1. Hebrew Bible, Joshua, 17.11 (8th cent. BCE - 5th cent. BCE)
| 17.11. וַיְהִי לִמְנַשֶּׁה בְּיִשָּׂשכָר וּבְאָשֵׁר בֵּית־שְׁאָן וּבְנוֹתֶיהָ וְיִבְלְעָם וּבְנוֹתֶיהָ וְאֶת־יֹשְׁבֵי דֹאר וּבְנוֹתֶיהָ וְיֹשְׁבֵי עֵין־דֹּר וּבְנֹתֶיהָ וְיֹשְׁבֵי תַעְנַךְ וּבְנֹתֶיהָ וְיֹשְׁבֵי מְגִדּוֹ וּבְנוֹתֶיהָ שְׁלֹשֶׁת הַנָּפֶת׃ | 17.11. And Manasseh had in Issachar and in Asher Beth-shean and its towns, and Ibleam and its towns, and the inhabitants of Dor and its towns, and the inhabitants of En-dor and its towns, and the inhabitants of Taanach and its towns, and the inhabitants of Megiddo and its towns, even the three regions." |
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2. Hebrew Bible, Judges, 1.27 (8th cent. BCE - 5th cent. BCE)
| 1.27. וְלֹא־הוֹרִישׁ מְנַשֶּׁה אֶת־בֵּית־שְׁאָן וְאֶת־בְּנוֹתֶיהָ וְאֶת־תַּעְנַךְ וְאֶת־בְּנֹתֶיהָ וְאֶת־ישב [יֹשְׁבֵי] דוֹר וְאֶת־בְּנוֹתֶיהָ וְאֶת־יוֹשְׁבֵי יִבְלְעָם וְאֶת־בְּנֹתֶיהָ וְאֶת־יוֹשְׁבֵי מְגִדּוֹ וְאֶת־בְּנוֹתֶיהָ וַיּוֹאֶל הַכְּנַעֲנִי לָשֶׁבֶת בָּאָרֶץ הַזֹּאת׃ | 1.27. Neither did Menashshe drive out the inhabitants of Bet-she᾽an and its hamlets, nor Ta῾nakh and its hamlets, nor the inhabitants of Dor and its hamlets, nor the inhabitants of Yivle῾am and its hamlets, nor the inhabitants of Megiddo and its hamlets: but the Kena῾ani persisted in dwelling in that land." |
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3. Epicurus, Kuriai Doxai, 35, 33 (4th cent. BCE - 3rd cent. BCE)
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4. Philo of Alexandria, On The Life of Abraham, 184, 3-4, 181 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 181. And also that barbarous nations have for many ages practised the sacrifice of their children as if it were a holy work and one looked upon with favour by God, whose wickedness is mentioned by the holy Moses. For he, blaming them for this pollution, says, that, "They burn their sons and their daughters to their Gods. |
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5. Philo of Alexandria, On Husbandry, 24 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 24. For as fishermen let down their nets at times to the most extraordinary depths, comprehending a vast surface of the sea in their circle, in order to catch the greatest possible number of fish enclosed within their nets, like people shut up within the walls of a besieged city; so in the same manner the greatest part of men having extended their universal nets to take everything, as the poets somewhere say, not only over the parts of the sea, but also over the whole nature of earth, and air, and water, seek to catch everything from every quarter for the enjoyment and attainment of pleasure. |
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6. Philo of Alexandria, On The Cherubim, 91-97, 90 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 90. Since therefore it is naturally the case that things, which are changed, are changed in consequence of fatigue, and since God is subject to no variation and to no change, he must also by nature be free from fatigue, and that, which has no participation in weakness, even though it moves everything, cannot possibly cease to enjoy rest for ever. So that rest is the appropriate attribute of God alone. XXVII. And it has been shown that it is suitable to his character to keep festival; sabbaths therefore and festivals belong to the great Cause of all things alone, and absolutely to no man whatever. 90. Will you then, without shame call upon God, the father and sovereign of the world, to give his testimony in favour of those things, to witness which you will not venture even to bring your friend? And if you do so, will you do it knowing that he sees everything and hears everything, or not knowing this fact? |
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7. Philo of Alexandria, On The Confusion of Tongues, 48-49, 46 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 46. For when he sees war stirred up in the midst of tranquil peace, so as to be continued and incessant among all men, both public and private, not existing only among nations and countries, and cities and villages, but also in every house, and between each particular individual; who is there who does not reproach and admonish and seek to correct the foolish men whom he sees, and not by day only, but also by night, his soul being unable to remain tranquil by reason of the hatred of wickedness implanted in his nature? |
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8. Philo of Alexandria, On The Life of Joseph, 125 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
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9. Philo of Alexandria, On The Migration of Abraham, 151, 47, 150 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 150. And a proof of this is, that the one, having fallen back again into his ancient disease, departs, having been taken prisoner by those enemies who are in the soul; but the other, having guarded against all his designs, concealed in ambuscade, took every imaginable care to live at a distance from him. But the separate habitation he will arrange hereafter, but not yet. For at present, his speculations, as would be likely to be the case with a man who has but lately begun to apply himself to divine contemplation, have a want of solidity and steadiness in them. But when they have become more compact, and are established on a firmer footing, then he will be able to separate from himself the alluring and flattering disposition as an irreconcileable enemy, and one difficult to subdue: |
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10. Philo of Alexandria, On The Creation of The World, 172, 69, 71, 128 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 128. These things, and more still are said in a philosophical spirit about the number seven, on account of which it has received the highest honours, in the highest nature. And it is honoured by those of the highest reputation among both Greeks and barbarians, who devote themselves to mathematical sciences. It was also greatly honoured by Moses, a man much attached to excellence of all sorts, who described its beauty on the most holy pillars of the law, and wrote it in the hearts of all those who were subject to him, commanding them at the end of each period of six days to keep the seventh holy; abstaining from all other works which are done in the seeking after and providing the means of life, devoting that day to the single object of philosophizing with a view to the improvement of their morals, and the examination of their consciences: for conscience being seated in the soul as a judge, is not afraid to reprove men, sometimes employing pretty vehement threats; at other times by milder admonitions, using threats in regard to matters where men appear to be disobedient, of deliberate purpose, and admonitions when their offences seem involuntary, through want of foresight, in order to prevent their hereafter offending in a similar manner. XLIV. |
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11. Philo of Alexandria, On The Special Laws, 2.13, 2.62, 3.163, 4.128 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 2.13. for there are some men who swear, if chance so prompts them, to commit theft, or sacrilege, or adultery, or rape, or to inflict wounds or slaughter, or any similar acts of wickedness, and who perform them without any delay, making an excuse that they must keep their oaths, as if it were not better and more acceptable to God to do no iniquity, than to perform such a vow and oath as that. The national laws and ancient ordices of every people are established for the sake of justice and of every virtue, and what else are laws and ordices but the sacred words of nature having an authority and power in themselves, so that they differ in no respect from oaths? 2.62. Accordingly, on the seventh day there are spread before the people in every city innumerable lessons of prudence, and temperance, and courage, and justice, and all other virtues; during the giving of which the common people sit down, keeping silence and pricking up their ears, with all possible attention, from their thirst for wholesome instruction; but some of those who are very learned explain to them what is of great importance and use, lessons by which the whole of their lives may be improved. 3.163. But perhaps it is not wonderful if men, barbarians by nature, utterly ignorant of all gentleness, and under the command of despotic authority, which compelled them to give an account of the yearly revenue, should, in order to enforce the payment of the taxes, extend their severities, not merely to properties but also to the persons, and even to the lives, of those from whom they thought they could exact a vicarious payment. 4.128. For a vast cloud being Raised{28}{#ex 16:13.} out of the sea showered down quails about the time of sunrise, and the camp and all the district around it for a day's journey for a well-girt active man was overshadowed all about with the Birds.{29}{#nu 11:31.} And the height of the flight of the birds was distant from the ground a height of about two cubits, in order that they might be easily caught. |
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12. Philo of Alexandria, On The Virtues, 65 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 65. For whatever advantages are derived from the most approved philosophy to its students, full as great are derived by the Jews from their laws and customs, inasmuch as through them they have rejected all errors about gods who have been created themselves; for there is no created being who is truly God, but such a one is so only in appearance and opinion, being destitute of that most indispensable quality in God, namely, eternity." XI. |
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13. Philo of Alexandria, On The Contemplative Life, 15, 18, 2, 21-23, 3, 38, 4-7, 72, 8, 82, 9, 14 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 14. The Greeks celebrate Anaxagoras and Democritus, because they, being smitten with a desire for philosophy, allowed all their estates to be devoured by cattle. I myself admire the men who thus showed themselves superior to the attractions of money; but how much better were those who have not permitted cattle to devour their possessions, but have supplied the necessities of mankind, of their own relations and friends, and have made them rich though they were poor before? For surely that was inconsiderate conduct (that I may avoid saying that any action of men whom Greece has agreed to admire was a piece of insanity); but this is the act of sober men, and one which has been carefully elaborated by exceeding prudence. |
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14. Philo of Alexandria, On The Life of Moses, 2.12-2.13, 2.16, 2.44, 2.251 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 2.12. But that he himself is the most admirable of all the lawgivers who have ever lived in any country either among the Greeks or among the barbarians, and that his are the most admirable of all laws, and truly divine, omitting no one particular which they ought to comprehend, there is the clearest proof possible in this fact, the laws of other lawgivers 2.13. if any one examines them by his reason, he will find to be put in motion in an innumerable multitude of pretexts, either because of wars, or of tyrannies, or of some other unexpected events which come upon nations through the various alterations and innovations of fortune; and very often luxury, abounding in all kind of superfluity and unbounded extravagance, has overturned laws, from the multitude not being able to bear unlimited prosperity, but having a tendency to become insolent through satiety, and insolence is in opposition to law. 2.16. and what neither famine, nor pestilence, nor war, nor sovereign, nor tyrant, nor the rise of any passions or evil feelings against either soul or body, nor any other evil, whether inflicted by God or deriving its rise from men, ever dissolved, can surely never be looked upon by us in any other light than as objects of all admiration, and beyond all powers of description in respect of their excellence. 2.44. and then, if they make any fresh start and begin to improve, how great is the increase of their renown and glory? I think that in that case every nation, abandoning all their own individual customs, and utterly disregarding their national laws, would change and come over to the honour of such a people only; for their laws shining in connection with, and simultaneously with, the prosperity of the nation, will obscure all others, just as the rising sun obscures the stars. 2.251. The fear is necessary, and the terror is inevitable, and the danger is great; in front of us is the widely open sea, there is no retreat to which we can flee, we have no vessels, behind are the phalanxes of the enemy ready to attack us, which march on and pursue us, never stopping to take breath. Where shall any one turn? Which way can any one look to escape? Every thing from every quarter has unexpectedly become hostile to us, the sea, the land, men, and the elements of nature. |
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15. Philo of Alexandria, Hypothetica, 11.1-11.3, 11.5, 11.12, 11.14-11.17 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
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16. Philo of Alexandria, On The Embassy To Gaius, 155, 215-216, 291, 116 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 116. for all others, all men, all women, all cities, all nations, every country and region of the earth, I had almost said the whole of the inhabited world, although groaning over what was taking place, did nevertheless flatter him, dignifying him above measure, and helping to increase his pride and arrogance; and some of them even introduced the barbaric custom into Italy of falling down in adoration before him, adulterating their native feelings of Roman liberty. |
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17. Philo of Alexandria, Allegorical Interpretation, 3, 2 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
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18. Philo of Alexandria, That Every Good Person Is Free, 54, 73-75, 77-91, 94, 2 (1st cent. BCE - 1st cent. CE)
| 2. Now it is said, that the most sacred sect of the Pythagoreans, among many other excellent doctrines, taught this one also, that it was not well to proceed by the plain ordinary roads, not meaning to urge us to talk among precipices (for it was not their object to weary our feet with labour), but intimating, by a figurative mode of speech, that we ought not, either in respect of our words or actions, to use only such as are ordinary and unchanged; |
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19. Dio Chrysostom, Orations, 8.20-8.26 (1st cent. CE
| 8.20. "But there is another battle more terrible and a struggle not slight but much greater than this and fraught with greater danger, I mean the fight against pleasure. Nor is it like that battle which Homer speaks of when he says, Fiercely then around the ships The struggle was renewed. With halberds and with trenchant battle-axe They fought, with mighty sword and two-edged spear. 8.21. No, it is no such battle, for pleasure uses no open force but deceives and casts a spell with baneful drugs, just as Homer says Circe drugged the comrades of Odysseus, and some forthwith became swine, some wolves, and some other kinds of beasts. Yes, such is this thing pleasure, that hatches no single plot but all kinds of plots, and aims to undo men through sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch, with food too, and drink and carnal lust, tempting the waking and the sleeping alike. 8.22. For it is not possible to set guards and then lie down to sleep as in ordinary warfare, since it is just then of all times that she makes her attack, at one time weakening and enslaving the soul by means of sleep itself, at another, sending mischievous and insidious dreams that suggest her. 8.23. "Now work is carried on by means of touch for the most part and proceeds in that way, but pleasure assails a man through each and every sense that he has; and while he must face and grapple with work, to pleasure he must give the widest berth possible and have none but unavoidable dealings with her. 8.24. And herein the strongest man is indeed strongest, one might almost say, who can keep the farthest away from pleasures; for it is impossible to dwell with pleasure or even to dally with her for any length of time without being completely enslaved. Hence when she gets the mastery and overpowers the soul by her charms, the rest of Circe's sorcery at once follows. With a stroke of her wand pleasure coolly drives her victim into a sort of sty and pens him up 8.25. and now from that time forth the man goes on living as a pig or a wolf. Pleasure also brings divers and deadly vipers into being, and other crawling things that attend constantly upon her as they lie about her doors, and though yearning for pleasure and serving her, they yet suffer a thousand hardships all in vain. 8.26. For pleasure, after overpowering and taking possession of her victims, delivers them over to hardships, the most hateful and most difficult to endure. "This is the contest which I steadfastly maintain, and in which I risk my life against pleasure and hardship, yet not a single wretched mortal gives heed to me, but only to the jumpers and runners and dancers. |
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20. Josephus Flavius, Jewish Antiquities, 13.171-13.173, 13.311-13.313, 13.371-13.372, 15.371-15.379, 18.18-18.22 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
| 13.171. 9. At this time there were three sects among the Jews, who had different opinions concerning human actions; the one was called the sect of the Pharisees, another the sect of the Sadducees, and the other the sect of the Essenes. 13.172. Now for the Pharisees, they say that some actions, but not all, are the work of fate, and some of them are in our own power, and that they are liable to fate, but are not caused by fate. But the sect of the Essenes affirm, that fate governs all things, and that nothing befalls men but what is according to its determination. 13.173. And for the Sadducees, they take away fate, and say there is no such thing, and that the events of human affairs are not at its disposal; but they suppose that all our actions are in our own power, so that we are ourselves the causes of what is good, and receive what is evil from our own folly. However, I have given a more exact account of these opinions in the second book of the Jewish War. 13.311. But here one may take occasion to wonder at one Judas, who was of the sect of the Essenes, and who never missed the truth in his predictions; for this man, when he saw Antigonus passing by the temple, cried out to his companions and friends, who abode with him as his scholars, in order to learn the art of foretelling things to come? 13.312. “That it was good for him to die now, since he had spoken falsely about Antigonus, who is still alive, and I see him passing by, although he had foretold that he should die at the place called Strato’s Tower that very day, while yet the place is six hundred furlongs off, where he had foretold he should be slain; and still this day is a great part of it already past, so that he was in danger of proving a false prophet.” 13.313. As he was saying this, and that in a melancholy mood, the news came that Antigonus was slain in a place under ground, which itself was called also Strato’s Tower, or of the same name with that Caesarea which is seated at the sea. This event put the prophet into a great disorder. 13.371. Both these brothers did Antiochus vehemently oppose, but presently died; for when he was come as an auxiliary to Laodice, queen of the Gileadites, when she was making war against the Parthians, and he was fighting courageously, he fell, while Demetrius and Philip governed Syria, as hath been elsewhere related. 13.372. 5. As to Alexander, his own people were seditious against him; for at a festival which was then celebrated, when he stood upon the altar, and was going to sacrifice, the nation rose upon him, and pelted him with citrons [which they then had in their hands, because] the law of the Jews required that at the feast of tabernacles every one should have branches of the palm tree and citron tree; which thing we have elsewhere related. They also reviled him, as derived from a captive, and so unworthy of his dignity and of sacrificing. 15.371. The Essenes also, as we call a sect of ours, were excused from this imposition. These men live the same kind of life as do those whom the Greeks call Pythagoreans, concerning whom I shall discourse more fully elsewhere. 15.372. However, it is but fit to set down here the reasons wherefore Herod had these Essenes in such honor, and thought higher of them than their mortal nature required; nor will this account be unsuitable to the nature of this history, as it will show the opinion men had of these Essenes. 15.373. 5. Now there was one of these Essenes, whose name was Manahem, who had this testimony, that he not only conducted his life after an excellent manner, but had the foreknowledge of future events given him by God also. This man once saw Herod when he was a child, and going to school, and saluted him as king of the Jews; 15.374. but he, thinking that either he did not know him, or that he was in jest, put him in mind that he was but a private man; but Manahem smiled to himself, and clapped him on his backside with his hand, and said, “However that be, thou wilt be king, and wilt begin thy reign happily, for God finds thee worthy of it. And do thou remember the blows that Manahem hath given thee, as being a signal of the change of thy fortune. 15.375. And truly this will be the best reasoning for thee, that thou love justice [towards men], and piety towards God, and clemency towards thy citizens; yet do I know how thy whole conduct will be, that thou wilt not be such a one 15.376. for thou wilt excel all men in happiness, and obtain an everlasting reputation, but wilt forget piety and righteousness; and these crimes will not be concealed from God, at the conclusion of thy life, when thou wilt find that he will be mindful of them, and punish time for them.” 15.377. Now at that time Herod did not at all attend to what Manahem said, as having no hopes of such advancement; but a little afterward, when he was so fortunate as to be advanced to the dignity of king, and was in the height of his dominion, he sent for Manahem, and asked him how long he should reign. 15.378. Manahem did not tell him the full length of his reign; wherefore, upon that silence of his, he asked him further, whether he should reign ten years or not? He replied, “Yes, twenty, nay, thirty years;” but did not assign the just determinate limit of his reign. Herod was satisfied with these replies, and gave Manahem his hand, and dismissed him; and from that time he continued to honor all the Essenes. 15.379. We have thought it proper to relate these facts to our readers, how strange soever they be, and to declare what hath happened among us, because many of these Essenes have, by their excellent virtue, been thought worthy of this knowledge of divine revelations. 18.18. 5. The doctrine of the Essenes is this: That all things are best ascribed to God. They teach the immortality of souls, and esteem that the rewards of righteousness are to be earnestly striven for; 18.18. Now Antonia was greatly esteemed by Tiberius on all accounts, from the dignity of her relation to him, who had been his brother Drusus’s wife, and from her eminent chastity; for though she was still a young woman, she continued in her widowhood, and refused all other matches, although Augustus had enjoined her to be married to somebody else; yet did she all along preserve her reputation free from reproach. 18.19. and when they send what they have dedicated to God into the temple, they do not offer sacrifices because they have more pure lustrations of their own; on which account they are excluded from the common court of the temple, but offer their sacrifices themselves; yet is their course of life better than that of other men; and they entirely addict themselves to husbandry. 18.19. But when Caesar had gone round the hippodrome, he found Agrippa standing: “For certain,” said he, “Macro, this is the man I meant to have bound;” and when he still asked, “Which of these is to be bound?” he said “Agrippa.” 18.21. and neither marry wives, nor are desirous to keep servants; as thinking the latter tempts men to be unjust, and the former gives the handle to domestic quarrels; but as they live by themselves, they minister one to another. 18.21. that it turned greatly to the advantage of his son among all; and, among others, the soldiery were so peculiarly affected to him, that they reckoned it an eligible thing, if need were, to die themselves, if he might but attain to the government. 18.22. They also appoint certain stewards to receive the incomes of their revenues, and of the fruits of the ground; such as are good men and priests, who are to get their corn and their food ready for them. They none of them differ from others of the Essenes in their way of living, but do the most resemble those Dacae who are called Polistae [dwellers in cities]. 18.22. and I desire thee never to be unmindful when thou comest to it, either of my kindness to thee, who set thee in so high a dignity |
