Taylor - Eleusianian and Bacchic Mysteries.pdf - Platonic Philosophy

Bacchic Mysteries. 87this was likewise accompanied with the |u>7]-oic, or initiation,course of this inquiry.as will be evident in theBut let us now proceed to the doctrine ofthe Greater :Mysteries and here I shall endeavor to prove that as the dramatic showsof the Lesser Mysteries occultly signified themiseries of the soul while in subjection tobody, so those of the Greater obscurely intimated, by mystic and splendid visions,thefelicity of the soul both here and hereafter,when purified from the defilements of amaterial nature, and constantly elevated tothe realitiesof intellectual [spiritual] vision.Hence, as the ultimate design of the Mysteries, according to Plato, was to lead us backto the principles from which we descended,that is, to a perfect enjoyment of intellectual[spiritual]good, the imparting of these principles was doubtless one part of the doctrinecontained in the arcoppTj-ct, aporrfyeta, or secret discourses ;*and the different purifica-* The apostle Paul apparently alludes to the disclosing of theMystical doctrines to the epopts or seers, in his Second Epistleto the Corinthians, xii. 3, 4: "I knew a certain man, whether in