Let not the living star of science' sink To him, who trac'd upon his typic lyre 1 Chamum à posteris hujus artis admiratoribus Zoroastrum, seu vivum astrum, propterea fuisse dictum et pro Deo habitum.-Bochart. Geograph. Sacr. lib. iv. cap. 1. 2 Orpheus. Paulinus, in his Hebdomades, cap. 2. lib. iii. has endeavoured to show, after the Platonists, that man is a diapason, or octave, made up of a diatesseron, which is his soul, and a diapente, which is his body. Those frequent allusions to music, by which the ancient philosophers illustrated their sublime theories, must have tended very much to elevate the character of the art, and to enrich it with associations of the grandest and most interesting nature. See a preceding note, for their ideas upon the harmony of the spheres. Heraclitus compared the mixture of good and evil in this world to the blended varieties of harmony in a musical instrument (Plutarch. de Anima Procreat.); and Euryphamus, the Pythagorean, in a fragment preserved by Stobaeus, describes human life, in its perfection, as a sweet and well tuned lyre. Some of the ancients were so fanciful as to suppose that the operations of the memory were regulated by a kind of musical cadence, and that ideas occurred to it" per arsin et thesin," while others converted the whole man into a mere harmonised machine, whose motion depended upon a certain tension of the body, analogous to that of the strings in an instrument. Cicero indeed ridicules Aristoxenus for this fancy, and says, "Let him teach singing, and leave philosophy to Aristotle;" but Aristotle himself, though decidedly opposed to the harmonic speculations of the Pythagoreans and Platonists, could sometimes condescend to enliven his doctrines by reference to the beauties of musical science; as, in the treatise Пep Kooμov attributed to him, Kadanep de το χώρο, κορυφαίου καταρξαντος, κ. τ. λ. The Abbé Batteux, in his inquiry into the doctrine of the Stoics, attributes to those philosophers the same mode of illustration. "L'âme étoit cause active rossi acting; le corps cause passive de rou #aoxew:l'une agissant dans l'autre; et y prenant, par son action même, un caractère, des formes, des modifications, qu'elle n'avoit pas par elle-même; à peu près comme l'air, qui, chassé dans un instrument de musique, fait connoître, par les différens sons qu'il produit, les différentes modifications qu'il y reçoit." See a fine simile founded upon this notion in Cardinal Polignac's poem, lib. 5. v. 734. 3 Pythagoras is represented in Iamblichus as descending with great solemnity from Mount Carmel, for which reason the Carmelites have claimed him as one of their fraternity. This Mochus or Moschus, with the descendants of whom Pythagoras conversed in Phoenicia, and from whom he derived the doctrines of atomic philosophy, is supposed by some to be the same with Moses. Huett has adopted this idea, Demonstration Evangélique, Prop. iv. chap. 2. § 7. ; and Le Clerc, amongst others, has refuted it. See Biblioth. Choisie, tom. i. p. 75. It is certain, however, that the doctrine of atoms was known and promulgated long before Epicurus. "With the fountains of Democritus," says Cicero, "the gardens of Epicurus were watered;" and the learned author of the Intellectual System has shown, that all the early philosophers, till the time of Plato, were atomists. We find Epicurus, however, boasting that his tenets were new and unborrowed, and perhaps few among the ancients had any stronger claim to originality. In truth, if we examine their schools of philosophy, notwithstanding the peculiarities which seem to distinguish them from each other, we may generally observe that the difference is but verbal and trifling; and that, among those various and learned heresies, there is scarcely one to be selected, whose opinions are its own, original and exclusive. The doctrine of the world's eternity may be traced through all the sects. The continual metempsychosis of Pythagoras, the grand periodic year of the Stoics, (at the conclusion of which the universe is supposed to return to its original order, and commence a new revolution,) the successive dissolution and combination of atoms maintained by the Epicureans all these tenets are but different intimations of the same general belief in the