Taylor - Eleusianian and Bacchic Mysteries.pdf - Platonic Philosophy

Bacchic Mysteries. 59material nature is connected ;of the soul sdormant condition through its union withbody and of the various mental diseases to;which, through such a conjunction, it becomes unavoidably subject for this ;description contains a threefold division ; representing, in the first place, the external evil withwhich this material region is replete in the;second place, intimating that the life of thesoul when merged in the body is nothing buta dream; and, in the third place,under the disguise of multiform and terrific monsters, exhibiting the various vices of our irrational andsensuous part. Hence Empedocles, in perfectconformity with the first part of this description, calls this material abode, or the realmsof generation, atsprcsa /a> 4oov,* a "joylessregion"11Where slaughter, rage, and countless ills reside;EvO-a<povo?is XOTO? TS xai aXXuw eBvsa xfjpwvand into which those who fall,* This and the other citations from Empedoclesare to be foundin the book of Hierocles on The Golden Verses of Pythagoras.