On the eve of its extinction the school of Plato diffused a great light at Alexandria; but, victorious after three centuries of warfare, Christianity had assimilated all that was permanent and true in the doctrines of antiquity. The last adversaries of the new religion attempted to check the progress of men who were alive by galvanising mummies. The time had come when the competition could be taken seriously no longer, and the pagans of the school of Alexandria, unwillingly and unconsciously, were at work on the sacred monument raised by the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth to confront all the ages. Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus are great names in the annals of science and virtue; their theology was elevated, their doctrine moral, their own manners were austere. But the chief and most touching figure of this epoch, the brightest star in the whole constellation, was Hypatia, the daughter of Theon—that virginal and learned girl whose understanding and virtues would have taken her to the baptismal font, but she died a martyr for liberty of conscience when they attempted to drag her thereto. Synesius of Cyrene was trained at the school of Hypatia; he became Bishop of Ptolemais, and was one of the most instructed philosophers as well as the best Christian poet of the early centuries. It was he who remarked that the common people always despised things which are of easy understanding and that what they require is imposture. When it was proposed to confer on him episcopal dignity, he wrote thus in a letter to a friend: “The mind which is drawn to wisdom and to the contemplation of truth at first hand is forced to disguise it, so that it may be rendered acceptable to the multitude. There is a real analogy between light and truth, as between our eyes and ordinary understandings. The sudden communication of a light too brilliant dazzles the material eye, and rays that are moderated by shadow are more serviceable to those whose sight as yet is feeble. So, in my opinion, fictions are necessary for the people, truth being harmful to those who are not strong enough to contemplate it in all its splendour. If therefore the ecclesiastical laws permit reserve in judgment, and allegory in mode of expression, I can accept the dignity which is offered me; the condition is, in other words, that I shall remain a philosopher at home, though I shall tell apologues and parables in public. What can there be in common, as a fact, between the vulgar crowd and sublime wisdom? Truth must be kept in secret; the multitude need instruction proportioned to their imperfect reason.”