Chapter VIII Conclusion
Our survey of the Roman Empire and of the ancient world of thought which it represented is finished. We have found reason to believe that hatred and dread of “magic,” the confusion of science or of philosophy with magic, the incurring of reputations as wizards by men of learning, were phenomena not confined to the Middle Ages. We have seen some evidence of the prominence of magic in the intellectual life of the Roman Empire, in the writings and in the conduct of physicians and astronomers, of statesmen and philosophers. Just how prominent magic was one hesitates to estimate, but one may safely affirm that it was sufficiently prominent to merit the attention of the student of those times. It is almost useless to chronicle the events if we do not understand the spirit of an age.
Can the student of that age, we may ask in concluding, rightly interpret and appreciate it, can he make proper use of its extant records, unless he recognizes not merely that men made mistakes then and accepted a mass of false statements concerning nature, but that the best minds were liable to be esoteric and mystical, to incline to the occult and the fantastic, to be befogged by absurd credulity and by great mental confusion, to be fettered by habits of childish and romantic reasoning such as occurs in Ptolemy’s Tetrabiblos and in Plato’s Timaeus? Have we a right to attribute to the minds of that age our definiteness and clarity of thought, our common sense, our scientific spirit? Is it fair to take the words in which they expressed their thought and to interpret these according to our knowledge, our frame of mind; to read into their words our ideas and discoveries; to rearrange their disconnected utterances into systems which they were incapable of constructing; to endeavor by nothing else than a sort of allegorical interpretation to discover our philosophy, our science, our ideals in their writings? Have not even words a greater definiteness and value now than once? When we translate a passage from an ancient language are we not apt to transfigure its thought? These are, however, only questions.
Certainly there was much true scientific knowledge in the Roman Empire. There was sane medical theory and practice, there was a great deal of correct information in regard to plants, animals and the stars. Science was in the ascendant; magic was in its latter stages of decay. We flatter ourselves that it has now quite vanished away; then its doctrines were accepted only in part or in weakened form by men of education. Perhaps, though I am far from asserting this, magic played a less prominent part then in science and in philosophy than in the later Middle Ages. Perhaps we may picture to ourselves the minds of men in the twelfth and thirteenth and succeeding centuries as awakening from a long, intellectual torpor during the chaotic and dreary “Dark Ages,” and, eager for knowledge and for mental occupation, but still inexperienced and rather bewildered, as snatching without discrimination at whatever came first to hand of the lore of the past. Thus for a time we might find the most able men of the later age taking on the worst characteristics of the earlier time. But this again is mere speculation.
Moreover, we must remember that, if magic was accepted only in part by men of learning in the Roman Empire, there was no thoroughgoing scepticism. We sought in vain for an instance of consistent disbelief. If, too, there was an effort to make the magic, which was accepted, scientific by basing it upon natural laws, as Quintus Cicero, Seneca and Ptolemy tried to do, there was also, besides the definite approval of magical doctrines, often a mystical tone in the science and philosophy of the time. The question of the relative strength of magic and of science in those days must, then, be left unsettled. It is difficult enough to judge even a single individual; to tell, for instance, just how superstitious Cato was.
In closing we may, however, sum up very briefly those elements which we selected as combining to give a fairly faithful picture of the belief in magic which then prevailed among educated people. Native superstitions from which science had not yet wholly freed itself; much fantastical and mystical lore from Oriental nations; allegorizing and mysticizing in the interpretation of books—which in Philo went to the length of a belief that all knowledge could be secured by this means; a portrayal of nature which attributed to her many magic properties and caused medicine to be infected with magic ceremony and to be based to some extent on the principle of sympathetic magic; a widespread and often extreme belief in astrology; a speculative philosophy which was often favorable to the doctrines of magic or even advanced some itself; and the system of Neo-Platonism in especial, with which we may associate the view—prevalent long before Plotinus, however—that everything in the universe is in close sympathy with everything else and is a sign of coming events—these were the forces ready at the opening of the Middle Ages to influence the future.
34.
“Gaspar fert myrram, thus Melchoir, Balthasar aurum.
Haec tria qui secum portabit nomina regum
Solvitur a morbo Christi pietate caduco.”
Hist. Litt., vol. xxv, p. 327.
FRANK J. GOODNOW:—Comparative Administrative Law (2 vols.), New York, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1893; one volume edition, 1902. Municipal Home Rule, Columbia University Press (Macmillan), 1895. Municipal Problems, Columbia University Press (Macmillan), 1897. Politics and Administration, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1900. City Government in the United States, The Century Co., 1904.
EDWIN R. A. SELIGMAN:—Railway Tariffs and the Interstate Commerce Act, Boston, Ginn & Company, 1888. The Shifting and the Incidence of Taxation, Second Edition, Columbia University Press (Macmillan), 1899. Progressive Taxation in Theory and Practice, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1894. Essays in Taxation, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1895; Fourth Edition, 1904. The Economic Interpretation of History, Columbia University Press, (Macmillan), 1902.
HERBERT L. OSGOOD:—Archives and Public Records of New York, published by The American Historical Association, Washington, 1901. The American Colonies in the Seventeenth Century., (2 vols.) New York, The Macmillan Co., 1904.
WILLIAM A. DUNNING:—Essays on the Civil War and Reconstruction, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1898. A History of Political Theories, Ancient and Mediæval, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1902.
JOHN BASSETT MOORE:—Extraterritorial Crime, Washington, published by the Government, 1887. Extradition and Interstate Rendition (2 vols.), Boston, The Boston Book Company, 1891. American Notes on Conflict of Laws (accompanying Dicey’s “Conduct of Laws”), Boston, The Boston Book Company, 1895. History and Digest of International Arbitrations (6 vols.), Washington, published by the Government, 1898.
FRANKLIN H. GIDDINGS:—The Modern Distributive Process (in collaboration with J. B. Clark), Boston, Ginn & Company, 1888. The Theory of Sociology, Philadelphia, American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1894. The Principles of Sociology, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1896; Seventh Edition, 1902. The Theory of Socialization, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1897. Elements of Sociology, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1898. Democracy and Empire, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1900; Second Edition, 1901. Inductive Sociology, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1901.
JOHN B. CLARK:—The Philosophy of Wealth, Boston, Ginn & Company, 1886, Second Edition, 1887. The Modern Distributive Process (in collaboration with F. H. Giddings), Boston, Ginn & Company, 1888. The Distribution of Wealth, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1899. The Control of Trusts, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1901. The Problem of Monopoly, Columbia University Press (Macmillan), 1904.
JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON:—Petrarch, the First Modern Scholar and Man of Letters (in collaboration with H. W. Rolfe), New York, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1898. The History of Western Europe., Boston, Ginn & Company, 1902.
WILLIAM M. SLOANE:—The French War and the Revolution, American History Series, New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1893. The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte (3 vols.), New York, The Century Company, 1896. The French Revolution and Religious Reform, New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1901.
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Notes
1. H. C. Lea, History of the Inquisition in the Middle Ages (1887), vol. iii, p. 437. Mr. Lea’s chapter on “Sorcery and the Occult Arts” is very interesting and contains much material which it is difficult to find elsewhere.
2. We speak of persons as jovial or saturnine or mercurial in temperament; as ill-starred, and so on.
3. The classic on the theme of magic reputations incurred by the learned in ancient and mediæval times is Gabriel Naudé’s “Apologie pour tous les grands personages qui ont esté faussement soupçonnez de Magie.” Paris, 1625. That such reputations were often unjustly incurred was recognized long before Naudé, however. To say nothing now of Apuleius’ Apologia, to which we shall refer later, attention may be called to the fact that even William of Malmesbury, while relating with apparent credulity the legends in regard to Gerbert, had the grace to admit that “the common people often attack the reputation of the learned, and accuse any one of dealing with the devil who excels in his art.” Gesta Regum Anglorum, book ii, secs. 167, 168.
