[382] _Synesii_ Episcopi Cyrenes Opera quae extant omnia, interprete Dionysio Petavio—codicum fide recensita ac notis illustrata et eodem modo omnia _secunda_ hac _editione_ multo accuratiora et uberiora prodeunt. Lutetiae Parisiorum 1633. fol. p. 25. A. Ὡς Ὅμηρός φησι τοὺς θεοὺς Ἀνθρώπων ὕβριν τε καὶ εὐνομίαν ἐφέποντες Σκύθας δὲ τούτους, Ἡρόδοτός τέ φησι, καὶ ἡμεῖς ὁρῶμεν, κατεχομένους ἅπαντας ὑπὸ _νόσον θηλείας_· οὗτοι γάρ εἰσιν, ἀφ’ ὧν οἱ πανταχοῦ δοῦλοι κ. τ. λ. _Synesius_ Bishop of Cyrené, Complete Works so far as Extant. edit. Dionysius Petavius; text revised and compared with MSS., and illustrated with explanatory notes; the whole re-issued in a more accurate and fuller form in this Second Edition. Paris 1633. fol., p. 25. A., “As Homer—Odyssey XVII. 487—says of the gods, visiting the insolence and good government of men; but these Scythians Herodotus declares, and we see the fact for ourselves, to be all fallen under the feminine disease; and it is they from whom come as a rule the slaves, etc.” The word θηλείας in the edition mentioned stands in text; and in the margin as γρ. δειλίας. [383] Pyrrh. Hypotyp., bk. III. ch. 199., Νενόμισται τὸ τῆς _ἀῤῥενομιξίας παρὰ Γερμανοῖς_ ὥς φασιν οὐκ αἰσχρὸν ἀλλ’ ὡς ἕν τι τῶν συνηθῶν (But the practice of intercourse with males is not among the Germans, so they say, reckoned a shameful thing, but as one of the customary acts)—_Aristotle_, Polit. II. 6. 6., _Strabo_, Geogr., IV. 199. _Diodorus_, Bibl. V. 32. _Athenaeus_, Deipn., p. 603 a., relate the same thing of the Celts. _Quintilian_ who lived about 42 after Christ, directly denies the fact, it is true: Declam. 3, Nihil tale _novere_ Germani et sanctius vivitur ad Oceanum. Non sit mihi forsitan quaerendum aversis auribus saeculi huius in tantum vitia regnare, ut obscoenis cupiditatibus natura cesserit, ut pollutis in _femineam_ usque _patientiam_ maribus incurrat iam libido in sexum suum, finem tamen aliquem sibi vitia ipsa exceperunt, ultimumque adhuc huius flagitii crimen fuit corrupisse futurum virum. Hoc vero cuius est dementiae? In concubinatum iuniores leguntur, et in _muliebrem patientiam vocatur_ fortasse iam maritus. (The _Germans_ know no such practice; for life is purer near the Ocean. Would it were possible to shut my ears to the fact that Vice in this age prevails to such a degree that Nature has had to yield to foul lusts, that men corrupted even to the length of _suffering themselves to be treated as women_ are filled with lust towards their own sex; yet vice itself set some limit to its own excesses, and the last extremity of this lewdness was to have ruined one that might have grown into a man. But what a height of insanity is here! Young men are chosen as mistresses, and a man _is called upon to endure the treatment proper to a woman_.) Who can fail to see that in this passage the words _feminea patientia_, _muliebris patientia_, are given as a translation of νοῦσος θήλεια?