THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 325 



perfectly execute his designs. Hence the mixture of good and 

 evil which is found in the material world. 



Plato taught in express terms the doctrine of the immortality of 

 the soul ; that the soul of man is derived by emanation from 

 God, but that this emanation was not immediate but through the 

 intervention of the soul of the world, that is the Son of God ; 

 that the soul is a simple indivisible substance, and therefore 

 incapable of dissolution or corruption ; that the objects to which 

 it naturally adheres are spiritual and incorruptible, therefore its 

 nature is so. 



Virtue Plato defined to be the imitation of God, or the effort 

 of man to attain to a resemblance to his original. " True virtue 

 is really and in effect a purification from all worldly passions." 

 " Whosoever enters the other world without being initiated and 

 purified shall be hurled headlong into the vast abyss ; but who- 

 ever arrives there after due purgation and expiation shall be 

 lodged in the apartments of the gods." " The soul of man 

 carries nothing along with it out of this world but its good or 

 bad actions, its virtues or its vices, which are the cause of its 

 eternal happiness or misery." "It is said that after the death of 

 every individual person, the spirit or genius that was partner 

 with it and conducted it during life, leads it to a certain place 

 where all the dead are obliged to appear in order to be judged, 

 and from thence are conducted by a guide to the world below. 

 When it arrives at that fatal rendezvous of all souls, if it has 

 been guilty of any impurity, or polluted with murder, or has 

 committed any of those atrocious crimes that desperate and lost 

 souls are commonly guilty of, it is abhorred and avoided by all 

 other souls, and wanders without guides in fearful solitudes and 

 horrible deserts. Whereas the temperate and pure soul has the 

 gods themselves for its guides and conductors, and goes to co- 

 habit with them in the mansions of pleasure prepared for it." 



Such extracts from the translations of the Dialogues of Plato 

 might be made almost ad infinitum. But enough are already 

 given to show that this old philosopher had very advanced ideas 

 of the divine attributes and man's duty and destiny. It would 

 be hard to condemn to everlasting punishment those of the 