eternity of the world. As explained by St. Austin, the periodic year of the Stoics disagrees only so far with the idea of the Pythagoreans, that instead of an endless transmission of the soul through a variety of bodies, it restores the same body and soul to repeat their former round of existence, so that the "identical Plato, who lectured in the Academy of Athens, shall again and again, at certain intervals, during the lapse of eternity, appear in the same Academy and resume the same functions: "sic eadem tempora temporaliumque rerum volumina repeti, ut v. g. And the grand Doric heptachord of heaven. sicut in isto sæculo Plato philosophus in urbe Atheniensi, in es schola quæ Academia dicta est, discipulos docuit, ita per innume rabilia retro sæcula, multum plexis quidem intervallis, sed certis, et idem Plato, et eadem civitas, eademque schola, iidemque discipuli repetiti et per innumerabilia deinde sæcula repetendi sint.-De Ci vitat. Dei, lib. xii. cap. 13. Vanini, in his dialogues, has given us similar explication of the periodic revolutious of the world. Et de causâ, qui nunc sunt in usu ritus, centies millies fuerunt, totiesque renascentur quoties ceciderunt." 52. The paradoxical notions of the Stoics upon the beauty, the riches, the dominion of their imaginary sage, are among the most distinguishing characteristics of their school, and, according to their advocate Lipsius, were peculiar to that sect. "Priors ills (decreta) quæ passim in philosophantium scholis ferè obtinent, ists quæ peculiaria huic sectæ et habent contradictionem: i.e. paradoxa." -Manuduct. ad Stoic. Philos. lib. iii. dissertat. 2. But it is evident (as the Abbé Garnier has remarked, Mémoires de l'Acad. tom. xxxv.) that even these absurdities of the Stoics are borrowed, and that Plato is the source of all their extravagant paradoxes. We find their dogma, "dives qui sapiens," (which Clement of Alexandria has transferred from the Philosopher to the Christian. Pædagog. lib. iii. cap. 6.) expressed in the prayer of Socrates at the end of the Phedrus. Ω φίλο Παν τε και αλλοι όσοι τον θεον, βάση τα μάτι καλώ γενέσθαι τανδοθεν, ταξωθεν δε όσα έχουν τους αυτός είναι από φύκια πλούσιον δε νομίζουμε τον σοφον. And many other instances might be adduced from the Αντερασται, the Πολιτικός, &e. to prove that there weeds of paradox were all gathered among the bowers of the Academy. Hence it is that Cicero, in the preface to his Paradoxes, calls them Socratica; and Lipsius, exulting in the patronage of Socrates, says, "Ille totus est noster." This is indeed a coalition, which evinces as much as can be wished the confused similitude of ancient philosophical opinions: the father of scepticism is here enrolled amongst the founders of the Portico; he, whose b knowledge was that of his own ignorance, is called in to authors the pretensions of the most obstinate dogmatists in all antiquity. Rutilius, in his Itinerarium, has ridiculed the sabbath of the Jews, as "lassati mollis imago Dei; " but Epicurus gave an eterna holiday to his gods, and, rather than disturb the lumbers of Olympus, denied at once the interference of a Providence. He does not, however, seem to have been singular in this opinion. Theophilus of Antioch, if he deserve any credit, imputes a similar belief to Pythagoras: - no. (Iludayopaç) te rwy Tastes Brous exfporus under $povrišew. And Plutarch, though so hostile to the followers of Epicurus, has unaccountably adopted the very same theological error. Thus, after quoting the opinions of Anaxagoras and Phia upon divinity, he adds, Koç our dμaptarsevi autorepos, dra row fem εποίησαν επιστρεφόμενον των ανθρωπινων - De Placit. Philose. Πα cap. 7. Plato himself has attributed a degree of indifference to Liz gods, which is not far removed from the apathy of Epicura's heaven; as thus, in his Philebus, where Protarchus asks, Ove me εικός γε αυτή χαίρειν θεούς, ούτε το εναντίον ; and Socrates answers, 1 μεν ουν εικός, ασχημον γουν αὐτῶν ἑκατέρων γιγνομένου στην πε Aristotle supposes a still more absurd neutrality, and concludes, no very flattering analogy, that the deity is as incapable of virtue as of vice. Και γαρ ώσπερ ουδεν θηρίου εστι κακία, ουδ' αρετή, ούτως cov.