ARISTOTLE. 147 



wines which, as is notorious, were beyond almost any others cele- 

 brated in antiquity. When a sample of each had been brought to 

 him, he first tasted the latter, and praised it for its soundness and 

 agreeable flavour. Then trying the Lesbian, he seemed for a time to 

 doubt which he should choose, but at last said, " Both are admirable 

 wines, but the Lesbian is the pleasanter of the two." He never made 

 any further allusion to the matter of a successor, and the disciples 

 universally concluded that this observation relative to the Rhodian 

 and Lesbian vintages was meant as an answer to their question, 

 Theophrastus the Lesbian being a man singularly distinguished for 

 suavity both of language and manners ; and accordingly, on the death 

 of Aristotle, they unanimously acknowledged him as the chosen 

 successor. That this anecdote implies the belief that a disease of 

 some duration was the cause of the philosopher's death is quite 

 obvious ; and there is some ground for supposing that this disease 

 was an affection of the intestines, from which he had long suffered. His probable 

 This affection, says another ancient author, 1 which he bore with the ' mp ai 

 greatest fortitude, was of such a nature that the wonder is that he 

 contrived to prolong his life to the extent of sixty-three years, not 

 that he died when he did. For complaints of this kind warm foment- 

 ations of oil applied to the stomach were recommended in the medical 

 practice of antiquity. 2 Now Lycon the Pythagorean, 3 a bitter calum- 

 niator of Aristotle, grounded a charge of inordinate luxury against 

 him upon the assertion that he indulged himself in the habit of taking 

 baths of warm oil : an assertion which, if we should fail at once to 

 recognise it as a misrepresentation of the medical treatment alluded 

 to, will be unequivocally explained by the more accurate description 

 of another writer, 4 who obviously alludes to the same circumstance. 



Diogenes Laertius, as we have mentioned in an earlier part of this His will, 

 essay, speaks of having seen Aristotle's will, and proceeds to give the 

 substance of it. 5 That this is not an abstract of the authentic docu- 

 ment is obvious from the circumstance that no mention whatever is 

 made in it of his literary property, which was very considerable, and 

 which we know from other sources came to Theophrastus. 6 Neither, 

 however, does there seem to us any well-grounded suspicion that the 

 account of Diogenes is either a forgery, or the copy of a forgery. The 

 whole document bears the stamp, in our judgment, of a codicil to a 

 previously-existing will, drawn up at a time when the testator was 

 dangerously ill, and had but little expectation of recovery. Thus, at 

 the very commencement, Antipater, the regent of Macedonia, is 



1 Censorinus, cited above, p. 6. 



2 Celsus, ii. 17, iii. ult. 



8 Cited by Aristocles, ap. Euseb. loc. cit. He adds, that his avarice induced 

 him to sell the oil after this use had been made of it. 



* Diog. Laert. Vit. sec. 16. He adds to Lycon's account, ej/tot 5e /col affitiov 

 Qepfiov eA.ai'ou eiriTidei/ai avrbv T< ffrofj-d^cf, 



5 Vit. Arist. sec. 1216. 



6 Strabo, xiii. p. 124. 



L2 



