CHAPTER XIX.

That we may not however present the reader with our conceptions, but may unfold to the utmost of our power the theory of Plato, to the lovers of the contemplation of truth, let us consider by ourselves, where those leaders must be arranged, which Socrates celebrates in the Phædrus, and with whom it is fit to connumerate, and with what orders of Gods, it is proper to co-arrange the great ruler of those leaders, who drives a winged chariot. For it is necessary either to give to him an intellectual, or an assimilative, or a liberated, or a mundane order. For these are the decrements accompanying the progression of the great God Jupiter. If however, he is the intellectual Jupiter, whom we have denominated the demiurgus of the universe, and have made Plato bear testimony to our assertion, how is he the leader of the above mentioned dodecad? And how is he divided oppositely to the principality of Vesta? For the demiurgic monad closes indeed, the intellectual breadth, but is exempt from all other numbers, and unco-ordinated with all [the monads of other numbers.] For it neither was, nor is lawful for effects to have an hypostasis opposed in division to their causes. It is not therefore proper to make twelve leaders of wholes, but to make the number of causes to be one, as Timæus says. Moreover, Jupiter the demiurgus is exempt from the universe, as being himself the author of the apparent order of things. But the first of the twelve leaders, is said by Socrates to drive a winged chariot in the heavens. How therefore, can he who is connected with the world, and who approximates to the Gods in the heavens, be considered as the same with him who is exempt from all [mundane natures,] and who abides, as Timæus says, in his own accustomed manner?

Farther still, this Jupiter indeed, presides over a philosophic life, and souls [that follow him] perpetually lead this life. But another God presides over the prophetic, amatory, and poetic life. The demiurgus of wholes, however, contains in himself the paradigms of all lives; and as he uniformly comprehends the essence of souls, after the same manner also, he comprehends all the different mutations of their lives. He is not, therefore, divisibly the cause of the lives in the soul, but pre-establishes according to one demiurgic cause, all the periods of souls, all the variety, and all the measures of life. And as the mundane sun is not the cause of some things, but the demiurgus of others, but of whatever the sun is the author, the demiurgus is in a greater degree the fabricator, and precedaneous cause,--thus also in the lives of souls, it is not proper to refer the cause to the demiurgus in a divided manner. For the demiurgic monad, presides as the impartible, common, and one cause of all lives; but the divisions according to lives, and the different paradigms of mundane natures, pertain to the Gods posterior to him.

If, however, some one should think that we ought to abandon this hypothesis, but that we should assert this Jupiter, and the other leaders to be mundane, where must we arrange the Gods that follow him? For Socrates says, “that the army of Gods and dæmons divided into eleven parts, follows Jupiter.” For there are more comprehensive and partial orders of Gods in the universe than these, and some of them have the relation of leaders, but others of followers. The magnitude, however, of the principality celebrated by Socrates, does not manifest to us a transcendency co-arranged with, but exempt from mundane natures. For in incorporeal causes, the great, imparts a peculiarity of this kind to those to whom it is present. And as Love being not simply called a dæmon by Diotima, but a great dæmon, is demonstrated to be expanded above all dæmons, and is a god, but is not arranged in the genus of dæmons, thus also Jupiter, being celebrated as the great leader, not as the mundane leader of mundane natures, but as exempt from, and transcending the mundane order, is allotted this appellation. But if Jupiter is exempt from the Gods in the world, it is necessary that the other leaders also should have an essence antecedent to those that follow Jupiter. For all of them are allotted a ruling dignity. But if the other leaders are arranged as mundane, and Jupiter alone is a leader beyond these, again we must transfer the whole principality from the dodecad, to the Jovian monad. It is necessary, however, to attribute a ruling power to all of them, and to preserve to Jupiter the principal authority among them.

It remains, therefore, that a principality such as this of the Gods, must either be that of the assimilative Gods, or of those that are allotted a liberated dominion in the universe, as we say it must. If, however, we should admit it to belong to the assimilative orders, it will be the leader of a demiurgic triad, but not of the dodecad which is now celebrated. The Jupiter, therefore, who is among the assimilative Gods, and whom we have before unfolded, is the first of the sons of Saturn. For these sons, as Socrates says in the Gorgias, divide the whole kingdom of Saturn. And the first of them indeed is the author of first, the second of middle, and the third of last natures. The division, therefore, of mundane natures being three-fold, the first of the sons of Saturn may be called the leader of the triadic division, and the multitude proximately suspended from him will be the first of the triadic division in the universe. But the leader of the twelve Gods, presides over an army distributed into eleven parts. Hence the one defines his proper dominion in the thirds of wholes, but the other in the twelfths. And according to the power of comprehension, one of them defines his principality conformably to the triad, but the other according to the endecad [or the number eleven.] By no means, therefore, is each of these allotted the same order. The demiurgus, therefore, and saviour Jupiter is uncoarranged with all these. But the assimilative Jupiter is the leader of the division of wholes into a triad. And the mundane Jupiter is among the number of leaders that follow, and not of those that are exempt. The Jupiter, however, who is celebrated by Socrates in the Phædrus, is co-arranged with the other leaders, and presides over those that are disposed in an orderly manner according to eleven parts, and not over those that receive a tripartite division; and he is also exempt from all mundane natures on account of the magnitude of his ruling transcendency. Hence he is different from all the above-mentioned orders, and exhibits in no one of them the peculiarity which is now presented to our view.

It remains, therefore, that we should connumerate him with the liberated Gods, in order that he may be proximate to the mundane Gods; and on this account he is said to be in the heavens, and to be exempt from the mundane divinities. On this account, likewise, he is celebrated as great. For frequently media present themselves to our view, from the extremes being surveyed according to mixture. Since therefore, Jupiter is said to drive a winged chariot in the heavens, and is denominated great, he is in a certain respect co-arranged with the celestial Gods, and is exempt from them. But he who is at one and the same time co-arranged with the Gods in the universe, among whom the celestial Jupiter is allotted the highest dignity, and is exempt from them, ranks among the liberated Gods, if in what has been before said, we have rightly determined. Hence, of the Gods, some are exempt from the universe; but others give completion to it; and others are at one and the same time allotted a co-arranged, and an exempt transcendency. This great leader in the heavens therefore Jupiter, is liberated and supercelestial, and the whole dodecad shines forth in this order of Gods. For there is one all-perfect and divine number, to which the twelve leaders give completion. So that it is necessary the whole number should be placed in this order of Gods, but we must not call in a divided manner some of the leading and ruling Gods mundane, and others supermundane. But if the first of them is supermundane, the rest also will after the same manner establish themselves above the Gods in the world. Each also is the leader of an appropriate multitude, and is surrounded with a great number of Gods and dæmons. But partial souls rank among the last of their followers. For they are co-divided with dæmons, and divine natures, and participate of the liberated principality of the Gods, as far as they are able. For, as Socrates says, “that which is willing and able always follows the Gods.” Through these things therefore, we have reminded the reader, that the twelve leaders of wholes celebrated by Socrates in the Phædrus, belong to the liberated Gods.