In the same comedy, Æschylus is made to accuse Euripides of having carried on literary free-booting in every direction. Further on, Bacchus, in expressing his admiration for some striking thought expressed by Euripides, asks whether it is really his or Ctesiphon’s, and the tragedian frankly admits that the credit for the idea properly belongs to the latter. Clement concludes that there must have been foundation for the raillery of the comedian, and refers, in this connection, to the remarks of Plato that if one wished to examine the philosophy of Anaxagoras, the simplest course was to read the tragedies of Euripides, the choruses of which reproduced faithfully the teachings of the philosopher. Aristophanes, while scoffing sharply at the misdeeds of others, was himself not beyond criticism, being charged with having made free use of the comedies of Cratinus and Eupolis.[34] The philosophers and historians appear to have been little more conscientious than the poets in their literary standard. The historian Theopompus included, without credit, in the eleventh book of his _Philippics_ a whole harangue of Isocrates, and with a few changes of names and places, he was able to make use of passages from Androtion and Xenophon. His appropriations were so considerable that they were collected in a separate volume to which was given the fitting title of _The Hunters_.[35] Lysimachus wrote a book entitled The _Robberies of Ephorus_. Timon, in some lines preserved by Aulus Gellius, charges Plato with having obtained from a treatise of the Pythagorean philosopher Philolaus the substance of his famous dialogue the _Timæus_.[36] The lines, from the version of Clement, read as follows: “You also, Plato, being ambitious to acquire knowledge, first purchased for a great sum a small book, and then with its aid proceeded yourself to instruct others.” Even our moral friend Plutarch does not escape from the general charge of borrowing from others. “In reading,” says Rozoir, “the text of many of the _Lives_, one cannot but be struck with the very great differences of style and of forms of expression, differences so marked, that it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that many portions are extracts taken literally and without credit, from other authors.”[37] From these examples, out of many which might be cited, it seems evident that during the centuries in which Greek literature was at its height, the practice of plagiarism was very general, even among authors whose originality and creative power could not be questioned. Emerson’s dictum that “man is as lazy as he dares to be” was assuredly as true two thousand years ago as at the time it was uttered.