Chapter xv.-Of the Corruption of Angels, and the Two Kinds of
Demons.
When, therefore, the number of men had begun to increase, God in His
forethought, lest the devil, to whom from the beginning He had given
power
over the earth, should by his subtilty either corrupt or destroy men,
as
he had done at first, sent angels for the protection and improvement
206
of the human race; and inasmuch as He had given these a free will, He
enjoined
them above all things not to defile themselves with contamination from
the earth, and thus lose the dignity of their heavenly nature.
207
He plainly prohibited them from doing that which He knew that they
would
do, that they might entertain no hope of pardon. Therefore, while they
abode among men, that most deceitful ruler
208
of the earth, by his very association, gradually enticed them to vices,
and polluted them by intercourse with women. Then, not being admitted
into
heaven on account of the sins into which they had plunged themselves,
they
fell to the earth. Thus from angels the devil makes them to
become
his satellites and attendants. But they who were born from these,
because
they were neither angels nor men, but bearing a kind of mixed
209
nature, were not admitted into hell, as their fathers were not into
heaven.
Thus there came to be two kinds of demons; one of heaven, the other of
the earth. The latter are the wicked
210
spirits, the authors of all the evils which are done, and the same
devil
is their prince.Whence
Trismegistus calls
him the ruler of the demons. But grammarians say that they are called
demons,
as though doemones,
211 that is, skilled
and acquainted with matters: for they think that these are gods. They
are
acquainted, indeed, with many future events, but not all, since it is
not
permitted them entirely to know the counsel of God; and therefore they
are accustomed to accommodate
212 their
answers to ambiguous results. The poets both know them to be demons,
and
so describe them.
Hesiod thus speaks:-
"These are the demons according to the will of Zeus, Good, living on
the earth, the guardians of mortal men."
And this is said for this purpose, because God had sent them as
guardians
to the human race; but they themselves also, though they are the
destroyers
of men, yet wish themselves to appear as their guardians, that they
themselves
may be worshipped, and God may not be worshipped. The philosophers also
discuss the subject of these beings. For Plato attempted even to
explain
their natures in his "Banquet; "and Socrates said that there was a
demon
continually about him, who had become attached to him when a boy, by
whose
will and direction his life was guided. The art also and power of the
Magi
altogether consists in the influences
213
of these; invoked by whom they deceive the sight of men with deceptive
illusions,
214 so
that
they do not see those things which exist, and think that they see those
things which do not exist. These contaminated and abandoned spirits, as
I say, wander over the whole earth, and contrive a solace for their own
perdition by the destruction of men. Therefore they fill every place
with
snares, deceits, frauds, and errors; for they cling to individuals, and
occupy whole houses from door to door, and assume to themselves the
name
of genii; for by this word they translate demons in the Latin language.
They consecrate these in their houses, to these they daily pour out
215
libations of wine, and worship the wise demons as gods of the earth,
and
as averters of those evils which they themselves cause and impose. And
these, since spirits are without substance
216
and not to be grasped, insinuate themselves into the bodies of men; and
secretly working in their inward parts, they corrupt the health, hasten
diseases, terrify their souls with dreams, harass their minds with
phrenzies,
that by these evils they may compel men to have recourse to their aid.
Chapter xvi.-That Demons Have No Power Over Those Who are
Established
in the Faith.
And the nature of all these deceits
217
is obscure to those who are without the truth. For they think that
those
demons profit them when they cease to injure, whereas they have no
power
except to injure.
218 Some one may
perchance
say that they are therefore to be worshipped, that they may not injure,
since they have the power to injure. They do indeed injure, but those
only
by whom they are feared, whom the powerful and lofty hand of God does
not
protect, who are uninitiated in the mystery
219
of truth. But they fear the righteous,
220
that is, the worshippers of God, adjured by whose name they depart
221
from the bodies of the possessed: for, being lashed by their words as
though
by scourges, they not only confess themselves to be demons, but even
utter
their own names-those which are adored in the temples-which they
generally
do in the presence of their own worshippers; not, it is plain, to the
disgrace
of religion, but
222 to the disgrace of
their own honour, because they cannot speak falsely to God, by whom
they
are adjured, nor to the righteous, by whose voice they are
tortured.
Therefore ofttimes having uttered thegreatest howlings, they cry out
that
they are beaten, and are on fire, and that they are just on the point
of
coming forth: so much power has the knowledge of God, and
righteousness!
