Produced by Charles Keller BYGONE BELIEFS BEING A SERIES OF EXCURSIONS IN THE BYWAYS OF THOUGHT By H. Stanley Redgrove _Alle Erfahrung ist Magic, und nur magisch erklarbar_. NOVALIS (Friedrich von Hardenberg). Everything possible to be believ'd is an image of truth. WILLIAM BLAKE. TO MY WIFE Transcriber's Note: <.> = coordinate covalent bond. <#s> = subscripted #. <#S> = superscripted #. {} mark non-ascii characters. "Emphasis" _italics_ have a * mark. @@@ marks a reference to internal page numbers. Comments and guessed at characters in {braces} need stripped/fixed. Footnotes have not been re-numbered, however, (#) are moved to EOParagraph. The footnotes that have duplicate numbers across 2 pages are "a" and "b". "Protected" indentations have a space before the [Tab]. EOL - have been converted to ([Soft Hyphen]). Greek letters are encoded in <gr > brackets, and the letters are based on Adobe's Symbol font. Hebrew letters are encoded in <hb > brackets. PREFACE THESE Excursions in the Byways of Thought were undertaken at different times and on different occasions; consequently, the reader may be able to detect in them inequalities of treatment. He may feel that I have lingered too long in some byways and hurried too rapidly through others, taking, as it were, but a general view of the road in the latter case, whilst examining everything that could be seen in the former with, perhaps, undue care. As a matter of fact, how ever, all these excursions have been undertaken with one and the same object in view, that, namely, of understanding aright and appreciating at their true worth some of the more curious byways along which human thought has travelled. It is easy for the superficial thinker to dismiss much of the thought of the past (and, indeed, of the present) as _mere_ superstition, not worth the trouble of investigation: but it is not scientific. There is a reason for every belief, even the most fantastic, and it should be our object to discover this reason. How far, if at all, the reason in any case justifies us in holding a similar belief is, of course, another question. Some of the beliefs I have dealt with I have treated at greater length than others, because it seems to me that the truths of which they are the images--vague and distorted in many cases though they be--are truths which we have either forgotten nowadays, or are in danger of forgetting. We moderns may, indeed, learn something from the thought of the past, even in its most fantastic aspects. In one excursion at least, namely, the essay on "The Cambridge Platonists," I have ventured to deal with a higher phase--perhaps I should say the highest phase--of the thought of a bygone age, to which the modern world may be completely debtor. "Some Characteristics of Mediaeval Thought," and the two essays on Alchemy, have appeared in _The Journal of the Alchemical Society_. In others I have utilised material I have contributed to _The Occult Review_, to the editor of which journal my thanks are due for permission so to do. I have also to express my gratitude to the Rev. A. H. COLLINS, and others to be referred to in due course, for permission here to reproduce illustrations of which they are the copyright holders. I have further to offer my hearty thanks to Mr B. R. ROWBOTTOM and my wife for valuable assistance in reading the proofs. H. S. R. BLETCHLEY, BUCKS, _December_ 1919. CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE........................... ix LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.................... xiii 1. SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF MEDIAEVAL THOUGHT......... 1 2. PYTHAGORAS AND HIS PHILOSOPHY............... 8 3. MEDICINE AND MAGIC..................... 25 4. SUPERSTITIONS CONCERNING BIRDS .............. 34 5. THE POWDER OF SYMPATHY: A CURIOUS MEDICAL SUPERSTITION.. 47 6. THE BELIEF IN TALISMANS.................. 57 7. CEREMONIAL MAGIC IN THEORY AND PRACTICE.......... 87 8. ARCHITECTURAL SYMBOLISM..................111 9. THE QUEST OF THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE............121 10. THE PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMICAL DOCTRINE.........149 11. ROGER BACON: AN APPRECIATION...............183 12. THE CAMBRIDGE PLATONISTS..................193 {the LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS are incomplete and raw OCR output!} PAGE 46. Symbolic Alchemical Design from Mutus Liber (1677). PLATE: 25, to face p.176 47. Symbolic Alchemical Design illustrating the Work of Woman, from MAIER's Atalanta Fugiens...,, 26,,, 178 48. Symbolic Alchemica Design, Hermaphrodite, from MAIER's Atalanta Fugiens..,, 27,,, 180 49. ROGER BACON presenting a Book to a King, from a Fifteenth Century Miniature in the Bodleian Library, Oxford...,, 28,,, 184 50. ROGER BACON, from a Portrait in Knole Castle..,, 29,,, 188 51. BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE, from an engraved Portrait by ROBERT WHITE....30...194 52. HENRY MORE, from a Portrait by DAVID LOGGAN, engraved ad vivum, 1679 ...,, 31,,, 198 53. RALPH CUDWORTH, from an engraved Portrait by VERTUE, after LOGGAN, forming the Frontispiece to CUDWORTH's Treatise Concerning Morality (1731) ,, 32,,, 3~ BYGONE BELIEFS I. SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF MEDAEVAL THOUGHT IN the earliest days of his upward evolution man was satisfied with a very crude explanation of natural phenomena--that to which the name "animism" has been given. In this stage of mental development all the various forces of Nature are personified: the rushing torrent, the devastating fire, the wind rustling the forest leaves--in the mind of the animistic savage all these are personalities, spirits, like himself, but animated by motives more or less antagonistic to him. I suppose that no possible exception could be taken to the statement that modern science renders animism impossible. But let us inquire in exactly what sense this is true. It is not true that science robs natural phenomena of their spiritual significance. The mistake is often made of supposing that science explains, or endeavours to explain, phenomena. But that is the business of philosophy. The task science attempts is the simpler one of the correlation of natural phenomena, and in this effort leaves the