And now, they say, he is playing the mountebank over that very thing, digging a pit, collecting logs, and promising really awesome fortitude.

Thanks to Paul Graindor, the date of the Olympiads mentioned in connection with Peregrinus can now be determined. He has deduced from the apparent ages of the children represented in the exedra erected ty Herodes on the comlotion of his aqueduct that this took place in a.d. 153 (Hérode Atticus et Sa Famille, pp. 87-88). His deduction finds support in the text of Lucian as soon as we recognise that Lucian is talking about four different Olympiads, not three. The first is that on which Peregrinus criticised the aqueduct, which will be the year of its completion, a.d. 153. At the nezt (τὴν ἑξῆς, A.D. 157) he withdrew his criticism. The Olympiad just after which he announced his intention of cremating himself need not and cannot be identical with the one of a.D. 157; it is called by the speaker the last, or previous (τὴν ἐμπρόσθεν), and the text clearly implies a lapse of time. It must therefore be the one of a.d. 161. Then comes the fourth, on which the cremation took place, dated by Eusebius in a.d. 165.

“What he should have done, I think, was first and foremost to await death and not to cut and run from life ; but if he had determined to be off at all costs, not to use fire or any of these devices out of tragedy, but to choose for his departure some other form of death out of the myriads that there are. If, however, he is partial to fire as something connected with Heracles,. why in the world did he not quietly select a wellwooded mountain and cremate himself upon it in solitude, taking along only one person such as Theagenes here for his Philoctetes?

Philoctetes had helped Heracles to cremate himself on Mt. Oeta by kindling the pyre for him.

“The spectacle is being planned, I suppose, as Something awe-inspiring—a fellow getting burnt up in a holy place where it is impious even to bury the others who die. But you have heard, no doubt, that long ago a man who wished to become famous burned the temple of Ephesian Artemis, not being able to attain that end in any other way.

Herostratus, in356 3.0, The Ephesians sought to defeat his object by forbidding anyone for all time to mention his name (Valerius Maximus, VIII, 14, 5). The prohibition, which very likely was accompanied by a curse, was far from ineffective, for nearly all ancient authors who mention the story, including Cicero and Plutarch, omit the name just as Lucian does,

“He alleges, however, that he is doing it for the sake of his fellow men, that he may teach them to despise death and endure what is fearsome. For my part, I should like to ask, not him but you, whether you would wish malefactors to become his disciples in this fortitude of his, and to despise death and burning and similar terrors. No, you would not, I am very sure. How, then, is Proteus to draw distinctions in this matter, and to benefit the good without making the bad more adventurous and daring?

“Nevertheless, suppose it possible that only those will present themselves at this affair who will see it to their advantage. Once more I shall question you: would you desire your children to become imitators of such a man? You will not say so. But why did I ask that question, when even of his disciples them- selves not one would imitate him? In fact, the thing for which one might blame Theagenes most of all is that although he copies the man in everything else, he does not follow his teacher and take the road with him, now that he is off, as he says, to join Heracles; why, he has the opportunity to attain absolute felicity instanter by plunging headlong into the fire with him!

“Emulation is not a matter of wallet, staff, and mantle; all this is safe and easy and within anyone’s power. One should emulate the consummation and culmination, build a pyre of fig-wood logs as green as can be, and stifle one’s selfin the smoke of them. Fire itself belongs not only to Heracles and Asclepius, but to doers of sacrilege and murder, who can be seen enduring it by judicial sentence. Therefore it is better to employ smoke, which would be peculiar and belong only to you and your like.

“Besides, if Heracles really did venture any such act, he did it because he was ailing, because the blood of the Centaur, as the tragedies tell us, was preying upon him; but for what reason does this man throw himself bodily into the fire? Oh, yes! to demonstrate his fortitude, like the Brahmans, for Theagenes thought fit to compare him with them, just as if there could not be fools and notoriety-seekers even among the Indians. Well, then, let him at least imitate them. They do not leap into the fire (so Onesicritus says, Alexander’s navigator, who saw Calanus burning), but when they have built their pyre, they stand close beside it motionless and en- dure being toasted; then, mounting upon it, they cremate themselves decorously, without the slightest alteration of the position in which they are lying.

“In this man’s case, what great thing will it be if he tumbles in and dies in the sudden grip of the fire? It is not beyond expectation that he will jump out half consumed, unless, as they say, he is going to see to it that the pyre is deep down in a pit.