Chapter VIII‰

Prior, there are three orders of dæmons, the first of which are more intellectual , the second are of a more rational nature , and the third, of which Iamblichus is now speaking, are various, more irrational, and more material . 86 . Charonea is a country of Asia Minor, bordering on the river Meander; and in it there are spiracles which exhale a foul odour. According to Pliny, there are places of this kind in Italy, in the country of Puteoli, now Puzzulo. In Amsanctus, also, a place in the middle of Italy, in the country of the Samnites, there were sulphureous waters, the steams of which were so pestilential, that they killed all who came near them. Hence Cicero, in lib. i. De Divin. “Quid enim? Non videmus, quam sint varia terrarum genera? Ex quibus et mortifera quædam pars est, ut et Amsancti in Hirpinis, et in Asia Plutonia.” 87 . And these irrational spirits, so far as they contribute to wholes, are more excellent than we are, though through being irrational they are inferior to us. 88 . See the justice of providence in this respect most admirably defended by Plotinus, in the first of his treatises on Providence, which treatise forms one of the five books of Plotinus translated by me, in 8vo. 1794. 89 . In the original, την ιδιαν της ψυχης αυτοπραγιαν , which Gale very inadequately translates proprium animæ officium . 90 . See my translation of Proclus on the Subsistence of Evil, at the end of my translation of his six books on the Theology of Plato. 91 . See cap. 40, 41, 42, of Eunead iv. lib. iv. of Plotinus, from which the doctrine of this chapter is derived. 92 . Agreeably to this, Plotinus, also, in Eunead iv. lib. iv. cap. 32, says, παν τουτο το εν, και ως ζωον εν ζωον τε οντος, και εις εν τελουντος, ουδεν ουτω πορρω τοπου ως μη εγγυς ειναι τη του ενος ζωου προς το συμπαθειν ψυσει , i. e. “This universe is one, and is as one animal. But being an animal and completely effecting one thing, nothing in it is so distant in place as not to be near to the nature of the one animal, on account of its sympathy with the whole of itself.” 93 . This art is no other than magic, of which the following account, from a very rare Greek manuscript of Psellus, On Dæmons according to the Dogmas of the Greeks , will, I doubt not, be acceptable to the reader, as it illustrates what is here said by Iamblichus, and shows that magic is not an empty name, but possesses a real power, though at present this art seems to be totally lost. Ficinus published some extracts from this manuscript in Latin; but Gale does not appear to have had it in his possession.