68 
MEMOIR OP ARISTOTLE. 
peting with Plato, who then stood pre-eminent in 
philosophical fame, and whose opinions he had in se- 
veral material points impugned. Whatever the fact 
may be, the carelessness or timidity of Aristotle 
was fatal to his writings, and had well nigh created 
a blank in literary history, which might have for ever 
deprived the world of this invaluable treasury of an- 
cient learning. 
The extraordinary fate and miraculous preserva- 
tion of these works, form a curious episode in the 
biography of their author ; and the regret which 
every friend to science must feel, that so much 
has perished, is heightened by reflecting on the 
imperfect and mutilated state of the little that re- 
mains. Whilst the Stagirito distributed his other 
property to his surviving family, he left the more 
precious bequest of his library and manuscripts to 
his favourite disciple Theophrastus, who in his turn 
bequeathed them to his own scholar Neleus, by whom 
they were conveyed from Athens to Scepsis, bis na- 
tive place, a city of the ancient Troas, in Asia Mi- 
nor. The heirs of Neleus, to whom they next de- 
scended, being neither men of letters, nor lovers of 
books, (as Strabo relates,) totally neglected the intel- 
lectual treasure that had most unworthily devolved 
to them. The magnificence of kings had then be- 
gun to display itself in collecting works of ge- 
nius, which were sought out with an eager and la- 
vish curiosity. It was a taste happy for the cause 
of literature in general, although in the present in- 
