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The various translations and original works of Thomas Taylor, though still in request by the more zealous students of ancient philosophy and occult science, have now become so scarce and expensive that it is only within the power of comparatively wealthy collectors to obtain them. This is a matter for regret, inasmuch as it cannot be affirmed that his writings have been, or are likely to be superseded, or that they are without value. They can hardly be neglected without loss by those who desire to understand the systems of philosophy which satisfied the spiritual needs of the antique world. It is not possible, even for the most feivent believer in modern “ progress,” to dis- miss the speculations of the ancient philo- sophers as antiquated notions which have had their day and no longer possess interest or value. The names of Socrates, Plato, and Aris- totle can never grow dim with age, nor is it possible to conceive a time when men shall cease to study and reverence them. As the disciple, the translator, and the expounder of VI VI these and of other sages of antiquity, Thomas Taylor deserves to be held in honour and re- membrance, and it would be a misfortune if his labours remained unknown because of the scarcity of his books. It is for this reason that the present reprint has been undertaken; and it is hoped that it will meet with such a measure of success as may encourage the re- publication of various other works by the same author. It has been printed in handsome style and published at a moderate price in order that it may be regarded as a desirable addition to the scholar’s library, while yet it will not tax severely the means of the not too wealthy student. For the rest it is only necessary to say that this reprint is, in size, ' number of pages, type, and general get-up, an almost exact facsimile of the original edition, which was first printed in 1821. No altera- tions or additions have been made in or to the original text, as it is thought that those who care for Taylor’s writings will prefer to have them in their integrity. Should it be found possible, however, to continue the series it is intended to prefix to a future volume an essay on Taylor, which will contain a bio- graphy of him, and a critical estimate of his writings.
INTRODUCTION.
INTRODUCTION.
It appears to me that there are two descrip- tions of persons by whom the present work must be considered to be of inestimable worth, the lovers of antiquity and the lovers of ancient philosophy and religion. To the former of these it must be invaluable, be- cause it is replete with information derived from the wise men of the Chaldeans, the prophets of the Egyptians, the dogmas of the Assyrians, and the ancient pillars of Hermes; and to the latter, because of the doctrines contained in it, some of which originated from the Hermaic pillars, were known by Pythagoras and Plato, and were the sources of their philosophy; and others are profoundly theological, and unfold the mysteries of ancient religion with an admir- able conciseness of diction, and an inimita- ble vigour and elegance of conception. To vni which also may be added, as the colophon of excellence, that it is the most copious, the clearest, and the most satisfactory de- fence extant of genuine ancient theology.
This theology, the sacred operations per- taining to which called theurgy are here developed, has for the most part, since the destruction of it, been surveyed only in its corruptions among barbarous nations, or during the decline and fall of the Roman empire, with which, overwhelmed with pol- lution, it gradually fell, and at length totally vanished from what is called the polished part of the globe. This will be evident to the intelligent reader from the following remarks, which are an epitome of what has been elsewhere more largely discussed by me on this subject, and which also demon- strate the religion of the Chaldeans, Egyp- tians, and Greeks to be no less scientific than sublime.
