Taylor - Eleusianian and Bacchic Mysteries.pdf - Platonic Philosophy

Bacchic Mysteries. 35invested with an earthly body, and enveloped in a material and physical nature ;or,in other words, to signify that such a soul inthe present lifemight be said to die, as faras it is possible for a soul to die, and thaton the dissolution of the present body, whilein this state of impurity, it would experiencea death stillmore permanent and profound.That the soul, indeed, till purified by philosophy,* suffers death through its union withthe body was obvious to the philologistMacrobius, who, not penetrating the secretmeaning of the ancients, concluded fromhence that they signified nothing more thanthe present body, by their descriptions ofthe infernal abodes.But this is manifestlyabsurd ;since it is universally agreed, thatall the ancient theological poets and philosophersinculcated the doctrine of a futurestate of rewards and punishments in themost full and decisive terms; at the sametime occultly intimating that the death ofthe soul was nothing more than a profoundunion with the ruinous bonds of the body.* Philosophy here relates to discipline of the life.