4. République, book iv, ch. 2, cited by W. E. H. Lecky, History of Rationalism (1900), vol. i, p. 28. The chapter upon “Magic and Witchcraft” contains considerable material bearing upon our theme. A similar attitude to that of Bodin is found in a political treatise of about the year 1300, probably written by Pierre du Bois, where an argument for the universal rule of a French monarch is based on astrology. N. de Wailly, Mémoire sur un opuscule anonyme (Mémoires de l’Institut Impérial de France), vol. xviii, pt. ii, p. 442.
5. Summa Theologica, pars prima, quæst. 115, arts. 3 and 4.
6. For some data on this point see Hastings Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages (1895), vol. i, pp. 240–250; vol. ii, pp. 290, 452, 458, 459.
7. Etymologiae, bk. viii, ch. 9. In Migne’s Patrologia Latina, vol. lxxxii.
8. Ibid., bk. xvi, passim.
9. Ibid., bk. iii, ch. 71. He condemned astrology, however. See ibid., and bk. iii, ch. 27.
10. “Liber Numerorum qui in Sanctis Scripturis Occurunt.” (Also in Migne, vol. lxxxiii, col. 179.) “Non est superfluum numerorum causas in Scripturis sanctis attendere. Habent enim quamdam scientiae doctrinam plurimaque mystica sacramenta.”
11. De Natura Rerum, ch. 24; De Temporum Ratione, ch. 28. The scientific writing of Bede may be found in vol. vi of his works as edited by J. A. Giles. London, 1843.
12. De Tonitruis ad Herefridum, and De Minutione Sanguinis sive Phlebotomia. Many spurious treatises were attributed to Bede but there are some reasons for believing these genuine, although they are not named by Bede in the list of his writings which he gives in his Ecclesiastical History. Giles included them in his edition after some hesitation.
13. For the predominance of astrology in the mathematics of the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th centuries, cf. Histoire Littéraire, vol. v, p. 183; vi, 9; vii, 137; ix, 197.
14. De Naturis Rerum, bk. ii, ch. 173, and bk. i, ch. 7. Volume xxxiv of The Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain. (The Rolls Series.)
15. Ibid., bk. i, ch. 7.
16. De Naturis Rerum, bk. ii, ch. 63.
17. Ibid., bk. ii, ch. 80.
18. Ibid., bk. ii, ch. 3 et seq.
19. Ibid., bk. ii, ch. 88. In chapter 87 he writes: “Chelidonius autem rufus portantes se gratissimos facit; niger vero gestatus optimum finem negotiis imponit, et ad iras potentium sedandas idoneus est.”
20. Ibid., bk. ii, ch. 89.
21. Ibid., bk. ii, ch. 85. “In verbis et herbis et lapidibus multam esse virtutem compertum est a diligentibus naturarum investigatoribus. Certissimum autem experimentum fidem dicto nostro facit.”
22. Preface, p. xii in vol. xxxiv of the Rolls Series.
23. My information concerning Michael Scot is mainly derived from his biography (Edinburgh, 1897) by Rev. J. Wood Brown, who has studied the manuscript copies of Scot’s works in various European libraries and has succeeded in dispelling much of the uncertainty which previously existed concerning the events of Scot’s career and even the dates of his life. Of Scot’s works the Physionomia exists in printed form; indeed, eighteen editions of it are said to have been issued between the years 1477 and 1660.
24. The poem is printed in Forschungen zur Deutschen Geschichte, vol. xviii, (1878) p. 486.
25. The part of the manuscript containing the experiment was written between 1450 and 1500, Brown thinks, but purports to be a copy “from a very ancient work.” If spurious, its fabricator at least shows considerable familiarity with Scot’s life. See Brown, pp. 18–19. The recipe is given in full in the appendix of Brown’s book.
26. De Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturae et de Nullitate Magiae, ch. 7. Contained in the Appendix of vol. xv of the Rolls Series, edited by J. S. Brewer, London, 1859.
27. Opus Maius, vol. ii, pp. 204–221. Edited by J. H. Bridges, Oxford, 1897–1900. On page 210 et seq. Bacon gives an elaborate recipe for an elixir vitae.
28. Opus Minus, Rolls Series, vol. xv, pp. 373–4.
29. Bridges, Opus Maius, vol. i, pp. 137–139.
30. Compendium Studii, Rolls Series, vol. xv, pp. 421–422.
31. Bridges, Opus Maius, vol. i, pp. 253–269.
32. De Secretis, ch. 3, discusses this question of fascination and also the power of words and of the human soul. In regard to characters and incantations, see De Secretis, ch. 2, and the Opus Tertium, which is also contained in vol. xv of the Rolls Series, ch. 26.
33. Opus Tertium, ch. 27.
35. See Liber Mineralium. Opera Omnia, ed. Borgnet (1890), vol. v, page 23 et seq.
36. Two good accounts of Arnald are those in the Histoire Littéraire, vol. xxviii and Lea, History of the Inquisition, vol. iii, pp. 52–57. Older accounts are generally very misleading.
37. J. M. Rigg, Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola, London, 1890, pp. viii-x.
38. Janssen, History of the German People, vol. iii, p. 45, of the English translation by A. M. Christie (1900).
39. Henry Morley, Life of Agrippa von Nettesheim (London, 1856), vol. i, p. 79. This biography includes a full and instructive outline of Agrippa’s work on Occult Philosophy.
40. A. E. Waite, Hermetical and Alchemistical Writings of Paracelsus, vol. i, p. xii.
41. For Cardan, see the biography in two volumes by Henry Morley, London, 1854, and that in one volume by W. G. Waters, London. 1898.
42. J. L. E. Dreyer, Tycho Brahe. A Picture of Scientific Life and Work in the Sixteenth Century (Edinburgh, 1890), p. 56. A valuable book.
43. De Augmentis Scientiarum, bk. iv, ch. 1.
44. Ibid., bk. iv, ch. 3.
45. Ibid., bk. iii, ch. 4.
46. Bodin for instance condemned “magic” in his De Magorum Daemonomania (Paris, 1581).
47. Bridges, Opus Maius, vol. i, p. 241. See too the De Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturae et de Nullitate Magiae. Rolls Series, vol. xv, appendix.
48. Spec. Astron., ch. 17. Albertus Magnus, Opera Omnia, ed. Borgnet (1890), vol. x, pp. 629 et seq. And he finally came to the conclusion that “concerning books of necromancy the better judgment—prejudice aside—seems to be that they ought rather to be preserved than destroyed. For the time is perchance near at hand in which, for reasons which I now suppress, it will be advantageous to consult them occasionally. Nevertheless, let their inspectors abstain from abuse of them.” Ch. 17.
Similarly Roger Bacon, in his De Secretis, ch. 3, after mentioning books of magic to be eschewed, remarked that many books classed as magic were not such but contained worthy wisdom.
49. Magiae Naturalis Libri XX. Lyons, 1651.
50. De Augmentis, bk. iii, ch. 4.
51. This view is set forth at length in J. G. Frazer’s The Golden Bough (3 vols., London, 1900). The book also furnishes many illustrations of the magic of primitive man. Mr. Frazer holds that “religion” supplanted magic and is in turn itself being supplanted by science. His definition of religion would probably not be generally accepted.
52. Alfred Maury, in the introduction to his La Magie et l’astrologie dans l’antiquité et au moyen âge, (Paris, 1860), expresses a practically identical view and has the conception of magic gradually fading away before the advance of science. (See also the article on “Magic” in the Encyclopædia Brittanica, 9th edition.)
Maury’s work is not, however, as satisfactory as one is led to think from reading its introduction. Although he has defined magic almost in so many words as the attitude of primitive man towards the universe, he himself interprets magic much more narrowly when he comes to write his book proper, as indeed its title, Magic and Astrology, suggests. In short the thought that science and magic may at one time have mingled does not seem to impress him, and his work is of little aid to one considering our present subject. For instance, he cites Pliny only as an opponent of magic. Maury’s work, moreover, comprising in its historical portion but a little over two hundred pages—and these nearly half filled by foot-notes—can hardly be regarded as more than a brief narrative sketch of the subject.
Considerable erudition is displayed in Maury’s references, especially those to Greek and Roman writers, and from page 208 to 211 Maury gives a good bibliography of some of the chief secondary works dealing with magic. More was written upon the subject shortly before his time than has been since.