In the first place, this theology celebrates the immense principle of things as some- thing superior even to being itself; as exempt from the whole of things, of which it is nevertheless ineffably the source; and IX does not, therefore, think fit to enumerate it with any triad* or order of beings. In- deed it even apologizes for giving the ap- pellation of the most simple of our concep- tions to that which is beyond all knowledge and all conception. It denominates this principle however, the one and the good; by the former of these names indicating its transcendent simplicity, and by the latter * According to this theology, as I have elsewhere shown, in every order of things, a triad is the immediate progeny of a monad. Hence the intelligible triad proceeds immediately from the ineffable principle of things. Phanes, or intelli- gible intellect, who is the last of the intelligible order, is the monad, leader, and producing cause of a triad, which is de- nominated vorjTos Kai voepos, i. e. intelligible, and at the same time intellectual. In like manner the extremity of this order produces immediately from itself the intellectual triad, Saturn, Rhea, and Jupiter. Again, Jupiter, who is also the Demiurgus, is the monad of the supermundane triad. Apollo, who subsists at the extremity of the supermundane order, produces a triad of liberated Gods. (0eot a7roA,vTot.) And the extremity of the liberated order becomes the monad of a triad of mundane Gods. This theory, too, which is the progeny of the most consummate science, is in perfect con- formity with the Chaldean theology. And hence it is said in one of the Chaldean oracles, ‘‘In every world a triad shines forth, of which a monad is the 'ruling principle.” (IlavTi yap cv Koa-pcp XapTrec rpias rjs pova<s ap^6i). I refer the reader, who is desirous of being fully convinced of all this, to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
X its subsistence as the object of desire to all beings. For all things desire good. At the same time, however, it asserts that these appellations are in reality nothing more than the parturitions of the soul, which, standing as it were in the vestibules of the adytum of deity, announce nothing pertaining to the ineffable, but only indicate her spontaneous tendencies towards it, and belong rather to the immediate offspring of the first God than to the first itself Hence, as the result of this most venerable conception of the supreme, when it ventures not only to de-. nominate it, though ineffable, but also to assert something of its relation to other things, it considers this as preeminently its peculiarity, that it is the principle of princi- ples; it being necessary that the characte- ristic property of principle, after the same manner as other things, should not begin from multitude, but should be collected into one monad as a summit, and which is the principle of all principles.
The scientific reasoning from which this dogma is deduced is the following. As the principle of all things is the one, it is XI necessary that the progression of beings should be continued, and that no vacuum should intervene either in incorporeal or / corporeal natures. It is also necessary that every thing which has a natural progression should proceed through similitude. In con- sequence of this, it is likewise necessary that every producing principle should gene- rate a number of the same order with itself, viz. nature j a natural number; soul, one that is psychical {i. e. 'belonging to soul); and intellect an intellectual number. For if whatever possesses a power of generating, generates similars prior to dissimilars, every cause must deliver its own form and charac- teristic peculiarity to its progeny; and be- fore it generates that which gives subsist- ence to progressions, far distant and sepa- rate from its nature, it must constitute things proximate to itself according to es- sence, and conjoined with it through simili- tude. It is, therefore, necessary from these premises, since there is one unity, the prin- ciple of the universe, that this unity should produce from itself, prior to every thing else, a multitude of natures characterized by unity, and a number the most of all things allied to its cause; and these natures are no other than the Gods.
According to this theology, therefore, from the immense principle of principles, in which all things causally subsist, ab- sorbed in superessential light, and involved in unfathomable depths, a beauteous pro- geny of principles proceed, all largely par- taking of the ineffable, all stamped with the occult characters of deity, all possessing an overflowing fulness of good. From these dazzling summits, these ineffable blossoms, these divine propagations, being, life, intel- lect, soul, nature, and body depend; monads suspended from unities, deified natures pro- ceeding from deities. Each of these mo- nads, too, is the leader of a series which extends from itself to the last of things, and which, while it proceeds from, at the same time abides in, and returns to, its leader. And all these principles, and all their pro- geny, are finally centred and rooted by their summits in the first great all-compre- hending one. Thus all beings proceed from, and are comprehended in, the first Xlll Xlll being: all intellects emanate from one first intellect; all souls from one first soul; all natures blossom from one first nature; and all bodies proceed from the vital and lumi- nous body of the world. And, lastly, all these great monads are comprehended in the first one, from which both they and all their depending series are unfolded into light. Hence this first one is truly the unity of unities, the monad of monads, the prin- ciple of principles, the God of Gods, one and all things, and yet one prior to all.
No objections of any weight, no argu- ments but such as are sophistical, can be urged against this most sublime theory, which is so congenial to the unperverted conceptions of the human mind, that it can only be treated with ridicule and contempt in degraded, barren, and barbarous ages. Ignorance and impious fraud, however, have hitherto conspired to defame those inestimable works in which this and many other grand and important dogmas can * Viz. The Philosophical Works of Proclus, together with those of Plotinus, Porphyry, lamblichus, Syrianus, Ammo- nius, Damascius, Olympiodorus, and Simplicius.
XIV alone be found; and the theology of the ancients has been attacked with all the in- sane fury of ecclesiastical zeal, and all the imbecile flashes of mistaken wit, by men whose conceptions on the subject, like those of a man between sleeping and waking, have been turbid and wild, phantastic and confused, preposterous and vain.
