which alone, as being undefiled by slaughter and death, they say
that Pythagoras would permit approach. And will they not believe
us when we say that the righteous soul is the truly sacred altar?
But I believe that sacrifices were invented by men _to be a pretext
for eating flesh_, and yet, without such idolatry, they might have
partaken of it.”
He next glances at the _popular_ reason for the Pythagorean abstinence,
and declares:--
“If any righteous man does not burden his soul by the eating
of flesh, he has the advantage of a rational motive, not, as
Pythagoras and his followers dream, of the transmigration of the
soul. Now Xenokrates, treating of ‘Food derived from Animals,’[72]
and Polemon in his work ‘On Life according to Nature,’[72] seem
clearly to affirm that animal food is unwholesome. If it be said
that the lower animals were assigned to man--and we partly admit
it--yet it was not entirely for food; nor were all animals, but
_such as do not work_. And so the comic poet, Plato, says not badly
in the drama of _The Feasts_:--
‘For of the quadrupeds we should not slay
In future aught but swine. For they have flesh
Most delicate: and about the swine is nought
For us: excepting bristles, dirt, and noise.’
Some eat them as being useless, others as destructive of fruits,
and others do not eat them because they are said to have strong
propensity to coition. It is alleged that the greatest amount of
fatty substance is produced by swine’s flesh: it may, then, be
appropriate for those whose ambition is for the body; it is not so
for those who cultivate the soul, by reason of the dulling of the
faculties resulting from eating of flesh. The Gnostic, perhaps,
too, will abstain for the sake of training, and that the body
may not grow wanton in amorousness. ‘For wine,’ says Andokides,
‘and gluttonous feeds of flesh make the body strong, but the
soul more sluggish.’ Accordingly such food, in order to a clear
understanding, is to be rejected.”[73]
In a chapter in his _Miscellanies_, discussing the comparative merits
of the Pagan and of the Jewish code of ethics, he displays much
eloquence in attempting to prove the superiority of the latter. In the
course of his argument he is led to make some acknowledgment of the
claims of the lower animals which, however incomplete, is remarkable
as being almost unique in Christian theology. He quotes certain of the
“Proverbs,” _e.g._, ‘The merciful man is long-suffering, and in every
one who shows solicitude there is wisdom,’ and proceeds (assuming the
indebtedness of the Greeks to the Jews):--
“Pythagoras seems to me to have derived his mildness towards
irrational animals from the Law. For instance, he interdicted the
employment of the young of sheep and goats and cows for some time
after their birth; not even on the pretext of sacrifice allowing
it, on account both of the young ones and of the mother; training
men to gentleness by their conduct towards those beneath them.
‘Resign,’ he says, ‘the young one to the mother for the proper
time.’ For if nothing takes place without a cause, and milk is
produced in large quantity in parturition for the sustenance of the
progeny, he who tears away the young one from the supply of the
milk and the breast of the mother, dishonours Nature.”
Reverting to the Jewish religion, he asserts:--
“The Law, too, expressly prohibits the slaying of such animals as
are pregnant till they have brought forth, remotely restraining the
proneness of men to do wrong to men; and thus also it has extended
its clemency to the irrational animals, that by the exercise of
humanity to beings of different races we may practise amongst those
of the same species a larger abundance of it. Those too that kick
the bellies of certain animals before parturition, in order to
feast on flesh mixed with milk, make the womb created for the birth
of the fœtus its grave, though the Law expressly commands ‘but
neither shalt thou seethe a lamb in his mother’s milk.’[74] For the
nourishment of the living animal, it is meant, may not be converted
into sauce for that which has been deprived of life; and that which
is the cause of life may not co-operate in the consumption of its
flesh.”[75]
IX.
PORPHYRY. 233-306 (?) A.D.
One of the most erudite, as well as one of the most spiritual, of the
_literati_ of any age or people, and certainly the most estimable of
all the extant Greek philosophers after the days of Plutarch, was
born either at Tyre or at some neighbouring town. His original name,
Malchus, the Greek form of the Syrian Melech (king), and the name by
which he is known to us, Porphyrius (purple-robed), we may well take
deservedly to mark his philosophic superiority. He was exceptionally
fortunate in his preceptors--Longinus, the most eloquent and elegant
of the later Greek critics, under whom he studied at Athens; Origen,
the most independent and learned of the Christian Fathers, from whom,
probably, he derived his vast knowledge of theological literature;
and, finally, Plotinus, the famous founder of New-Platonism, who had
established his school at Rome in the year 244.
