Chapter I: Preface

I Now present the reader with the remaining part of the Commentaries of Proclus on Euclid: with the addition of his Theological Elements, and a History of the Restoration of the Platonic Theology, by the latter disciples of Plato. Should my design be enquired into, in combining works which the superficial observer will consider as opposite and heterogeneous, I answer that it is no less novel than certain, no less important than apposite and connected. Its novelty will be evident by assuring the reader, that a vindication of philosophical Polytheism, as embraced by the wisdom, and supported by the general voice of antiquity, is the ultimate tendency of its execution. Its connection too with geometry will be manifest to every Tyro in Platonism, and has been so copiously proved in the former volume, that it would be superfluous to repeat the demonstration in the present. I am well aware that nothing has been so much the subject of ridicule and declamation, of ignorant aspersion and impotent contempt, as the theology of the ancients. It has supplied the harangues of the pulpit with an endless variety of popular argument, and an exhaustless source of _priestly_ elocution. It has been equally derided by the man of learning and the merchant, by the noble and the vulgar, by the peasant and the priest. But it still lives in the works of the ancients, it is still capable of being supported by sound reasoning, and sublime philosophy; and its intrinsic excellence and truth will extend its existence beyond the wreck of modern systems, and the desolation of ages. Like a strong and capacious ship it sails with majestic security through the ocean of time; and sustains with careless dignity the storms of opposition that roar round its well-compacted sides. The blasts of calumny may indeed impede its progress, but are unable to shatter its indissoluble fabric; and the prosperous gales of philosophy will always succeed the tempests of folly, and waft it with rapidity to the _enlightned_ regions of mankind. The time perhaps is not far distant, when this fortunate change may commence. Above twelve hundred years have elapsed since the vessel of ancient wisdom visited the civilized parts of the world, and the nations were blest with its invaluable contents: and during this dreadful interval, ignorance and delusion, _jargon_ and _reverie_, have held an undisturbed and universal reign. The depravity of the times is the subject of general complaint: genius no longer soars; learning has evaporated into words; and philosophy is but a name. Yet, though the restoration of ancient theology is the object of my most ardent desires, I much fear that a period still more barbarous, with respect to philosophy; that an age still darker and more debased must precede its establishment on the earth. Prodigies and destruction attended, as we shall observe in the ensuing history, its departure from mankind; and desolation will doubtless be the harbinger of its future appearance. The orb of vicissitude produces renovation and decay in regular succession; and marks, as it revolves, the dormant events of future periods with _the ruinous_ characters of the past. Let us, therefore, patiently wait for, and joyfully expect the happy moment when the breezes of philosophy shall arise with abundance and vigour; and impel the vessel of theology laden with the riches of wisdom, on our natal coast. The revolution is certain, however remote: and the prospect is of itself sufficient to increase the vigour of exertion, and animate the expectations of hope; to enable us to brave the storms of ecclesiastical persecution, and vanquish the resistance of folly.

COMMENTARIES

OF

PROCLUS.