Indeed, that after the great incompre- hensible cause of all, a divine multitude subsists, cooperating with this cause in the production and government of the universe, has always been, and is still, admitted by all nations and all religions, however much they may differ in their opinions respecting the nature of the subordinate deities, and the veneration which is to be paid to them by man; and however barbarous the con- ceptions of some nations on this subject may be, when compared with those of others. Hence, says the elegant Maximus Tyrius, ^'You will see one according law and assertion in all the earth, that there is one God, the king and father of all things, and many Gods, sons of God, ruling to- gether with him. This the Greek says, and XV XV the Barbarian says, the inhabitant of the continent, and he who dwells near the sea, the wise and the unwise. And if you pro-. ceed as far as to the utmost shores of the ocean, there also there are Gods, rising very near to some, and setting very near to others.” * The deification, however, of dead men, and the worshiping men as Gods, formed no part of this theology, when it is con- sidered according to its genuine purity. Numerous instances of the truth of this might be adduced, but I shall mention for this purpose, as unexceptionable witnesses, the writings of Plato, the Golden Pytha- goric Verses,t and the Treatise of Plutarch * Ei^a cSots av ev Tracra yy ofiocfioyvov vojxov Kai Xoyov, on 6eos €ts TravTtov ]3aa-iXevs Kai irarrip, Kai deoL ttoXXoi, Oeov TratSes, <Tvvap')(Ovns Oe(p. ravra Kai o eXXyv Aeyet, Kai o ^ap- fSapos Xeyei, Kai o yTreipuiTy^ Kai o 6aXaTTio<s, Kai o cro<f)0^ Kai o aa’0(f>os. K(^v eiri rov WKcavov eXdys ras rji'ovas, k(^K€i Oeoi, tois /jtev avtcr^ovTes ay^ov p.aXa, tois 8e KaTa8vop.evoi, Dissert, i.
. Edit. Princ.
. Edit. Princ.
t “ Diogenes Laertius says of Pythagoras, that he charged his disciples not to give equal degrees of honour to the Gods and heroes. Herodotus (in Eutei'pe) says of the Greeks, That they worshiped Hercules two rVays, one as an immoHal deity, and so they sacrificed to him; and another as a Hero, and so they celebrated his memory. Isocrates (Encom. He- XVI on Isis and Osiris. All the works of Plato, indeed, evince the truth of this position, len.) distinguishes between the honours of heroes and Gods, when he speaks of Menelaus and Helena. But the dis- tinction is no where more fully expressed than in the Greek inscription upon the statue of Regilla, wife to H erodes Atti- cus, as Salmasius thinks, which was set up in his temple at Triopium, and taken from the statue itself by Sirmondus; where it is said. That she had neither the honour of a mortal nor yet that which was proper to the Gods. OuSe upa dvr\- TOL<Sj arap ovSe ^eoicriv opoia. It seems by the inscription of Herodes, and by the testament of Epicteta, extant in Greek in the Collection of Inscriptions, that it was in the power of particular families to keep festival days in honour of some of their own family, and to give heroical honours to them. In that noble inscription at Venice, we find three days appointed every year to be kept, and a confraternity established for that purpose with the laws of it. The first day to be observed in honour of the Muses, and sacrifices to be offered to them as deities. The second and third days in honour of the heroes of the family; between which honour and that of deities, they showed the difference by the dis- tance of time between them, and the preference given to the other. But whereinsoever the difference lay, that there was a distinction acknowledged among them appears by this pas- sage of Valerius, in his excellent oration, extant in Dionysius Halicarnass. Antiq. Rom. lib. ii. p. 696. I call, says he, the Gods to witness, whose temples and altars our family has worshiped with common sacrifices; and next after them, I call the Genii of our ancestors, to whom we give Sevrepas Tipas, the second honours next to the Gods, (as Celsus calls those, Ttts TrpocrrjKovcras rtpas, the due honours that belong to the lower dcemons.) From which we take notice, that the Heathens did not confound all degrees of divine worship, giving to the lowest object the same which they supposed to XVll but this is particularly manifest from his Laws. The Golden verses order that the immortal Gods be honoured first, as they are disposed by law; afterwards the illus- trious Heroes, under which appellation the author