Chapter IX. Of Philo, Who Succeeded Cleitomachus, the Successor of Carneades. From the Same

‘So then this Philon on first succeeding to the School was beside himself with joy, and by way of making a grateful return used to worship and extol the doctrines of Cleitomachus, and

“arm himself in gleaming brass” [1]

against the Stoics.

‘But as time went on, and their doctrine of “suspense” was going out of fashion from familiarity, he was not at all consistent in thought with himself, but began to be converted by the clear evidence and acknowledgement of his misfortunes. Having therefore already much clearness of perception, he was very desirous, you may be sure, to find some who would refute him, that he might not appear to be turning his back and running away of his own accord.

‘A disciple of Philon was Antiochus, who founded a different Academy: at least he attended the School of Mnesarchus the Stoic, and adopted the contrary opinions to his teacher Philon, and fastened countless strange doctrines upon the Academy.’

These anecdotes and thousands like these are recorded of the successors of Plato. It is time, however, to take up our subject anew, and examine the opinions, alike false and contradictory, of the physical philosophers, men who wandered over the wide earth, and had set the highest value on the discovery of truth, and been familiar with the opinions of all the ancients, and carefully studied the exact nature of the theology which existed among all, Phoenicians and Egyptians and the Greeks themselves, in much earlier times. It is worth while then to hear from themselves what was the fruit they found from their labours, that so we may learn whether any worthy notion of God had come down to them from the men of an older time.

For the superstition of polytheism was formerly prevalent from ancient times among the nations, and shrines, and temples, and mysteries of the gods were everywhere customarily maintained, both in city and country districts. So then there was no need even of human philosophy, if indeed the knowledge of things divine had preoccupied the ground: nor was there any necessity for the wise to invent novelties, if forsooth the doctrines of their forefathers were right, nor any cause for factions and dissensions among the noble philosophers, if the ancestral opinion about their gods had been tested and proved to be harmonious and true.

Or what need was there to war and fight with one another, or run about and wander up and down the long course, and filch the learning of the Barbarians, when they ought to have been staying at home, and learning all from the gods, if forsooth there were any gods, or to learn from the writers on religion the true and infallible statements of the matters investigated in philosophy, about which they spent infinite toil and contention, yet fell far short of discovering the truth?

Why too need they have ventured to make novel inquiries about gods or to quarrel and pummel one another, if forsooth a safe and sure discovery of gods and a true knowledge of religion was contained in sacred rites and mysteries and the rest of the theology of the most ancient races, when they might have cultivated that very religion undisturbed and in harmonious agreement?

But then if it should be found that these men had learned no truth about God from their predecessors, but had set themselves to the examination of nature by their own devices, and used conjectures rather than clear conception, why should they any longer refuse to acknowledge that the ancient theology of the nations offered nothing beyond the account which has been rendered in the books preceding this?

Now that the philosophy of the Greeks was a product of human conjectures and much disputation and error, but not of any exact conception, you may learn from Porphyry’s Epistle to Anebo the Egyptian,when you hear him acknowledge this very fact in these words: [2]