ultimate problems of metaphysics untouched. A universe, however, whose phenomena are not only capable of some degree of correlation, but present the extraordinary degree of harmony and unity which science makes manifest in Nature, cannot be, as in animism, the product of a vast number of inco-ordinated and antagonistic wills, but must either be the product of one Will, or not the product of will at all. The latter alternative means that the Cosmos is inexplicable, which not only man's growing experience, but the fact that man and the universe form essentially a unity, forbid us to believe. The term "anthropomorphic" is too easily applied to philosophical systems, as if it constituted a criticism of their validity. For if it be true, as all must admit, that the unknown can only be explained in terms of the known, then the universe must either be explained in terms of man--_i.e_. in terms of will or desire--or remain incomprehensible. That is to say, a philosophy must either be anthropomorphic, or no philosophy at all. Thus a metaphysical scrutiny of the results of modern science leads us to a belief in God. But man felt the need of unity, and crude animism, though a step in the right direction, failed to satisfy his thought, long before the days of modern science. The spirits of animism, however, were not discarded, but were modified, co-ordinated, and worked into a system as servants of the Most High. Polytheism may mark a stage in this process; or, perhaps, it was a result of mental degeneracy. What I may term systematised as distinguished from crude animism persisted throughout the Middle Ages. The work of systematisation had already been accomplished, to a large extent, by the Neo-Platonists and whoever were responsible for the Kabala. It is true that these main sources of magical or animistic philosophy remained hidden during the greater part of the Middle Ages; but at about their close the youthful and enthusiastic CORNELIUS AGRIPPA (1486-1535)(1) slaked his thirst thereat and produced his own attempt at the systematisation of magical belief in the famous _Three Books of Occult Philosophy_. But the waters of magical philosophy reached the mediaeval mind through various devious channels, traditional on the one hand and literary on the other. And of the latter, the works of pseudo-DIONYSIUS,(2) whose immense influence upon mediaeval thought has sometimes been neglected, must certainly be noted. (1) The story of his life has been admirably told by HENRY MORLEY (2 vols., 1856). (2) These writings were first heard of in the early part of the sixth century, and were probably the work of a Syrian monk of that date, who fathered them on to DIONYSIUS the Areopagite as a pious fraud. See Dean INGE'S _Christian Mysticism_ (1899), pp. 104--122, and VAUGHAN'S _Hours with the Mystics_ (7th ed., 1895), vol. i. pp. 111-124. The books have been translated into English by the Rev. JOHN PARKER (2 vols.1897-1899), who believes in the genuineness of their alleged authorship. The most obvious example of a mediaeval animistic belief is that in "elementals"--the spirits which personify the primordial forces of Nature, and are symbolised by the four elements, immanent in which they were supposed to exist, and through which they were held to manifest their powers. And astrology, it must be remembered, is essentially a systematised animism. The stars, to the ancients, were not material bodies like the earth, but spiritual beings. PLATO (427-347 B.C.) speaks of them as "gods". Mediaeval thought did not regard them in quite this way. But for those who believed in astrology, and few, I think, did not, the stars were still symbols of spiritual forces operative on man. Evidences of the wide extent of astrological belief in those days are abundant, many instances of which we shall doubtless encounter in our excursions. It has been said that the theological and philosophical atmosphere of the Middle Ages was "scholastic," not mystical. No doubt "mysticism," as a mode of life aiming at the realisation of the presence of God, is as distinct from scholasticism as empiricism is from rationalism, or "tough-minded" philosophy (to use JAMES' happy phrase) is from "tender-minded". But no philosophy can be absolutely and purely deductive. It must start from certain empirically determined facts. A man might be an extreme empiricist in religion (_i.e_. a mystic), and yet might attempt to deduce all other forms of knowledge from the results of his religious experiences, never caring to gather experience in any other realm. Hence the breach between mysticism and scholasticism is not really so wide as may appear at first sight. Indeed, scholasticism officially recognised three branches of theology, of which the MYSTICAL was one. I think that mysticism and scholasticism both had a profound influence on the mediaeval mind, sometimes acting as opposing forces, sometimes operating harmoniously with one another. As Professor WINDELBAND puts it: "We no longer onesidedly characterise the philosophy of the middle ages as scholasticism, but rather place mysticism beside it as of equal rank, and even as being the more fruitful and promising movement."(1) (1) Professor WILHELM WINDELBAND, Ph.D.: "Present-Day Mysticism," _The Quest_, vol. iv. (1913), P. 205. Alchemy, with its four Aristotelian or scholastic elements and its three mystical principles--sulphur, mercury, salt,--must be cited as the outstanding product of the combined influence of mysticism and scholasticism: of mysticism, which postulated the unity of the Cosmos, and hence taught that everything natural is the expressive image and type of some supernatural reality; of scholasticism, which taught men to rely upon deduction and to restrict experimentation to the smallest possible limits. The mind naturally proceeds from the known, or from what is supposed to be known, to the unknown. Indeed, as I have already indicated, it must so proceed if truth is to be gained. Now what did the men of the Middle Ages regard as falling into the category of the known? Why, surely, the truths of revealed religion, whether accepted upon authority or upon the evidence of their own experience. The realm of spiritual and moral reality: there, they felt, they were on firm ground. Nature was a realm