Note 30 — Chapter XIII · THE RELATION OF THE STOIC PHILOSOPHY TO RELIGION.

This is done in Plut. Plac. i. 6, 9. Belief in the Gods, it is there said, is held in three forms—the physical, the mythical, and the form established by law (theologia civilis). All the gods belong to seven classes, εἴδη: (1) τὸ ἐκ τῶν φαινομένων καὶ μετεώρων: the observation of the stars, and their regularity of movement, the changes of season, &c., has conducted many to faith; and, accordingly, heaven and earth, sun and moon, have been honoured. (2 and 3) τὸ βλάπτον καὶ ὠφελοῦν: beneficent Beings are Zeus, Here, Hermes, Demeter: baleful Beings are the Erinnyes, Ares, &c. (4 and 5) πράγματα, such as Ἐλπὶς, Δίκη, Εὐνομία; and πάθη, such as Ἔρως, Ἀφροδίτη, Πόθος. (6) τὸ ὑπὸ τῶν ποιητῶν πεπλασμένον (τὸ μυθικὸν), such as the Gods invented by Hesiod for the purpose of his genealogies—Coios, Hyperion, &c. (7) Men who are honoured for their services to mankind—Hercules, the Dioscuri, Dionysus. This list includes not only things which deserve divine honours, but all things to which they have been actually given: hence it includes, besides the purely mythical Gods, things which the Stoics can never have regarded as Gods, such as the baleful Gods and emotions, on which see p. 345, 1; 346, 2. On the other hand, they could raise no objection to the worship of personified virtues. In the above list the elementary Gods, such as Here, are grouped, together with the Gods of fruits, under the category of useful. Another grouping was that followed by Dionysius (whether the well-known pupil of Zeno—see p. 44, 1—or some later Stoic, is unknown), who, according to Tertullian (Ad Nat. ii. 2, conf. c. 14), divided Gods into three classes: the visible—the sun and moon, for instance; the invisible, or powers of nature, such as Neptune (that is, natural forces as they make themselves felt in the elements and in planets); and those facti, or deified men. ↑