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2. I do not think that any explanation of the quotation from Grote is 
necessary. Alteration, of course, is impossible in a quotation. It fully 
established my position, that Pythagoras was successful in his mission of 
reformation ; and although I should not have used the word “ converted ” 
had I been writing the description, yet I cannot blame Grote for using it. 
It simply means changed, and what he described was not only a great change, 
but a great moral improvement. If one set of men use a word in a much 
narrower sense than its etymology requires, they have no authority to forbid 
the rest of the world using it in its purity, especially when, as in the present 
case, their narrower use of the word is indefinite and equivocal. 
3. I am quite ready to admit that the best of the ancient heathen had 
very imperfect knowledge of God and of Divine things, in comparison with 
those to whom were given the Oracles of God. But I should be sorry to 
regard Ptahhotep and Zoroaster as no better than “ prison scavengers.” And 
I cannot fully receive the second part of Dr. Duncan’s doctrine ; because, 
although all who lived b.c. were without that full revelation which could 
only come from “ God manifest in the flesh,” yet not a man has been born 
into the world beyond the scope and influence of redemption. Further, if 
the doctrine of Dr. Duncan be correct, then all the Old Testament saints 
were in bondage as well as the rest of the world. Like nearly all smart 
sayings, its smartness is the measure of its inaccuracy. 