unknown; but they had analogy to guide, or, rather, misguide them. Nevertheless if, as we know, it misguided, this was not, I think, because the mystical doctrine of the correspondence between the spiritual and the natural is unsound, but because these ancient seekers into Nature's secrets knew so little, and so frequently misapplied what they did know. So alchemical philosophy arose and became systematised, with its wonderful endeavour to perfect the base metals by the Philosopher's Stone--the concentrated Essence of Nature,--as man's soul is perfected through the life-giving power of JESUS CHRIST. I want, in conclusion to these brief introductory remarks, to say a few words concerning phallicism in connection with my topic. For some "tender-minded"(1) and, to my thought, obscure, reason the subject is tabooed. Even the British Museum does not include works on phallicism in its catalogue, and special permission has to be obtained to consult them. Yet the subject is of vast importance as concerns the origin and development of religion and philosophy, and the extent of phallic worship may be gathered from the widespread occurrence of obelisks and similar objects amongst ancient relics. Our own maypole dances may be instanced as one survival of the ancient worship of the male generative principle. (1) I here use the term with the extended meaning Mr H. G. WELLS has given to it. See _The New Machiavelli_. What could be more easy to understand than that, when man first questioned as to the creation of the earth, he should suppose it to have been generated by some process analogous to that which he saw held in the case of man? How else could he account for its origin, if knowledge must proceed from the known to the unknown? No one questions at all that the worship of the human generative organs as symbols of the dual generative principle of Nature degenerated into orgies of the most frightful character, but the view of Nature which thus degenerated is not, I think, an altogether unsound one, and very interesting remnants of it are to be found in mediaeval philosophy. These remnants are very marked in alchemy. The metals, as I have suggested, are there regarded as types of man; hence they are produced from seed, through the combination of male and female principles--mercury and sulphur, which on the spiritual plane are intelligence and love. The same is true of that Stone which is perfect Man. As BERNARD of TREVISAN (1406-1490) wrote in the fifteenth century: "This Stone then is compounded of a Body and Spirit, or of a volatile and fixed Substance, and that is therefore done, because nothing in the World can be generated and brought to light without these two Substances, to wit, a Male and Female: From whence it appeareth, that although these two Substances are not of one and the same species, yet one Stone doth thence arise, and although they appear and are said to be two Substances, yet in truth it is but one, to wit, _Argent-vive_."(1) No doubt this sounds fantastic; but with all their seeming intellectual follies these old thinkers were no fools. The fact of sex is the most fundamental fact of the universe, and is a spiritual and physical as well as a physiological fact. I shall deal with the subject as concerns the speculations of the alchemists in some detail in a later excursion. (1) BERNARD, Earl of TREVISAN: _A Treatise of the Philosopher's Stone_, 1683. (See _Collectanea Chymica: A Collection of Ten Several Treatises in Chemistry_, 1684, p. 91.) II. PYTHAGORAS AND HIS PHILOSOPHY IT is a matter for enduring regret that so little is known to us concerning PYTHAGORAS. What little we do know serves but to enhance for us the interest of the man and his philosophy, to make him, in many ways, the most attractive of Greek thinkers; and, basing our estimate on the extent of his influence on the thought of succeeding ages, we recognise in him one of the world's master-minds. PYTHAGORAS was born about 582 B.C. at Samos, one of the Grecian isles. In his youth he came in contact with THALES--the Father of Geometry, as he is well called,--and though he did not become a member of THALES' school, his contact with the latter no doubt helped to turn his mind towards the study of geometry. This interest found the right ground for its development in Egypt, which he visited when still young. Egypt is generally regarded as the birthplace of geometry, the subject having, it is supposed, been forced on the minds of the Egyptians by the necessity of fixing the boundaries of lands against the annual overflowing of the Nile. But the Egyptians were what is called an essentially practical people, and their geometrical knowledge did not extend beyond a few empirical rules useful for fixing these boundaries and in constructing their temples. Striking evidence of this fact is supplied by the AHMES papyrus, compiled some little time before 1700 B.C. from an older work dating from about 3400 B.C.,(1) a papyrus which almost certainly represents the highest mathematical knowledge reached by the Egyptians of that day. Geometry is treated very superficially and as of subsidiary interest to arithmetic; there is no ordered series of reasoned geometrical propositions given--nothing, indeed, beyond isolated rules, and of these some are wanting in accuracy. (1) See AUGUST EISENLOHR: _Ein mathematisches Handbuch der alten Aegypter_ (1877); J. Gow: _A Short History of Greek Mathematics_ (1884); and V. E. JOHNSON: _Egyptian Science from the Monuments and Ancient Books_ (1891). One geometrical fact known to the Egyptians was that if a triangle be constructed having its sides 3, 4, and 5 units long respectively, then the angle opposite the longest side is exactly a right angle; and the Egyptian builders used this rule for constructing walls perpendicular to each other, employing a cord graduated in the required manner. The Greek mind was not, however, satisfied with the bald statement of mere facts--it cared little for practical applications, but sought above all for the underlying REASON of everything. Nowadays we are beginning to realise that the results achieved by this type of mind, the general laws of Nature's behaviour formulated by its endeavours, are frequently of immense practical importance--of far more importance than the mere rules-of-thumb beyond which so-called practical minds never advance. The classic example of the utility of seemingly useless knowledge is afforded by Sir WILLIAM HAMILTON'S discovery, or, rather, invention of Quarternions, but no better example of the utilitarian triumph of the theoretical over the so-called practical mind can be adduced than that afforded by PYTHAGORAS. Given this rule for constructing a right angle, about whose reason the Egyptian who used it never bothered himself, and the mind of PYTHAGORAS, searching for its full significance, made that gigantic geometrical discovery which is to this day known as the Theorem of PYTHAGORAS--the law that in every right-angled triangle the square on the side opposite the right angle is equal in area to the sum of the squares on the other two sides.