_Sincerity of Plutarch’s belief in Dæmons—Function
of the Dæmons as Mediators not confined to oracular
inspiration—Dæmons in their personal relationship with the
human soul—The DE DÆMONIO SOCRATIS—This tract not a formal
treatise on Demonology—Various explanations of the Socratic
“Dæmon”—Ethical value of the conception of Dæmons as spiritual
guardians of individual men—“Men may rise on stepping-stones
of their dead selves to higher things”—Dangers of the
conception—Superstition: Plutarch’s general attitude towards
that Vice._
The evident sincerity of Plutarch’s piety—his attitude of more than
toleration towards everything consecrated by the religious tradition of
his age and country—render it impossible for us to regard his system of
Dæmonology as a mere concession made by Rationalism to Superstition.[311]
But it is not the less clear that Plutarch thinks he has found in the
existence of Dæmons not only a means of communication between God and
man, but a means of reconciliation between Philosophy and Piety, between
Boethus and Serapion. It is a very happy circumstance for a man’s
moral progress when he finds Religion and Reason in an agreement so
plausible; and when Reason has in some way furnished the very means of
agreement—for was it not Plato himself to whom most people had gone for
their Dæmonology?—the resulting tendency will have the strength of two
harmonizing influences, instead of the halting weakness of a compromise
between two mutually conflicting elements.[312] Plato’s Dæmonology is a
trick of fence: an ironical pose of sympathetic agreement with popular
ideas: but Plutarch does not see this, and can honestly think himself a
Platonist, a philosopher, even on a question whose settlement demands
philosophical concessions all along the line. It is true that there was
one gain for Philosophy which, in Plutarch’s mind, would compensate for
even greater sacrifices than it was actually called upon to make: the
gain, namely, that each concession to the belief in Dæmons would bring
into greater prominence the pure splendour and naked simplicity of the
idea of God. As God was withdrawn not only from participation in the
ignoble adventures of the Homeric legends, but also from the direct
inspiration of oracular and prophetic phrensy, His character would become
more worthy of the adoration of the Best, while His omnipotence would
be maintained by virtue of the controlling power exercised by Him over
all subordinate powers. The gain for a philosophic conception of the
Deity was so great in this direction, that we are without surprise in
seeing Plutarch proceed still further on the same path. The Dæmons by
their divine alloy come into close contact with the nature of God: they
perform many functions as interpreters of the Divine Will to humanity.
But by virtue of the human element in their character, they are fitted
for assuming a personal relationship with individual men, and for
becoming the instruments by means of which God enters into those ethical
relations with humanity which we have seen described in the “De Sera
Numinis Vindicta.” The hint for this aspect of their work and influence
Plutarch has found in the Hesiodic people of the golden age, whose death
promoted them to the duty of keeping watch over the actions of men. We
have seen him already develop this hint in an assertion that the Dæmons,
in addition to attending on shrines and religious ceremonies, are endowed
with punitive authority over great sinners; and the ethical value of
the doctrine is enforced in a passage in which the love of justice, the
fear of dishonour, the adoration of virtue, the amenities and graces
of civilized life, are intimately associated with the belief that good
deities and Dæmons keep a watch upon our career.[313] This belief in
an intimate personal relation between men and Dæmons received its most
notorious expression in the famous philosophic tradition of the Dæmon of
Socrates, and it is naturally in a tract with this title that we have the
fullest information respecting Plutarch’s view of the personal connexion
between Dæmons and men. The essay, “On the Dæmon of Socrates,” does
not, however, contain an exhaustive and scientific discussion of this
interesting aspect of Theology similar to that given by Apuleius in his
tract with the same designation. At first we find ourselves plunged into
the midst of a most dramatically told piece of history—the famous Return
of the Theban Exiles under Pelopidas after the treacherous seizure of
the Cadmea by the Spartans. In the pauses of the plot the Thebans—averse
from such studies as their character is supposed to have been—discourse
on these high questions of religious philosophy, and one would almost
guess that Plutarch’s subsidiary intention was to indicate, by the
broken character of the discussion, the difficulty of attaining to a
complete and final view of the subject. Various rational and supernatural
explanations of the well-known Socratic expression are suggested,
explanations which vary in harmony with the different types of character,
or mental attitude, already familiar in Plutarch. Galaxidorus takes the
