Selected Essays of Plutarch, Vol. II. — Edition Insights

, and suggests that, with some corrections and the removal of obsolete words, North’s work might still serve ‘especially with gentlemen, who if the expression bee playne looke not into criticisme’. ‘If you have the Greek Plutarke,’ he writes, ‘have also the Latin adjoyned unto it, so you may consult either upon occasion, though you apply yourself to translate out of French, and the English translation may be sometimes helpful.’ Very likely an acceptable version of the _Moralia_ might now be produced out of Amyot and Philemon Holland, a racy and scholarly translator from the Greek, with the original and the old Latin at hand for reference. But Dr. Edward Browne was a physician, of little leisure and of delicate health, and it might hardly be respectful to Plutarch to adopt this procedure now; indeed it seems to recall that of ‘the dog’ in the proverb, who ‘drinks from the Nile’, running as he drinks, always with an eye on the crocodiles. However this may be, some indulgence may fairly be claimed by a translator of an author, who, however straight-forward himself, abounds in allusion and latent quotation, and also in difficulties of text not of his own making, and upon whom no commentary exists. I will mention, for the sake of clearness, two instances as to which I have troubled myself and, I fear, others a good deal:

In the dialogue _On the Genius of Socrates_, chap. iii, end (577 A), the speaker says that his brother Epaminondas is keeping out of the patriotic enterprise in hand, on the ground that the more hot-headed members of the party will not stop short of a general massacre and the murder of many of the leading citizens.

I have followed the Latin version in so rendering the words καὶ διαφθεῖραι πολλοὺς τῶν διαφερόντων. But I have felt some doubt—needlessly, I think—whether the Greek participle would bear this meaning, and also whether the sense so given is strong and suitable. Wyttenbach felt doubts too, for in his posthumous _Index_, s.v. διαφέρω, the rendering given is ‘hostes vel amici’, i.e. ‘friends or foes’. The sense is excellent, but seems hardly to be in the Greek; probably it was a mere query or jotting. The Teubner editor prints τῶν ἰδίᾳ διαφόρων ὄντων, i.e. ‘those with whom they had private differences’, giving Cobet’s name for the last two words. I have not been able to trace the reference in Cobet, but in _Novae Lectiones_, p. 565, he examines instances where he thinks that ἰδίᾳ should be supplied or suppressed, as the case may be, before compounds of διά. The sense seems good, but too special to be introduced into a text without cogent evidence, since, once given currency, it is difficult for a future critic to go back upon it. Meanwhile, in Wyttenbach’s note on ii, 75 A, he collects many instances where οἱ διάφοροι is used by Plutarch for ‘the enemy’, ‘the other party’, and τῶν διαφερόντων may have grown out of τῶν διαφόρων with τῶν repeated. I have thought it the more peaceable course to preserve the old rendering. I only quote this instance, which is of no great importance but is of some, as one where a _Variorum_ editor would have stated at length and evaluated the possible alternatives. That a translator should do so is perhaps a case of ‘putting the cart before the horse’.

The other instance is one of real interest, where the problem is perhaps insoluble upon our present knowledge. In the long dialogue _On the Cessation of the Oracles_, c. 20 (420 c.), where Cleombrotus has been pressing a view that there may be daemons with a long, but yet a limited, term of existence, against the Epicureans, whose own strange theory of _Eidola_ he derides, Ammonius replies in words which appear thus in the Latin:

‘Recte, inquit, mihi pronunciare videtur Theophrastus, quid enim obstat quin sententiam gravissimam et philosophiae convenientissimam recipiamus dicentis: opinionem de Daemonibus, si reiciatur, multa eorum simul abolere quae fieri possunt demonstratione autem carent; _sin admittatur multa secum trahere impossibilia et quae non exstiterint_.’

