s eminently learned
in all law, human and divine, as any man could be in that age. They
falsely represent that Pythagoras of Samos was his instructor in
learning, because there appears no other. Now it is certain that this
philosopher, in the reign of Servius Tullius, more than a hundred
years after this, held assemblies of young men, who eagerly
embraced his doctrines, on the most distant shore of Italy, in the
neighbourhood of Metapontum, Heraclea, and Croton. But from these
places, even had he flourished in the same age, what fame of his could
have reached the Sabines? or by what intercourse of language could it
have aroused any one to a desire of learning? Or by what safeguard
could a single man have passed through the midst of so many nations
differing in language and customs? I am therefore rather inclined to
believe that his mind, owing to his natural bent, was attempered by
virtuous qualities, and that he was not so much versed in foreign
systems of philosophy as in the stern and gloomy training of the
ancient Sabines, a race than which none was in former times more
strict. When they heard the name of Numa, although the Roman fathers
perceived that the balance of power would incline to the Sabines if
a king were chosen from them, yet none of them ventured to prefer
himself, or any other member of his party, or, in fine, any of the
citizens or fathers, to a man so well known, but unanimously resolved
that the kingdom should be offered to Numa Pompilius. Being sent for,
just as Romulus obtained the throne by the augury in accordance with
which he founded the city, so Numa in like manner commanded the gods
to be consulted concerning himself. Upon this, being escorted into the
citadel by an augur, to whose profession that office was later made
a public and perpetual one by way of honour, he sat down on a stone
facing the south: the augur took his seaton his left hand with his
head covered, holding in his right a crooked wand free from knots,
called lituus; then, after having taken a view over the city and
country, and offered a prayer to the gods, he defined the bounds of
the regions of the sky from east to west: the parts toward the south
he called the right, those toward the north, the left; and in front of
him he marked out in his mind the sign as far as ever his eyes could
see. Then having shifted the lituus into his left hand, and placed
his right on the head of Numa, he prayed after this manner: "O father
Jupi