Upon first joining the school of Plotinus, he had ventured to contest
some of the characteristic doctrines of his new teacher, and he even
wrote a book to refute them. Amerius, his fellow-disciple, was
chosen to reply to this attack. After a second trial of strength by
each antagonist, Amerius, by weight of argument induced Porphyry to
confess his errors, and to read his recantation before the assembled
Platonists. Porphyry ever after remained an attached and enthusiastic
follower of the beloved master, with the final revision and edition
of whose voluminous works he was entrusted. He had lived with him
six years when, becoming so far unsettled in his mind as even to
contemplate suicide in order to free himself from the shackles of the
flesh, by the persuasion of his preceptor he made a voyage to Sicily
for the restoration of his health and serenity of mind. This was in
270, in the thirty-seventh year of his age. Returning to the capital
upon the death of his master, he continued the amiable but vain work
of attempting the reform of the established religion, which had then
sunk to its lowest degradation, and to this labour of love he may be
said to have devoted his whole life. At an advanced age he married
Marcella, the widow of one of his friends, who was a Christian and the
mother of a rather numerous progeny, with the view, as he tells us, of
superintending the education of her children.
About sixty separate works of Porphyry are enumerated by Fabricius,
published, unpublished, or lost; the last numbering some forty-three
distinct productions. The most important of his writings are--
(1) _On Abstinence from the Flesh of Living Beings_,[76] in four books,
addressed to a certain Firmus Castricius, a Pythagorean, who for some
reason or other had become a renegade to the principles, or at least to
the practice, of his old faith. Next to the inculcation of abstinence
as a spiritual or moral obligation, Porphyry’s “chief object seems to
have been to recommend a more spiritual worship in the place of the
sacrificial system of the pagan world, with all its false notions and
practical abuses. This work,” adds Dr. Donaldson, “is valuable on many
accounts, and full of information.”
(2) His criticism on Christianity, which he entitled a _Treatise
against the Christians_--his most celebrated production. It was divided
into fifteen books. All our knowledge of it is derived from Eusebius,
Jerome, and other ecclesiastical writers. Several years after its
appearance the courtly Bishop of Cæsarea, the well-known historian of
the first ages of Christianity, replied to it in a work extending to
twenty-five books. More than a century later, Theodosius II. caused
the obnoxious volume to be publicly burned, and Porphyry’s criticism
shared the fate of those “many elaborate treatises which have since
been committed to the flames” by the theological or political zeal of
orthodox emperors and princes.[77]
(3) _The Life of Pythagoras_--a fragment, but, as far as it goes, the
most interesting of the Pythagorean biographies.
(4) _On the Life of Plotinus and the Arrangement of his Works._ It is
to this biography we are indebted for our knowledge of the estimable
elaborator of New-Platonism. We learn that he was the pupil of
Ammonius, who disputes with Numenius the fame of having originated
the principles of the new school of thought of which Plotinus,
however, was the St. Paul--the actual founder. Of a naturally feeble
constitution, he had early betaken himself to the consolations of
divine philosophy. After vainly seeking rest for his truth-loving and
aspiring spirit in other systems, he at last found in Ammonius the
teacher and teaching which his intellectual and spiritual sympathies
demanded. His great ambition was to visit the country of Buddha and of
Zerdusht or Zoroaster, and, for that purpose, he joined the expedition
of the Emperor Gordian against the Persians. The defeat and death
of that prince frustrated his plans. He then settled at Rome, where
he established his school, and he remained in Italy until his death
in 270. By the earnest solicitations of his disciples, Porphyry and
Amerius, he was induced with much reluctance to publish his oral
discourses, and eventually they appeared in fifty-four books, edited by
Porphyry, who gave them the name of the _Enneads_, as being arranged in
six groups of _nine_ treatises. Perhaps no teacher ever engaged to so
unbounded an extent the admiration and affection of his followers.
