TWO:
THREE:No more wounded were taken to the hospitals of Louvain, as it had been decided to send them straight on to Germany for the present; yet there were many wounded men who were being nursed there already, and the doctors had their hands full attending to the wounded who passed the town. Dr. Noyons told me that the previous Sunday a train with 600 wounded had arrived from Northern France, and he and his assistants had been requested "just" to dress the wounds again of some of them. The condition of these unfortunate men must have been awful; not one had a dressing less than eight days old. Most of them had had it on much longer,209 and then these were merely emergency dressings. They were laid on straw in cattle trucks, many of them even in filth, and infection had worsened their condition to a great extent. Dr. Noyons and his colleagues tried to give the poor fellows as much relief as possible, but as a matter of course they could not do very much during a short stay at a station."Very well," he said, "then I shall wash my hands of the whole business. Fool, do you want to stand in the dock? And there are other dupes with not a tithe of the wit and brains of Maitrank. The gems!"
THREE:The Epicurean philosophy was, in fact, the first to gain a footing in Rome; and it thereby acquired a position of comparative equality with the other schools, to which it was not really entitled, but which it has ever since succeeded in maintaining. The new doctrine fell like a spark on a mass of combustible material. The Romans were full of curiosity about Nature and her workings; full of contempt for the degrading Etruscan superstitions which hampered them at every turn, and the falsity of which was proving too much even for the official gravity of their state-appointed interpreters; full of impatience at the Greek mythology which was beginning to substitute itself for the severe abstractions of their own more spiritual faith;265 full of loathing for the Asiatic orgies which were being introduced into the highest society of their own city. Epicureanism offered them a complete and easily intelligible theory of the world, which at the same time came as a deliverance from supernatural terrors. The consequence was that its different parts were thrown out of perspective, and their relative importance almost reversed. Originally framed as an ethical system with certain physical and theological implications, it was interpreted by Lucretius, and apparently also by his Roman predecessors,266 as a scientific and anti-religious system, with certain references to conduct neither very prominently brought forward nor very distinctly conceived.168 And we know from the contents of the papyrus rolls discovered at Herculaneum, that those who studied the system in its original sources paid particular attention to the voluminous physical treatises of Epicurus, as well as to the theological works of his successors. Nor was this change of front limited to Epicureanism, if, as we may suspect, the rationalistic direction taken by Panaetius was due, at least in part, to a similar demand on the side of his Roman admirers.
THREE:"I may be mad," she gasped, "but there is method in it. I may not----"When we next hear of Aristotle he is at the Macedonian285 Court,174 acting as tutor to Alexander, the future conqueror of Asia, who remained under his charge between the ages of thirteen and sixteen years. The philosopher is more likely to have obtained this appointment by Court interesthis father was Court-physician to Alexanders grandfather, Amyntasthan by his reputation, which could hardly have been made until several years afterwards. Much has been made of a connexion which, although it did not last very long, appeals strongly to the imagination, and opens a large field for surmise. The greatest speculative and the greatest practical genius of that agesome might say of all agescould not, one would think, come into such close contact without leaving a deep impression on each other. Accordingly, the philosopher is supposed to have prepared the hero for his future destinies. Milton has told us how Aristotle bred great Alexander to subdue the world. Hegel tells us that this was done by giving him the consciousness of himself, the full assurance of his own powers; for which purpose, it seems, the infinite daring of thought was required; and he observes that the result is a refutation of the silly talk about the practical inutility of philosophy.175 It would be unfortunate if philosophy had no better testimonial to show for herself than the character of Alexander. It is not the least merit of Grotes History to have brought out in full relief the savage traits by which his conduct was marked from first to last. Arrogant, drunken, cruel, vindictive, and grossly superstitious, he united the vices of a Highland chieftain to the frenzy of an Oriental despot. No man ever stood further from the gravity, the gentleness, the moderationin a word, the S?phrosyn of a true Hellenic hero. The time came when Aristotle himself would have run the most imminent personal risk had he been within the tyrants immediate grasp. His286 nephew, Callisthenes, had incurred deep displeasure by protesting against the servile adulation, or rather idolatry, which Alexander exacted from his attendants. A charge of conspiracy was trumped up against him, and even the exculpatory evidence, taken under torture, of his alleged accomplices did not save him. I will punish the sophist, wrote Alexander, and those who sent him out. It was understood that his old tutor was included in the threat. Fortunately, as Grote observes, Aristotle was not at Ecbatana but at Athens; he therefore escaped the fate of Callisthenes, who suffered death in circumstances, according to some accounts, of great atrocity.
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