daemons In Other Literature

[MojaveByrd]

Having fallen madly in love with the musical/opera Les Miserables I decided I should probably read the book. So I ordered it online and ordered the unabridged version. Little did I know until I got it that this paperback version was over 1400 pages of small type.

In any case, on page 169 of this excellent and enjoyable translation I found this:

"It is our conviction that if souls were visible to the eye we would clearly see the strange fact that each individual of the human species corresponds to some species of the animal kingdom; and we would easily recognize the truth, scarcely perceived by thinkers, that from the oyster to the eagle, from the pig to the tiger, all animals are in man, and that each of them is in each man; sometimes even several of them at a time."

It continues:

"Animals are merely the forms of our virtues and vices, wandering before our eyes, the visible phantoms of our souls."

It continues as Hugo is quite wordy (as you can imagine from a 1400 page book). Have any of the other HDM readers come across these kind of references in their other readings? This was written in the mid 1800s. Does anyone know if Pullman was influenced by this book?

[kaoshoneybun]

There was another thread dealing with something abit like this - whether jimney cricket or Harry Potter's patronis were daemons.

Nice extract, I enjoyed reading it! I doubt he was directly influenced though - the ideas of daemons and animal familiars or spirit guides crop up everywhere.

[MojaveByrd]

Yes, I remember that thread by a reader wondering if Jiminy Crickett or the other could be daemons. But what I found interesting in the quote from Hugo is that he actually states it.