When Apollonius was introduced to the King of Babylon, the King invited him to sacrifice with him, for he was about to offer a Nisean horse to the Sun, selected for its beauty and adorned with all pomp for the occasion. But the Philosopher replied, “O King do you sacrifice after your manner, and give me leave to sacrifice after mine.” He then took frankincense, and prayed, saying, “O Sun, conduct me so far as it seemeth good to me and to thee. And let me become acquainted with virtuous men; but as for the wicked, let me neither know them nor they me.” And throwing the frankincense in the fire he observed the smoke, how it ascended and which way it bent, and just touching the fire when it seemed that he had sacrificed enough, he said to the King that he had performed the rites of his country, and forthwith withdrew that he might have nothing to do with blood and slaughter. Afterwards when the King took him where were many lions, bears and panthers reserved for sport, invited him to go with him and hunt them, Apollonius replied, “King, you should remember, that I did not chuse to be present at your sacrifice, much less should I like to see animals wounded, and by the pain of their wounds rendered more ferocious than nature has made them.” Isaac la Peyresc thought differently from the Talmudists and the French Lawyers. He says, quoting the Apostle, _Ubi non est lex, neque prævaricatio est._ Where ‘no law is, there is no transgression.’ _Prævaricatio autem eadem est, quæ transgressio legis: illa ipsa proprie quæ peccatum imputationis labe infecit. Quod ut compingatur in oculos: pecudes actualiter et materialiter eadem faciunt, quæ transgrediuntur homines; incestant, rapiunt, occidunt; non erit tamen uspiam adeo supinus qui dicat, pecudes peccare ad similitudinem transgressionis hominum; quia pecudes quæ hæc peccant, sequuntur tantum suam naturam et suam materiam; neque legum transgrediuntur ullam, quia nulla eis data est cujus transgressione formetur in eis et imputetur peccatum._ Yet it cannot be doubted that in such a case Peyresc himself, disregarding his own arguments would have ordered the Sow to be put to death. This author derives _peccatum_ from _pecus_, for, says he, “as often as a man wilfully departs from that right reason which constitutes him man,—as often as under the impulse of that brute matter which he has in common with beasts, he commits any action fitting in a beast, but unworthy in man, so often he seems to fall below his own species, and sink into that of a brute.” “_Latini nomen peccati mutuati sunt à pecore. Quoties enim homo delirat à rectâ ratione illa quæ hominem constituit; quoties impulsu materiæ suæ quam habet communem cum brutis, quid agit dignum pecore, et indignum homine, toties cadere videtur à specie suâ, et incidere in speciem pecoris sive bruti._”