Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/291

 incantations, and sacrifices. By the time this stage had been reached, Neoplatonism appeared to be fully equipped for satisfying the occult proclivities of all classes, and asserting its right to become the prevailing religion of the state.

III. The most distinctive and irrepressible theological principle which entered Western civilization from the East, was the dualistic conception of nature inherent in the old Babylonian religions. The seers of that ancient people could not resolve the problem as to the providential government of the world, without postulating a perpetual strife between two opposed powers, who were engaged in determining the course of events. The spectacle of suffering humanity enforced the belief that a potent spirit of evil shared the control of the existing order of things to an equal extent with the benign Deity from whom all blessings flowed. The eastern provinces of the Empire became saturated with these views, and the prime mover in diffusing them was said to be that Simon Magus who, although he makes but a brief and insignificant appearance in Gospel history, occupies a very considerable space in extra-biblical literature. Under the*