Platonic Theology (Thomas Taylor trans.)

INTRODUCTION. xvii

προχέει σειρά
το, τε κυδήεν
γένος ηρώων,
έργα τα θνητών
κρυφίαισιν οδοίς
διανισσόμενον,
έργα βρότεια.
ψυχά τ' ακλινής,
και κλινόμενα
ες μελαναυγείς
χθονίους όγκους.

viz. “ Thee, father of the worlds, father of the æones,¹ artificer of the Gods, it is holy to praise.
Thee, O king, the intellectual Gods sing, thee, O blessed God, the Cosmagi, those fulgid eyes, and
starry intellects, celebrate, round which the illustrious body [of the world] dances. All the race of
the blessed sing thy praise, those that are about, and those that are in the world, the zonic Gods,
and also the azonic,² who govern the parts of the world, wise itinerants, stationed about the illus-
trious pilots [of the universe,] and which the angelic series pours forth. Thee too, the renowned
genus of heroes celebrates, which by occult paths pervades the works of mortals, and likewise the
soul which does not incline to the regions of mortality, and the soul which descends into dark terres-
trial masses.”

In another part also of the same hymn, he informs us that he adored the powers that
preside over Thrace and Chalcedon.

¹ What these are will be shortly explained, when we come to speak of the Apostle Paul.
² Synesius does not here speak conformably to the Chaldean theologians, from whom he has derived these ap-
pellations. For the ζωναιοι and the αζωνοι, are according to them Gods, the former being the divinities of the stars,
and the latter forming that order of Gods which is called by Proclus in the sixth book of this work απολυτος, li-
berated. Both these orders therefore, are superior to the angelic series. This unscientific manner however of calling
both the highest and lowest divine powers by the common name of angels, is not peculiar to Synesius and the
Jews, but to all the fathers of the church, and all the Christian divines that succeeded them.
Proc. VOL. I. c

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