-Ethic. Nicomach. lib. vii. cap. 1. In truth, Aristotle, up the subject of Providence, was little more correct than Epicurus He supposed the moon to be the limit of divine interferenOT, EXcluding of course this sublunary world from its influence. The first definition of the world, in his treatise a Keres if th treatise be really the work of Aristotle), agrees, almost vent verbo, with that in the letter of Epicurus to Pythocles: and both omit the mention of a deity. In his Ethics, too, he intimates a doubt whether the gods feel any interest in the concerns of mankind.Ει γαρ τις επιμέλεια των ανθρωπίνων ύπο ένων γεντικών It is true, he adds, rep does, but even this is very sceptical. In these erroneous conceptions of Aristotle, we trace the caus of that general neglect which his philosophy experienced an ag the early Christians. Plato is seldom much more orthodox, bet the obscure enthusiasm of his style allowed them to accommodated his fancies to their own purpose. Such glowing steel was easy moulded, and Platonism became a sword in the hands of the fathers. Of calmer converse, he beguil'd us on Of heavenly truth lay, like a broken beam And bright through every change!- he spoke of The lone, eternal One, who dwells above, And of the soul's untraceable descent Through meads of flowery light and mines of gold, When pour'd at length into the dusky deep, And here the old man ceas'd- a winged train Of nymphs and genii bore him from our eyes. The fair illusion fled! and, as I wak'd, 'Twas clear that my rapt soul had roam'd the while, From that high fount of spirit, through the To that bright realm of dreams, that spirit-world, grades Of intellectual being, till it mix With atoms vague, corruptible, and dark; Nor yet even then, though sunk in earthly dross, Corrupted all, nor its ethereal touch Quite lost, but tasting of the fountain still. As some bright river, which has roll'd along The Providence of the Stoics, so vaunted in their school, was a power as contemptibly inefficient as the rest. All was fate in the system of the Portico. The chains of destiny were thrown over Jupiter himself, and their deity was like the Borgia of the epigrammatist," et Cæsar et nihil." Not even the language of Seneca can reconcile this degradation of divinity, Ille ipse omnium conditor ac rector scripsit quidem fata, sed sequitur; semper paret, semel jussit."- Lb. de Providentia, cap. 5. With respect to the difference between the Stoics, Peripatetics, and Academicians, the following words of Cicero prove that he saw but Little to distinguish them from each other :-" Peripateticos et Academicos, nominibus differentes, re congruentes; a quibus Stoici fp verbis magis quam sententiis dissenserunt."-Academic. lib. ii. 5.; and perhaps what Reid has remarked upon one of their points of controversy might be applied as effectually to the reconcilement of all the rest. "The dispute between the Stoics and Peripatetics was probably all for want of definition. The one said they were good under the control of reason, the other that they should be eradicated." Essays, vol. iii. In short, it appears a no less difficult matter to establish the boundaries of opinion between any twa of the philosophical sects, than it would be to fix the landmarks of those estates in the moon, which Ricciolus so generously allotted to his brother astronomers. Accordingly we observe some of the greatest men of antiquity passing without scruple from school to school, according to the fancy or convenience of the moment. Cicero, the father of Roman philosophy, is sometimes an Academatian, sometimes a Stoic; and, more than once, he acknowledges a conformity with Epicurus; "non sine causâ igitur Epicurus ausus est dicere semper in pluribus bonis esse sapientem, quia semper sit in voluptatibus.” — Tusculan. Quæst. lib. v. Though often pure in his theology, Cicero sometimes smiles at futurity as a fiction; thus, in his Oration for Cluentius, speaking of punishments in the life to come, he says, “Que si falsa sunt, id quod omnes intelligunt, quid ei tandem aliud more eripuit, prætur sensum doloris ?"