Proteus, according to the poets, was Neptune’s herdsman; an old man,
and a most extraordinary prophet, who understood things past and
present, as well as future; so that besides the business of divination,
he was the revealer and interpreter of all antiquity, and secrets of
every kind. He lived in a vast cave, where his custom was to tell over
his herd of sea-calves at noon, and then to sleep. Whoever consulted
him, had no other way of obtaining an answer, but by binding him with
manacles and fetters; when he, endeavoring to free himself, would
change into all kinds of shapes and miraculous forms; as of fire,
water, wild beasts, &c.; till at length he resumed his own shape again.
EXPLANATION.—This fable seems to point at the secrets of nature, and
the states of matter. For the person of Proteus denotes matter, the
oldest of all things, after God himself;[631] that resides, as in a
cave, under the vast concavity of the heavens. He is represented as the
servant of Neptune, because the various operations and modifications
of matter are principally wrought in a fluid state. The herd, or flock
of Proteus, seems to be no other than the several kinds of animals,
plants, and minerals, in which matter appears to diffuse and spend
itself; so that after having formed these several species, and as it
were finished its task, it seems to sleep and repose, without otherwise
attempting to produce any new ones. And this is the moral of Proteus’s
counting his herd, then going to sleep.
This is said to be done at noon, not in the morning or evening; by
which is meant the time best fitted and disposed for the production of
species, from a matter duly prepared, and made ready beforehand, and
now lying in a middle state, between its first rudiments and decline;
which, we learn from sacred history, was the case at the time of the
creation; when, by the efficacy of the divine command, matter directly
came together, without any transformation or intermediate changes,
which it affects; instantly obeyed the order, and appeared in the form
of creatures.
And thus far the fable reaches of Proteus, and his flock, at liberty
and unrestrained. For the universe, with the common structures, and
fabrics of the creatures, is the face of matter, not under constraint,
or as the flock wrought upon and tortured by human means. But if any
skilful minister of nature shall apply force to matter, and by design
torture and vex it, in order to its annihilation, it, on the contrary,
being brought under this necessity, changes and transforms itself
into a strange variety of shapes and appearances; for nothing but the
power of the Creator can annihilate, or truly destroy it; so that
at length, running through the whole circle of transformations, and
completing its period, it in some degree restores itself, if the force
be continued. And that method of binding, torturing, or detaining, will
prove the most effectual and expeditious, which makes use of manacles
and fetters; that is, lays hold and works upon matter in the extremest
degrees.
The addition in the fable that makes Proteus a prophet, who had the
knowledge of things past, present, and future, excellently agrees with
the nature of matter; as he who knows the properties, the changes, and
the processes of matter, must, of necessity, understand the effects and
sum of what it does, has done, or can do, though his knowledge extends
not to all the parts and particulars thereof.