REASONS WHICH LEAD US TO BELIEVE THAT THE GREATER PART OF THE ANCIENT
ORACLES WERE ONLY IMPOSITIONS OF THE PRIESTS AND PRIESTESSES, WHO
FEIGNED THAT THEY WERE INSPIRED BY GOD.
If it is true, as has been thought by many, both among the ancients
and the moderns, that the oracles of pagan antiquity were only
illusions and deceptions on the part of the priests and priestesses,
who said that they were possessed by the spirit of Python, and filled
with the inspiration of Apollo, who discovered to them internally
things hidden and past, or present and future, I must not place them
here in the rank of evil spirits. The devil has no other share in the
matter than he has always in the crimes of men, and in that multitude
of sins which cupidity, ambition, interest, and self-love produce in
the world; the demon being always ready to seize an occasion to
mislead us, and draw us into irregularity and error, employing all
our passions to lead us into these snares. If what he has foretold is
followed by fulfilment, either by chance, or because he has foreseen
certain circumstances unknown to men, he takes to himself all the
credit of it, and makes use of it to gain our confidence and
conciliate credit for his predictions; if the thing is doubtful, and
he knows not what the issue of it will be, the demon, the priest, or
priestess will pronounce an equivocal oracle, in order that at all
events they may appear to have spoken true.
The ancient legislators of Greece, the most skillful politicians, and
generals of armies, dexterously made use of the prepossession of the
people in favor of oracles, to persuade them what they had concerted
was approved of by the gods, and announced by the oracle. These things
and these oracles were often followed by success, not because the
oracle had predicted or ordained it, but because the enterprise being
well concerted and well conducted, and the soldiers also perfectly
persuaded that God was on their side, fought with more than ordinary
valor. Sometimes they gained over the priestess by the aid of
presents, and thus disposed her to give favorable replies. Demosthenes
haranguing at Athens against Philip, King of Macedon, said that the
priestess of Delphi _Philipized_, and only pronounced oracles
conformable to the inclinations, advantage, and interest of that
prince.
Porphyry, the greatest enemy of the Christian name,[202] makes no
difficulty of owning that these oracles were dictated by the spirit of
falsehood, and that the demons are the true authors of enchantments,
philtres, and spells; that they fascinate or deceive the eyes by the
spectres and phantoms which they cause to appear; that they
ambitiously desire to pass for gods; that their aerial and spiritual
bodies are nourished by the smell and smoke of the blood and fat of
the animals which are immolated to them; and that the office of
uttering oracles replete with falsehood, equivocation, and deceit has
devolved upon them. At the head of these demons he places _Hecate and
Serapis_. Jamblichus, another pagan author, speaks of them in the same
manner, and with as much contempt.
The ancient fathers who lived so near the times when these oracles
existed, several of whom had forsaken paganism and embraced
Christianity, and who consequently knew more about the oracles than we
can, speak of them as things invented, governed, and maintained by the
demons. The most sensible among the heathens do not speak of them
otherwise, but also they confess that often the malice, imposition,
servility and interest of the priests had great share in the matter,
and that they abused the simplicity, credulity and prepossessions of
the people.
Plutarch says,[203] that a governor of Cilicia having sent to consult
the oracle of Mopsus, as he was going to Malle in the same country,
the man who carried the billet fell asleep in the temple, where he saw
in a dream a handsome looking man, who said to him the single word
_black_. He carried this reply to the governor, whose mysterious
question he knew nothing about. Those who heard this answer laughed at
it, not knowing what was in the billet: but the governor having opened
it showed them these words written in it; _shall I immolate to thee a
black ox or a white one?_ and that the oracle had thus answered his
question without opening the note. But who can answer for their not
having deceived the bearer of the billet in this case, as did
Alexander of Abonotiche, a town of Paphlagonia, in Asia Minor. This
man had the art to persuade the people of his country that he had with
him the god Esculapius, in the shape of a tame serpent, who pronounced
oracles, and replied to the consultations addressed to him on divers
diseases without opening the billets they placed on the altar of the
temple of this pretended divinity; after which, without opening them,
they found the next morning the reply written below. All the trick
consisted in the seal being raised artfully by a heated needle, and
then replaced after having written the reply at the bottom of the
note, in an obscure and enigmatical style, after the manner of other
oracles. At other times he used mastic, which being yet soft, took the
impression of the seal, then when that was hardened he put on another
seal with the same impression. He received about ten sols (five pence)
per billet, and this game lasted all his life, which was a long one;
for he died at the age of seventy, being struck by lightning, near the
end of the second century of the Christian era: all which may be found
more at length in the book of Lucian, entitled _Pseudo Manes_, or _the
false Diviner_. The priest of the oracle of Mopsus could by the same
secret open the billet of the governor who consulted him, and showing
himself during the night to the messenger, declared to him the
above-mentioned reply.
