I offer no particular remarks on the foregoing passage, but merely recommend it to the attention of the reader, as defining the use of Prophecy in a manner similar to that in which I think the use of the Platonic Myth ought to be defined. With Spinoza's view of the end of Prophecy, Henry More's view of the end of Scripture has much in common. The interpretation of the literal text, he explains,1 must always depend on what we have learned from Philosophy, not from Scripture; but the sole end of the Scripture is the furthering of the Holy Life. Similarly, John Smith says, "Christ's main scope was to promote an Holy Life as the best and most compendious way to a right Belief. He hangs all true acquaintance with Divinity upon the doing God's will. If any man will do his will he shall know the doctrine, whether it be of God." This view of the meaning of Prophecy, and generally of inspired scriptures, held by the Cambridge Platonists in independent agreement with Spinoza, is one which finds much favour at the present day among those critical students of the Bible whose paramount interest is still in religion as a practical concern. Their teaching on the subject of "inspiration" and "divine revelation," in my view, throws much light on the subject of this work. I would summarise my advice to those who wish to realise for themselves the function of the Platonic Myth as follows:-After reading Plato's Myths, each one in its own context, seal the effect of the whole by reading the work of some other great master of Myth-best of all the Divina Commedia; then turn to the writings of those modern critics of the Bible whose paramount interest is still in religion as a practical concern. Were the student to undertake the last-mentioned part of this programme, he would probably find the word "inspiration" a difficulty. He would probably think that the use made of the word by the based on insight, and sees not future events but the tendency of existing forces, and looks beneath the surface of the present and sees its true inwardness. The Jewish prophet dealt far less with the future than with the present. was first and foremost a teacher of righteousness-one who explained the purposes of God and made his ways bare to man. He was, in fact, a preacher." He 1 Appendix to the Defence of the Philosophick Cabbala, ch. xii., especially § 3, pp. 150, 151, ed. 1662. 2 Select Discourses (1660), p. 9 ("The True Way or Method of attaining Divine Knowledge"), and cf. pp. 169 ff. (Of Prophesie"). critics is vague and uncertain. But let him remember that Plato's use of the corresponding epos (especially where pos and piλooopía are identified, as in Diotima's Discourse) is equally vague. Precision is not to be looked for in the description of such a condition or gift. Indeed, Diotima's piλooopía is perhaps even more vague than the "inspiration of these critics; for the former is the condition of an individual, while the community rather than the individual is the recipient of the latter-"It is not the individual so much as the society or community which is the recipient of divine inspiration," says Professor P. Gardner,1 interpreting Ritschl. While the "inspiration" of the individual is an abnormal condition, difficult to describe psychologically, and still more difficult to estimate in respect of "value," the "inspiration" received by a community is something which can be definitely reviewed, being the series of ideas of betterment which spring up in the community one after another and actually determine its development. The historian may find it difficult to show how this idea or that arose; but he can generally describe the circumstances in which, having arisen, it "caught on" and became an effective factor in the development of the community. The "idea of emancipating slaves may serve as an example of what is meant when the "inspiration received by a community" is spoken of; and a prophet is one who can put such an idea before his contemporaries so vividly that it must perforce, sooner or later, realise itself in practice. When we look back over the past life of a nation we see how true it is that the grain of mustard seed becomes the great tree. How the seed came we seldom can tell; it is so small that we should not even have noticed it at all, unless the tree had grown out of it. We rather infer it from the tree; and if the tree is good we are apt to think of the seed as "divinely implanted" in some special way. What we can trace clearly to antecedents we do not regard with religious feeling; but when we come to some little inexplicable thing, which we recognise, after the 1 Jowett Lectures, p. 270. Expressing his own view Professor Gardner says: "It may be that in this matter Ritschl goes too far, for, after all, it is only in the consciousness of individuals that divine inspiration can be realised; religious utterances must come from individuals; and the will of individuals must lead society in the right way nevertheless there is profound and most important truth in the recognition of the divine mission of the society." event, as source of great things, we say that it comes by divine dispensation—θείᾳ μοίρα. As the influence of the new biology makes itself more and more felt in the field of historical study, we may expect that the doctrine of "inspiration received by the community' will recommend itself more and more to religious minds, as a solution of