Page:The battle of the books - Guthkelch - 1908.djvu/318

244 But Stesichorus had been a proper instance, if the letters be true; for he was twelve years the tyrant's friend, and died too before him. So that Lucian's not mentioning him, shews he knew nothing of the Epistles; as on the contrary his mentioning Pythagoras, shews he knew nothing of that story of his deposing Phalaris.

In the next place, Mr B. accounts for Plato's silence about the friendship of Stesichorus and Phalaris; because Plato mentions nothing there of the acquaintance between Pythagoras and Phalaris. An admirable account indeed! Plato, says Mr B., might omit the mention of Stesichorus's friendship with Phalaris, and yet might believe it true; because he mentions not another friendship, that in all probability is as mere a fiction as that. Which is as just as if he reasoned thus, the ancients in their accounts of Æsop, say nothing of his ugliness, and yet they might believe it: because they say nothing neither of Xanthus the philosopher with his company of scholiastics. But, says Mr B., the Pythagoreans all agree that their master and Phalaris were acquainted; and Dr B. grants it. I granted they were contemporaries; and