- though here we should, perhaps, do him but justice by agreeing with his commentator Sylvius, who remarks upon this passage," Hæc autem dixit, ut cause suæ subserviret." The poet Horace roves like a butterfly through the schools, and now wings along the walls of the Porch, now basks among the flowers of the Garden; while Virgil, with a tone of mind strongly philosophical, has yet left us wholly uncertain as to the sect which he espoused. The balance of opinion declares him to have been an Epicurean, but the ancient author of his life, asserts that he was an Academician; and we trace through hpoetry the tenets of almost all the leading sects. The same kind of eclectic indifference is observable in most of the Roman writers. The Propertius, in the fine elegy to Cynthia, on his departure for Athens, Illie vel studiis animum emendare Platonis, Incipiam, aut hortis, docte Epicure, tuis. Lib. iii. Eleg. 21. Though Broeckhusius here reads, "dux Epicure," which seems to x the poet under the banners of Epicurus. Even the Stoic Seneca, Which mortals know by its long track of light O'er midnight's sky, and call the Galaxy.' whose doctrines have been considered so orthodox, that St. Jerome has ranked him amongst the ecclesiastical writers, while Boccaccio doubts (in consideration of his supposed correspondence with St. Paul) whether Dante should have placed him in Limbo with the rest of the Pagans-even the rigid Seneca has bestowed such commendations on Epicurus, that if only those passages of his works were preserved to us, we could not hesitate, I think, in pronouncing him a confirmed Epicurean. With similar inconsistency, we find Porphyry, in his work upon abstinence, referring to Epicurus as an example of the most strict Pythagorean temperance; and Lancelotti (the author of "Farfalloni degli antici Istorici") has been seduced by this grave reputation of Epicurus into the absurd error of associating him with Chrysippus, as a chief of the Stoic school. There is no doubt, indeed, that however the Epicurcan sect might have relaxed from its original purity, the morals of its founder were as correct as those of any among the ancient philosophers; and his doctrines upon pleasure, as explained in the letter to Menaceus, are rational, amiable, and consistent with our nature. A late writer, De Sablons, in his Grands Hommes vengés, expresses strong indignation against the Encyclopédistes for their just and animated praises of Epicurus, and discussing the question, "si ce philosophe étoit vertueux," denies it upon no other authority than the calumnies collected by Plutarch, who himself confesses that, on this particular subject, he consulted only opinion and report, without pausing to investigate their truth. - Αλλα την δόξαν, οὗ την αλη Becav OkоTrouμev. To the factious zeal of his illiberal rivals, the Stoics, Epicurus chiefly owed these gross misrepresentations of the life and opinions of himself and his associates, which, notwithstanding the learned exertions of Gassendi, have still left an odium on the name of his philosophy; and we ought to examine the ancient accounts of this philosopher with about the same degree of cautious belief which, in reading ecclesiastical history, we yield to the invectives of the fathers against the heretics,- trusting as little to Plutarch upon a dogma of Epicurus, as we would to the vehement St. Cyril upon a tenet of Nestorius. (1801.) The preceding remarks, I wish the reader to observe, were written at a time, when I thought the studies to which they refer much more important as well as more amusing than, I freely confess, they appear to me at present. Lactantius asserts that all the truths of Christianity may be found dispersed through the ancient philosophical sects, and that any one who would collect these scattered fragments of orthodoxy might form a code in no respect differing from that of the Christian. "Si extitisset aliquis, qui veritatem sparsam per singulos per sectasque diffusam colligeret in unum, ac redigeret in corpus, is profecto non dissentiret a nobis."- Inst. lib. vi. c. 7. 2 Το μόνον και ερημον. 