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21. Josephus Flavius, Jewish War, 1.78-1.80, 2.119-2.161, 2.567, 3.11, 3.19, 5.145 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
| 1.78. 5. And truly anyone would be surprised at Judas upon this occasion. He was of the sect of the Essenes, and had never failed or deceived men in his predictions before. Now, this man saw Antigonus as he was passing along by the temple, and cried out to his acquaintance (they were not a few who attended upon him as his scholars) 1.79. “O strange!” said he, “it is good for me to die now, since truth is dead before me, and somewhat that I have foretold hath proved false; for this Antigonus is this day alive, who ought to have died this day; and the place where he ought to be slain, according to that fatal decree, was Strato’s Tower, which is at the distance of six hundred furlongs from this place; and yet four hours of this day are over already; which point of time renders the prediction impossible to be fulfilled.” 2.119. 2. For there are three philosophical sects among the Jews. The followers of the first of which are the Pharisees; of the second, the Sadducees; and the third sect, which pretends to a severer discipline, are called Essenes. These last are Jews by birth, and seem to have a greater affection for one another than the other sects have. 2.121. They do not absolutely deny the fitness of marriage, and the succession of mankind thereby continued; but they guard against the lascivious behavior of women, and are persuaded that none of them preserve their fidelity to one man. 2.122. 3. These men are despisers of riches, and so very communicative as raises our admiration. Nor is there anyone to be found among them who hath more than another; for it is a law among them, that those who come to them must let what they have be common to the whole order,—insomuch that among them all there is no appearance of poverty, or excess of riches, but every one’s possessions are intermingled with every other’s possessions; and so there is, as it were, one patrimony among all the brethren. 2.123. They think that oil is a defilement; and if anyone of them be anointed without his own approbation, it is wiped off his body; for they think to be sweaty is a good thing, as they do also to be clothed in white garments. They also have stewards appointed to take care of their common affairs, who every one of them have no separate business for any, but what is for the use of them all. 2.124. 4. They have no one certain city, but many of them dwell in every city; and if any of their sect come from other places, what they have lies open for them, just as if it were their own; and they go in to such as they never knew before, as if they had been ever so long acquainted with them. 2.125. For which reason they carry nothing at all with them when they travel into remote parts, though still they take their weapons with them, for fear of thieves. Accordingly, there is, in every city where they live, one appointed particularly to take care of strangers, and to provide garments and other necessaries for them. 2.126. But the habit and management of their bodies is such as children use who are in fear of their masters. Nor do they allow of the change of garments, or of shoes, till they be first entirely torn to pieces or worn out by time. 2.127. Nor do they either buy or sell anything to one another; but every one of them gives what he hath to him that wanteth it, and receives from him again in lieu of it what may be convenient for himself; and although there be no requital made, they are fully allowed to take what they want of whomsoever they please. 2.128. 5. And as for their piety towards God, it is very extraordinary; for before sunrising they speak not a word about profane matters, but put up certain prayers which they have received from their forefathers, as if they made a supplication for its rising. 2.129. After this every one of them are sent away by their curators, to exercise some of those arts wherein they are skilled, in which they labor with great diligence till the fifth hour. After which they assemble themselves together again into one place; and when they have clothed themselves in white veils, they then bathe their bodies in cold water. And after this purification is over, they every one meet together in an apartment of their own, into which it is not permitted to any of another sect to enter; while they go, after a pure manner, into the dining-room, as into a certain holy temple 2.131. but a priest says grace before meat; and it is unlawful for anyone to taste of the food before grace be said. The same priest, when he hath dined, says grace again after meat; and when they begin, and when they end, they praise God, as he that bestows their food upon them; after which they lay aside their [white] garments, and betake themselves to their labors again till the evening; 2.132. then they return home to supper, after the same manner; and if there be any strangers there, they sit down with them. Nor is there ever any clamor or disturbance to pollute their house, but they give every one leave to speak in their turn; 2.133. which silence thus kept in their house appears to foreigners like some tremendous mystery; the cause of which is that perpetual sobriety they exercise, and the same settled measure of meat and drink that is allotted to them, and that such as is abundantly sufficient for them. 2.134. 6. And truly, as for other things, they do nothing but according to the injunctions of their curators; only these two things are done among them at everyone’s own free will, which are to assist those that want it, and to show mercy; for they are permitted of their own accord to afford succor to such as deserve it, when they stand in need of it, and to bestow food on those that are in distress; but they cannot give any thing to their kindred without the curators. 2.135. They dispense their anger after a just manner, and restrain their passion. They are eminent for fidelity, and are the ministers of peace; whatsoever they say also is firmer than an oath; but swearing is avoided by them, and they esteem it worse than perjury for they say that he who cannot be believed without [swearing by] God is already condemned. 2.136. They also take great pains in studying the writings of the ancients, and choose out of them what is most for the advantage of their soul and body; and they inquire after such roots and medicinal stones as may cure their distempers. 2.137. 7. But now, if anyone hath a mind to come over to their sect, he is not immediately admitted, but he is prescribed the same method of living which they use, for a year, while he continues excluded; and they give him also a small hatchet, and the fore-mentioned girdle, and the white garment. 2.138. And when he hath given evidence, during that time, that he can observe their continence, he approaches nearer to their way of living, and is made a partaker of the waters of purification; yet is he not even now admitted to live with them; for after this demonstration of his fortitude, his temper is tried two more years; and if he appear to be worthy, they then admit him into their society. 2.139. And before he is allowed to touch their common food, he is obliged to take tremendous oaths, that, in the first place, he will exercise piety towards God, and then that he will observe justice towards men, and that he will do no harm to any one, either of his own accord, or by the command of others; that he will always hate the wicked, and be assistant to the righteous; 2.141. that he will be perpetually a lover of truth, and propose to himself to reprove those that tell lies; that he will keep his hands clear from theft, and his soul from unlawful gains; and that he will neither conceal anything from those of his own sect, nor discover any of their doctrines to others, no, not though anyone should compel him so to do at the hazard of his life. 2.142. Moreover, he swears to communicate their doctrines to no one any otherwise than as he received them himself; that he will abstain from robbery, and will equally preserve the books belonging to their sect, and the names of the angels [or messengers]. These are the oaths by which they secure their proselytes to themselves. 2.143. 8. But for those that are caught in any heinous sins, they cast them out of their society; and he who is thus separated from them does often die after a miserable manner; for as he is bound by the oath he hath taken, and by the customs he hath been engaged in, he is not at liberty to partake of that food that he meets with elsewhere, but is forced to eat grass, and to famish his body with hunger, till he perish; 2.144. for which reason they receive many of them again when they are at their last gasp, out of compassion to them, as thinking the miseries they have endured till they came to the very brink of death to be a sufficient punishment for the sins they had been guilty of. 2.145. 9. But in the judgments they exercise they are most accurate and just, nor do they pass sentence by the votes of a court that is fewer than a hundred. And as to what is once determined by that number, it is unalterable. What they most of all honor, after God himself, is the name of their legislator [Moses], whom, if anyone blaspheme, he is punished capitally. 2.146. They also think it a good thing to obey their elders, and the major part. Accordingly, if ten of them be sitting together, no one of them will speak while the other nine are against it. 2.147. They also avoid spitting in the midst of them, or on the right side. Moreover, they are stricter than any other of the Jews in resting from their labors on the seventh day; for they not only get their food ready the day before, that they may not be obliged to kindle a fire on that day, but they will not remove any vessel out of its place, nor go to stool thereon. 2.148. Nay, on theother days they dig a small pit, a foot deep, with a paddle (which kind of hatchet is given them when they are first admitted among them); and covering themselves round with their garment, that they may not affront the Divine rays of light, they ease themselves into that pit 2.149. after which they put the earth that was dug out again into the pit; and even this they do only in the more lonely places, which they choose out for this purpose; and although this easement of the body be natural, yet it is a rule with them to wash themselves after it, as if it were a defilement to them. 2.151. They are long-lived also, insomuch that many of them live above a hundred years, by means of the simplicity of their diet; nay, as I think, by means of the regular course of life they observe also. They condemn the miseries of life, and are above pain, by the generosity of their mind. And as for death, if it will be for their glory, they esteem it better than living always; 2.152. and indeed our war with the Romans gave abundant evidence what great souls they had in their trials, wherein, although they were tortured and distorted, burnt and torn to pieces, and went through all kinds of instruments of torment, that they might be forced either to blaspheme their legislator, or to eat what was forbidden them, yet could they not be made to do either of them, no, nor once to flatter their tormentors, or to shed a tear; 2.153. but they smiled in their very pains, and laughed those to scorn who inflicted the torments upon them, and resigned up their souls with great alacrity, as expecting to receive them again. 2.154. 11. For their doctrine is this: That bodies are corruptible, and that the matter they are made of is not permanent; but that the souls are immortal, and continue forever; and that they come out of the most subtile air, and are united to their bodies as to prisons, into which they are drawn by a certain natural enticement; 2.155. but that when they are set free from the bonds of the flesh, they then, as released from a long bondage, rejoice and mount upward. And this is like the opinions of the Greeks, that good souls have their habitations beyond the ocean, in a region that is neither oppressed with storms of rain or snow, or with intense heat, but that this place is such as is refreshed by the gentle breathing of a west wind, that is perpetually blowing from the ocean; while they allot to bad souls a dark and tempestuous den, full of never-ceasing punishments. 2.156. And indeed the Greeks seem to me to have followed the same notion, when they allot the islands of the blessed to their brave men, whom they call heroes and demigods; and to the souls of the wicked, the region of the ungodly, in Hades, where their fables relate that certain persons, such as Sisyphus, and Tantalus, and Ixion, and Tityus, are punished; which is built on this first supposition, that souls are immortal; and thence are those exhortations to virtue, and dehortations from wickedness collected; 2.157. whereby good men are bettered in the conduct of their life by the hope they have of reward after their death; and whereby the vehement inclinations of bad men to vice are restrained, by the fear and expectation they are in, that although they should lie concealed in this life, they should suffer immortal punishment after their death. 2.158. These are the Divine doctrines of the Essenes about the soul, which lay an unavoidable bait for such as have once had a taste of their philosophy. 2.159. 12. There are also those among them who undertake to foretell things to come, by reading the holy books, and using several sorts of purifications, and being perpetually conversant in the discourses of the prophets; and it is but seldom that they miss in their predictions. 2.161. However, they try their spouses for three years; and if they find that they have their natural purgations thrice, as trials that they are likely to be fruitful, they then actually marry them. But they do not use to accompany with their wives when they are with child, as a demonstration that they do not marry out of regard to pleasure, but for the sake of posterity. Now the women go into the baths with some of their garments on, as the men do with somewhat girded about them. And these are the customs of this order of Essenes. 2.567. Nor did they neglect the care of other parts of the country; but Joseph the son of Simon was sent as general to Jericho, as was Manasseh to Perea, and John, the Essene, to the toparchy of Thamma; Lydda was also added to his portion, and Joppa, and Emmaus. 3.11. 1. And now Vespasian, with his son Titus, had tarried some time at Ptolemais, and had put his army in order. But when Placidus, who had overrun Galilee, and had besides slain a number of those whom he had caught (which were only the weaker part of the Galileans, and such as were of timorous souls) 3.11. This excursion was led on by three men, who were the chief of them all, both for strength and sagacity; Niger, called the Peraite, Silas of Babylon, and besides them John the Essene. 3.19. 14. However, Josephus contrived another stratagem besides the foregoing, to get plenty of what they wanted. 3.19. And as the former strove zealously under their misfortunes, out of the shame of a sudden flight, and hopes of the change in their success, so did the latter feel no weariness by reason of their good fortune; insomuch that the fight lasted till the evening, till ten thousand men of the Jews’ side lay dead, with two of their generals, John and Silas 5.145. But if we go the other way westward, it began at the same place, and extended through a place called “Bethso,” to the gate of the Essenes; and after that it went southward, having its bending above the fountain Siloam, where it also bends again towards the east at Solomon’s pool, and reaches as far as a certain place which they called “Ophlas,” where it was joined to the eastern cloister of the temple. |
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22. Josephus Flavius, Life, 11-12, 10 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
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23. Mishnah, Hagigah, 2.6-2.7 (1st cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 2.6. If he immersed for unconsecrated [food], and was presumed to be fit to eat unconsecrated [food], he is prohibited from [eating second] tithe. If he immersed for [second] tithe, and was presumed to be fit to eat [second] tithe, he is prohibited from [eating] terumah. If he immersed for terumah, and was presumed to be fit to eat terumah, he is prohibited from [eating] holy things. If he immersed for holy things, and was presumed to be fit to eat holy things he is prohibited from [touching the waters of] purification. If one immersed for something possessing a stricter [degree of holiness], one is permitted [to have contact with] something possessing a lighter [degree of holiness]. If he immersed but without special intention, it is as though he had not immersed." 2.7. The garments of an am haaretz possess midras-impurity for Pharisees. The garments of Pharisees possess midras-impurity for those who eat terumah. The garments of those who eat terumah possess midras-impurity for [those who eat] sacred things. The garments of [those who eat] sacred things possess midras-impurity for [those who occupy themselves with the waters of] purification. Yose ben Yoezer was the most pious in the priesthood, yet his apron was [considered to possess] midras-impurity for [those who ate] sacred things. Yoha ben Gudgada all his life used to eat [unconsecrated food] in accordance with the purity required for sacred things, yet his apron was [considered to possess] midras-impurity for [those who occupied themselves with the water of] purification." |
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24. Mishnah, Sotah, 3.4 (1st cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 3.4. She had barely finished drinking when her face turns yellow, her eyes protrude and her veins swell. And [those who see her] exclaim, “Remove her! Remove her, so that the temple-court should not be defiled”. If she had merit, it [causes the water] to suspend its effect upon her. Some merit suspends the effect for one year, some merit suspends the effects for two years, and some merit suspends the effect for three years. Hence Ben Azzai said: a person must teach his daughter Torah, so that if she has to drink [the water of bitterness], she should know that the merit suspends its effect. Rabbi Eliezer says: whoever teaches his daughter Torah teaches her lasciviousness. Rabbi Joshua says: a woman prefers one kav (of food) and sexual indulgence to nine kav and sexual separation. He used to say, a foolish pietist, a cunning wicked person, a female separatist, and the blows of separatists bring destruction upon the world." |
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25. Mishnah, Toharot, 4.12 (1st cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 4.12. \"A condition of doubt concerning non-sacred food\"--this refers to the cleanness practiced by Pharisees. \"A condition of doubt concerning a sheretz\" –according [to their condition at] the time they are found. \"A condition of doubt concerning negaim\" it is deemed clean in the beginning before it had been determined to be unclean, but after it had been determined to be unclean, a condition of doubt is deemed unclean. \"A condition of doubt concerning a nazirite vow\" [in such a condition of doubt he] is permitted [all that is forbidden to a nazirite]. \"A condition of doubt concerning first-borns\" whether they are human firstborn or firstborn of cattle, whether the firstborn of an unclean beast or a clean one, for the one who wishes to extract from his fellow bears the burden of proof." |
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26. Mishnah, Yadayim, 4.6 (1st cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 4.6. The Sadducees say: we complain against you, Pharisees, because you say that the Holy Scriptures defile the hands, but the books of Homer do not defile the hands. Rabban Yoha ben Zakkai said: Have we nothing against the Pharisees but this? Behold they say that the bones of a donkey are clean, yet the bones of Yoha the high priest are unclean. They said to him: according to the affection for them, so is their impurity, so that nobody should make spoons out of the bones of his father or mother. He said to them: so also are the Holy Scriptures according to the affection for them, so is their uncleanness. The books of Homer which are not precious do not defile the hands." |
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27. New Testament, Mark, 3.6, 8.15, 12.23 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
| 3.6. The Pharisees went out, and immediately conspired with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him. 8.15. He charged them, saying, "Take heed: beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod. 12.23. In the resurrection, when they rise, whose wife will she be of them? For the seven had her as a wife. |
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28. Pliny The Elder, Natural History, 5.73 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
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29. Aelian, Varia Historia, 4.17 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
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30. Anon., Leviticus Rabba, 3.6 (2nd cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
