ON THE DÆMON OF SOCRATES.'

Socrates' dæmon a form of Augury.

Socrates made a distinction between things subject to divination and those not subject to it. He said—a supernatural force has sway over the greatest things in all human undertakings (p. 5.) and that the uncertainty belonging to them all, is the introduction of that power, or rather that all events except those which the human will modifies, are modified by the divine will.

This is the memorandum referred to at p. 50 as being made among the Notes on Sculptures.

At the beginning is written, indistinctly, what seems to read thus,— Mem. on. L. I.

ON PROPHECY.

AN EXCERPT FROM THE TRACTATUS

THEOLOGICO-POLITICUS.

TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN OF SPINOZA.

[The following translation was printed in Middleton's Shelley and his Writings as an original work of the poet's, and assigned to the period of Zastrozzi and St. Irvyne, on "internal evidence"! Two pages of the MS. were reproduced in fac-simile: as far as I can judge from this, which is not well executed, the MS. seems to be of about the year 1815, or perhaps later. Middleton does not profess to give the whole fragment, which he describes as "too crude for publication entire"; but I suspect that, either as it stood, or in the way of quotation and paraphrase, he gave nearly all he had. Mr. Garnett subsequently identified this fragment as a translation from the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus. Mr. Rossetti (Poetical Works, 1878, Vol. I, page 150) records that, in March 1820, "Shelley was dictating to his wife a translation of Spinoza." From the part of Williams's journal published by Mr. Garnett in The Fortnightly Review for June 1878, we learn that, on the evening of the 11th of November 1821, Shelley proposed to Williams "to assist him in a continuation of the translation of Spinoza's Theologico-political tract, to which Lord B. has consented to put his name, and to give it greater currency, will write the life of that celebrated Jew to preface the work." On the 12th of November, Williams records, "S. and I commence Spinoza, that is to say, I write while he dictates. Write from page 178 to page 188." The following day's entry is "Write fifteen pages. S. talks of printing here"-and the record of the 14th is "Four and a half pages." Mr. Garnett says that "the abortive translation must have progressed at least as far as Spinoza's sixth definition "; but he does not lead us to suppose that the work is known to be extant. Perhaps the rest of it will be found some day; and it would certainly be well worth recovering.-H. B. F.]

ON PROPHECY.

TRANSLATED FROM SPINOZA.

ALL considerations which relate to this question must be drawn from Scripture alone; for what conclusions can we establish with respect to matters which exceed the limits of our own understanding, besides the doctrines delivered in the writing or traditions of the Prophets? and, since in our own times we acknowledge no prophets, nothing is left to us but the contemplation of those sacred volumes which have been handed down from those whom we do acknowledge, with this caution, indeed, that we determine nothing on the subjects of which they treat, or attribute anything to the Prophets themselves, which does not flow directly from their own words. Here we should observe that the Jews never acknowledge secondary or intermediate causes; but from a sense of religion, or (as the vulgar would allege) from a desire of rendering homage to God, refer everything to divine interference. If, for instance, they have made a

successful adventure in commerce, they say that God gave it them. If they desire anything, it is their phrase to say, "God has disposed my heart thus." If any imagination suggests itself to their thoughts, they say that God has told it them. Everything, therefore, that Scripture asserts God to have communicated to any one, is not to be considered prophetic and supernatural, but only that which Scripture expressly affirms.'

*

It is the opinion of many of the Jews that the words of the Decalogue were not promulgated by God; but that at the time of its delivery nothing but an obscure tumult was heard by the Israelites, in which no words were to be distinguished, but that the laws of the Decalogue were then communicated to their minds,

At this point Middleton breaks into a mixture of quotation and paraphrase, thus:

"He commences by attempting to explain prophecy, as differing only in degree from human foresight, which he calls 'natural knowledge'; the former being nothing more than a much clearer perception, and more far-seeing vision, than enjoyed by mankind in general; but singularly enough he proceeds immediately to a more elaborate consideration of other causes and means through which God reveals those things which exceed the limits of natural knowledge.'

"Of these 'causes and means' he says Scripture affords three ex. amples, namely: 'By words, by signs, and by a combination of both'; but inspiration is always a necessary adjunct, which he speaks of as a peculiar disposition of the imagination, making it appear

that the words and signs may be actual or imaginary.

"Here, too, there is full scope for his favourite theory of dreams, for the revelations made to the Prophets are often spoken of as conveyed in visions; and speaking of sleep, he calls it a condition of body and mind when the imagination is best prepared to the shaping out those things which are not.'

"Under this last medium of communication, he classes many things which are not given as visions. Such as God's command to Abraham to sacrifice his son. God's first making himself known to Samuel, who at first mistook his voice for that of Eli. One he seems to consider a kind of daydream, the other inspiration, as just defined, which would make it appear that visions and the peculiar disposition of the imagination are in many respects the same thing."