The ideal city of Plato could only come true if three great and unlikely changes were made in the state. Neither Plato's contemporaries nor later generations have been able to breast the second of these ‘waves,’ which brings in a new order of marriage for guardians. The scheme is condemned as not only not good or possible—the Platonic tests—but as inconsistent with itself and with the account given in the Timaeus. The parts under censure are the so-called table of prohibited affinities and the sanction of infanticide. It would be strange to find discrepancies in a proposal so important for Plato's state that details cannot well be left to some Damon, and I hope to show that difficulties arise only when critics do not place themselves exactly at Plato's point of view. He conceived a certain problem with sharp outlines, and his answer is precisely adapted to that. The first wave left the guardians as a family of men and women living in common. How was it possible to preserve this communal life and provide for the future of the guardian class? If the rulers failed to choose aright here, an oracle foretold the decay of the city (415b-c). Therefore Plato's rigid preoccupation in the second wave is to secure for the archons entire control over the birth of guardian children. Otherwise the community will sink into mere promiscuity and the stock will degenerate. In short, Plato tries to ensure that, apart from the necessary getting of children for the state, the guardians shall be friends and not lovers. Our special problems arise from the two questions—πως παδοποιήσονtαι, καì γεκομÉνους πως θρÉψουσι; (449c). Let us begin with the first of these.

When Odysseus and Diomede are about to set out on their adventure in the tenth Iliad, Meriones lends the former a noble κυνέη, the workmanship of which is carefully described.

The recently issued volume of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri (Part XI.) contains new and important fragments from the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women; and the two substantial pieces grouped as No. 1358 are particularly welcome as shedding light upon two rather obscure sections of that work—the γης περlόδος, and the history of the Sons of Europa and Zeus. It goes without saying that the editors' treatment of these fragments is in every way admirable; and I trust it will not be regarded as an impertinence if I endeavour to restore a few lines which they have refrained from completing, and to offer an alternative reconstruction of a somewhat difficult passage.

As far as I know, Kaibel is the only champion of the soundness of our text in this passage. In his edition of the Electra he has the following note : ‘Zu τòν ⋯ɛ⋯ πατρóς ist, wie Haupt gezeigt hat (Op. II. 301), der Nominal-begriff (wie στɛναγμóν) aus dem Verbum zu ergäanzen, genau wie in μ⋯ανδικ⋯ζɛιν, διττ⋯ν παῖσαι u. a. statt des Adjektivs steht das durch den Artikel gestützte Adverbium, vgl. Arist. Ran. 191 νɛναυμ⋯χηκɛ τ⋯ν πɛρ⋯ τ⋯ν κρɛ⋯ν und das sprüchwörtliche τòν πɛρ⋯ ψυχ࿆ς (δρóμον) τpεXειv. So ist auch der Komikervers (fr. adesp. 104 K) ganz in Ordnung εγω Tov αλλov, αvδρεs, εTεθvηkη πáλaι aπavθ', ôv εζηv, wo zu εζηv und also auch zu ετεθvηkη sich ein Nominal-begriff wie βιóv oder χρóvov von selbst ergánzt; denn auf ein bestimmtes Nomen kommt nichts an, da kein Grieche thatsáchlich ein Nomen ergánzte, sondern den Begriff aus dem Verbum heraushörte.’ He concludes: ‘So unzweifelhaft richtig Haupts Erklärung ist, so pflegt man sie neuerdings doch wieder zu ignoriren oder zu verwerfen und die allerungläublichsten “Emendationen” zu bevorzugen.’ With the latter part of his assertion I fully agree, and am prepared to throw all emendations that have been so far suggested overboard. But with due diffidence I beg to try my hand once more at emending this passage, as I firmly believe that Sophocles has not written it as handed down to us. τóv aεì…στεváχovσ' is intolerably weak. It is far more likely that we have here a case of the wrong division of words. In uncials we should have read: HAEKTPATON, which ought to have been transcribed ΉHλεkτρ’.

So MSS. For ϕερετε metri causa Scaliger proposed ϕερετι, an emendation rightly accepted by editors. In the preceding line καιδή conceals a corruption.

Wilamowitz reads:

και μήν παιδωμ ταδε δή.

The change,however, is too violent to recommend itself on palaeographic grounds. In his notatio critica Murray says: Fortasse παισι.

