PLUTARCH 



PLUTO 



249 



le moyen, 1'antre est le but.' For this reason the 

 Parallel Lives are and will remain the book of all 

 ages, for no book of classical antiquity has had 

 more influence upon the leading men of the world, 

 BO that Plutarch may almost be called the in- 

 terpreter of Greece and Rome to modern Europe. 

 They form indeed a complement to the other and 

 less known half of his writings the Morals a col- 

 lection of short treatises, sixty or more ( though cer- 

 tainly not all from Plutarch's hand), upon various 

 subjects Ethics, Politics, History, Health, Facetife, 

 Love-stories, and Philosophy. The last comprise 

 dissertations On the nature of the unseen world and 

 spiritual beings. On the creation and government 

 of the Universe, On the human soul, and similar 

 speculations, classed by the ancients under the 

 head of Theosophy. 'The treatise upon Isis and 

 Osiris in this series,' says its most recent translator, 

 Mr C. W. King, ' is the only complete account of 

 the religion of Egypt that has come down to us 

 written too by one who had been initiated in its 

 deepest mysteries. The three treatises upon the 

 Oracles also are of the highest value, and that 

 on Superstition is one of the most eloquent and 

 closely reasoned compositions of antiquity.' Some 

 of the essays, especially those On Brotherly Love, 

 On gradual advance in virtue, On the benefit to 

 be got out of enemies, breathe quite a Christian 

 spirit, although the writer probably never heard 

 of Christianity or its divine founder. One of the 

 most interesting is that On the apparent delays in 

 tlirine justice ; another, On the conduct proper to 

 young men at Lectures, which is partly moral, 

 partly social in its tone. The nine books of his 

 Symposiaca or Table-talk on a variety of topics 

 exhibit him in the light of the most amiable and 

 genial of boon companions, who appreciated good 

 conversation ; while his dialogue Gryllus reveals a 

 remarkable sense of humour. 



Though not a profound thinker, Plutarch was a 

 man of rare gifts, and occupies quite a unique place 

 in literature as the encyclopedist of antiquity. 

 He was not master of any science, but whatever 

 was noticeable in natural, moral, or metaphysical 

 science did not come amiss to him, and he had 

 a universal sympathy with genius and nobility 

 of character. As a moralist he is, as Professor 

 MahafTV well describes him, the spokesman of the 

 better life that still survived in the Greek world 

 in the ' Martinmas summer ' of its history ; not the 

 exponent of any system, and only occasionally an 

 opponent, as in the Dialogue against Colotes, the 

 disciple of Epicurus, and that Against the Stoic 

 first conceptions, but a man of practical views and 

 sober judgment, a chief example of the illumina- 

 tion of the intellect by the [>ower of morals. His 

 kindly sympathy and tender-heartedness, a leading 

 feature in his character, is well shown in his Con- 

 solation addressed to Apollonius on the early death 

 of his son, and the beautiful Letter to his unfe 

 on the death of their only daughter. As a stylist 

 he is picturesque, realistic and varied ; his chief 

 fault i.i a tendency to ditt'iiseiH'ss and redundancy 

 of expression. He does not, like his contemporary 

 Lucian, affect the Attic purity and clearness of 

 diction, and he is too fond of crowding his sentences ; 

 Init occasionally he rises into eloquence, and he is 

 almost always happy in the novelty of his illustra- 

 tions and similes and the point of his anecdotes. 



The best editions of Plutarch's entire works are those 

 of J. .1. Keiske ( 12 volg. 1774-79) and Dubner-Dohner in 

 Didot's Bibliotheca. ( 6 vola. 1846-55). The best text of 

 the Lives is that of Sintenis in the Tenbner series (5 

 vola. 1874-81); of the Moralia, that of D. Wyttenbach 

 (15 Tola. Oxford, 1795-1830; unfinished), and that in the 

 Tenbner series by G. N. Bernardakis (ti vuls., published 

 in 1H88-95). Separate annotated editions of the Lira 

 have been published by Held, Leopold, Siefert-Blass, 

 intem*-r'ulir in Germany, and in England by the 



present writer, with elaborate commentaries (Sulla, De- 

 mosthenes, Gracchi, Nicias, Timolcon, and Themistoclcs), 

 and by E. G. Hardy ( Galba and Otho ). There are trans- 

 lations of the Lives in English by the brothers Langhorne 

 and by Dryden and others (the latter re-edited by A. H. 

