behind these the original divine principle. Now the knowledge of the secret powers of nature conducts farther and more securely to a reverence and firm faith in the true Creator, than ignorance and a terror of the same, which only lead to superstition and perdition. Therefore we find amongst the more intelligent heathen, not merely ideal performances in art and science-not merely a moral course of life serving for an example, but also a religious revelation, with a genuine love of our neighbour, which probably would put to shame the majority of Christians. But wherever ignorant and mistaken longings to practise secret arts and perform miracles exist, there the inquisitive and incautious experiment avenges itself; and this is ascribed to the imaginary ruling divinity of the place.

A very remarkable example of this kind is related by Livy (i. c. 31). Tullus Hostilius read in the books of Numa of the mysterious art, in order, most probably, to produce an electrical fire, of which more will be said presently. But as he did not understand the matter thoroughly, and went awkwardly to work with it, the fire was indeed kindled, but destroyed him together with his house. Jupiter, in whose myth that electric fire was symbolised, was thus the god of the land who punished the criminal daring of the unconsecrated.

Before we explore the hitherto unsuspected traces of magic in the Mythology, we will cast a glance at the newPlatonic school of Alexandria, which, for the history of magic and the doctrine of magnetism, is too important to be passed over. The new-Platonists stood at the point where antiquity and the modern world divide. They stood yet nearer to the mysteries, and knew, in a place like Alexandria, certainly much more of them than people usually imagine. They united the mystic theology of the Egyptians with the philosophy of the Greeks; and the soothsaying character of the Therapeutists is in a most remarkable manner united with philosophical acumen in the new-Platonism. Therefore the new-Platonists became the connecting links of the old pagan views of the world with the new Christian knowledge and faith. Now, no antiquarian has attempted to deny that the knowledge of the mysteries belonged to the theology of the Greeks and Romans.

Hence it comes that the influence of the new-Platonic philosophy in the formation of the theology and philosophy of the middle ages was so predominant; a circumstance which, the closer we look at it, is certainly more important to the progressive improvement of the race than the socalled mystical enthusiasm, which has only diffused nonsense and superstition.

The coming together of the Jews who had returned from Asia with Zoroastic ideas, and of the Greek philosophers and Egyptian mystics at Alexandria, the point of union between the east and the west, of the spiritual and temporal life and traffic of the time, soon after the commencement of the Christian era, originated that remarkable school in which at once all the tendencies of the Greek philosophy with the doctrines of the orientals, of the Jewish Kabbalah with the reflections and speculations of the later occidentalists, amalgamated. The new-Platonism sought to present the elements of theosophy and philosophy according to the primeval doctrines of the oriental prophets, in combination with the poetical Platonism and the Aristotelian philosophy in the form of Grecian dialectics. The oriental doctrine of emanation, the Pythagorean number of harmony, Plato's ideas on the creation and the separation from the world of sense, constitute the proper fabric of the socalled new-Platonic eclectic school.

In judging of this school we have to distinguish the highest principles of theology and philosophy from the opinions and views on particular circumstances and things in the world of nature and of men. We will here only notice the notions which the new-Platonists had respecting magic,-what they knew, and we may learn something from them. In this department we find much, as well on the nature of ecstasy and its explanation, as that in an historical point of view we obtain guidance and information respecting the ancient mysteries. The amount of these revelations we perceive best when we take in hand the writings of Plotinus, Porphyrius, and Iamblichus. These pre-eminent spirits exerted themselves to defend falling paganism; but their principles came on many sides so near to Christianity, that they unconsciously produced a powerful influence on the advocates of that religion, and on the age; and their views, especially

through Dionysius Areopagita, passed over to the mystics of the middle ages, according to whom contemplation and a predominating quietism were the business of men.

Ammonius Saccas is said to have been the chief founder of this school (220 B.C.) He said that the philosophy which originated amongst the people of the east, which was brought by Hermes to Egypt, and which was darkened and disturbed by the disputations of the Greeks, was restored to its purity by Plato, and that the religion of the people was at the bottom synonymous with this, and only required to be freed from its errors, which Jesus especially, an excellent man and friend of God, had done;-that he had the art to purify the imagination so that it could perceive spirits, and by their help could perform miracles (Brucker, Th. ii. S. 211; Büsching, a. O. S. 475).