Thus reads the ‘optimus Laurentianus,’ and starting hence we shall refuse claudent, the facile but incoherent correction of some MSS., and still more the claudunt which the majority offer. Nor for all that shall we make the ineptitude of these readings a ground for condemning the pentameter, which, save for its lack of grammatical construction, is perfectly faultless in expression. Turning our attention to the hexameter, we observe that Parca, a synonym for fata (Ex Pont. III. 7. 20 ‘Parcaque ad extremum qua mea coepit eat’ by id. II. 7. 17 sq. ‘iam mihi fata liquet coeptos seruantia cursus | per sibi consuetas semper itura uias’) with trahebat will set everything right. The offending fata is due to a gloss or an unfortunate reminiscence.

In a previous article I have cited these lines in support of my emendation ‘Ηλεκτρατον for the MS. text Ηλεκτρα τοκν, v. 1075. With Jebb I tacitly agreed that the word-order ωδ’ ακορεστον οίμωγáν was correct. The metre of vv. 138–9 οντε γools ορτε λίταίσιν must therefore be defective.

As the abolition of gold cannot directly cause the restoration of a ruined city, the word γάρ must be taken as referring back to 1. 348: ‘Enemies will make peace; for gold, the cause of quarrels, will be abolished.’ But the awkwardness of the connexion suggests a suspicion that the passage has been in some way altered or rearranged.

In January, 1914, I published in the Classical Quarterly an article on t1he Five Grammatical Chapters of Quintilian, in which I endeavoured to set out the general scheme of the writer and his relation to the educational practice of his time. In the present paper I propose to deal with some of the numerous difficulties of detail—difficulties both of text and meaning—which crop up in chapters 4–7. The technicality of the subject and the abbreviated method of treatment produce much obscurity, even when we have no reason to doubt the text. And as to the text, one can but echo the words of Varro with regard to philological and grammatical questions, ‘librarios haec spinosiora indiligentius elaturos putaui.’ The result is that these chapters provide perhaps more problems than are to be found in the same limits in any first class Latin writer—problems which, though not perhaps of much intrinsic importance, have that interest which must always attach to questions which have baffled generations of commentators. I have divided the questions which I have treated into two classes. The first consists of passages in which I feel some confidence in the text which I have adopted or the meaning which I have proposed. The second consists of those which I fear must be left unsolved, though I hope that I have been able to advance the discussion a few steps.

Many critics have condemned, some have defended, Euripides for composing a play ‘altogether wanting in the satisfaction which nothing but a unity of ideas could produce.’ It helps us little to marvel, with Paley, at the ‘obtuseness of critics who forsooth prefer “unity of ideas” to profoundly moving incidents, etc.,’ though it may be admitted that Paley has detected part of the truth when he calls attention to the importance of the fact that Athens is, throughout the play, the only possible asylum for the hero. Verrall's analysis has the merit that it attempts to account for the play as a whole, but it is hard to believe that the Athenian audience was composed of subtle critics, endowed with Verrall's ingenuity and acumen. Still, though it is easy to disagree with Verrall, it is less easy to give the reasons for one's disagreement. In detail one can say: ‘The straightforward and obvious sense of the words is adequate; the subtle suggestion is not likely to have occurred to an audience which had never heard of Schlegel or of Swinburne.’ That leaves us with the fact that the impression made on most of us by the whole work is not one of formal perfection. To most readers there seem to be three episodes, each excellent, but not intimately connected with the other two: in the first we are concerned for the fate of the tyrant Lycus, and rejoice at his just destruction; in the second we are moved by the sudden reversal in the fortunes of the beneficent Heracles; and in the third we are impressed by the magnanimity, and, perhaps, delighted with the Athenian connections, of the excellent Theseus. There is a good deal of talk which we ascribe to the tendency of Euripides to make his characters the mouthpieces for current debate. There are choral odes which we think charming, but, on the whole and as a rule, slightly irrelevant to the main ‘incidents.’ My purpose in this paper is to suggest, first, that the audience was occupied with certain quite familiar ideas upon which Euripides has built his play, and was, therefore, not at leisure to catch at subtleties of detail, suggestions, ambiguities, ironies, points of logic and of lack of logic, such as Verrall emphasizes; and, secondly, that if we also remember these ideas, we shall find both unity in the construction and relevance in the choral odes.

Medea v. 856 sqq.

