have visited the countries of which he had occasion to speak, and in particular to have crossed the Alps, that he might describe the march of Hannibal with graphical accuracy ; he professes to have found a brazen tablet, inscribed by Hannibal when he was in Italy, of which Polybius availed himself in writing his history.

1

CHAP. XXVI.

Diodorus Siculus.

THIS historian is said to have been born at Argyrium or Agyrium, in Sicily *, though he is called a Syracusan by Pliny. He lived in the time of Julius Cæsar and Augustus beyond the period in which the Calendar underwent a second reformation, which took place A. U. 746, when a regulation was enforced for the insertion of an intercalary day, on the 24th of February every fourth

year.

Having travelled over a great part of Asia and other countries with a view to collect accurate information, he settled at Rome, and composed his Bibliotheca Historica, a diffusive and elaborate work, which contained a great mass of history, embracing a period from the reign of Ogyges, King of Bœotia,

Scaliger in Euseb. Chron. ad Ann. 1967.

to the time of the historian. Only fifteen of his forty books, with some fragments collected from Photius, are now extant; the loss of those parts, which related to the Egyptian, Assyrian, and Phoenician histories, is particularly to be regretted. Henry Stephens had heard a report that all the works of Diodorus were extant in Sicily: and Lascaris professed to have seen a complete copy of his history in the Imperial Library at Constantinople. There is great reason to doubt whether any remains of this library now exist. Professor Carlyle, who made it the object of his particular enquiry, could not obtain any information concerning it, though he had the advantage of a confidential intercourse with the Patriarch.

Diodorus is a valuable historian, though far inferior to Herodotus and Thucydides, as to the spirit and interest of his work. The information which he affords, is furnished with a plain and unaffected simplicity. He appears to have been desirous of communicating truth; but commencing with the fabulous parts of ancient history, he could not but relate many traditionary fictions. It is probable, however, that he had not any intention of sanctioning some of those ac

counts, which he gives of earlier nations, and indeed he expressly objects to the Chaldæan calculations. He seems, however, in many instances, to have listened with too easy credulity to the relations of travellers; as where he represents that the inhabitants of Ceylon had the tongue divided, and could converse perfectly with two men at the same time, speaking with one part of the tongue to one person, and with the other part to another. He writes under a just feeling of moral impressions, ascribes events to the interference of Providence, and states that evil is intermixed with good, with a view to discipline man to caution, modesty, and gratitude for the blessings which they enjoy. He speaks of the mythological notions which prevailed with respect to a future state in the manner which' might be expected from a Heathen writer, who regarded them merely as useful fictions, conducive to piety and justice, but as less efficacious to form the manners than history, which he represents as alone conferring immortal celebrity to beings, who exist but for a short part of eternity*. His representations of the progress and excesses of idolatry, illus

Bibliotheca, lib. i. c. 2. p. 4, 5. Edit. Wetsten.

trating to what extent the heathens were given up to their vile affections," being "dead in sins," remarkably confirm the description of St. Paul *.

Diodorus is particularly cited by Justin Martyr, as substantiating the claims and history of Moses. Many testimonies to the truth of the Sacred Writings, illustrative of the completion of prophecy, may be gleaned from his works. He speaks of Moses as an ancient legislator, who professed to derive his precepts from Iao or Jehovah 1, and he gives an account of the creation of the world, gradually distributed into its constituent parts, and composed into order and arrangement, which seems to exhibit a mutilated account of particulars described by the sacred historian. He specifies the production of the sun and stars, and of animals and creeping things and fishes; and he speaks of the generation of living creatures after the earth had been settled under the infuence of heat and the spirit (πνευμάτων) in a manner obscure indeed, but in which we

Rom. i. 25-31. Ephes. ii. 2, 3.

* Λογος προς Ελληνας. p. 14. Edit. Par. 1742. Lib. i. c. 59. p. 105.