Select Works of Porphyry (On Abstinence, Cave of the Nymphs, Auxiliaries)

life ^f; but I write to the man who considers what he is, whence he came, and whither he ought to tend, and who—in what pertains to nutrition and other necessary concerns—is different from those who propose to themselves other kinds of life; for to none but such as these do I direct my discourse ^g." This treatise is also highly valuable for the historical information it contains, independent of the philosophical beauties with which it abounds.

The Explanation of the Homeric Cave of the Nymphs, which follows next, is not only remarkable for the great erudition it displays, but also for containing some profound arcana of the mythology and symbolical theology of the Greeks.

And the third treatise, which is denominated

^f The translator of this work and the others in this volume, having been so circumstanced that he has been obliged to mingle the active with the contemplative life (original: "μετα θεωρητικου νου πολιτευομενος") in acquiring a knowledge of the philosophy of Plato and disseminating it for the good of others, has also found it expedient to use a fleshy diet. Nothing, however, but an imperious necessity, from causes it would be superfluous to detail at present, could have induced him to adopt animal instead of vegetable nutrition. But though he has been nurtured in Eleatic and Academic studies, it has not been in Academic bowers.

^g Page 19.