| 3.6. וֶהֱבִיאָהּ אֶל בְּנֵי אַהֲרֹן (ויקרא ב, ב), תָּנֵי רַבִּי חִיָּא וַאֲפִלּוּ רִבּוֹת, אָמַר רַבִּי יוֹחָנָן (משלי יד, כח): בְּרָב עָם הַדְּרַת מֶלֶךְ. (ויקרא ב, ב): וְקָמַץ מִשָּׁם מְלֹא קֻמְצוֹ מִסָּלְתָּהּ וּמִשַּׁמְנָהּ, מִסַּלְתָּהּ וְלֹא כָּל סָלְתָּהּ, מִשַּׁמְנָהּ וְלֹא כָּל שַׁמְנָהּ, הֲרֵי שֶׁהֵבִיא מִנְחָתוֹ מִגּוֹלָה מֵאַסְפַּמְיָא וְרָאָה אֶת הַכֹּהֵן שֶׁהִקְמִיץ וְאָכַל אֶת הַשְּׁאָר, אָמַר אוֹי לִי, כָּל הַצַּעַר הַזֶּה שֶׁנִּצְטַעַרְתִּי בִּשְׁבִיל זֶה, וְהַכֹּל מְפַיְּסִין אוֹתוֹ וְאוֹמְרִים לוֹ וּמָה אִם זֶה שֶׁלֹּא נִצְטַעֵר אֶלָּא שְׁנֵי פְּסִיעוֹת בֵּין הָאוּלָם לַמִּזְבֵּחַ זָכָה לֶאֱכֹל, אַתָּה שֶׁנִּצְטַעַרְתָּ כָּל הַצַּעַר הַזֶּה, עַל אַחַת כַּמָּה וְכַמָּה. וְלֹא עוֹד אֶלָּא (ויקרא ב, ג): וְהַנּוֹתֶרֶת מִן הַמִּנְחָה לְאַהֲרֹן וּלְבָנָיו, רַבִּי חֲנִינָא בַּר אַבָּא אֲזַל לְחַד אֲתַר אַשְׁכָּחָא הָדֵין פְּסוּקָא רֹאשׁ סִדְרָא: וְהַנּוֹתֶרֶת מִן הַמִּנְחָה לְאַהֲרֹן וּלְבָנָיו, מַה פָּתַח עֲלָהּ (תהלים יז, יד): מִמְתִים יָדְךָ ה' מִמְתִים מֵחֶלֶד. מִמְתִים יָדְךָ ה', מַה גִּבּוֹרִים הֵם אֵלּוּ שֶׁנָּטְלוּ חֶלְקָן מִתַּחַת יָדְךָ ה', וְאֵיזֶה זֶה שִׁבְטוֹ שֶׁל לֵוִי. מִמְתִים מֵחֶלֶד, אֵלּוּ שֶׁלֹּא נָטְלוּ חֵלֶק בָּאָרֶץ. חֶלְקָם בַּחַיִּים, אֵלּוּ קָדְשֵׁי מִקְדָּשׁ. וּצְפוּנְךָ תְּמַלֵּא בִטְנָם, אֵלּוּ קָדְשֵׁי הַגְּבוּל. יִשְׂבְּעוּ בָנִים, (ויקרא ו, יא): כָּל זָכָר בִּבְנֵי אַהֲרֹן יֹאכְלֶנָּה. וְהִנִּיחוּ יִתְרָם לְעוֹלְלֵיהֶם, וְהַנּוֹתֶרֶת מִן הַמִּנְחָה לְאַהֲרֹן וּלְבָנָיו, אַהֲרֹן זָכָה לְבָנִים בֵּין כְּשֵׁרִים בֵּין פְּסוּלִים, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (מלאכי ב, ה): בְּרִיתִי הָיְתָה אִתּוֹ הַחַיִּים וְהַשָּׁלוֹם, שֶׁהָיָה רוֹדֵף שָׁלוֹם בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל. (מלאכי ב, ה): וָאֶתְּנֵם לוֹ מוֹרָא וַיִּירָאֵנִי, שֶׁקִּבֵּל עָלָיו דִּבְרֵי תוֹרָה בְּאֵימָה וּבְיִרְאָה וּבִרְתֵת וּבְזִיעַ. מַה תַּלְמוּד לוֹמַר (מלאכי ב, ה): מִפְּנֵי שְׁמִי נִחַת, אָמְרוּ בְּשָׁעָה שֶׁיָּצַק משֶׁה שֶׁמֶן הַמִּשְׁחָה עַל רֹאשׁ אַהֲרֹן, נִרְתַּע וְנָפַל לַאֲחוֹרָיו, וְאָמַר, אוֹי לִי שֶׁמָּא מָעַלְתִּי בְּשֶׁמֶן הַמִּשְׁחָה. הֵשִׁיבָה רוּחַ הַקֹּדֶשׁ וְאָמְרָה לוֹ (תהלים קלג, א ג): הִנֵּה מַה טּוֹב וּמַה נָּעִים שֶׁבֶת אַחִים גַּם יָחַד כַּשֶּׁמֶן הַטּוֹב עַל הָרֹאשׁ וגו' כְּטַל חֶרְמוֹן שֶׁיּוֹרֵד וגו'. מַה הַטַּל אֵין בּוֹ מְעִילָה אַף הַשֶּׁמֶן אֵין בּוֹ מְעִילָה. כַּשֶּׁמֶן הַטּוֹב עַל הָרֹאשׁ יוֹרֵד עַל הַזָּקָן זְקַן אַהֲרֹן, וְכִי שְׁנֵי זְקָנִים הָיוּ לְאַהֲרֹן וְאַתְּ אֲמַרְתְּ הַזָּקָן זְקַן, אֶלָּא כֵּיוָן שֶׁרָאָה משֶׁה אֶת הַשֶּׁמֶן יוֹרֵד עַל זְקַן אַהֲרֹן הָיָה שָׂמֵחַ כְּאִלּוּ עַל זְקָנוֹ יָרָד. (מלאכי ב, ו): תּוֹרַת אֱמֶת הָיְתָה בְּפִיהוּ, שֶׁלֹּא אָסַר אֶת הַמֻּתָּר וְלֹא הִתִּיר אֶת הָאָסוּר. בְּשָׁלוֹם וּבְמִישׁוֹר הָלַךְ אִתִּי, שֶׁלֹּא הִרְהֵר אַחַר דַּרְכֵי הַמָּקוֹם, כְּדֶרֶךְ שֶׁלֹּא הִרְהֵר אָבִינוּ אַבְרָהָם. וְרַבִּים הֵשִׁיב מֵעָוֹן, שֶׁהֵשִׁיב פּוֹשְׁעִים לְתַלְמוּד תּוֹרָה, וְכֵן הוּא אוֹמֵר (שיר השירים א, ד): מֵישָׁרִים אֲהֵבוּךָ, מַה כְּתִיב בּוֹ בַּסּוֹף (מלאכי ב, ז): כִּי שִׂפְתֵי כֹהֵן יִשְׁמְרוּ דַעַת וְתוֹרָה יְבַקְּשׁוּ מִפִּיהוּ וגו'. | |
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31. Clement of Alexandria, Miscellanies, 1.15.72 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
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32. Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies, 9.25 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 9.25. Since, therefore, we have explained even the diversities among the Jews, it seems expedient likewise not to pass over in silence the system of their religion. The doctrine, therefore, among all Jews on the subject of religion is fourfold-theological, natural, moral, and ceremonial. And they affirm that there is one God, and that He is Creator and Lord of the universe: that He has formed all these glorious works which had no previous existence; and this, too, not out of any coeval substance that lay ready at hand, but His Will - the efficient cause- was to create, and He did create. And (they maintain) that there are angels, and that these have been brought into being for ministering unto the creation; but also that there is a sovereign Spirit that always continues beside God, for glory and praise. And that all things in the creation are endued with sensation, and that there is nothing iimate. And they earnestly aim at serious habits and a temperate life, as one may ascertain from their laws. Now these matters have long ago been strictly defined by those who in ancient times have received the divinely-appointed law; so that the reader will find himself astonished at the amount of temperance, and of diligence, lavished on customs legally enacted in reference to man. The ceremonial service, however, which has been adapted to divine worship in a manner befitting the dignity of religion, has been practised among them with the highest degree of elaboration. The superiority of their ritualism it is easy for those who wish it to ascertain, provided they read the book which furnishes information on these points. They will thus perceive how that with solemnity and sanctity the Jewish priests offer unto God the first-fruits of the gifts bestowed by Him for the rise and enjoyment of men; how they fulfil their ministrations with regularity and steadfastness, in obedience to His commandments. There are, however, some (liturgical usages adopted) by these, which the Sadducees refuse to recognise, for they are not disposed to acquiesce in the existence of angels or spirits. Still all parties alike expect Messiah, inasmuch as the Law certainly, and the prophets, preached beforehand that He was about to be present on earth. Inasmuch, however, as the Jews were not cognizant of the period of His advent, there remains the supposition that the declarations (of Scripture) concerning His coming have not been fulfilled. And so it is, that up to this day they continue in anticipation of the future coming of the Christ, - from the fact of their not discerning Him when He was present in the world. And (yet there can be little doubt but) that, on beholding the signs of the times of His having been already among us, the Jews are troubled; and that they are ashamed to confess that He has come, since they have with their own hands put Him to death, because they were stung with indignation in being convicted by Himself of not having obeyed the laws. And they affirm that He who was thus sent forth by God is not this Christ (whom they are looking for); but they confess that another Messiah will come, who as yet has no existence; and that he will usher in some of the signs which the law and the prophets have shown beforehand, whereas, regarding the rest (of these indications), they suppose that they have fallen into error. For they say that his generation will be from the stock of David, but not from a virgin and the Holy Spirit, but from a woman and a man, according as it is a rule for all to be procreated from seed. And they allege that this Messiah will be King over them - a warlike and powerful individual, who, after having gathered together the entire people of the Jews, and having done battle with all the nations, will restore for them Jerusalem the royal city. And into this city He will collect together the entire Hebrew race, and bring it back once more into the ancient customs, that it may fulfil the regal and sacerdotal functions, and dwell in confidence for periods of time of sufficient duration. After this repose, it is their opinion that war would next be waged against them after being thus congregated; that in this conflict Christ would fall by the edge of the sword; and that, after no long time, would next succeed the termination and conflagration of the universe; and that in this way their opinions concerning the resurrection would receive completion, and a recompense be rendered to each man according to his works. |
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33. Justin, Dialogue With Trypho, 80.3-80.4 (2nd cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
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34. Philostratus The Athenian, Life of Apollonius, 3.12-3.13, 3.15, 3.18-3.20, 3.24-3.25, 3.28, 3.32, 3.35-3.36, 3.38, 3.41, 3.43, 3.48-3.49, 6.1-6.27 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 3.12. THEN he ran up to Apollonius and addressed him in the Greek tongue; and so far this did not seem so remarkable, because all the inhabitants of the village spoke the Greek tongue. But when he addressed him by name and said Hail so and so, the rest of the party were filled with astonishment, though our sage only felt the more confidence in his mission: for he looked to Damis and said: We have reached men who are unfeignedly wise, for they seem to have the gift of foreknowledge. And he at once asked the Indian what he must do, because he was already eager for an interview: and the Indian replied:Your party must halt here, but you must come on just as you are, for the Masters themselves issue this command. 3.13. Theword Masters at once had a Pythagorean ring for the ears of Apollonius and he gladly followed the messenger.Now the hill the summit of which is inhabited by the sages is, according to the account of our travelers, of about the same height as the Acropolis of Athens; and it rises straight up from the plain, though its natural position equally secures it from attack, for the rock surrounds it on all sides. On many parts of this rock you see traces of cloven feet and outlines of beards and of faces, and here and there impressions of backs as of persons who had slipped and rolled down. For they say that Dionysus, when he was trying to storm the place together with Heracles, ordered the Pans to attack it, thinking that they would be strong enough to stand the shock; but they were thunderstruck by the sages and fell one, one way, and another, another; and the rocks as it were took the print of the various postures in which they fell and failed. And they say that they saw a cloud floating round the eminence on which the Indians live and render themselves visible or invisible at will. Whether there were any other gates to the eminence they say they did not know; for the cloud around it did not anywhere allow them to be seen, whether there was an opening in the rampart, or whether on the other hand it was a close-shut fortress. 3.15. APOLLONIUS himself describes the character of these sages and of their settlement upon the hill; for in one of his addresses to the Egyptians he says, I saw Indian Brahmans living upon the earth and yet not on it, and fortified without fortifications, and possessing nothing, yet having the riches of all men. He may indeed be thought to have here written with too much subtlety; but we have anyhow the account of Damis to effect that they made a practice of sleeping the ground, and that they strewed the ground with such grass as they might themselves prefer; and, what is more, he says that he saw them levitating themselves two cubits high from the ground, not for the sake of miraculous display, for they disdain any such ambition; but they regard any rites they perform, in thus quitting earth and walking with the Sun, as acts of homage acceptable to the God. Moreover, they neither burn upon an altar nor keep in stoves the fire which they extract from the sun's rays, although it is a material fire; but like the rays of sunlight when they are refracted in water, so this fire is seen raised aloft in the air and dancing in the ether. And further they pray to the Sun who governs the seasons by his might, that the latter may succeed duly in the land, so that India may prosper; but of a night they intreat the ray of light not to take the night amiss, but. to stay with them just as they have brought it down. Such then was the meaning of the phrase of Apollonius, that the Brahmans are upon earth and yet not upon earth. And his phrase fortified without fortifications or walls, refers to the air or vapor under which they bivouac, for though they seem to live in the open air, yet they raise up a shadow and veil themselves in it, so that they are not made wet when it rains and they enjoy the sunlight whenever they choose. And the phrase without possessing anything they had the riches of all men, is thus explained by Damis: All the springs which the Bacchanals see leaping up from the ground under their feet, whenever Dionysus stirs them and earth in a common convulsion, spring up in plenty for these Indians also when they are entertaining or being entertained. Apollonius therefore was right in saying that people provided as they are with all they want offhand and without having prepared anything, possess what they do not possess. And on principle they grow their hair long, as theLacedaemonians did of old and the people of Thurium and Tarentum, as well as the Melians and all who set store by the fashions of Sparta; and they bind a white turban on their heads, and their feet are naked for walking and they cut their garments to resemble the exomis [ 1]. But the material of which they make their raiment is a wool that springs wild from the ground, white like that of the Pamphylians, though it is of softer growth, and a grease like olive oil distills from off it. This is what they make their sacred vesture of, and if anyone else except these Indians tries to pluck it up, the earth refuses to surrender its wool. And they all carry both a ring and a staff of which the peculiar virtues can effect all things, and the one and the other, so we learn, are prized as secrets. 3.18. And when he had taken his seat, he said: Ask whatever you like, for you find yourself among people who know everything. Apollonius then asked him whether they knew themselves also, thinking that he, like the Greeks, would regard self-knowledge as a difficult matter. But the other, contrary to Apollonius' expectations, corrected him and said: We know everything, just because we begin by knowing ourselves; for no one of us would be admitted to this philosophy unless he first knew himself. And Apollonius remembered what he had heard Phraotes say, and how he who would become a philosopher must examine himself before he undertakes the task; and he therefore acquiesced in this answer, for he was convinced of its truth in his own case also. He accordingly asked a fresh question, namely, who they considered themselves to be; and the other answered We consider ourselves to be Gods. Apollonius asked afresh: Why? Because, said the other, we are good men. This reply struck Apollonius as so instinct with trained good sense that he subsequently mentioned it to Domitian in his defense of himself. 3.19. HE therefore resumed his questions and said: And what view do you take of the soul? That, replied the other, which Pythagoras imparted to you, and which we imparted to the Egyptians. Would you then say, said Apollonius, that as Pythagoras declared himself to be Euphorbus, so you yourself, before you entered your present body, were one of the Trojans or Achaeans or someone else? And the Indian replied: Those Achaean sailors were the ruin of Troy, and your talking so much about it is the ruin of you Greeks. For you imagine that the campaigners against Troy were the only heroes that ever were, and you forget other heroes both more numerous and more divine, whom your own country and that of the Egyptians and that of the Indians have produced. Since then you have asked me about my earlier incarnation, tell me, whom you regard as the most remarkable of the assailants or defenders of Troy. I, replied Apollonius, regard Achilles, the son of Peleus and Thetis, as such, for he and no other is celebrated by Homer as excelling all the Achaeans in personal beauty and size, and he knows of mighty deeds of his. And he also rates very highly such men as Ajax and Nireus, who were only second to him in beauty and courage, and are celebrated as such in his poems. With him, said the other, O Apollonius, I would have you compare my own ancestor, or rather my ancestral body, for that was the light in which Pythagoras regarded Euphorbus. 3.20. There was then, he said, a time when the Ethiopians, an Indian race, dwelt in this country, and when Ethiopia as yet was not; but Egypt stretched its borders beyond Meroe and the cataracts, and on the one side included in itself the fountains of the Nile, and on the other was only bounded by the mouths of the river. Well, at that time of which I speak, the Ethiopians lived here, and were subject to King Ganges, and the land was sufficient for their sustece, and the gods watched over them; but when they slew this king, neither did the rest of the Indians regard them as pure, nor did the land permit them to remain upon it; for it spoiled the seed which they sowed in it before it came into ear, and it inflicted miscarriages on their women, and it gave a miserable feed to their flocks; and wherever they tried to found a city, it would give way sink down under their feet. Nay more, the ghost of Ganges drove them forward on their path, a haunting terror to their multitude, and it did not quit them until they atoned to earth by sacrificing the murderers who had shed the king's blood with their hands. Now this Ganges it seems, was ten cubits high, and in personal beauty excelled any man the world had yet seen, and he was the son of the river Ganges; and when his own father inundated India, he himself turned the flood into the Red Sea, and effected a reconciliation between his father and the land, with the result that the latter brought forth fruits in abundance for him when living, and also avenged him after death. And since Homer brings Achilles to Troy in Helen's behalf, and relates how he took twelve cities by sea and eleven on land, and how he was carried away by wrath because he had been robbed of a woman by the king, on which occasion, in my opinion, he showed himself merciless and cruel, let us contrast the Indian in similar circumstances. He on the contrary set himself to found sixty cities, which are the most considerable of those hereabouts — and I would like to know who would regard the destruction of cities as a better title to fame than the rebuilding of them — and he also repulsed the Scythians who once invaded this land across the Caucasus. Surely it is better to prove yourself a good man by liberating your country than to bring slavery upon a city, and that too on behalf of a woman who probably was never really carried off against her will. And he had formed an alliance with the king of the country, over which Phraotes now rules, although that other had violated every law and principle of morality by carrying of his wife, he yet did not break his oath, and so stable, he said, was his pledged word, that, in spite of the injury he had suffered, he would not do anything to harm that other. 3.24. But Apollonius replied: Since you tempt me to talk about pilotage, I would have you hear what I consider to have been my soundest exploit at that time. Pirates at one time infested the Phoenician Sea, and were hanging about the cities to pick up information about the cargoes which different people had. The agents of the pirates spied out accordingly a rich cargo which I had on board my ship, and having taken me aside in conversation, asked me what was my share in the freight; and I told them that it was a thousand drachmas, for there were four people in command of the ship. “And,” said they, “have you a house?' “A wretched hut,” I replied, “on the Island of Pharos, where once upon a time Proteus used to live.” “Would you like then,” they went on, “to acquire a landed estate instead of the sea, and a decent house instead of your hut, and ten times as much for the cargo as you are going to get now? And to get rid of a thousand misfortunes which beset pilots owing to the roughness of the sea?' I replied that I would gladly do so, but that I did not aspire to become a pirate just at a time when I had made myself more expert than I ever had been, and had won crowns for my skill in my profession. However they persevered and promised to give me a purse of ten thousand drachmas, if I would be their man and do what they wanted. Accordingly I egged them on to talk by promising not to fail them, but to assist them in every way. Then they admitted that they were agents of the pirates, and besought me not to deprive them of a chance of capturing the ship, and instead of sailing away to the city whenever I weighed anchor thence, they arranged that I should cast anchor under the promontory, under the lee of which the pirate ships were riding; and they were willing to swear that they would not only not kill myself, but spare the life of any for whom I interceded. I for my part did not consider it safe to reprehend them, for I was afraid that if they were driven to despair, they would attack my ship on the high seas and then we would all be lost somewhere at sea; accordingly I promised to assist their enterprise, but I insisted upon their taking oath to keep their promise truly. They accordingly made oath, for our interview took place in a sanctuary, and then I said: “You betake yourselves to the ships of the pirates at once, for we will sail away by night.” And they found me all the more plausible from the way I bargained about the money, for I stipulated that it must all be paid me in current cash, though not before they had captured the ship. They therefore went off, but I put straight out to sea after doubling the promontory. This then, said Iarchas, O Apollonius, you consider the behavior of a just man? Why yes, said Apollonius, and of a humane one too! for I consider it was a rare combination of virtues for one who was a mere sailor to refuse to sacrifice men's lives, or to betray the interests of merchants, so rising superior to all bribes of money. 3.25. ThereUPON the Indian smiled and said: You seem to think that mere abstention from injustice constitutes justice, and I am of opinion that all Greeks do the same. For as I once learned from the Egyptians that come hither, governors from Rome are in the habit of visiting your country, brandishing their axes naked over your heads, before they know they have bad men to rule or not; but you acknowledge them to be just if they merely do not sell justice. And I have heard that the slave merchants yonder do exactly the same; for when they come to you with convoys of Carian slaves and are anxious to recommend their characters to you, they make it a great merit of the slaves that they do not steal. In the same way do you recommend on such grounds the rulers whose sway you acknowledge, and after decorating them with such praises as you lavish upon slaves, you send them away, objects, as you imagine, of universal admiration. Nay more, your cleverest poets will not give you leave to be just and good, even if you want to. For here was Minos, a man who exceeded all men in cruelty, and who enslaved with his navies the inhabitants of continent and islands alike, and yet they honor him by placing in his hand a scepter of justice and give him a throne in Hades to be umpire of spirits; while at the same time they deny food and drink to Tantalus, merely because he was a good man and inclined to share with his friends the immortality bestowed upon them by the Gods. And some of them hang stones over him, and rain insults of a terrible kind upon this divine and good man; and I would much rather that they had represented him as swimming in a lake of nectar, for he regaled men with that drink humanely and ungrudgingly. And as he spoke he pointed out a statue which stood upon his left hand, on which was inscribed the name Tantalus. Now this statue was four cubits high, and represented a man of fifty years who was clad in the fashion of Argolis, though he differed in his cloak, that being like a Thessalian's, and he held a cup sufficient at least for one thirsty man and drank your health therefrom, and in the goblet was a liquor, an unmixed draught which frothed and foamed, though without bubbling over the edge of the cup. Now I will presently explain what they consider this cup to be, and for what reason they drink from it. In any case, however, we must suppose that Tantalus was assailed by the poets for not giving rein to his tongue, but because he shared the nectar with mankind; but we must not suppose that he was really the victim of the gods' dislike, for, had he been hateful to them, he would never have been judged by the Indians to be a good man, for they are most religious people and never transgress any divine command. 