The Wonder-Working Magician | Page 6

DEMON. Yes; for I am of a country
Where the most exalted science

Needs no study to be known.
CYPRIAN. Would I were a happy inmate
Of that country! Here our
studies
Prove our ignorance more.
DEMON. No figment
Is the fact that without study,
I had the
superb ambition
For the first Professor's chair
To compete, and
thought to win it,
Having very numerous votes.
And although I
failed, sufficient
Glory is it to have tried.
For not always to the
winner
Is the fame. If this you doubt,
Name the subject of your
study,
And then let us argue on it;
I not knowing your opinion,

Even although it be the right,
Shall the opposite view insist on.
CYPRIAN. I am greatly gratified
That you make this proposition.

Here in Plinius is a passage
Which much anxious thought doth give
me
How to understand, to know
Who's the God of whom he has
written.
DEMON. 'Tis that passage which declares
(Well I know the words)
this dictum:
"God is one supremest good,
One pure essence, one
existence,
Self-sustained, all sight, all hands."
CYPRIAN. Yes, 'tis true.
DEMON. And what is in it
So abstruse?
CYPRIAN. I cannot find
Such a god as Plinius figures.
If he be the
highest good,
Then is Jupiter deficient
In that attribute; we see him

Acting like a mortal sinner
Many a time,-- this, Danae,
This,

Europa, too, doth witness.
Can then, by the Highest Good,
All
whose actions, all whose instincts,
Should be sacred and divine,

Human frailty be committed?
DEMON. These are fables which the learned
First made use of, to
exhibit
Underneath the names of gods
What in truth was but a
hidden
System of philosophy.
CYPRIAN. This reply is not sufficient,
Since such awe is due to God,

None should dare to Him attribute,
None should stain His name
with sins,
Though these sins should be fictitious.
And considering
well the case,
If the highest good is figured
By the gods, of course,
they must
Will what is the best and fittest;
How, then, can some
gods wish one thing,
Some another? This we witness
In the dubious
responses
Which are by their statues given.
Here you cannot say I
speak of
Learned abstractions of the ideal.
To two armies, if two
shrines
Promise give of being victors,
One, of course, must lose the
battle:
The conclusion is so simple,--
Need I say it? that two wills,

Mutually antagonistic,
Cannot lead unto one end.
They being
thus in opposition,
One we must consider good,
One as bad we
must consider.
But an evil will in God
Would imply a contradiction:

Then the highest good can dwell not
Among gods who know
division.
DEMON. I deny your major, since
These responses may be given,

By the oracles, for ends
Which our intellectual vision
Cannot reach:
'tis providence.
Thus more good may have arisen

To the loser in
that battle
Than its gain could bring the winner.
CYPRIAN. Granted; but that god ought not,
For the gods are not
malicious,
To have promised victory;--
It would have been quite
sufficient,
Without this most false assurance,
The defeat to have
permitted.
Then if God must be all sight,
Every god should see
distinctly
With clear vision to the end;
Seeing THAT, he erred in

fixing
On a false conclusion; then
Though the deity may with
fitness
Be divided into persons,
Yet His essence must be single
In
the smallest circumstance.
DEMON. It was needful for this business,
That the oracle should
rouse
The two hosts alike.
CYPRIAN. If fitting,
There were genii that could rouse them
(Good
and bad, as they're distinguished
By the learned), who are, in fact,

Spirits who among us mingle,
And who good and evil acts,
Evil
thoughts, suggest and whisper,
A convincing argument
For the
immortal soul's existence:
Of these ministers could God
Have made
use, nor thus exhibit
He was capable of a lie
To effect his ends?
DEMON. Consider,
That these seeming contradictions
Cannot our
firm faith diminish
In the oneness of the gods,
If in things of higher
import
They know naught of dissonance.
Take man's wondrous
frame, for instance,
Surely that majestic structure
Once conception
doth exhibit.
CYPRIAN. If man's maker then were one
He some vantage must
have given him
O'er the others; and if they
All are equal,--'tis
admitted
That they are so, from the fact
Of their mutual opposition

To each other,-- when the thought
Of creating man was hinted

By one god, another could
Say, "No, no, I do not wish it."
Then if
God must be all hands,
Time might come when they would differ,

One creating, one undoing,
Ere the other's work was finished,
Since
the power of each was equal,
But unequal were their wishes.
Which
of these two powers would conquer?
DEMON. On impossible and false issues
There can be no
argument;--
But your premises admitting,
Say what then?
CYPRIAN. That there must be
One sole God, all hands, all vision,


Good Supreme, supreme in grace,
One who cannot err, omniscient,

One the highest, none can equal,
Not beginning, yet the Beginner,

One pure essence, one sole substance,
One wise worker, ozone sole
willer;--
And though He in one or two
Or more persons be
distinguished,
Yet the sovereign Deity
Must be one, sublime and
single,
The first cause of every cause,
The first germ of all
existence.
DEMON. How can I deny so clear,
[They rise.
So conclusive a
position?
CYPRIAN. Do you feel it?
DEMON. Who would not
Feel to find another quicker
In the rivalry
of wit?--
And though I am not deficient
In an answer, I restrain it,

Hearing steps approaching hither
Through the wood; besides 'tis