of the verses comprehends also an- gels and dmmons, properly so called; and in the last place, the terrestrial daemons, i. e. such good men as transcend in virtue the rest of mankind. But to honour the Gods as they are disposed by law, is, as Hierocles observes, to reverence them as they are arranged by their demiurgus and father; and this is to honour them as be- ings not only superior to man, but also to daemons and angels. Hence, to honour men, however excellent they may be, as Gods, is not to honour the Gods according to the rank in which they are placed by their Creator; for it is confounding the divine with the human nature, and is thus acting directly contrary to the Pythagoric be due to the celestial deities, or the supreme God. So that if the distinction of divine worship will excuse from idolatrj'^, the Heathens were not to blame for it.” See Stillingfleet’s Answer to a book entitled Catholics no Idolaters, p. 510, XVlll precept. Plutarch too, in his above men- tioned treatise, most forcibly and clearly shows the impiety of worshiping men as Gods.* So great an apprehension indeed,’' says Dr. Stillingfleet,t had the Heathens of the necessity of appropriate acts of divine worship, that some of them have chosen to die, rather than to give them to what they did not believe to be God. We have a remarkable story to this purpose in Arrian and Curtiust concerning Callisthenes. Alex- ander arriving at that degree of vanity as to desire to have divine worship given him, and the matter being started out of design among the courtiers, either by Anaxarchus, as Arrian, or Cleo the Sicilian, as Curtius says; and the way of doing it proposed, viz. by incense and prostration; Callis- thenes vehemently opposed it, as that which would confound the difference of human and * See the extracts from Plutarch, in which this is shown, in the Introduction to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
t Answer to Catholics no Idolaters. Lond. l676. p. 211 I Arrian, de Exped. Alex. 1. iv. et Curt. lib. viii.
XIX divine worship, which had been preserved in- violable among them. The worship of the Gods had been kept up in temples, with altars, and images, and sacrifices, and hymns, and prostrations, and such like; hut it is by no means fitting, says he, for us to confound these things, either by lifting up men to the honours of the Gods, or depressing the Gods to the honours of men. For if Alex- ander would not suffer any man to usurp his royal dignity by the votes of men; how much more justly may the Gods disdain for any man to take their honours to himself. And it appears by Plutarch,* that the Greeks thought it a mean and base thing for any of them, when sent on any embassy to the kings of Persia, to prostrate themselves before them, because this was only allowed among them in divine adoration. There- fore, says he, when Pelopidas and Ismenias were sent to Artaxerxes, Pelopidas did no- thing unworthy, but Ismenias let fall his ring to the ground, and stooping for that, was thought to make his adoration; which * Vit. Artaxerx. iElian. Var. Hist. lib. i. c. 21.
C XX was altogether as good a shift as the Jesuits advising the crucifix to be held in the man- darin’s hands while they made their adora- tions in the Heathen temples in China.
Conon* also refused to make his adoration^ as a disgrace to his city; and Isocrates t accuses the Persians for doing it, because herein they showed that they despised the Gods rather than men, by prostituting their honours to their princes. Herodotus mentions Sper- chies and Bulis, who could not with the greatest violence be brought to give adora- tion to Xerxes, because it was against the law - of their country to give divine honour to men.\ And Valerius Maximus § says, ‘'the Athe- nians put Timagoras to death for doing it; so strong an apprehension had possessed them, that the manner of worship which they used to their Gods, should be preserved sacred and inviolable.” The philosopher Sallust also, in his Treatise on the Gods and the World, says, ""It is not unreasonable to suppose that impiety is a species of punish- ment, and that those who have had a know- * Justin, lib. vi. J Lib. vii.
t Panegyr.
§ Lib. vi. cap. iii.
XXI ledge of the Gods, and yet despised them, will in another life be deprived of this knowledge. And it is requisite to make the punishment of those who have honoured their kings as Gods to consist in being ex- pelled from the Gods.’’
