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from Ocellus Lucanus, who in this instance deserted the principles of his master Pythagoras, and almost all the more ancient writers.

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It has been asserted that Plato never confounds the Soul of the universe with the one First Cause and Creator of all things. In illustration of this assertion it may not be uninteresting, however extravagant and little intelligible such a rhapsody "rather than a philosophy" may be in itself, to give a short abstract of the creation of the world compressed from the Timæus. Having observed that it is difficult to discover the Maker and Father of all things, and when we have discovered him it is impossible to reveal him to all men; having laid down a necessary distinction between what is created and uncreated, and declared that the one is discerned by reason and intelligence, (vónos,) the other by sensible perception, (anos,) the author proceeds to give an account of creation in terms which he premises will be akin to the nature of the subjects treated of, where proba

c Vide an extract from Philo Judæus in Gale's Opusc. Mytholog. p. 501. ed. 1688.

d Εστιν οὖν δὴ κατ ̓ ἐμὴν δόξαν πρῶτον διαιρετέον τάδε. τί τὸ ὂν ἀεὶ, γένεσιν δὲ οὐκ ἔχον, καὶ τί τὸ γιγνόμενον μὲν ἀεὶ, ἂν δὲ οὐδέποτε; Bekker, pars iii. vol. ii. Timæus, p. 22.

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bility not certainty is to be expected. In that flowing and beautiful language which is peculiar to him, as different from the compressed and simple style of the short composition by Timæus the Locrian as the ornamented Corinthian column from its Doric original, he explains in detail how the supreme Deity, influenced by the desire of diffusing his own goodness, out of disorder reduced to forder the fluctuating mass of matter, gave intelligence to the soul, united soul with body, till the whole material world arose into existence, an animal endowed with life and intelligence through the providence of God. In the formation of this visible fabric after the model of the invisible archetype which was eternal in the divine Mind, the Creator first took fire and earth, and made the union of these two substances complete by the addition of a third called Analogiah, or

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• Αγαθὸς ἦν, ἀγαθῷ δὲ οὐδεὶς περὶ οὐδενὸς οὐδέποτε ἐγγίγνεται φθόνος· τούτου δ ̓ ἐκτὸς ὢν πάντα ὅτι μάλιστα γενέσθαι ἐβουλήθη παραπλήσια Eavτ. Timæus, p. 25.

ἡ Εἰς τάξιν αὐτὸ ἡγαγεν ἐκ τῆς ἀταξίας. Timæus, ibid.

Β Ζῶον ἔμψυχον ἔννουν τε τῇ ἀληθείᾳ διὰ τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ γενέσθαι πρός volav. Timæus, p. 26.

h This Analogia appears to be the law of nature, like the apy Apuorías, the law of harmonious arrangement; (Aristot. Polit. lib. i. cap. 3;) or that law so beautifully described by Hooker, to which all things in heaven and earth do homage: Δεσμῶν δὲ κάλλιστος ὃς ἂν αὑτὸν καὶ τὰ ξυνδούμενα ὅτι μάλιστα εν To. Timæus, p. 28. The principles on which Analogia per

Proportion, which was to regulate the order and limits of their connection. The First Cause next took air and water, gave it in charge to Analogia to combine these with the former elements, and all with itself, till the one vast fabric was bound together in the ties of friendship indissoluble, except at the hands of him who first connected it. The supreme Creator then assigned motion to the whole, and placed a soul in the centre, that its energy might be extended from thence throughout the various parts. Thus did the eternal Deity create the universe as an inferior deity possessed of consciousness and enjoying happiness; a second cause and servant of himself; (εὐδαίμονα θεὸν ἐγεννήσατο. But this Soul of the

forms its functions, Plato attempts to illustrate by a mystical application of the relations of numbers. Vide Timæus the Locrian also Aristot. Metaph. lib. i. cap. 5. It should be remembered, however, that when the ancients appear to speak so extravagantly of the power of number, they do not use the word exactly in our sense, but as conveying the idea that all things are subject to certain definite rules and proportions, which may be illustrated by the operation of numbers; as if they had some obscure notions of those physical laws of combination which modern philosophers have demonstrated: Oi μὲν γὰρ Πυθαγόρειοι ΜΙΜΗΣΙΝ τὰ ὄντά φασιν εἶναι τῶν ἀριθμῶν. Aristot. Metaph. lib. i. cap. 6. Thus when Aristotle in his Rhetoric observes, Περαίνεται δὲ ἀριθμῷ πάντα, “ All things are

"limited by number," he means, probably, all things are subject to some definite law.

world, though mentioned last in the description, was not contrived the last in order, but was prior both in production and in excellence. It was composed of three essences, the divisible and changeable, the indivisible and unchangeable, and of a third made up of the combination of the other two. From these three substances, the divinity formed one soul, and distributed it to the different members of the universe. But when the composition of the soul had been thus completed according to the intention of the Composer, the eternal Cause then contrived all the material mass within, and united it centre to centrek. The soul, diffusing itself from hence,

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1 ΕΠΕΙ ΔΕ ΚΑΤΑ ΝΟΥΝ ΤΩΙ ΞΥΝΙΣΤΑΝΤΙ πᾶσα ἡ τῆς ψυχῆς ξύστασις ἐγεγένητο, μετὰ τοῦτο πᾶν τὸ σωματοειδὲς ἐντὸς αὐτῆς ἐτεκταίVETO. Thus translated by Cicero: "Animum igitur quum ille procreator mundi Deus ex sua mente et divinitate genuisset." This can hardly be considered a translation of the words. If ex sua mente alone will bear the meaning, "according to his "intention," ex sua mente et divinitate together, can scarcely signify any thing else than, "out of his own divine essence," which Plato does not say. Ciceronianum Lexicon Græco-Latinum ab Henrico Stephano, edit. 1557. Platonis Loci a Cicerone Interpretati, p. 23.

The principles on which this distribution is made are described with all the useless and unintelligible mysticism in which Plato was so fond of indulging. The laws again by which the composition of the soul was regulated are explained by a fanciful combination of numbers. In this sense, the number of the soul in Timæus the Locrian is declared to be

pervaded the extremity of the heaven revolving upon itself around it, and established the commencement of a life unceasing and full of intellectual enjoyment. Formed by the most excellent Creator the most excellent of created things, it is endowed with a capacity of perceiving eternal truths. From its proportionate distribution and compound essence, and self-revolving power1, when it approaches any divisible or indivisible substance, it is enabled to discern, by moving itself through its own entire nature, the identity and differences of things, to what class each belongs, the time and place and manner of its existence, the distinction

114695. Vide Timæus the Locrian. Bekker, pars iii. vol. iii. p. 382.

Absurd as these speculations of Plato are, they are more than equalled by those of Darjes, a German writer, (and he was only one of a school,) not a century ago, who published a philosophical treatise to demonstrate the Trinity by algebraical formula. Tractatus philosophicus in quo Pluralitas Personarum in Deitate, &c.1735. Problems of the same kind are also to be found in Stapfer, a divine of a different church, in a learned work, (Institutiones Theolog. tomi 5. Tiguri, 1743.) Vid. vol. iii. p. 481, 482, &c. And Dr. Hutchinson, in his inquiry into the origin of our ideas of beauty and virtue, has applied algebra to the question of "moral merit:" "The benevolence (moral merit) of an agent is proportional to a fraction, having the moment of good for the numerator, and the ability of the agent for the "denominator." Life and Writings of Dr. Reid, in Dugald Stewart's edition of his works.

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1 Cicero de Natura Deorum lib. i.

cap. 10.

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