What mystagogy exhibited in the sanctuaries, poets, and even philosophers, in their fictions, publicly taught to the people: hence the descriptions of the Elysium and of the Tartarus found in Homer, Virgil and Plato, and all those given us by many systems of theology. We never had a description of the earth and of its inhabitants, a description as complete as that transmitted to us, by the ancients, about those countries of new creation, known under the names of Hell, Tartarus, and Elysium. Those men, whose geographical knowledge was so limited, have given us the minutest details of the abode of the souls beyond the grave; of the government of each one of the two empires, which form the domain of the shadows; of their habits; of their diet; of their pains and pleasures; and even of the costume of the inhabitants of these two regions. The same poetical imagination which had invented that new world, arbitrarily traced out its plan and distribution. Socrates, in the Phædo of Plato, a work intended to prove the immortality of our soul, and the necessity of practicing virtue, speaks of the place where the souls go after death. He imagines a sort of ethereal land, superior to the one we inhabit, and situated in a sunnier region. There is nothing on our earth that can compare to the beauties of this wonderful abode. There colors are brighter, the vegetation richer; the trees, flowers and fruits are infinitely superior to those of our earth. There precious stones are so bright that those of our earth are but their shadow. This ethereal land is strewed with pearls of the purest crystal; everywhere gold and silver are dazzling. There beasts are more beautiful, and more perfectly organized than ours. There the air is the sea, and ether is the air. There seasons are so harmoniously combined, that the fortunate inhabitants are not subject to infirmities and to diseases. There the temples are inhabited by the gods themselves, who familiarly converse with men. The inmates of this delightful mansion are the only ones who see the sun, the moon, and the stars, as they truly are. To this Socrates adds, that men, who, here below, distinguish themselves for their piety and exactitude in discharging their social duties, will be admitted in this abode of happiness when death destroys their mortal form. There all those whom philosophy has led to wisdom will dwell. Socrates concludes thus: Then it is for us a strong inducement to study wisdom, and to practice virtue, while we are on earth. These expectations are high enough for us to risk the chances of this opinion, and not to break its charms. This is a plain avowal of the motive of the fiction: such is the secret of nearly all legislators, and the deceitfulness of the most renowned philosophers.