is now rare, and seldom comes into the market. Rare, too, is
Vaucher's critical essay (1854), which is unlucky, as the French and
English books both contain valuable disquisitions on the age of the
author of the Treatise. This excellent work has had curious fortunes. It
is never quoted nor referred to by any extant classical writer, and,
among the many books attributed by Suidas to Longinus, it is not
mentioned. Decidedly the old world has left no more noble relic of
criticism. Yet the date of the book is obscure, and it did not come into
the hands of the learned in modern Europe till Robertelli and Manutius
each published editions in 1544. From that time the Treatise has often
been printed, edited, translated; but opinion still floats undecided
about its origin and period. Does it belong to the age of Augustus, or
to the age of Aurelian? Is the author the historical Longinus--the
friend of Plotinus, the tutor of Porphyry, the victim of Aurelian,--or
have we here a work by an unknown hand more than two centuries earlier?
Manuscripts and traditions are here of little service. The oldest
manuscript, that of Paris, is regarded as the parent of the rest. It is
a small quarto of 414 pages, whereof 335 are occupied by the "Problems"
of Aristotle. Several leaves have been lost, hence the fragmentary
character of the essay. The Paris MS. has an index, first mentioning the
"Problems," and then +DIONUSIOU E LONGINOU PERI UPSOUS+, that is, "The
work of Dionysius, or of Longinus, about the Sublime."

[Footnote 1: Longmans, London, 1836.]

On this showing the transcriber of the MS. considered its authorship
dubious. Supposing that the author was Dionysius, which of the many
writers of that name was he? Again, if he was Longinus, how far does his
work tally with the characteristics ascribed to that late critic, and
peculiar to his age?

About this Longinus, while much is written, little is certainly known.
Was he a descendant of a freedman of one of the Cassii Longini, or of an
eastern family with a mixture of Greek and Roman blood? The author of
the Treatise avows himself a Greek, and apologises, as a Greek, for
attempting an estimate of Cicero. Longinus himself was the nephew and
heir of Fronto, a Syrian rhetorician of Emesa. Whether Longinus was born
there or not, and when he was born, are things uncertain. Porphyry, born
in 233 A.D., was his pupil: granting that Longinus was twenty years
Porphyry's senior, he must have come