When the ineffable transcendency of the first God, which was considered as the grand principle in the Heathen religion by the best theologists of all nations, and par- ticularly by its most illustrious promulga- tors, Orpheus, Pythagoras, and Plato, was forgotten, this oblivion was doubtless the principal cause of dead men being deified by the Pagans. Had they properly di- rected their attention to this transcendency they would have perceived it to be so im- mense as to surpass eternity, infinity, self- subsistence, and even essence itself, and that these in reality belong to those venera- ble natures which are, as it were, first un- folded into light from the unfathomable * Kat KoXacreb)^ 8e eiSos eivai adeiav ovk airetKOS. rovs yap yvovras deovs, Kai Kara<f)povri<ravTaSf evXoyov ev €T€p(p /3i(p Kai rr]<s yvoKTccDS S’cpecr^ai, nai Tovs eavT0)v ^acriAeas ws 9eov<i rip.r]- (ravras, eSei ttjv Siktjv avruiv rroitjcrai tcjv Occjjv eKTrecreiv. Cap. xviii.
XXll XXll depths of that truly mystic unknown, about which all knowledge is refunded into igno- rance. For, as Simplicius justly observes, “ It is requisite that he who ascends to the principle of things should investigate whe- ther it is possible there can be any thing better than the supposed principle; and if something more excellent is found, the same inquiry should again be made respect- ing that, till we arrive at the highest con- ceptions, than which we have no longer any more venerable. Nor should we stop in our ascent till we find this to be the case.. For there is no occasion to fear that our progression will be through an unsubstan- tial void, by conceiving something about the first principles which is greater and more transcendent than their nature. For it is not possible for our conceptions to take such a mighty leap as to equal, and much less to pass beyond, the dignity of the first principles of things.’' He adds, This, therefore, is one and the best extension [of the soul] to [the highest] God, and is, as much as possible, irreprehensible; viz. to know firmly, that by ascribing to him the XXlll XXlll most venerable excellences we can con- ceive, and the most holy and primary names and things, we ascribe nothing to him which is suitable to his dignity. It is sufficient, however, to procure our pardon [for the attempt], that we can attribute to him nothing superior.” If it is not possi- ble, therefore, to form any ideas equal to the dignity of the immediate progeny of the ineffable, e. of the first principles of things, how much less can our conceptions reach that thrice unknown darkness, in the reverential language of the Egyptians,!
Tov eivai Ti KpciTTov T’i]s V7roTe6ei(rr]<s o-pX'l^ €vpe$rj, 7raA.11/ €7T CKeLVOv ^7]T€iv, €(j)'S av CIS Tas aKpoTaTas evvoias (XOiapev, <j)v ovKCTt CT€pvoTepa<s €)(op€v' /cat pr) •^rjcrat rrjv ava/3aariv. ovSe yap evXa^rjreov prj K€vep^aTb)p€v, pei^ova riva Kat vTTipfiaLvovTa ras wpiara^ ap)pi<s rrepi avT(ov evvo^fvTCS. ov yap Svvarov ryXcKOVTOv TrrjS'qpa 7rvj&q(raL ras rjperepa^ €vvoLas, ws TrapLcr(t)6r]vaL Ty a^i^ to/v ttjoo/twv ap^cav, ov Xeycj /cat vnepur- Trjvac. pia yap avry -irpos 6eov avaraa-is apis’r/, /cat tos Svva- TOv aTTTatS’OS. Kat (vv evvoiSpev aya6(ov ra a-epvoTara^ /cat ayuarara, Kat TrpiOTOvpya, Kat ovopara Kat Trpaypara avro) avartOevras eiSevai ^ej8atu)9, on prjSev avareOetKapev a^tov. apK€L 8c yptv CIS o’vyyvioprjv, to pySev c/ccii/wv vTrepTepov.
Simplic. in Epict. Enchir. p. 207. Lend. l670. 8vo.
t Of the first principles, says Damascius in MS. Trept ap^oiv, the Egyptians said nothing, but celebrated it as a darkness beyond all intellectual conception, a thrice un- XXIV which is even beyond these? Had the Heathens, therefore, considered as they ought this transcendency of the supreme God, they would never have presumed to equalize the human with the divine nature, and consequently would never have wor- shiped men as Gods. Their theology, how- ever, is not to be accused as the cause of this impiety, but their forgetfulness of the sublimest of its dogmas, and the confusion with which this oblivion was necessarily attended.
