ate the rigour of these concessions yet will scarce any palliate that in the fourth of his meteors, that salt is easiest dissolvable in cold water; nor that of Dioscorides, that quicksilver is best preserved in vessels of tin and lead. Other authors write often dubiously, even in matters wherein is expected a strict and definitive truth, extenuating their affirmations with aiunt, ferunt, fortasse ; as Dioscorides, Galen, Aristotle, and many more. Others by hearsay, taking upon trust most they have delivered; whose volumes are mere collections, drawn from the mouths or leaves of other authors, as may be observed in Pliny, Ælian, Athenæus, and many more. Not a few transcriptively, subscribing their names unto other men's endeavours, and merely transcribing almost all they have written. Arabs transcribing the Greeks, the Greeks and Latins each other. And though favourable constructions, &c.] edition. The Added in second 9 That salt is easiest dissolvable in cold water.] Upon examining the entire chapter (vi.) of the Meteors here cited, I found that our author had altogether mistaken the meaning of the passage relating to the solubility of salts. Aristotle does not use the term "cold moisture (for this is the sense of the original, not cold water, as Browne has rendered it) in contradiction to hot moisture, he does not intend to say, as our author infers, that nitre and salts are more readily soluble in cold water than in hot; but he uses the phrase "cold moisture" as the opposite to "dry heat." Not far from the beginning of the chapter, he had previously defined water to be "a cold moisture;" and in the passage in question he says that salts and nitre (the virpov of the Greeks, which was not our nitre, or saltpetre, but the natron of North Africa, one of the carbonates of soda of modern chemistry) are soluble in moisture, using that term to denote humid substances in general, yet not in all moisture, "but in that which is cold." He adds, immediately, which proves this view of the subject to be the true one, "hence they are liquefied by water, and by aqueous fluids in general; (vdaros &ion) but they are not liquefied by oil; " evidently regarding the latter fluid as not being "a cold moisture." It may be remarked also, as an indication of the degree of acquaintance with such subjects possessed by our author, and by the generality of physical inquirers in his time, that he would, to a considerable extent, be himself in error, even had the assertion of Aristotle really been as he represents it; for common salt and several others are actually "easiest dissolvable in cold water."-Br. 1 aiunt, ferunt, fortasse.] These three terms, and such like, argue so much modesty in those magazines of all human [learning?] as might well free them from a censure.-Wr. Thus hath Justine2 borrowed all from Trogus Pompeius, and Julius Solinus in a manner transcribed Pliny. Thus have Lucian and Apuleius served Lucius Pratensis; men both living in the same time, and both transcribing the same author, in those famous books, entituled Lucius by the one, and Aureus Asinus by the other. In the same measure hath Simocrates, in his tract De Nilo, dealt with Diodorus Siculus, as may be observed in that work annexed unto Herodotus, and translated by Jungermannus. Thus Eratosthenes wholly translated Timotheus de Insulis, not reserving the very preface. The same doth Strabo report of Eudorus, and Arstion, in a treatise entituled De Milo. Clemens Alexandrinus hath observed many examples hereof among the Greeks; and Pliny speaketh very plainly in his preface, that conferring his authors, and comparing their works together, he generally found those that went before verbatim transcribed by those that followed after, and their originals never so much as mentioned. To omit how much the wittiest* piece of Ovid is beholden unto Parthenius Chius; even the magnified Virgil hath borrowed almost all his works; his Eclogues from Theocritus, his Georgicks from Hesiod and Aratus, his Æneids from Homer, the second book whereof containing the exploit of Sinon and the Trojan Horse (as Macrobius observeth) he hath verbatim derived from Pisander. Our own profession is not excusable herein. Thus Oribasius, Ætiuus, and Ægineta, have in a manner transcribed Galen. But Marcellus Empericus, who hath left a famous work De Medicamentis, hath word for word transcribed all Scribonius Largus De Compositione Medicamentorum, and not left out his very peroration. Thus may we perceive the ancients were but men, even like ourselves. The practice of transcription in our days was no monster in theirs. Plagiary had not its nativity with printing, but began in times when thefts were difficult, and the paucity of books scarce wanted that invention. Nor did they only make large use of other authors, but often without mention of their names. Aristotle, who seems to have borrowed many things from Hippocrates, in the most favourable construction, makes mention but once of him,† and that by the bye, and without reference unto his present * His Metamorphoses. In his Politicks. 2 Justine.] He cannot be properly said to borrow who professes only an epitome.-Wr. doctrine. Virgil," so much beholding unto Homer,3 hath not his name in all his works; and Pliny, who seems to borrow many authors out of Dioscorides, hath taken no notice of him. I wish men were not still content to plume themselves with others' feathers. Fear of discovery, not single ingenuity, affords quotations rather than transcriptions; wherein, notwithstanding, the plagiarism of many makes little consideration,5 whereof though great authors may complain, small ones cannot but take notice.6 Fourthly, while we so eagerly adhere unto antiquity, and the accounts of elder times, we are to consider the fabulous condition thereof. And that we shall not deny, if we call to mind the mendacity of Greece, from whom wee have received most relations; and that a considerable part of ancient times was by the Greeks themselves termed μúkov, that is, made up, or stuffed out with fables. And surely the 3 beholding unto Homer.] "Very corruptly written," says Johnson, "for beholden, held in obligation, from the Dutch gehouden." But Sir Thomas probably uses the word in the sense of "looking unto Homer," as to an authority or a source of information. 4 66 single ingenuity.] Simple ingenuousness." 5 the plagiarism, &c.] That is, "plagiarism against many authors, who are little known, often escapes detection." 