Note (return) — Chapter XIV

Aristotle continued the work of undermining polytheism. He defines God as "the Eternal Reason"--the Supreme Mind. "He is the immovable cause of all movement in the universe, the all-perfect principle. This principle or essence pervades all things. It eternally possesses perfect happiness, and its happiness consists in energy. This primeval mover is immaterial, for its essence is energy--it is pure thought, thought thinking itself--the thought of thought." 885 Polytheism is thus swept away from the higher regions of the intelligence. "For several to command," says he, "is not good, there should be but one chief. A tradition, handed down from the remotest antiguity, and transmitted under the veil of fable, says that all the stars are gods, and that the Divinity embraces the whole of nature. And round this idea other mythical statements have been agglomerated, with a view to influencing the vulgar, and for political and moral expediency; as for instance, they feigned that these gods have human shape, and are like certain of the animals; and other stories of the kind are added on. Now, if any one will separate from all this the first point alone, namely, that they thought the first and deepest grounds of existence to be Divine, he may consider it a divine utterance." 886 The popular polytheism, then, was but a perverted fragment of a deeper and purer "Theology." This passage is a sort of obituary of polytheism. The ancient glory of paganism had passed away. Philosophy had exploded the old theology. Man had learned enough to make him renounce the ancient religion, but not enough to found a new faith that could satisfy both the intellect and the heart. "Wherefore we are not to be surprised that the grand philosophic period should be followed by one of incredulity and moral collapse, inaugurating the long and universal decadence which was, perhaps, as necessary to the work of preparation, as was the period of religious and philosophic development."