103. We are told that Empedokles leapt into the crater of Etna that he might be deemed a god. This appears to be a malicious version[532] of a tale set on foot by his adherents that he had been snatched up to heaven in the night.[533] Both stories would easily get accepted; for there was no local tradition. Empedokles did not die in Sicily, but in the Peloponnese, or, perhaps, at Thourioi. He had gone to Olympia to have his religious poem recited to the Hellenes; his enemies were able to prevent his return, and he was seen in Sicily no more.[534] Footnote 532: R. P. 162 h. The story is always told with a hostile purpose. Footnote 533: R. P. _ib._ This was the story told by Herakleides of Pontos, at the end of his romance about the ἄπνους. Footnote 534: Timaios took the trouble to refute the common stories at some length (Diog. viii. 71 sqq.; R. P. _ib._). He was quite positive that Empedokles never returned to Sicily. Nothing can be more likely than that, when wandering as an exile in the Peloponnese, he should have seized the opportunity of joining the colony at Thourioi, which was a harbour for many of the “sophists” of this time. [Sidenote: Writings.] 104. Empedokles was the second philosopher to expound his system in verse, if we leave the satirist Xenophanes out of account. He was also the last among the Greeks; for the forged Pythagorean poems may be neglected.[535] Lucretius imitates Empedokles in this, just as Empedokles imitated Parmenides. Of course, the poetical imagery creates a difficulty for the interpreter; but it would be wrong to make too much of it. It cannot be said that it is harder to extract the philosophical kernel from the verses of Empedokles than from the prose of Herakleitos. Footnote 535: See Chap. IV. § 85. There is some divergence of opinion as to the poetical merit of Empedokles. The panegyric of Lucretius is well known.[536] Aristotle says in one place that Empedokles and Homer have nothing in common but the metre; in another, that Empedokles was “most Homeric.”[537] To my mind, there can be no question that he was a genuine poet, far more so than Parmenides. No one doubts nowadays that Lucretius was one, and Empedokles really resembles him very closely. Footnote 536: Lucr. i. 716 sqq. Footnote 537: _Poet._ 1. 1447 b 18; cf. Diog. viii. 57 (R. P. 162 i). [Sidenote: The remains.]