Plutarch

I pulled it out to start reading it, although I am apprehensive about starting such a dense book set millenia ago in with unfamiliar people and places. This could easily be a semester of study, or longer. As I read, I am reminded of the importance of knowing history. We get so caught up in our modern accessories that we forget the fundamental human nature of all that we do.

I started this book, and then it sat without being read for six months. When I picked it up again, I started the chapter on: Lycurgus king of Sparta. The true details are shrouded in antiquity, but this chapter outlines him as a king who worked to create laws and a society for the blessing of his people. The laws of marriage are quite strange. He created a culture of self-denial.

A couple of paragraphs quite struck me, and are quoted here.

"Cæsar once, seeing some wealthy strangers at Rome, carrying up and down with them in their arms and bosoms young puppy-dogs and monkeys, embracing and making much of them, took occasion not unnaturally to ask whether the women in their country were not used to bear children; by that prince-like reprimand gravely reflecting upon persons who spend and lavish upon brute beasts that affection and kindness which nature has implanted in us to be bestowed on those of our own kind. With like reason may we blame those who misuse that love of inquiry and observation which nature has implanted in our souls, by expending it on objects unworthy of the attention either of their eyes or their ears, while they disregard such as are excellent in themselves, and would do them good." (Loc 4651)

"It was not said amiss by Antisthenes, when people told him that one Ismenias was an excellent piper, “It may be so,” said he, “but he is but a wretched human being, otherwise he would not have been an excellent piper.” And king Philip, to the same purpose, told his son Alexander, who once at a merry-meeting played a piece of music charmingly and skilfully, “Are you not ashamed, son, to play so well?” For it is enough for a king or prince to find leisure sometimes to hear others sing, and he does the muses quite honor enough when he pleases to be but present, while others engage in such exercises and trials of skill. He who busies himself in mean occupations produces, in the very pains he takes about things of little or no use, an evidence against himself of his negligence and indisposition to what is really good." (Loc 4669)


Theseus about 1284-1232 BC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theseus
Romulus about 771 BC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romulus_and_Remus
Lycurgus of Sparta Born: 800 BC
Numa Pompilius Wikipedia Born: April 21, 753 BC
Solon Born: Athens, Greece Died: 558 BC
Themistocles Athenian Politician Wikipedia Born: 524 BC, Athens, Greece Died: 459 BC
Marcus Furius Camillus (/kəˈmɪləs/; c. 446 – 365 BC) was a Roman soldier and statesman of patrician descent.
Pericles Greek statesman Born: 495 BC, Holargos, Greece Died: 429 BC, Athens, Greece
Pyrrhus - a fierce warrior without moral principle. (Loc - 12313)
Eumenes - betrayed into the hands of Antigonus. (Loc 17600-17643)
Tiberius was a just man who endeavored to do justice to the people by ensuring that they had property, and not just the rich. He was slain by a conspiracy of the wealthy. (75% of the way through)

The term patrician (Latin: patricius, Greek: πατρίκιος, patrikios) originally referred to a group of ruling class families in ancient Rome.… (meer)

I've read a different edition of "De Iside et Osiride", namely Plutarch, and J. Gwyn Griffiths. 1970. Plutarch's de Iside et Osiride. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, thus omitted Babbitt's translation. This Plutarchian text that I've read in the National Library of Wales as a second year student years ago brightened my mind and opened to a wholly new course of studies in metaphysics, pagan theology and magic that I pursued privately for the next fourteen years. As an advise, if anyone reads the "E at Delphi"; "Delphic oracles no longer given in verse" and "On the obsolence of oracles" it is of dire necessity to understand the neo-platonic schools of thought, knowledge of basic "modus operandi" of ancient mysteries is of great significance, otherwise it is quite a fruitless endeavour save for an aesthetical journey in a magnificent classical text. I understand that most people want to read with understanding - not only that, to "acquire the belief-perspective" is enriching, even if for a while, to honour the Eleusia and adorn one's intellect with a true commitment. Plutarch left extremely important matter in his magisterial works, collected and translated in Loeb's volumes, yet to grasp it fully, it is advisable to read, e.g. Iamblichus "On the Mysteries", Chaldean Oracles by Julian the Theurgist, Macrobius commentary to Somnium Scipionis, Hymn to Magna Mater and King Helios by Emperor Julian, Metamorphoses by Apuleius, modern Daniel Ogden's "Greek and Roman Necromancy" to name a few, for background; For whom shall believe it mere tale-tale of ancient past shall never understand the profound truths that are full of vigorous blood: Of prophetissas, of oracles, of Divine transcendent Sun that in the modern world are not only unseen, forgotten, but in the mind's of many descended into mere shadows of shadows, deeper into Platonic cave of apparitions. May the muses guide you.… (meer)