 Clough, 5 vols. 1874) neither so scholar-like and correct 

 as the French of Jacques Amyot (Paris, 1559), from 

 which Sir Thomas North's version ( 1579 ; new ed. by 

 Wyndham, 6 vols., 1895 et seq.) was made ; also of the 

 Roman Lives by G. Long. The best translation of the 

 Moralia is that by several hands, corrected and revised 

 by W. W. Goodwin (Boston, U.S., 1874-78). 



Pluto ( Gr. Plmtton, from ploutein, ' to be rich ' ), 

 originally only a surnanie of Hades, as the giver or 

 possessor of riches, is, in the mythology of Greece, 

 the third son of Cronos and Rhea, and the brother 

 of Zeus and Poseidon. On the tripartite division 

 of the universe he obtained the sovereignty of the 

 under-world the realm of darkness and ghostly 

 shades, where he sits enthroned as a ' subterranean 

 Zeus ' to use the expression of Homer, and rules 

 the spirits of the dead. His dwelling-place, how- 

 ever, is not far from the surface of the earth. Pluto 

 is inexorable in disposition, not to be moved either 

 by prayers or flatteries. He is borne on a car, 

 drawn by four black steeds, whom he guides with 

 golden reins. His helmet makes him invisible. 

 According to some scholars, his name of Hades is 

 from a priv. , and idein, ' to see ; ' although others, 

 with less probability, derive Hades from hado or 

 chado, ' I receive or embrace,' and translate the 

 word the ' all-receiver. ' In. Homer Hades never 

 means a place, but always a person. Moreover, it 

 is to be noticed that the poet does not divide the 

 realm of the shades into two separate regions. All 

 the souls of the dead good and bad alike mingle 

 together. Subsequently, however, when the ethical 

 conception of future retribution became more widely 

 developed, the kingdom of the dead was divided 

 into Elysium (q.v.), the abode of the good, and 

 Tartarus (q.v.), the place of the wicked. This 

 change also exercised an important influence on 

 the conception of Pluto. The ruler of the under- 

 world not only acquired additional power and 

 majesty, but the very idea of his character was 

 essentially modified. He was now regarded as a 

 beneficent deity, who held the keys of the earth 

 in his hand, and possessed its metallic treasures 

 (whence his new name Pluto or Plutus), and who 

 blessed the year with fruits, for out of the darkness 

 underground come all the riches and swelling 

 fullness of the soil. Hence, in later times, mortals 

 prayed to him before proceeding to dig for the 

 wealth hidden in the bowels of the earth. 



Pluto married Persephone ( Proserpina ), the 

 daughter of Demeter (Ceres), after carrying her 

 off from the plains of Enna. He assisted his 

 brothers according to the mythological story in 

 their wars against the Titans, and received from 

 the Cyclopes, as a reward for delivering them from 

 Tartarus, the helmet that makes him invisible, 

 which he lent to Hermes (Mercury) in the afore- 

 said war, to Perseus in his combat with the Gorgons, 

 and which ultimately came to Meiiones. The 

 Erinnyes and Charon obey his behests. He sits in 

 judgment on every open and secret act, and is 

 assisted by three subordinate judges, ^Eacus, 

 Minos, and Rhadamanthus. At Eiis alone was 

 there a formal cult of Pluto, though in many 

 places in Greece he was worshipped conjointly 

 with Demeter and Kore. Among trees and flowers 

 the cypress, boxwood, narcissus, and maidenhair 

 were sacred to him ; black rams and ewes were 

 sacrificed to him amid the shadows of night, and 

 his priests had their brows garlanded with cypress 

 wreaths. In works of art lie resembles his brothers 

 Zeus and Poseidon ; only his hair hangs down 

 somewhat wildly and fiercely over his brow, and 

 his appearance, though majestic, as becomes so 