3.28. And when the wine had circulated, Iarchas said: I pledge you to drink the health, O king, of a Hellene, and he pointed to Apollonius, who was reclining just below him, and he made a gesture with his hand to indicate that he was a noble man and divine. But the king said: I have heard that he and the persons who are halting in the village belong to Phraotes.Quite, right, he answered, and true is what you heard: for it is Phraotes who entertains him here also. What, asked the king, is his mode of life and pursuit? Why, what else, replied Iarchas, except that of that king himself? It is no great compliment you have paid him, answered the king, by saying that he has embraced a mode of life which has denied even to Phraotes the chance of being a noble man. Thereupon Iarchas remarked: You must judge more reasonably, O king, both about philosophy and about Phraotes: for as long as you were a stripling, your youth excused in you such extravagances. But now that you have already reached man's estate, let us avoid foolish and facile utterances. But Apollonius, who found an interpreter in Iarchas said: And what have you gained, O king, by refusing to be a philosopher? What have I gained? Why, the whole of virtue and the identification of myself with the Sun. Then the other, by way of checking his pride and muzzling him, said: If you were a philosopher, you would not entertain such fancies. And you, replied the king, since you are a philosopher, what is your fancy about yourself, my fine fellow? That I may pass, replied Apollonius, for being a good man, if only I can be a philosopher. Thereupon the king stretched out his hand to heaven and exclaimed: By the Sun, you come here full of Phraotes. But the other hailed this remark as a godsend, and catching him up said: I have not taken this long journey in vain, if I am become full of Phraotes. But if you should meet him presently, you will certainly say that he is full of me; and he wished to write to you in my behalf, but since he declared that you were a good man, I begged him not to take the trouble of writing, seeing that in his case no one sent a letter commending me. 3.32. THESE words of Apollonius caused the king to burst into tears, and he said: Dearest friend, in what an heroic light do you represent these Hellenes to me. Why then, O king, were you so hard upon them? The visitors who come hither from Egypt, O guest, replied the king, malign the race of Hellenes, and while declaring that they themselves are holy men and wise, and the true law-givers who fixed all the sacrifices and rites of initiation which are in vogue among the Greeks, they deny to the latter any and every sort of good quality, declaring them to be ruffians, and a mixed herd addicted to every sort of anarchy, and lovers of legend and miracle mongers, and though indeed poor, yet making their poverty not a title of dignity, but a mere excuse for stealing. But now that I have heard this from you and understand how fond of honor and how worthy the Hellenes are, I am reconciled for the future to them and I engage both that they shall have my praise and that I will pray all I can for them, and will never set trust in another Egyptian. But Iarchas remarked: I too, O king, was aware that your mind had been poisoned by these Egyptians; but I would not take the part of the Hellenes until you met some such counselor as this. But since you have been put right by a wise man, let us now proceed to quaff the good cheer provided by Tantalus, and let us sleep over the serious issues which we have to discuss tonight. But at another time I will fill you full with Hellenic arguments, and no other race is so rich in them; and you will delight in them whenever you come hither. And forthwith he set an example to this fellow guests, by stooping the first of them all to the goblet which indeed furnished an ample draught for all; for the stream refilled itself plenteously, as if with spring waters welling up from the ground; and Apollonius also drank, for this cup is instituted by the Indians as a cup of friendship; and they feign that Tantalus is the wine-bearer who supplies it, because he is considered to have been the most friendly of men. 3.35. And the subject is so vast and so far transcends our mental powers, that I do not know any example adequate to illustrate it; but we will take that of a ship, such as the Egyptians construct for our seas and launch for the exchange of Egyptian goods against Indian wares. For there is an ancient law in regard to the Red Sea, which the king Erythras laid down, when he held sway over that sea, to the effect that the Egyptians should not enter it with a vessel of war, and indeed should employ only a single merchant ship. This regulation obliged the Egyptians to contrive a ship equivalent to several at once of those which other races have; and they ribbed the sides of this ship with bolts such as hold a ship together, and they raised its bulwarks and its mast to a great height, and they constructed several compartments, such as are built upon the timber balks which run athwart a ship, and they set several pilots in this boat and subordinated them to the oldest and wisest of their number, to conduct the voyage; and there were several officers on the prow and excellent and handy sailors to man the sails; and in the crew of this ship there was a detachment of armed men, for it is necessary to equip the ship and protect it against the savages of the Gulf that live on the right hand as you enter it, in case they should ever attack and plunder it on the high seas. Let us apply this imagery to the universe, and regard it in the light of a naval construction; for then you must apportion the first and supreme position to God the begetter of this animal, and subordinate posts to the gods who govern its parts; and we may well assent to the statements of the poets, when they say that there are many gods in heaven and many in the sea, and many in the fountains and streams, and many round about the earth, and that there are some even under the earth. But we shall do well to separate from the universe the region under the earth, if there is one, because the poets represent it as an abode of terror and corruption. 3.36. AS the Indian concluded this discourse, Damis says that he was transported with admiration and applauded loudly; for he could never have thought that a native of India could show such mastery of the Greek tongue, nor even that, supposing he understood that language, he could have used it with so much ease and elegance. And he praises the look and smile of Iarchas, and the inspired air with which he expressed his ideas, admitting that Apollonius, although he had a delivery as graceful as it was free from bombast, nevertheless gained a great deal by contact with this Indian, and he says that whenever he sat down to discuss a theme, as he very often did, he resembled Iarchas. 3.38. THIS discussion was interrupted by the appearance among the sages of the messenger bringing in certain Indians who were in want of succor. And he brought forward a poor woman who interceded in behalf of her child, who was, she said, a boy of sixteen years of age, but had been for two years possessed by a devil. Now the character of the devil was that of a mocker and a liar. Here one of the sages asked, why she said this, and she replied: This child of mine is extremely good-looking, and therefore the devil is amorous of him and will not allow him to retain his reason, nor will he permit him to go to school, or to learn archery, nor even to remain at home, but drives him out into desert places. And the boy does not even retain his own voice, but speaks in a deep hollow tone, as men do; and he looks at you with other eyes rather than with his own. As for myself I weep over all this and I tear my cheeks, and I rebuke my son so far as I well may; but he does not know me. And I made my mind to repair hither, indeed I planned to do so a year ago; only the demon discovered himself using my child as a mask, and what he told me was this, that he was the ghost of man, who fell long ago in battle, but that at death he was passionately attached to his wife. Now he had been dead for only three days when his wife insulted their union by marrying another man, and the consequence was that he had come to detest the love of women, and had transferred himself wholly into this boy. But he promised, if I would only not denounce him to yourselves, to endow the child with many noble blessings. As for myself, I was influenced by these promises; but he has put me off and off for such a long time now, that he has got sole control of my household, yet has no honest or true intentions. Here the sage asked afresh, if the boy was at hand; and she said not, for, although she had done all she could to get him to come with her, the demon had threatened her with steep places and precipices and declared that he would kill her son, in case, she added, I haled him hither for trial. Take courage, said the sage, for he will not slay him when he has read this. And so saying he drew a letter out of his bosom and gave it to the woman; and the letter, it appears, was addressed to the ghost and contained threats of an alarming kind. 3.41. BOTH Apollonius and Damis then took part in the interviews devoted to abstract discussions; not so with the conversations devoted to occult themes, in which they pondered the nature of astronomy or divination, and considered the problem of foreknowledge, and handled the problems of sacrifice and of the invocations in which the gods take pleasure. In these Damis says that Apollonius alone partook of the philosophic discussion together with Iarchas, and that Apollonius embodied the results in four books concerning the divination by the stars, a work which Moeragenes has mentioned. And Damis says that he composed a work on the way to offer sacrifice to the several gods in a manner pleasing to them. Not only then do I regard the work on the science of the stars and the whole subject of such divination as transcending human nature, but I do not even know if anyone has these gifts; but I found the treatise on sacrifices in several cities, and in the houses of several learned men; moreover, if anyone should translate [ 1] it, he would find it to be a grave and dignified composition, and one that rings of the author's personality. And Damis says thatIarchas gave seven rings to Apollonius named after the seven stars, and that Apollonius wore each of these in turn on the day of the week which bore its name. 3.43. And with these words he turned to Damis and said playfully: And you, O Assyrian, have you no foreknowledge of anything, especially as you associate with such a man as this? Yes, by Zeus, answered Damis, at any rate of the things that are necessary for myself; for when I first met with Apollonius here, he at once struck me as full of wisdom and cleverness and sobriety and of true endurance; but when I saw that he also had a good memory, and that he was very learned and entirely devoted to the love of learning, he became to me something superhuman; and I came to the conclusion that if I stuck to him I should be held a wise man instead of an ignoramus and a dullard, and an educated man instead of a savage; and I saw that, if I followed him and shared his pursuits, I should visit the Indians and visit you, and that I should be turned into a Hellene by him and be able to mix with the Hellenes. Now of course you set your oracles, as they concern important issues, on a level with those of Delphi and Dodona and of any other shrine you like; as for my own premonitions, since Damis is the person who has them, and since his foreknowledge concerns himself alone, we will suppose that they resemble the guesses of an old beggar wife foretelling what will happen to sheep and such like. 3.48. As to the gold which the griffins dig up, there are rocks which are spotted with drops of gold as with sparks, which this creature can quarry because of the strength of its beak. For these animals do exist in India, he said, and are held in veneration as being sacred to the Sun; and the Indian artists, when they represent the Sun, yoke four of them abreast to draw the imaged car; and in size and strength they resemble lions but having this advantage over them that they have wings, they will attack them, and they get the better of elephants and of dragons. But they have no great power of flying, not more than have birds of short flight; for they are not winged as is proper with birds, but the palms of their feet are webbed with red membranes, such that they are able to revolve them, and make a flight and fight in the air; and the tiger alone is beyond their powers of attack, because in swiftness it rivals the winds. 3.49. And the phoenix, he said, is the bird which visits Egypt every five hundred years, but the rest of that time it flies about in India; and it is unique in that it gives out rays of sunlight and shines with gold, in size and appearance like an eagle; and it sits upon the nest; which is made by it at the springs of the Nile out of spices. The story of the Egyptians about it, that it comes to Egypt, is testified to by the Indians also, but the latter add this touch to the story, that the phoenix which is being consumed in its nest sings funeral strains for itself. And this is also done by the swans according to the account of those who have the wit to hear them. 6.1. Ethiopia covers the western wing of the entire earth under the sun, just as India does the eastern wing; and at Meroe it adjoins Egypt, and, after skirting a part of Libya Incognita, it ends at the sea which the poets call by the name of the Ocean, that being the name they applied to the mass of water which surrounds the earth. This country supplies Egypt with the river Nile, which takes its rise at the cataracts (Catadupi), and brings down from Ethiopia all Egypt, the soil of which in flood-time it inundates. Now in size this country is not worthy of comparison with India, not for that matter is any of the continents that are famous among men; and even if you put together all Egypt with Ethiopia, and we may regard the river as so combining the two, we should not compare the two together with India, so vast is the standard of comparison. However their respective rivers, theIndus and the Nile, resemble one another, if we consider their creatures. For they both spread their moisture over the land in the summer season, when the earth most wants it, and unlike all other rivers they produced the crocodile and the river-horse; and the religious rites celebrated over them correspond with one another, for many of the religious invocations of the Indians are repeated in the case of the Nile. We have a proof of the similarity of the two countries in the spices which are found in them, also in the fact that the lion and the elephant are captured and confined in both the one and the other. They are also the haunts of animals not found elsewhere, and of black men — a feature not found in other continents — and we meet in them with races of pigmies and of people who bark in various ways instead of talking, and other wonders of the kind. And the griffins of the Indians and the ants of the Ethiopians, though they are dissimilar in form, yet, from what we hear, play similar parts; for in each country they are the guardians of gold, and devoted to the gold reefs of the two countries. But we will not pursue these subjects; for we must resume the course of our history and follow in the sage's footsteps. 6.2. For when he arrived at the confines of Ethiopia and Egypt, and the name of the place is Sycaminus, he came across a quantity of uncoined gold and linen and an elephant and various roots and myrrh and spices, which are all lying without anyone to watch them at the crossways. I will explain the meaning of this, for the same custom still survives among ourselves. It was a market place to which the Ethiopians bring all the products of their country; and the Egyptians in their turn take them all away and bring to the same spot their own wares of equal value, so bartering what they have got for what they have not. Now the inhabitants of the marches are not yet fully black but are half-breeds in matter of color, for they are partly not so black as the Ethiopians, yet partly more so than the Egyptians. Apollonius, accordingly, when he realized the character of the market, remarked: Contrast our good Hellenes: they pretend they cannot live unless one penny begets another and unless they can force up the price of their goods by chaffering or holding them back; and one pretends that he has got a daughter whom it is time to marry, and another that he has got a son who has just reached manhood, and a third that he has to pay his subscription to his club, and a fourth that he is having a house built for him, and a fifth that he would be ashamed of being thought a worse man of business than his father was before him. What a splendid thing then it would be, if wealth were held in less honor and equality flourished a little more and “if the black iron were left to rust in the ground,” for all men would agree with one another, and the whole earth would be like one brotherhood. 6.3. With such conversations, the occasions providing as usual the topics he talked about, he turned his steps towards Memnon; an Egyptian showed them the way, of whom Damis gives the following account: Timasion was the name of this stripling, who was just emerging from boyhood, and was now in the prime of life and strength. He had a stepmother who had fallen in love with him; and when he rejected her overtures, she set upon him and by way of spiting him had poisoned his father's mind against him, condescending to a lower intrigue than ever Phaedra had done, for she accused him of being effeminate, and of finding his pleasure in pederasts rather than in women. He had accordingly abandoned Naucratis, for it was there that all this happened, and was living in the neighborhood of Memphis; and he had acquired and manned a boat of his own and was plying as a waterman on the Nile. He then, was going down the river when he saw Apollonius sailing up it; and he concluded that the crew consisted of wise men, because he judged them by the cloaks they wore and the books they were hard at work studying. So he asked them whether they would allow one who was so passionately fond of wisdom as himself to share their voyage; and Apollonius said: This youth is wise, my friends, so let him be granted his request. And he further related the story about his stepmother to those of his companions who were nearest to him in a low tone while the stripling was still sailing towards them. But when the ships were alongside of one another, Timasion stepped out of his boat, and after addressing a word or two to his pilot, about the cargo in his own boat, he greeted the company. Apollonius then ordered him to sit down under his eyes, and said: You stripling of Egypt, for you seem to be one of the natives, tell me what you have done of evil or what of good; for in the one case you shall be forgiven by me, in consideration of your youth; but in the other you shall reap my commendation and become a fellow-student of philosophy with me and with these gentlemen. Then noticing that Timasion blushed and checked his impulse to speak, and hesitated whether to say or not what he had been going to say, he pressed his question and repeated it, just as if he had no foreknowledge of the youth at his command. Then Timasion plucked up courage and said: O Heavens, how shall I describe myself? for I am not a bad boy, and yet I do not know whether I ought to be considered a good one, for there is no particular merit in having abstained from wrong. But Apollonius cried: Bravo, my boy, you answer me just as if you were a sage from India; for this was just the sentiment of the divine Iarchas. But tell me how you came to form these opinions, and how long ago; for it strikes me that you have been on your guard against some sin. The youth then began to tell them of his stepmother's infatuation for himself, and of how he had rejected her advances; and when he did so, there was a shout in recognition of the divine inspiration under which Apollonius had foretold these details. Timasion, however, caught them up and said: Most excellent people, what is the matter with you? for my story is one which calls as little for your admiration, I think, as for your ridicule. But Damis said: It was not that we were admiring, but something else which you don't know about yet. As for you, my boy, we praise you because you think that you did nothing very remarkable. And Apollonius said: Do you sacrifice to Aphrodite, my boy? And Timasion answered: Yes, by Zeus, every day; for I consider that this goddess has great influence in human and divine affairs. Thereat Apollonius was delighted beyond measure, and cried: Let us, gentlemen, vote a crown to him for his continence rather than to Hippolytus the son of Theseus, for the latter insulted Aphrodite; and that perhaps is why he never fell a victim to the tender passion, and why love never ran riot in his soul; but he was allotted an austere and unbending nature. But our friend here admits that he is devoted to the goddess, and yet did not respond to his stepmother's guilty overtures, but went away in terror of the goddess herself, in case he were not on his guard against another's evil passions; and the mere aversion to any one of the gods, such as Hippolytus entertained in regard to Aphrodite, I do not class as a form of sobriety; for it is a much greater proof of wisdom and sobriety to speak well of the gods, especially at Athens, where altars are set up in honor even of unknown gods. So great was the interest which he took in Timasion. Nevertheless he called him Hippolytus for the eyes with which he looked at his stepmother. It seemed also that he was a young man who was particular about his person and enhanced its charms by attention to athletic exercises. 