(1) The importance of this discovery can hardly be overestimated. It is of fundamental importance in most branches of geometry, and the basis of the whole of trigonometry--the special branch of geometry that deals with the practical mensuration of triangles. EUCLID devoted the whole of the first book of his _Elements of Geometry_ to establishing the truth of this theorem; how PYTHAGORAS demonstrated it we unfortunately do not know. (1) Fig. 3 affords an interesting practical demonstration of the truth of this theorem. If the reader will copy this figure, cut out the squares on the two shorter sides of the triangle and divide them along the lines AD, BE, EF, he will find that the five pieces so obtained can be made exactly to fit the square on the longest side as shown by the dotted lines. The size and shape of the triangle ABC, so long as it has a right angle at C, is immaterial. The lines AD, BE are obtained by continuing the sides of the square on the side AB, _i.e_. the side opposite the right angle, and EF is drawn at right angles to BE. After absorbing what knowledge was to be gained in Egypt, PYTHAGORAS journeyed to Babylon, where he probably came into contact with even greater traditions and more potent influences and sources of knowledge than in Egypt, for there is reason for believing that the ancient Chaldeans were the builders of the Pyramids and in many ways the intellectual superiors of the Egyptians. At last, after having travelled still further East, probably as far as India, PYTHAGORAS returned to his birthplace to teach the men of his native land the knowledge he had gained. But CROESUS was tyrant over Samos, and so oppressive was his rule that none had leisure in which to learn. Not a student came to PYTHAGORAS, until, in despair, so the story runs, he offered to pay an artisan if he would but learn geometry. The man accepted, and later, when PYTHAGORAS pretended inability any longer to continue the payments, he offered, so fascinating did he find the subject, to pay his teacher instead if the lessons might only be continued. PYTHAGORAS no doubt was much gratified at this; and the motto he adopted for his great Brotherhood, of which we shall make the acquaintance in a moment, was in all likelihood based on this event. It ran, "Honour a figure and a step before a figure and a tribolus"; or, as a freer translation renders it:-- "A figure and a step onward Not a figure and a florin." "At all events," as Mr FRANKLAND remarks, "the motto is a lasting witness to a very singular devotion to knowledge for its own sake."(1) (1) W. B. FRANKLAND, M.A.: _The Story of Euclid_ (1902), p. 33 But PYTHAGORAS needed a greater audience than one man, however enthusiastic a pupil he might be, and he left Samos for Southern Italy, the rich inhabitants of whose cities had both the leisure and inclination to study. Delphi, far-famed for its Oracles, was visited _en route_, and PYTHAGORAS, after a sojourn at Tarentum, settled at Croton, where he gathered about him a great band of pupils, mainly young people of the aristocratic class. By consent of the Senate of Croton, he formed out of these a great philosophical brotherhood, whose members lived apart from the ordinary people, forming, as it were, a separate community. They were bound to PYTHAGORAS by the closest ties of admiration and reverence, and, for years after his death, discoveries made by Pythagoreans were invariably attributed to the Master, a fact which makes it very difficult exactly to gauge the extent of PYTHAGORAS' own knowledge and achievements. The regime of the Brotherhood, or Pythagorean Order, was a strict one, entailing "high thinking and low living" at all times. A restricted diet, the exact nature of which is in dispute, was observed by all members, and long periods of silence, as conducive to deep thinking, were imposed on novices. Women were admitted to the Order, and PYTHAGORAS' asceticism did not prohibit romance, for we read that one of his fair pupils won her way to his heart, and, declaring her affection for him, found it reciprocated and became his wife. SCHURE writes: "By his marriage with Theano, Pythagoras affixed _the seal of realization_ to his work. The union and fusion of the two lives was complete. One day when the master's wife was asked what length of time elapsed before a woman could become pure after intercourse with a man, she replied: 'If it is with her husband, she is pure all the time; if with another man, she is never pure.'" "Many women," adds the writer, "would smilingly remark that to give such a reply one must be the wife of Pythagoras, and love him as Theano did. And they would be in the right, for it is not marriage that sanctifies love, it is love which justifies marriage."