THE Divine, to theion, is being subsisting in conjunction with The One. For all things except The One, viz. essence, life and intellect are considered by Plato as suspended from and secondary to the gods. For the gods do not subsist in, but prior to, these, which they also produce and connect, but are not characterized by these. In many places, however, Plato calls the participants, of the gods by the names of the gods. For not only the Athenian guest in the Laws, but also Socrates in the Phaedrus, calls a divine soul a god. “For,” says he “all the horses and charioteers of the gods are good,” etc. And afterwards, still more clearly, he adds, “And this is the life of the gods.” And not only this, but he also denominates those natures gods, that are always united to the gods, and which, in conjunction with them, give completion to one series. He also frequently calls daemons gods, though according to essence, they are secondary to, and subsist about, the gods. For in the Phaedrus, Timaeus, and other dialogues, he extends the appellation of the gods as far as to daemons. And what is still more paradoxical than all this, he does not refuse to call some men, gods; as, for instance, the Elean Guest in the Sophist. From all this, therefore, we must infer, that with respect to the word god, one thing which is thus denominated is simply deity; another is so according to union; a third, according to participation; a fourth, according to contact; and a fifth, according to similitude. Thus every superessential nature is primarily a god; but every intellectual nature is so according to union. And again, every divine soul is a god according to participation; but divine daemons are gods, according to tontact with the gods; and the souls of men obtain this appellation through similitude. Each of these, however, except the first, is, as we have said, rather divine than a god: for the Athenian Guest, in the Laws, calls intellect itself divine. But that which is divine is secondary to the first deity, in the same manner as the united is to The One; that which is intellectual, to intellect, and that which is animated, to soul. Indeed, things more uniform and simple always precede; and the series of beings ends in The One itself.