108 plint's natueal histoet. [Book XXXIII. 



erected in the Temple of the goddess Anaitis. To what par- 

 ticular region this name belongs, we have already *^ stated, it 

 being that of a divinity*^® held in the highest veneration by 

 the nations in that part of the world. This statue was carried 

 off during the wars of Antonius with the people of Parthia ; 

 and a witty saying is told, with reference to it, of one of the 

 veterans of the Eoman army, a native of Bonouia. Enter- 

 taining on one occasion the late Emperor Augustus at dinner, 

 he was asked by that prince whether he was aware that the 

 person who was the first to commit this violence upon the 

 statue, had been struck with blindness and paralysis, and then 

 expired. To this he made answer, that at that very moment 

 Augustus was making his dinner off of one of her legs, for that 

 he himself was the very man, and to that bit of plunder he 

 had been indebted for all his fortune.^^ 



As regards statues of human beings, Gorgias of Leontini ^ 

 was the first to erect a solid statue of gold, in the Temple at 

 Delphi, in honour of himself, about the seventieth ^^ Olympiad : 

 so great were the fortunes then made by teaching the art of 

 oratory ! 



CHAP. 25. EIGHT EEMEDIES DEEIVED FEOM GOLD. 



Gold is efficacious as a remedy in many ways, being applied 

 to wounded persons and to infants, to render any malpractices 

 of sorcery comparatively innocuous that may be directed against 

 them. Gold, however, itself is mischievous in its effects if 



^ In B. V. c. 20, most probably. See also B. xvi. c. 64. 



^s The worship of Anaitis was probably a branch of the Indian worship 

 of Nature. The Greek writers sometimes identify this goddess with their 

 Artemis and their Aphrodite. 



6' Holland has strangely mistaken the meaning of the veteran's reply ; 

 ** Yea, sir, that it is ; and that methinks you should know best, for even 

 now a leg of his you have at supper, and all your wealth besides is come 

 unto you by that saccage." He then adds, by way of Note, " For Au- 

 gustus Cassar defeited Antonie, and was mightily enriched by the spoile 

 of him." 



6^ In Sicily. According to Valerius Maximus and other writers, a statue 

 of solid gold was erected by the whole of Greece, in the temple at Delphi, 

 in honour of Gorgias, who was distinguished for his eloquence and literary 

 attainments. The leading opinion of Gorgias was, that nothing had any 

 real existence. 



63 The ninetieth Olympiad, about the year 420 b.c, is much more pro- 

 bably the correct reading ; as it was about the seventieth Olympiad, or some- 

 what later, that Gorgias was born. 