6.4. Under his guidance, they say, they went on to the sacred enclosure of Memnon, of whom Damis gives the following account. He says that he was the son of the Dawn, and that he did not meet his death in Troy, where indeed he never went; but that he died in Ethiopia after ruling the land for five generations. But his countrymen being the longest lived of men, still mourn him as a mere youth and deplore his untimely death. But the place in which his statue is set up resembles, they tell us, an ancient market-place, such as remain in cities that were long ago inhabited, and where we come on broken stumps and fragments of columns, and find traces of walls as well as seats and jambs of doors, and images of Hermes, some destroyed by the hand of man, others by that of time. Now this statue, says Damis, was turned towards the sunrise, and was that of a youth still unbearded; and it was made of a black stone, and the two feet were joined together after the style in which statues were made in the time of Daedalus; and the arms of the figure were perpendicular to the seat pressing upon it, for though the figure was still sitting it was represented in the very act of rising up. We hear much of this attitude of the statue, and of the expression of its eyes, and of how the lips seem about to speak; but they say that they had no opportunity of admiring these effects until they saw them realized; for when the sun's rays fell upon the statue, and this happened exactly at dawn, they could not restrain their admiration; for the lips spoke immediately the sun's ray touched them, and the eyes seemed to stand out and gleam against the light as do those of men who love to bask in the sun. Then they say they understood that the figure was of one in the act of rising and making obeisance to the sun, in the way those do who worship the powers above standing erect. They accordingly offered a sacrifice to the Sun of Ethiopia and to Memnon of the Dawn, for this the priests recommended them to do, explaining that one name was derived from the words signifying to burn and be warm [ 1] and the other from his mother. Having done this they set out upon camels for the home of the naked philosophers. 6.5. On the way they met a man wearing the garb of the inhabitants of Memphis, but who was wandering about rather than wending his steps to a fixed point; so Damis asked him who he was and why he was roving about like that. But Timasion said: You had better ask me, and not him; for he will never tell you what is the matter with him, because he is ashamed of the plight in which he finds himself; but as for me, I know the poor man and pity him, and I will tell you all about him. For he has slain unwittingly a certain inhabitant of Memphis, and the laws of Memphis prescribe that a person exiled for an involuntary offense of this kind, — and the penalty is exile, — should remain with the naked philosophers until he has washed away the guilt of bloodshed, and then he may return home as soon as he is pure, though he must first go to the tomb of the slain man and sacrifice there some trifling victim. Now until he has been received by the naked philosophers, so long he must roam about these marches, until they take pity upon him as if he were a suppliant. Apollonius therefore put the question to Timasion: What do the naked philosophers think of this particular exile? And he answered: I do not know anything more than that this is the seventh month that he has remained here as a suppliant, and that he has not yet obtained redemption. Said Apollonius: You don't call men wise, who refuse to purify him, and are not aware that Philiscus whom he slew was a descendant of Thamus the Egyptian, who long ago laid waste the country of these naked philosophers. Thereat Timasion said in surprise: What do you mean? I mean, said the other, my good youth, what was actually the fact; for this Thamus once on a time was intriguing against the inhabitants of Memphis, and these philosophers detected his plot and prevented him; and he having failed in his enterprise retaliated by laying waste all the land upon which they live, for by his brigandage he tyrannized the country round Memphis. I perceive that Philiscus whom this man slew was the thirteenth in descent from this Thamus, and was obviously an object of execration to those whose country the latter so thoroughly ravaged at the time in question. Where then is their wisdom? Here is a man that they ought to crown, even if he had slain the other intentionally; and yet they refuse to purge him of a murder which he committed involuntarily on their behalf.. The youth then was astounded and said: Stranger, who are you? And Apollonius replied: He whom you shall find among these naked philosophers. But as it is not allowed me by my religion to address one who is stained with blood, I would ask you, my good boy, to encourage him, and tell him that he will at once be purged of guilt, if he will come to the place where I am lodging. And when the man in question came, Apollonius went through the rites over him which Empedocles and Pythagoras prescribe for the purification of such offenses, and told him to return home, for that he was now pure of guilt. 6.6. Thence they rode out at sunrise, and arrived before midday at the academy of the naked sages, who dwell, they relate, upon a moderate-sized hill a little way from the bank of the Nile; and in point of wisdom they fall short of the Indians rather more than they excel the Egyptians. And they wear next to no clothes in the same way as people do at Athens in the heat of summer. And in their district there are few trees, and a certain grove of no great size to which they resort when they meet for the transaction of common affairs; but they do not build their shrines in one and the same place, as Indian shrines are built, but one is in one part of the hill and another in another, all worthy of observation, according to the accounts of the Egyptians. The Nile is the chief object of their worship, for they regard this river as land and water at once. They have no need, however, of hut or dwelling, because they live in the open air directly under the heaven itself, but they have built an hospice to accommodate strangers, and it is a portico of no great size, about equal in length to those of Elis, beneath which the athletes await the sound of the midday trumpet. 6.7. At this place Damis records an action of Euphrates, which if we do not regard it as juvenile, was anyhow unworthy of the dignity of a philosopher. Euphrates had heard Apollonius often say that he wished to compare the wisdom of India with that of Egypt, so he sent up to the naked sages one Thrasybulus, a native of Naucratis, to take away our sage's character. Thrasybulus at the same time that he pretended to have come there in order to enjoy their society, told them that the sage of Tyana would presently arrive, and that they would have no little trouble with him, because he esteemed himself more highly than the sages of India did themselves, though he extolled the latter whenever he opened his mouth; and he added that Apollonius had contrived a thousand pitfalls for them, and that he would not allow any sort of influence either to the sun, or to the sky, or to the earth, but pretended to move and juggle and rearrange these forces for whatever end he chose. 6.8. Having concocted these stories the man of Naucratis went away; and they, imagining they were true, did not indeed decline to meet Apollonius when he arrived, but pretended that they were occupied with important business and were so intent upon it, that they could only arrange an interview with him if they had time, and if they were informed first of what he wanted and of what attracted him thither.And a messenger from the bade them stay and lodge in the portico, but Apollonius remarked: We do not want to hear about a house for ourselves, for the climate here is such that anyone can live naked, — an unkind reference this to them, as it implied that they went without clothes not to show their endurance, but because it was too to wear any. And he added: I am not surprised indeed at their nor yet knowing what I want, and what I am come here for, though the Indians never asked me these questions. 6.9. Accordingly Apollonius lay down under one of the trees, and let his companions who were there with him ask whatever question they pleased. Damis took Timasion apart and asked him the question in private: About these naked sages, my good fellow, as you have lived with them, and in all probability know, tell me what their wisdom comes to? It is, answered the other, manifold an profound. And yet, said Damis, their demeanor towards us does not evince any wisdom, my fine fellow; for when they refuse to converse about wisdom with so great a man as our master, and assume all sorts of airs against him, what can I say of them except that they are too vain and proud. Pride and vanity! said the other, I have already come among them twice, and I never saw any such thing about them; for they were always very modest and courteous towards those who came to visit them. At any rate a little time ago, perhaps a matter of fifty days, one Thrasybulus was staying here who achieved nothing remarkable in philosophy, and they received him with open arms merely because he said he was a disciple of Euphrates. Then Damis cried: What's that you say, my boy? Then you saw Thrasybulus of Naucratis in this academy of theirs? Yes, and what's more, answered the other, I conveyed him hence, when he went down the river, in my own boat. Now I have it, by Athena, cried Damis, in a loud tone of indignation. I warrant he has played us some dirty trick. Timasion then replied: Your master, when I asked him yesterday who he was, would not answer me at once, but kept his name a secret; but do you, unless this is a mystery, tell me who he is, for then I could probably help you to find what you seek. And when he heard from Damis, that it was the sage of Tyana, You have put the matter, he said, in a nutshell. For Thrasybulus, as he descended the Nile with me, in answer to my question what he had gone up there for, explained to me that his love for wisdom was not genuine, and said that he had filled these naked sages with suspicion of Apollonius, to the end that whenever he came here they might flout him; and what his quarrel is with him I know not, but anyhow, it is, I think, worthy of a woman or of a vulgar person to backbite him as he has done. But I will address myself to these people and ascertain their real disposition; for they are friendly to me. And about eventide Timasion returned, though without telling Apollonius any more than that he had interchanged words with them; however he told Damis in private that they meant to come the next morning primed with all that they had heard from Thrasybulus. 6.10. They spent that evening conversing about trifles which are not worth recording, and then they lay down to sleep on the spot where they had supped; but at daybreak Apollonius, after adoring the sun according to his custom, had set himself to meditate upon some problem, when Nilus, who was the youngest of the naked philosophers, running up to him, exclaimed: We are coming to you. Quite right, said Apollonius, for to get to you I have made this long journey from the sea all the way here. And with these words he followed Nilus. So after exchanging greetings with the sages, and they met him close to the portico. Where, said Apollonius, shall we hold our interview? Here, said Thespesion, pointing to the grove. Now Thespesion was the eldest of the sect, and led them in procession; and they followed him with an orderly and leisurely step, just as the jury of the athletic sports at Olympia follow the eldest of their number. And when they had sat down, which they did anyhow, and without the observing their previous order, they all fixed their eyes on Thespesion as the one who should regale them with a discourse, which he proceeded as follows: They say, Apollonius, that you have visited the Pythian and Olympian festivals; for this was reported of you here by Stratocles of Pharos, who says he met you there. Now those who come to the Pythian festival are, they say, escorted with the sound of pipe and song and lyre, and are honored with shows of comedies and tragedies; and then last of all they are presented with an exhibition of games and races run by naked athletes. At the Olympic festival, however, these superfluities are omitted as inappropriate and unworthy of the place; and those who go to the festival are only provided with the show of naked athletes originally instituted by Heracles. You may see the same contrast between the wisdom of the Indians and our own. For they, like those who invite others to the Pythian festival, appeal to the crowd with all sorts of charms and wizardry; but we, like the athletes of Olympia, go naked. Here earth strews for us no couches, nor does it yield us milk or wine as if we were bacchants, nor does the air uplift us and sustain us aloft. But the earth beneath us is our only couch, and we live by partaking of its natural fruits, which we would have it yield to us gladly and without being tortured against its will. But you shall see that we are not unable to work tricks if we like. Heigh! you tree yonder, he cried, pointing to an elm tree, the third in the row from that under which they were talking, just salute the wise Apollonius, will you? And forthwith the tree saluted him, as it was bidden to do, in accents which were articulate and like those of a woman. Now he wrought this sign to discredit the Indians, and in the belief that by doing so he would wean Apollonius of his excessive estimate of their powers; for he was always recounting to everybody what the Indians said and did.Then the Egyptian added these precepts: he said that it is sufficient for the sage to abstain from eating all flesh of living animals, and from the roving desires which mount up in the soul through the eyes, and from envy which ends by teaching injustice to hand and will, and that truth stands not in need of miracle-mongering and sinister arts. For look, he said, at the Apollo of Delphi, who keeps the center of Hellas for the utterance of his oracles. There then, as you probably know yourself, a person who desires a response, puts his question briefly, and Apollo tells what he knows without any miraculous display. And yet it would be just as easy for him to convulse the whole mountain of Parnassus, and to alter the springs of the Castalian fountain so that it should run with wine, and to check the river Cephisus and stay its stream; but he reveals the bare truth without any of this show of ostentation. Nor must we suppose that it is by his will, that so much gold and showy offerings enter his treasury, nor that he would care for his temple even if it were made twice as large as it already is. For once on a time this god Apollo dwelt in quite a humble habitation; and a little hut was constructed for him to which the bees are said to have contributed their honeycomb and wax, and the birds their feathers. For simplicity is the teacher of wisdom and the teacher of truth; and you must embrace it, if you would have men think you really wise, and forget all your legendary tales that you have acquired among the Indians. For what need is there to beat the drum over such simple matters as: “Do this, or do not do it,” or “I know it, or I do not know it,” or “It is this and not that'? What do you want with thunder, nay, I would say, What do you want to be thunder-struck for?You have seen in picture-books the representation of Heracles by Prodicus; in it Heracles is represented as a youth, who has not yet chosen the life he will lead; and vice and virtue stand in each side of him plucking his garments and trying to draw him to themselves. Vice is adorned with gold and necklaces and with purple raiment, and her cheeks are painted and her hair delicately plaited and her eyes underlined with henna; and she also wears golden slippers, for she is pictured strutting about in these; but virtue in the picture resembles a woman worn out with toil, with a pinched look; and she has chosen for her adornment rough squalor, and she goes without shoes and in the plainest of raiment, and she would have appeared naked if she had not too much regard for her feminine decency. Now figure yourself, Apollonius, as standing between Indian wisdom on one side, and our humble wisdom on the other; imagine that you hear the one telling you how she will strew flowers under you when you lie down to sleep, yes, and by Heaven, how she will regale you upon milk and nourish you on honey-comb, and how she will supply you with nectar and wings, whenever you want them; and how she will wheel in tripods, whenever you drink, and golden thrones; and you shall have no hard work to do, but everything will be flung unsought into your lap. But the other discipline insists that you must lie on the bare ground in squalor, and be seen to toil naked like ourselves; and that you must not find dear or sweet anything which you have not won by hard work; and that you must not be boastful, not hunt after vanities and pursue pride; and that you must be on your guard against all dreams and visions which lift you off the earth. If then you really make the choice of Heracles, and steel your will resolutely, neither to dishonor truth, nor to decline the simplicity of nature, then you may say that you have overcome many lions and have cut off the heads of many hydras and of monsters like Geryon and Nessus, and have accomplished all his other labors, but if you embrace the life of a strolling juggler, you will flatter men's eyes and ears, but they will think you no wiser than anybody else, and you will become the vanquished of any naked philosopher of Egypt. 6.11. When he ended, all turned their eyes upon Apollonius; his own followers knowing well that he would reply, while Thespesion's friends wondered what he could say in answer. But he, after praising the fluency and vigor of the Egyptian, merely said: Have you anything more to say? No, by Zeus, said the other, for I have said all I have to say. Then he asked afresh: And has not any one of the rest of the Egyptians anything to say? I am their spokesman, answered his antagonist, and you have heard them all. Apollonius accordingly paused for a minute and then, fixing his eyes, as it were, on the discourse he had heard, he spoke as follows: You have very well described and in a sound philosophic spirit the choice which Prodicus declares Heracles to have made as a young man; but, ye wise men of the Egyptians, it does not apply in the least to myself. For I am not come here to ask your advice about how to live, insomuch as I long ago made choice of the life which seemed best to myself; and as I am older than any of you, except Thespesion, I myself am better qualified, now I have got here, to advise you how to choose wisdom, if I did not find that you had already made the choice. Being, however, as old as I am, and so far advanced in wisdom as I am, I shall not hesitate as it were to make you the auditors of my life and motives, and teach you that I rightly chose this life of mine, than which no better one has ever suggested itself to me. For I discerned a certain sublimity in the discipline of Pythagoras, and how a certain secret wisdom enabled him to know, not only who he was himself, but also who he had been; and I saw that he approached the altars in purity, and suffered not his belly to be polluted by partaking of the flesh of animals and that he kept his body pure of all garments woven of dead animal refuse; and that he was the first of mankind to restrain his tongue, inventing a discipline of silence described in the proverbial phrase, An ox sits upon it. I also saw that his philosophical system was in other respects oracular and true. So I ran to embrace his teachings, not choosing one form of wisdom rather than another of two presented me, as you, my excellent Thespesion, advise me to do. For philosophy marshaled before me her various points of view, investing them with the adornment proper to each and she commanded me to look upon them and make a sound choice. Now they were all possessed of an august and divine beauty; and some of them were of such dazzling brightness that you might well have closed your eyes. However I fixed my eyes firmly upon all of them, for they themselves encouraged me to do so by moving towards me, and telling me beforehand how much they would give me. Well, one of them professed that she would shower upon me a swarm of pleasures without any toil on my part and another that she would give me rest after toil; and a third that she would mingle mirth and merriment in my toil; and everywhere I had glimpses of pleasures and of unrestrained indulgence in the pleasures of the table; and it seemed that I had only to stretch out my hand to be rich, and that I needed not to set any bridle upon my eyes, but love and loose desire and such-like feelings were freely allowed me. One of them, however, boasted that she would restrain me from such things, but she was bold and abusive and in an unabashed manner elbowed all others aside; and I beheld the ineffable form of wisdom 6.12. Damis says that he breathed afresh when he heard this address; for that the Egyptians were so impressed by Apollonius' words, that Thespesion, in spite of the blackness of his complexion, visibly blushed, while the rest of them seemed in some way stunned by the vigorous and fluent discourse which they listened to; but the youngest of them, whose name was Nilus, leapt up from the ground, he says, in admiration, and passing over to Apollonius shook hands with him, and besought him to tell him about the interviews which he had had with the Indians. And Apollonius, he says, replied: I should not grudge you anything, for you are ready to listen, as I see, and are ready to welcome wisdom of every kind; but I should not care to pour out the teachings I gathered there upon Thespesion or on anyone else who regards the lore of the Indians as so much nonsense. Whereupon Thespesion said: But if you were a merchant or a seafarer, and you brought to us some cargo or other from over there, would you claim, merely because it came from India, to dispose of it untested and unexamined, refusing us either the liberty of looking at it or tasting it? But Apollonius repled as follows: I should furnish it to those who asked for it; but if the moment my ship had reached the harbor, someone came down the beach and began to run down my cargo and abuse myself, and say that I came from a country which produces nothing worth having, and if he reproached me for sailing with a cargo of shoddy goods, and tried to persuade the rest to think like himself, do you suppose that one would, after entering such a harbor, cast anchor or make his cables fast, and not rather hoist his sails and put to sea afresh, entrusting his goods more gladly to the winds than to such undiscerning and inhospitable people? Well, I anyhow, said Nilus, lay hold on your cables, and entreat you, my skipper, to let me share your goods that you bring hither; and I would gladly embark with you in your ship as a super-cargo and a clerk to check your merchandise. 