Page:Apollonius of Tyana - the pagan Christ of the third century.pdf/46

Rh time being is perfectly justified in putting down such a character. Far different in nature is the wonder-worker who, like Apollonius, performs miracles by virtue of his higher knowledge and his communion with the gods. In order to attain to such a power he must practise virtue with the greatest austerity; he must be distinguished by the strictest purity of morals, and must be obedient to the severest of disciplines. Through these he is enabled to put spirits of impurity to flight, to foretell future events, to discern the secret thoughts of others, to be visible or invisible at will: in a word, Apollonius owes his power not to magic but to theurgy, and if it be said that theurgy has not more truth in it than magic, if like the latter it only denotes a gross ignorance of Nature and her irrefragable laws, at any rate it proceeds, in a moral point of view, from a much higher source.

As regards the philosophical and religious doctrine of Apollonius, we have already alluded to the theological principle which lies at the root of it. It consists of a kind of pantheism clothed in polytheistic