(1) (1) EDOUARD SCHURE: _Pythagoras and the Delphic Mysteries_, trans. by F. ROTHWELL, B.A. (1906), pp. 164 and 165. PYTHAGORAS was not merely a mathematician, he was first and foremost a philosopher, whose philosophy found in number the basis of all things, because number, for him, alone possessed stability of relationship. As I have remarked on a former occasion, "The theory that the Cosmos has its origin and explanation in Number... is one for which it is not difficult to account if we take into consideration the nature of the times in which it was formulated. The Greek of the period, looking upon Nature, beheld no picture of harmony, uniformity and fundamental unity. The outer world appeared to him rather as a discordant chaos, the mere sport and plaything of the gods. The theory of the uniformity of Nature--that Nature is ever like to herself--the very essence of the modern scientific spirit, had yet to be born of years of unwearied labour and unceasing delving into Nature's innermost secrets. Only in Mathematics--in the properties of geometrical figures, and of numbers--was the reign of law, the principle of harmony, perceivable. Even at this present day when the marvellous has become commonplace, that property of right-angled triangles... already discussed... comes to the mind as a remarkable and notable fact: it must have seemed a stupendous marvel to its discoverer, to whom, it appears, the regular alternation of the odd and even numbers, a fact so obvious to us that we are inclined to attach no importance to it, seemed, itself, to be something wonderful. Here in Geometry and Arithmetic, here was order and harmony unsurpassed and unsurpassable. What wonder then that Pythagoras concluded that the solution of the mighty riddle of the Universe was contained in the mysteries of Geometry? What wonder that he read mystic meanings into the laws of Arithmetic, and believed Number to be the explanation and origin of all that is?"(1) (1) _A Mathematical Theory of Spirit_ (1912), pp. 64-65. No doubt the Pythagorean theory suffers from a defect similar to that of the Kabalistic doctrine, which, starting from the fact that all words are composed of letters, representing the primary sounds of language, maintained that all the things represented by these words were created by God by means of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet. But at the same time the Pythagorean theory certainly embodies a considerable element of truth. Modern science demonstrates nothing more clearly than the importance of numerical relationships. Indeed, "the history of science shows us the gradual transformation of crude facts of experience into increasingly exact generalisations by the application to them of mathematics. The enormous advances that have been made in recent years in physics and chemistry are very largely due to mathematical methods of interpreting and co-ordinating facts experimentally revealed, whereby further experiments have been suggested, the results of which have themselves been mathematically interpreted. Both physics and chemistry, especially the former, are now highly mathematical. In the biological sciences and especially in psychology it is true that mathematical methods are, as yet, not so largely employed. But these sciences are far less highly developed, far less exact and systematic, that is to say, far less scientific, at present, than is either physics or chemistry. However, the application of statistical methods promises good results, and there are not wanting generalisations already arrived at which are expressible mathematically; Weber's Law in psychology, and the law concerning the arrangement of the leaves about the stems of plants in biology, may be instanced as cases in point."(1) (1) Quoted from a lecture by the present writer on "The Law of Correspondences Mathematically Considered," delivered before The Theological and Philosophical Society on 26th April 1912, and published in _Morning Light_, vol. xxxv (1912), p. 434 _et seq_. The Pythagorean doctrine of the Cosmos, in its most reasonable form, however, is confronted with one great difficulty which it seems incapable of overcoming, namely, that of continuity. Modern science, with its atomic theories of matter and electricity, does, indeed, show us that the apparent continuity of material things is spurious, that all material things consist of discrete particles, and are hence measurable in numerical terms. But modern science is also obliged to postulate an ether behind these atoms, an ether which is wholly continuous, and hence transcends the domain of number.(1) It is true that, in quite recent times, a certain school of thought has argued that the ether is also atomic in constitution--that all things, indeed, have a grained structure, even forces being made up of a large number of quantums or indivisible units of force. But this view has not gained general acceptance, and it seems to necessitate the postulation of an ether beyond the ether, filling the interspaces between its atoms, to obviate the difficulty of conceiving of action at a distance. (1) Cf. chap. iii., "On Nature as the Embodiment of Number," of my _A Mathematical Theory of Spirit_, to which reference has already been made. According to BERGSON, life--the reality that can only be lived, not understood--is absolutely continuous (_i.e_. not amenable to numerical treatment). It is because life is absolutely continuous that we cannot, he says, understand it; for reason acts discontinuously, grasping only, so to speak, a cinematographic view of life, made up of an immense number of instantaneous glimpses. All that passes between the glimpses is lost, and so the true whole, reason can never synthesise from that which it possesses. On the other hand, one might also argue--extending, in a way, the teaching of the physical sciences of the period between the postulation of DALTON'S atomic theory and the discovery of the significance of the ether of space--that reality is essentially discontinuous, our idea that it is continuous being a mere illusion arising from the coarseness of our senses. That might provide a complete vindication of the Pythagorean view; but a better vindication, if not of that theory, at any rate of PYTHAGORAS' philosophical attitude, is forthcoming, I think, in the fact that modern mathematics has transcended the shackles of number, and has enlarged her kingdom, so as to include quantities other than numerical. PYTHAGORAS, had he been born in these latter centuries, would surely have rejoiced in this, enlargement, whereby the continuous as well as the discontinuous is brought, if not under the rule of number, under the rule of mathematics indeed. PYTHAGORAS' foremost achievement in mathematics I have already mentioned. Another notable piece of work in the same department was the discovery of a method of constructing a parallelogram having a side equal to a given line, an angle equal to a given angle, and its area equal to that of