6.13. Thespesion, however, was anxious to put a stop to such propositions, so he said: I am glad, Apollonius, that you are annoyed at what we said to you; for you can the more readily condone our annoyance at the misrepresentation you made of our local wisdom, long before you had gained any experience of its quality. Apollonius was for a moment astonished at these words, for he had heard nothing as yet of the intrigues of Thrasybulus and Euphrates; but as was his wont, he guessed the truth and said: The Indians, O Thespesion, would never have behaved as you have, nor have given ear to these insinuation dropped by Euphrates, for they have a gift of prescience. Now I never have had any quarrel of my own with Euphrates; I only tried to wean him of his passion for money and cure his propensity to value everything by what he could make out of it; but I found that my advice was not congenial to him, nor in his case practicable; nay he merely takes it as a tacit reproach, and never loses any opportunity of intriguing against me. But since you have found his attacks upon my character so plausible, I may as well tell you that it is you, rather than myself, that he has calumniated. For though, as is clear to me, the victims of calumny incur considerable dangers, since they are, I suppose, sure to be disliked without having done any wrong, yet neither are those who incline to listen to the calumnies free from danger; for in the first place they will be convicted of paying respect to lies and giving them as much attention as they would to the truth, and secondly they are convicted of levity and credulity, faults which it is disgraceful even for a stripling to fall into. And they will be thought envious, because they allow envy to teach them to listen to unjust tittle-tattle; and they expose themselves all the more to calumny, because they think it true of others. For man is by nature inclined to commit a fault which he does not discredit when he hears it related to others. Heaven forbid that a man of these inclinations should become a tyrant, or even president of a popular state; for in his hands even a democracy would become a tyranny; nor let him be made a judge, for surely he will not ever discern the truth. Nor let him be captain of a ship, for the crew would mutiny, nor general of an army, for that would bring luck to the adversary; nor let one of his disposition attempt philosophy, for he would not consider the truth in forming his opinions. But Euphrates has deprived you of even the quality of wisdom; for how can those on whom he has imposed with his falsehoods claim wisdom for themselves? have they not deserted from it to take sides with one who has persuaded them of improbabilities? Here Thespesion tried to calm him, and remarked: Enough of Euphrates and of his small-minded affairs; for we are quite ready even to reconcile you with him, since we consider it the proper work of a sage to be umpire in the disputes of other sages. But, said Apollonius, who shall reconcile me with you? For the victim of lies must surely be driven into hostility by the falsehood. ... Be it so, said Apollonius, and let us hold a conversation, for that will be the best way of reconciling us. 6.14. And Nilus, as he was passionately anxious to listen to Apollonius, said: And what's more, it behoves you to begin the conversation, and to tell us all about the journey which you made to the people of India, and about the conversations which you held there, I have no doubt, on the most brilliant topics. And I too, said Thespesion, long to hear about the wisdom of Phraotes, for you are said to have brought from India some examples of his arguments. Apollonius accordingly began by telling them about the events which occurred in Babylon, and told them everything, and they gladly listened to him, spellbound by his words. But when it was midday, they broke of the conversations, for at this time of day the naked sages, like others, attend to the ceremonies of religion. 6.15. Apollonius and his comrades were about to dine, when Nilus presented himself with vegetables and bread and dried fruits, some of which he carried himself, while his friends carried the rest; and very politely he said: The sages send these gifts of hospitality, not only to yourselves but to me; for I mean to share in your repast, not uninvited, as they say, but inviting myself. It is a delightful gift of hospitality, said Apollonius, which you bring to us, O youth, in the shape of yourself and your disposition, for you are evidently a philosopher without guile, and an enthusiastic lover of the doctrines of the Indians and of Pythagoras. So lie down here and eat with us. I will do so, said the other, but your dishes will not be ample enough to satisfy me. It seems to me, said the other, that you are a gourmand and an appalling eater. None like me, said the other, for although you have set before me so ample and so brilliant a repast, I am not sated; and after a little time I am come back again to eat afresh. What then can you call me but an insatiable cormorant? Eat your fill, said Apollonius, and as for topics of conversation, some you must yourself supply, and I will give you others. 6.16. So when they had dined, I, said Nilus, until now have been camping together with the naked sages, and joined my forces with them as with certain light armed troops or slingers. But now I intend to put on my heavy armor, and it is your shield that shall adorn me. But, said Apollonius, I think, my good Egyptian, that you will incur the censure of Thespesion and his society for two reasons; firstly, that after no further examination and testing of ourselves you have left them, and secondly that you give the preference to our manners and discipline with more precipitancy than is admissible where a man is making choice of how he shall live. I agree with you, said the young man, but if I am to blame for making this choice, I might also be to blame if I did not make it; and anyhow they will be most open to rebuke, if they make the same choice as myself. For it will be more justly reprehensible in them, as they are both older and wiser than myself, not to have made the choice long ago which I make now; for with all their advantages they will have failed to choose what in practice would so much redound to their advantage. A very generous sentiment indeed, my good youth, is this which you have expressed, said Apollonius; but beware lest the mere fact of their being so wise and aged should give them an appearance, at any rate, of being right in choosing as they have done, and of having good reason for rejecting my doctrine; and lest you should seem to take up a very bold position in setting them to rights rather than in following them. But the Egyptian turned short round upon Apollonius and countering his opinion said: So far as it was right for a young man to agree with his elders, I have been careful to do so; for so long as I thought that these gentlemen were possessed of a wisdom which belonged to no other set of men, I attached myself to them; and the motive which actuated me to do so was the following: My father once made a voyage on his own initiative to the Red Sea, for he was, I may tell you, captain of the ship which the Egyptians send to the Indies. And after he had had intercourse with the Indians of the seaboard, he brought home stories of the wise men of that region, closely similar to those which you have told us. And his account which I heard was somewhat as follows, namely that the Indians are the wisest of mankind, but that the Ethiopians are colonists sent from India, who follow their forefathers in matters of wisdom, and fix their eyes on the institutions of their home. Well, I, having reached my teens, surrendered my patrimony to those who wanted it more than myself, and frequented the society of these naked sages, naked myself as they, in the hope of picking up the teaching of the Indians, or at any rate teaching allied to theirs. And they certainly appeared to me to be wise, though not after the manner of India; but when I asked them point blank why they did not teach the philosophy of India, they plunged into abuse of the natives of that country very much as you have heard them do in their speeches this very day. Now I was still young, as you see, so they made me a member of their society, because I imagine they were afraid I might hastily quit them and undertake a voyage to the Red Sea, as my father did before me. And I should certainly have done so, yes, by Heaven, I would have pushed on until I reached the hill of the sages, unless someone of the gods had sent you hither to help me and enabled me without either making any voyage over the Red Sea or adventuring to the inhabitants of the Gulf, to taste the wisdom of India. It is not today therefore for the first time that I shall make my choice, but I made it long ago, though I did not obtain what I hoped to obtain. For what is there to wonder at if a man who has missed what he was looking for, returns to the search? And if I should convert my friends yonder to this point of view, and persuade them to adopt the convictions which I have adopted myself, should I, tell me, be guilty of any hardihood? For you must not reject the claim that youth makes, that in some way it assimilates an idea more easily than old age; and anyone who counsels another to adopt the wisdom and teaching which he himself has chosen, anyhow escapes the imputation of trying to persuade others of things he does not believe himself. And anyone who takes the blessings bestowed upon him by fortune into a corner and there enjoys them by himself, violates their character as blessings, for he prevents their sweetness from being enjoyed by as many as possible. 6.17. When Nilus had finished these arguments, and juvenile enough they were, Apollonius took him up and said: If you were in love with my wisdom, had you not better, before I begin, discuss with me the question of my reward? Let us discuss it, answered Nilus, and do you ask whatever you like. I ask you, he said, to be content with the choice you have made, and not to annoy the naked sages by giving them advice which they will not take. I consent, he said, and let this be agreed upon as your reward. This then was the substance of their conversation, and when Nilus at its close asked him how long a time he would stay among the naked sages he replied: So long as the quality of their wisdom justifies anyone in remaining in their company; and after that I shall take my way to the cataracts, in order to see the springs of the Nile, for it will be delightful not only to behold the sources of the Nile, but also to listen to the roar of its waterfalls. 6.18. After they had held this discussion and listened to some recollections of India, they lay down to sleep upon the grass; but at daybreak, having offered their accustomed prayers, they followed Nilus, who led them into the presence of Thespesion. They accordingly greeted one another, and sitting down together in the grove they began a conversation in which Apollonius led as follows: How important it is, said he, not to conceal wisdom, is proved by our conversation of yesterday; for because the Indians taught me as much of their wisdom as I thought it proper for me to know, I not only remember my teachers, but I go about instilling into others what I heard from them. And you too will be richly rewarded by me, if you send me away with a knowledge of your wisdom as well; for I shall not cease to go about and repeat your teachings to the Greeks, while to the Indians I shall write them. 6.19. Ask, they said, for you know question comes first and argument follows on it. It is about the gods that I would like to ask you a question first, namely, what induced you to impart, as your tradition, to the people of this country forms of the gods that are absurd and grotesque in all but a few cases? In a few cases, do I say? I would rather say that in very few are the gods' images fashioned in a wise and god-like manner, for the mass of your shrines seem to have been erected in honor rather of irrational and ignoble animals than of gods. Thespesion, resenting these remarks, said: And your own images in Greece, how are they fashioned? In the way, he replied, in which it is best and most reverent to construct images of the gods. I suppose you allude, said the other, to the statue of Zeus in Olympia, and to the image of Athena and to that of the Cnidian goddess and to that of the Argive goddess and to other images equally beautiful and full of charm? Not only to these, replied Apollonius, but without exception I maintain, that whereas in other lands statuary has scrupulously observed decency and fitness, you rather make ridicule of the gods than really believe in them. Your artists, then, like Phidias, said the other, and like Praxiteles, went up, I suppose, to heaven and took a copy of the forms of the gods, and then reproduced these by their art or was there any other influence which presided over and guided their molding? There was, said Apollonius, and an influence pregt with wisdom and genius. What was that? said the other, for I do not think you can adduce any except imitation. Imagination, said Apollonius, wrought these works, a wiser and subtler artist by far than imitation; for imitation can only create as its handiwork what it has seen, but imagination equally what it has not seen; for it will conceive of its ideal with reference to the reality, and imitation is often baffled by terror, but imagination by nothing; for it marches undismayed to the goal which it has itself laid down. When you entertain a notion of Zeus you must, I suppose, envisage him along with heaven and seasons and stars, as Phidias in his day endeavoured to do, and if you would fashion an image of Athena you must imagine in your mind armies and cunning, and handicrafts, and how she leapt out of Zeus himself. But if you make a hawk or an owl or a wolf or a dog, and put it in your temples instead of Hermes or Athena or Apollo, your animals and your birds may be esteemed and of much price as likenesses, but the gods will be very much lowered in their dignity. I think, said the other, that you criticize our religion very superficially; for if the Egyptians have any wisdom, they show it by their deep respect and reverence in the representation of the gods, and by the circumstance that they fashion their forms as symbols of a profound inner meaning, so as to enhance their solemnity and august character. Apollonius thereon merely laughed and said: My good friends, you have indeed greatly profited by the wisdom of Egypt and Ethiopia, if your dog and your ibis and your goat seem particularly august and god-like, for this is what I learn from Thespesion the sage.But what is there that is august or awe-inspiring in these images? Is it not likely that perjurers and temple-thieves and all the rabble of low jesters will despise such holy objects rather than dread them; and if they are to be held for the hidden meanings which they convey, surely the gods in Egypt would have met with much greater reverence, if no images of them had ever been set up at all, and if you had planned your theology along other lines wiser and more mysterious. For I imagine you might have built temples for them, and have fixed the altars and laid down rules about what to sacrifice and what not, and when and on what scale, and with what liturgies and rites, without introducing any image at all, but leaving it to those who frequented the temples to imagine the images of the gods; for the mind can more or less delineate and figure them to itself better than can any artist; but you have denied to the gods the privilege of beauty both of the outer eye and of an inner suggestion. Thespesion replied and said: There was a certain Athenian, called Socrates, a foolish old man like ourselves, who thought that the dog and the goose and the plane tree were gods and used to swear by them. He was not foolish, said Apollonius, but a divine and unfeignedly wise man; for he did not swear by these objects on the understanding that they were gods, but to save himself from swearing by the gods. 6.20. Thereupon Thespesion as if anxious to drop the subject, put some questions to Apollonius, about the scourging in Sparta, and asked if the Lacedaemonians were smitten with rods in public. Yes, answered the other, as hard, O Thespesion, as men can smite them; and it is especially men of noble birth among them that are so treated. Then what do they do to menials, he asked, when they do wrong? They do not kill them nowadays, said Apollonius, as Lycurgus formerly allowed, but the same whip is used to them too. And what judgment does Hellas pass upon the matter? They flock, he answered, to see the spectacle with pleasure and utmost enthusiasm, as if to the festival of Hyacinthus, or to that of the naked boys. Then these excellent Hellenes are not ashamed, either to behold those publicly whipped who erewhile governed them or to reflect that they were governed by men who are whipped by men who are whipped before the eyes of all? And how is it that you did not reform this abuse? For they say that you interested yourself in the affairs of the Lacedaemonians, as of other people. So far as anything could be reformed, I gave them my advice, and they readily adopted it; for they are the freest of the Hellenes; but at the same time they will only listen to one who gives them good advice. Now the custom of scourging is a ceremony in honor of the Scythian Artemis, so they say, and was prescribed by oracles, and to oppose the regulations of the gods is in my opinion utter madness. 'Tis a poor wisdom, Apollonius, he replied, which you attribute to the gods of the Hellenes, if they countece scourging as a part of the discipline of freedom. It's not the scourging, he said, but the sprinkling of the altar with human blood that is important, for the Scythians too held the altar to be worthy thereof; but the Lacedaemonians modified the ceremony of sacrifice because of its implacable cruelty, and turned it into a contest of endurance, undergone without any loss of life, and yet securing to the goddess as first fruits an offering of their own blood. Why then, said the other, do they not sacrifice strangers right out to Artemis, as the Scythians formerly considered right to do? Because, he answered, it is not congenial to any of the Greeks to adopt in full rigor the manners and customs of barbarians. And yet, said the other, it seems to me that it would be more humane to sacrifice one or two of them than to enforce as they do a policy of exclusion against all foreigners.Let us not assail, said the other, O Thespesion, the law-giver Lycurgus; but we must understand him, and then we shall see that his prohibition to strangers to settle in Sparta and live there was not inspired on his part by mere boorish exclusiveness, but by a desire to keep the institutions of Sparta in their original purity by preventing outsiders from mingling in her life. Well, said the other, I should allow the men of Sparta to be what they claim to be, if they had ever lived with strangers, and yet had faithfully adhered to their home principles; for it was not by keeping true to themselves in the absence of strangers, but by doing so in spite of their presence, that they needed to show their superiority. But they, although they enforced his policy of excluding strangers, corrupted their institutions, and were found doing exactly the same as did those of the Greeks whom they most detested. Anyhow, their subsequent naval program and policy of imposing tribute was modelled entirely upon that of Athens, and they themselves ended by committing acts which they had themselves regarded as a just casus belli against the Athenians, whom they had no sooner beaten in the field than they humbly adopted, as if they were the beaten party, their pet institution. And the very fact that the goddess was introduced from Taurus and Scythia was the action of men who embraced alien customs. But if an oracle prescribed this, what want was there of the scourge? What need to feign an endurance fit for slaves? Had they wanted to prove the disdain that Lacedaemonians felt for death, they had I think done better to sacrifice a youth of Sparta with his own consent upon the altar. For this would have been a real proof of the superior courage of the Spartans, and would have disinclined Hellas from ranging herself in the opposite camp to them. But you will say that they had to save their young men for the battlefield; well, in that case the law which prevails among the Scythians, and sentences all men of sixty years of age to death, would have been more suitably introduced and followed among the Lacedaemonians then among the Scythians, supposing that they embrace death in its grim reality and not as a mere parade. These remarks of mine are directed not so much against the Lacedaemonians, as against yourself, O Apollonius. For if ancient institutions, whose hoary age defies our understanding of their origins, are to be examined in an unsympathetic spirit, and the reason why they are pleasing to heaven subjected to cold criticism, such a line of speculation will produce a crop of odd conclusions; for we could attack the mystery rite of Eleusis in the same way and ask, why it is this and not that; and the same with the rites of the Samothracians, for in their ritual they avoid one thing and insist on another; and the same with the Dionysiac ceremonies and the phallic symbol, and the figure erected in Cyllene, and before we know where we are we shall be picking holes in everything. Let us choose, therefore, any other topic you like, but respect the sentiment of Pythagoras, which is also our own; for it is better, if we can't hold our tongues about everything, at any rate to preserve silence about such matters as these. Apollonius replied and said, If, O Thespesion, you had wished to discuss the topic seriously, you would have found that the Lacedaemonians have many excellent arguments to advance in favor of their institutions, proving that they are sound and superior to those of other Hellenes; but since you are so averse to continue the discussion, and even regard it as impious to talk about such things, let us proceed to another subject, of great importance, as I am convinced, for it is about justice that I shall now put a question. 