“For the vulgar, incapable of reasoning, derive sufficient benefit from what is conveyed by means of symbols; whilst to those of superior intellect, the truth respecting the gods will then only be serviceable, when they through diligent research shall find it out and lay hold thereof”

Upon The Mother Of The Gods (c. 362-363)
Context: Let nobody suppose me to say that all these things were done and happened formerly without the gods themselves knowing what they meant to do; or as though they were chastising their own faults. The causes of things that be, the ancients (whether with the gods to guide them, or discovering them by their unassisted efforts, but better to say seeking them out under the guidance of the gods), when they had discovered them, wrapped up the same in strange fables, in order that the fiction, being detected through its own extravagance and obscurity, might draw us on to the investigation of the Truth. For the vulgar, incapable of reasoning, derive sufficient benefit from what is conveyed by means of symbols; whilst to those of superior intellect, the truth respecting the gods will then only be serviceable, when they through diligent research shall find it out and lay hold thereof: whilst they are reminded by means of dark legends that it is their duty to inquire; and that they may advance to the end, as to the summit of the thing, after they have discerned it by means of such research; not so much out of respect and confidence in the judgment of others, as in the exertion of one's own understanding upon other objects.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "For the vulgar, incapable of reasoning, derive sufficient benefit from what is conveyed by means of symbols; whilst to …" by Julian (emperor)?
Julian (emperor) photo
Julian (emperor) 97
Roman Emperor, philosopher and writer 331–363

Related quotes

Frithjof Schuon photo
José Ortega Y Gasset photo

“That science is incapable of solving in its own way those fundamental questions is no sufficient reason for slighting them”

José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955) Spanish liberal philosopher and essayist

Source: History as a System (1962), p. 14

James Hudson Taylor photo
Laxmi Prasad Devkota photo

“For me, practicality is limited; philosophy, intellect is blind; I enjoy imaginative truth the most and through it find the glimpses of God”

Laxmi Prasad Devkota (1909–1959) Nepali poet

कला र जीवन (Art and Life)
Art and Life
Context: Even Truth is of many types, like – Imaginative Truth, Practical Truth and Philosophical Truth. That which is in three times, that is called Truth and God itself is the first and the last truth.  But in practical life, truth takes many forms and as the practical truth I understand the sensible world's hard comprehensible truth. The one attained by the research of intellect, I call philosophical truth and imaginative that which illustrates through the subtle pictures of the mind. To say the stone is hard is practical truth, saying that adding up one and one the result will be two and through the existence of creation there is truth I call philosophical truth; and saying things like seeing Sarasvati talked with her, I understand as being the imaginative truth. For me, practicality is limited; philosophy, intellect is blind; I enjoy imaginative truth the most and through it find the glimpses of God

Mata Amritanandamayi photo
Yoshida Shoin photo

“The only way we can ever get through to the truth is by finding out what we are not. We do that by looking, by observation.”

Barry Long (1926–2003) Australian spiritual teacher and writer

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

Cassandra Clare photo

Related topics