the poet and revealer of the remotest periods of antiquity, and Apollonius, the modern reformer, the Greek Christ, whose teachings had recently been enlightening the world.
The gospel of Philostratus (for in reality his work may he so termed) did not go sufficiently far for so comprehensive a system of religion. The aristocratic spirit of the Pagan Greek still breathed throughout it, and Julia Domna, who had fostered the writing of the work, was not as yet so well disposed towards the religion which had sprung from the ancient soil of Judaea as her niece, Julia Mamaea, would afterwards become. If the reform she dreamt of was ever realised, Paganism would have its son of God, pure, blameless, devoted to his mission, and adding to his doctrines the weight of influence which a bodily manifestation and a real life alone can give to an ideal theory. Hence this reform must be a positive religion, and not only a system of philosophy. This is why Apollonius, though a great friend of the philosophers, must be superior to them all, even to Socrates. Their rational monotheism,