But to return to the present work. To some who are conversant with the writings of Porphyry, who know how high he ranks among the best of the Platonists, and that he was denominated by them, on account of his excellence, the philosopher, it may seem strange that he should have been so un- skilled in theological mysteries, and so ignorant of the characteristics of the beings superior to man, as by his epistle to Anebo he may appear to have been. That he was not, however, in reality thus unskilful and known darkness. Hpior-qv apx’?*' avvfxvrjKaa-iv, o-kotos virep Traa-av voTjertv, otkotos ayvo)<^ov rpis tqvto €m(fi7]pi^ovT€<i.
XXV ignorant, is evident from his admirable Treatise on Abstinence from Animal Food, and his Acpopjuai 7rpo9 ra uorjra, or Auxiliaries to Intelligibles. His apparent ignorance, there- fore, must have been assumed for the pur- pose of obtaining a more perfect and copious solution of the doubts proposed in his Epistle, than he would otherwise have received. But at the same time that this is admitted, it must also be observed, that he was inferior to lamblichus in theological science, who so greatly excelled in knowledge of this kind, that he was not surpassed by any one, and was equaled by few. Hence he was de- nominated by all succeeding Platonists the divine, in the same manner as Plato, ''to whom,” as the acute Emperor Julian re- marks, " he was posterior in time only, but not in genius.” * The difficulties attending the translation of this work into English are necessarily great, not only from its sublimity and no- * For farther particulars respecting this most extraordi- nary man, see the introduction to my translation of his Life of Pythagoras, and my History of the Restoration of the Platonic Theology.
XXVI velty, but also from the defects of the origi- nal. I have, however, endeavoured to make the translation as faithful and com- plete as possible; and have occasionally availed myself of the annotations of Gale, not being able to do so continually, because for the most part, where philosophy is con- cerned, he shows himself to be an inaccu- rate, impertinent, and garrulous smatterer.
f THE EPISTLE OF PORPHYRY TO THE EGYPTIAN ANEBO.
Porphyry to the Prophet Aneho greeting.
I COMMENCE my friendship towards you from the Gods and good dsemons, and from those philosophic disquisitions, which have an affinity to these powers. And concerning these par- ticulars indeed, much has been said by the Grecian philosophers; but, for the most part, the principles of their belief are derived from conjecture.
In the first place, therefore, it is granted that there are Gods. But I inquire what the peculiarities are of each of the more excellent genera, by which they are separated from each other; and whether we must say that the cause of the distinction between them is from their energies, or their passive motions, or from things B 2 that are consequent, or from their different arrangement with respect to bodies; as, for instance, from the arrangement of the Gods with reference to etherial, but of daemons to aerial, and of souls to terrestrial, bodies?
I also ask, why, since [all] the Gods dwell in the heavens, theurgists only invoke the terres- trial and subterranean Gods? Likewise, how some of the Gods are said to be aquatic and aerial? And how different Gods are allotted different places, and the parts of bodies ac- cording to circumscription, though they have an infinite, impartible, and incomprehensible power? How there will be a union of them with each other, if they are separated by the divisible circumscriptions of parts, and by the difference of places and subject bodies?
How do theologists, or those who are wise in divine concerns, represent the Gods as passive, to whom on this account, it is said, erect phalli are exhibited, and obscene language is used? But if they are impassive, the invocations of the Gods will be in vain, which announce that they can appease the anger of the divinities, and procure a reconciliation with them; and still more, what are called the necessities of the Gods, will be vain. For that which is impassive cannot be allured, nor compelled, nor necessitated. How, therefore, are many 3 tilings, in sacred operations, performed to them as passive? Invocations, likewise, are made to the Gods as passive; so that not daemons only are passive, but the Gods also, conform- ably to what Homer says, “And flexible are e’en the Gods themselves.” * But if we assert with certain persons, that the Gods are pure intellects, but that daemons, be- ing psychical, participate of intellect; in a still greater degree will pure intellects be incapable of being allured, and will be unmingled wdth sensible natures. Supplications, however, are foreign to the purity of intellect, and therefore are not to be made to it. But the things which are offered [in sacred rites] are offered as to sensitive and psychical essences.