of three kinds, to wit, those of the celestial gods, those of
the aerial demons, and those of terrestrial men._
There is, say they, a threefold division of all animals endowed with
a rational soul, namely, into gods, men, and demons. The gods occupy
the loftiest region, men the lowest, the demons the middle region.
For the abode of the gods is heaven, that of men the earth, that of
the demons the air. As the dignity of their regions is diverse, so
also is that of their natures; therefore the gods are better than men
and demons. Men have been placed below the gods and demons, both in
respect of the order of the regions they inhabit, and the difference
of their merits. The demons, therefore, who hold the middle place,
as they are inferior to the gods, than whom they inhabit a lower
region, so they are superior to men, than whom they inhabit a loftier
one. For they have immortality of body in common with the gods, but
passions of the mind in common with men. On which account, say they,
it is not wonderful that they are delighted with the obscenities
of the theatre, and the fictions of the poets, since they are also
subject to human passions, from which the gods are far removed, and
to which they are altogether strangers. Whence we conclude that it
was not the gods, who are all good and highly exalted, that Plato
deprived of the pleasure of theatric plays, by reprobating and
prohibiting the fictions of the poets, but the demons.
Of these things many have written: among others Apuleius, the Platonist
of Madaura, who composed a whole work on the subject, entitled,
_Concerning the God of Socrates_. He there discusses and explains of
what kind that deity was who attended on Socrates, a sort of familiar,
by whom it is said he was admonished to desist from any action which
would not turn out to his advantage. He asserts most distinctly, and
proves at great length, that it was not a god but a demon; and he
discusses with great diligence the opinion of Plato concerning the
lofty estate of the gods, the lowly estate of men, and the middle
estate of demons. These things being so, how did Plato dare to take
away, if not from the gods, whom he removed from all human contagion,
certainly from the demons, all the pleasures of the theatre, by
expelling the poets from the state? Evidently in this way he wished
to admonish the human soul, although still confined in these moribund
members, to despise the shameful commands of the demons, and to detest
their impurity, and to choose rather the splendour of virtue. But
if Plato showed himself virtuous in answering and prohibiting these
things, then certainly it was shameful of the demons to command them.
Therefore either Apuleius is wrong, and Socrates' familiar did not
belong to this class of deities, or Plato held contradictory opinions,
now honouring the demons, now removing from the well-regulated
state the things in which they delighted, or Socrates is not to be
congratulated on the friendship of the demon, of which Apuleius was
so ashamed that he entitled his book _On the God of Socrates_, whilst
according to the tenor of his discussion, wherein he so diligently
and at such length distinguishes gods from demons, he ought not to
have entitled it, _Concerning the God_, but _Concerning the Demon of
Socrates_. But he preferred to put this into the discussion itself
rather than into the title of his book. For, through the sound doctrine
which has illuminated human society, all, or almost all men have such
a horror at the name of demons, that every one who, before reading
the dissertation of Apuleius, which sets forth the dignity of demons,
should have read the title of the book, _On the Demon of Socrates_,
would certainly have thought that the author was not a sane man. But
what did even Apuleius find to praise in the demons, except subtlety
and strength of body and a higher place of habitation? For when he
spoke generally concerning their manners, he said nothing that was
good, but very much that was bad. Finally, no one, when he has read
that book, wonders that they desired to have even the obscenity of the
stage among divine things, or that, wishing to be thought gods, they
should be delighted with the crimes of the gods, or that all those
sacred solemnities, whose obscenity occasions laughter, and whose
shameful cruelty causes horror, should be in agreement with their
passions.