182 DIVI BOTANICI. 



in his topographical collections. Juba was also the author of essays 

 on grammar and painting and Roman archeology, of some dramatic 

 sketches, and of various pieces on the nature and economy of ani- 

 mals — all of which have irretrievably perished. Such then, are the 

 outlines of Juba's portraiture, as a prince and a philosopher : it was 

 while taking delight in the " study of mankind" amid the blandish- 

 ments of imperial favour, that he found happiness in cultivating the 

 friendship of Antonius Musa and his illustrious brother 



Euphorbus the Physician. — When Pythagoras proclaimed the 

 rule for his disciples, AiiEXEseAi TflNKTAiVMN, fabis abstine, abstain 

 from beans,* his precept shewed clearly that the sage himself was 

 not " of Leicestershire;" but, when he required the same disciples to 

 admit his doctrine of the Metempsychosis or transmigration of souls, 

 he shewed with equal clearness that he had obtained initiation into 

 the hieroglyphic mysteries of the Egyptian psychosophy, and into 

 those on which the gymnosophists of India were wont to contemplate 

 in their solitary retreats. With a view to establish the truth of this 

 chimerical notion, the Samian philosopher fell into the flagrant moral 

 obliquity of affirming that his own soul had heretofore inhabited 

 the bodies of iEthalides,t and of Hermotimus, and of Euphorbus, a 



votaries, and Bel by His western worshippers, under the druidic theosophy. 

 Berosus acquired an extraordinary reputation for the knowledge and experi- 

 ence, gained by foreign travel. He visited Greece, and made a long resi- 

 dence at Athens, whose clever but cruelly fickle " People" erected a statue 

 in the Yv^iaaim or place for exercises, with the object of honouring his learn- 

 ing. He nourished in the third century before the vulgar era ; and, besides 

 distinguishing himself by his astronomical predictions, he composed a history 

 of the Chaldsean nations; .but not more than a few fragments of this work 

 have been preserved from the ravages of barbarism and time — these unre- 



strainable destroyers Flavius Josephus : Opera, grace et latine, cum ver- 



sione nova et notis Joannls Hudsonii ; folio, 2 tomis, Oxonii, 1720 ; and Wins- 

 ton's translation. 



* Varying greatly in their ingenuity, many interpretations of this singu- 

 lar preceptive apothegm have been propounded, both by metaphysicians and 

 archasologists. More probable than most of the others, however, is that 

 which would represent the Sage of Samos as desirous of declaring by it, his 

 profound abhorrence of 'he Bean as an instrument, like the shell in ostra- 

 cism, of secret and irresponsible voting — a cowardly and tyrannical expedi- 

 ent by which many excellent persons and much valuable property were 

 sacrificed by the villainy of malice or selfishness. 



t jEthalides enjoyed the distinction of being reputed a son of the god 

 Mercury : he was a herald by profession ; and, through his father's influence, 

 he obtained the singular privilege of appearing among the living and the 



dead, at stated times Hermotimus was a Clazomenian by birth, and a 



revered soothsayer by character. His ghostly freaks and their issue are re- 