53. “Praeterea iter est, non trita auctoribus via, nec qua peregrinari animus expetat. Nemo apud nos qui idem temptaverit, nemo apud Graecos qui unus omnia ea tractaverit.” From his dedication to the Emperor Vespasian. C. Plinii Secundi, Naturalis Historiae Libri xxxvii. Ludovicus Janus, Lipsiae, 1870. 5 vols. in 3. I shall refer to passages by the division into chapters found in the editions of Hardouin, Valpy, Lemaire and Ajasson. Three modes of division are indicated in the edition of Janus. There is an English translation of the Natural History, with an introductory essay, by J. Bostock and H. T. Riley, London, 1855, 6 vols. (Bohn Library).
54. “Viginti milia rerum dignarum cura... ex lectione voluminum circiter duum milium, quorum pauca admodum studiosi attingunt propter secretum materiæ, ex exquisitis auctoribus centum inclusimus xxxvi voluminibus, adiectis rebus plurimis quas aut ignoraverant priores aut postea invenerat vita.” Also from the dedication. Pliny uses more than one hundred writers, however.
55. “Homines enim sumus et occupati officiis, subcisivisque temporibus ista curamus, id est nocturnis, ne quis vestris putet cessatum horis.” From the dedication.
56. Pliny the Younger to Macer in his Letters, bk. iii, ep. 5, ed. Keil, Leipzig, 1896.
57. Geo. H. Lewes, Aristotle; a Chapter from the History of Science, London, 1864. Lewes also holds that while Aristotle often dwelt upon the value of experiment and the necessity of having a mass of facts before making general assertions, he in practice frequently jumped at conclusions.
58. Nat. Hist., bk. xxvi, ch. 9. “Mirum esset profecto hucusque profectam credulitatem antiquorum saluberrimis ortam initiis, si in ulla re modum humana ingenia novissent atque non hanc ipsam medicinam ab Asclepiade repertam probaturi suo loco assemus evectam ultra Magos etiam. Haec est omni in re animorum condicio, ut a necessariis orsa primo cuncta pervenerint ad nimium.” Cf. also bk. xxviii, ch. 1. “Quamquam et ipsi consensu prope iudicata eligere laboravimus potiusque curae rerum quam copiae institimus.” In Pliny’s dedication, however, occurs a sentence which gives one the impression that he felt rather in duty bound to accept tradition. “Res ardua, vetustis novitatem dare, novis auctoritatem, obseletis nitorem, obscuris lucem, fastiditis gratiam, dubiis fidem, omnibus vero naturam et naturae suae omnia.”
59. Quoted without reference by E. Eggleston, “The Transit of Civilization from England to America in the Seventeenth Century” (N. Y., 1901), p. 16. This interesting and valuable book contains much material illustrative of the science and superstitions of the times.
60. Etymologies, bk. xvi, Migne, vol. lxxxii.
61. Alcuini Epistolae, 103, vol. vi, pp. 431–432, of Bibliotheca Rerum Germanicarum, ed. Philip Jaffé, Berlin, 1873. “Vel quid acutius quam quod naturalium rerum divitissimus [or devotissimus] inventor, Plinius Secundus, de caelestium siderum ratione exposuit, investigari valet?” In Migne’s Patrologia Latina, vol. c, col. 278, the letter is given as number 85. For other references to Pliny by earlier writers, see Bibliothèque Latine-Française, C. L. F. Panckoucke, vol. cvi which forms the opening volume of Pliny’s work in that set.
62. Nat. Hist., bk. xxx, ch. 1. “Auctoritatem ei maxumam fuisse nemo miretur, quandoquidem sola artium tris alias imperiosissimas humanae mentis conplexa in unam se redigit.”
63. Ibid. He uses the words “mathematicas artes” instead of “astrologiam” but the words following make his meaning evident: “nullo non avido futura de sese sciendi atque ea e caelo verissime pati credente.”
64. Ibid. “Natam primum e medicina nemo dubitat ac specie salutari inrepisse velut altiorem sanctioremque medicinam.”
65. Bk. xxx, ch. 2.
66. Bk. xxvi, ch. 9.
67. Bk. xxx, ch. 2. “Eudoxus qui inter sapientiae sectas clarissimam utilissimamque eam intellegi voluit.”
68. Bk. xxviii, ch. 23.
69. Bk. xxvi, ch. 9.
70. Bk. xxxvii, ch. 40. The word in this passage which I render as “potion” is in the Latin “veneficium”—a word difficult to translate owing to its double meaning. “Venenum” signifies a drug or potion of any sort, and then in a bad sense a drug used to poison or a potion used to bewitch. In a passage soon to be cited Pliny contrasts “veneficæ artes” to “magicæ artes” but I doubt if he always preserved such a distinction. A similar confusion exists in regard to the Greek word φάρμακον, as Plato sets forth clearly in his Laws. There are, he says, two kinds of poisons employed by men which cannot be clearly distinguished. One variety injures bodies “according to a natural law.” “There is also another kind which persuades the more daring class that they can do injury by sorceries and incantations....” Laws, bk. xi, p. 933 (Steph.). Jowett’s translation.
71. Bk. xxxvii, ch. 60. “Magorum inpudentiæ vel manifestissimum in hac quoque exemplum est....”
72. Bk. xxx, ch. 5, 6.
73. Bk. xxviii, ch. 2. Pliny’s own medicine is not prudish, and elsewhere he gives instances of devotees of magic guarding against defilement. (Bk. xxx, ch. 6 and xxviii, ch. 19).
74. Bk. xxviii, ch. 23. “Quanta vanitate,” adds Pliny, “si falsum est, quanta vero noxia, si transferunt morbos!”
75. Bk. xxx, ch. 4.
76. Bk. xxx, ch. 6. “Proinde ita persuasum sit, intestabilem, inritam, inanem esse, habentem tamen quasdam veritatis umbras, sed in his veneficas artis pollere non magicas.”
77. Concerning the stag, see bk. viii, ch. 50. On the use of frogs and fishes to cure fevers, bk. xxxii, ch. 38.
78. Bk. xxvi, ch. 59.
79. Bk. xxi, ch. 105.
80. Bk. xviii, ch. 8.
81. Bk. xxiv, ch. 102.
82. Bk. xxiv, chs. 106, 107, 109, 110, 111. Evidently these last remedies derive their force not merely from magic powers inherent in vegetation. The effect of ceremony and of circumstance becomes a factor.
83. Bk. xxxvii, ch. 36.
84. Bk. xxxvii, ch. 58.
85. Bk. ii, ch. 106.
86. Bk. vii, ch. 2. “... Qui visu quoque effascinent interimantque quos diutius intueantur, iratis praecipue oculis, quod eorum malum facilius sentire puberes. Notabilius esse quod pupillas binas in singulis habeant oculis.”
87. Bk. xxviii, ch. 6. The eggs, however, it should be said, are represented as being beneath a setting hen.
88. Bk. xxviii, ch. 3. “Ex homine remediorum primum maxumae quaestionis et semper incertae est, polleatne aliquid verba et incantamenta carminum. Quod si verum est, homini acceptum fieri oportere conveniat, sed viritim sapientissimi cuiusque respuit fides. In universum vero omnibus horis credit vita.... Vestalis nostras hodie credimus nondum egressa urbe mancipia fugitiva retinere in loco precationibus, cum, si semel recipiatur ea ratio et deos preces aliquas exaudire aut illis moveri verbis, confitendum sit de tota coniectione. Prisci quidem nostri perpetuo talia credidere, difficilimumque ex his etiam fulmina elici, ut suo loco docuimus.”
Pliny seems inclined to narrow down the problem of the power of words to the question whether the gods answer prayer or not, a question which takes us out of the field of magic unless he regarded prayer as a means of coercing the gods.
89. Bk. xxi, ch. 19.
90. Bk. xxvi, ch. 60. “Experti adfirmavere plurumum referre, si virgo inponat nuda ieiuna ieiuno et manu supina tangens dicat; ‘Negat Apollo pestem posse crescere cui nuda virgo restinguat,’ atque ita retrorsa manu ter dicat totiensque despuant ambo.”
