Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/521

 APPENDIX. 513 nidos meant it to tlieir disparagement, as if those could liave little wortli whom tlioir enemies did not think it worth while to complain of. Thirteen letters professing to be Plato's have come down to us, almost all relating to these more eventful passages of his life, and addressed to Dion, Dion's friends, and Dionysius himself. It is of course highly probable that let- ters of this description would be fabricated, — it is more probable, perhaps, that any extant compositions of the kind should be fictitious, than that they should be genuine. These which we have are not what we should expect Plato's, let- ters to be, and yet, on the other hand, are not what we should e.xpect to have been written for him. Plutarch quotes the fourth and seventh ; and some critics have considered these to be, not Plato's own, but early compositions by some im- mediate disciples, written in his name, as a defence of his conduct. Mr. Grote appears to treat the whole collection as genuine. Life of Brutus, pages 325, 32G. — Letters of Brutus to Cicero and to Atticus, in which the phrases quoted by Plutarch occur, have come down to us in a series from Cicero to Bratus (_Epist. ad Brutum, I. 16, 17). But this whole collection also is regarded with suspicion. Page 329. — Plutarch discusses the nature of this ravenous or famishing ox- hunger (as the Greek word is), in the Symposiac Questions {VI. 8). Page 339. — Favonius might very aptly quote the whole passage from Homer : Ah me, truly gi'eat grief to the land of Achaia is coming. Truly would Priam be glad and all the children of Priam, And every Trojan else be greatly rejoiced in his spirit, Should he be told the news of you contending together, Who are in counsel best of the Danaans, and in the battle. Be persuaded; you are, both of you, younger than I am, I have consorted ere this with men much greater than you are — etc. Page 358. — Punish, great Jove, Euripides, Medea, 332. It has been thought that by the verse which Volumnius says he forgot we may understand two which Dion Cassius gives. " Alas, poor Virtue, you were, it seems, a mere word, I practised j-ou as a reality, but you were the slave of fortune." This, however, was a very well-known conmionplace on the subject, and Dion's statement must be considered quite doubtful. Page 365. — A real likeness, i. e., an iconic statue ; compare the first note on the Life of Lysander, Vol. IIL, p. 104, Appendix. Life of AEATUS,page 367. — The quotation from Pindar is from the eighth P}'thian ode, line 44. Page 381. — A year after, being again elected general. Not one year after, but eight, as we find from Polybius. Plutarch's phrase is a little ambiguous; it is possible that the word eight has slipped out. Page 411. — The fragment of Simonides is only known by this mention of it. It is probably confined to the words sweet and something excusable. Life of Artaxerxes, page 451. — The verse from Sophocles is an un- certain fragment. No 57; 714 in Dindorf. Life of Galba, page 464. — Mauriscus, both really and in reputation one of the best of the city, is probably Julius Mauricus, mentioned with honor both VOL. V. 33