the difficulty which few indeed are content to put by wholly the difficulty of conceiving how the development of beautifully articulated organisms can take place along lines opened up by "accidental variations." This difficulty the new biology has brought home to us thoroughly, by showing us how decisive is the part played in evolution by these accidental variations" among the factors which maintain the moving equilibrium of life. The objections which stand in the way of accepting the alternative solution-Weismann's theory, which explains "accidental variations" as provided for in the original germ-plasma-seem to be at least as formidable as those which might be brought against the theory of "divine inspiration of which the community or race is the recipient." II EXCURSUS ON THE HISTORY OF THE DOCTRINE OF DAEMONS (Symposium, 202 E) The doctrine, here enunciated, of daiμoves who perform the office of interpreters and mediators between the Gods and Men, played a great part in the History of Religious Belief. In its original sense Saípov is synonymous with eos, and means simply "a divine immortal being." But Hesiod's δαίμονες ἁγνοὶ ἐπιχθόνιοι] introduced a specification of the term. These Saíμoves éπixoóvioi are indeed "divine immortal beings,” but they are not ἐπουράνιοι οι Ὄλυμπον ἔχοντες, "divine immortal beings who dwell in Heaven"; they dwell in "the parts about the Earth," 2 and more especially "in the Air." They are, in fact, the disembodied spirits of the men of a long past age—the Golden Age. When these men died, 10. et D. 108. 2 The region described as repì yêv in Phaedrus, 257 a. their bodies were buried; but their immortal spirits remained in the neighbourhood of the Earth, and will ever remain there, to be the Guardians and Patrons of mortal men : χρύσεον μὲν πρώτιστα γένος μερόπων ἀνθρώπων When the men of the Silver Age died, their spirits went under the Earth. They became ὑποχθόνιοι μάκαρες θνητοί 2 -a difficult phrase, on which Rohde may be consulted. They too, although their works on Earth were displeasing to the Gods, receive honour and worship from men. The third age was that of the Copper Men. They did evil on Earth, and went down nameless to the black pit of Hades.4 The fourth age was that of the Heroes those who fought at Thebes and Troy. Some of them died; some of them were translated in the flesh to the Islands of the Blessed, where they enjoy everlasting felicity: τοὺς μὲν θανάτου τέλος ἀμφεκάλυψε, τοῖς δὲ δίχ ̓ ἀνθρώπων βίοτον καὶ ἤθε ὀπάσσας τρὶς ἔτεος θάλλοντα φέρει ζείδωρος άρουρα,5 The fifth age is the present-that of the Men of Iron." 10. et D. 97 ff. 3 Psyche, i. 99-102. 20. et D. 125. etymology of Saíμoves is discussed and Hesiod's verses about the δαίμονες ἐπιχθόνιοι are quoted, and the Laws, iv. 713, and Politicus, 272, where the Myth of the Golden Age of Cronus, when Saíμoves ruled over men, is told, can fail to see that the Hesiodic account of Saíuoves has a great hold on Plato's imagination; and it may be that even the púλakes of the Republic-men with gold in their nature (as the èπíkovρo have silver, and the artisans and husbandmen have copper and iron)—are somehow, in Plato's imagination, parallel to Hesiod's φύλακες θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων, the spirits of the men of the Golden Age. But we must not forget that there is a difference between Plato's Saíμoves of the Laws and Politicus and of Diotima's Discourse, and Hesiod's Saiμoves, which is greater than the obvious resemblance. Hesiod's δαίμονες éπix@óvio are the spirits of deceased men-as are Pindar's ἥρωες ἁγνοί (Meno, 81 c); but the δαίμονες of the Laus and Politicus, who rule over men in the Golden Age, are not spirits of deceased men, but beings of an entirely different order-Gods, who were created Gods, to whom provinces on Earth were assigned by the Supreme God — οἱ κατὰ τοὺς τόπους συνάρχοντες τῷ μεγίστῳ δαίμονι θεοί, as they are described in Politicus, 272 E; and in Diotima's Discourse Tò Saiμóviov, headed by Eros, is clearly set forth as an order of divine beings essentially superhuman, not spirits of deceased men. They are, I take it, of the same rank as, indeed probably identical with, the yevvηToì Beoί of the Timaeuscreated before men, to be managers of human affairs on behalf of the Supreme God.2 In Rep. v. 468 E, on the other hand, · 1 This parallel is suggested by Mr. Adam in a note on Republic, 468 E, and worked out by Mr. F. M. Cornford in an interesting article on "Plato and Orpheus" in The Classical Review, December 1903. 2 Chalcidius, in his Commentary on the Timaeus, is at pains to show (cap. cxxxv.) that the Platonic daiμoves and the Souls of deceased men are two distinct orders:-"Plerique tamen ex Platonis magisterio, daemonas putant animas corporeo munere liberatas: laudabilium quoque virorum aethereos daemonas, improborum vero nocentes, easdemque animas anno demum millesimo terrenum corpus resumere. Empedoclesque non aliter longaevos daemonas fieri has animas putat. Pythagoras etiam in suis aureis versibus: Corpore deposito cum liber aethera perges, Evades hominem factus deus aetheris almi. Quibus Plato consentire minime videtur, cum in Politia tyranni animam facit excruciari post mortem ab ultoribus, ex quo apparet aliam esse animam, alium daemonem siquidem quod cruciatur et item quod cruciat diversa necesse sit. Quodque opifex Deus ante daemonas instituit quam nostras animas creavit ; |