91. Bk. xxviii, ch. 7. “Mirum dicimus, sed experimento facile: si quem paeniteat ictus eminus comminusve inlati et statim exspuat in mediam manum qua percussit, levatur ilico in percusso culpa. Hoc saepe delumbata quadripede adprobatur statim a tali remedio correcto animalis ingressu.”
92. Bk. xxxii, ch. 1.
93. Bk. xxxvii, ch. 59.
94. Bk. xxviii, ch. 23.
95. Bk. ii, ch. 9. Indeed, in bk. ii, ch. 30, he gives examples of ominous eclipses of the sun, although it is true that they were also of unusual length.
96. Bk. vii, ch. 37. “Astrologia Berosus cui ob divinas praedictiones Athenienses publice in gymnasio statuam inaurata lingua statuere.”
97. Bk. ii, ch. 1. “Mundum... numen esse credi par est. Sacer est, aeternus, inmensus, totus in toto, immo vero ipse totum.”
98. Bk. ii, ch. 4. “Hunc esse mundi totius animum ac planius mentem, hunc principale naturae regimen ac numen credere decet opera eius aestimantes.”
99. Bk. ii, ch. 16.
100. Bk. ii, ch. 6.
101. Bk. ii, ch. 13.
102. Bk ii, ch. 6. See also bk. ii, ch. 39. “Ut solis ergo natura temperando intellegitur anno sic reliquorum quoque siderum propria est quibusque vis et ad suam cuique naturam fertilis.”
103. Bk. ii, ch. 39. For the general physical interaction of earth and stars as conceived by Pliny see bk. ii, ch. 38. “Terrena in caelum tendentia deprimit siderum vis, eademque quae sponte non subeant ad se trahit. Decidunt imbres, nebulae subeunt, siccantur amnes, ruunt grandines, torrent radii et terram in medio mundi undique inpellunt, iidem infracti resiliunt et quae potuere auferunt secum. Vapor ex alto cadit rursumque in altum redit. Venti ingruunt inanes iidemque cum rapina remeant. Tot animalium haustus spiritum e sublimi trahit, at ille contra nititur, tellusque ut inani caelo spiritum fundit.”
104. Bk. ii, ch. 41.
105. Bk. ii, ch. 104.
106. Bk. ii, ch. 6. “Huius natura cuncta generantur in terris, namque in alterutro exortu genitali rore conspergens non terrae modo conceptuus inplet verum animantium quoque omnium stimulat.”
107. Bk. ii, ch. 6.
108. Bk. ii, ch. 18. “A sidere caelestis ignis exspuitur praescita secum adferens.”
109. Bk. ii, ch. 23. The part dealing with the shape and position of the comet reads: “Tibiarum specie musicae arti portendere, obscenis autem moribus in verendis partibus signorum, ingeniis et eruditioni, si triquetram figuram quadratamve paribus angulis ad aliquos perennium stellarum situus edant, venena fundere in capite septentrionalis austrinaeve serpentis.”
110. Bk. ii, ch. 86. “Numquam urbs Roma tremuit, ut non futuri eventus alicuius id praenuntium esset.” See also bk. ii, ch. 85.
111. Bk. ii, ch. 54.
112. Bk. xxv, ch. 6. “Turpissima causa raritatis quod etiam qui sciunt demonstrare nolunt, tamquam ipsis periturum sit quod tradiderint aliis.”
113. Vol. i, p. 382. Dr. White’s book, which imputes well-nigh every fantastic feature of mediæval science to Christian institutions and theology, is written with too little use of primary sources, and considerable ignorance of the character of ancient science.
Aside from unfairness in the general tone and mode of presentation,—Cosmas Indicopleustes, for instance, is set forth as a typical representative of mediæval science of the clerical type, while Albertus Magnus is not permitted to stand as a representative of “theological” science at all but is pictured as one inclined to true science who was frightened into the paths of theology by an ecclesiastical tyranny bitterly hostile to scientific endeavor—the author makes some inexcusable mistakes in details. For instance, after speaking of “theological” methods, he proceeds (vol. i, p. 33): “Hence such contributions as that the basilisk kills serpents by his breath and men by his glance,” apparently in serene ignorance of the fact that this statement about the basilisk was a commonplace of ancient science. Again (vol. i, p. 386) he tells us that in 1163 the Council of Tours and Alexander III “forbade the study of physics to ecclesiastics, which of course in that age meant the prohibition of all such scientific studies to the only persons likely to make them.” On turning to the passage cited we find the prohibition to be that persons who have vowed to lead a monastic life shall not absent themselves from their monasteries for the purpose of studying “physica” (which the context indicates means medicine, not physics), or reading law. The canon does not apply to all ecclesiastics, and it is as absurd to infer from it that “all such scientific studies were prohibited to the only persons likely to make them” as to conclude that henceforth no one could study civil law. To argue from a single piece of legislation is hazardous in any case. (For the canon, see Hardouin, vol. vi, pt. ii, p. 1598. Canon viii.)
On the whole the book strikes one as an unscientific eulogy of science and a bigoted attack on bigotry. The inconsistency of the author’s professions and practice, to say nothing of the somewhat perplexing arrangement of his material, reminds one of Pliny’s Natural History.
114. Nat. Hist., bk. xxx, ch. 2. “Certe Pythagoras, Empedocles, Democritus, Plato ad hanc discendam navigavere exsiliis verius quam peregrinationibus susceptis. Hanc reversi praedicavere, hanc in arcanis habuere.” Philostratus, as we shall see, mentioned the same men as associating with the magi, although he denied that they embraced the magic art. (See infra, p. 67.)
115. Bk. xxx, ch. 2. “Plenumque miraculi et hoc, pariter utrasque artis effloruisse, medicinam dico et magicenque, eadem aetate illam Hippocrate, hanc Democrito inlustrantibus.” Pliny may have got a false idea of the teachings of Democritus by accepting as genuine works which were not. He tells us (bk. xxx, ch. 2) that some persons have vainly tried to save Democritus’ reputation by denying that certain works are his. “Democritus Apellobechen Coptiten et Dardanum et Phoenicem inlustravit voluminibus Dardani in sepulchrum eius petitis, suis vero ex disciplina eorum editis, quae recepta ab ullis hominum atque transisse per memoriam aeque ac nihil in vita mirandum est. In tantum fides istis fasque omne deest, adeo ut qui cetera in viro probant, haec opera eius esse inficientur. Sed frustra. Hunc enim maxume adfixisse animis eam dulcedinem constat.”
116. Bk. xxiv, ch. 9. “In promisso herbarum mirabilium occurrit aliqua dicere et de Magicis. Quae enim mirabiliores? Primi eas in nostro orbe celebravere Pythagoras atque Democritus, consectati Magos.”
117. De Divinatione, bk. i, ch. 39, and bk. ii, ch. 42.
118. Timaeus, p. 47 (Steph.). The passage may be found in English translation in vol. iii, p. 466, of B. Jowett’s Plato’s Dialogues (3d edit.), London, 1892.
119. Timaeus, pp. 53–56 (Steph.); Jowett, vol. iii, pp. 473–476.
120. Laws, bk. xi, p. 933 (Steph.).
121. Timaeus, p. 70 (Steph.). The translation is that of Jowett, vol. iii, p. 492.
122. Ibid., p. 71 (Steph.).
123. Symposium, p. 188 (Steph.). Translated by Jowett, vol. i, p. 558.
124. Timaeus, p. 40 (Steph.). Jowett, vol. iii, p. 459.
125. Ibid., pp. 41, 42 (Steph.).
126. W. Windelband, History of Philosophy, p. 147. English translation by J. H. Tufts. Macmillans, 1898.
127. Windelband, Hist. of Ancient Philos., p. 272. Eng. transl. by H. E. Cushman. Scribners, 1899.
128. Aristotelis De Animalibus Historiae Libri X (Graece et Latine. Io. Gottlob Schneider. Lipsiae, 1811). Vol. i contains the Greek text. In the following foot-notes I shall refer to the book, chapter and section by Roman and arabic numerals, but in the text the book and chapters are denoted by letters of the Greek alphabet. There is an English translation of the work by Richard Creswell, London, 1862. (Bohn Library.)
