Synesius, bishop of Ptolemais, was first a pagan, then a Ciiristian, and always a rhetorician. He lived at the close of the 4th and the beginning of the 5th century of our ffira. He was a late representative of the rhetorical declaimers of the Hellenic schools, and of the Neo-Pla- tonic philosophers. He was also a pagan and a Christian poet, an elegant gentleman of leisure, and a bishop of the African Church. Contrasts were combined and reconciled in the man and in his career. He lived in an age of transitions; and he is, in his writings and in his fort- unes, typical of the age in which he lived. The bi()g- raphy and the literary remains of Synesius are much more interesting and instructive for the light which they shed upon the social, intellectual, and religious condition of provincial life in the Koman empire during the first period of its manifest dissolution than for any influence exercised by him on the literature, the philos- ophy, the paganism, or the Christianity of his times, or on the sentiments, convictions, or character of subse- quent generations. He was designated by Casaubon " the sweetest of philosophers and the delight of the pious muses" ("suavissimus philosophus et piarum de- liciimi musarum," Prief. Kp. Greg. Ni/ssen.) ; yet few authors have excited so much admiration and been so seldom read. F'ew have been so often quoted by the few who were acquainted with him, and been so inac- cessible for many generations, even to professed schol- ars. The attractions of Synesius are so special in their character that they address themselves to a very limit- ed class of students. The period which he illustrates is so obscure, so disheartening, and so little considered, that only the frequenters of the by-ways of history are likely to turn their regards to it. More than two cen- turies intervened between two editions of his works. After this long interval, three complete editions have been published within the last twenty years. One is only a Latin version, another is a French translation, and the third is no more than a reprint of the (ireek text and Latin rendering from the edition of 1640, with some slight corrections. The writings of Synesius, in prose or verse, inspired by pagan or by Christian influ- ences, are much less notable for literary charm, for vigor- ous thought, or for philosophical reflection than as a pres- entation of the feelings, the aspirations, the struggles, the difticulties, the hazards, the gratifications, the an- noyances, the occupations, and the associations of a cid-
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tivated country gentleman, de prorincin, under the reign of Arcadius and Honorius, when all parts of the empire were falling to pieces. They, accordingly, interpret the times for us, and require to be interpreted by them.
I. Character and Circumstdnces of the Age. — The life of Synesius was cast in a stormy period ; and the storms were not limited to his own province, but swept over the wliole empire. It was the age of general dissolution, jiolitical, social, intellectual, and religious; an age of usurpations and civil iliscords; of crimes in the palace and treacheries in the State; of barbarian invasions; of permanent dismemberments; of strife between pagans and Christians; of controversies, heresies, and schisms in the Christian Church; of social depravation and de- cay ; of universal disintegration, and of rapid material decline. The date 'of the birth of Synesius is unde- termined. If he was born in 370, it occurred only sev- en years after the death of the pagan emperor and the failure of his attempt to restore paganism. When Sy- nesius died, if he died in 431. (ienseric and his Vandals had seized a large ])art of Africa; Britain, Gaul, and Spain had been cut off from the Roman dominion. During his lifetime usurper had sprung up after usurp- er; Asia iVIinor and (ireece and Italy had been ravaged by the Goths; Constantinople had been threatened and Kome thrice captured by them, and Alaric had led his wild hosts from the Alps to Scylla and Charybdis. Wliile Synesius was still a child in the cradle, Firmus had revolted in Egypt, and the insurrection had been revived after the lapse of a feiv years, to be crushed out in the Gildonic war. Strangely enough, to none of these portentous events is any distinct allusion made in the remains of this author, except to the Gothic in- surrection in Phrygia. There is a possible reference to the Gildonic war (Cafasfasis, ii, 1). In the early oration ilelivered before the emperor Arcadius there is a clear ex- position of the fearful perils from the Northern hordes im- ]>eiuiing over the empire {Be Regno, c. xxi-xxiv). Was liis mind so engrossed by literary labors, by philosoph- ical speculations, and by troubles nearer home that the great calamities of the time occurred without attracting bis attention? Or was his pen arrested by despair, even in his candid-communications to bis friends? Yet the invasions and the mutilations of the empire in the gloomy chasm between the birth and the death of Sy- nesius were not the most grievous calamities of those years. Even more grievous was the social condition which invited the invasions, and rendered resistance impracticable. There was no cohesion or concert be- tween the provinces ; no devotion to emperor or empire ; nothing but division, isolation, misery everywhere — as a con^ecpience, in part at least, of imperial rule and im- jKrial administration. The organization of the govern- ment was impotent for defence, or for that vigorous at- tack which is often the best means of defence. It was ingeniously devised for inflicting needless and paralyz- ing restraint, and for extorting revenue from penury and wide-spread distress. Lands were left uncultivated and almost without inhabitants. Wide tracts relapsed into forest or marsh. The people were ground by taxes and the ruinous modes of collecting them. Movement and enterprise were prevented in order to facilitate tiscal arrangements. Bridges were broken down by time and neglect. Roads were left without repair, and became im- passable. Communication was rendered difficult. Com- merce, manufactures, and industry of all kinds were harassed and impeded in many ways. In numerous extensive regions banditti lurked in the woods, infested the highways, and ransacked villages. So great was the wretchedness which had driven these outcasts into nefarious courses that a presbyter nearly contemporary with Synesius undertook their exculpation. One book of the Theodosian Code, whose compilation falls within this age, is occupied with defining and enforcing the lialiilities to municipal and other public burdens, and with regulating and restricting the exemptions from them, which were often arbitrarily and capriciously ac-