profound moral truth that there is no limit to the perfectibility of human nature; and we can surely forgive much that is irrational and fantastic in a scheme which embodies so effective an inspiration to goodness.[1]
But the value and moral dignity of any principle depend upon the method of its interpretation and application. That sense of personal dependence upon a benevolent supernatural power which Plutarch associates with the teachings of Dæmonology may be identical with the purest and loftiest religion, or may degenerate into the meanest and most degrading superstition, according to its development in the mind of the individual believer. If this intercourse is regarded as spiritual only, the communion of soul with soul in the "sessions of sweet, silent thought," high religious possibilities issue which no form of faith can dispense with. Any attempt to degrade this intercourse to material ends, or to appeal to it through material channels, involves recourse to magical rites, and superstitious practices of the grossest description. It is necessary, too, that even where there is no recourse to materialistic avenues of access to the spiritual world, the mind should cultivate a belief in the benevolence of the Higher Powers so that it may maintain a rational dignity and fearlessness in its communion with them.
- ↑ That this truth is one which appeals to the Imagination more cogently than to the Reason, resembling in that respect the belief in the soul's immortality, is evident to Plutarch. It is on this account that he illustrates it by Myth instead of arguing it by Reason, and takes every precaution to prevent his readers from regarding it as a complete and final presentation of a logically irrefutable belief.
