Note 139 — CONCERNING PROVIDENCE.

According to the Chaldaic theology, which is the same with the Platonic, the intelligible order, subsisting immediately after the one, consists of three triads; the summit of each being called father, the middle, power, and the third intellect. This is profoundly and beautifully explained by Proclus in Theol. Plat. lib. 3. to which I refer the reader desirous of copious information, on this sublime and interesting subject. I only add that Plato in the Timæus, ascribes these appellations to the demiurgus of the universe: and this sufficiently proves that words of this kind are not the invention of the latter Platonists, according to the ignorant assertion of Hyde, in the preface to his book, “On the Religion of the Persians;” a work of an alluring title, but of insignificant execution.