a given triangle. PYTHAGORAS is said to have celebrated this discovery by the sacrifice of a whole ox. The problem appears in the first book of EUCLID'S _Elements of Geometry_ as proposition 44. In fact, many of the propositions of EUCLID'S first, second, fourth, and sixth books were worked out by PYTHAGORAS and the Pythagoreans; but, curiously enough, they seem greatly to have neglected the geometry of the circle. The symmetrical solids were regarded by PYTHAGORAS, and by the Greek thinkers after him, as of the greatest importance. To be perfectly symmetrical or regular, a solid must have an equal number of faces meeting at each of its angles, and these faces must be equal regular polygons, _i.e_. figures whose sides and angles are all equal. PYTHAGORAS, perhaps, may be credited with the great discovery that there are only five such solids. These are as follows:-- The Tetrahedron, having four equilateral triangles as faces. The Cube, having six squares as faces. The Octahedron, having eight equilateral triangles as faces. The Dodecahedron, having twelve regular pentagons (or five-sided figures) as faces. The Icosahedron, having twenty equilateral triangles as faces.(1) (1) If the reader will copy figs. 4 to 8 on cardboard or stiff paper, bend each along the dotted lines so as to form a solid, fastening together the free edges with gummed paper, he will be in possession of models of the five solids in question. Now, the Greeks believed the world to be composed of four elements--earth, air, fire, water,--and to the Greek mind the conclusion was inevitable(2a) that the shapes of the particles of the elements were those of the regular solids. Earth-particles were cubical, the cube being the regular solid possessed of greatest stability; fire-particles were tetrahedral, the tetrahedron being the simplest and, hence, lightest solid. Water-particles were icosahedral for exactly the reverse reason, whilst air-particles, as intermediate between the two latter, were octahedral. The dodecahedron was, to these ancient mathematicians, the most mysterious of the solids: it was by far the most difficult to construct, the accurate drawing of the regular pentagon necessitating a rather elaborate application of PYTHAGORAS' great theorem.(1) Hence the conclusion, as PLATO put it, that "this (the regular dodecahedron) the Deity employed in tracing the plan of the Universe."(2b) Hence also the high esteem in which the pentagon was held by the Pythagoreans. By producing each side of this latter figure the five-pointed star (fig. 9), known as the pentagram, is obtained. This was adopted by the Pythagoreans as the badge of their Society, and for many ages was held as a symbol possessed of magic powers. The mediaeval magicians made use of it in their evocations, and as a talisman it was held in the highest esteem. (2a) _Cf_. PLATO: The Timaeus, SESE xxviii--xxx. (1) In reference to this matter FRANKLAND remarks: "In those early days the innermost secrets of nature lay in the lap of geometry, and the extraordinary inference follows that Euclid's _Elements_, which are devoted to the investigation of the regular solids, are therefore in reality and at bottom an attempt to 'solve the universe.' Euclid, in fact, made this goal of the Pythagoreans the aim of his _Elements_."--_Op. cit_., p. 35. (2b) _Op. cit_., SE xxix. Music played an important part in the curriculum of the Pythagorean Brotherhood, and the important discovery that the relations between the notes of musical scales can be expressed by means of numbers is a Pythagorean one. It must have seemed to its discoverer--as, in a sense, it indeed is--a striking confirmation of the numerical theory of the Cosmos. The Pythagoreans held that the positions of the heavenly bodies were governed by similar numerical relations, and that in consequence their motion was productive of celestial music. This concept of "the harmony of the spheres" is among the most celebrated of the Pythagorean doctrines, and has found ready acceptance in many mystically-speculative minds. "Look how the floor of heaven," says Lorenzo in SHAKESPEARE'S _The Merchant of Venice_-- "... Look how the floor of heaven Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold: There's not the smallest orb which thou behold's" But in his motion like an angel sings, Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins; Such harmony is in immortal souls; But whilst this muddy vesture of decay Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it."(1) (1) Act v. scene i. Or, as KINGSLEY writes in one of his letters, "When I walk the fields I am oppressed every now and then with an innate feeling that everything I see has a meaning, if I could but understand it. And this feeling of being surrounded with truths which I cannot grasp, amounts to an indescribable awe sometimes! Everything seems to be full of God's reflex, if we could but see it. Oh! how I have prayed to have the mystery unfolded, at least hereafter. To see, if but for a moment, the whole harmony of the great system! To hear once the music which the whole universe makes as it performs His bidding!"(1) In this connection may be mentioned the very significant fact that the Pythagoreans did not consider the earth, in accordance with current opinion, to be a stationary body, but believed that it and the other planets revolved about a central point, or fire, as they called it. (1) CHARLES KINGSLEY: _His Letters and Memories of His Life_, edited by his wife (1883), p. 28. As concerns PYTHAGORAS' ethical teaching, judging from the so-called _Golden Verses_ attributed to him, and no doubt written by one of his disciples,(2) this would appear to be in some respects similar to that of the Stoics who came later, but free from the materialism of the Stoic doctrines. Due regard for oneself is blended with regard for the gods and for other men, the atmosphere of the whole being at once rational and austere. One verse--"Thou shalt likewise know, according to Justice, that the nature of this Universe is in all things alike"(3)--is of particular interest, as showing PYTHAGORAS' belief in that principle of analogy--that "What is below is as that which is above, what is above is as that which is below"--which held so dominant a sway over the minds of