tch at
the end of the volume.

54 Isocrates was born at Athens, B.C. 436. He was a pupil of Gorgias,
Prodicus and Socrates. He opened a school of rhetoric, at Athens,
with great success. He died by his own hand at the age of 98.

55 So Horace joins these two classes as inventors of all kinds of
improbable fictions--

Pictoribus atque poetis
Quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas.--A. P. 9.

Which Roscommon translates--

Painters and poets have been still allow'd
Their pencil and their fancies unconfined.

56 Epicharmus was a native of Cos, but lived at Megara, in Sicily, and
when Megara was destroyed, removed to Syracuse, and lived at the
court of Hiero, where he became the first writer of comedies, so
that Horace ascribes the invention of comedy to him, and so does
Theocritus. He lived to a great age.

57 Pherecydes was a native of Scyros, one of the Cyclades; and is said
to have obtained his knowledge from the secret books of the
Phoenicians. He is said also to have been a pupil of Pittacus, the
rival of Thales, and the master of Pythagoras. His doctrine was that
there were three principles, {~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ZETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER UPSILON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~}, or AEther, {~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, or Chaos, and
{~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~}, or Time; and four elements, Fire, Earth, Air, and Water,
from which everything that exists was formed.--Vide Smith's Dict.
Gr., and Rom. Biog.

58 Archytas was a native of Tarentum, and is said to have saved the
life of Plato by his influence with the tyrant Dionysius. He was
especially great as a mathematician and geometrician, so that Horace
calls him

Maris et terrae numeroque carentis arenae
Mensorem--Od. i. 28. 1.

Plato is supposed to have learnt some of his views from him, and
Aristotle to nave borrowed from him every idea of the Categories.

59 This was not Timaeus the historian, but a native of Locri, who is
said also in the De Finibus (c. 29) to have been a teacher