On the Mysteries (De Mysteriis)

On the order of higher beings.

Our souls are counted among the divine kinds original: divinorum generibus; the author places human souls at the bottom rung of a celestial ladder. Heroes are greater than humans, and therefore demons daemones: in Greek philosophy, these are not "demons" in the modern sense of evil spirits, but intermediary beings who bridge the gap between gods and mortals are much grander still. The first of the divine is the Good itself and the gods who follow it; the last are the individual rational souls. Between these two extremes are two intermediates: namely, the heroes who are close to souls, and the demons who are close to the gods—just as air and water lie between the extremes of fire and earth This refers to the classical theory of the four elements, where air and water act as bridges between the light/hot fire and the heavy/cold earth.

Although heroes excel us in power, virtue, beauty, and size, they nevertheless have much in common with our soul and its life. Demons, however, are superior to heroes; they are the ministers of the gods, acting like assistants to architects in the workmanship of the world opificio mundano: the ongoing creation and maintenance of the physical universe. Those things which are inexpressible and hidden within the gods, the demons express and reveal.

Demons and heroes adapt the universal, simple, and unchanging gifts of the gods for the benefit of lower beings; they reconcile all things and are the authors of harmonic consensus and the mutual sympathy original: compassionis; in this context, it refers to the Neoplatonic concept of "sympathy," where all parts of the universe are interconnected and vibrate in harmony with one another of all things with each other. They translate divine things to us, and equally lead our concerns back to the divine. Furthermore, they distribute the degrees of the gifts of the higher beings and prepare those who receive them with equal care. These diverse kinds of divine beings differ among themselves by a triple mode of properties: namely, in their essences, their virtues virtutes: here meaning their inherent powers or capacities, and their actions. Property...