Sir Thomas Browne, writing in 1681-2 to his son Edward who was by way of translating the _Lives_ of Plutarch, and in fact accomplished two of them, assumes that he will in the main follow Amyot’s version, which North had followed absolutely, and suggests that, with some corrections and the removal of obsolete words, North’s work might still serve ‘especially with gentlemen, who if the expression bee playne looke not into criticisme’. ‘If you have the Greek Plutarke,’ he writes, ‘have also the Latin adjoyned unto it, so you may consult either upon occasion, though you apply yourself to translate out of French, and the English translation may be sometimes helpful.’ Very likely an acceptable version of the _Moralia_ might now be produced out of Amyot and Philemon Holland, a racy and scholarly translator from the Greek, with the original and the old Latin at hand for reference. But Dr. Edward Browne was a physician, of little leisure and of delicate health, and it might hardly be respectful to Plutarch to adopt this procedure now; indeed it seems to recall that of ‘the dog’ in the proverb, who ‘drinks from the Nile’, running as he drinks, always with an eye on the crocodiles. However this may be, some indulgence may fairly be claimed by a translator of an author, who, however straight-forward himself, abounds in allusion and latent quotation, and also in difficulties of text not of his own making, and upon whom no commentary exists. I will mention, for the sake of clearness, two instances as to which I have troubled myself and, I fear, others a good deal: In the dialogue _On the Genius of Socrates_, chap. iii, end (577 A), the speaker says that his brother Epaminondas is keeping out of the patriotic enterprise in hand, on the ground that the more hot-headed members of the party will not stop short of a general massacre and the murder of many of the leading citizens.