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Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. 1

By G.R.S. Mead

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The True “Logos,” again, according to Plutarch

LXIV. 1. But, to speak concisely, it is not correct to consider either water or sun or earth or heaven as Osiris or Isis, or, again, fire or drought or sea as Typhon; but if we were to assign simply that [nature] to the latter which is not subject to measure or rule owing to excesses or insufficiencies, and should reverence and honour that which has been subjected to order and is good and beneficent, as the work of Isis, and the image and copy and reason of Osiris, we should not miss the mark.

2. Moreover, we shall make Eudoxus 2 cease to disbelieve and be perplexed, how it is neither Demeter who has charge of love-affairs but Isis, nor Dionysus who has the power either to make the Nile increase or to rule over the dead [but Osiris].

3. For we think that by one Common Reason (Logos) 1 these Gods have been ordained over every domain of good; and every fair and good thing possible for nature owes its origin to their means,—[Osiris] giving [them] their origins and [Isis] receiving and distributing [them].

Footnotes
345:2 Cf. lxii. et al.

346:1 Parallel to “Common Sense.”