56 
MEMOIR OP ARISTOTLE. 
those hours which ho stole from the necessary sea- 
son of repose ; for Laertius affirms, that, when he 
went to bed, he held a brazen ball in his hand, the 
noise of which, dropping into a metal basin when he 
fell asleep, might awake him to resume his studies ; 
and in this practice he was imitated by his royal pupil 
Alexander. He was twice married. By his first 
wife he had a daughter, called after her own name 
(Pythias), who survived her father, and gave birth to 
a second Aristotle, of whom nothing except this cir- 
cumstance has been recorded. His second wife was 
Herpylis, a native of Stagira, and basely defamed by 
the enemies of her husband, as a courtezan and a 
concubine. By her he had an only son, Nicomachus, 
ivho was a disciple of Theophrastus, and fell in bat- 
tle at an early age. To him he dedicated his great 
work on Morals, called “ Nicomachea,” which, as it 
was the last and principal object of his studies, is of 
all his performances the longest, the best connected, 
and incomparably the most interesting. 
His will, a copy of which is preserved in Laertius, 
is curious, not merely as throwing some light on his 
domestic affairs, but as an example of the distinct 
yet concise form of ancient testamentary deeds. If 
indited shortly before he expired, it refuteB the fables 
about his committing suicide, and may be reckoned 
an evidence that he not only died a natural death, 
but with a calmness and composure worthy of a 
philosopher. Antipater, the confidential minister of 
Philip, and afterwards viceroy of Macedon, was ap- 
