which they are composed. CHAPTER IV. _Plutarch’s attitude towards Pagan beliefs marked by a spirit of reverent rationalism—The three recognized sources of Religion: Poetry, Philosophy, and Law or Custom—The contribution of each to be examined by Reason with the object of avoiding both Superstition and Atheism: Reason the “Mystagogue” of Religion—Provisional examples of Plutarch’s method in the three spheres—His reluctance to press rationalism too far—His piety partly explained by his recognition of the divine mission of Rome—Absence of dogmatism in his teaching._ The question which meets us on the very threshold of an inquiry into the religious views and moral teachings of Plutarch is that involved in a definition of his attitude towards the popular faith. His desire to form a consistent body of doctrine out of its heterogeneous and chaotic elements is not so intense as to blind him to the difficulties of the task. Poets, legislators, and philosophers have jointly contributed to the formation of the “ancient and hereditary Faith,” and Philosophy, Law, and Poetry, avoid reconciliation to as great a degree as, in the days of Solon, the famous Attic factions of the Paraloi, the Epakrioi, and the Pedieis, to the pacification of whose internecine animosities the policy of that statesman was directed. The gods of the philosophers are like the Immortals of Pindar:— “Not death they know, nor age, nor toil and pain, And hear not Acheron’s deep and solemn strain.”[133]