is called the Ision ([Greek: eis—iôn]), indicating that we shall know Being if we enter with piety and intelligence into the sacred rites of the goddess."[1]
The passage just quoted shows the intimate connexion between Being and Intelligence—the "Supreme Power is compact of Intelligence;" and we are left in little doubt respecting Plutarch's views on this second aspect of the Divine Nature. The conception of the Deity as [Greek: nous], an ancient abstraction in Greek philosophy, is at once strengthened and brought nearer to the intelligence of humanity by Plutarch's simple treatment of it, and by his connecting it, wherever possible, with the traditions of the popular creed. God is not only Intelligence, but intelligent. "The Divine Nature," says he, "is not blessed in the possession of silver and gold, nor mighty through the wielding of thunders and thunderbolts, but in the enjoyment of knowledge and understanding; and of all the things that Homer has said concerning the gods, this is his finest pronouncement:—
'Yet both one goddess formed
And one soil bred, but Jupiter precedence took in birth
And had more knowledge'[2]
—a pronouncement in which he gives the palm for
- ↑ De Iside et Osiride, 352 A. We need not here trouble with Plutarch's fanciful philology, almost as fanciful as that of some modern Aryanists. His meaning is clear—Absolute Being is the object of the worship of Isis—cf. Max Müller: Selected Essays, vol. i. p. 467: "Comparative philologists have not yet succeeded in finding the true etymology of Apollo." (Plato's derivations are given in the Cratylus, 266 C.)
- ↑ Iliad, xiii. 354. (Chapman's translation.)
