It is this true religion alone that has exposed the gods of the nations as impure demons. These spirits desire to be worshipped as gods, stealing the names of dead persons or assuming the forms of creatures, and they rejoice in base and infamous honors while envying the conversion of human souls to the true God. Humanity is liberated from their cruel and impious dominion through faith in Christ, who provided an example of humility by which we may rise from the fall of pride. Thus, not only the many gods of other nations but even these select gods, chosen for a senate of deities on account of their notorious crimes rather than their virtues, are revealed as frauds. Varro attempted to refer their sacred rites to natural reasons to make base things seem honorable, but he failed because the rites themselves were not caused by nature but by the deceit of demons. Had they been natural, they might have mitigated the offense of the rites, but as they are, they only reveal the demons’ mockery. The true religion unmasks and vanquishes them, offering instead the worship of the Creator, who grants eternal life not through the mutilation of the body or the madness of the theater, but through the sanctification of the soul by the truth.
Augustine now turns from the fabulous and civil theologies already examined to what philosophers call natural theology, undertaking a far more demanding inquiry. The question is whether the worship of the gods acknowledged by this natural theology can secure blessedness in the life to come. This discussion requires engaging not with ordinary citizens but with those who profess the love of wisdom. Yet the name of philosopher does not guarantee the reality, and Augustine must select from among the schools those with whom he may worthily dispute. He narrows the field to those thinkers who affirm that a divine nature exists and concerns itself with human affairs, yet who deny that worship of the one unchangeable God suffices for obtaining blessedness. These philosophers hold that many created gods, appointed by the supreme God to their various spheres, must receive sacred rites. In this respect they come closer to truth than Varro, for they acknowledge God as existing above all spiritual natures, as the Creator both of the visible world and of every soul, and as the one who grants blessedness to rational souls through participation in His own unchangeable and incorporeal light.
To establish the proper context for engaging the Platonists, Augustine surveys the philosophical traditions that preceded them. Greek intellectual history records two principal schools: the Italic, originating in that part of Italy once called Magna Graecia, and the Ionic, arising in the regions still known as Greece. Pythagoras of Samos founded the Italic school and is credited with coining the term “philosophy,” for he deemed it the height of arrogance to call oneself a sage and preferred the humbler title of wisdom-lover. Thales of Miletus, one of the renowned Seven Sages, founded the Ionic school and earned distinction for investigating the principles of nature. He held that water constituted the first principle of all things, yet he set no divine mind over the admirable work of creation. His successors developed various materialist cosmologies: Anaximander taught that each thing springs from its own proper principle, while Anaximenes attributed all causes to infinite air. Anaxagoras then perceived that a divine mind must be the productive cause of all things, and Diogenes added that the primordial air possessed a divine reason. Archelaus extended this by teaching that homogeneous particles pervaded by divine mind constitute reality. Socrates himself studied under Archelaus, and thus the line leads forward to Plato.
Socrates redirected philosophy from the investigation of physical phenomena to the correction of human conduct. He recognized that the ultimate causes of things depend upon the will of the one true and supreme God, and that such causes could be grasped only by a mind purified from earthly passions. His method involved exposing the ignorance of those who claimed knowledge, sometimes confessing his own ignorance, sometimes concealing what he knew. This practice earned him powerful enemies who brought false charges against him, leading to his condemnation and execution. Yet the city that killed him afterward repented, turning its wrath upon his accusers. Socrates left numerous disciples who disputed among themselves concerning the chief good, and because his dialectical method raised questions only to demolish them, his followers formed diverse and opposing sects. Some placed the final good in pleasure, others in virtue, and still others in different ends entirely.
Among Socrates’ disciples, Plato surpassed all the rest in brilliance and fame. Born of honorable Athenian parents and endowed with remarkable natural gifts, he traveled widely to master every branch of knowledge. He studied in Egypt and then journeyed to Italy, where he absorbed the Pythagorean tradition. Though he honored Socrates by making him the principal speaker in his dialogues, Plato combined the moral emphasis of his master with the contemplative depth of Pythagoras. He is therefore credited with perfecting philosophy by uniting its active and contemplative dimensions. Plato divided philosophy into three parts: the moral, which concerns action and the regulation of life; the natural, which investigates the causes of things; and the rational, which distinguishes truth from falsehood. Those who have best understood Plato recognize that in God are found the cause of existence, the light of understanding, and the end toward which all life should be directed.
If Plato thus defined the wise person as one who knows, imitates, and loves God, and who attains blessedness through fellowship with Him, there is no need to dispute with other philosophical schools. The Platonists come nearer to Christian truth than any others. The fabulous theology must yield to them—that theatrical display of divine crimes—and the civil theology must yield as well, with its impure demons seducing nations under the name of gods. Varro’s interpretations of sacred rites as referring to heaven and earth, to seeds and perishable operations, must give way. The writings Numa caused to be buried with himself, and the letter revealing that the principal gods were once mortal men—these too must yield. The materialist philosophers who made bodies the principles of all things—Thales with his water, Anaximenes with his air, the Stoics with their fire, Epicurus with his atoms—all must give place to those who recognized the true God as the author of all things, the source of truth’s light, and the giver of blessedness. For these materialists, with minds enslaved to bodily sense, failed to perceive what lay within themselves: they could represent inwardly what they had seen outwardly, yet that mental representation is not itself a body but the likeness of one. The faculty that beholds and judges this likeness is neither body nor bodily image. If the rational soul is not a body, how can God its Creator be a body?
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