148 ANALOGY of GREEK LETTERS; 



" and o-ccKTi^iiv being now fupplanted by o-vgirruv and o-uXntrTziv 

 " and that he is not allowed even to grumble, the proper word 

 " y§v&"> being now no more. Who could have patience to en- 

 " dure fuch indignities ? or what punifhment is adequate to 

 " the demerits of this mod execrable Tau ? 



" But, in mort, he is not only injurious to his kindred tribe 

 " of letters, but has already begun to encroach upon the hu- 

 " man race, in fuch a manner that he permits them not to 

 " make a proper ufe of their tongues. Apropos of tongues, 

 " which this mention of human affairs has introduced, it 

 " brings to mind how the mifcreant has ufurped my province 

 " here too, by metamorphofing yXwa-tra,, a tongue, into yXurrci, 

 " O thou villanous Tau ! thou very bane of all tongues ! — 

 " But to return from this digreflion to the defence of men, 

 " whom he has fo grofsly injured. He attempts to torture their 

 " voice, and bind it with chains. When one perfon beholds 

 " a beautiful object, and wifhes to ftyle it xccXov, fair, up comes 

 " this Tav, and moft impudently obliges him to call it ruXou ; 

 " fuch is the violence of his claim to be at the head of every 

 " thing ! When another is fpeaking of a vine-branch by the 

 " appellation of KXr^a., he himfelf being rXqpov, a wretch, 

 " makes the poor word wretched too, by calling it rXSJ^a. 

 " Nor are his injuries confined to vulgar men ; he even forms 

 " a plot againft that tremendous Monarch, to whom the earth 

 " and the fea, in a fupernatural manner, are reported to have 

 */ yielded * ; and inflead of giving him his proper name Kvgo$, 

 " Cyrus, he fpeaks of him by the appellation of Tvgog, as if 

 " he were a cheefe. 



" Such then are the ways in which he injures men in their 

 " fpeech. But how does he ftill more materially injure them \ 



" They 



* Lucian fecms here to allude to the magnificence of the oriental ftyle. Xenophon, 

 in the Anabq/is, relates, that Cyrus the younger, with his army, pafled the Euphrates 

 on foot, which had never been forded in that manner before, and adds — INxtt Seiov «»«», 

 *«» cra.®u>$ vvoyiooiiirctt Toy 5tot«/kov Y^vptu ug fSccffOitCeotru Lib. I. See the annotation 01 

 Hemstekhuis. 



