Note 174 — PARALLELS, OR A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE GREEK AND ROMAN HISTORIES.174

It seems impossible to believe this treatise to be the work of Plutarch, and equally impossible to believe it to be the work of any full-grown man of sound mind. In this case, and in that of the next treatise, no satisfaction is gained by merely supposing the work spurious. One of these Parallel Histories is usually a well-known story, and the other is an absurd imitation of it. An instance may be seen in section 12, where the common story of Manlius Torquatus and his son is matched by an absurd one of Epaminondas and his son; on which Wyttenbach remarks: “Romanum constat: Graecum non modo ementitum, sed stulte ementitum.” We might almost suspect that many of them are some school-boy’s compositions, half historical, and half imitations of well-known stories fortified by imaginary authorities. Is it possible that this school-boy can have been Plutarch himself? (G.)