“During the long period of his residence at Rome, Plotinus enjoyed
an estimation almost approaching to a belief in his superhuman
wisdom and sanctity. His ascetic virtue, and the mysterious
transcendentalism of his conversation, which made him the Coleridge
of the day, seems to have carried away the minds of his associates,
and raised them to a state of imaginative exaltation. He was
regarded as a sort of prophet, divine himself, and capable of
elevating his disciples to a participation in his divinity....
These coincidences or collusions [his alleged miracles] show how
sacred a character had attached to Plotinus. And we see the same
evidenced in his social influence. Men and women of the highest
rank crowded round him, and his house was filled with young persons
of both sexes whom their parents when dying had committed to his
care. Rogatian, a senator and prætor-elect, gave up his wealth
and dignities, and lived as the humble bedesman of his friends,
devoting himself to ascetic and contemplative philosophy. His
self-denial obtained for him the approbation of Plotinus, who
held him up as a pattern of philosophy; and he gained the more
solid advantage of a perfect cure from the worst kind of rheumatic
gout. The influence of Plotinus extended to the imperial throne
itself. The weak-minded Gallienus, and his Empress Salonina, were
so completely guided by the philosopher, that he had actually
obtained permission to convert a ruined City of Campania into a
_Platonopolis_, in which the laws of Plato’s _Republic_ were to be
tested by a practical experiment; and the philosopher had promised
to retire thither accompanied by his chief friends.”
The “practical common sense” (which usually may be interpreted to mean
cynical indifferentism), of the statesmen and politicians of the day
interposed to prevent this attempt at a realisation of Plato’s great
ideal; and, considering the prematurity of such ideas in the then
condition of the world--and, it must be added, the extravagance of some
of them--we can, perhaps, hardly regret that his “Republic” was never
instituted. As to the essence and spirit of the teaching of Plotinus,
“He cannot be termed, strictly or exclusively, a Neo-Platonist: he
is equally a Neo-Aristotelian and a _Neo-Philosopher_ in general.
He has himself one pervading idea, to which he is always recurring,
and to which he accommodates, as far as he can, the reasonings of
all his predecessors. It is his object to proclaim and exalt the
immanent divinity of man, and to raise the soul to a contemplation
of the good and the true, and to vindicate its independence of
all that is sensuous, transitory, and special. With an enthusiasm
bordering on fanaticism, he proclaims his philosophical faith in
an unseen world: and, rejecting with indignation the humiliating
attempt to make out that the spiritual world is no better than an
essence or elixir drained off from the material--that thoughts
are ‘merely the shadows and ghosts of sensations,’ he tells his
disciples that the inward eyes of consciousness and conscience were
to be purged and unsealed at the fountain of heavenly radiance,
before they can discern the true form and colours and value of
spiritual objects.”
The personal humility of this sublime teacher, we may add, seems to
have equalled the loftiness of his inspiration.
Of the other writings of Porphyry, space allows us to refer only to
his _Epistle to Anebo_--a critical refutation of some of the popular
prejudices of Pagan theology, such as the grosser dæmonism, necromancy,
and incantation,[78] and, above all, animal sacrifice, to which his
keen spiritual sense was essentially antagonistic. It is known only by
fragments preserved in Eusebius. As to the theological or metaphysical
opinions of Porphyry, “it is clear,” remarks Dr. Donaldson, “that he
had but little faith in the old polytheism of the Greeks. He expressly
tells his wife (Letter to Marcella) that outward worship does neither
good nor harm.” In truth, as regards the better parts of Christianity,
he was nearer to the religion of Jesus than of Jupiter, although he
found himself in opposition to what he considered the evils or errors
of dogmatic Christian theology. In common with most of the principal
expounders of Neo-Platonism,[79] his sympathies were with much that
was contained in the Christian Scriptures, and, in particular, with
the fourth Gospel, the sublime beginning of which, we are assured,
the disciples of Plato regarded as “an exact transcript of their own
opinions,” and which, as St. Augustin informs us (_De Civ. Dei_ x.,
29), they declared to be worthy to be written in letters of gold, and
inscribed in the most conspicuous place in every Christian church.
