Alciphron

“ These words softened Semestre's wrath, and, lowering her voice, she replied:
"You will no longer need the lad for that purpose; Leonax, Alciphron's son, is coming to-day. He'll lift and support you as if you were his own father. The people in Messina are friendly and honor age, for, while you jeer at me, they remember the old woman, and will send me a beautiful matron's-robe for the future wedding." ”

“ What he directly knows is his relation to some other elements of the universe namely, I, Alciphron, am located in my percipient event ‘here and now’ and the immediately perceived appearance of the planet is for me a characteristic of another event ‘there and now.’ In fact perceptual knowledge is always a knowledge of the relationship of the percipient event to something else in nature. ”

“ I know you well enough, and Leonax, Alciphron's son, not your sleepy Phaon, whom people say is roaming about when he ought to be resting quietly in the house, shall have our girl for his wife. It's not I who say so, but Lysander, my lord and master."
"Your will is his," replied Jason. "Far be it from me to wound the sick man with words, but ever since he has been ill you've played the master, and he ought to be called the house-keeper. ”

“ But it is to Alciphron that we owe the adaptation of this form of composition to prose fiction, and its employment in a far wider range of psychological and social observation.
The life whose details are given us by Alciphron is the life of contemporary Athens in the persons of its easy-going population. The writers whose letters we are supposed to read in reading Alciphron are peasants, fishermen, parasites, men-about-town, and courtesans. The language of the letters is neat, pointed, and appropriate to the person who in each case is supposed to be the writer ”

“ We are not to look upon the letters of Alciphron as embodying a literary unity. He did not attempt to write one single symmetrical epistolary romance; but the individual letters are usually slight sketches of character carelessly gathered together, and deriving their greatest charm from their apparent spontaneity and artlessness. Many of them are, to be sure, unpleasantly cynical, and depict the baser side of human nature; others, in their realism, are essentially commonplace; but some are very prettily expressed, and show a brighter side to the picture of contemporary life. ”

“ In The Epicurean, Moore shows a remarkable power of describing scenes of gloomy terror, which he throws into relief by occasional glimpses of light and splendour. The journey of Alciphron inevitably challenges comparison with that of Vathek, but the spirit of mockery that animates Beckford's story is wholly absent. Moore paints a theatrical panorama of effective scenes, but his figures are mere shadows.
The miseries of an existence, prolonged far beyond the allotted span, are depicted not only in stories of the elixir of life, but in the legends centring round the Wandering Jew. ”

“ We are often influenc'd by our Love, or our Hatred, before we are aware of it our selves. I have met with several good Judges of Books, who disliked, and spoke very slightingly of your Alciphron; and I found, the chief Reason was, because you attack'd all Free Thinkers, without Exception. But I declare, that I think your Book, for the Generality, to be well wrote; tho' you have us'd me most unmercifully, and not acted, if you had read The Fable of the Bees, like an honest Man. When a Person has a handsome Face, I can't be so stupid as to believe him ugly, because he has us'd me ill. ”

“ I am only sorry for your poor father, who needed a trustworthy son, and the good Leonax—"
At this moment, as if he had heard his name and obediently appeared at her call, the son of Alciphron, of Messina, appeared with Phaon's father, Protarch, from the shadow of the myrtle-grove.
He was a gay, handsome youth, richly and carefully dressed. After many a pressure of the hand and cordial words of welcome, Phaon took the young girl's hand and led her to the new-comers, saying:
"Give me Xanthe for a wife, my father. We have grown up together like the ivy and wild vine on the wall, and cannot part." ”

“ Alciphron,—an Epicurean philosopher, converted to Christianity A. D. 257, by a young Egyptian maiden, who suffered martyrdom in that year. Immediately upon her death he betook himself to the desert, and lived a life, it is said, of much [pg 307] holiness and penitence. During the persecution under Dioclesian, his sufferings for the faith were most exemplary ”

