Pagina 361 di 2651

The most eminent of them, however, appear always to have enjoyed

a degree of consideration much superior to any of the like

profession in the present times. The Athenians sent Carneades the

academic, and Diogenes the stoic, upon a solemn embassy to Rome;

and though their city had then declined from its former grandeur,

it was still an independent and considerable republic.

Carneades, too, was a Babylonian by birth; and as there never was

a people more jealous of admitting foreigners to public offices

than the Athenians, their consideration for him must have been

very great.