manner he pleased." There was none who pretended to any right in this affair, till the third generation: when a Samian appeared, named Idmon'; a grandson of that Idmon, who had been mafter of Efop, in the island of Samos and the Delphians, having made him the fatisfaction he defired, were delivered from their calamities.

According to Eufebius, the death of Efop happened in the fourth year of the fiftyfourth Olympiad; which was 561 years before the Chriftian Æra.

If we were to follow probability rather than the affertions of fome writers in the lower ages, I should be more apt to think that Esop was of a handfome countenance and fhape, than ugly and deformed; notwithstanding the general prepoffeffion to the contrary, which has prevailed for the three or four laft centuries. There is no author quoted as faying any thing to the difadvantage of Efop's perfon, till after the fall of all the arts and fciences; and almoft a thousand years after his death. The firft writer quoted in fupport of this groundlefs opinion is Stobæus, who has it from I don't know whom; and what is faid by this unknown perfon, relates

S

Herodotus; and Plutarch, de ferâ numinis vindicâ.

Bayle, Art. Ef. Note C. Meziriac fays, the first of the fifty-fourth Olympiad, chap. vi.

Efop died 561 years before our Era, and Stobæus (according to Blair's Tables) lived in the beginning of the fifth century after Christ.

only

only to the air of Efop's" countenance; for there is not a word intimated of his resembling an Ethiop, or of his being deformed in any part of his body. Planudes was the first who propagated any fancies of the latter kind; and that probably from his taking another perfon for Efop; and not till * about two thousand years after the death of this celebrated mythologift. There is no occafion to oppofe this notion of Planudes by fearching for any exprefs authorities against him; it having been fo fully proved before that he has totally destroyed all his own credit himself.

Philoftratus, in his account of several pictures in the time of the Antonines, gives us one, in which Efop is the principal figure. The painter reprefents him before his own

He fays, that Efop being reproached for having a four countenance, anfwered, Regard not my looks, but my mind." This anonymous authority from Stobæus, I fhould think might be much over-balanced by that of Philoftratus, who lived long before Stobæus; and in his picture of Efop gives him a pleafing countenance, even while he is meditating. σε Ο δε οίμαι τινα υφαίνει μύθον το γαρ μειδίαμα το προσωπο, και οι οφθαλμος καλα της γης εσωλές, τελο δηλεσιν. Οι δε ο ζωγράφος ότι των μύθων φροντίδες ανειμένης της Ψυχης δεονται. Phil. Εικ. γ. w See p. xi.

* He flourished 1941 years after the death of Efop. See note a, p. xi.

y See pp. xii and xiii.

z In Icon. Art. Mu9..

From the year 138 to 179 of our Æra.

b

houfe;

C

houfe; there the Geniufes b of the feveral forts of Efopian Fables approach him with pleasure and regard, as the chief inventor and writer of Fables. As fuch they adorn him with wreaths of flowers, and crown him with olive-branches. He has a pleasing smile upon his countenance; and at the fame time his eyes are fixt upon the ground, as being then compofing a Fable; and compofing it with that humour and gaiety for which he was fo remarkable. There are feveral men, and feveral beafts intermixt, that form a fort of circle round him; and among the latter, the Fox is particularly diftinguished; Efop making as much ufe of him in his Fables, as the dramatic writers do of Davus in their Comedies. There is a great deal of fense, (Cays Philoftratus) expreft in the picture in general; and particularly, in the looks and

b There were, probably, three of thefe Geniuses in the picture; the Efopian Fables being divided into three forts. "The rational, in which Men only are introduced; the charactered, where only Beafts, under characters affigned to them; and the mixt, in which both Men and Beafts are concerned." From Aphthonius, in Præexercitam: one of the Teftimon. in Nevelet's edition.

The Genius of each fort of the leffer Fables is made to attend Efop here, as perfons; in the fame manner that the Genius of the greater, or Epic, Fable attends Homer, in the famous relievo of his Apotheofis.

This feems to be the intent of the painter, tho' Philoftratus gives another turn to it. Οι δε ο ζωγράφο, fays he, δι αι των μύθων φρονίδες ανειμένης της ψυχής δεονται. d φιλοσοφεί η γραφή, και τα των Μύθων σωματα.

attitudes

attitudes of the three Geniuses, that are paying their regards to him.

In this picture the countenance of Efop is very well represented, as partly pleasant and partly grave; but Plutarch has given us a much fuller and ftronger picture of his thoughts and manner of converfation. 'Tis in his Feast of the Sages, at the court of Periander King of Corinth, who himself was one of the seven. As this is perhaps one of the most valuable remains of antiquity that is left to us, and as Efop has a confiderable share in it, I fhall take the liberty of inferting it very much at large; though it will bear no proper proportion to the rest of his life but I think it cannot be unacceptable to the reader; and heartily wifh, that the whole was tranflated into English by fome abler hand.

Periander, while the reft of the wife men were all in his court, invites them, and feveral others, to a feast in one of his pleasurehoufes,

e The other fix are Thales, Solon, Cleobulus, Chilo, Bias, and Pittacus: to whom, fays Laertius, fome add Anacharfis the Scythian, Mufo the Kenean, Perecydes the Syrian, Epimenides of Crete, and Pififtratus the tyrant of Athens. In proem. § 13.

f Befides Periander, and the fix Sages (firft mentioned in the note before) there were Efop, and Anacharfis the scythian; Meliffa, the wife of Periander; Eumetis her attendant, daughter of Cleobulus, one of the Sages, and herself fometimes called Cleoboline, or the Little Female Sage: Naucratites (alfo called Niloxenus) fent

b z

houses, near the city of Corinth, where he was to make a particular facrifice to Venus. It was at the foot of the Licæum, or eastern promontory of the Corinthian Ifthmus; a place naturally very delightful ", and much affifted by art: for Periander was a lover of magnificence; which, together with his being a tyrant, may poffibly account for Lucian's excluding him from his Elyfium. Periander ordered a chariot for each of the invited guests, to convey them to the place. When that which was provided for Thales arrives, he fmiles; is very much obliged, but chooses to walk through the fields. He does fo; and two other of the guests accompany him. In their walk, they meet with Alexidemus, natural fon of the tyrant of Miletus,

to confult Bias, and his brethren, by Amafis King of Egypt; Mnefiphilus, from Athens; Diocles, a priest and augur, in Periander's fervice; Ardalus, priest of the temple of the Mufes, founded by one of his anceftors; Cherfias, a poet; and Cleodemus, a physician.

* Periander had left off paying any devotions to Venus, ever fince his mother had put an end to her life for love; and this was his first return to them, upon fome dreams of his wife Meliffa. Xylander's Plutarch, fol. vol. 2. p. 146, D.

h Paufanias, in Corinthiacis.

i Plutarch, p. 148, B.

" and Tom I. P.

k Lucian fays, he faw Anacharfis, Zamolxes, Numa, Lycurgus, Phocion, and Tellus, in Elyfium; all the feven Sages, except Periander.” 674, Ed. Blaeu.

Diocles, the priest and augur; and Naucratites, the embalador from Amalis, King of Egypt.

9

returning