lectual energy. For uninterrupted energy about any thing calls forth and resuscitates our dormant ideas. But through this familiarity, becoming stationed at the doar of the father, it is necessary that we should be united to him. For discovery is this, to meet with him, to be united to him, fo associate alone with the alone, and to see him himself, the soul hastily withdrawing herself from every’ other energy to him. For, being present with her father, she then considers scientific discussions to be but words*, banquets together with him on the truth of real being, and in pure splendour 1s purely initiated in entire and stable visions. Such, therefore, is the discovery of the father, not that which is doxastic [or pertaining to opinion]; for this is dubious, and not very remote from the irrational life. Neither is it scientific; for this is syllogistic and composite, and does not come into contact with the intellectual essence of the intellectual Demi- urgus. But it is that which subsists according to intel- - lectual vision itself, a contact with the intelligible, and a union with the demiurgic intellect. For this may properly be denominated difficult, either as hard to obtain, presenting itself to souls after every evolution of life, or as the true labour of souls. For, after the — wandering about generation, after purification, and the light of science, intellectual energy and the intellect which is in us shine forth, placing the soul in the father as in a port, purely establishing her in demiurgic intel- lections, and conjoining light with light; not such as. that of science, but more beautiful, more intellectual, .and partaking more of the nature of the one than this. For this is the paternal port, and the discovery of the father, viz. an undefiled union with him.”
With great beauty also, and in perfect conformity to the most recondite theology, is the father.of Ulysses k This is in consequence of a union with the Demiurgus being so much superior to scientific perception.
ΟΝ THE WANDERINGS OF ULYSSES. 209 represented as coarsely clothed, and occupied in bota- nical labours:: But all alone the hoary king he found; His habit coarse, but warmly wrapt around; His head, that bow’d with many a pensive care, Fenc’d with a double cap of goatskin hair; His buskins old, in former service torn, But well repair’d; and gloves against the thorn.
In this array the kingly gard’ner stood, | And clear’d a plant, encumber’d with its wood!, For this simplicity, and coarseness of the garb of Laertes, considered as an image of the true father of Ulysses, is, in every respect, conformable to the method adopted by ancient mythologists in their adumbrations of deity. For they imitated the transcendency of divine natures by things preternatural; a power more divine than all reason by things irrational; and, by apparent deformity, a beauty which surpasses every thing corporeal, This array, therefore, of the father of Ulysses, is, in the lan-— guage of Proclus, indicative “ of an essence established in the simplicity of the one, and vehemently rejoicing, as some one of the piously wise says, in an unadorned privation of form, and extending it to those who are able to survey it™,” And the botanical labours of Laertes are an image of the providential attention of the Demiurgus to the immediate ramifications and blossoms of his own divine essence, in which they are meffably. rooted, and from which they eternally germinate.
Though Ulysses, however, is placed through the theoretic virtues in the paternal port, as far as this is possible to be effected in the present life, yet we must remember, according to the beautiful observation of Por- ' Odyss. lib. xxiv. 225, &c.
™ Ta μὲν γαρ sols Sta καὶ ev τὴ AWAOTNTS τοῦ ἔγος ἐιδρυμῖνα τὴν ἀκαλλοπιστον ευμορφιαν" (lege ἀμορφιαν) ὡς φησι τις τῶν τὰ ὁσία σόφων, διαφεροντως ἀγαπῶντα, καὶ προτεινοντα τοῖς εἰς αὐτὰ βλέπειν δυγαμνοις. ---- Ῥτοοὶ. in Parmenid. lib. i., Ρ. 38. 8vo. Parisiis, 1821.
2970 ON THE WANDERINGS OF ULYSSES.
phyry, that he is not freed from molestation, till he has passed over the raging sea of a material nature; 7. e. has become impassive® to the excitations of the irrational life, and is entirely abstracted from external concerns. For, | Then heav’n decrees in peace to end his days, And steal himself from life by slow decays; Unknown to pain, in age resign his breath, When late stern Neptune points the shaft of death; To the dark grave retiring as to rest; His people blessing, by his people blest 5.
I shall only observe farther, that Plotinus also con- sidered the wanderings of Ulysses as a fabulous nar- ration containing a latent meaning, such as that which we have above unfolded. This is evident from the fol- lowing extract from his admirable treatise on the Beauti- ful: “It is here, then, [in order to survey the beautiful itself] that we may more truly exclaim, Haste, let us fly and all our sails expand, To gain our dear, our long-lost native land P.
But by what leading stars shall we direct our flight, and by what means avoid the magic power of Circe, and the detaining charms of Calypso? For thus the fable of Ulysses obscurely signifies, which feigns him abiding an unwilling exile, though pleasant spectacles " This impassivity, or perfect subjugation of the passions to reason, which is the true apathy of the Stoics and Platonists, is indicated by Ulysses finding a nation s¢ Who ne’er knew salt or heard the billows roar.”
° Odyss. lib. xxiii. 281, &c. By the people, in these lines, the inferior parts or powers of the soul are indicated. P liad, lib. ii. 140, and lib. ix. 27.
ON THE WANDERINGS OF ULYSSES. 271 were continually presented to his sight; and every thing was proffered to invite his stay, which can delight the senses and captivate the heart. But our true country, like that of Ulysses, is from whence we came, and where our father lives 4.”
4 See my paraphrased translation of this treatise, p. 37, &c.
THE END.
LONDON: PRINTED BY J. MOYES, GREVILLE STREET.
A, UNIV. OF MICHIGAN