As for the learning, as well as lofty ideas, of the author of the
treatise _On Abstinence_, there has been a general consensus of opinion
even from his theological opponents. Augustin, himself among the most
learned of the Latin Fathers, styles him _doctissimus philosophorum_
(“the most learned of the philosophers”), and, again, _philosophus
nobilis_ (“a noble philosopher”), “a man of no common mind” (_De
Civit. Dei_); and elsewhere he calls him “the great philosopher of the
heathen.” Even Eusebius, his immediate antagonist, concedes to him
the titles of “the noble philosopher,” “the wonderful theologian,”
“the great prophet of ineffable doctrines” (ὁ τῶν ἀποῤῥητων μύστης).
Donaldson, endorsing the common admiration of the moderns, describes
his learning and erudition as “stupendous.”
Amongst modern testimonies to the merits of Porphyry’s treatise,
_On Abstinence_, the sympathising remarks of Voltaire are worth
transcribing:--
“It is well known that Pythagoras embraced this humane doctrine
[of abstinence from flesh-eating] and carried it into Italy. His
disciples followed it through a long period of time. The celebrated
philosophers, Plotinus, Iamblichus, and Porphyry, recommended
and practised it, although it is sufficiently rare to practice
what one preaches. The work of Porphyry, written in the middle of
our third century, and very well translated into our language by
M. de Burigni, is much esteemed by the learned--but he has made
no more converts amongst us than has the book of the physician
Hecquet.[80] It is in vain that Porphyry alleges the example of
the Buddhists and Persian Magi of the first class, who held in
abhorrence the practice of engulfing the entrails of other beings
in their own--he is followed at present only by the Fathers of La
Trappe.[81] The treatise of Porphyry is addressed to one of his old
disciples, named Firmus, who became a Christian, it is said, to
recover his liberty to eat flesh and drink wine.
“He remonstrates with Firmus, that in abstaining from flesh and
from strong liquors the health of the soul and of the body is
preserved; that one lives longer and with more innocence. All
his reflections are those of a scrupulous theologian, of a rigid
philosopher, and of a gentle and sensitive spirit. One might
believe, in reading him, that this great enemy of the Church is a
Father of the Church. He does not speak of the _Metempsychosis_,
but he regards other animals as our brothers--_because_ they are
endowed with life as we, _because_ they have the same _principles_
of life, the same feelings, ideas, memory, industry, as we. Speech
alone is wanting to them. If they had it, should we dare to kill
and eat them? Should we dare to commit those fratricides? What
barbarian is there who would cause a lamb to be slaughtered and
roasted, if that lamb conjured him, by an affecting appeal, not to
be at once assassin and cannibal?
“This book, at least, proves that there were, among the ‘Gentiles,’
philosophers of the strictest and purest virtue. Yet they could
not prevail against the butchers and the _gourmands_. It is to
be remarked that Porphyry makes a very beautiful eulogy on the
Essenians. At that time the rivalship was who could be the most
virtuous--Essenians, Pythagoreans, Stoics, Christians. When
churches form but a small flock their manners are pure; they
degenerate as soon as they get powerful.”[82]
Of this famous treatise there is, it appears, only one English
translation, that of Taylor (1851), long out of print; and there is
a German version by Herr Ed. Baltzer, President of the Vegetarian
Society of Germany; thus we have to lament for Porphyry, no less than
for Plutarch, the indifferentism of the publishers, or rather of the
public, which allows a production, of an inspiration far above that of
the common herd of writers, to continue to be a sealed book for the
community in general.
It has been already stated that it consists of four Divisions. The
first treats of Abstinence from the point of view of Temperance and
Reason. In the second is considered the lawfulness or otherwise of
animal sacrifice. In the third Porphyry treats the subject from the
side of Justice. In the fourth he reviews the practice of some of
the nations of antiquity and of the East--of the Egyptians, Hindus,
and others. This last Book, by its abrupt termination, is evidently
unfinished.
