Frederick Apthorp Paley and John Malcolm Mitchell

“ How a Flatterer may be Distinguished from a Friend is a rather long and uninteresting treatise. The ancient writers are full of warnings against flatterers, who do not seem to exercise much influence in modern society. ”

“ On the whole, this is a most interesting treatise
On Isis and Osiris is a rather long treatise on Egyptian symbolism, interesting chiefly to students of Egyptology. It gives an exposition of the strange myths and superstitions of this ancient solar cult, including a full account of the great antagonist of Osiris, Typhon, or the Egyptian Satan. Plutarch thus lays down the Zoroastrian theory of good and bad agencies (§ 45) : "If nothing can happen without cause, and good cannot furnish cause for evil, it follows that the nature of evil, as of good, must have an origin and principle of its own." ”

“ How a Young Man ought to Hear Poetry is largely made up of quotations from Homer and the tragic poets. The points of the essay are the moral effects of poetry as combining the true with the false, the praises of virtue and heroism with a mythology depraved and unworthy of gods, εἰ θεοί τι δρῶσι φαῦλον, οὐκ εἰσὶν θεοί (§ 21) . ”

“ It is easy to say that this essay "neither requires nor merits refutation”; but Plutarch knew history, and he writes like one who thoroughly understands the charges which he brings against the historian. The Lives of the Ten Orators from Antiphon to Dinarchus (now considered spurious) are biogaphies of various lengths, compiled, doubtless, from materials now lost.
Two rather long essays, Should a Man engage in Politics when he is no longer Young, and Precepts for Governing (πολιτικὰ παραγγέλματα) , are interspersed with valuable quotations. ”

“ The dialogue ends with an interesting narrative of the concealment of Pelopidas and some of the Theban conspirators against the Spartans in the house of Charon.
On Exile is a fine essay, rendered the more interesting from its numerous quotations from the poets, including several from the Phoenissae. Man is not a plant that grows only in one soil; he belongs to heaven rather than to earth, and wherever he goes there are the same sun, the same seasons, the same providence, the same laws of virtue and justice (§ 5) . There is no discredit in being driven from one's country ”

“ Another long and learned work bears the rather obscure title Κεφαλαίων καταγραφή. It is generally known as Quaestiones Romanae and Graecae, in two parts. In the former, which contains one hundred and thirteen headings, the inquiry (on some matter political, religious or antiquarian) always commences with διὰ τί, usually followed by πότερον, with alternative explanations. ”

“ All these are interspersed with citations from the poets, several of them unknown from other sources.
A longer treatise, well and clearly written, and not less valuable for its many quotations, is the Consolation addressed to Apollonius (considered spurious by some) on the early death of his “generally beloved and religious and dutiful son.” Equality of mind both in prosperity and in adversity is recommended (§ 4) , since there are “ups and downs” (ὔψος καὶ ταπεινότης) in life, as there are storms and calms on the sea, and good and bad seasons on the earth. ”

“ It opens with the wise remark that ignorance about the gods, which makes the obstinate man an atheist, also begets credulity in weak and pliant minds. The atheist fears nothing because he believes nothing; the superstitious man believes there are gods, but that they are unfriendly to him (§ 2) . A man who fears the gods is never free from fear, whatever he may do or whatever may befall him. ”

“ How to get Benefit out of Enemies argues that, as primitive man had savage animals to fight against, but learnt to make use of their skins for clothing and their flesh for food, so we are bound to turn even our enemies to some good purpose. ”

“ The lamenting a death because it is untimely or premature has something of selfishness in it (§ 19) , besides that it only means that one has arrived sooner than another at the end of a common journey. ”

“ It is rather an amusing essay, and may be regarded as a kind of appendix to the last. The theory propounded (§ 24) is that verse was the older vehicle of philosophy, history and religion, but that plain prose has become the later fashion, and therefore that oracles are now generally delivered "in the same form as laws speak to citizens, kings reply to their subjects, and scholars hear their teachers speak." Discredit, too, was brought on the verse-oracle by the facility with which it was employed by impostors (§ 25) . ”

“ One service they do to us is to make us live warily against plots; another is they induce us to live honestly, so as to vex our rivals not by scolding them, but by making them secretly jealous of us (§ 4) . ”

“ A rather long treatise On the Virtues of Women contains a series of narratives of noble deeds done by the sex in times of danger and trouble, especially from "tyrants." Many of the stories are interesting, and the style is easy and good. ”

“ It may therefore fairly be inferred that Plutarch’s original idea was simply to set a Greek warrior, statesman, orator or legislator side by side with some noted Roman celebrated for the same qualities, or working under similar conditions. Nearly all the lives are in pairs ”