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The first act of Eusebius and Theognis was to drive out the Catholic Bishops who had been elected to replace them in their sees; the second was to look about them to see who was likely to stand in their way. Eustathius, the Bishop of Antioch, an intrepid defender of the Faith, must be gotten rid of at once, they decided, and they proceeded to plot his ruin.
The catalogue of authors, which this Rev. Gentleman has pleased to specify and recommend, begins with Homer, Hesiod, the Argonautics, Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Pindar, Theognis, Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, Polybius, Diodorus Siculus. *. 'This catalogue, says he, 'might be considerably extended, but I study brevity.
"Well, you see, I had occasion this morning to be in Calatinus's library. Yes, I remember, I was just putting the new copy of Theognis back into the cupboard, when I noticed that the Mimnermus was not neatly rolled, and so I happened to stay in the room, and " "By Zeus, speak faster and to the point!" cried Agias. "Oh, there wasn't very much to it all! Why, how excited you are!
Too well I know how monstrous is the deed; My poverty, but not my will, consents. And every one knows the place in Theognis, whether I quote it or not, where he approves of people's flinging themselves to the unplumbed deep from sky-pointing crags, if one may be quit of poverty that way. That about exhausts the obvious lines of defence; and none of them is very promising.
And Aristophanes testifies to his lasting popularity when he shows little Tomides with a bad grouch over seeing a play by Theognis, when he had gone to the theater "expecting Aeschylus"; and when he shows Aeschylus and Euripides winning, because his poetry had died with him, and so he had it there for a weapon whereas Aeschylus's was still alive and on earth.
How comes it to pass then, said he, Theognis that thou thyself being so poor pratest and gratest our ears in this manner? Nor are we to omit, in our reading those hints which, from some other words or phrases bordering on those that offend us, may help to rectify our apprehensions.
They esteem indeed Theognis to have been a man altogether of a base and abject spirit, for saying, as one overfearful in regard to poverty, which is an indifferent thing: From poverty to fly, into the deep Throw thyself, Cyrnus, or from rocks so steep.
Suppose it paid, and paid in full: the whole sum is swallowed up to the last farthing, before their necessities are supplied. I would advise them to think upon better expedients; not such as are merely the protectors and accomplices of Poverty, but such as will make an end of her altogether. What say you, Theognis? Might this be a case for, Steep plunge from crags into the teeming deep?
With Arius recalled, there was no longer any reason why Eusebius and Theognis, who declared that they shared his opinions, should remain in banishment. Once in Constantinople, Eusebius regained all his old influence over the Emperor.
To unbend after this serious study, some other short and agreeable books that have a relation to it may be read: such as Ecclesiasticus, the Wisdom of Solomon, Theognis, Phocilides, the Golden Verses ascribed to Pythagoras, Epictetus's Enchiridion, Hierocles, and the Commentaries of Arrian; not omitting the Characters of Theophrastus.
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