opportunities of growing wealthy, he only left about £800 at his death.”[516] It must be remembered that the Sophists received money only from those who definitely enrolled themselves as pupils or came to a few advertised lectures. Hippias lectured at Sparta frequently, and never received a penny. Any one might go and ask a Sophist a question, and would almost always receive a voluminous answer. The eloquence and practical skill of these men were also always at the disposal of their own city. Like the greater Renaissance scholars, Hippias, Gorgias, and Prodikos were much occupied in going on embassies. For the larger part of their life-work they received no payment whatever; what they actually received was possibly less than what their philosophic opponents obtained in donations from friendly tyrants. At any rate, their fees were not heavy enough to damp the ardour of their pupils. Young men left their relations and friends to follow Sophists from city to city. These enthusiastic disciples were almost ready to carry their teachers about on their shoulders, so great was their affection for them. Why this enthusiasm? Partly because the Sophists were men of great personal charm. Partly because in that age the thirst for knowledge was unbounded. Partly from a desire to learn the way of virtue, which the Sophists claimed to teach. But the most potent reason was ambition. The young wished to shine in conversation, the great occupation of the age, and to be able to discuss every conceivable topic with intelligence. But education was also the road to political success. The Sophists taught systematic rhetoric, and logic of a sort. They also supplied the subject-matter for orations, in their practical handling of political science, of history, of ethical commonplaces; for a public oration was expected to be a storehouse of erudition. Rhetoric was needful not only for power, but also for security; for in the courts it had more influence than mere argument and facts. * * * * * About the individual Sophists little is known. They appear for us only in the pages of those who traduced them. Plato is mainly occupied with various conclusions which he draws from their philosophic theories, which were not a part of their teaching. _Protagoras_, the eldest of them, a most dignified personage, set himself to train good citizens: he claimed that he enabled his pupils to manage their households and govern their states. He imparted to them all the worldly wisdom which he had gained by long years of personal experience. He made a special study of political science, no doubt for this purpose, and left a treatise upon the subject, which was sufficiently excellent for a certain Aristoxenos to be able to say that Plato had plagiarised most of the _Republic_ from it.[517] Being businesslike, he favoured clearness of thought, and studied grammar: he was the first to separate nouns into the three genders.[518]