HERACLITUS.—Woe! woe to every man of ye, I say! buyers or not buyers. CUSTOMER.—Why, this fellow is pretty near mad—I’ll have naught to do with either of them, for my part. MERCURY [_turning to Jupiter_].—We shall have this pair left on our hands too.”—COLLINS. “The Sale of the Philosophers” has a sequel in “the Resuscitated Professors.” Permitted to return to earth for a day to revenge themselves on Lucian, the Philosophers capture him, and bring him to trial before the goddess of philosophy. He clears himself by showing that he has not attacked the venerable sages themselves, but only the impostors who cheat the world under their great names. In the beginning of the Dialogue, Lucian is thus assailed by the belligerent Socrates and his _confrères_:— “SOCRATES.—Pelt the wretch! pelt him with volleys of stones—throw clods at him—oyster-shells! Beat the blasphemer with your clubs—don’t let him escape! Hit him, Plato! and you, Chrysippus! and you! Form a phalanx, and rush on him all together. As Homer says—’Let wallet join with wallet, club with club!’ He is the common enemy of us all, and there is no man among ye whom he has not insulted. You, Diogenes, now use that staff of yours, if ever you did! Don’t stop! let him have it, blasphemer that he is! What! tired already, Epicurus and Aristippus? Aristotle, do run a little faster! That’s good! we’ve caught the beast! We’ve got you, you rascal! You shall soon find out whom you’ve been abusing! Now what shall we do with him? Let us think of some multiform kind of death that may suffice for all of us, for he deserves a separate death from each. PHILOSOPHER A.—I vote that he be impaled. PHILOSOPHER B.—Yes—but be well scourged first. PHILOSOPHER C.—Let his eyes be gouged out. PHILOSOPHER D.—Ay—but his tongue should be cut out first. SOCRATES.—What think you, Empedocles? EMPEDOCLES.—He should be thrown down the crater of some volcano,[39] and so learn not to revile his betters. PLATO.—Nay—the best punishment for him will be that, like Pentheus or Orpheus, ‘Torn by the ragged rocks he meet his fate.’ LUCIAN.—Oh! no, no, pray! spare me, for the love of Heaven! SOCRATES.—Sentence is passed: nothing can save you.” COLLINS.