extreme rationalistic view. He rebukes Philosophy for promising to pursue
scientific methods in the investigation of “the Good and the Expedient,”
and then, in contempt of Reason, falling back upon the gods as principles
of action, thus relying on dreams instead of demonstrations.[314]
He thinks the Dæmon of Socrates was nothing but the “last straw”
which inclines, in one direction or the other, a man whose close and
experienced study of every aspect of the case has not enabled him to come
to a practical decision. A sneeze might be the grain which turned the
balance. Phidolaus will not allow so “great a phenomenon of prophetic
inspiration” to be explained by a sneeze, a method of divination which
“is only jestingly used by common people in small matters.”[315] A
statement of Simmias to the effect that he had heard Socrates often
inveighing against those who asserted they had seen a divine vision,
while he always listened sympathetically to those who said they had
heard a voice, leads to a general surmise that the Dæmon may have been
“not an apparition, but the perception of a voice or the interpretation
of a word, which had occurred to him under extraordinary circumstances,
just as in a dream there is no actual voice, but we have fancies and
notions of words, and imagine that we can hear people speaking.”[316]
Archidamas, who is narrating the dialogue and its events to Caphisias,
here expounds his own views on the subject in the light of the foregoing
explanation. He thinks that the voice, or the perception of a voice,
which influenced Socrates, was the speech of a Dæmon, who, without the
intermediation of audible sound, made this direct appeal to the mind of
the pure and passionless sage;[317] it was the influence of a superior
intelligence and of a diviner soul, operating upon the soul of Socrates,
whose calm and holy temper fitted him “to hear this spiritual speech
which, though filling all the air around, is only heard by those whose
souls are freed from passion, and its perturbing influence.”[318] Here
we have the extreme religious view placed, as usual, in contrast with
the sceptical rationalism of Galaxidorus, which has also been indirectly
opposed by a narrative of the events, involving the hearing of a Dæmonic
voice, connected with the death and burial of a Pythagorean philosopher,
Lysis, from which it appears that the Pythagoreans believed that a few
men only were under the guardian care of the Dæmons.[319] These two
opposing views having been fully expounded by their respective defenders,
we should now expect the dialogue to be concluded, in the usual manner of
Plutarch, with a compromise between the rationalistic and the religious
attitudes. But on this occasion we are disappointed. Plutarch abandons
the _rôle_ of rationalist and gives himself up entirely to the view of
Dæmonic influence expounded by Archidamas, taking Myth for his guide
again whither Philosophy refuses to go. He is careful, however, as in the
parallel case in the “De Sera Numinis Vindicta,” at once to still the
suspicion of the philosopher and to put the pious reader on his guard,
by suggesting a contrast between Myth and Reason before entering on the
narrative, a warning which is strongly emphasized by the fact that even
Theocritus, “the Soothsayer,” can only claim for Myth, that it is not to
be depended upon for scientific accuracy, but only sometimes comes in
contact with Truth.[320] The Myth in this case describes the experiences
in the Cave of Trophonius of the young philosopher Timarchus, a friend
of Socrates, who desired to ascertain the true nature of the “Dæmon” of
that great man. The story is told with considerable beauty of imagery, an
example of Plutarch’s skill in which we have already seen in the similar
story of Thespesius of Soli. The soul of the philosopher leaves his body
through the sutures of the cranium. In the subterranean regions he stays
two nights and a day, receiving from an invisible spirit much information
concerning the afterworld and the beings who inhabit it. The main object
of the story seems to be to establish and elucidate the ethical value
of the doctrine of Dæmonology, while at the same time we note that a
mystical significance now begins to be attached to certain principles
long the topic of discussion in the schools. Timarchus is informed by the
invisible spirit that there are four principles which operate throughout
the universe: the first of Life, the second of Motion, the third of
Generation, the fourth of Corruption. The sphere of Life is united to the
sphere of Motion by the _Monad_ in the world of invisibility; the sphere
of Motion is united to the sphere of Generation by _Nous_ in the Sun; the
sphere of Generation is united to the sphere of Corruption by _Nature_ in
the Moon. Over each of these unions a Fate presides. The other “islands”
are peopled by gods: but the Moon is inhabited by Epichthonian Dæmons,
being raised only a little above Styx, which is “the way to Hell.”[321]
Styx periodically seizes upon many of these souls in the Moon, and they
are swallowed up in Hell. Other souls, at the end of their participation
