our head that have been corrupted through being employed on generation, by a diligent investigation of the harmonies and circulations of the universe, with the view of assimilating the reflective power to the object of reflection according to its ancient nature;* for, by this assimilation, we shall obtain the end of the best life proposed by the gods to men, both present and future.

LXXII.—And now the discussion which we announced at the beginning concerning the universe, as far at least as concerns the generation of man, is very nearly completed; for as to the rest of the animals, how they were generated, we will only briefly describe them, except where necessity bids us enlarge: for a person may think that he is thus more in measure as concerns such an inquiry. On this subject, then, let us speak as follows:-Of the men that were born, such as are timid, and have passed through life unjustly, are, we suppose, changed into women in their second generation. At that time, then, and for that reason, the gods devised the love of copulation; constructing an animated substance, and placing one in us men, another in the women,-forming each in the following manner :-That passage for the drink, by which these liquids run through the lungs under the reins into the bladder, and which sends them forth as it receives them, by the pressure of the breath,t—this [the gods] made to pass into the condensed marrow, from the head, along the neck, and through the back-bone; and this we called seed in a former part of this discourse:-and this [the marrow], in consequence of being animated and endued with respiration, produces in the part where it respires a lively desire of emission, thus perfecting in us the love of procreation. On this account, the nature of men, as respects their private parts, becoming insubordinate and imperious, like an animal not obedient to reason, tries through raging desire to gain absolute sway. The same is the case with the wombs, and

* Gr. τῷ κατανοουμένῳ τὸ κατανοοῦν ἐξομοιῶσαι κατὰ τὴν ἀρχαίαν púov, &c. The meaning is, that where the reflective powers are employed in meditating on the universe, they are necessarily brought into harmony with the only true objects of intellect,—and which existed indeed from the first creation.

This very erroneous view has been before alluded to in a note on ch. xlv. speaking of the lungs. Plato had evidently no knowledge of the action of the kidneys.

other connected parts of women,-so called, as forming an animal desirous of procreating children. This, when it remains without fruit long beyond its proper time, becomes discontented and indignant; and wandering every way through the body, it obstructs the passage of the breath, and throws women into extreme difficulties, causing all varieties of diseases, till at length the desire and love of both parties [i. e. the man and woman] cause the emission of seed, like fruit from a tree; by which emission, they sow in the womb, as in a field, animals invisible from their minute size, and yet unformed, which, as they become larger, they nourish within; and lastly, by bringing them to light, perfect the generation of animals.

LXXIII. Such is the process of generation in women and every female. Next succeeded the tribe of birds having feathers instead of hair, which were fashioned from men without vice indeed, but light-minded and curious about things on high, yet conceiving in their folly that the strongest proofs of these things are received through the sight [i.e. the senses]. Again, the race of wild animals with feet was generated from men, who made no use of philosophy, nor ever inquired into anything that concerned the nature of the universe,—and this, because they no longer employed the circulations in the head, but followed the guidance of those parts of the soul that reside about the breast. Owing to these pursuits, therefore, they fixed their fore-legs and head earthwards, as suited their nature, having also long and variously-shaped heads, where the circulations of each were compressed by inactivity :—and hence their race became quadruped and multiped, the Deity giving a greater number of feet to those more than usually unwise, that they might be the more drawn towards the earth. But as regards the most unwise of these, which extend all their body along the ground, as if they had no longer any need for feet, the gods formed them without feet to creep on the earth. The fourth class is that living in the water, which was produced from such men as were to the last degree unthinking and ignorant, and whom those transformers of our nature did not think deserving of a pure medium of respiration, because they possessed a soul rendered impure by extreme transgression, but drove them from the attenuated and pure atmosphere into the turbid and deep breathing-medium of

water-and hence arose the tribe of fishes and oysters, and all other aquatic animals, which have received the most remote habitations, as a punishment of their extreme ignorance. After this manner then, both formerly and now, animals migrate into each other; experiencing their changes through either the loss or acquisition of intellect and folly. We are now at length to say, that our discourse about the universe has reached its con.. clusion;-for not only containing, but full of mortal and immortal animals, it has thus been formed a visible animal embracing things visible, a sensible god of the intelligible, the greatest, best, and most perfect, this one only-begotten UNIVERSE.

THE END OF THE TIMÆUS.

INTRODUCTION TO THE CRITIAS.

THIS Dialogue may be considered as an appendix to that preceding, and the fulfilment of a promise which Critias had made in the opening of the Timæus, to give some account of the primæval history of the Athenians, whose early manners he supposed to correspond with those of the citizens in Socrates's ideal republic. The Athenians were a people so boastful of their antiquity, as to arrogate to themselves the name of avróxloves; and therefore any narrative or legend was likely to be agreeable to their feelings, which assigned to them even a higher antiquity than they really possessed. This may probably have been a leading motive with Plato for constructing this amusing dialogue; more than half of which, however, is taken up with the description of the Atlantic islands, its kings and its inhabitants, who all existed in the time of the primitive Athenians, though in Plato's time they were extinct, and their islands submerged in the sea. Many curious speculations have been put forth respecting the geography of the Atlantic isles, and some have gone so far as to conjecture them to have been a portion of the modern America. The whole story, however, has so much the appearance of a myth, that it seems useless to apply to it any of the laws of historical or geographical criticism. The Dialogue, moreover, is so short as scarcely to require any abbreviated account of its contents.