129. Bk. v, ch. xx, sec. 2; bk. vi, ch. xi, sec. 2; bk. vi, ch. xiv, sec. 1; bk. vii, ch. xi; bk. viii, ch. xvii, sec. 4; bk. viii, ch. xx, sec. 12.
130. Bk. v, ch. xix, sec. 4. Γίγνεται δὲ κηρίον μὲν ἐξ ἀνθῶν. κήρωσιν δὲ φέρσοσιν ἀπὸ τοῦ δακρύου τῶν δένδρων, μέλι δὲ τὸ πίπτον ἐκ τοῦ ἀέρος καὶ μάλιστα ἐν ταῖς τῶν ἄστρων ἐπιτολαῖς, καὶ ὅταν κατασκήφῃ ἡ ἶρις. Ὅλως δ’ οὐ γίγνεται μέλι πρὸ πλειάδος ἐπιτολῆς. τὸν μὲν οὖν κηρὸν ποιεῖ, ὥσπερ εἴρηται, ἐκ τῶν ἀνθέων, τὸ δὲ μέλι ὅτι οὐ ποιεῖ, ἀλλὰ φέρει τὸ πίπτον, σημεῖον. ἐν μιᾷ γὰρ ἢ ἐν δυσὶν ἡμέραις πλήρη εὑρίσκουσι τὰ σμήνη οἱ μελιττουργοὶ μέλιτος. Ἔτι δὲ τοῦ μετοπώρου ἄνθη γίγνεται μὲν, μέλι δ’ οὒ, ὅταν ἀφαιρεθῇ.
131. Bk. v, ch. xvii, sec. 13.
132. Bk. viii, ch. xxviii, sec. 2.
133. Bk. iii, ch. ix, sec. 7 and bk. vi, ch. ii, sec. 4.
134. Bk. v, ch. iv, sec. 7 and bk. vi, ch. ii, sec. 9. See also bk. vi, ch. xvii, sec. 4.
135. Bk. v, ch. xvii, sec. 2.
136. Bk. ix, ch. xxv, sec 2.
137. Bk. v, ch. xxv, sec. 2.
138. Bk. viii, ch. ix, sec. 1.
139. De Re Rustica, chs. 26, 31, 37, 40, 50. Scriptores Rei Rusticae Veteres Latini. Tomus Primus. Io. Matthias Gesnerus, Lipsiae, 1773. The speed with which I progressed through the De Re Rustica was accelerated by the fact that Mr. E. H. Oliver, Ph. D., then of the School of Political Science, Columbia University, kindly lent me an English translation which he had made of that work.
140. De Re Rustica, ch. 71. See also ibid., ch. 70.
141. De Re Rustica, ch. 70.
142. De Re Rustica, ch. 160. “S. F.” probably means “Sanitas Fracto.” Two alternative charms are also suggested, namely, “Huat hanat huat ista pista sista domiabo damnaustra” and “Huat huat huat ista sis tar sis ardannabon dunnaustra.”
143. Dio Cassius, ch. lii, sec. 36. μαντικὴ μὲν γὰρ ἀναγκαία ἐστί, καὶ πάντως τινὰς καὶ ἱερόπτας καὶ οἰωνιστὰς ἀπόδειζον, oἷς οἱ βουλόμενοι τι κοινώσασθαι σονέσονται. τοὺς δὲ δὴ μαγευτὰς πάνυ οὐκ εἶναι προσήκει. πολλοὺς γὰρ πολλάκις οἱ τοιοῦτοι, τὰ μέν τινα ἀληθῆ, τὰ δὲ δὴ πλείω ψευδῆ λέγοντες, νευχμοῦν ἐπαίρουσι.
Lecky translates the passage in his History of European Morals (1889), vol. i, p. 399. The next sentence of the passage is also worth quoting: τὸ δ’ αὐτὸ τοῦτο καὶ τῶν φιλοσοφεῖν προσποιουμένων οὐκ ὀλίγοι ποιοῦσι.
144. Apologia, ch. xxv (Van der Vleet, Apologia et Florida. Lipsiae, 1900). “Leges cerimoniarum, fas sacrorum, ius religionum.”
145. Ibid., ch. xxvi. “Auditisne, magiam, qui eam temere accusatis, artem esse diis immortalibus acceptam, colendi eos ac venerandi pergnaram, piam scilicet et divini scientem, iam inde a Zoroastro et Oromazo, auctoribus suis nobilem, caelitum antistitam? Quippe qui inter prima regalia docetur, nec ulli temere inter Persas concessum est magum esse, haud magis quam regnare.” This definition reminds one of Agrippa von Nettesheim’s praise of “that science divine beyond all human tracing.” In a less degree—for with Apuleius magic is the cult of the gods and not much concerned with material things—it recalls the high place assigned to magic by Porta and Francis Bacon.
146. Bk. i, ch. 2 of the life of Apollonius in the works of Philostratus as edited by Gottfridus Olearius. Lipsiae, 1709. ὁμιλήσαντες μάγοις καὶ πολλὰ δαιμόνια εἴποντες οὔπω ὑπήχθησαν τῇ τέχνῃ.
147. Indeed “magic,” though condemned, was popular, and charlatans calling themselves “magi” did a thriving business.
148. Suetonius, Aug., ch. xc; Tiber., ch. lxix. Cited by W. E. H. Lecky. Hist. of European Morals (London, 1899), vol. i, p. 367. Lecky gives a large amount of material on superstition in the Roman Empire.
149. Nat. Hist., bk. xxviii, ch. 5.
150. A. Bouché-Leclercq. “L’Astrologie dans le monde romain.” Revue Hist., vol. lxv, pp. 249 et seq. If we may believe the Roman historians, Tiberius was a devotee of astrology; Caligula was warned of his death by the stars; Nero, among other acts dictated by his trust in the art, ordered a number of executions in order to avoid the evils threatened by a comet; Galba, the three Flavians and Vespasian all had their astrologers; Titus was himself an adept in the art; Domitian, when disposing of persons whom the stars designated as dangerous, made the fatal error of sparing Nerva because the constellations allowed him but a brief additional term of life; etc.
151. Revue Hist., vol. lxv, p. 252.
152. Nat. Hist., bk. xxx, ch. 1, and Tacitus, Annals, bk. vi, ch. 22 (28 in some editions).
153. Carolus Gottlob Kuhn. Claudii Galeni Opera Omnia. (Lipsiae, 1821, 19 vols.), vol. xii, p. 362. De simplicium medicamentorum temperamentis ac facultatibus.
154. De diebus decretoriis, ibid., vol. ix, pp. 901 et seq. πάντων μὲν τῶν ἄνωθεν ἄστρων ἀπολαύομεν τῆς δυνάμεως.
155. “Quod optimus medicus sit quoque philosophus.” Ibid., vol. i, p. 53.