Amyot and others write ‘Cleombrotus’ for ‘Theophrastus’, a change which, in view of Plutarch’s carelessness as to personal names, seems not unlikely, and helps a little. No doubt Theophrastus is quoted, but his name need not have been mentioned, and may have been brought into the text in the wrong place. The absurdity of the words which I have given in italics seems evident, and I have returned to a suggestion of Xylander,[2] by introducing a negative before πολλά, assuming that Theophrastus is quoted, not for any opinion about daemons, but for a canon of what is logically ‘probable’. More subtle solutions are suggested, which could not be discussed here properly: the question seems too intricate to be settled by a translator as he goes on his way. We really want to know what Theophrastus said.

The remarks on the absence of a commentary do not apply to the dialogue on _Instances of Delay in Divine Punishment_, fully annotated by Wyttenbach in 1772, nor to the essay _On Superstition_ and the greater part of _The E at Delphi_, which are dealt with in his continuous commentary. Nor should I omit to mention the great help afforded by Kepler’s notes on the _Face in the Moon_ and his scholarly translation.

The large number of poetical quotations in Plutarch often stop a translator’s hand. Wherever it is possible, I have turned to standard versions: for Homer to that of Worsley completed by Conington, for Pindar’s extant Odes to that of Bishop George Moberly, which it has been an especial pleasure to use; for some lines of the _Cyclops_ of Euripides I have been fortunate enough to draw upon Shelley. There remain a good many fragments, some of them of real poetical quality, and some jingling oracles and the like; for the latter doggerel is the proper vehicle, for the former the best attainable doggerel must serve. The range of Plutarch’s poetical quotations seems strangely limited considering their number. All are Greek, and most from the older poets; indeed, with the exception of a few from the New Comedy, nearly all might have been used by Plato. Those from the Tragedians are always to the point, but he does not appear to care from which of the three he is borrowing.[3] Homer and Hesiod always bring a welcome flavour of an older world. Perhaps Pindar is the poet whom he quotes with most hearty appreciation. Though he has given us many new poetical fragments, he introduces us to few, if any, new poets. Of Bacchylides there are only two slight quotations in all Plutarch’s works. A single reference to a passage of Horace is all that shows a knowledge of the existence of Roman poetry.

Southey’s comparison between the _Moralia_ and the _Lives_ need not be pressed; it is the scholar’s preference for the rare, which is his by privilege, over the popular. But it is well to realize, as it is easy to do with the help of indices, that the author’s hand is one in both. It is agreed that the _Lives_ belong to Plutarch’s later years, and were written at Chaeroneia, under the limitations of his own library; the several books appeared at intervals, of what length we cannot say.[4] The few indications of date mentioned in the introductions to the dialogues now before us suggest the later part of Vespasian’s reign or the years nearly following it, say from A.D. 80 on. The dialogue on the _Instances of Delay in Divine Punishment_ from its simpler psychology and demonology, and perhaps from some crudity in style, suggests a date earlier than that of some of the others. Dr. Max Adler, in his lucid and learned dissertation, has established the close connexion between the _Face in the Moon_ and the _Cessation of the Oracles_, and thinks the former to have been the earlier, and to have been utilized for the latter piece.[5]

Montaigne, who knew his Plutarch up and down, has said that he is one of the authors whom he likes to take after the manner of the Danaids,[6] which may be described as a method of ‘dip and waste’. You may dip anywhere, as you may into the pages of _The Doctor_, and be sure of finding something which you would wish to remember; but you may also find, on re-reading the same passage, that you have not remembered it at all, so that the waste is continual. The freshness need not be impaired by a little more system; indeed it would be enhanced, at least for the dialogues, for this reason, that they all represent real conversations between real persons, and it is worth our while to put together our impressions about each. The fullest materials for such an attempt will be found in the _Symposiacs_ or dialogues over wine.[7]

