Res Gestae

Likewise from the immortal poems of Homer[*](Perhaps Iliad, i. 503 ff.) we are given to understand that it was not the gods of heaven that spoke with brave men, and stood by them or aided them as they fought, but that guardian spirits attended them; and through reliance upon their special support, it is said, that Pythagoras, Socrates, and Numa Pompilius[*](Referring to the nymph Egeria; cf. Livy, i. 19, 5.) became famous; also the earlier Scipio,[*](Africanus, the conqueror of Hannibal.) and (as some believe) Marius and Octavianus, who first had the title of Augustus conferred upon him, and Hermes Trismegistus,[*](A surname of the Egyptian Hermes. Here the refer- ence is apparently to a writer of the second century, who under that name tried to revive the old Egyptian, Pythagorean, and Platonic ideas.) Apollonius of Tyana,[*](The famous magician of the first century B.C., whose biography was written by Philostratus.) and Plotinus,[*](An eclectic philosopher of the third century, whose views entitled τερὶ τοῦ εἰληχότος ἡμᾶς δαίμονος have come down to us (Plot. En., iii, 4).) who ventured to discourse on this mystic theme, and to present a profound discussion of the question by what elements these spirits are linked with men’s souls, and taking them to their bosoms, as it were, protect them (as long as possible) and give them higher instruction, if they perceive that they are pure and kept from the pollution of sin through association with an immaculate body.