The Obsolesence of Oracles (20-24)

After these remarks Ammonius said, It seems to me that Theophrastus was right in his pronouncement. What, in fact, is there to prevent our accepting an utterance that is impressive and most highly philosophical? For if it be rejected, it does away with many things which are possible but cannot be proved; and if it be allowed as a principle, it brings in its train many things that are impossible or non-existent.[*] The one thing that I have heard the Epicureans say with reference to the demigods introduced by Empedocles[*] is that it is not possible, if they are bad and sinful, that they should be happy and of long life, inasmuch as vice has a large measure of blindness and the tendency to encounter destructive agencies, so that argument of theirs is silly. For by this reasoning Epicurus will be shown to be a worse man than Gorgias the sophist, and Metrodorus worse than Alexis the comic poet; for Alexis lived twice as long as Metrodorus and Gorgias more than a third as long again as Epicurus. It is in another

sense that we speak of virtue as something strong, and vice as something weak, not with reference to permanence or dissolution of the body. For example, many of the animals that are sluggish in movement and slow in their reactions and many that are lascivious and ungovernable live a longer time than the quick and the clever. Therefore they do not well who make God’s eternal existence to be the result of watchfulness and the thrusting aside of destructive agencies. No, immunity from emotion and destruction ought to reside in the blessed Being, and should require no activity on His part. Perhaps, however, to speak thus with reference to people that are not present does not show great consideration. So it is right that Cleombrotus should resume the topic which he discontinued a few moments ago about the migration and flight of the demigods.

Then Cleombrotus continued, I shall be surprised if it does not appear to you much more strange than what has already been said. Yet it seems to be close to the subject of natural phenomena and Plato[*] has given the key-note for it, not by an unqualified pronouncement, but as the result of a vague concept, cautiously suggesting also the underlying idea in an enigmatic way; but, for all that, there has been loud disparagement of him on the part of other philosophers. But there is set before us for general use a bowl of myths and stories combined, and where could one meet with more kindly listeners for testing these stories, even as one tests coins from foreign lands? So I do not hesitate to favour you with a narrative about a man, not a Greek, whom I had great difficulty in finding, and then only by dint of long wanderings,

and after paying large sums for information. It was near the Persian Gulf that I found him, where he holds a meeting with human beings once every year; and there I had an opportunity to talk with him and met with a kindly reception. The other days of his life, according to his statement, he spends in association with roving nymphs and demigods. He was the handsomest man I ever saw in personal appearance and he never suffered from any disease, inasmuch as once each month he partook of the medicinal and bitter fruit of a certain herb. He was practised in the use of many tongues; but with me, for the most part, he spoke a Doric which was almost music. While he was speaking, a fragrance overspread the place, as his mouth breathed forth a most pleasant perfume. Besides his learning and his knowledge of history, always at his command, he was inspired to prophesy one day in each year when he went down to the sea and told of the future. Potentates and kings’ secretaries would come each year and depart. His power of prophecy he referred to the demigods. He made most account of Delphi and there was none of the stories told of Dionysus or of the rites performed here of which he had not heard; these too he assert ed were the momentous experiences of the demigods and so, plainly, were those which had to do with the Python. And upon the slayer of that monster was not imposed an exile of eight full years,[*] nor, following this, was he exiled to Tempê; but after he was expelled, he fared forth to another world, and later, returning from there, after eight cycles of the Great Years, pure and truly the Radiant One, he took over the oraele which had been guarded during this time by Themis. Such also, he said, were the stories about Typhons and Titans[*]; battles of demigods against demigods had taken place, followed by the exile of the vanquished, or else judgement inflicted by a god upon the sinners, as, for example, for the sin which Typhon is said to have committed in the case of Osiris, or Cronus in the case of Uranus; and the honours once paid to these deities have become quite dim to our eyes or have vanished altogether when the deities were transferred to another world. In fact, I learn that the Solymi, who live next to the Lycians, paid especial honour to Cronus. But when lie had slain their rulers, Arsalus, Dryus, and Trosobius, he fled away from that place to some place or other, where they cannot say; and then he ceased to be regarded, but Arsalus and those connected with him are called the stern gods, and the Lycians employ their names in invoking curses both in public and in private. Many accounts similar to these are to be had from theological history. But, as that man said, if we call some of the demigods by the current name of gods, that is no cause for wonder; for each of them is wont to be called after that god with whom he is allied and from whom he has derived his portion of power and honour. In fact, among ourselves one of us is Dïus, another Athenaeus, another Apollonius or Dionysius or Hermaeus; but only some of us have, by chance, been rightly named; the majority have received names derived from the gods which bear no relation to the persons, but are only a travesty.

Cleombrotus said nothing more, and his account appeared marvellous to all. But when Heraeleon inquired in what way this was related to Plato and how he had given the key-note for this topic, Cleombrotus said, You well remember that he summarily decided against an infinite number of worlds, but had doubts about a limited number; and up to five[*] he conceded a reasonable probability to those who postulated one world to correspond to each element, but, for himself, he kept to one. This seems to be peculiar to Plato, for the other philosophers conceived a fear of plurality,[*] feeling that if they did not limit matter to one world, but went beyond one, an unlimited and embarrassing infinity would at once fasten itself upon them.

But, said I, did your far-away friend set a limit to the number of worlds, as Plato did, or did you not go so far as to sound him on this point when you had your interview with him ?