The _Symposiacs_ are arranged in nine books, each of which contains ten conversations of unequal length, but all short, except the last which has fifteen. On the other hand nine, viz. four of the fourth book and five of the last, are missing, only the titles being preserved. All the books are dedicated to Sossius Senecio, who was consul first in A.D. 99; and as there is no reference to the dignity, we may perhaps infer that all were written before that year.[8] There is not a single reference in all the nine books to any public or personal event which might help us to a date. We hear of the ‘year’ of officials of the Greek games, of Plutarch’s return from a visit to Alexandria, and of a marriage in his family, which Sossius Senecio attended, but we cannot follow these clues.[9] Many of the discussions are about wine and wine-parties; in others the range of subject is very wide, from ‘What Plato meant by saying, if he did say, that God geometrizes’ to ‘Whether the table should be cleared after dinner’, or ‘Why truffles grow after thunder’. A good many are on medical subjects; in one of them the promising problem, ‘Whether new diseases can arise, and from what causes’, is well argued. The physicians present show a full knowledge of the Natural History found in the works of Aristotle and Theophrastus, and the laymen seem to argue with them on equal terms. There is little or no pleasantry about professional habits, the fees or the pedantry, except that in one party a physician is host, and sets on the table an inordinately good dinner, while certain young men of severe habits put him to a great deal of trouble to produce some cheese to eat with their dry bread.[10]

In the first dialogue of the First Book the question is raised, ‘Whether philosophy may be discussed over wine’. The answer appears to be ‘Why not?’ but probably none of the following dialogues would be called ‘philosophical’ by philosophers. Plutarch loved a vigorous set-to, with no quarter given, ‘nothing for hate, but all for honour’, as much as did Montaigne.[11] But he felt deeply about the matters at issue between Stoics and Epicureans, the two schools which mattered. Believing himself in a Providence, kindly and particular, associated by him with the Apollo of Delphi, he disliked equally the Epicurean who flouted a Providence, and the Stoic who lowered it by his pedantry and contradictions. He would not have a scene over the wine. Even in the daylight dialogues now before us, the cynic ‘Planetiades’ is skilfully bowed out before there is trouble, and ‘Epicurus’ takes himself off before the reported discussion begins, leaving the company surprised rather than angry.

The titles of the five lost dialogues of the last book (the others of that book being all on literary subjects) are curious. Three are connected with music; and I should have the permission of those who have kindly helped me here to say that there is about Greek music a considerable region of dim penumbra. Another raises a question discussed in the _De Facie_ and answered there out of Aristotle and Posidonius, as to the eclipses of sun and moon. Another is on the problem ‘Whether the total number of the stars is more probably even than odd’. The speakers (for a fragment is preserved) are quite aware that a game of odd-and-even on such a scale might seem childish. It need not be so, if the treatment were like that of the _Arenarius_ of Archimedes (all the better if in his Doric); it would then have contained some long numbers and some stiff reasoning. Of one thing we may be sure, that if Lamprias, who is much to the fore in the Ninth Book, took a part, he was ready with a received view, framed on the spot.

M. Bernardakis[12] (who quotes a letter from M. Wessely) tells us that in the Paris E there is a blank space here of 2-¼ leaves, but that in the old Vienna MS., no. 148 (which contains the _Symposiacs_ only), three whole pages have been cut out, leaving a gap between what remains of the sixth dialogue and the fragment of the twelfth. Former editions had printed continuously, and our gratitude is due to M. Bernardakis for his restitution of the fragment to its proper place. The inference appears to be that the Vienna MS. is here the parent, though why the fragment stops short where it does is not clear. Probably the scribe was daunted by the technical language, and either left a blank space to be filled up by some one of greater experience, or so spoilt his sheets by errors and erasures that it was better to cut them out. Some such cause has been conjectured for the many gaps left in E, occurring where the subject-matter is difficult.