Porphyry begins with an expression of surprise and regret at the
apostasy of the Pythagorean renegade:--
“For when I reflect with myself upon the cause of your change of
mind [so he addresses his former associate], I cannot believe,
as the vulgar herd will suppose, that it has anything to do
with reasons of health or strength, inasmuch as you yourself
were used to assert that the fleshless diet is more consonant
to healthfulness and to an even and proportionate endurance of
philosophic toils (σύμμετρον ὑπομονὴν τῶν περὶ φιλοσοφίαν πόνων),
and experience fully proved the truth of your conviction. Whether
then it was through some other fallacy or delusion, or through a
later notion that this or that diet makes no difference to the
intellectual powers, or whether it was from the fear of incurring
odium by opposition to orthodox customs, or what the reason may
have been, I am unable to conjecture.”
He expresses his hope, or rather his belief, that, at least, the lapse
was not due in this case to natural intemperance, or regret for the
gluttonous habits (λαιμαργίας) of flesh-eating.
He then proceeds to quote and refute the fallacies of the ordinary
systems and sects, and, in particular, the objections of one Clodius,
a Neapolitan, who had published a treatise against Pythagoreanism. He
professes that he does not hope to influence those who are engaged in
sordid and selfish, or in sanguinary, pursuits. Rather he addresses
himself to the man
“Who considers what he is, whence he came, and whither he ought
to tend; and who, in what pertains to the nourishment of the body
and other necessary concerns, is of really thoughtful and earnest
mind--who resolves that he shall not be led astray and governed
by his passions. And let such a man tell me whether a rich flesh
diet is more easily procured, or incites less to the indulgence of
irregular passions and appetites, than a light vegetable dietary.
But if neither he, nor a physician, nor, indeed, any reasonable man
whosoever, dares to affirm this, why do we persist in oppressing
ourselves with gross feeding? And why do we not, together with that
luxurious indulgence, throw off the encumbrances and snares which
attend it?
“It is not from those who have lived on innocent foods that
murderers, tyrants, robbers, and sycophants have come, but from
eaters of flesh. The necessaries of life are few and easily
procured, without violation of justice, liberty, or peace of mind;
whereas luxury obliges those ordinary souls who take delight in
it to covet riches, to give up their liberty, to sell justice, to
misspend their time, to ruin their health, and to renounce the
satisfaction of an upright conscience.”
In condemning animal sacrifice, he declares that “it is by means of
an exalted and purified intellect alone that we can approximate to
the Supreme Being, to whom nothing material should be offered.” He
distinguishes four degrees of virtue, the lowest being that of the man
who attempts to moderate his passions; the highest, the life of pure
reason, by which man becomes one with the Supreme Existence.
In the third book, maintaining that other animals are endowed with high
degrees of reasoning and of mental faculties, and, in some measure,
even with moral perception, Porphyry proceeds logically to insist that
they are, _therefore_, the proper objects of Justice:--
“By these arguments, and others which I shall afterwards adduce in
recording the opinions of the old peoples, it is demonstrated that
[many species of] the lower animals are rational. In very many,
reason is imperfect indeed--of which, nevertheless, they are by no
means destitute. Since then justice is due to rational beings, as
our opponents allow, how is it possible to evade the admission also
that we are bound to act justly towards the races of beings below
us? We do not extend the obligations of justice to plants, because
there appears in them no indication of reason; although, even in
the case of these, while we eat the fruits we do not, with the
fruits, cut away the trunks. We use corn and leguminous vegetables
when they have fallen on the earth and are dead. But no one uses
for food the flesh of dead animals, unless they have been killed by
violence, so that there is in these things a radical injustice. As
Plutarch says, it does not follow, because we are in need of many
things, that we should therefore act unjustly towards _all beings_.
Inanimate things we are allowed to injure to a certain extent, to
procure the necessary means of existence--if to take anything from
plants while they are growing can be said to be an injury--but to
destroy living and conscious beings merely for luxury and pleasure
is truly barbarous and unjust. And to refrain from killing them
neither diminishes our sustenance nor hinders our living happily.
If indeed the destruction of other animals and the eating of flesh
were as requisite as air and water, plants and fruits, then there
could be no injustice, as they would be necessary to our nature.”
Porphyry, it is scarcely necessary to remark, by these arguments proves
himself to have been, in moral as well as mental perception, as far
ahead of the average thinkers of the present day as he was of his own
times. He justly maintains that