6.21. Let us, said Thespesion, tackle the subject; for it is one very suitable to men, whether they are wise or not wise. But lest we should drag in the opinions of Indians, and so confuse our discussion, and go off without having formed any conclusions, do you first impart to us the views held by the Indians concerning justice, for you probably examined their views on the spot; and if their opinion is proved to be correct we will adopt it; but if we have something wiser to put in its place, you must adopt our view, for that too is plain justice. Said Apollonius: Your plan is excellent and most satisfactory to me; so do listen to the conversation which I held there. For I related to them how I had once been captain of a large ship, in the period when my soul was in command of another body, and how I thought myself extremely just because, when robbers offered me a reward, if I would betray my ship by running it into roads where they were going to lie in wait for it, in order to seize its cargo, I agreed and made the promise, just to save them from attacking us, but intending to slip by them and get beyond the place agreed upon. And, said Thespesion, did the Indians agree that this was justice? No, they laughed at the idea, he said, for they said that justice was something more than not being unjust. It was very sensible, said the other, of the Indians to reject such a view; for good sense is something more than not entertaining nonsense, just as courage is something more than not running away from the ranks; and so temperance is something more than the avoidance of adultery, and no one reserves his praise for a man who has simply shown himself to be not bad. For because a thing, no matter what, is equidistant between praise and punishment, it is not on that account to be reckoned off-hand to be virtue How then. O Thespesion, said Apollonius, are we to crown the just man and for what actions? Could you have discussed justice more completely and more opportunely, said the other, than when the sovereign of so large and flourishing a country intervened in your philosophic discussion of the art of kingship, a thing intimately connected with justice? If it had been Phraotes, said Apollonius, who turned up on that occasion, you might rightly blame me for not gravely discussing the subject of justice in his presence. But you from the account which I gave of him yesterday that the man is a drunkard and an enemy of all philosophy. What need therefore was there to inflict on him the trouble? Why should we try to win credit for ourselves in the presence of a sybarite who thinks of nothing but his own pleasures? But inasmuch as it is incumbent upon wise men like ourselves to explore and trace out justice, more so than on kings and generals, let us proceed to examine the absolutely just man. For though I thought myself just in the affair of the ship, and thought others just too because they do not practice injustice, you deny that this in itself constitutes them just or worthy of honor. And rightly so, said the other, for whoever heard of a decree drafted by Athenians or Lacedaemonians in favor of crowning so and so, because he is not a libertine, or of granting the freedom of the city to so and so, because the temples have not been robbed by him? Who then is the just man and what are is actions? For neither did I ever hear of anyone being crowned merely for his justice, nor of a decree being proposed over a just man to the effect that so and so shall be crowned, because such and such actions of his show him to be just. For anyone who considers the fate of Palamedes in Troy or Socrates in Athens, will discover that even justice is not sure of success among men, for assuredly these men suffered most unjustly being themselves most just. Still they at least were put to death on the score of acts of injustice imputed on them, and the verdict was a distortion of the truth; whereas in the case of Aristides the son of Lysimachus, it was very justice that was the undoing of him, for he in spite of his integrity was banished merely because of his reputation for this very virtue. And I am sure that justice will appear in a very ridiculous light; for having been appointed by Zeus and by the Fates to prevent men being unjust to one another, she has never been able to defend herself against injustice.And the history of Aristides is sufficient to me to show the difference between one who is nor unjust and one who is really just. For, tell me, is not this the same Aristides of whom your Hellenic compatriots when they come here tell us that he undertook a voyage to the islands to fix the tribute of the allies, and after settling it on a fair basis, returned again to his country still wearing the same cloak in which he left it? It is he, answered Apollonius, who made the love of poverty once to flourish. Now, said the other, let us suppose that there were at Athens two public orators passing an encomium upon Aristides, just after he had returned from the allies; one of the proposes that he shall be crowned, because he has come back again without enriching himself or amassing any fortune, but the poorest of the Athenians, poorer than he was before; and the other orator, we will suppose, drafts his motion somewhat as follows: “Whereas Aristides has fixed the tribute of the allies according to their ability to pay, and not in excess of the resources of their respective countries; and whereas he has endeavored to keep them loyal to the Athenians, and to see that they shall feel it no grievance to pay upon this scale, it is hereby resolved to crown him for justice.” Do you not suppose that Aristides himself would have opposed the first of these resolutions, as an indignity to his entire life, seeing that it only honored him for not doing injustice; whereas, he might perhaps have supported the other resolution as a fair attempt to express his intentions and policy? For I imagine it was with an eye to the interest of Athenians and subject states alike, that he took care to fix the tribute on a fair and moderate basis, and in fact his wisdom in this matter was conclusively proved after his death. For when the Athenians exceeded his valuations and imposed heavier tributes upon the islands, their naval supremacy at once went to pieces, though it more than anything else had made them formidable; on the other hand the prowess of the Lacedaemonians passed on to the sea itself; and nothing was left of Athenian supremacy, for the whole of the subject states rushed into revolution and made good their escape. It follows then, O Apollonius, that rightly judged, it is not the man who abstains from injustice that is just, but the man who himself does what is just, and also influences others not to be unjust; and from such justice as his there will spring up a crop of other virtues, especially those of the law-court and of the legislative chamber. For such a man as he will make a much fairer judge than people who take their oaths upon the dissected parts of victims, and his legislation will be similar to that of Solon and of Lycurgus; for assuredly these great legislators were inspired by justice to undertake their work. 6.22. Such, according to Damis, was the discussion held by them with regard to the just man, and Apollonius, he says, assented to their argument, for he always agreed with what was reasonably put. They also had a philosophic talk about the soul, proving its immortality, and about nature, along much the same lines which Plato follows in his Timaeus; and after some further remarks and discussions of the laws of the Hellenes, Apollonius said: For myself I have come all this way to see yourselves and visit the springs of the Nile; for a person who only comes as far as Egypt may be excused if he ignores the latter, but if he advances as far as Ethiopia, as I have done, he will be rightly reproached if he neglects to visit them, and to draw as it were from their well-springs some arguments of his own. Farewell then, said the other, and pray to the springs for whatever you desire, for they are divine. But I imagine you will take as your guide Timasion, who formerly lived at Naucratis, but is now of Memphis; for he is well acquainted with the springs of the Nile and he is not so impure as to stand in need of further lustrations. But as for you, O Nilus, we would like to have a talk to you by ourselves. The meaning of this sally was clear enough to Apollonius, for he well understood their annoyance at Nilus' preference for himself; but to give them an opportunity of speaking him apart, he left them to prepare and pack up for his journey, for he meant to start at daybreak. And after a little time Nilus returned, but did not tell them anything of what they had said to him, though he laughed a good deal to himself. And no one asked him what he was laughing about, but they respected his secret. 6.23. They then took their supper and after a discussion of certain trifles they laid them down to sleep where they were; but at daybreak they said goodbye to the naked sages, and started off along the road which leads to the mountains, keeping the Nile on their right hand, and they saw the following spectacles deserving of notice. The Catadupi [the first cataract] are mountains formed of good soil, about the same size as the hill of the Lydians called Tmolus; and from them the Nile flows rapidly down, washing with it the soil of which it creates Egypt; but the roar of the stream, as it breaks down in a cataract from the mountains and hurls itself into the Nile, is terrible and intolerable to the ears, and many of those have approached it too close have returned with the loss of their hearing. 6.24. Apollonius, however, and his party pushed on till they saw some round-shaped hills covered with trees, the leaves and bark and gum of which the Ethiopians regard as of great value; and they also saw lions close to the path, and leopards and other such wild animals; but they were not attracted by any of them, for they fled from them in haste as if they were scared at the sight of men. And they also saw stags and gazelles, and ostriches an asses, the latter in great numbers, and also many wild bulls and ox-goats, the former of these two animals being a mixture of the stag and the ox, that latter of the creatures from which its name is taken. They found moreover on the road the bones and half-eaten carcases of these; for the lions, when they have gorged themselves with fresh prey, care little for what is left over of it, because, I think, they feel sure of catching fresh quarry whenever they want it. 6.25. It is here that the nomad Ethiopians live in a sort of colony upon wagons, and not far from them the elephant-hunters, who cut up these animals and sell the flesh, and are accordingly called by a name which signifies the selling of elephants. And the Nasamones and the man-eaters and the pigmies and the shadow-footed people are also tribes of Ethiopia, and they extend as far as the Ethiopian ocean, which no mariners ever enter except castaways who do so against their will. 6.26. As our company were discussing these animals and talking learnedly about the food which nature supplies in their different cases, they heard a sound as of thunder; not a crashing sound, but of thunder as it is when it is still hollow and concealed in the cloud. And Timasion said: A cataract is at hand, gentlemen, the last for those who are descending the river, but the first to meet you on your way up. And after they had advanced about ten stades, he says that they saw a river discharging itself from the hill-side as big as the Marsyas and the Meander at their first confluence; and he says that after they had put up a prayer to the Nile, they went on till they no longer saw any animals at all; for the latter are naturally afraid of noise, and therefore live by calm waters rather than by those which rush headlong with a noise. And after fifteen stades they heard another cataract which this time was horrible and unbearable to the senses, for it was twice as loud as the first one and it fell from much higher mountains. And Damis relates that his own ears and those of one of his companions were so stunned by the noise, that he himself turned back and besought Apollonius not to go further; however he, along with Timasion and Nilus, boldly pressed on to the third cataract, of which he made the following report on their return. Peaks overhang the Nile, at the most eight stades in height; but the eminence faces the mountains, namely a beetling brow of rocks mysteriously cut away, as if in a quarry, and the fountains of the Nile cling to the edge of the mountain, till they overbalance and fall on to the rocky eminence, from which they pour into the Nile as an expanse of whitening billows. But the effect produced upon the senses by this cataract, which is many times greater than the earlier ones, and the echo which leaps up therefrom against the mountains render it impossible to hear what your companion tells you about the river [ 1]. But the further road which leads up to the first springs of the river was impracticable, they tell us, and impossible to think of; for they tell many stories of the demons which haunt it, stories similar to those which Pindar in his wisdom puts into verse about the demon whom he sets over these springs to preserve the due proportions of the Nile. 6.27. After passing the cataracts they halted in a village of the Ethiopians of no great size, and they were dining, towards the evening, mingling in their conversation the grave with the gay, when all on a sudden they heard the women of the village screaming and calling to one another to join in the pursuit and catch the thing; and they also summoned their husbands to help them in the matter. And the latter caught up sticks and stones and anything which came handy, and called upon one another to avenge the insult to their wives. And it appears that for ten months the ghost of a satyr had been haunting the village, who was mad after the women and was said to have killed two of them to whom he was supposed to be specially attached. The companions, then, of Apollonius were frightened out of their wits till Apollonius said: You need not be afraid, for it's only a satyr that is running amuck here. Yes, by Zeus, said Nilus, it's the one that we naked sages have found insulting us for a long time past and we could never stop his jumps and leaps. But, said Apollonius, I have a remedy against these hell-hounds, which Midas is said once to have employed; for Midas himself had some of the blood of satyrs in his veins, as was clear from the shape of his ears; and a satyr once, trespassing on his kinship with Midas, made merry at the expense of his ears, not only singing about them, but piping about them. Well, Midas, I understand, had heard from his mother that when a satyr is overcome by wine he falls asleep, and at such times comes to his senses and will make friends with you; so he mixed wine which he had in his palace in a fountain and let the satyr get at it, and the latter drank it up and was overcome. And to show that the story is true, let us go to the head man of the village, and if the villagers have any wine, we will mix it with water for the satyr and he will share the fate of Midas' satyr. They thought it a good plan, so he poured four Egyptian jars of wine into the trough out of which the village cattle drank, and then called the satyr by means of some secret rebuke or threat; and though as yet the latter was not visible, the wine sensibly diminished as if it was being drunk up. And when it was quite finished, Apollonius said: Let us make peace with the satyr, for he is fast asleep. And with these words he led the villagers to the cave of the nymphs, which was not quite a furlong away from the village; and he showed them a satyr lying fast asleep in it, but he told them not to hit him or abuse him, For, he said, his nonsense is stopped for ever. Such was this exploit of Apollonius, and, by heavens, we may call it not an incidental work in passing, but a masterwork of his passing by [ 1]; and if you read the sage's epistle, in which he wrote to an insolent young man that he had sobered even a satyr demon in Ethiopia, you will perforce call to mind the above story. But we must not disbelieve that satyrs both exist and are susceptible to the passion of love; for I knew a youth of my own age in Lemnos whose mother was said to be visited by a satyr, as he well might to judge by this story; for he was represented as wearing in his back a fawn-skin that exactly fitted him, the front paws of which were drawn around his neck and fastened over his chest. But I must not go further into this subject; but, anyhow, credit is due as much to experience of facts as it is to myself. |
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35. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of The Philosophers, 7.121 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 7.121. But Heraclides of Tarsus, who was the disciple of Antipater of Tarsus, and Athenodorus both assert that sins are not equal.Again, the Stoics say that the wise man will take part in politics, if nothing hinders him – so, for instance, Chrysippus in the first book of his work On Various Types of Life – since thus he will restrain vice and promote virtue. Also (they maintain) he will marry, as Zeno says in his Republic, and beget children. Moreover, they say that the wise man will never form mere opinions, that is to say, he will never give assent to anything that is false; that he will also play the Cynic, Cynicism being a short cut to virtue, as Apollodorus calls it in his Ethics; that he will even turn cannibal under stress of circumstances. They declare that he alone is free and bad men are slaves, freedom being power of independent action, whereas slavery is privation of the same; |
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36. Eusebius of Caesarea, Preparation For The Gospel, 8.11.1-8.11.2 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
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37. Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras, 65-66, 90-93, 28 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
| 28. That which follows after this, we shall no longer discuss generally, but direct our attention particularly to the works resulting from the virtues of Pythagoras. And we shall begin in the first place from the Gods, as it is usual to do, and endeavour to exhibit his piety, and the admirable works which he performed. Let this, therefore, be one specimen of his piety, which also we have before mentioned, that he knew what his soul was, and whence it came into the body, and also its former lives, and that of these things he gave most evident indications. After this also, let the following be another specimen; that once passing over the river Nessus with many of his associates, he spoke to it, and the river in a distinct and clear voice, in the hearing of all his followers, answered, Hail Pythagoras! Farther still, nearly all historians of his life confidently assert, that in one and 98the same day he was present at Metapontum in Italy, and Tauromenium in Sicily, and discoursed in common with his disciples in both places, though these cities are separated from each other by many stadia both by land and sea, and cannot be passed through in a great number of days. The report, also, is very much disseminated, that he showed his golden thigh to the Hyperborean Abaris, who said that he resembled the Apollo among the Hyperboreans, and of whom Abaris was the priest; and that he did this in order that Abaris might apprehend this to be true, and that he was not deceived in his opinion. Ten thousand other more divine and more admirable particulars likewise are uniformly and uimously related of the man: such as infallible predictions of earthquakes, rapid expulsions of pestilence and violent winds, instantaneous cessations of the effusion of hail, and a tranquillization of the waves of rivers and seas, in order that his disciples might easily pass over them. of which things also, Empedocles the Agrigentine, Epimenides the Cretan, and Abaris the Hyperborean, receiving the power of effecting, performed certain miracles of this kind in many places. Their deeds, however, are manifest. To which we may add, that Empedocles was surnamed an expeller of winds; Epimenides, an expiator; and Abaris, a walker on air; because being carried on the dart which was given to him by the Hyperborean Apollo, he passed over rivers and seas and inaccessible 99places, like one walking on the air. Certain persons likewise are of opinion, that Pythagoras did the same thing, when in the same day he discoursed with his disciples at Metapontum and Tauromenium. It is also said, that he predicted there would be an earthquake from the water of a well which he had tasted; and that a ship which was sailing with a prosperous wind, would be merged in the sea. And let these, indeed, be the indications of his piety.Again, however, assuming a more elevated exordium, I am desirous to exhibit the principles of the worship of the Gods, which Pythagoras and his followers established; viz. that all such particulars as they define with respect to doing or not doing a thing, have for the mark at which they aim, a consent with divinity. This also is with them the principle, [of piety] and their whole life is arranged with a view to follow God. The language, too, of their philosophy is this, that men act ridiculously in exploring good from any other source than the Gods; and that their conduct in this respect resembles that of a man, who in a country governed by a king should reverence one of the magistrates in the city, and neglect him who is the ruler of all of them. For they were of opinion that such was the conduct of mankind. For since God is, and is the Lord of all things, it is universally acknowledged that good is to be requested of him. For all men impart good to those whom they love, and to those 100with whom they are delighted; but they give the contrary to good, to those to whom they are contrarily disposed. It is evident, therefore, that those things are to be done, in which God delights. It is, however, not easy for a man to know what these are, unless he obtains this knowledge from one who has heard God, or has heard God himself, or procures it through divine art. Hence also, the Pythagoreans were studious of divination. For this alone is an interpretation of the benevolence of the Gods. And in short, he will conceive an employment of this kind to be worthy of regard, who believes that there are Gods; but he who thinks that either of these is folly, will also be of opinion that both are foolish. Many of the mandates, however, of the Pythagoreans were introduced from the mysteries; for they did not conceive them to be the productions of arrogance, but to originate from a certain divinity. And in a similar manner, all the Pythagoreans believe such things as are mythologically related of Aristeas the Proconesian, and Abaris the Hyperborean, and other particulars of a like nature. For they consider every thing of this kind to be credible; and of many [such] things they make trial themselves. They also frequently recollect such-like particulars as appear to be fabulous, as not disbelieving in any thing which may be referred to divinity. A certain person therefore relates, that Eurytus said, that a shepherd feeding his sheep near the tomb of Philolaus, heard some 101one singing. But the person to whom this was related, did not at all disbelieve the narration, but asked what kind of harmony it was? Both of them, however, were Pythagoreans, and Eurytus was the disciple of Philolaus. It is likewise said, that a certain person told Pythagoras, that he appeared to himself once to converse with his father who was dead, and that he asked Pythagoras what this indicated? Pythagoras replied, that it indicated nothing; but that he had in reality conversed with his father. As therefore, said he, nothing is signified by my now discoursing with you, so neither is any thing signified by your conversing with your father. Hence, in all particulars of this kind, they did not think that they were stupid, but those that disbelieved in them. For they did not conceive that some things are possible to the Gods, but others impossible, as those fancy who reason sophistically; but they believed that all things are possible to the Gods. And this very assertion is the beginning of the verses, which they ascribe to Linus, and which are as follow:All things may be the objects of our hope,Since nothing hopeless any where is found:All things with ease Divinity effects,And nought can frustrate his almighty power.But they thought that their opinions deserved to be believed, because he who first promulgated them, was not any casual person, but a God. For this 102was one of their questions; What was Pythagoras? For they say that he was the Hyperborean Apollo; of which this was an indication, that rising up in the Olympic games, he showed his golden thigh; and also that he received the Hyperborean Abaris as his guest; and was presented by him with the dart on which he rode through the air. But it is said that Abaris came from the Hyperborean regions, in order that he might collect gold for the temple, and that he predicted a pestilence. He also dwelt in temples, and was never seen either to eat or drink. It is likewise said, that rites which purify from evil are performed by the Lacedæmonians, and that on this account Lacedæmon was never infested with pestilence. Pythagoras, therefore, caused this Abaris to acknowledge [that he was more than man,] receiving from him at the same time the golden dart, without which it was not possible for him to find his way. In Metapontum also, certain persons praying that they might obtain what a ship contained that was then sailing into port, Pythagoras said to them, You will then have a dead body. In Sybaris, too, he caught a deadly serpent and dismissed it. In a similar manner likewise in Tyrrhenia, he caught a small serpent, whose bite was fatal. But in Crotona a white eagle, it is said, suffered Pythagoras to stroke it. A certain person also wishing to hear him discourse, he said