156. Vacherot, L’Ecole d’Alexandria, vol. ii, p. 115.
157. Ricardus Volkmann, Plotini Enneades, Lipsiae (Teubner) 1883. Ennead ii, ch. iii, sec. 7. ἀλλ’ εἰ σημαίνουσιν οὗτοι τὰ ἐσόμενα, ὥσπερ φαμὲν πολλὰ καὶ ἄλλα σημαντικὰ εἶναι τῶν ἐσομένων, τί ἂν τὸ ποιοῦν εἴη; καὶ ἡ τάξις πῶς; οὐ γὰρ ἂν ἐσημαίνετο τεταγμένως μὴ ἑκάστων γιγνομένων. ἔστω τοίνυν ὣσπερ γράμματα ἐν οὐρανῷ γραφόμενα ἀεὶ ἢ γεγραμμένα καὶ κινούμενα, ποιοῦντα μέντοι ἔργον καὶ ἄλλο. ἐπακολουθείτω δὲ τῷδε ἡ παρ’ αὐτῶν σημασία, ὡς ἀπὸ μιᾶς ἀρχῆς ἐν ἑνὶ ζῴῳ παρ’ ἄλλου μέρους ἄλλο ἄν τις μάθοι. καὶ γὰρ καὶ ἦθος ἄν τις γνοίη εἰς ὀφθαλμούς τινος ἰδὼν ἤ τι ἄλλο μέρος τοῦ σώματος καὶ κινδύνους καὶ σωτηρίας. καὶ οὖν μέρη μὲν ἐκεῖνα, μέρη δὲ καὶ ἡμεῖς. ἄλλα οὖν ἂλλοις. μεστὰ δὲ πάντα σημείων καὶ σοφός τις ὁ μαθὼν ἐξ ἄλλου ἄλλο. πολλὰ δὲ ἤδη συνηθείᾳ γιγνόμενα γινώσκεται πάσι. τίς οὖν ἡ οὐνταξις ἡ μία; οὕτω γὰρ καὶ τὸ κατὰ τοὺς ὄρνεις εὔλογον καὶ τὰ ἄλλα ξῷα, ἀφ’ ὦν σημαινόμεθα ἕκαστα. συνηρτῆσθαι δὴ δει ἀλλήλοις τὰ πάντα, καὶ μὴ μόνον ἐν ἑνὶ τῶν καθ’ ἕκαστα τοῦ εὖ εἰρομένου σύμπνοια μία, ἀλλὰ πολὺ μᾶλλον καὶ πρότερον ἐν τῷ παντί. This entire third chapter of the Ennead deals with the subject. περὶ τοῦ εἰ ποιεῖ τὰ ἄστρα.
See The Philosophy of Plotinus, Dunlap Printing Co., Phila., 1896, page 40, for further references to passages in his works giving his views anent astrology. He believed that the souls of the dead are still able to benefit men and to inspire with powers of divination. Ennead, iv, ch. vii, sec. 15.
158. Page 66, note 1.
159. Apologia, ch. iii. Even if the oration was a satire and not a speech actually delivered, the inferences to be drawn from it would be practically the same.
160. Apuleius may have been guilty of attempting to practice magic. Certainly he believed in its possibility. He affirmed the existence of subordinate gods, or demons,—interpreters and ambassadors between mankind and the superior gods, who live far away from us and have no direct concern with our affairs. The demons, he believed, were susceptible to human influence and capable of working marvels. He stated that the art of divination was due to them. See his De Deo Socratis.
161. Apologia, ch. xxvii. Evidently hostility to magic did not commence with Christianity. Not even, as Roger Bacon thought, did the practice of confusing philosophy with magic originate among Christian writers. Bridges, Opus Maius, vol. i, p. 29.
162. See Philo’s treatise De Cherubim, cited in vol. ii, p. 243, of Rev. James Drummond’s Philo Judaeus; or The Jewish-Alexandrian Philosophy in its Development and Completion (2 vols., London, 1888). Concerning Philo see also Edouard Herriot, Philon le Juif (Paris, 1898), where a full bibliography of Philonian and Jewish-Alexandrian literature may be found. A third important secondary book on Philo is by Siegfried: Philo von Alexandria (Jena, 1875).
163. Drummond, vol. i, p. 13.
164. Stromata, bk. v, ch. 9. Nor was such mysticism advocated by theological writers alone. Roger Bacon—but one instance from many—declared that one lessened the majesty of knowledge who divulged its mysteries, and even went to the length of enumerating seven methods by which the arcana of philosophy and science might be concealed from the crowd (a vulgo), De Secretis Artis et Naturae et de Nullitate Magiae. Rolls Series, vol. xv, pp. 543–544.
165. De Civitate Dei, bk. xi, ch. 30.
166. “Aliquando De Motu Terrarum volumen iuvenis ediderim.” L. Annaei Senecae Naturalium Quaestionum Libri Septem, bk. vi, ch. 4. The edition by G. D. Koeler, Gottingen, 1819 has convenient summaries indicating contents at the head of each book, and devotes several hundred pages to a “Disquisitio” and “Animadversiones” upon Seneca’s work. In Pancoucke’s Library, vol. cxxxxvii, a French translation accompanies the text.
167. “Veniet tempus, quo posteri nostri tam aperta nos nescisse mirentur. Harum quinque stellarum... modo coepimus scire.” Bk. vii, ch. 25.
168. Bk. vii, ch. 31. “Non semel quaedam sacra traduntur. Eleusin servat quod ostendit revisentibus. Rerum natura sacra sua non simul tradit. Initiatos nos credimus; in vestibule eius haeremus. Illa arcana non promiscue nec omnibus patent; reducta et in interiore sacrario clausa sunt.”
169. Bk. iv, ch. 7. “Et apud nos in duodecim tabulis cavetur ne quis alienos fructus excantassit. Rudis adhuc antiquitas credebat et attrahi imbres cantibus, et repelli; quorum nihil posse fieri, tam palam est, ut huius rei causa nullius philosophi schola intranda sit.”
170. Bk. v, ch. 6 for animals being generated in flames.
Bk. ii, ch. 31 for snakes struck by lightning.
Bk. iii, ch. 25 for the Nile. Bk. iii passim, for marvelous fountains, etc.
171. Bk. iii, ch. 25.
172. Bk. iii, ch. 26.
173. Bk. ii, ch. 32. “Quidquid fit, alicuius rei futurae signum est.”
174. Bk. ii, ch. 46.
175. Bk. i, ch. 1.
176. Bk. vii, ch. 30. “Egregie Aristoteles ait, numquam nos verecundiores esse debere, quam quum de diis agitur. Si intramus templa compositi, si ad sacrificium accesuri vultum submittimus, togam adducimus, si in omne argumentum modestiae fingimur; quanto hoc magis facere debemus, quum de sideribus, de stellis, de deorum natura disputamus, ne quid temere, ne quid impudenter, aut ignorantes affirmemus, aut scientes mentiamur?”
177. Bk. ii, ch. 10.
178. Bk. vii, ch. 28. “Chaldean” was often used to denote an astrologer without reference to the person’s nationality.
179. Bk. ii, ch. 32. “Quinque stellarum potestatem Chaldaeorum observatio excepit. Quid tu? tot millia siderum judicas otiosa lucere? Quid est porro aliud, quod errorem incutiat peritis natalium, quam quod paucis nos sideribus assignant: quum omnia quae supra nos sunt, partem sibi nostri vindicent? Submissiora forsitan in nos propius vim suam dirigunt; et ea quae frequentius mota aliter nos, aliter cetera animalia prospiciunt. Ceterum et illa quae aut immota sunt, aut propter velocitatem universo mundo parem immotis similia, non extra ius dominiumque nostri sunt. Aliud aspice et distributis rem officiis tractas. Non magis autem facile est scire quid possint, quam dubitari debet, an possint.”
180. Bk. iii, ch. 29.
181. Bk. ii, ch. 32. Seneca has been describing other manifestations of the “divina et subtilis potentia” of thunderbolts; he proceeds, “Quid, quod futura portendunt: nec unius tantum aut alterius rei signa dant, sed saepe totum fatorum sequentium ordinem nuntiant, et quidem decretis evidentibus, longeque clarioribus, quam si scriberentur?”
182. His discussion of divination by thunderbolts is contained in bk. ii, ch. 31–50.
183. The edition of the Tetrabiblos which I used is that by Philip Melanchthon, 1553. It gives the Greek text, a Latin translation and an introduction of interest, in which Melanchthon affirms his own more modest trust in astrology.
Two other treatises of considerable length setting forth the principles of astrology and which have come down to us from the Roman Empire, are a poem consisting of five books of about 900 lines each by Manilius, probably of the Augustan age; and a prose treatise in eight books, and apparently left unfinished, by Firmicus who was a Neo-Platonist of about 350 A. D. M. Manilii Astronomicon, London, 1828, Delphin edition. Iulii Firmici Materni Matheseos Libri VIII, (ediderunt W. Kroll et K. Skutsch, Lipsiae, 1897, 2 vols., Teubner edition). The essay on astrology purporting to be by Lucian is probably spurious.