The most intellectual of the new-Platonists is Plotinus, who lived in the deepest abstraction, often fasted and fell into ecstasy, in which he immediately perceived the moral condition of every man, and penetrated into the most concealed things. Once, as an humble widow who lived in his house with her children had a valuable necklace stolen, she caused all the inmates to pass in review before Plotinus, who looked sharply at them, and then pointed to one, with the words "This is the thief;" and the man, after some denial, confessed. Porphyrius, his biographer, also relates of himself that Plotinus once came suddenly to him and said "Thy intention, O Porphyrius, has not its foundation in the spirit, but proceeds from a bodily ailment;" and he, therefore, advised him to travel to Rome, where, indeed, he was cured.

"Plotinus arrived," says Porphyrius, "in his spiritual illumination (daiμoviy pwri) at the direct view of God, who is supreme over all life and thought; for union with God was the object of all his philosophy and his cogitations. This union takes place through abstract contemplation, since God is not without but within us, not in a place but in the spirit. God is present to all, even to those who do not perceive him; but men fly from him, and go forth out of him, or rather out of themselves. The union with the body is only in part, as when one has his foot in the water, and by elevation of the spiritual centre we unite ourselves with the centre

of the universe. Disembodied things are not separated by space, but by the difference of qualities; if this difference ceases, they are immediately near each other. Now as God is everywhere, we are near him when we resemble him" (Eneid. 6. lib. ix. c. 8.) Men breathe and live through God, not rent away from him, and their choice consists in their inclination towards the divine in opposition to the attraction of the corporeal nature. Through this inclination the soul raises itself into the region where there is no more evil, but peace only, and there receives her true life in her tranquil union with the Eternal, by which beauty, uprightness, and virtue are produced, and the real strength of the spiritual man; for in the perfect union with God the soul looks into herself and into God, glorified and filled with the divine light, without any earthly_weight, which only again shows its power by darkening. But why does the soul not continue so? Because she has not yet quitted the earthly, in which she only occasionally reaches the higher vision, by which the gazing spirit is at rest, and stands at once above reason and that which is seen, and the perceiving and the perceived (subjective and objective) are no longer two but one. The soul is, namely, no longer self (purely subjective), but she is different-that, namely, which she beholds; she passes over into the objective as a point brought into contact with another becomes one point and not two (1. c. c. 10.) Therefore this condition is somewhat incomprehensible, because one cannot make that which is seen intelligible to another as different from the seer. Thence came the prohibition concerning the mysteries, not to impart the divine to the uninitiated, because it is essentially unimpartable to him who does not by his own perception participate in it.

In the highest state of contemplation the soul is at perfect rest, disposed to nothing more; transcending the beautiful, and ascending above the choir of the virtues, as one who has entered the holy of holies and has left the statues of the temple behind him, which at his going out again are the first visions that present themselves. These, according to the order, are the second contemplations, which present themselves after the first and innermost contemplation or vision, whose object is without form (objec

tive). Yet is the vision perhaps not a vision, but another kind of seeing,—a stepping out of one's self, an exaltation and simplifying of one's self, a thought in rest. Plotinus asserts further that the contemplators must approach God and assimi late themselves to him, in order truly to know him. "The eye would never see the sun, if it were not of the nature of the sun-ηλιοειδής.”

The workings of nature take place also in opposing beams upon a spiritually wise man (dynamic): namely, out of the eternal light-fountain of God flow unceasing images (powers), shapes, or spirits, like the Idolen of Heraclitus; that we may regard the universe as filled with spirits (Dämonen), and animated by them; and we may compare this to the human body, in which all parts hang together, and stand fast in manifold sympathy. The wise man seeks to discover the harmony of parts, and is not astonished when he finds it the most opposite things; when he finds stars agreeing with plants, and one indicated by the other. There exists but one only power, and this he calls the magical power of nature.

To the community of spirits which surrounds us in manifold forms man can arrive only by withdrawing himself from the outward sensual attractions. Thence such community is obtained in ecstasy, which generally is the work of spirits. Plotinus himself had these spirits completely in his power, and through this he healed the most dangerous diseases, and obtained thus such a reputation that people believed him to possess a demon, by whose aid he foretold future events, and performed superhuman actions. His confidant and scholar, Porphyrius, related extraordinary things of him. He also himself knew his demon, and held familiar conversations with him. Amongst other things, when Æmilius invited him to attend the service of the church, he replied " The spirits must come to me, not I to the spirits."

By the help of spirits, or through his extraordinary spiritual power, he was able to operate upon his enemies. When a strife arose between him and one Olympius, as to which held the first rank in philosophy, Olympius challenged him to a trial of magical arts. Plotinus let loose upon him all his science, and said to his disciples, "Now the body of Olympius shrinks together like a purse;" which Olympius found, and that so painfully, that he abstained from his hos