“ An adulterer is laying siege to the household--a young man from Elis, one of the Olympian fascinators; he sends neatly folded notes every day to our master's wife, together with faded bouquets and half-eaten apples." Alciphron, iii, 62. The words are put into the mouth of a rapacious parasite who feels that the security of his position in the house is about to be shaken. ”

“ Your Crito and Euphranor are very good Characters; but what I admire the most in them, is the consummate Patience in keeping Company, and bearing for a whole Week together, with two such insupportable, out of the way Rascals, as you have represented Alciphron and Lysicles to be. I believe with you, that among the Vain and Voluptuous, there are Abundance of superficial People, who call themselves Free Thinkers, and are proud of being thought to be Unbelievers, without having laid the Foundation of any Philosophy at all. ”

“ She proves to be a Christian, and the hero is thus introduced to the secret communion. It is of course the basis of Moore's prose romance, The Epicurean, but his collected works contain a considerable fragment of Alciphron, his first sketch of it in verse, which dates from this time. ”

“ But the Knowledge, good Sense and Penetration, which your Libertines display at some Times, are inconsistent with the Ignorance, Folly and Stupidity they shew at others. It is impossible that Men of Parts, and the least Spirit, how much soever they were in the Wrong, could see themselves defeated, banter'd and exposed with so much Tranquility and Chearfulness; and I can't conceive how any, but egregious Coxcombs, without Sense of Shame, could behave as Alciphron and Lysicles do throughout your Dialogues. They are Fellows without Feeling or Manners. ”

“ The German Student in Tales Of A Traveller (1824) is a slyly concise and effective presentation of the old legend of the dead bride, whilst woven into the comic tissue of The Money Diggers in the same volume is more than one hint of piratical apparitions in the realms which Captain Kidd once roamed. Thomas Moore also joined the ranks of the macabre artists in the poem Alciphron, which he later elaborated into the prose novel of The Epicurean (1827) . ”

“ Jason began, that when, long ago, we two, you as nurse and I as steward, came to this place, our present masters' fine estates belonged undivided to their father. The gods gave the old man three sons. The oldest, Alciphron, whom you nursed and watched through his boyhood, went to a foreign land, became a great merchant in Messina, and, after his father's death, received a large inheritance in gold, silver and the city house at the port. The country estates were divided between Protarch and Lysander. ”

“ You allow, that there are vicious Clergymen, who are unworthy of their Function. I foresee, that Some of these, who have neither Crito's Learning, nor Euphranor's good Sense, will make use of your Alciphron for an evil Purpose. Having by their bad Courses made themselves contemptible to all who know them, they will endeavour to stop the Mouths of all Opposers, by barely naming the Minute Philosopher; and having, by the Credit of that Book, repell'd the Censure they had deserv'd, insult the Laity, and lay claim to the Honour and Deference, which ought only to be paid to worthy Divines. ”

“ The motto as it appeared on title pages of The Fable of the Bees was elliptical. In his text, Mandeville repeatedly stated that it was by "the skilful Management of the clever Politician" that private vices could be made to serve the public good, thus ridding the formula of any implication of laissez-faire.
This is made clear beyond reasonable doubt by the Letter to Dion. Berkeley, in Alciphron, had made Lysicles say: "Leave nature at full freedom to work her own way, find all will be well." ”

“ In Ariosto's Orlando Furioso she is a kind of Circê, whose garden is a scene of enchantment. Alcina enjoys her lovers for a season, and then converts them into trees, stones, wild beasts, and so on, as her fancy dictates.
Al'ciphron, or The Minute Philosopher, the title of a work by bishop Berkeley, so called from the name of the chief speaker, a freethinker. The object of this work is to expose the weakness of infidelity.
Al'ciphron, "the epicurean," the hero of T. Moore's romance entitled The Epicurean.
Like Aleiphron, we swing in air and darkness,
and know not whither the wind blows us. ”