Macrobius[204] relates that the Emperor Trajan, to prove the oracle of
Heliopolis in Phoenicia, sent him a well-sealed letter in which
nothing was written; the oracle commanded that a blank letter should
also be sent to the emperor. The priests of the oracle were much
surprised at this, not knowing the reason of it. Another time the same
emperor sent to consult this same oracle to know whether he should
return safe from his expedition against the Parthians. The oracle
commanded that they should send him some branches of a knotted vine,
which was sacred in his temple. Neither the emperor nor any one else
could guess what that meant; but his body, or rather his bones, having
been brought to Rome after his death, which happened during his journey,
it was supposed that the oracle had intended to predict his death, and
designate his fleshless bones, which somewhat resemble the branches of a
vine.
It is easy to explain this quite otherwise. If he had returned
victorious, the vine being the source of wine which rejoices the heart
of man, and is agreeable to both gods and men, would have typified his
victory--and if the expedition had proved fruitless, the wood of the
vine, which is useless for any kind of work, and only good for burning
as firewood, might in that case signify the inutility of this
expedition. It is allowed that the artifice, malice, and inventions of
the heathen priests had much to do with the oracles; but are we to
infer from this that the demon had no part in the matter?
We must allow that as by degrees the light of the Gospel was spread in
the world, the reign of the demon, ignorance, corruption of morals,
and crime, diminished. The priests who pretended to predict, by the
inspiration of the evil spirit, things concealed from mortal
knowledge, or who misled the people by their illusions and impostures,
were obliged to confess that the Christians imposed silence on them,
either by the empire they exercised over the devil, or else by
discovering the malice and knavishness of the priests, which the
people had not dared to sound, from a blind respect which they had for
this mystery of iniquity.
If in our days any one would deny that in former times there were
oracles which were rendered by the inspiration of the demon, we might
convince him of it by what is still practiced in Lapland, and by what
missionaries[205] relate, that in India the demon reveals things
hidden and to come, not by the mouth of idols, but by that of the
priests, who are present when they interrogate either the statues or
the demon. And they remark that there the demon becomes mute and
powerless, in proportion as the light of the Gospel is spread among
these nations. Thus then the silence of the oracles may be
attributed--1. To a superhuman cause, which is the power of Jesus
Christ, and the publication of the Gospel. 2. Mankind are become less
superstitious, and bolder in searching out the cause of these
pretended revelations. 3. To their having become less credulous, as
Cicero says.[206] 4. Because princes have imposed silence on the
oracles, fearing that they might inspire the nation with rebellious
principles. For which reason, Lucan says, that princes feared to
discover the future.[207]
Strabo[208] conjectures that the Romans neglected them because they
had the Sibylline books, and their auspices (aruspices, or
haruspices), which stood them instead of oracles. M. Vandale
demonstrates that some remains of the oracles might yet be seen under
the Christian emperors. It was then only in process of time that
oracles were entirely abolished; and it may be boldly asserted that
sometimes the evil spirit revealed the future, and inspired the
ministers of false gods, by permission of the Almighty, who wished to
punish the confidence of the infidels in their idols. It would be
going too far, if we affirmed that all that was said of the oracles
was only the effect of the artifices or the malice of the priests, who
always imposed on the credulity of mankind. Read on this subject the
learned reply of Father Balthus to the treatises of MM. Vandale and
Fontenelle.
Footnotes:
[202] Porphr. apud Euseb. de Praepar. Evang. lib, iv. c. 5, 6.
[203] Plutarch, de Defectu Oracul. p. 434.
[204] Macrob. Saturnal. lib. i. c. 23.
[205] Lettres edifiantes, tom. x.
[206] Cicero, de Divinat. lib. ii. c. 57.
[207]
"Reges timent futura
Et superos vetant loqui."
_Lucan_, Pharsal. lib. v. p. 112.
[208] Strabo, lib. xvii.