The situation is saved by the good sense of the augur Theocritus, the same who plays a quaint and gallant part in the enterprise described in _The Genius of Socrates_; and a chestnut colt takes the place of the daughter. And there is no doubt on which side of the argument Plutarch’s sympathies lie. An admirable running commentary on Plutarch’s treatise is supplied by the _Discourse on Superstition_ of John Smith, the Cambridge Platonist (1618-52), here printed as an Appendix to it. Like Bacon, John Smith has written also a _Discourse on Atheism_, from which it may be sufficient for the present purpose to quote the words of the Son of Sirach appended as his conclusion: ‘O Lord, Father and God of my life, give me not a proud look, but turn away from thy servants a Giant-like minde’ (Ecclus. 23, 4). See, for this whole treatise, Dr. Oakesmith’s Chapter IX, pp. 179 foll. ON SUPERSTITION [Sidenote: 164 E] The stream of ignorance and of misconception about the Gods passed, from the very first, into two channels; one branch flowed, as it were, over stony places, and has produced atheism in hard characters, the other over moist ground, and this has produced superstition in the tender ones. Now any error of judgement, especially on such matters, is a vicious thing, but if passion be added it is more vicious. For all passion is ‘deceit accompanied by inflammation’; and as dislocations are more [Sidenote: F] serious when there is also a wound, so are distortions of the soul when there is passion. A man thinks that atoms and a void are the first principles of the universe; the conception is a false one, but does not produce ulceration or spasm, or tormenting pain. Another conceives of wealth as the greatest [Sidenote: 165] good; this falsity has poison in it, preys on his soul, deranges it, allows him no sleep, fills him with stinging torments, thrusts him down steep places, strangles him, takes away all confidence of speech. Again, some think that virtue is a corporeal thing, and vice also; this is a gross piece of ignorance perhaps, but not worthy of lament or groans. But where there are such judgements and conceptions as these: _Alas, poor Virtue! so thou art but words, And as a thing I was pursuing thee_[263]— dropping, he means, the injustice which makes money, and the intemperance which is parent of all pleasure—, these it is worth our while to pity and to resent also, because their presence [Sidenote: B] in the soul breeds diseases and passions in numbers, very worms and vermin.