Note 30 — Chapter II · ARISTOTELIAN CANON.

Strabo, xiii. 609: συνέβη δὲ τοῖς ἐκ τῶν περιπάτων τοῖς μὲν πάλαι τοῖς μετὰ Θεόφραστον, ὅλως οὐκ ἔχουσι τὰ βίβλια πλὴν ὀλίγων καὶ μάλιστα τῶν ἐξωτερικῶν, μηδὲν ἔχειν φιλοσοφεῖν πραγματικῶς, ἀλλὰ θέσεις ληκυθίζειν· τοῖς δ’ ὕστερον, ἀφ’ οὖ τὰ βίβλια ταῦτα προῆλθεν, ἄμεινον μὲν ἐκείνων φιλοσοφεῖν καὶ ἀριστοτελίζειν, ἀναγκάζεσθαι μέντοι τὰ πολλὰ εἰκότα λέγειν διὰ τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν. Also Plutarch, Sylla, c. xxvi.

The passage of Strabo is so perspicuous and detailed, that it has all the air of having been derived from the best critics who frequented the library at Rome, where Strabo was when he wrote (καὶ ἔνθαδε καὶ ἐν Ἀλεξανδρείᾳ, xiii. 609). The Peripatetic Andronikus, whom he names among the celebrated Rhodians (xiv. 655), may have been among his informants. His statements about the bad state of the manuscripts; the unskilful emendations of Apellikon; the contrast between the vein of Peripatetic study, as it had stood before the revelation of the manuscripts, and as it came to stand afterwards; the uncertain evidences upon which careful students, even with the manuscripts before them, were compelled to proceed; the tone of depreciation in which he speaks of the carelessness of booksellers who sought only for profit, — all these points of information appear to me to indicate that Strabo’s informants were acute and diligent critics, familiar with the library, and anxious both for the real understanding of these documents, and for philosophy as an end.