6 Nor did they, &c.] Added in sixth edition. "By the Greeks themselves termed μvoikov, that is, made up, or stuffed out with fables.] Our author seems here to misinterpret to a certain extent the term uvlikov, as applied to the earlier ages of Grecian history; and as his view of this point enters into the consideration of many other subjects discussed in the Pseudodoxia, it may be useful to the reader to offer in this place a few remarks upon what appears to be the true meaning of that term, as employed by the ancients themselves. The remains of Grecian, Egyptian, and Indian antiquity which have come down to us, and the modern investigation of the mythi of the ancients in general, abundantly evince that it was the custom with mankind, at periods of very remote antiquity, to couch whatever instructions or intellectual contemplations they wished to be conveyed to posterity, under the form of a historical relation, but intermingled with circumstances so extraordinary, as showed it was not designed to be literally apprehended. In process of time, however, the meaning of the symbols thus used was forgotten; and then the narratives composed by their aid, being accompanied in their descent to posterity by a feeling of respect which prevented their total rejection, began to be understood according to their literal meaning only, and mankind were lost in amazement at the marvellous things, which they supposed their ancestors to have witnessed. Thus the vulgar, in the latter ages of Greece fabulous inclination of those days was greater than any since; which swarmed so with fables, and from such slender grounds took hints for fictions, poisoning the world ever after wherein how far they succeeded may be exemplified and Rome, looked back with admiration at the times when their heroes went to school to the Centaurs, and when sacred statues or holy shields fell from heaven for the protection of favoured cities. And further the people of the earliest ages of the world appear to have been of a turn of mind so devoted to exalted sentiments and sublime contemplations, that they seem never to have thought of committing to writing accounts of common or historical occurrences: for which reason, as the researches of our own and the preceding age have amply proved, no authentic history of political or civil events, of any very great antiquity, exists, with the exception of the inspired books given through Moses.-Hence, and now we arrive at the true meaning of the term μvokov-the well known remark of Varro: that the space of time before the flood was adnλov-the period of utter obscurity; that the age from the flood to the first Olympiad was μvikov-the period of mythi or of mystery,—not the part of history made up of fables, in the common sense of the term, as our author supposes: and that it was only with the first Olympiad that commenced the period Topikov -that of literal or true history. With this general view of the subject, (for which I must acknowledge myself indebted, substantially, to Lect. vi. of Noble's Plenary Inspiration of the Scriptures,) the results of the profound researches of M. Julius Klaproth into the history and philological antiquities of Asia, especially with respect to the comparative state and nature of history among the Hindûs and the Chinese, entirely concur. The sense here attributed to μvoiкov may also in particular be confirmed from the results at which M. Klaproth has arrived; as used by Varro, it must of course have been suggested by the consideration, principally, of Greek and early Roman history; but M. Klaproth, from the consideration, principally, of the ancient history of Asia, divides the history of ancient nations into mythology, doubtful history, and authentic history; the first of which he states to be "truth in part, enveloped in an impenetrable darkness of fable and allegory," and generally consisting (as M. Klaproth, perhaps somewhat too comprehensively, infers), "of subsequently calculated astronomical periods, metamorphosed into dynasties and heroes." If the views submitted in this note be borne in mind, and much might be added in further confirmation of their truth, from the most recent and satisfactory investigations of the mythi, by the most soberminded inquirers and critics, of all countries, and all schools of ancient literature, the reader will often be enabled to arrive at a more satisfactory solution of the marvellous relations of classical antiquity, than those adopted by our author. To what extent we may receive the explanations of them he has given from Palæphatus and others, may in some degree be inferred from the circumstances mentioned in our note upon the "fable of Charon," p. 47.-Br. from Palæphatus,* in his book of Fabulous Narrations. That fable of Orpheus, who by the melody of his musick made woods and trees to follow him, was raised upon a slender foundation; for there were a crew of mad women retired unto a mountain, from whence, being pacified by his musick, they descended with boughs in their hands; which, unto the fabulosity of those times, proved a sufficient ground to celebrate unto all posterity the magick of Orpheus's harp, and its power to attract the senseless trees about it.8 That Medea, the famous sorceress, could renew youth, and make old men young again, was nothing else, but that from the knowledge of simples, she had a receipt to make white hair black, and reduce old heads into the tincture of youth again. The fable of Geryon and Cerberus with three heads was this: Geryon was of the city Tricarinia, that is, of three heads, and Cerberus of the same place, was one of his dogs, which, running into a cave upon pursuit of his master's * An ancient author who writ IIɛpì dπìoтwv, sive de incredibilibus, whereof some part is yet extant. 8 Orpheus' Harp, &c.] Dr. Delany, in his life of David, produces some ingenious arguments to prove that Orpheus was in reality the same person with David.-J. We are tempted to insert (rather for ornament than illustration) a jeu d'esprit of the late. Lisle See Aiken's Vocal Poetry, 8vo. 1810, p. 228 : When Orpheus went down to the regions below, Which men are forbidden to see, He tuned up his lyre, as old histories show, To set his Eurydice free. All hell was astonish'd, a person so wise Should rashly endanger his life, And venture so far-but how vast their surprise, To find out a punishment due for his fault, But hell had not torments sufficient he thought, But pity succeeding soon vanquish'd his heart, • Tricarinia.-Read Trinacria.- Wr. |