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sentences, are the most popular.

      About a century after the death of Plato appeared a popular exposition of the Pythagorean teaching, in hexameters, which is known by the title given to it by Iamblichus—the Golden Verses. “More than half of them,” says Professor Clifford, “consist of a sort of versified ‘Duty to God and my Neighbour,’ except that it is not designed by the rich to be obeyed by the poor; that it lays stress on the laws of health; and that it is just such sensible counsel for the good and right conduct of life as an Englishman might now-a-days give to his son.”

      Hierokles, an eminent Neo-Platonist of the fifth century, A.D., gave a course of lectures upon them at Alexandria—which since the time of the Ptolemies had been one of the chief centres of Greek learning and science—and his commentary is sufficiently interesting. Suïdas, the lexicographer, speaks of his matter and style in the highest terms of praise. “He astonished his hearers everywhere,” he tells us, “by the calm, the magnificence, the width of his superlative intellect, and by the sweetness of his speech, full of the most beautiful words and things.” The Alexandrian lecturer quotes the old Pythagorean maxims:

      

      “You shall honour God best by becoming godlike in your thoughts. Whoso giveth God honour as to one that needeth it, that man in his folly hath made himself greater than God. The wise man only is a priest, is a lover of God, is skilful to pray; … for that man only knows how to worship, who begins by offering himself as the victim, fashions his own soul into a divine image, and furnishes his mind as a temple for the reception of the divine light.”

      The following extracts will serve as a specimen of the religious or moral character of the Golden Verses:—

      “Let not sleep come upon thine eyelids till thou hast pondered thy deeds of the day.

      “Wherein have I sinned? What work have I done, what left undone that I ought to have done?

      “Beginning at the first, go through even unto the last, and then let thy heart smite thee for the evil deeds, but rejoice in the good work.

      “Work at these commandments and think upon them: these commandments shalt thou love.

      “They shall surely set thee in the way of divine righteousness: yea, by Him who gave into our soul the Tetrad,[18] well-spring of life everlasting.

      “Know so far as is permitted thee, that Nature in all things is like unto herself:

      “That thou mayest not hope that of which there is no hope, nor be ignorant of that which may be.

      “Know thou also, that the woes of men are the work of their own hands.

      “Miserable are they, because they see not and hear not the good that is very nigh them: and the way of escape from evil few there be that understand it.

      “Verily, Father Zeus, thou wouldst free all men from much evil, if thou wouldst teach all men what manner of spirit they are of.

      “Keep from the meats aforesaid, using judgment both in cleansing and setting free the soul.

      “Give heed to every matter, and set reason on high, who best holdeth the reins of guidance.[19]

      “Then when thou leavest the body, and comest into the free æther, thou shalt be a god undying, everlasting, neither shall death have any more dominion over thee.”

      Referring to these verses, which inculcate that the human race is itself responsible for the evils which men, for the most part, prefer to regret than to remedy, Professor Clifford, to whom we are indebted for the above version of the Golden Verses, remarks on the merits of this teaching, that it reminds us that “men suffer from preventible evils, that the people perish for lack of knowledge.”[20] Thus we find that the principal obstructions, in all ages, to human progress and perfectibility may be ever found in IGNORANCE and SELFISHNESS.

IV.

       OVID. 43 B.C.–18 A.D.

       Table of Contents

      THE school of Pythagoras and of Plato, although it was not the fashionable or popular religion of Rome, counted amongst its disciples some distinguished Italians, and the name of Cicero, who belonged to the “New Academy,” is sufficiently illustrious. The Italians, however, who borrowed their religion as well as their literature from the Greeks, were never distinguished, like their masters, for that refinement of thought which might have led them to attach themselves to the Pythagorean teaching. Under the bloody despotism of the Empire, the philosophy which was most affected by the literati and those who were driven to the consolations of philosophy was the stoical, which taught its disciples to consider apathy as the summum bonum of existence. This school of philosophy, whatever its other merits, was too much centred in self—paradoxical as the assertion may seem—to have much regard for the rest of mankind, much less for the non-human species. Nor, while they professed supreme contempt for the luxuries and even comforts of life, did the disciples of the “Porch,” in general, practice abstinence from any exalted motive, humanitarian or spiritual. They preached indifference for the “good things” of this life, not so much to elevate the spiritual and moral side of human nature as to show their contempt for human life altogether.

      That the Italian was essentially of a more barbarous nature than the Greek is apparent in the national spectacles and amusements. The savage scenes of gladiatorial and non-human combat and internecine slaughter of the Latin amphitheatres, of which the famous Colosseum in the capital was the model of many others in the provinces, were abhorrent to the more refined Greek mind.[21] In view of scenes so sanguinary—the “Roman holiday”—it is scarcely necessary to observe that humanitarianism was a creed unknown to the Italians; and it was not likely that a people, addicted throughout their career as a dominant race to the most bloody wars, not only foreign but also internecine, with whom fighting and slaughter of their own kind was an almost daily occupation, should entertain any feeling of pity (to say nothing of justice) towards their non-human dependants. Nevertheless, even they were not wholly inaccessible, on occasion, to the prompting of pity. Referring to a grand spectacle given by Pompeius at the dedication of his theatre (B.C. 55), in which a large number of elephants, amongst others, were forced to fight, the elder Pliny tells us:—

      “When they lost the hope of escape, they sought the compassion of the crowd with an appearance that is indescribable, bewailing themselves with a sort of lamentation so much to the pain of the populace that, forgetful of the imperator and the elaborate munificence displayed for their honour, they all rose up in tears and bestowed imprecations on Pompeius, of which he soon after experienced the effect.”[22]

      Cicero, who was himself present at the spectacle of the Circus, in a letter to a friend, Marcus Marius, writes:—

      “What followed, for five days, was successive combats between a man and a wild beast. (Venationes binæ.) It was magnificent. No one disputes it. But what pleasure can it be to a person of refinement, when either a weak man is torn to pieces by a very powerful beast, or a noble animal is struck through by a hunting spear? … The last day was that of the elephants, in which there was great astonishment on the part of the populace and crowd, but no enjoyment. Indeed there followed a degree of compassion, and a certain idea that there is a sort of fellowship between that huge animal and the human race.” (Cicero, Ep. ad Diversos vii., 1.)

      Testimonies which might induce one almost to think that, had not they been systematically and industriously accustomed to these horrible and gigantic butcheries by their rulers, even the Roman populace might have been susceptible of better feelings and desires than those inspired by their amphitheatres, though these savage exhibitions were perhaps hardly worse than the combats and slaughter in the bull-rings of Seville or Madrid, or at the courts of the Mohammedan princes of India recently sanctioned by the presence of English royalty. It is worth noting, in passing, that while the gladiatorial slaughters were discontinued some years after the triumph of Christianity, the other part of the entertainment—the indiscriminate combats and slaughter

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