“ But when Phrynichus found his counsel to be rejected, and that he was himself become a declared enemy of Alcibiades, he gave secret intelligence to Astyochus, the enemy's admiral, cautioning him to beware of Alcibiades, and to seize him as a double dealer, unaware that one traitor was making discoveries to another. For Astyochus, who was eager to gain the favor of Tisaphernes, observing the credit Alcibiades had with him, revealed to Alcibiades all that Phrynichus had said against him. Alcibiades at once dispatched messengers to Samos, to accuse Phrynichus of the treachery. ”

“ All shame and ill befall you if you bring me not Childe Horn himself!"
"Lady and Princess," answered Athelbrus warily, "listen, and I will tell you why I brought Athulf. The King entrusted Horn to my care, and I dread his anger. Now be not angry with me, and I will fetch him forthwith."
Then he went away, but, instead of Horn, this time he called Figold, the deceiver, and said to him, "Come with me, instead of Horn, to the royal Princess. Do not betray yourself, lest we both suffer for it." ”

“ But about thirty days after, Alcibiades escaped from his keepers, and, having got a horse, fled to Clazomenae, where he procured Tissaphernes additional disgrace by professing that he was a party to his escape. From there he sailed to the Athenian camp, and, being informed that Mindarus and Pharnabazus were together at Cyzicus, he made a speech to the soldiers, telling them that sea-fighting, land-fighting, and, by the gods, fighting against fortified cities too, must be all one for them, as, unless they conquered everywhere, there was no money for them. ”

“ When they were come thither, Aylmer entrusted them to his steward, Athelbrus, whom he charged to bring them up in knightly ways. They were added to Aylmer's household, and taught all that squires of kings should know. But Horn was to come to greater things than this. He learnt quickly, and became beloved by every one; and most of all, Rimenhild, the king's daughter, loved him from the day when she first set eyes on him. Her love for him grew daily stronger and stronger, though she dared speak no word of it to him, for she was a princess, and he only a squire rescued by chance from the sea. ”

“ VII. This happiness of Alcibiades proved by no means lasting; for after all manner of honours had been decreed him, and the whole management of the state, both at home and in the field, had been committed to him, to be regulated at his sole pleasure, and he had requested that two colleagues, Thrasybulus and Adimantus, should be assigned him (a request which was not refused) , proceeding with the fleet to Asia, he fell again under the displeasure of his countrymen, because he did not manage affairs at Cyme [13] to their wish; for they thought that he could do every thing. ”

“ After the above incidents, Tissaphernes arrived in the Hellespont, and received a visit from Alcibiades, who presented him with a single ship, bringing with him tokens of friendship and gifts, whereupon Tissaphernes seized him and shut him up in Sardis, giving out that the king's orders were to go to war with the Athenians. Thirty days later Alcibiades, accompanied by Mantitheus, who had been captured in Caria, managed to procure horses and escaped by night to Clazomenae. ”

“ Thus Alcibiades, quitting the interests of the Spartans, whom he could no longer trust, because he stood in fear of Agis, endeavored to do them ill offices, and render them odious to Tisaphernes, who, by his means, was hindered from assisting them vigorously, and from finally ruining the Athenians. For his advice was to furnish them but sparingly with money, and so wear them out, and consume them insensibly; when they had wasted their strength upon one another, they would both become ready to submit to the king. ”

“ He slew Antiochus himself, took many men and ships, and erected a trophy.
As soon as Alcibiades heard this news, he returned to Samos, and loosing from thence with his whole fleet, came and offered battle to Lysander. But Lysander, content with the victory he had gained, would not stir. Amongst others in the army who hated Alcibiades, Thrasybulus, the son of Thrason, was his particular enemy, and went purposely to Athens to accuse him, and to exasperate his enemies in the city against him. ”

“ And the fame of thy wondrous beauty in all the West be found."
So Horn found great favour with the King, and he put him in charge of Athelbrus, the house-steward, that he might teach him all knightly duties, and he spared no pains with him, nor yet with his companions; but well trained as they all were, Horn was far ahead of them both in stature and noble bearing. Even a stranger looking at him could guess his lofty birth, and the splendour of his marvellous beauty lit up all the palace; while he won all hearts, from the meanest grooms to the greatest of the court ladies. ”