ONE:When the belief in a future life assumes the form last mentioned, it is, as we have said, simply a survival of the most primitive animism, not testifying to any religious reaction at the time when it can be proved to have flourished. It is introduced in the present connexion merely to show what ideas were current among those classes to whose opinions Roman civilisation was gradually giving irresistible weight. How the minds of the richer and more educated classes were affected by this underlying stratum, is shown by the nature of the figured representations with which their last abodes were ornamented. Everyone has been made tolerably familiar with these through the sculptured sarcophagi preserved in our museums; but, from their symbolical character, the significance of the reliefs with which they are decorated is not obvious at first sight; and some of the mythical adventures thus embodied may have been wrought without any reference to the destination of the dark and narrow chamber which they enclosed, or may even have been intended to divert the imagination from sad thoughts by the luxuriance of rushing life and joy and victory which they displayed; but after making every possible deduction on this score, there remain many others offering a deeper source of consolation to the bereaved survivor by the pictured promise of future reunion with those whom he had loved and lost. One favourite subject is the visit of Diana to the sleeping Endymion, by which is clearly foreshadowed an awakening to divine felicity from the sleep of death. The rape of Proserpine, followed by238 her restoration to the upper world, conveys a similar intention; as also does the fate of Adonis, since he too was believed to have risen from the dead. The marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne unquestionably symbolises the exchange of an earthly for a heavenly life; and the scenes of Bacchic revelry with which the interior of some tombs is decorated, were, to the imagination of those who designed them, no unbecoming image of the joys awaiting a blessed soul in its celestial abode. An inscription of which we have already quoted the opening words expresses in terms that hope of companionship with the joyous band of Dionysus at which the plastic representations can but mutely hint. Now in a flowery meadow, says the mourning mother of Doxato to her child, the priestess marked with a sacred seal is enrolling thee in the troop of Bacchus, where the Naiads that bear the sacred baskets claim thee as their fellow to lead the solemn procession by the light of torches. At the same time, a tenderer or graver note is often struck. The stories of Admtus and Alcestis, of Protesilaus and Laodameia, point to a renewal of conjugal love beyond the grave. What were formerly supposed to be scenes representing the eternal farewell of husband and wife are, in the opinion of modern archaeologists, pictures of their restoration to each others arms. Rising higher still, Achilles among the daughters of Lycomdes probably typifies the liberation of an immortal spirit from the seductions of sense. The labours of Heracles recall his apotheosis, and seem to show that a life of noble effort shall be rewarded hereafter. The battle of the Amazons is an allegory of strife with and triumph over the temptations of earthly delight. Another often-recurring theme, the hunting of the Calydonian boar, may mean the souls victory over death; but this explanation is offered only as a conjecture of the present writers.
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ONE:Just outside Tongres I met a fleet of Red Cross cars loaded with wounded. Cavalry escorted them. I was stopped and ordered to go back, as they expected the Belgians to attack Tongres.
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ONE:Plotinus is careful to make us understand that his morality has neither an ascetic nor a suicidal tendency. Pleasures are to be tolerated under the form of a necessary relief and relaxation; pains are to be removed, but if incurable, they are to be patiently borne; anger is, if possible, to be suppressed, and, at any rate, not allowed to exceed the limits of an involuntary movement; fear will not be felt except as a salutary warning. The bodily appetites will be restricted to natural wants, and will not be felt by the soul, except, perhaps, as a transient excitement of the imagination.496 Whatever abstinences our philosopher may have practised on his own account, we find no trace of a tendency towards self-mortification in his writings, nothing that is not consistent with the healthiest traditions of Greek spiritualism as originally constituted by the great Athenian school.
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