184. “C’était la capitulation de la science.” Rev. Hist., vol. lxv, p. 257, note 3.
185. Roger Bacon, Opus Minus, Rolls Series, vol. xv, p. 313, speaks of “Hermes Mercurius, pater philosophorum.”
186. Stromata, bk. vi, ch. 4.
187. Ammianus Marcellinus, however, writing during the latter fourth century, says of Egypt: “Hic primum homines longe ante alios ad varia religionum incunabula, ut dicitur, pervenerunt et initia prima sacrorum caute tuentur condita scriptis arcanis.” Bk. xxii, ch. xvi, sec. 20. Again, in bk. xxii, ch. xiv, sec. 7, Ammianus speaks of the Egyptian mystical books as still extant.
188. F. J. Champagny, Les Antonins, vol. iii, p. 81 (Paris, 1863).
189. See article on “Hermes” in La Grande Encyclopédie by Berthelot who has made an extended study of the history of alchemy; and who, in his La Chimie au Moyen Age holds that Greek alchemistic treatises were continuously extant in Italy during the Dark Ages—a circumstance which diminishes the importance of Arabian influence on the study of the hermetic art in the later Middle Ages.
190. See Anthon’s Classical Dictionary, 1855 (no adequate account of Hermes Trismegistus exists in any of the more recent classical dictionaries).
191. The Poemander (or Pymander) has been reproduced in the Bath Occult Reprint Series (London, 1884) from the translation “from the Arabic by Dr. Everard, 1650.” It has an introduction by Hargrave Jennings, “author of the Rosicrucians,” giving some account of Hermes Trismegistus. Vol. ii in the same Bath Occult Reprint Series—which seems to have been instituted on behalf of “students of the occult sciences, searchers after truth and Theosophists”—is Hermes’ Virgin of the World. Besides Berthelot’s article, an account of Hermes may be found in pages 181–190 of The Literary Remains of the late Emanuel Deutsch (London, 1879). There is a French translation of the Poemander by Menard with an introductory essay which, however, Deutsch characterized as “deplorably shallow.”
192. J. B. Bury, Later Roman Empire (N. Y., 1899), vol. i, p. 208.
193. De Divinatione, bk. i, ch. 58. “Haec habui, inquit, de divinatione quae dicerem. Nunc illa testabor non me sortilegos neque eos qui quaestus causa hariolentur, ne psychomantia quidem quibus Appius amicus tuus uti solebat, agnoscere.”
194. For the arguments of Favorinus, see Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae, bk. xiv; ch. 1. (Delphin & Variorum Classics [1824] ex editione Jacobi Gronovii.) Fragments of Favorinus’s writings are also to be found in Stobæus.
The edition of the Opera of Sextus Empiricus which I used was that by Johannes Albertus Fabricus, (Lipsiae, 1718), giving the Greek text and a Latin translation.
For Cicero’s arguments, see De Divinatione, bk. ii, chs. 42–47.
195. “Adversum istos qui sese chaldæos seu genethliacos appellant, ac de motu deque positu stellarum dicere posse, quae futura sunt, profitentur, audivimus quondam Favorinum philosophum Romae Graece disserentem egregia atque illustri oratione; exercendine autem, anne ostentandi gratia ingenii, an quod ita serio judicatoque existimaret, non habeo dicere.” Noctes Atticae, bk. xiv, ch. 1, sect. 1. A foot-note in the Delphin edition expresses preference in place of the words “exercendine autem, anne ostentendi” for the shorter reading “exercendi autem, non ostentandi”—which reading is adopted by Hertz in his edition of the year, 1885.
196. “Disciplinam istam Chaldaeorum tantae vetustatis non esse, quantae videri volunt; neque eos principes eius auctoresque esse, quos ipsi ferant: sed id praestigiarum atque offuciarum genus commentos esse homines aeruscatores, et cibum quaestumque ex mendaciis captantes.” Noctes Atticae, bk. xiv, ch. 1, sect. 2.
197. For instance, the charge that astrologers disregard the differing aspects of the heavens in different regions does not hold true in the case of Ptolemy. Also the objection to the doctrine of nativities, that men born at different times often suffer a common fate in battle or some such general disaster, is a weak argument at best, for the fact that you and I are born under different stars does not necessitate that our careers have absolutely nothing in common, and it was nullified by Ptolemy’s explanation that great general events like earthquakes, wars, floods and plagues overrule any contradictory destiny which the constellations may seem to portend for the individual. See Bouché-Leclercq, Rev. Hist., vol. lxv, p. 268.
198. Similarly Favorinus declared that, if the different fate of twins was to be explained by the fact that after all they are not born at precisely the same moment, then to determine one’s destiny the time of his birth and the position of the stars at the same instant must be measured with an exactness practically impossible. “Atque id velim etiam, inquit, ut respondeant: si tam parvum atque rapidum est momentum temporis, in quo homo nascens fatum accipit, ut in eodem illo puncto, sub eodem circulo coeli, plures simul ad eamdem competentiam nasci non queant; et si idcirco gemini quoque non eadem vitae sorte sunt, quoniam non eodem temporis puncto editi sunt; peto, inquit, respondeant, cursum illum temporis transvolantis, qui vix cogitatione animi comprehendi potest, quonam pacto aut consulto assequi queant, aut ipsi perspicere et deprehendere; quum in tam praecipiti dierum noctiumque vertigine minima momenta ingentes facere dicant mutationes.” Noctes Atticae, bk. xiv, ch. 1, sect. 10.
199. Favorinus declares that the astrologers may congratulate themselves that he does not propose such a question to them as that of astral influence on minute animals; Cicero says that if all animals are to be subjected to the stars, then inanimate things must be too, than which nothing could be more absurd.
“Illud autem condonare se iis dicebat, quod non id quoque requireret, si vitae mortisque hominum rerumque humanarum omnium tempus et ratio et causa in coelo et apud stellas foret, quid de muscis aut vermiculis aut echinis, multisque aliis minutissimis terra marique animantibus, dicerent? An ista quoque isdem, quibus homines, legibus nascerentur, isdemque itidem exstinguerentur.” Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae, bk. xiv, ch. 1, sect. 12.
“Et si ad rem pertinet, quo modo coelo affecto compositisque sideribus quodque animal oriatur; valeat id necesse est etiam in rebus inanimis. Quo quid dici potest absurdius?” De Divin., bk. ii, ch. 47.
Favorinus, however, does hint in one place that the sole evidence that we possess of any influence of the stars upon us is a few such causal connections as that between the phases of the moon and the tides of the ocean.
200. Ptolemy made a fair retort to this argument by holding that foreknowledge, even if it could not enable us to avoid the coming event, at least served the purpose of breaking the news gently and saving us the more vivid shock which the actual event, if unexpected, would cause by its raw reality.
201. See T. Schiche, De Fontibus Librorum Ciceronis qui sunt de Divinatione, (Jena, 1875) and K. Hartfelder, Die Quellen von Ciceros zwei Büchern de Divinatione (Freiburg, 1878).
202. Bk. i, ch. 39. “Neque ante philosophiam patefactam, quae nuper inventa est, hac de re communis vita dubitavit; et postea, quam philosophia processit, nemo aliter philosophus sensit, in quo modo esset auctoritas. Dixi de Pythagora, de Democrite, de Socrate; excepi de antiques praeter Xenophanem neminem; adiunxi veterem academiam, peripateticos, stoicos. Unus dissentit Epicurus.” This trust in tradition, it may be here observed, formed one of the chief grounds for mediæval belief in magic as well.
203. Bk. ii, ch. 11. “Hoc ego philosophi non arbitror, testibus uti, qui aut casu veri aut malitia falsi fictique esse possunt. Argumentis et rationibus oportet quare quidque ita sit docere, non eventis, iis praesertim quibus mihi liceat non credere.”
204. Bk. ii, ch. 33. “Errabat enim multis in rebus antiquitas.”
205. Bk. ii, ch. 36.
206. As Tully (bk. ii, ch. 5) puts it, “Quae enim praesentiri aut arte aut ratione aut usu aut conjectura possunt, ea non divinis tribuenda putas sed peritis.”
