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The City of God

Chapter 14.--Of the Opinion of Those Who Have Said that Rational Souls are of Three Kinds, to Wit, Those of the Celestial Gods, Those of the Aerial Demons, and Those of Terrestrial Men.

There is, say they, a threefold division of all animals endowed with a rational soul, namely, into gods, men, and demons. The gods occupy the loftiest region, men the lowest, the demons the middle region. For the abode of the gods is heaven, that of men the earth, that of the demons the air. As the dignity of their regions is diverse, so also is that of their natures; therefore the gods are better than men and demons. Men have been placed below the gods and demons, both in respect of the order of the regions they inhabit, and the difference of their merits. The demons, therefore, who hold the middle place, as they are inferior to the gods, than whom they inhabit a lower region, so they are superior to men, than whom they inhabit a loftier one. For they have immortality of body in common with the gods, but passions of the mind in common with men. On which account, say they, it is not wonderful that they are delighted with the obscenities of the theatre, and the fictions of the poets, since they are also subject to human passions, from which the gods are far removed, and to which they are altogether strangers. Whence we conclude that it was not the gods, who are all good and highly exalted, that Plato deprived of the pleasure of theatric plays, by reprobating and prohibiting the fictions of the poets, but the demons.

Of these things many have written: among others Apuleius, the Platonist of Madaura, who composed a whole work on the subject, entitled, Concerning the God of Socrates. He there discusses and explains of what kind that deity was who attended on Socrates, a sort of familiar, by whom it is said he was admon ished to desist from any action which would not turn out to his advantage. He asserts most distinctly, and proves at great length, that it was not a god but a demon; and he discusses with great diligence the opinion of Plato concerning the lofty estate of the gods, the lowly estate of men, and the middle estate of demons. These things being so, how did Plato dare to take away, if not from the gods, whom he removed from all human contagion, certainly from the demons, all the pleasures of the theatre, by expelling the poets from the state? Evidently in this way he wished to admonish the human soul, although still confined in these moribund members, to despise the shameful commands of the demons, and to detest their impurity, and to choose rather the splendor of virtue. But if Plato showed himself virtuous in answering and prohibiting these things, then certainly it was shameful of the demons to command them. Therefore either Apuleius is wrong, and Socrates' familiar did not belong to this class of deities, or Plato held contradictory opinions, now honoring the demons, now removing from the well-regulated state the things in which they delighted, or Socrates is not to be congratulated on the friendship of the demon, of which Apuleius was so ashamed that he entitled his book On the God of Socrates, whilst according to the tenor of his discussion, wherein he so diligently and at such length distinguishes gods from demons, he ought not to have entitled it, Concerning the God, but Concerning the Demon of Socrates. But he preferred to put this into the discussion itself rather than into the title of his book. For, through the sound doctrine which has illuminated human society, all, or almost all men have such a horror at the name of demons, that every one who before reading the dissertation of Apuleius, which sets forth the dignity of demons, should have read the title of the book, On the Demon of Socrates, would certainly have thought that the author was not a sane man. But what did even Apuleius find to praise in the demons, except subtlety and strength of body and a higher place of habitation? For when he spoke generally concerning their manners, he said nothing that was good, but very much that was bad. Finally, no one, when he has read that book, wonders that they desired to have even the obscenity of the stage among divine things, or that, wishing to be thought gods, they should be delighted with the crimes of the gods, or that all those sacred solemnities, whose obscenity occasions laughter, and whose shameful cruelty causes horror, should be in agreement with their passions.

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De civitate Dei (CCSL)

Caput XIV: De opinione eorum, qui rationales animas trium generum esse dixerunt, id est in dis caelestibus, in daemonibus aeriis et in hominibus terrenis.

Omnium, inquiunt, animalium, in quibus est anima rationalis, tripertita diuisio est, in deos, homines, daemones. di excelsissimum locum tenent, homines infimum, daemones medium. nam deorum sedes in caelo est, hominum in terra, in aere daemonum. sicut eis diuersa dignitas est locorum, ita etiam naturarum. proinde di sunt hominibus daemonibusque potiores; homines uero infra deos et daemones constituti sunt, ut elementorum ordine, sic differentia meritorum. daemones igitur medii, quemadmodum dis, quibus inferius habitant, postponendi, ita hominibus, quibus superius, praeferendi sunt. habent enim cum dis communem inmortalitatem corporum, animorum autem cum hominibus passiones. quapropter non est mirum, inquiunt, si etiam ludorum obscenitatibus et poetarum figmentis delectantur, quandoquidem humanis capiuntur adfectibus, a quibus di longe absunt et modis omnibus alieni sunt. ex quo colligitur, Platonem poetica detestando et prohibendo figmenta non deos, qui omnes boni et excelsi sunt, priuasse ludorum scaenicorum uoluptate, sed daemones. haec si ita sunt - quae licet apud alios quoque reperiantur, Apuleius tamen Platonicus Madaurensis de hac re sola unum scripsit librum, cuius esse titulum uoluit de deo Socratis, ubi disserit et exponit, ex quo genere numinum Socrates habebat adiunctum et amicitia quadam conciliatum, a quo perhibetur solitus admoneri, ut desisteret ab agendo, quando id quod agere uolebat, non prospere fuerat euenturum; dicit enim apertissime et copiosissime adserit non illum deum fuisse, sed daemonem, diligenti disputatione pertractans istam Platonis de deorum sublimitate et hominum humilitate et daemonum medietate sententiam - haec ergo si ita sunt, quonam modo ausus est Plato, etiamsi non dis, quos ab omni humana contagione semouit, certe ipsis daemonibus poetas urbe pellendo auferre theatricas uoluptates, nisi quia hoc pacto admonuit animum humanum, quamuis adhuc in his moribundis membris positum, pro splendore honestatis inpura daemonum iussa contemnere eorumque inmunditiam detestari? nam si Plato haec honestissime arguit et prohibuit, profecto daemones turpissime poposcerunt atque iusserunt. aut ergo fallitur Apuleius et non ex isto genere numinum habuit amicum Socrates aut contraria inter se sentit Plato modo daemones honorando, modo eorum delicias a ciuitate bene morata remouendo, aut non est Socrati amicitia daemonis gratulanda, de qua usque adeo et ipse Apuleius erubuit, ut de deo Socrates praenotaret librum, quem secundum suam disputationem, qua deos a daemonibus tam diligenter copioseque discernit, non appellare de deo, sed de daemone Socratis debuit. maluit autem hoc in ipsa disputatione quam in titulo libri ponere. ita enim per sanam doctrinam, quae humanis rebus inluxit, omnes uel paene omnes daemonum nomen exhorrent, ut, quisquis ante disputationem Apulei, qua daemonum dignitas commendatur, titulum libri de daemone Socratis legeret, nequaquam illum hominem sanum fuisse sentiret. quid autem etiam ipse Apuleius quod in daemonibus laudaret inuenit praeter subtilitatem et firmitatem corporum et habitationis altiorem locum? nam de moribus eorum, cum de omnibus generaliter loqueretur, non solum nihil boni dixit, sed etiam plurimum mali. denique lecto illo libro prorsus nemo miratur eos etiam scaenicam turpitudinem in rebus diuinis habere uoluisse, et cum deos se putari uelint, deorum criminibus oblectari potuisse, et quidquid in eorum sacris obscena sollemnitate seu turpi crudelitate uel ridetur uel horretur, eorum adfectibus conuenire.