Some ninety different persons are mentioned by name as taking part in the _Symposiac Dialogues_, and if we allow for the lost pieces, there must have been at least a hundred. These may be arranged in groups: Plutarch and his family—his grandfather, father, brothers, sons, sons-in-law—the doctors (8), the grammarians (5), and so on. Many of these reappear in the dialogues now before us, and much may be gained in distinctness of personality by following out the references given.[13] Ammonius, Plutarch’s teacher in the Platonic philosophy, comes out as a masterful person, and a past-master in the art of tactful arrangement of a debate. Theon (‘Our Comrade’, an appellation given to some half-dozen others), to be distinguished from ‘Theon the Grammarian’, is a close and much trusted family friend. Very few Roman names appear, but Sossius Senecio, Mestrius Florus, and one or two others, must have been intimates.

None of the conversations in the _Symposiacs_ turn upon points which were Plutarch’s interest when he wrote the _Lives_; the study of character in stirring times, of the reaction of circumstances upon character and of character upon circumstances, of the insoluble problem which is always solving itself, as to ‘Virtue’ on the one hand and ‘Fortune’ on the other, determining success. The elaborate introduction to the _Genius of Socrates_, put side by side with that to the _Life of Pericles_, shows that the author wished to turn from subjects which made good talk over wine in hours of leisure, to others of a more virile stamp. The most convenient hypothesis would be that the success of the _Symposiacs_ suggested to the author to try his hand on more elaborate dialogue, and that, still later on, he settled to the _Lives_ in the spirit, not of an historian, but of an artist, filling his canvas with themes inspired by that great art, Virtue. The lost _Life of Epaminondas_, his favourite hero, would have told us a great deal about the artist himself. It was not Plutarch’s habit to sum up in such brilliant character sketches as stand out in other historians: this has been done for Epaminondas, on broad and generous lines, by Sir Walter Raleigh, and before him, not less generously, by Montaigne; and much material will be found scattered among Plutarch’s other _Lives_.

Such an hypothesis can only be ventured in the broadest outline, for no one date covers all the _Lives_ or all the _Dialogues_, and some of the facts are perplexing. In the _Second Pythian Dialogue_ Diogenianus appears as a very young man, and is introduced as the son of a father known to the company; and Diogenianus of Pergamum takes part in several of the _Symposiacs_, but there is no mention of a son old enough to be brought with him. On the other hand, Boethus in the same dialogue is ‘on his way to the camp of the Epicureans’; in one of the _Symposiacs_ he is ‘an Epicurean’ simply. In the last book of the _Symposiacs_ Theon’s sons come in, but we do not hear of him elsewhere as a father of grown-up sons.

The dialogue _On the Face which appears on the Orb of the Moon_ is unique as showing the interest taken by men of good general education in scientific subjects in the first century of our era, and as evidence of the point to which the natural sciences had then attained. Professional science may be said to have been almost limited to the province of the mathematician and his congeners. Natural History was part of the general outfit of the ‘Philosophers’, and there was no idea of the ‘Conquest of Nature’ for the relief of man’s estate, unless by the engineer or the physician. With these limitations, the progress made may strike some modern readers as surprisingly great, and a good example may be found in the very precise knowledge of Hipparchus and Ptolemy of the delicate phenomena of the moon’s movements. We are tempted to ask whether, if Greeks had not settled these problems, which men of no other ancient race attacked scientifically, they would have been settled to this day. To come down to a humbler matter: if the properties of the conic sections had not been discovered by Apollonius and his predecessors, would they stand in their place, probably a modest one, on a modern syllabus, and, meanwhile, could the mechanical arts have progressed without them? And the conic sections are simple things compared with the lines, surfaces, and solids determined once for all by Archimedes. Archimedes was a mathematician by the grace of Nature, and an engineer by the order of a prince; and the conic sections themselves were examined, not from any practical interest in the cone, but because they were found to furnish instances of the curves which might facilitate the line of inquiry, suggested by Plato with such amazing foresight, as a half-way house towards a solution of Apollo’s problem.[14] Of course this can only be stated as a question—not a rhetorical question—and must be left on the knees of the gods. The general subject is discussed in D. Ruhnken’s admirable _De Graecia artium ac doctrinarum inventrice_, an inaugural lecture delivered at Leyden in 1757 (just thirty years after Newton’s death).