
circle, is the cause of the events in the sublunary
world. For both are parts of the universe, and
they have a certain relation to each other. If,
therefore, the cause of generation 1 in the things
which surround us, originates in the natures which
are above us, it follows that the seeds of things
which happen here descend from thence. And if
some one should add, since astronomy imparts
credibility to this, that there are apocatastatic 1
periods of the stars and spheres, some of which are
simple but others compounded, such a one will
partly accord with the Egyptians, and partly with
the Grecians, and wall be perfectly wise from both,
1 Instead of ei δη yeveffis ev rois π ept ημάς, αίτια yeveaews €v rots νπερ ημάς, it is necessary to read conformably to the above translation, ei δη yeveueojs ev rois περί ημάς, curia γίνε· ται} k. λ.
% i. e. Restitutions to a pristine form or condition.
conjoining intellect to science. A man of this
kind, therefore, will not deny that in consequence
of the same motions returning, effects also will re¬
turn together with their causes ; and that lives on
the earth, generations, educations, dispositions and
fortunes, will be the same with those that formerly
existed. We must not wonder, therefore, if we
behold a very ancient history verified in life, and
should see things which flourished before our times,
accord with what is unfolded in this narration ;
and besides this, perceive that the forms which are
inserted in matter, are consentaneous to the arcana
of a fable.”
I Ti ll?· 'iff M *'.■■.’· s v·'*»· ' ■ ■ · ■’:■■■>
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Page l. Intellectual "Prudence . The following ac- count of the virtues is extracted from the Notes to my Translation of the Phasdo of Plato : The first of the vir¬ tues are the physical, which are common to brutes, being mingled with the temperaments, and for the most part contrary to each other; or rather pertaining to the animal. Or it may be said that they are illuminations from reason, when not impeded by a certain bad temperament : or that they are the restilt of energies in a former life. Of these Plato speaks in the Politicus and the Laws. The ethi¬ cal virtues, which are above these, are ingenerated by custom and a certain right opinion, and are the virtues of children when well educated. These virtues also are to be found in some brute animals. They likewise transcend the temperaments, and on this account are not contrary to each other. These virtues Plato delivers in the Laws. They pertain however at the same time both to reason and the irrational nature. In the third rank above these Plot . 2 N
are the political virtues, which pertain to reason alone ; for they are scientific. But they are the virtues of reason adorning the irrational part as its instrument ; through prudence adorning the gnostic, through fortitude the iras¬ cible, and through temperance the epithymetic power, (or the power which is the source of desire ;) but adorning all the parts of the irrational nature through justice. And of these virtues Plato speaks much in the Republic. These virtues too follow each other. Above these are the cathartic virtues, which pertain to reason alone, with¬ drawing from other things to itself, throwing aside the instruments of sense as vain, repressing also the energies through these instruments, and liberating the soul from the bonds of generation. Plato particularly unfolds these virtues in the Phaedo. Prior to these however are the theoretic virtues, which pertain to the soul, introducing itself to natures superior to itself, not only gnostically, as some one maybe induced to think from the name, but also orectically : for it hastens to become, as it were, intellect instead of soul ; and intellect possesses both desire and knowledge. These virtues are the converse of the po^- litical : for as the latter energize about things subordinate according to reason, so the former about things more excellent according to intellect. These virtues Plato delivers in the Theaetetus.
According to Plotinus, there is also another gradation
of the virtues besides these, viz. the paradigmatic. For, as our eye, when it is first illuminated by the solar light, is different from that which illuminates, as being illumi- nated, but afterwards is in a certain respect united and conjoined with it, and becomes as it were solar- form ; so also our soul at first indeed is illuminated by intellect, and energizes according to the theoretic virtues, but afterwards becomes, as it were, that which is illuminated, and ener¬ gizes uniformly according to the paradigmatic virtues. And it is the business indeed of philosophy to make us in¬ tellect ; but of theurgy to unite us to intelligibles, so that we may energize paradigmatically. And as when pos¬ sessing the physical virtues, wre know mundane bodies (for the subjects to virtues of this kind are bodies) ; so from possessing the ethical virtues, we know the fate of the universe, because fate is conversant with irrational lives. For the rational soul is not under fate ; and the ethical virtues are irrational, because they pertain to the irrational part. According to the political virtues we know mundane affairs, and according to the cathartic super¬ mundane ; but as possessing the theoretic we know intel¬ lectual, and from the paradigmatic intelligible natures. Temperance also pertains to the ethical virtues ; justice to the political, on account of compacts; fortitude to the cathartic, through not verging to matter ; and prudence to the theoretic. Observe too, that Plato in the Phaedo calls the physical virtues servile, because they may subsist