ancient and mediaeval philosophers, leading them--in spite, I suggest, of its fundamental truth--into so many fantastic errors, as we shall see in future excursions. Metempsychosis was another of the Pythagorean tenets, a fact which is interesting in view of the modern revival of this doctrine. PYTHAGORAS, no doubt, derived it from the East, apparently introducing it for the first time to Western thought. (2) It seems probable, though not certain, that PYTHAGORAS wrote nothing himself, but taught always by the oral method. (3) Cf. the remarks of HIEROCLES on this verse in his _Commentary_. Such, in brief, were the outstanding doctrines of the Pythagorean Brotherhood. Their teachings included, as we have seen, what may justly be called scientific discoveries of the first importance, as well as doctrines which, though we may feel compelled--perhaps rightly--to regard them as fantastic now, had an immense influence on the thought of succeeding ages, especially on Greek philosophy as represented by PLATO and the Neo-Platonists, and the more speculative minds--the occult philosophers, shall I say?--of the latter mediaeval period and succeeding centuries. The Brotherhood, however, was not destined to continue its days in peace. As I have indicated, it was a philosophical, not a political, association; but naturally PYTHAGORAS' philosophy included political doctrines. At any rate, the Brotherhood acquired a considerable share in the government of Croton, a fact which was greatly resented by the members of the democratic party, who feared the loss of their rights; and, urged thereto, it is said, by a rejected applicant for membership of the Order, the mob made an onslaught on the Brotherhood's place of assembly and burnt it to the ground. One account has it that PYTHAGORAS himself died in the conflagration, a sacrifice to the mad fury of the mob. According to another account--and we like to believe that this is the true one--he escaped to Tarentum, from which he was banished, to find an asylum in Metapontum, where he lived his last years in peace. The Pythagorean Order was broken up, but the bonds of brotherhood still existed between its members. "One of them who had fallen upon sickness and poverty was kindly taken in by an innkeeper. Before dying he traced a few mysterious signs (the pentagram, no doubt) on the door of the inn and said to the host: 'Do not be uneasy, one of my brothers will pay my debts.' A year afterwards, as a stranger was passing by this inn he saw the signs and said to the host: 'I am a Pythagorean; one of my brothers died here; tell me what I owe you on his account.'"(1) (1) EDOUARD SCHURE: _Op. cit_., p. 174. In endeavouring to estimate the worth of PYTHAGORAS' discoveries and teaching, Mr FRANKLAND writes, with reference to his achievements in geometry: "Even after making a considerable allowance for his pupils' share, the Master's geometrical work calls for much admiration"; and, "... it cannot be far wrong to suppose that it was Pythagoras' wont to insist upon proofs, and so to secure that rigour which gives to mathematics its honourable position amongst the sciences." And of his work in arithmetic, music, and astronomy, the same author writes: "... everywhere he appears to have inaugurated genuinely scientific methods, and to have laid the foundations of a high and liberal education"; adding, "For nearly a score of centuries, to the very close of the Middle Ages, the four Pythagorean subjects of study--arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music--were the staple educational course, and were bound together into a fourfold way of knowledge--the Quadrivium."(1) With these words of due praise, our present excursion may fittingly close. (1) _Op. cit_., pp. 35, 37, and 38. III. MEDICINE AND MAGIC THERE are few tasks at once so instructive and so fascinating as the tracing of the development of the human mind as manifested in the evolution of scientific and philosophical theories. And this is, perhaps, especially true when, as in the case of medicine, this evolution has followed paths so tortuous, intersected by so many fantastic byways, that one is not infrequently doubtful as to the true road. The history of medicine is at once the history of human wisdom and the history of human credulity and folly, and the romantic element (to use the expression in its popular acceptation) thus introduced, whilst making the subject more entertaining, by no means detracts from its importance considered psychologically. To whom the honour of having first invented medicines is due is unknown, the origins of pharmacy being lost in the twilight of myth. OSIRIS and ISIS, BACCHUS, APOLLO father of the famous physician AESCULAPIUS, and CHIRON the Centaur, tutor of the latter, are among the many mythological personages who have been accredited with the invention of physic. It is certain that the art of compounding medicines is extraordinarily ancient. There is a papyrus in the British Museum containing medical prescriptions which was written about 1200 B.C.; and the famous EBERS papyrus, which is devoted to medical matters, is reckoned to date from about the year 1550 B.C. It is interesting to note that in the prescriptions given in this latter papyrus, as seems to have been the case throughout the history of medicine, the principle that the efficacy of a medicine is in proportion to its nastiness appears to have been the main idea. Indeed, many old medicines contained ingredients of the most disgusting nature imaginable: a mediaeval remedy known as oil of puppies, made by cutting up two newly-born puppies and boiling them with one pound of live earthworms, may be cited as a comparatively pleasant example of the remedies (?) used in the days when all sorts of excreta were prescribed as medicines.(1) (1) See the late Mr A. C. WOOTTON'S excellent work, _Chronicles of Pharmacy_ (2 vols, 1910), to which I gladly acknowledge my indebtedness. Presumably the oldest theory concerning the causation of disease is that which attributes all the ills of mankind to the malignant operations of evil spirits, a theory which someone has rather fancifully suggested is not so erroneous after all, if we may be allowed to apply the term "evil spirits" to the microbes of modern bacteriology. Remnants of this theory (which does--shall I say?