or ARTS AND SCIENCES. 375 



point, are quite in the manner of the accomplished Athenian. But a 

 judgment of style on internal evidence alone, in a matter so remote 

 from our own times, is not confidently to be relied upon. At all 

 events, it seems quite certain that the passage is taken from some 

 poet of the New Comedy, which delights in general delineations of 

 character, and in sententious expressions embodying the wit and 

 wisdom drawn from the observation of society ; and, without further 

 examination, it appeared to me more like the manner of Menander than 

 that of any other Fragments that have come down to us of the works 

 of that genial school. The tablet is very curious, because it contains 

 more writing than any hitherto discovered, excepting those Latin 

 tablets of the second century to which allusion has already been 

 made. It is also curious, as containing a passage hitherto unknown, 

 if not of Menander, certainly of some poet of the same Athenian age ; 

 and it is curious, because it shows that children in ancient times, in 

 learning to write, had copies set them embodying some apophthegm, 

 or moral sentiment, or condensed phrase of practical wisdom, or some 

 side view of character, just as they do in our own schools. In fact, 

 our ' Evil communications corrupt good manners,' quoted by St. Paul 

 and translated by TertuUian, is from Menander. 



" In the tablet which I suppose to have been used by a scholar, the 

 master's copy is at first correctly followed ; but the poor boy seems to 

 have got wearied with such close attention, and towards the end ven- 

 tured to write a word on his own account ; for, instead of ylverai, we 

 have (})dapT](T€Tai^ which spoils both sense and metre. 



" In order to settle, if possible, the question as to the authorship of 

 the lines, I examined all the Fragments of the Attic comedians to be 

 found in any of the collections, the National Hotel distemper continu- 

 ing to afford me the requisite leisure. The result of this examination 

 showed that the turn of expression, and several of the individual 

 words, occur in many of Menander's known Fragments, but only once 

 or twice in those of other poets. For example, passages beginning 

 with oTav, signifying when this or that happens, then the result will be 

 so and so, — as in Frag. V. of the ItXoKiof, or the Necklace. 



"0(TTis Trevrjs o)V (rju iv aaTei ^ovKerai 

 " hdvyiOTepov iavrov enidviKt ivoielv • 

 'Orav yap els rpvcj^uiVTa /cat axo^rju ayeiv 

 Avvajxevov ep^Xeyj/t], tot avTov ecrT Ibelv 

 'Q,s adXcov ^fj KOL ToXaiTTcopov ^iop. 