that he could not, till some sign appeared. And after this 103a white bear was seen in Cauconia; the death of which he predicted to one who was about to tell him that it was dead. He likewise reminded Myllias the Crotonian that he had been Midas the son of Gordius. And Myllias passed over to the continent of Asia, in order to perform at the sepulchre [of Midas] those rites which had been enjoined him by Pythagoras. It is likewise said, that the person who bought his house, and who dug up that which had been buried in it, did not dare to tell any one what he saw [on this occasion]. But instead of suffering for this offence, he was seized at Crotona for sacrilege, and put to death. For he took away a golden beard which had fallen from a statue. These things therefore, and others of the like kind, are related by the Pythagoreans, in order to render their opinions worthy of belief. And as these are acknowledged to be true, and it is impossible they should have happened to one man, they consequently think it is clear, that what is related of Pythagoras, should be received as pertaining to a being superior to man, and not to a mere man. This also is the meaning of their enigmatical assertion, that man, bird, and another third thing, are bipeds. For the third thing is Pythagoras. Such, therefore, was Pythagoras on account of his piety, and such he was truly thought to be.With respect to oaths, however, all the Pythagoreans religiously observe them, being mindful of the Pythagoric precept,First to th’ immortal Gods thy homage pay,As they by law are orderly dispos’d;And reverence thy oath, but honor nextTh’ illustrious heroes.Hence a certain Pythagorean, being compelled by law to take an oath, yet in order that he might preserve a Pythagoric dogma, though he would have sworn religiously, chose instead of swearing to pay three talents, this being the fine which he was condemned to pay to the defendant. That Pythagoras however thought that nothing was from chance and fortune, but that all events happened conformably to divine providence, and especially to good and pious men, is confirmed by what is related by Androcydes in his treatise on Pythagoric Symbols, of Thymaridas the Tarentine, and a Pythagorean. For when through a certain circumstance he was about to sail from his own country, and his friends who were present were embracing him, and bidding him farewell, some one said to him, when he had now ascended into the ship, May such things happen to you from the Gods, O Thymaridas, as are conformable to your wishes! But he replied, predict better things; for I should rather wish that such things may happen to me as are conformable to the will of the Gods. For he thought it was more scientific and equitable, not to resist or be indigt with divine providence. If, therefore, any one wishes to learn what were the sources whence these men derived so much piety, it must 105be said, that a perspicuous paradigm of the Pythagoric theology according to numbers, is in a certain respect to be found in the writings of Orpheus. Nor is it to be doubted, that Pythagoras receiving auxiliaries from Orpheus, composed his treatise Concerning the Gods, which on this account also he inscribed the Sacred Discourse, because it contains the flower of the most mystical place in Orpheus; whether this work was in reality written by Pythagoras, as by most authors it is said to have been, or as some of the Pythagoric school who are both learned and worthy of belief assert, was composed by Telauges; being taken by him from the commentaries which were left by Pythagoras himself to his daughter Damo, the sister of Telauges, and which it is said after her death were given to Bitale the daughter of Damo, and to Telauges the son of Pythagoras, and the husband of Bitale, when he was of a mature age. For when Pythagoras died, he was left very young with his mother Theano. In this Sacred Discourse also, or treatise concerning the Gods (for it has both these inscriptions), who it was that delivered to Pythagoras what is there said concerning the Gods, is rendered manifest. For it says: “that Pythagoras the son of Mnesarchus was instructed in what pertains to the Gods, when he celebrated orgies in the Thracian Libethra, being initiated in them by Aglaophemus; and that Orpheus the son of Calliope, 106having learnt wisdom from his mother in the mountain Pangæus, said, that the eternal essence of number is the most providential principle of the universe, of heaven and earth, and the intermediate nature; and farther still, that it is the root of the permanency of divine natures, of Gods and dæmons.”[35] From these things, therefore, it is evident 107that he learnt from the Orphic writers that the essence of the Gods is defined by number. Through the same numbers also, he produced an admirable fore-knowledge and worship of the Gods, both which are especially most allied to numbers. This, however, may be known from hence; for it is necessary to adduce a certain fact, in order to procure belief of what is said. When Abaris performed sacred rites in his accustomed manner, he procured a fore-knowledge of future events, which is studiously cultivated by all the Barbarians, through sacrificing animals, and especially birds; for they are of opinion that the viscera of such animals are subservient to a more accurate inspection. Pythagoras, therefore, not wishing to suppress his ardent pursuit of truth, but to impart it to him through a certain safer way, and without blood and slaughter, and also because he thought that a cock was sacred to the sun, furnished him with a consummate knowledge of all truth, as it is said, through the arithmetical science. He also obtained from piety, faith concerning the Gods. For Pythagoras always proclaimed, that nothing admirable pertaining to the Gods or divine dogmas should be disbelieved, because the Gods are able to accomplish all things. And the divine dogmas 108in which it is requisite to believe, are those which Pythagoras delivered. Thus, therefore, the Pythagoreans believed in, and assumed the things about which they dogmatised, because they were not the progeny of false opinion. Hence Eurytus the Crotonian, the auditor of Philolaus said, that a shepherd feeding his sheep near the tomb of Philolaus, heard some one singing. But the person to whom this was related, did not at all disbelieve the narration, but asked what kind of harmony it was. Pythagoras himself, also, being asked by a certain person what was indicated by seeming in sleep to converse with his father who was dead, answered that it indicated nothing. For neither, said he, is any thing portended by your speaking with me.Pythagoras likewise used pure and white garments, and in a similar manner white and pure coverlids; for he did not use those that were made of wool. And this custom he also delivered to his auditors. In speaking also of the natures superior to man, he employed honorable appellations, and words of good omen, and upon every occasion made mention of and reverenced the Gods; so that while at supper, he performed libations to the divinities, and ordered his disciples to celebrate with hymns the beings that are above us, every day. He paid attention likewise to rumors and omens, prophecies and lots, and in short, to all casual circumstances. Moreover, he sacrificed to the Gods with millet, cakes, honey-combs, and 109other fumigations. But he did not sacrifice animals, nor did any one of the contemplative philosophers. His other disciples, however, viz. the acusmatici, and the politici, were ordered by him to sacrifice animals, such as a cock, or a lamb, or some other animal recently born, but not frequently. At the same time they were prohibited from sacrificing oxen. This also is an indication of the honor which he paid to the Gods, that he exhorted his disciples never to employ the names of the Gods uselessly in swearing. On which account also Syllus, one of the Pythagoreans in Crotona, paid a fine for not swearing, though he could have sworn without violating truth. An oath too such as the following is ascribed to the Pythagoreans, as they were unwilling, through reverence, to name Pythagoras; just as they very much abstained from using the names of the Gods. But they manifested the man through the invention of the tetractys,I swear by him who the tetractys found,Whence all our wisdom springs, and which containsPerennial Nature’s fountain, cause, and root.And, in short, it is said that Pythagoras was emulous of the Orphic mode of writing and [piety of] disposition; and that he honored the Gods in a way similar to that of Orpheus, placing them in images and in brass, not conjoined to our forms, 110but to divine receptacles;[36] because they comprehend and provide for all things; and have a nature and morphe similar to the universe. He also promulgated purifications, and initiations as they are called, which contain the most accurate knowledge of the Gods. And farther still, it is said, that he was the author of a compound divine philosophy and worship of the Gods; having learnt indeed some things from the followers of Orpheus, but others from the Egyptian priests; some from the Chaldæans and Magi; some from the mysteries performed in Eleusis, in Imbrus, Samothracia, and Delos; and some also from those which are performed by the Celtæ, and in Iberia. It is also said that the Sacred Discourse of Pythagoras is extant among the Latins, and is read not to all, nor by all of them, but by those who are promptly disposed 111to learn what is excellent, and apply themselves to nothing base. He likewise ordained that men should make libations thrice, and observed that Apollo delivered oracles from the tripod, because the triad is the first number. That sacrifices also should be made to Venus on the sixth day, because this number is the first that partakes of every number, and, when divided in every possible way, receives the power of the numbers subtracted and of those that remain. But that it is necessary to sacrifice to Hercules on the eighth day of the month from the beginning, looking in so doing to his being born in the seventh month. He further asserted, that it was necessary that he who entered a temple should be clothed with a pure garment, and in which no one had slept; because sleep in the same manner as the black and the brown, is an indication of sluggishness; but purity is a sign of equality and justice in reasoning. He also ordered, that if blood should be found involuntarily spilt in a temple, a lustration should be made, either in a golden vessel, or with the water of the sea; the former of these [i. e. gold] being the most beautiful of things, and a measure by which the price of all things is regulated; but the latter as he conceived being the progeny of a moist nature, and the nutriment of the first and more common matter. He likewise said, that it was not proper to bring forth children in a temple; because it is not holy that in a temple the divine part of the soul should be bound to the 112body. He further ordained, that on a festive day neither the hair should be cut, nor the nails paired; not thinking it fit that we should leave the service of the Gods for the purpose of increasing our good. He also said, that a louse ought not to be killed in a temple; conceiving that a divine power ought not to participate of any thing superfluous and corruptible. But that the Gods should be honored with cedar, laurel, cypress, oak, and myrtle; and that the body should not be purified with these, nor should any of them be divided by the teeth. He likewise ordained, that what is boiled should not be roasted; signifying by this that mildness is not in want of anger. But he would not suffer the bodies of the dead to be burned; following in this the Magi, being unwilling that any thing divine should communicate with a mortal nature. He likewise thought it was holy for the dead to be carried out in white garments; obscurely signifying by this the simple and first nature, according to number and the principle of all things. But above all things he ordained, that an oath should be taken religiously; since that which is behind is long.[37] And he said, that it is much more holy to be injured than to kill a man: for judgment is deposited in Hades, where the soul and its essence, and the first nature 113of things are [properly] estimated. Farther still, he ordered that sepulchral chests [i. e. biers] should not be made of cypress, because the sceptre of Jupiter was made of this wood, or for some other mystic reason. He likewise ordained that libations should be performed before the table of Jupiter the Saviour, and of Hercules and the Dioscuri; in so doing celebrating Jupiter as the presiding cause and leader of this nutriment; Hercules, as the power of nature; and the Dioscuri, as the symphony of all things. But he said, that libations should not be offered with closed eyes. For he did not think it fit, that any thing beautiful should be undertaken with shame and bashfulness. Moreover, when it thundered, he ordained that the earth should be touched, in remembrance of the generation of things. But he ordered that temples should be entered from places on the right hand, and that they should be departed out of from the left hand. For he asserted that the right hand is the principle of what is called the odd number, and is divine; but that the left hand is a symbol of the even number, and of that which is dissolved. And such is the mode which he is said to have adopted in the cultivation of piety. But other particulars which we have omitted concerning it, may be conjectured from what has been said. So that I shall cease to speak further on this subject. |
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38. Porphyry, On Abstinence, 4.6-4.8 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
| 4.6. 6.Chaeremon the Stoic, therefore, in his narration of the Egyptian priests, who, he says, were considered by the Egyptians as philosophers, informs us, that they chose temples, as the places in which they might philosophize. For to dwell with the statues of the Gods is a thing allied to the whole desire, by which the soul tends to the contemplation of their divinities. And from the divine veneration indeed, which was paid to them through dwelling in temples, they obtained security, all men honouring these philosophers, as if they were certain sacred animals. They also led a solitary life, as they only mingled with other men in solemn sacrifices and festivals. But at other times the priests were almost inaccessible to any one who wished to converse with them. For it was requisite that he who approached to them should be first purified, and abstain from many things; and this is as it were a common sacred law respecting the Egyptian priests. But these [philosophic priests], |116 having relinquished every other employment, and human labours,7 gave up the whole of their life to the contemplation and worship of divine natures and to divine inspiration; through the latter, indeed, procuring for themselves, honour, security, and piety; but through contemplation, science; and through both, a certain occult exercise of manners, worthy of antiquity8. For to be always conversant with divine knowledge and inspiration, removes those who are so from all avarice, suppresses the passions, and excites to an intellectual life. But they were studious of frugality in their diet and apparel, and also of continence and endurance, and in all things were attentive to justice and equity. They likewise were rendered venerable, through rarely mingling with other men. For during the time of what are called purifications, they scarcely mingled with their nearest kindred, and those of their own order, nor were they to be seen by anyone, unless it was requisite for the necessary purposes of purification. For the sanctuary was inaccessible to those who were not purified, and they dwelt in holy places for the purpose of performing divine works; but at all other times they associated more freely with those who lived like themselves. They did not, however, associate with any one who was not a religious character. But they were always seen near to the Gods, or the statues of the Gods, the latter of which they were beheld either carrying, or preceding in a sacred procession, or disposing in an orderly manner, with modesty and gravity; each of which operations was not the effect of pride, but an indication of some physical reason. Their venerable gravity also was apparent from their manners. For their walking was orderly, and their aspect sedate; and they were so studious of preserving this gravity of countece, that they did not even wink, when at any time they were unwilling to do so; and they seldom laughed, and when they did, their laughter proceeded no farther than to a smile. But they always kept their hands within their garments. Each likewise bore about him a symbol indicative of the order which he was allotted in sacred concerns; for there were many orders of priests. Their diet also was slender and simple. For, with respect to wine, some of them did not at all drink it, but others drank very little of it, on account of its being injurious to the |117 nerves, oppressive to the head, an impediment to invention, and an incentive to venereal desires. In many other things also they conducted themselves with caution; neither using bread at all in purifications, and at those times in which they were not employed in purifying themselves, they were accustomed to eat bread with hyssop, cut into small pieces. For it is said, that hyssop very much purifies the power of bread. But they, for the most part, abstained from oil, the greater number of them entirely; and if at any time they used it with pot-herbs, they took very little of it, and only as much as was sufficient to mitigate the taste of the herbs. SPAN 4.7. 7.It was not lawful for them therefore to meddle with the esculent and potable substances, which were produced out of Egypt, and this contributed much to the exclusion of luxury from these priests. But they abstained from all the fish that was caught in Egypt, and from such quadrupeds as had solid, or many-fissured hoofs, and from such as were not horned; and likewise from all such birds as were carnivorous. Many of them, however, entirely abstained from all animals; and in purifications this abstinence was adopted by all of them, for then they did not even eat an egg. Moreover, they also rejected other things, without being calumniated for so doing. Thus, for instance, of oxen, they rejected the females, and also such of the males as were twins, or were speckled, or of a different colour, or alternately varied in their form, or which were now tamed, as having been already consecrated to labours, and resembled animals that are honoured, or which were the images of any thing [that is divine], or those that had but one eye, or those that verged to a similitude of the human form. There are also innumerable other observations pertaining to the art of those who are called mosxofragistai, or who stamp calves with a seal, and of which books have been composed. But these observations are still more curious respecting birds; as, for instance, that a turtle should not be eaten; for it is said that a hawk frequently dismisses this bird after he has seized it, and preserves its life, as a reward for having had connexion with it. The Egyptian priests, therefore, that they might not ignorantly meddle with a turtle of this kind, avoided the whole species of those birds. And these indeed were certain common religious ceremonies; but there were different ceremonies, which varied according to the class of the priests that used them, and were adapted to the several divinities. But chastity and purifications were common to all the priests. When also the time arrived in which they were to perform something pertaining to the sacred rites of religion, they spent some days in preparatory ceremonies, some indeed forty-two, but others a greater, and |118 others a less number of days; yet never less than seven days; and during this time they abstained from all animals, and likewise from all pot-herbs and leguminous substances, and, above all, from a venereal connexion with women; for they never at any time had connexion with males. They likewise washed themselves with cold water thrice every day; viz. when they rose from their bed, before dinner, and when they betook themselves to sleep. But if they happened to be polluted in their sleep by the emission of the seed, they immediately purified their body in a bath. They also used cold bathing at other times, but not so frequently as on the above occasion. Their bed was woven from the branches of the palm tree, which they call bais; and their bolster was a smooth semi-cylindric piece of wood. But they exercised themselves in the endurance of hunger and thirst, and were accustomed to paucity of food through the whole of their life. SPAN 4.8. 8.This also is a testimony of their continence, that, though they neither exercised themselves in walking or riding, yet they lived free from disease, and were sufficiently strong for the endurance of modern labours. They bore therefore many burdens in the performance of sacred operations, and accomplished many ministrant works, which required more than common strength. But they divided the night into the observation of the celestial bodies, and sometimes devoted a part of it to offices of purification; and they distributed the day into the worship of the Gods, according to which they celebrated them with hymns thrice or four times, viz. in the morning and evening, when the sun is at his meridian altitude, and when he is declining to the west. The rest of their time they devoted to arithmetical and geometrical speculations, always labouring to effect something, and to make some new discovery, and, in short, continually exercising their skill. In winter nights also they were occupied in the same employments, being vigilantly engaged in literary pursuits, as paying no attention to the acquisition of externals, and being liberated from the servitude of that bad master, excessive expense. Hence their unwearied and incessant labour testifies their endurance, but their continence is manifested by their liberation from the desire of external good. To sail from Egypt likewise, [i.e. to quit Egypt,] was considered by them to be one of the most unholy things, in consequence of their being careful to avoid foreign luxury and pursuits; for this appeared to them to be alone lawful to those who were compelled to do so by regal necessities. Indeed, they were very anxious to continue in the observance of the institutes of their country, and those who were found to have violated them, though but in a small degree were expelled [from the college of the priests]. The |119 true method of philosophizing, likewise, was preserved by the prophets, by the hierostolistae 9, and the sacred scribes, and also by the horologi, or calculators of nativities. But the rest of the priests, and of the pastophori 10, curators of temples, and ministers of the Gods, were similarly studious of purity, yet not so accurately, and with such great continence, as the priests of whom we have been speaking. And such are the particulars which are narrated of the Egyptians, by a man who was a lover of truth, and an accurate writer, and who among the Stoics strenuously and solidly philosophized. SPAN |
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39. Synesius of Cyrene, Dion, 3.2 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
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