--conceal a transcendental truth), that is, in its original form, still survive to the present day in various superstitious customs, whose absurdity does not need emphasising: for example, the use of red flannel by old-fashioned folk with which to tie up sore throats--red having once been supposed to be a colour very angatonistic to evil spirits; so much so that at one time red cloth hung in the patient's room was much employed as a cure for smallpox! Medicine and magic have always been closely associated. Indeed, the greatest name in the history of pharmacy is also what is probably the greatest name in the history of magic--the reference, of course, being to PARACELSUS (1493-1541). Until PARACELSUS, partly by his vigorous invective and partly by his remarkable cures of various diseases, demolished the old school of medicine, no one dared contest the authority of GALEN (130-_circa_ 205) and AVICENNA (980--1037). GALEN'S theory of disease was largely based upon that of the four humours in man--bile, blood, phlegm, and black bile,--which were regarded as related to (but not identical with) the four elements--fire, air, water, and earth,--being supposed to have characters similar to these. Thus, to bile, as to fire, were attributed the properties of hotness and dryness; to blood and air those of hotness and moistness; to phlegm and water those of coldness and moistness; and, finally, black bile, like earth, was said to be cold and dry. GALEN supposed that an alteration in the due proportion of these humours gives rise to disease, though he did not consider this to be its only cause; thus, cancer, it was thought, might result from an excess of black bile, and rheumatism from an excess of phlegm. Drugs, GALEN argued, are of efficiency in the curing of disease, according as they possess one or more of these so-called fundamental properties, hotness, dryness, coldness, and moistness, whereby it was considered that an excess of any humour might be counteracted; moreover, it was further assumed that four degrees of each property exist, and that only those drugs are of use in curing a disease which contain the necessary property or properties in the degree proportionate to that in which the opposite humour or humours are in excess in the patient's system. PARACELSUS' views were based upon his theory (undoubtedly true in a sense) that man is a microcosm, a world in miniature.(1) Now, all things material, taught PARACELSUS, contain the three principles termed in alchemistic phraseology salt, sulphur, and mercury. This is true, therefore, of man: the healthy body, he argued, is a sort of chemical compound in which these three principles are harmoniously blended (as in the Macrocosm) in due proportion, whilst disease is due to a preponderance of one principle, fevers, for example, being the result of an excess of sulphur (_i.e_. the fiery principle), _etc_. PARACELSUS, although his theory was not so different from that of GALEN, whose views he denounced, was thus led to seek for CHEMICAL remedies, containing these principles in varying proportions; he was not content with medicinal herbs and minerals in their crude state, but attempted to extract their effective essences; indeed, he maintained that the preparation of new and better drugs is the chief business of chemistry. (1) See the "Note on the Paracelsian Doctrine of the Microcosm" below. This theory of disease and of the efficacy of drugs was complicated by many fantastic additions;(1) thus there is the "Archaeus," a sort of benevolent demon, supposed by PARACELSUS to look after all the unconscious functions of the bodily organism, who has to be taken into account. PARACELSUS also held the Doctrine of Signatures, according to which the medicinal value of plants and minerals is indicated by their external form, or by some sign impressed upon them by the operation of the stars. A very old example of this belief is to be found in the use of mandrake (whose roots resemble the human form) by the Hebrews and Greeks as a cure for sterility; or, to give an instance which is still accredited by some, the use of eye-bright (_Euphrasia officinalis_, L., a plant with a black pupil-like spot in its corolla) for complaints of the eyes.(2) Allied to this doctrine are such beliefs, once held, as that the lungs of foxes are good for bronchial troubles, or that the heart of a lion will endow one with courage; as CORNELIUS AGRIPPA put it, "It is well known amongst physicians that brain helps the brain, and lungs the lungs."(3) (1) The question of PARACELSUS' pharmacy is further complicated by the fact that this eccentric genius coined many new words (without regard to the principles of etymology) as names for his medicines, and often used the same term to stand for quite different bodies. Some of his disciples maintained that he must not always be understood in a literal sense, in which probably there is an element of truth. See, for instance, _A Golden and Blessed Casket of Nature's Marvels_, by BENEDICTUS FIGULUS (trans. by A. E. WAITE, 1893). (2) See Dr ALFRED C. HADDON'S _Magic and Fetishism_ (1906), p. 15. (3) HENRY CORNELIUS AGRIPPA: _Occult Philosophy_, bk. i. chap. xv. (WHITEHEAD'S edition, Chicago, 1898, P. 72). In modern times homoeopathy--according to which a drug is a cure, if administered in small doses, for that disease whose symptoms it produces, if given in large doses to a healthy person---seems to bear some resemblance to these old medical theories concerning the curing of like by like. That the system of HAHNEMANN (1755--1843), the founder of homoeopathy, is free from error could be scarcely maintained, but certain recent discoveries in connection with serum-therapy appear to indicate that the last word has not yet been said on the subject, and the formula "like cures like" may still have another lease of life to run. To return to PARACELSUS, however. It may be thought that his views were not so great an advance on those of GALEN; but whether or not this be the case, his union of chemistry and medicine was of immense benefit to each science, and marked a new era
{'title': 'Bygone Beliefs: Being a Series of Excursions in the Byways of Thought by Redgrove', 'source': 'Project Gutenberg', 'lang': 'en'}