3 This bold Platonic image I have taken from a passage in Father Bouchet's letter upon the Metempsychosis, inserted in Picart's Céré m. Relig. tom. iv. 4 According to Pythagoras, the people of Dreams are souls collected together in the Galaxy. - Δήμος δε ονειρων, κατά Πυθαγόραν, αἱ ψυχαι ὡς συνάγεσθαι φησιν εις τον γαλαξίαν. - Porphyr. de Antro Nymph. MRS. ΤΟ To see thee every day that came, Where are the chords she us'd to touch? ΤΟ LADY HEATHCOTE, ON AN OLD RING FOUND AT TUNBRIDGE-WELLS. "Tunnebridge est à la même distance de Londres, que Fontainebleau l'est de Paris. Ce qu'il y a de beau et de galant dans l'un et dans l'autre sexe s'y rassemble au tems des eaux. La compagnie," &c. &c. See Mémoires de Grammont, Second Part, chap iii. WHEN Grammont grac'd these happy springs, That ever rul'd these gay, gallant isles; At eve, they did as we may do, That woman then, if man beset her, Where, every fear to slumber charm'd, Lovers were all they ought to be, And husbands not the least alarm'd. Of weeds, that "have no business there!' And thus they miss'd and thus they hit, And now they struck and now they parried; And some laid in of full-grown wit, While others of a pun miscarried. "Twas one of those facetious nights That Grammont gave this forfeit ring For breaking grave conundrum-rites, Or punning ill, or some such thing: From whence it can be fairly trac'd, Through many a branch and many a bough, From twig to twig, until it grac'd The snowy hand that wears it now. All this I'll prove, and then, to you, Oh Tunbridge! and your springs ironical, I swear by Heathcote's eye of blue Their mantles to your modern lodgers, For ever be those fops abolish'd, And, Heaven knows! not half so polish'd. And acting Grammont every night. THE DEVIL AMONG THE SCHOLARS, A FRAGMENT. Τι κακον ὁ γελως ή CHRYSOST. Homil. in Epist. ad Hebræos, BUT, whither have these gentle ones, Instead of studying tomes scholastic, Off I fly, careering far In chase of Pollys, prettier far Than any of their namesakes are,— Mamurra, a dogmatic philosopher, who never doubted about anything, except who was his father. "Nulla de re unquam Præterquam de patre dubitavit."-In Vit. He was very learned — "L-dedans, (that is, in his head when it was opened,) le Punique hearte le Perean, l'Hébreu choque l'Arabique, pour ne point parler de la mauvaise intelligence du Latin avec le Grec," &c. - See L'Histoire de Montmaur, tom. ii. p. 91. Bombastus was one of the names of that great scholar and qack Paracelsus."Philippus Bombastus latet sub splendido termine Aureoli Theophrasti Paracelsi," says Stadelius de circumfrand Literatorum vanitate. He used to fight the devil every tight with a broadsword, to the no small terror of his pupil Oporise, who has recorded the circumstance. (Vide Oporin. Vit. apud Christian. Gryph. Vit. Select. quorundam Eruditissimorum, Paracelsus had but a poor opinion of Galen :-"My very beard (ays he in his Paragrænum) has more learning in it than either Galen or Avicenna." The angel, who scolded St. Jerom for reading Cicero, as Gratian tells the story in his Concordantia discordantium Canonum,' sad says, that for this reason bishops were not allowed to read the Cassies: Episcopus Gentilium libros non legat." - Distinct. 37. Bet Gratian is notorious for lying-besides, angels, as the illustrious pupil of Pantenus assures us, have got no tongues. Ox's hui ra στα, ούτως εκεινους ή γλώττα ουδ' αν οργανα τις ζωη φωνης αγγελοις. Cm. Alexand. Stromat. 4 The idea of the Rabbins respecting the origin of woman is not ttle singular. They think that man was originally formed with a tail. like a monkey, but that the Deity cut off this appendage and made woman of it. Upon this extraordinary supposition the following reflection is founded: If such is the tie between women and men, Why he leaves her behind him as much as he can. But to begin my subject rhyme"Twas just about this devilish time, When scarce there happen'd any frolics That were not done by Diabolics, A cold and loveless son of Lucifer, Who woman scorn'd, nor saw the use of her, A branch of Dagon's family, 5 (Which Dagon, whether He or She, 5 Scaliger. de Emendat. Tempor.