method, according to the Platonic teaching, to release the soul from the prison of the body. From this mad design, however, he was dissuaded by bis master, who advised a voyage to Sicily. Complying with this ad- Nice. Porphyry recovered his bodily vigor and serenity of mind, and devoted himself to authorship. He then wrote, according tec Eusebius (Hist. Eccles. \i. 19) and Jerome (Catdl. Script Tllttst.), his treatise against the Christian religion (see below, under Works), on which account St. Augustine (Retract, ii. 31) styles bim Sicu- /in,/ ilium CVJUS ci h In iriiuii fiiiim is/. 'I"he notion that i his work was written in l'.ithynia is quite without foun- dation, being merely derived from a passage of Lactan-
tius I v. 2), referring to somebody whose name is not
mentioned, and who wrote against the Christians, and which was supposed by Baronius to refer to Porphyry. But the account does not suit him in any respect. It. was very likely aboul this period that Porphyrj took occasion tec visit Carthage. That he also went to Athens after the death of Plotinus has he'e-u inferred (by llolsieiiiiis i from a passage quoted bj Eusebius, where, as the teexl Btands, Porphyry is made' tec speak of celebrating the' birthday of Plotinus at Athens with Longinus. There can l»- little doubt, however, that the reading should be, as Brucker (L c. p. 148) suggests,
HXeire./ruei. and that the' incident refers t" the earlier
part of the Life of Porphyry, otherwise the allusion will ihci accord with the history either of Porphyrj or Lon- ginus.
in the' remainder of the' life of Porphyry we know- very little. According tec Eunapius hi' returned to
Koine, where hi' taUght, and gave frecpient public (X-
hibiiiecns of his acquirements and talents as a speaker, and was held in high honor by the senate and people till he died. Put his mind again lost its balance, for he
PORPHYRY
421
PORPHYRY
pretended to be not only a philosopher "endued with superior wisdom, but a divine person, favored with su- pernatural communications from heaven." He avers that in the sixty-eighth year of his age (Vit. Plot. c. xxiii) he had a vision of the Supreme Intelligence, the God superior to all gods, without an image— the result. as Augustine thought, of the agency of evil spirits, but more probably an entire fiction, employed to offset the supernatural "elements of Christianity, or a mere phan- tasm of an overwrought brain. When probably at a somewhat advanced period of his life, he married Mar- cella, the widow of one of his friends, and the mother of seven children (Ad Marc. 1), with the view, as he avowed, of superintending their education. About ten months after his marriage he had occasion to leave her and go on a journey; and to console her during his ab- sence he wrote to her an epistle, which is still extant. The date of his death cannot be fixed with any exact- ness; it was probably about A.D. 305 or 306.
His Philosophy. — It appears from the testimony even of antagonists, and from what we have left of Porphyry's writings, that he was a man of great abilities and very extensive learning. Eusebius speaks of him as one riov jiaXiara dicupavwv icai ircan yvwpifiuiv, kXe'oc ti oh (.UKpbv (pt\o(TO<piac Trap' "E\,\)/<T(i> (iTm'T]i'iypivov (Pra>p. Ev. iii, 9) ; and Augustine styles him "hominem non mediocri ingenio prseditum" (De Civ. Dei, x, 32; comp. xix, 22). The philosophical doctrines of Por- phyry were in all essential respects the same as those of his master, Plotinus. To that, system he was ardent- ly attached, and proved himself one of its most ener- getic defenders. His writings were all designed direct- ly or indirectly to illustrate, commend, or establish it. His rhetorical training, extensive learning, and compar- ative clearness of style, no doubt did good service in the cause of his school. Thus Eunapius (Vita Porph. p. 8, Boiss) ascribes to Porphyry as his principal merit that by his perspicuous and pleasing diction he brought within the range of the understanding of all men the doctrine of Plotinus, which in the language of its author had seemed difficult and obscure. Indeed, Porphyry lays himself less claim to originality than to the merit of an expositor and defender of the doctrine of Plotinus, which he regarded as identical with that of Plato, and sub- stantially also with that of Aristotle. Porphyry is, nevertheless, charged with inconsistencies and contra- dictions; his later views being frequently at variance with his earlier ones (Eunapius, Vit. Porph. fin. ; Euse- bius, Prmp. Ev. iv, 10 ; Iambi, ap. Stobaeum, Eel. i, 860). The reason of this may probably be found in the vacil- lation of his views with respect to theurgy and philoso- phy— a vacillation which would doubtless attract the greater attention, as it was in opposition to the general tendencies of his age and school that he ranked philoso- phy higher than the theurgic superstitions which were connected with the popular polytheism. With the lat- ter, some features of his doctrines had considerable affin- ity. He insisted strongly on the contrast between the corporeal and the incorporeal, and the power of the lat- ter over the former. The influence of the incorporeal was, in his view, unrestricted by the limits of space, and independent of the accident of contiguity. When free from intermixture with matter, it is omnipresent, and its power unlimited. His doctrine with regard to dae- mons.pointed in the same direction. Over both them and the souls of the dead power could be obtained by enchantments (De Abst. ii, 38, 39, 41, 43, 47). Yet these notions seem to have been taken up by him rather in deference to the prevalent opinion of his times than as forming an essential part of his philosophy. Though at first somewhat disposed to favor theurgy, he still ranked philosophy above it, considering, with Plotrrms, that the true method of safety consisted in the purgatiKn of the soul and the contemplation of the eternal Deity. The increasing value set upon theurgy, and the endeavors to raise it above philosophy itself, probably produced some- thing like a reaction in his mind, and strengthened the