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Sallustius or Sallust (Σαλούστιος) was a 4th-century Latin writer, a friend of the Roman Emperor Julian. He wrote the treatise On the Gods and the Cosmos, which owes much to the work of Iamblichus of Chalcis, who synthesized Platonism with Pythagoreanism and theurgy, as well as to Julian's own philosophical writings.
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If evil exists it must exist either in Gods or minds or souls or bodies. It does not exist in any God, for all god is good.
It is strong evidence of this that noble souls despise being for the sake of the good, when they face death for their country or friends or for the sake of virtue.
Is not that perhaps a thing worthy of admiration… that by means of the visible absurdity the soul may immediately feel that the words are veils and believe the truth to be a mystery?
The arts of prophecy and of healing, which are part of the cosmos, come of the good providence of the gods.
From all these things the Gods gain nothing; what gain could there be to God? It is we who gain some communion with them.
Souls that have lived in virtue are in general happy, and when separated from the irrational part of their nature, and made clean from all matter, have communion with the gods and join them in the governing of the whole world.
Of the cosmic Gods some make the world be, others animate it, others harmonize it, consisting as it does of different elements; the fourth class keep it when harmonized.
There is this first benefit from myths, that we have to search and do not have our minds idle.
The elements, though they can be changed, cannot be destroyed. Again, everything destructible is changed by time and grows old. But the world through all these years has remained utterly unchanged.
Of the bodies in the cosmos, some imitate mind and move in orbits; some imitate soul and move in a straight line, fire and air upward, earth and water downward.
Theological myths suit philosophers, physical and psychic suit poets, mixed suit religious initiations, since every initiation aims at uniting us with the world and the Gods.
Everything destroyed is either resolved into the elements from which it came, or else vanishes into not-being. If things are resolved into the elements from which they came, then there will be others: else how did they come into being at all?
The soul sins therefore because, while aiming at good, it makes mistakes about the good, because it is not primary essence. And we see many things done by the Gods to prevent it from making mistakes and to heal it when it has made them.
It is proper to the first cause to be one — for unity precedes multitude — and to surpass all things in power and goodness. Consequently all things must partake of it. For owing to its power nothing else can hinder it, and owing to its goodness it will not hold itself apart.
If fortune makes a wicked man prosperous and a good man poor, there is no need to wonder. For the wicked regard wealth as everything, the good as nothing. And the good fortune of the bad cannot take away their badness, while virtue alone will be enough for the good.
Those who believe in the destruction of the world, either deny the existence of the Gods, or, while admitting it, deny God's power.
The soul sins … because, while aiming at good, it makes mistakes about the good, because it is not primary essence. And we see many things done by the Gods to prevent it from making mistakes and to heal it when it has made them.
It is impossible that there should be so much providence in the last details, and none in the first principles. Then the arts of prophecy and of healing, which are part of the cosmos, come of the good providence of the Gods.
The fact that the stars predict high or low rank for the father of the person whose horoscope is taken, teaches that they do not always make things happen but sometimes only indicate things. For how could things which preceded the birth depend upon the birth?
The essences of the Gods never came into existence (for that which always is never comes into existence; and that exists for ever which possesses primary force and by nature suffers nothing): neither do they consist of bodies; for even in bodies the powers are incorporeal. Neither are they contained by space; for that is a property of bodies. Neither are they separate from the first cause nor from one another, just as thoughts are not separate from mind nor acts of knowledge from the soul.
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