- Dagon was thought by others to be a certain sea-monster, who came every day out of the Red Sea to teach the Syrians husbandry. See Jacques Gaffarel (Curiosités Inouïes, chap. i.), who says he thinks this story of the seamonster "carries little show of probability with it." 6 I wish it were known with any degree of certainty whether the Commentary on Boethius attributed to Thomas Aquinas be really the work of this Angelic Doctor. There are some bold assertions hazarded in it: for instance, he says that Plato kept school in a town called Academia, and that Alcibiades was a very beautiful woman whom some of Aristotle's pupils fell in love with:-" Alcibiades mulier fuit pulcherrima, quam videntes quidam discipuli Aristotelis," &c. - See Freytag Adparat. Litterar. art. 86. tom. i. 7 The following compliment was paid to Laurentius Valla, upon his accurate knowledge of the Latin language:— Nunc postquam manes defunctus Valla petivit, His nouns and pronouns all so pat in, To say his soul's his own, in Latin ! See for these lines the "Auctorum Censio," of Du Verdier (page 29.). 8 It is much to be regretted that Martin Luther, with all his talents for reforming, should yet be vulgar enough to laugh at Camerarius for writing to him in Greek. "Master Joachim (says he) has sent me some dates and some raisins, and has also written me two letters in Greek. As soon as I am recovered, I shall answer them in Turkish, that he too may have the pleasure of reading what he does not understand." "Græca sunt, legi non possunt," is the ignorant speech attributed to Accursius; but very unjustly for, far from asserting that Greek could not be read, that worthy jurisconsult upon the Law 6. D. de Bonor. Possess.expressly says, "Græcæ literæ possunt intelligi et legi." (Vide Nov. Libror. Rarior. Collection. Fascic. IV.)-Scipio Carteromachus seems to have been of opinion that there is no salvation out of the pale of Greek Literature: "Via prima salutis Graia pandetur ab urbe:" and the zeal of Laurentius Rhodomannus cannot be sufficiently admired, when he exhorts his countrymen, "per gloriam And never paid a bill or balance That though you were the learn'd Stagirite, He dearly loved, 'cause no one heard it,) But, as for all your warbling Delias, He own'd he thought them much surpass'd Likewise to show his mighty knowledge, he, But 'twas in Optics and Dioptrics, Christi, per salutem patriæ, per reipublicæ decus et emolumentum," to study the Greek language. Nor must we forget Phavorinus, the excellent Bishop of Nocera, who, careless of all the usual commendations of a Christian, required no further eulogium on his tomb than "Here lieth a Greek Lexicographer." I'O mavv.-The introduction of this language into English poetry has a good effect, and ought to be more universally adopted. A word or two of Greek in a stanza would serve as ballast to the most "light o' love" verses. Ausonius, among the ancients, may serve as a model :- Ου γαρ μοι θεμις εστιν in hac regione μενοντι Ronsard, the French poet, has enriched his sonnets and odes with many an exquisite morsel from the Lexicon. His "chère Entelechie," in addressing his mistress, can only be equalled by Cowley's "Antiperistasis." 2 Or Glass-Breaker - Morhofius has given an account of this extraordinary man, in a work, published 1682,-"De vitreo scypho fracto," &c. He thought the aberrating rays, Is for the eyes a great emporium, To which these noted picture-stealers Send all they can and meet with dealers. The brain, he said, show'd great good-breeding. (A trick which Barbara tutor❜d him in), Yet instantly the modest brain Our doctor thus, with "stuff'd sufficiency" In which the Greeks and Romans drest, [us,) 3 Translated almost literally from a passage in Albertus de Secretis, &c. 4 Alluding to that habitual act of the judgment, by which, notwithstanding the inversion of the image upon the retina, a correci impression of the object is conveyed to the sensorium. 5 Under this description, I believe, "the Devil among the Scholars," may be included. Yet Leibnitz found out the uses of incomprehensibility, when he was appointed secretary to a society of philosophers at Nuremberg, chiefly for his ingenuity in writing s cabalistical letter, not one word of which either they or himself could interpret. See the Eloge Historique de M. de Leibni l'Europe Savante. People in all ages have loved to be puzzled. We find Cicero thanking Atticus for having sent him a work of Serapion "ex quo (says he) quidem ego (quod inter nos Eerst dicere) milesimam partem. vix intelligo." Lib. ii. epist. 4. And we know that Avicenna, the learned Arabian, read Aristotle's Metaphysics forty times over for the mere pleasure of being able to inform the world that he could not comprehend one syllabis throughout them. (Nicholas Massa in Vit. Avicen.) |