Sallustius or Sallust was a 4th-century writer, a friend of the Roman
Emperor Julian. He wrote the treatise On the Gods and the Cosmos, a kind of
catechism of 4th-century Hellenic paganism. Sallustius' work owes much to that
of Iamblichus of Chalcis, who synthesized Platonism with Pythagoreanism and
theurgy, and also to Julian's own philosophical writings. The treatise is quite
concise, and generally free of the lengthy metaphysical theorizing of the more
detailed Neoplatonic texts. Its aim is in part "to parry the usual onslaughts
of Christian polemic" in the face of Christianity's growing preeminence,
and "me[e]t theology with theology"
The first of these is the production of Sallust, a Neo Platonic
philosopher, who is considered by Gale as the same Sallust that, according to
Suidas, was cotemporary with Proclus, and who appears to have been alive when
Simplicius wrote his Commentaries on Epictetus: but though the testimony of
Suidas, or rather Damascius, from whose History of Philosophers Suidas derived
his account of Sallust, is very decisive as to the existence of a philosopher
of this name, yet there are two particulars which, in my opinion, render it
very doubtful whether the author of the present treatise is the Sallust
mentioned by Suidas. The first is, that the Sallust of Suidas is said to have
asserted, “that it was not easy, but rather impossible, for men to
philosophize;” an assertion, as Damascius well observes, which is neither true,
nor worthy to be uttered, and which is certainly very inconsistent with what
the author of the present treatise asserts: for (in Chap. XIII.) he informs us,
that his book was composed for that class of mankind whose souls may be
considered as neither incurable, nor yet capable of being elevated by
philosophy; plainly acknowledging by this, that some men are capable of
philosophizing in a proper manner, and thus evidently contradicting the dogma
of the Sallust mentioned by Damascius and Suidas. But there is another
particular which militates against this opinion, and which is of no less weight
than that we have just now mentioned; and this is, the disagreement which is
related by Suidas to have taken place between Sallust and Proclus; for the
author of the following book, as was obvious to the learned philologist Gale,
treads every where in the footsteps of Proclus: not to mention that the Sallust
of Suidas, by composing Orations after the manner of the antients, and
philosophizing like the Cynics, can hardly be supposed to be that profound
philosopher who wrote the ensuing treatise On the Gods and the World.
It is, however, sufficient for our purpose, that the work itself is
fortunately preserved entire, whatever uncertainty we may labour under
concerning its real author; I say fortunately preserved, for it may be
considered as a beautiful epitome of the Platonic philosophy, in which the most
important dogmas are delivered with such elegant conciseness, perfect accuracy,
and strength of argument, that it is difficult to say to which the treatise is
most intituled—our admiration or our praise. I have before observed, that this
little work was composed by its author with a view of benefiting a middle class
of mankind, whose souls are neither incurable, nor yet capable of ascending
through philosophy to the summit of human attainments: but in order to
understand this distinction properly, it is necessary to inform the reader,
that human souls may be distributed into three ranks; into such as live a life
pure and impassive when compared with the multitude; into such as are neither
wholly pure nor yet perfectly impure; and into such as are profoundly impure.
Souls of the first class, which are consequently the fewest in number, may be
called divine souls, heroes and demigods, and when invested with a terrene
body, form such men as Pythagoras, Plato, Plotinus, Jamblichus, Proclus,
&c., were of old: souls of this kind, not only descend into mortality in
consequence of that necessity by which all human souls are at times drawn down
to the earth, but for the benevolent purpose of benefiting such as are of an
inferior class; they likewise easily recover a remembrance of their pristine
state, and, in consequence of this, descend no farther than to the earth. But
souls of the middle class, for whom the book of Sallust is designed, in
consequence of becoming vitiated and defiled, though not in an incurable
degree, are incapable of acquiring in the present life philosophic perfection
and purity, and are with great difficulty, and even scarcely able to ascend,
after long periods, to the beatific vision of the intelligible world. But souls
of the third class, are such as, from their profound impurity, and from having
drank immoderately deep of oblivion, may be considered as abiding perpetually
in life, as in the dark regions of Tartarus, from which, through having lost
all freedom of the will, they can never emerge.
But we may easily collect the propriety of this distribution, by
considering, that there must necessarily be two mediums between souls that
abide on high with purity, such as the souls of essential heroes, who are
perpetual attendants on the gods, and souls that descend with the greatest
impurity; and these mediums can be no other than souls that descend indeed, but
with purity, and souls that descend, and are partly pure and partly impure.
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