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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



for and respect them. The ancients evidently 

 felt for the wet-nurse who cherished their in- 

 fancy, slave as she might be, something of last- 

 ing and filial affection : 



" Here is laid in earth the best of nurses, whose 

 foster-child still misses her. I loved thee, nurse, 

 when alive, and still I honor thee though thou art 

 laid in the ground, and shall honor as long as I 

 live." 



More characteristic of the Greek disposition 

 than mere praise of the dead are those praises of 

 the good-fortune of the departed, which sound 

 almost mocking to modern ears, and yet on a 

 little reflection do not displease. Of one, Sym- 

 machus, of Chios, we read on his tomb that 

 through life his joys were many and his sorrows 

 few, that he reached the extreme limit of old age, 

 and lies in Athens, the city dear to gods and men. 

 On the tombs of women it is often stated that 

 they were in comfortable circumstances, and that 

 they lived to see children's children. All the 

 happiness of past life seemed to the Greeks a 

 gain, and even when it was over was to be re- 

 garded, not with bitter regret, but gentle sympa- 

 thy. In one inscription, though a late one, we 

 find an elaborate description of the beauty of the 

 young wife buried below — of her yellow hair, her 

 bright eyes, her snow-white forehead, the ruddy 

 lips and ivory teeth of her lovely mouth. These 

 things were past, it is true, but even so they were 

 something better to look back upon than ugli- 

 ness. 



Sometimes, however, through the general level 

 . of cheeriness a sadder note breaks : 



" My name is Athena'is, and with grief I go to 

 my place among the dead, leaving my husband 

 and my darling children. A grudging web the 

 Fates spun for me." 



When youthful promise is early cut off it is 

 scarcely possible that it should be spoken of 

 without a sound of sad regret. Even the state- 

 ment of the fact produces this impression : 



" If fortune had continued thy life, Macareus, 

 and brought thee to manhood, strong wert thou in 

 the hope that thou wouldst become the guiding 

 spirit of tragic art among the Hellenes. But thou 

 diest not without fame for discretion and virtue." 



Even here consolation comes in to modify 

 regret, so true to the happy disposition of the 

 Greeks was the charming saying of Spenser — 



"A dram of sweeteis worth a pound of sowret" 



As in sepulchral reliefs, so in epitaphs, the 

 Greek mourner usually turns his thought to the 



past, and dwells on the life which is over rather 

 than on any which may be beginning. Neverthe- 

 less we do find, here and there, some allusions to 

 the state of the departed which are of great in- 

 terest, and which furnish us with evidence on a 

 subject still obscure and much discussed, the be- 

 liefs of the ordinary minds among the Greeks as 

 to the future life, and as to reward and punish- 

 ment in it. The small space which these allu 

 sions occupy, compared with the whole body of 

 epitaphs, shows how small a corner of the Greek 

 thought was taken up with meditation on mat- 

 ters outside the present life. But the materialism 

 of the Greeks was rather natural and practical 

 than speculative, and we nowhere find any posi- 

 tive denial of future existence. In one or two 

 epitaphs there is an appearance of such denial, 

 but its meaning must not be pressed. Thus, in 

 one case, we find the phrase, " Rising out of earth 

 I am become earth again," and in another epitaph, 

 one Nicomedes, who calls himself the servant of 

 the Muses, says that he is " clad in wakeless 

 sleep." Here we probably only have popular 

 phrases used in a vague and indefinite sense, and 

 without the least intention of theorizing on the 

 nature of the soul. Commoner still are even 

 more vague phrases as to the destination of the 

 soul, which is said to fly to heaven, to air, or to 

 ether. 1 It is ether which is said in the metrical 

 inscription first quoted to receive the souls of the 

 slain Athenian warriors. So in the following: 



" Here Dialogus, student of wisdom, his limbs 

 purged with pure fire, is gone to the immortals. 

 Here lie naked the bones of Dialogus the discreet, 

 who practised virtue and wisdom ; them a little 

 dust hides sprinkled over them ; but the spirit 

 from his limbs the broad heaven has received." 



Dialogus was presumably a philosopher, and 

 had learned the difference between soul and 

 body. The words " heaven and the immortals " 

 have to him a somewhat vague meaning, repre- 

 senting rather something hoped for than believed 

 in and expected. There is a stronger flavor of 

 philosophic materialism in the following : " Damp 

 ether holds the soul and mighty intellect of Eu- 

 rymachus, but his body is in this tomb." The 

 word aleijpy ether, is certainly used by Homer to 

 signify the abode of the gods, and no doubt the 

 poet of our metrical inscription had Homer in his 

 mind, but here the word " damp" (vyp6s) seems 

 to point to some materialist notion as to the 

 nature of spirit and its affinity to the upper air. 

 A more popular interpretation must be accepted 



1 ovpavos, a£0)jp. 