πóθεν θράος η Θρενό η

χειρì ΤÈΚνων σÈθΕν

Καρδα τε λήψη

δεινàν πpoσáγονσα τóλμαν

Dr. Leaf's article in the Journal of Hellenic Studies has recalled our attention to the venerable problem of the Rhesus. I hasten to give my adhesion to his main contention (in which he was partly anticipated by W. Christ) that the play is a pièce d'occasion justifying or sanctifying the foundation of the city of Amphipolis. But, as he remarks, seeing that the oracle ordering the removal of the bones of Theseus from Skyros to Athens preceded the actual removal by some years, so this play may be intended to prepare for the actual removal of the bones of Rhesus from Troy by Hagnon, and may be prior to it by several years. For this official theft—doubtless arranged beforehand—we have only the authority of Polyainos' Strategemata, but it is a story which seems likely in itself, and goes far to explain the previously obscure lament of the Muse at the end of the play. My object is to examine the play afresh and see whether anything prevents our believing that it was written and exhibited somewhere near 440 B.C., in which case of course it is almost certainly the work of Euripides and not far from his Cyclops in date.

‘The populace,’ says Menelaus, ‘when roused to anger, is difficult to deal with; but if when it rages one slacks the sheet, watching an opportunity, the storm may blow itself out. And when it moderates its blasts, one may easily win one's will of it. It is capable of pity and nobility, qualities most precious to one who bides his time.’

The completion of a critical text of Catullus, which Teubner expects soon to publish, furnishes a plausible excuse for offering a few observations on readings:

29. 20 Hunc gallie timet et britannie (brittanie O) GORM (spatium solito maius post timet reliquit R).

There has been much discussion in recent years regarding the date and authorship of the poems included in the Appendix Vergiliana, and about the Civis and the Culex in particular. Evidence of very various kinds has been brought to bear on the question. My chief aim in this paper is to propound a criterion which as far as I know is new—though it seems to me a fairly conspicuous thing, and I do not know why it has not been investigated —and to examine certain criteria which seem to me to have been treated quite wrongly—treated in a way which could lead to no conclusion—even by so distinguished a scholar as Norden. I propose in a second paper to examine the argument from diction, especially in regard to the Culex, and to try to show that the evidence adduced for Virgilian authorship by Miss Jackson (Class. Quart. vol. V., p. 163 sq.) is not so conclusive as it has been supposed to be; and, next, to point out certain features or mannerisms in the Culex which seem to me to be on the whole against authorship by Virgil. I have hardly any doubt that both the Ciris and the Culex were written before 44 B.C., and the Lydia and Dirae only two or three years later; but, while the evidence for the early date of some of the Vergiliana grows stronger on further examination, the evidence for Virgilian authorship seems to me to grow weaker, even in the case of the well-attested Culex

A very slight reading of Clement of Alexandria is enough to prove how deeply he is indebted to Plato both in respect of language and of thought. Quotations from Plato are to be found throughout Clement's works, and in many cases acknowledgment is made of their origin. In addition there are frequent allusions, which for the most part the student of Plato can easily recognize. Clement invariably shows a profound respect for the Greek philosopher, whom he looks upon as a seeker after truth and as an authority, we may almost say, second only to the Scriptures. A careful comparison of the Protrepticus with the Phaedrus, results of which are given below, will furnish a striking illustration of the close dependence of Clement upon Plato. The Protrepticus is a short work, occupying in space not more than one–twelfth of Clement's extant writings, while the Phaedrus is even smaller in proportion to the whole of Plato. It is remarkable that so much inter-connexion should be found in so small a field, especially when we remember that the references to the Phaedrus represent by no means the whole of Clement's drawing upon Plato in the Protrepticus. There are allusions also to the Theaetetus, Republic, Charmides, Laws and Epistles, and possibly to the Politicus, Cratylus, Philebus, Symposium and Apology.

Before the year 1857, when Mommsen published his celebrated treatise Die Rechtsfrage zwischen Caesar und dem Senat, most scholars believed that Caesar's provincial command legally expired at the end of 49 B.C.; but Mommsen demonstrated the falsity of this opinion, and for nearly half a century it was an article of faith that the date fixed was the 1st of March. I may remark parenthetically that, although this date is usually quoted, it would be more correct to say the 28th of February. In 1904, however, Otto Hirschfeld gave reasons for believing that Caesar's command was not expressly secured beyond March 1, 50; and although Ludwig Holzapfel vigorously defended the orthodox view, Hirschfeld remained for several years in possession of the field. In 1913 Walther Judeich, while admitting that Hirschfeld had worsted Mommsen, argued, ‘convincingly’ as Mr. F. E. Adcock thinks, that the date was December 29, 50. The writers of the article on Latin Literature in The Year's Work in Classical Studies (1915), noticing the reissue of the third volume of The Correspondence of Cicero, remark that ‘the authors [Tyrrell and Purser] still hold the pious faith that Caesar's command in Gaul was to run out on the 1st of March in 49; it is a pity,’ they add, ‘in view of Hirschfeld and the rest, that they have not shown the English reader their grounds for that belief.’ I propose in this article to give mine for sharing it.