in the life of generation, are received into the Moon from below, except
such as are “polluted and unpurified,” these being driven away from her
by thunder and lightning to undergo another period of generation. As in
the myth of Thespesius, there is a chasm through which the souls pass
and repass to and from the life of earth. “What,” asks Timarchus, “are
these stars that dart about the chasm, some descending into its depths,
others arising from it?” “These are Dæmons,” he is told; and we can
only conclude that they are identical with the souls already described
as inhabiting the Moon. These Dæmons are incarnated in mankind. Some
are altogether dominated by the passions and appetites of the body,
others enter into it only partly, retaining the purest portion of their
substance unmingled with the human frame. “It is not dragged down, but
floats above the top of the head of a man, who is, as it were, sinking
in the depths, but whose soul is supported by the connexion so long as
it is submissive to this influence, and is not controlled by its bodily
passions. The part beneath the waves in the body is called the soul; but
the eternal, uncorrupted part is called the mind, by those who think it
is within the body.—Those who rightly judge, know it to be outside, and
describe it as a Dæmon.” The point of this narrative is emphasized by
Theanor, who expresses his belief that “there are very few men whom God
honours by addressing his commands directly to them. The souls of such
men, freed from the domination of passion and earthly desires, become
Dæmons, who act as guardian angels to certain men, whose long-continued
struggles after the good excite their attention, and at last obtain their
assistance.” Each of these Dæmons loves to help the soul confided to its
care, and to save it by its inspirations. The soul who adheres to the
Dæmon, and listens to its warnings, attains a happy ending; those who
refuse to obey are abandoned by it, and may expect no happiness.[322]
“The connexion which attaches the Dæmon to the soul is, as it were, a
restraint upon the irrational part thereof. When Reason pulls the chain
it gives rise to repentance for the sins which the soul has committed
under the influence of passion, shame for illicit and immoderate
indulgences, and finally produces a tendency to submit in quiet patience
to the better influence of the Dæmon. The condition of absolute
submission does not come all at once, but those who have been obedient
to their Dæmon from the very beginning constitute the class of prophets
and god-inspired men.” The Dæmons have here assigned to them a protective
care of humanity; they assist the souls who struggle after goodness,
and desert those who refuse to obey their injunctions. A few good men,
specially honoured by the deity, may themselves become Dæmons, and act as
guardian angels to others. Plutarch repeats this view more systematically
elsewhere, giving it a more general application. “It is maintained by
some that ... just as water is perceived to be produced from earth, from
water, air, and from air, fire, in a constantly ascending process, so
also the better souls undergo a transformation from men to heroes, from
heroes to dæmons, and from dæmons, some few souls, being purified through
prolonged practice of virtue, are brought to a participation in the
divine nature itself.”[323]
This examination of the story of Timarchus lends a strong support to
the statement already made respecting Plutarch’s use of myth. In the
“De Sera Numinis Vindicta” we saw that he could not accept as a subject
of rational demonstration the theory of rewards and punishments in a
future life; but so convinced is he of the ethical value of that belief
that he has recourse to a most solemn myth, which he clearly hopes
will operate for goodness through the imagination if not through the
intellect. The myth embodied in the “De Dæmonio Socratis” has a similar
origin and an identical aim. How important to a man in his efforts after
Goodness to know that he is under the observation of a Being whose
half-human, half-divine nature, fits him equally to feel sympathy and
administer aid! That is an aspect of Plutarch’s teaching which requires
no emphasis to-day.... With the Plutarchean doctrine of Dæmons is also
involved the sublimely moral notion of eternal endeavour after a higher
and more perfect goodness. The human being who earnestly strives to be
good within the limits of his present opportunities will have a larger
sphere of activity thrown open to him as a Dæmon in the Afterworld. The
human soul transfigured into the strength and splendour of this higher
nature has work to perform which may develop such qualities as will bring
their owner into closer proximity with the Highest Divine. The doctrine
of Dæmons, as expounded by Plutarch, involves the profound moral truth
that there is no limit to the perfectibility of human nature; and we can
surely forgive much that is irrational and fantastic in a scheme which
embodies so effective an inspiration to goodness.[324]
But the value and moral dignity of any principle depend upon the method