207. Bk. i, ch. 50.
208. Bk. ii, chs. 3, 4.
209. We saw Pliny use “mathematicae artes” as an equivalent of divination or astrology.
210. Bk. ii, ch. 15.
211. Bk. ii, ch. 16. “Urbem philosophiae, mihi crede, proditis dum castella defenditis. Nam dum aruspicinam veram esse vultis, physiologiam totam pervertitis. Caput est in jecore, cor in extis: iam abscedet, simul ac molam et vinum insperseris; deus id eripiet, vis aliqua conficiet, aut exedet. Non ergo omnium interitus atque obitus natura conficiet; et erit aliquid quod aut ex nihilo oriatur, aut in nihilum subito occidat. Quis hoc physicus dixit unquam? Aruspices dicunt? His igitur quam physicis potius credendum existimas?”
212. Bk. ii, ch. 28.
213. Bk. ii, ch. 12.
214. Bk. ii, ch. 19.
215. Bk. ii, ch. 12. “Atqui divina cum rerum natura tanta tamque praeclara in omnes partes motusque diffusa, quid habere potest commune, non dicam gallinacum fel (sunt enim qui vel argutissima haec exta esse dicant) sed tauri opimi jecur aut cor aut pulmo, quid habet naturale, quo declarari possit quid futurum sit?”
216. “Deinde est hominum generi prosperus et salutaris ille fulgor qui dicitur Jovis. Tum rutilus horribilisque terris, quem Martium dicitis. Deinde subter mediam fere regionem Sol obtinet, dux et princeps et moderator luminum reliquorum, mens mundi et temperatio,” etc.
217. “Nam cum aetas tua septenos octies solis anfractus reditusque converterit, duoque hi numeri, quorum uterque plenus, alter altera de causa habetur, circuitu naturali summam tibi fatalem confecerint, etc.”
218. These recipes are given in Frazer’s Golden Bough, vol. i, p. 23, from the De Medicamentis of Marcellus, bk. xv, ch. 82 and bk. xxxiv, ch. 100.
219. Ammianus Marcellinus. Rerum gestarum libri qui supersunt. F. Eyssenhardt recensuit. Berlin, 1871. Book xxviii, ch. iv, sec. 24. “Multi apud eos negantes esse superas potestates in caelo, nec in publico prodeunt nec prandent nec lavari arbitrantur se cautius posse, antequam ephemeride scrupulose sciscitata didicerint, ubi sit verbi gratia signum Mercurii, vel quotam cancri sideris partem polum discurrens optineat luna.” Very likely, however, Ammianus—whom we shall see defending divination in general—himself cherished a moderate trust in astrology and was rather satirizing the infidelity of the nobles—their inconsistency in so minutely ruling their lives by the planets when they denied the existence of “superas potestates in caelo.” There is an English translation of Ammianus by C. D. Yonge (London, 1862; Bohn Library).
220. Ibid., bk. xxii, ch. xvi, sec. 18. “Pro omni tamen experimento sufficiat medico ad commendandam artis auctoritatem, si Alexandriae se dixerit eruditum.”
221. Ibid., bk. xxii, ch. xvi, sec. 17. “Et quamquam veteres cum his, quorum memini floruere conplures, tamen ne nunc quidem in eadem urbe doctrinae variae silent; nam et disciplinarum magistri quodam modo spirant et nudatur ibi geometrico radio quidquid reconditum latet, nondumque apud eos penitus exaruit musica nec harmonica conticuit, et recalet apud quosdam adhuc licet raros consideratio mundani motus et siderum, doctique sunt numeros haud pauci; super his scientiam callent quae fatorum vias ostendit.”
222. Bk. xxii, ch. xii, sec. 8.
223. Bk. xxi, ch. i, sec. 7. “Et quoniam erudito et studioso cognitionum omnium principi malivoli praenoscendi futura pravas artes adsignant, advertendum est breviter unde sapienti viro hoc quoque accidere poterit doctrinae genus haud leve. Elementorum omnium spiritus, utpote perennium corporum praesentendi motu semper et ubique vigens ex his quae per disciplinas varias affectamus, participat nobiscum munera divinandi; et substantiales potestates ritu diverso placatae, velut ex perpetuis fontium venis vaticina mortalitati subpeditant verba.”
224. Bk. xxi, ch. i, sec. 13.
225. Bk. xxi, ch. i, sec. 14. “Unde praeclare hoc quoque ut alia Tullius ‘signa ostenduntur’ ait ‘a dis rerum futurarum.’” “Dis” seem to be practically identical in Ammianus’s mind with natural forces.
226. Περὶ ἐνυπνίων. (On Dreams) ch. 2. Synesii Cyrenâei Quae Extant Opera Omnia. Io. Georgius Krabinger. Landishuti, MDCCCL. Tomus I. All following references to and quotations from the works of Synesius apply to this edition. There is a French translation with several introductory essays by H. Druon, Paris, 1878. For an account in English of Synesius and his writings see W. S. Crawford, Synesius the Hellene, London, 1901. See also, H. O. Taylor, Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages, pp. 78–82, New York, 1901. This interesting work gives illustrations in various fields of the continuity of culture during the transition from Roman times to the Middle Ages.
227. Περὶ ἐνυπνίων (On Dreams) ch. 3. Ἔδει γαρ, οἶμαι, τοῦπαντὸς τούτου συμπαθοῦς τε ὄντος καὶ σύμπνου τὰ μέρη προσήκειν άλλήλοις, ἅτε ἑνὸς ὅλου τὰ μέλη τυγχάνοντα. Καὶ μή ποτε αἱ μάγων ἵυγγες αὖται· καὶ γὰρ θέλγεται παρ άλλήλων, ὢσπερ σημαίνεται· καὶ σοφὸς ὁ εἰδὼς τὴν τῶν μερῶν τοῦ κόσμου συγγένειαν. Ἔλκει γὰρ ἄλλο δἰ ἄλλου, ἔχων ἐνέχυρα παρόντα τῶν πλεῖστον ἀπόντων, καὶ φωνὰς, καὶ ὔλας καὶ σχήματα.... Evidently Synesius did not regard the magi as mere imposters.
228. Περὶ ἐνυπνίων, ch. 3. Καὶ δὴ καὶ θεῷ τινὶ τῶν εἴσω τοῦ κόσμου λίθος ἐνθένδε καὶ βοτάνη προσήκει, οἴς ὁμοιοπαθῶν εἴκει τῇ φύσει καὶ γοητεύεται. In his Praise of Baldness (Φαλάκρας ἐγκώμιον), ch. 10, Synesius tells how the Egyptians attract demons by magic influences.
229. Περι ἐνυπνίων, ch. 1. Αὐται μὲν ἀποδείξεις ἔστων τοῦ μαντείαν ἐν τοῖς ἀρίστοις εἶναι τῶν ἐπιτηδευομένων ἀνθρώποις.
230. Ibid., ch. 18.
231. Φαλάκρας ἐγκώμιον, ch. 10.
232. Αἰγύπτιοι ἤ περὶ προνοίας, bk. ii, ch. 7.
233. Πρὸς παιόνιον περί τοῦ δώρον, ch. 5.
234. Δίων, ch. 7. Περι ἑνυπνίων, ch. 4. Ἐπιστολαί, 4 and 49.
235. “Universa philosophiae integritas.” Commentary on Dream of Scipio, bk. ii, ch. 17. For Macrobius on Virgil see T. R. Glover, Life and Letters in the Fourth Century A. D. (Cambridge, Eng., 1901), p. 181, and Macrobius, Saturnalia, bk. i, ch. xvi, sec. 12. Macrobius has been edited in French and Latin by Nisard. Paris, 1883.
236. Commentary, bk. i, chs. 5 and 6; ii, ch. 1 and 2.
237. Ibid., bk. i, ch. 7.
238. Ibid., bk. i, ch. 19.
239. Commentary, bk. i, ch. 14.
240. Glover, op cit., p. 178.
241. Glover, op cit., p. 187, note 1.