This is the way to say in Latin ‘you see my face, though you cannot see the rest of me’. So her. X 53 ‘tua, quae possum, pro te uestigia tango’, 135 ‘non oculis sed, qua potes, aspice mente’, art. III 633 ‘corpora si nequeunt, quae possunt, nomina tangunt’, trist. IV 2 57 ‘haec ego summotus, qua possum,. mente uidebo’, 3 17 sq. ‘esse tui memorem… quodque potest, secum nomen habere tuum’, 10 112 ‘tristia, quo possum, carmine fata leuo’, ex Pont. IV 4 45 ‘absentem, qua possum, mente uidebo’.1 But that is not what Ovid seeks to say: he means ‘you see my face in such fashion as you can’, not in the flesh but in counterfeit presentment; and Latin expresses this meaning otherwise. As Ovid here speaks of his own likeness on a ring, so in ex Pont. II 8 55 he speaks of the likenesses of Augustus Tiberius and Liuia on a medal; and he says ‘nos quoque uestra iuuat quod, qua licet, ora uidemus’. Arellius Fuscus in Sen. suas. 4 I puts the same thought in the same way, ‘cur non ab infantia rerum naturam deosque, qua licet, uisimus, cum pateant nobis sidera et interesse numinibus liceat ?’ In her. XIII 41 sq. ‘qua possum, squalore tuos imitata labores dicar’ many MSS have changed the adverb into quo agreeing with the substantive hard by; and similarly here the ‘quae potes’ of the text has come from ‘qua potes’.

These are not two adjectives. They are two men—or, rather, two shadows. If I said that they were two names I should be speaking inexactly. The name of Varus occurs five times in Vergil: and twice (Ecl. VI. 12, IX. 35) out of these five times the oldest Latin MSS. which we possess have confounded it with that of Varius. In the Vitae Vergilianae, recently edited with an adequate Apparatus Criticus, the names Varus and Varius are found, I think, twenty-eight times; and twenty-two times out of these twenty-eight all, or most, of our MSS. have confused them—and that though in thirteen cases we are dealing with codices of saec. IX.–X. The same names occur four times in Quintilian, and in one case all, in another all the respectable, MSS. have got them wrong. They occur thrice in Martial—twice right, once wrong. I have selected these particular writers for a reason that will appear later. But the MSS. of Horace tell a like tale.

Heracles had gone to Arcadia to fetch the Erymanthian boar; when he had just returned he heard of the voyage of Argo, and, hastily depositing the boar at Mycenae, departed to join Jason without the knowledge of Eurystheus. λυρκήιον Αργος άμείψας is supposed to mean ‘having come to Lyrceian Argos’. But, first, άμείβω Αργος ought not to mean ‘I come to Argos’; άμείβω and άμείβομαι alike mean either change or pass or leave; enter they do not mean. The lexica quote passages as meaning enter which do not mean any such thing; Θύρας or βαλόν άμείβω is ‘I pass’ the door or threshold, πόλιν έκπόλεως άμείβω or άμείβομαι is ‘I change one city for another,’ άμείβομαι έρκοςόδότων ‘I pass the hedge of the teeth,’ and so on. Until I see an instance of it I shall not believe that πόλιν άμείβω can mean merely I enter or come to a city. Nor can we take it to mean pass in this place, because the road from Arcadia to Mycenae does not pass Argos. Secondly, what is Lyrceian Argos ? Whether a river or a mountain be implied by Lyrceian, it is not a Greek expression; we do not speak of Hymettian Athens or Cephisian Athens, of Cithaeronian or Asopian Thebes or Boeotia. There is indeed found the expression Πηλιωτιν 'Ιωλκόν in Euripides, Medea 484, and the scholiast on iv. 131 says that Τιτνίδος Αίης means Aea of the river Titen, referring to Eratosthenes as his authority for the river, but no one else knows anything about it, and it is more than probable that Mr. Mooney is right in regarding it with suspicion.