Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 10.djvu/18

* HERMES. 6 HERMETIC. many complaints had reatlitj tlio ears of the Pon- lilf, and that after careful exauiinatiou llcruies's works had been found erroneous, iscaudalous, and injurious to faith. The sections especially objcc- tionahlc related to the nature of faith and of divine revelation, the authority of Scripture and tradition, the necessity of grace, the evidence of Ciod's existence, and the idea thai through reason men could pain a kn(jwledge of super- natural truth. Such teaching was declared to lead toward skepticism and inditTcrence. Since the year 1832 the party had had an or- gan, the Zrilsclirift /iir I'hilusophir und katho- lische Theologie. In its columns and elsewhere defenses at once began to appear. The Her- mesians declared that the Po>e had been mis- informed by persons who were ignorant of phi- losophy an'l theology alike. It was freely ad- mitted that the doctrines specified in the Papal brief were heterodox, but it was alleged that these were not the doctrines of Hennes; that neither he nor his school had ever held or taught them. At this point the similarity of their defense to that adopted long before by the Jansenists should be noticed. So confident were they that the Pope was wrong that two of the Bonn professors i Braun and Elve- nich) undertook a mission to Rome to persuade him to withdraw the brief. They found, how- ever, that their hopes wore baseless, and they were forced to return without having accom- plished anything. About 1838 jihilosophical criticism began to add its strength to the oppo- sition which had already developed in other quarters, and the decline of Hermesianism was rapid. The two Bonn professors, Braun and Achterfeldt, who had been most active in defense of Ilermcs's memory, retired in 1844. They were not subjected, however, to any ecclesiastical cen- sure. Before the middle of the century the whole movement had become a matter of history. TIcrmes's writings are few. Their titles are: Vrher die Wahrheit des Christcnttims. which ap- l>eared in 1805: Einleitunfl in die rhrintknlho- lische Theoloqie. in two parts (181(1 and 1S20) ; Cliristkalholische Dofimnlik (1834) published posthumously under the editorship of .Achterfeldt. Iti general consult: Xicdner. Philnsophiir Iler- me.iii Explicatio ^Leipzig. 1838) : Braun and Elvenich. Aeta Rotnana (Hanover. 1838) : Wer- ner, Orschichte dcr kntholi.irhen Theoto/fie (Munich. 1860) : Lichtenherger. IHstorti of Ocr- man Theoloqii in the Sinrlrenth Century (Edin- burgh. 1880)". HERMES, hrr'mez. or MERCURY REPOS- ING. . life-size bronze statue foimd at Hcrcu- laneum, now in the Museo Xazionalc at Naples. It represents the youthful messenger of the gods seated and leaning forward with limbs relaxed. The attitude is life-like, and the statue is one of the most famous extant representations of the pod. HERMES CARRYING THE INFANT BACCHUS. A masterpiece of Praxiteles, found in HTT at Olympia, and now preserved in the museum there. The figure of the god is the most perfect example extant of the CJreek conception of youthful masculine beauty. Hermes standi leaning his left arm. drajied with a cloak, on a tree.stump, and holding the infant god of wine. His right arm is missing, but evidently the raised hand held some object for the babe's amusement. HERMESI'ANAX ('E(^i,<r.<iro{) . A Greek elegiac poet, who lived in the time of Alexander ihe Great, and was a native of Colophon, in Asia Minor. His chief work was Athvruiv, an elegiac poem in three books, addressed to his mistress, Leontium. The fragment of ninety- eight lines of the third book preserved by Athe- na'us (lib. xiii.) describes, in a somewhat dis- connected though not ungraceful style, the love-stories of the poets and sages from Orpheus down to Philetas. Consult the editions by Bailey I London, l83!t) ; by G. Henuann in his (>/iu.scuIa (Leipzig, 1828) ; and by Bergk, in his Anthologia Lyriea (2d ed., Leipzig, 1808); also Bergk, De Ilermcsianactis Elegia (Marburg, 1845) : and Susemihl, Oeschichte dcr griechischcn Litteratur ill d(r Alejandritierzeit (Leipzig, 1892). HERME'SIANISM. See Heiimes, Georg. HERMES OF AN'DROS. A statue in the National Museum at Athens, wrongly so called. It does not re[)resent the god, but is a portrait statue belonging to a tomb, and is considered the licst example of this class of statues. It dates friim tlic fourtli century B.C. HERMES, OR A Philosophical Inquiry Con- lERNiNG L'nivehsal GRAMMAR. A technical work by .Tames Harris, much infiuenced by Ari.stotle. It was publislied in 17.51. and was translated by Thtirot in 1700 by order of the French Directory. HERMES TRIS MEGIS'TUS. See Heb- Mf:TK. HERMET'IC (ML. Henncticus. relating to Hernus. Iioni y/crmcs, Gk. 'EpM^', Hermes). The ancient Egjptians considered the god Dhouti, or Thoth. identified by the Greeks with their god Hermes, as the patron of literature, and the scribe of the gods. Therefore, several magical and religious texts, partly embodied in the Book of the Deud (q.v. ). were reputed to have been written by this god with his own hands. As such writings could claim the most direct inspiration, the word Hermetic was applied, in Greek times, to writings of the highest degree of sanctity, and served in a genera! way to designate all inspired books. Clemens of Alexandria states that the Egyptian priests had to study forty- two (i.e. the nimil)er of assessors of Osiris) sacred or Hermetic books, divided into six sub- jects: sacred law. ritual, science, astrology. hym- nologj'. and medicine. It is questionable if such a canon existed throughout Egj'pf. The claim that the great medical papyrus discovered by El>ers was one of these Hermetic books has not been substantiated. In early Christian times it was customary to ascribe a certain type of magical and gnostic writings in Greek to Hermes Trismegistus. who lost his divine personality more and more, and came to be regarded as a great magician. These pseudographs often claimed to have t>een translated from the Egyp- tian, although they bear a thoroughly Greek character and mostly exhibit un-Egj-ptian ideas of .Tewish, Neo-Platonic. etc., origin. They may, however, have been written in Egj-pt. The most noticeable product among them is Hermes Tris- mefiistu.^ (most recent edition by Parthey. Ber- lin. 18.54). These writings exercised a strong influence vipon the various secret sciences : hence the term Hermetic became verj' popular in al- chemy and astrolngi'. and some media>val writ- ings claim the title of Hermetic books. Hermetic