The desire of visiting his own country, so natural to all men, and the approaches of old age, (for he could not be much less than sixty,) and perhaps also the death of Trajan, prevailed with him at last to leave Italy; or, if you will have it in his own words, “he was not willing his little city should be one the less by his absence.” After his return, he was, by the unanimous consent of his citizens, chosen Archon, or chief magistrate of Chæronea, and not long after admitted himself in the number of Apollo’s priests; in both which employments he seems to have continued till his death, of which we have no particular account, either as to the manner of it, or the year; only it is evident that he lived to a great old age,[8] always continuing his studies. That he died a natural death, is only presumed, because any violent accident to so famous a man would have been recorded; and in whatsoever reign he deceased, the days of tyranny were overpassed, and there was then a golden series of emperors, every one emulating his predecessor’s virtues. Thus I have collected from Plutarch himself, and from the best authors, what was most remarkable concerning him; in performing which, I have laboured under so many uncertainties, that I have not been able to satisfy my own curiosity, any more than that of others. It is the life of a philosopher, not varied with accidents to divert the reader; more pleasant for himself to live, than for an historian to describe. Those works of his, which are irrecoverably lost, are named in the catalogue made by his son, Lamprias, which you will find in the Paris edition, dedicated to King Louis the Thirteenth. But it is a small comfort to a merchant to peruse his bill of freight, when he is certain his ship is cast away; moved by the like reason, I have omitted that ungrateful task. Yet that the reader may not be imposed on in those which yet remain, it is but reasonable to let him know, that the Lives of Hannibal and Scipio, though they pass with the ignorant for genuine, are only the forgery of Donato Acciaiolo, a Florentine. He pretends to have translated them from a Greek manuscript, which none of the learned have ever seen, either before or since. But the cheat is more manifest from this reason, which is undeniable; that Plutarch did indeed write the Life of Scipio; but he compared him not with Hannibal, but with Epaminondas; as appears by the catalogue or nomenclature of Plutarch’s Lives, drawn up by his son Lamprias, and yet extant. But to make this out more clearly, we find the Florentine, in his Life of Hannibal, thus relating the famous conference betwixt Scipio and him:—“Scipio at that time being sent ambassador from the Romans to King Antiochus, with Publius Villius, it happened then that these two great captains met together at Ephesus; and amongst other discourse, it was demanded of Hannibal by Scipio,—whom he thought to have been the greatest captain? To whom he thus answered—In the first