The writings of Clement of Alexandria, Vol. 2 (of 2)Clement, of Alexandria, Saint
Religion
The writings of Clement of Alexandria, Vol. 2 (of 2)
Clement, of Alexandria, Saint
Theology -- Early works to 1800; Theology -- History -- Early Church, ca. 30-600
And Plato having said, in the _Republic_, that women were common,
Euripides writes in the _Protesilaus_:
“For common, then, is woman’s bed.”
Further, Euripides having written:
“For to the temperate enough sufficient is,”--
Epicurus expressly says, “Sufficiency is the greatest riches of all.”
Again, Aristophanes having written:
“Life thou securely shalt enjoy, being just
And free from turmoil, and from fear live well,”--
Epicurus says, “The greatest fruit of righteousness is tranquillity.”
Let these species, then, of Greek plagiarism of sentiments, being such,
stand as sufficient for a clear specimen to him who is capable of
perceiving.
And not only have they been detected pirating and paraphrasing thoughts
and expressions, as will be shown; but they will also be convicted of
the possession of what is entirely stolen. For stealing entirely what
is the production of others, they have published it as their own; as
Eugamon of Cyrene did the entire book on the Thesprotians from Musæus,
and Pisander of Camirus the Heraclea of Pisinus of Lindus, and Panyasis
of Halicarnassus, the capture of Œchalia from Cleophilus of Samos.
You will also find that Homer, the great poet, took from Orpheus, from
the _Disappearance_ of Dionysus, those words and what follows
verbatim:
“As a man trains a luxuriant shoot of olive.”[946]
And in the _Theogony_, it is said by Orpheus of Kronos:
“He lay, his thick neck bent aside; and him
All-conquering Sleep had seized.”
These Homer transferred to the Cyclops.[947] And Hesiod writes of
Melampous:
“Gladly to hear, what the immortals have assigned
To men, the brave from cowards clearly marks;”
and so forth, taking it word for word from the poet Musæus.
And Aristophanes the comic poet has, in the first of the
_Thesmophoriazusæ_, transferred the words from the _Empiprameni_ of
Cratinus. And Plato the comic poet, and Aristophanes in _Dædalus_,
steal from one another. _Cocalus_, composed by Araros,[948] the son of
Aristophanes, was by the comic poet Philemon altered, and made into the
comedy called _Hypobolimæus_.
Eumelus and Acusilaus the historiographers changed the contents of
Hesiod into prose, and published them as their own. Gorgias of Leontium
and Eudemus of Naxus, the historians, stole from Melesagoras. And,
besides, there is Bion of Proconnesus, who epitomized and transcribed
the writings of the ancient Cadmus, and Archilochus, and Aristocles,
and Leandrus, and Hellanicus, and Hecatæus, and Androtion, and
Philochorus. Dieuchidas of Megara transferred the beginning of his
treatise from the _Deucalion_ of Hellanicus. I pass over in silence
Heraclitus of Ephesus, who took a very great deal from Orpheus.
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