of its interpretation and application. That sense of personal dependence
upon a benevolent supernatural power which Plutarch associates with
the teachings of Dæmonology may be identical with the purest and
loftiest religion, or may degenerate into the meanest and most degrading
superstition, according to its development in the mind of the individual
believer. If this intercourse is regarded as spiritual only, the
communion of soul with soul in the “sessions of sweet, silent thought,”
high religious possibilities issue which no form of faith can dispense
with. Any attempt to degrade this intercourse to material ends, or to
appeal to it through material channels, involves recourse to magical
rites, and superstitious practices of the grossest description. It is
necessary, too, that even where there is no recourse to materialistic
avenues of access to the spiritual world, the mind should cultivate a
belief in the benevolence of the Higher Powers so that it may maintain a
rational dignity and fearlessness in its communion with them. Plutarch
is aware of these clangers. He knows that Dæmonology, and even Theology,
may involve Superstition, and he takes pains to close those avenues to
its approach, which a misunderstanding of the subject, a mistaken mental
attitude towards it, may easily throw widely open. He seldom misses an
opportunity of inculcating the proper attitude of mind to assume in face
of questions of Religion, or of placing such questions in an atmosphere
of clear and rational daylight, which is equally unlike the dim gloom of
Superstition, and the blinding glare of Atheism. In a word, he continues
to make Reason his Mystagogue to Religion. Polemically, as against the
Epicureans, he is inclined to argue that Atheism is an unmixed evil,
since it deprives mankind of Hope, Courage, and Pleasure, and leaves us
no refuge in God from the sorrows and troubles of life.[325] He adds
that Superstition should be removed as a dimming rheum from before our
eyes; but, if that is impossible, we must not knock the eye out for the
sake of removing the rheum, or turn the sight of Faith to the blindness
of Atheism in order to destroy false ideas of the Deity. Although he
admits that there are some men for whom it is best to be in fear of God;
although he knows that a much greater number combine with their honour
and worship of the Deity a certain superstitious fear and dread of Him;
yet he insists most strongly that these feelings are totally eclipsed
by the hope and joy that attend their communion with God.[326] He
draws a beautiful picture of the happiness accompanying participation
in divine services, asserting, in a lofty strain of religious feeling,
that it is from a recognition of the presence of God in these services
that the sense of happiness proceeds. “He that denies the Providence of
God has no share in this exceeding joy. For it is not abundance of wine
and well-cooked meats that gladden our hearts in a religious festival;
it is our good hope and belief that God Himself is graciously present
and approving our acts.” Without this conviction, he insists, the
religious value of the ceremony is utterly lost.[327] To approach the
gods with cheerfulness and courage and openness is the soul of Plutarch’s
religion, and he is faithful to this principle on the most diverse
occasions. Fond of Literature as he is, there are many famous passages
of classical verse which he will not permit youthful students to carry
away into their lives as factors in ethical progress until they have
been harmonized with the claims of a rational criticism. Thus he quotes
a verse of Sophocles—“God is a cause of fear to prudent men”—and insists
that “fear” should be changed to “hope,” lest those should be justified
who regard “with suspicion and dread as the cause of injury the power
that is the principle and origin of all good.”[328] And when dealing with
the sanctities of domestic life he insists that one important element of
conjugal happiness lies in the avoidance of separate worship on the part
of the wife, and in a closing of the door on superfluous ministrations
and the practices of foreign superstition. “For,” says he, “there is no
god who takes delight in stolen and secret sacrifices on the part of a
wife.”[329] These passages, selected from various portions of Plutarch’s
ethical teachings, show how strongly it is his practice to emphasize a
note of cheerful and open courage in worship as an essential part of
religious belief. But it is in the well-known essay “on Superstition”
that he most thoroughly expounds this aspect of his philosophy, and
no endeavour to understand Plutarch’s mental attitude in face of a
problem which always affects humanity would be successful without a
careful analysis of that treatise. The “De Iside et Osiride” attempts to
safeguard the mind from the attacks of Superstition on the side of the
Intellect, as the “De Superstitione” does on the side of the Imagination,
and the two tracts have therefore an organic connexion which renders it
necessary to treat them together as expounding different aspects of the
same question.