HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF MYTH AND SCIENCE. 225 



soul is also proved by the memory. The subsequent 

 union of life and matter in the production of the 

 universe is the work of an intermediate, equivocal 

 being, the demiurgos. Thus Plato opposes the eternity 

 of the intelligence to Ionic materialism, and the 

 eternity of matter to the monistic theory of the 

 Eleatics. 



In the genesis of nature we again find the syn- 

 thetic conception of the elements, which he estimates 

 to be four ; to which geometrical forms correspond, 

 and the world was finally organized after its human 

 type. He divides the soul into several distinct and 

 independent powers, which are ever revolving be- 

 tween life and death : they inhabit the stars and 

 depend upon them, since the soul which has been 

 righteous on earth will be happy after death in the star 

 to which it was originally destined ; but those who 

 on earth only desire here bodily pleasures will wander 

 as shades round the tombs, or will migrate into the 

 bodies of various animals. He constitutes the stars 

 into contingent and sensible gods : they have beauti- 

 ful and immortal bodies of a round form, and are 

 made of fire. He asserts poetic inspiration and 

 madness to be the result of demoniac possession, 

 and says with Socrates that those who deny de- 

 moniac powers are themselves demoniacs. 



"VYe see from this account the mythical origin of 

 all that concerns the organization and genesis of the 

 world, the destinies and nature of the soul, since these 



