216 PLINY'S NATITEAL HISTOEY. [Book XIV. 



formerly lay concealed, are now revealed for our indiscriminate 

 use? 



Still, by Hercules ! at the present day there are none to be 

 found who have any acquaintance with much that has been 

 handed down to us by the ancient writers ; so much more 

 comprehensive was the diligent research of our forefathers, or 

 else so much more happily employed was their industry. It 

 is a thousand years ago since Hesiod, 4 at the very dawn, so to 

 say, of literature, first gave precepts for the guidance of the 

 agriculturist, an example which has since been followed by no 

 small number of writers. Hence have originated considerable 

 labours for ourselves, seeing that we have not only to enquire 

 into the discoveries of modern times, but to ascertain as well 

 what was known to the ancients, and this, too, in the very 

 midst of that oblivion which the heedlessness of the present 

 day has so greatly tended to generate. What causes then are 

 we to assign for this lethargy, other than those feelings which 

 we find actuating the public in general throughout all the 

 world ? New manners and usages, no doubt, have now come 

 into vogue, and the minds of men are occupied with subjects 

 of a totally different nature ; the arts of avarice, in fact, are 

 the only ones that are now cultivated. 



In days gone by, the sway and the destinies of states were 

 bounded by their own narrow limits, and consequently the 

 genius of the people was similarly circumscribed as well, 

 through a sort of niggardliness that was thus displayed by 

 Fortune : hence it became with them a matter of absolute 

 necessity to employ the advantages of the understanding : 

 kings innumerable received the homage of the arts, and in 

 making a display of the extent of their resources, gave the 

 highest rank to those arts, entertaining the opinion that it was 

 through them that they should ensure immortality. Hence it 

 was that due rewards, and the various works of civilization, were 

 displayed in such vast abundance in those times. For these 

 later ages, the enlarged boundaries of the habitable world, 

 and the vast extent of our empire, have been a positive injury. 

 Since the Censor has been chosen for the extent of his property, 

 since the judge has been selected according to the magnitude of 

 his fortune, since it has become the fashion to consider that 



4 In allusion to Ms poem, the "Works and Days," the prototype of 

 Virgil's Georgics. 