Was it not likely, said Cleombrotus, that on anything touching these matters, if on nothing else, I should be an inquisitive and eager listener, when he so graciously put himself at my disposal and gave me the opportunity? He said that the worlds are not infinite in number, nor one, nor five, but one hundred and eighty-three,[*] arranged in the form of a triangle,

each side of the triangle having sixty worlds; of the three left over each is placed at an angle, and those that are next to one other are in contact and revolve gently as in a dance. The inner area of the triangle is the common hearth of all, and is called the Plain of Truth, in which the accounts, the forms, and the patterns of all things that have come to pass and of all that shall come to pass rest undisturbed; and round about them lies Eternity, whence Time, like an ever-flowing stream, is conveyed to the worlds. Opportunity to see and to contemplate these things is vouchsafed to human souls once in ten thousand years if they have lived goodly lives; and the best of the initiatory rites here are but a dream of that highest rite and initiation; and the words of our philosophic inquiry are framed to recall these fair sights there — else is our labour vain. This, said he, is the tale I heard him recite quite as though it were in some rite of mystic initiation, but without offering any demonstration or proof of what he said.

Then I, addressing Demetrius, said, How do the verses about the suitors run, when they are marvelling at Odysseus as he handles the bow? And when Demetrius had recalled them to my mind, I said, It occurs to me to say this of your far-away friend:

Surely he liked to see, or else was given to filching[*]

beliefs and tales of all sorts. He had ranged widely in literature and was no foreigner, but a Greek by birth, and replete with Greek culture to a high degree. The number of his worlds convicts him, since it is not Egyptian nor Indian, but Dorian and from Sicily, being the idea of a man of Himera named Petron. Petron’s own treatise I have never read nor am I sure that a copy is now extant; but Hippys[*] of Rhegium, whom Phanias[*] of Eresus mentions, records that this was the opinion and the account of it given by Petron: that there are one hundred and eighty-three worlds in contact with one another according to element; but what this is, to be in contact according to element, he does not explain further nor subjoin any plausible proof.

Demetrius, joining in, said, What plausible proof could there be in matters of this sort in which even Plato, without stating anything reasonable or plausible, simply set down his own account?

But, said Heracleon, we hear you grammarians attributing this view to Homer on the ground that he distributed the universe into five worlds[*]: the heavens, the water, the air, the earth, and Olympus. Of these he leaves two to be held in common, the earth for all below and Olympus for all above, and the three that lie between were assigned to the three gods. In this wise Plato[*] also, apparently, associated the fairest and foremost forms and figures with the different divisions of the universe, and called them five worlds, one of earth, one of water, one of air, one of fire, and last of all, the one which includes all these, the world of the dodecahedron, of wide expanse and many turnings, to which he assigned a form appropriate to the cycles and movements of the soul.

Why, said Demetrius, do we call up Homer in the present instance? Enough of legends! Plato, however, is very far from calling the five different divisions of the world five different worlds; and in those passages again, in which he contends against those who postulate an infinite number of worlds, he says that his opinion is that this world is the only-begotten and beloved of God, having been created out of the corporeal whole, entire, complete, and sufficient unto itself. Wherefore one might well be surprised that he, in stating the truth himself, has supplied others with a source for a doctrine that is unconvincing and lacking in reason. For not to defend the idea of a single world implied somehow an assumption of the infinity of the whole universe; but to make the worlds definitely just so many, neither more nor less than five, is altogether contrary to reason and devoid of all plausibility — unless, he added, with a glance at me, you have anything to say.

It appears, said I, that we have already discontinued our discussion about oracles, feeling it to be completed, and are now taking up another topic just as large.

Not discontinued that topic, said Demetrius, but not passing over this one which claims our attention. We will not spend much time on it, but only touch upon it long enough to inquire into its plausibility; and then we will follow up the original proposition.

In the first place, then, said I, the considerations that prevent our making an infinite number of worlds do not preclude our making more than one. For it is possible for God and prophecy

and Providence to exist in more worlds than one, and for the incidence of chance to be reduced to the very smallest limits, while the vast majority of things and those of the highest importance attain to genesis and transmutation in a quite orderly sequence, none of which things does infinity, by its nature, admit. Then again it is more consistent with reason that the world should not be the only-begotten of God and quite alone. For He, being consummately good, is lacking in none of the virtues, and least of all in those which concern justice and friendliness; for these are the fairest and are fitting for gods. Nor is it in the nature of God to possess anything to no purpose or for no use. Therefore there exist other gods and other worlds outside, in relation with which He exercises the social virtues. For not in relation with Himself nor with any part of Himself is there any exercise of justice or benevolence or kindness, but only in relation with others. Thus it is not likely that this world, friendless, neighbourless, and unvisited, swings back and forth in the infinite void, since we see that Nature includes individual things in classes and species, like seeds in pods and envelopes. For there is nothing in the whole list of existing things for which there is not some general designation, nor does anything that does not possess certain qualities, either in common with others or solely by itself, obtain such an appellation. Now the world is not spoken of as having qualities in common with others. It has its qualities, therefore, solely by itself, by virtue of the difference when it is compared with other things which are akin to it and similar in appearance, since it has been created with such qualities as it possesses. If in all creation such a thing as one man, one horse, one star, one god, one demigod does not exist, what is there to prevent creation from having, not one world, but more than one? For he who says that creation has but one land and one sea overlooks a matter which is perfectly plain, the doctrine of similar parts[*]; for we divide the earth into parts which bear similar names, and the sea likewise. A part of the world, however, is not a world, but something combined from the differing elements in Nature.