[HARVEY] PYTHAGORAS AND HIS PHILOSOPHY 243 



fallen under Persian domination, and Pythagoras probably did not 

 wish tio propound his views under a d.espotic viceroy. Aulus Gellius, 

 discussing the comparative Chronology of Greece and Rome (Noctcs 

 Atlicse, lib. xvii.,_cap. 21), says Pythagoras came to Italy during the 

 reign of (Tiarquin the Proud, Solinus (cap. 16) and Cicero (Tusc. 

 Qnœs. lib. 4) state that he was in Italy under the consulship of Bmtus, 

 who had rebelled against and dethroned the Tarquin. Those, therefore, 

 who, like Ovid, contend that Numa Pompilius was a Pythagorean must 

 be in error, unless the received dates are wrong and our philosopher 

 was born before the forty-eighth Olympiad. Before settling at Crotona, 

 he visited Sicily, and a prince or chief of the Phliasii named Leon, 

 wondering at his' refusal to accept the fees or gifts of money usually 

 paid to those who called themselves "wise men," asked him Tis è'ir/ j 

 what he did in the world ? Said he, " I am a lover of wisdom " — 

 a qjiXoffocpOb, thus originating the word — and being asked for a 

 definition, answered, " All life looks to me like a national assembly, 

 '• at which some strive for merchandise, which to them seems the most 

 '" d.esirable possession, others hunt for glory and pawer, but philosophers 

 '■' seek after truth.'^ Those, he declared, were philosophers who en- 

 quired into the origin of the worlds, the paths of the celestial lights, 

 their size and distance, the nature of animals, plants and rocks, and gen- 

 erally all who tried to undeaatand the why and wherefore of everything 

 in the Cosmos.^ He did not stay in Sicily long, but went on to Crotona, 

 a rising town, then about 150 years old, where we will leave him for a 

 while, in order that before discussing his special tenets we may glance 

 at the various philosophies he must have enquired into in his travels. 

 Southern Italy, Grœcia magna, was then as thoroughly Greek as North 

 America is English now; every important position had been seized by 

 some colonizing party.- Crotona was Aohasan, and its specialty appears 

 to have been athletics, so that it was a congenial home for the muscular 

 philosopher with whom we are dealing. 



Philosophy and religion have ever been inseparable, and both have 

 been everywhere closely allied with astronomy and physics. " Whence 

 and whither " is not only a most important personal question, but it 

 relates to everything that is not the ego. Cosmogony is, therefore, 

 treated of in all sacred scriptures, the people being told by their leaders 

 in science (usually honoured by being entrusted with the worship of 

 Supreme Beings and the care of religious observances) how they thought 

 the world was made and life began. This is so natural a development 



• This corresponds to the main divisions of castes In India; see postea. 

 ^ The same was the case west of Italy, also on the Northern or Mediter- 

 ranean shores of Africa, as far as the Straits or " Pillars of Hercules." 



