38 MEMOIR OF ARISTOTLE. 



miration, and whom he seems to have treated through 

 life with uniform and unchanged respect. 



The branches of knowledge to which his attention 

 was first directed, were poetry, ethics, and politics. 

 Science and philosophy were not the only studies 

 in which Aristotle excelled; he was addicted to the 

 muses, and while he favoured the world with criti- 

 cisms on the works of others, he was himself the au- 

 thor of productions that ranked him a poet of the 

 first eminence. Few of his verses, indeed, have 

 reached modern times, but the few that remain prove 

 him worthy of sounding the lyre of Pindar ; and it 

 is not the least singularity attending this extraordi- 

 nary man, that with the nicest and most subtle powers 

 of discrimination and analysis, he united a vigorous 

 and rich vein of poetic fancy. In his writings he 

 frequently cites the bards of Greece, especially 

 Homer. This taste he imparted to his pupil, for 

 whose use he prepared a correct edition of the Iliad, 

 which obtained the name of the casket copy, from 

 the circumstance of its being enclosed in a rich cas- 

 ket, found after the siege of Gaza among the spoils 

 of Darius, in which that unfortunate monarch is said 

 to have kept his perfumed ointments. This edition 

 he constantly carried about with him in his wars, re- 

 garding it as " a portable treasure of military know- 

 ledge," and every night it was laid with his dagger 

 under his pillow. It is not improbable that the poe- 

 tical prelections of his master, and his admiration for 

 the verses of Homer, might tend to inflame that na- 



