Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 13.djvu/412

* METELLTJS. 376 METEMPSYCHOSIS. His son. QriNTUS C.ECILIUS Metellus, sur- nameil Pius, joined Sulla in B.C. 83, but sought to moderate the severity of liis proscriptions. IJc, too, bore a distinguished character for virtue. — QiiXTis C.ECii.us >Ietei,lus Creticus con- quered Crete, and reduced it to a Roman province (D.c. G7). — l^iixTis C.ECiLus Metelixs Pius Scirio. sometimes called QnxTus Scipio, and sometimes Scipio IMetelus, was a son of Pub- lius Cornelius Scipio, wlio was adopted by one of the Jletelli, and berame the fatherin-l.'iw of Pompey, and his zealous partisan. He com- manded under him at Pharsalia. maintained war on his behalf for some time in Africa, and after the battle of Trapsus (B.C. 40) died by his own hand. METEM'PSYCHO'SIS (Lat., from Gk. /xo-e^- ^i^X'^o'is, from fuTenipvxovv, metcmpsychoun, to malu' llie soul pass from one body to another, fnini ^^To, mr(((, over + ifij/vxoOt', cniitxi/clwun, to animate, iion tixfvxos, einiisyclios, animate, from iv, en, in + /-kxt?, imyche, soul). Transmigration of souls, or, more accurately, the reincorporation of a soul. In a crude form this is the usual belief of all animistic forms of religion, and is not a religious, but a philosophical opinion. That is to say, it is not believed that any religious factors, such as the state of the soul, or the will of the deity, decide the soul's fate, but that every soul necessaril.v finds another habitation after death in a body similar to the one it has just quilted or has been accustomed to occupy. To the primi- tive mind the soul is air, breath, and at death disappears from one body either to be lost in general air or to hold together, as before, sepa- rated from other air and screened by a new body. But as any soul during a man's life may enter at will the body of a beast, so after death the soul of the departed may find shelter either in a man's body or in the frame of a beast. Some savages believe that at the instant when one dies one's soul enters a new body. Others believe that the spirit can remain for some time disembodied, and that it seeks reincarnation, not from neces- sity, but for pleasure. At the same time it is be- lieved that souls may take quite dilferent habita- tions, such as trees, streams, and stars, sometimes remaining there forever, and sometimes descend- ing or ascending to be born again. The next stage is where this animistic belief appears sporadical- ly in a much more developed environment and is evidently a reversion. Thus in the midst of the nature-gods of the Teutons we find once in legend and often in folk-lore a revcj-sion to the lielief that men are often liable to be reborn on earth either in human or in animal bodies. Sometimes no rel)irth is necessary, but the soul, leaps from one body and drives out the soul of the animal whose body it enters. .Ml these beliefs, more or less confused and vague, but persistent through va- rious stages of social development, arc found in Europe. India, Asia, and . ierica, while in .Vf- riea, where verj' little social change has taken place, and in Polynesia, where the same holds good, it may be said to w in its crudest form the usual faith of the people. Quite ilifTerent are the coniplex systems of metempsychosis built upon this animistic basis. Three such systems are known. The latest in time, (hat of the fJreeks. has been derived by various scholars from the Kgj'ptian system on the one hand, and from the Hindu system on the other. Others hold that it was indigenous. The correct opinion must be based upon considera- tions often neglected in the discussion. These are, first, that the Greek belief ditVers essentially from both the Hindu and Egyptian systems; sec- ond, that Pythagoras traveled in the East, but did not invent the notions nor borrow the plan of his own system ; third, that metempsychosis to the Greeks was always as a system a matter of poetry and philosophy, whereas in India and in !'"g>pt it was a national belief. Herodotus says that the Greek .system was derived from the Egj^ptian; but he adds that the Greeks have made it their own. and in this he is probably right. The chief diirerences between the three systems are as follows: The Hindu system is an outgrowth from a general belief in transmi- gration of souls. There was at first no notion of retribution connected with this belief. The soul that sinned perished. The good soul per- sisted in a new body, or, if it chose, lived in heaven in a 'body of light.' About the seventh century B.C., however, arose the doctrine of Kar- ma (q.v. ), which turns this belief into a .system based on morality. According to this system, the soul is doomed to expiate by future reliirths in low forms of life the sins committed in this life. On the other hand, a highly moral life results in one being reborn in a higher plane, either as ' an aristocrat, a king, or a priest, or even as a i godling. By incessant and unrelaxing endeavors in every new birth a soul may, however, finally reach emancipation, and become pure and one with God. no longer to be reborn. In this sys- tem the length of the series of rebirths depends wholly upon the individual, who works out his own salvation by his own acts. As Buddhism denies the existence of a soul, metempsychosis in India is confined to Hinduism. But Buddhism had an analogous belief in the transmigration of char- acter-entities, also conditioned by acts, ending, if at all, in N'irvana. unconscious existence or ex- tinction of personality resulting from extinction of desire, volition, tlio animating principle in Buddhistic psycholog'. The Egyptian system puts a term of years to the series of rebirths. Further, the soul at the end of this series of three thousand yeai-s returns to its first cor- poral environment, an idea not found in India, Again, what was sporadic in India, namely, the termination of the series by divine favor, is cus- tomary, according to the Egyptian doctrine. But the third diirerence between the two .systems is most important. In Egypt, namely, metempsycho- sis is not the fate of the good, but of tlic sinful, the good being united with Osiris, and even this is only very generally true, for the sinful .nre sini])ly deprived of union with the good, while even the good may, if they will, continue on the round of existences, or if they prefer may live in Elysium. So. too. in the Greek system, the Elysian fields are the reward of the good, Imt transmigration is here the necessary consequence of sin. iloreover. both in India and in Greece the whole system of metempsychosis was crossed by the beli<'f in hell, and amalgamated with it rather roughly. In India, for examjile. the soul first expiates its sins in hell and then enters upon rebirth. Roman writers adopted the Greek idea, but it seems to have taken little liobl on the peojile either in Greece or in Rome. Metempsychosis has always had an attraction for some minds. It has even been attributed In a refined form to Christ, and the Church fathers