100 GREEK PHILOSOPHY. 



emperor Hadrian, was the compiler of another work of the same de- 

 scription, but not composed under such interesting circumstances. 

 His 'Miscellaneous Historical Questions ' (wajroSaTrj) vAr/ toropuo), or 

 TrajTodaTT?) tWopia) were, as well as the works of Pamphila, a mine 

 much worked by subsequent writers. But the degenerate taste which 

 had caused the production of such works as these, or at least as the 

 latter, did not stop here. Still declining, it called for yet more meagre 

 and worthless compilations, which were furnished by drawing from 

 the confused and turbid ' Miscellanies ' those parts which referred to 

 any particular subject on which the writer thought proper to make 

 Later com- collections. To this stage belongs the work of Diogenes Laertius, a 

 piiations. p art Q f W j 1 j c } 1 f orms the nucleus of all modern biographies of Aristotle, 

 as well as of Plato and most of the early Greek philosophers ; and to 

 a yet later period, after the processes which we have been describing 

 had been again and again repeated, the lives by the pseudo-Ammonius 

 and his anonymous Latin translator and interpolator. 



Criterion of If we were to estimate the relative importance of these later 

 vaiJfof'the authorities by the quantity of critical discernment or sound erudition 

 later writers, which they display, there would be little to choose between the con- 

 temporary of Severus and his followers of some centuries later. But 

 Diogenes, although devoid of all historical or philosophical discrimi- 

 nation, although sometimes contradicting himself within the limits of 

 a single biography, and confusing the tenets of Peripatetics and Epicu- 

 reans without the least consciousness of his own indistinct views, 1 is 

 distinguished by the circumstance that in his narrative the names of 

 the earliest authorities still appear, while from the rest they have in 

 most cases dropped out. With the use, therefore, of due caution and 

 diligence, we are frequently enabled to arrive at the views entertained 

 on a given point by individuals of four centuries earlier date, who 

 possessed both the wish and the means to ascertain truth where the 

 later writers were deficient in both. This is particularly the case with 

 certain classes of facts. Anecdotes illustrative of individual character 

 or habits of life readily spring up and have a rapid growth, if the 

 smallest nucleus of truth exist as a foundation for them. But dry 

 and uninteresting statements, such as the date of an insulated event, 

 will very rarely be falsified except by accidents attending transcription, 

 or unless their determination is distinctly felt to affect the decision of 

 some more obviously important question. When, therefore, such 

 statements, coupled with the name of an early authority, have been 

 preserved, there is a fair presumption that we have firm standing 

 ground ; and other notices of uncertain origin will possess a greater or 

 less claim to our consideration as they appear more or less adapted to 

 make parts of that body of which, as it were, a few fossil bones have 

 been preserved. These we shall first present collectively to the view 

 of our readers, and then proceed step by step in the process of 

 redintegration. 



1 See Casaubon's Note on Diog. Laert. v. 29. 