Whom, therefore, can they injure, except those whom they have in their
own power? In short,
Hermes affirms that
those
who have known God are not only safe from the attacks of demons, but
that
they are not even bound by fate. "The only protection," he says, "is
piety,
for over a pious man neither evil demon nor fate has any power: for God
rescues the pious man from all evil; for the one and only good thing
among
men is piety." And what piety is, he testifies in another place, in
these
words: "For piety is the knowledge of God." Asclepius also, his
disciple,
more fully expressed the same sentiment in that finished discourse
which
he wrote to the king. Each of them, in truth, affirms that the demons
are
the enemies and harassers of men, and on this account
Trismegistus
calls them wicked angels; so far was he from being ignorant that from
heavenly
beings they were corrupted, and began to be earthly.
Book IV. Of True Wisdom and Religion.
Chapter vi.-Almighty God Begat His Son; And the Testimonies of
the
Sibyls and of Trismegistus Concerning Him.
God, therefore, the contriver and founder of all things, as we have
said in the second hook, before He commenced this excellent work of the
world, begat a pure and incorruptible Spirit, whom He called His Son.
And
although He had afterwards created by Himself innumerable other beings,
whom we call angels, this first-begotten, however, was the only one
whom
He considered worthy of being called by the divine name, as being
powerful
in His Father's excellence and majesty. But that there is a Son
of
the Most High God, who is possessed of the greatest power, is shown not
only by the unanimous utterances of the prophets, but also by the
declaration
of
Trismegistus and the predictions of
the
Sibyls.
Hermes, in the book which is
entitled
The Perfect Word, made use of these words: "The Lord and Creator
of all things, whom we have thought right to call God, since He made
the
second God visible and sensible. But I use the term sensible, not
because
He Himself perceives (for the question is not whether He Himself
perceives),
but because He leads
25 to perception
and
to intelligence. Since, therefore, He made Him first, and alone, and
one
only, He appeared to Him beautiful, and most full of all good things;
and
He hallowed Him, and altogether loved Him as His own Son." The
Erythraean
Sibyl, in the beginning of her poem, which she commenced with the
Supreme
God, proclaims the Son of God as the leader and commander of all, in
these
verses:
"The nourisher and creator of all things, who placed the sweet
breath
in all, and made God the leader of all."
And again, at the end of the same poem:-
"But whom God gave for faithful men to honour."
And another Sibyl enjoins that He ought to be known:-
"Know Him as your God, who is the Son of God."
Assuredly He is the very Son of God, who by that most wise King
Solomon,
full of divine inspiration, spake these things which we have added:
26
"God founded
27 me in the beginning of
His
ways, in His work before the ages. He set me up in the beginning,
before
He made the earth, and before He established the depths, before the
fountains
of waters came forth: the Lord begat me before all the hills; He made
the
regions, and the uninhabitable
28
boundaries
under the heaven. When He prepared the heaven, I was by Him: and when
He
separated His own seat, when He made the strong clouds above the winds,
and when He strengthened the mountains, and placed them under heaven;
when
He laid the strong foundations of the earth, I was with Him arranging
all
things. I was He in whom He delighted: I was daily delighted,
when
He rejoiced, the world being completed." But on this account
Trismegistus
spoke of Him as "the artificer of God," and the Sibyl calls Him
"Counsellor,"
because He is endowed by God the Father with such wisdom and strength,
that God employed both His wisdom and hands in the creation of the
world.
-------
Chapter ix.-Of the Word of God.
But the Greeks speak of Him as the Logos,
60
more befittingly than we do as the word, or speech: for Logos signifies
both speech and reason, inasmuch as He is both the voice and the wisdom
of God. And of this divine speech not even the philosophers were
ignorant,
since Zeno represents the Logos as the arranger of the established
order
of things, and the framer of the universe: whom also He calls Fate, and
the necessity of things, and God, and the soul of Jupiter, in
accordance
with the custom, indeed, by which they are wont to regard Jupiter as
God.
But the words are no obstacle, since the sentiment is in agreement with
the truth. For it is the spirit of God which he named the soul of
Jupiter.
For
Trismegistus, who by some means or
other
searched into almost all truth, often described the excellence and
majesty
of the word, as the instance before mentioned declares, in which he
acknowledges
that there is an ineffable and sacred speech, the relation of which
exceeds
the measure of man's ability. I have spoken briefly, as I have been
able,
concerning the first nativity. Now I must more fully discuss the
second,
since this is the subject most controverted, that we may hold forth the
light of understanding to those who desire to know the truth.
<a href="http://ls.poly.edu/~jbain/mms/texts/mmslanctantius.htm">from The Divine Institutes</a>
