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

intimation, to unfold, in the Appendix that concludes the work, the secret meaning of the allegory; and, I trust, in a way which will not be deemed by the intelligent reader either visionary or vain.

With respect to the translation of these treatises, I have endeavored faithfully to preserve both the matter and manner of the author. I have availed myself of the best editions and all the information that appeared to me most important and appropriate from the remarks of critics and philologists, but especially from the elucidations of philosophers. This, I trust, will be evident from a perusal of the notes that accompany the translation.

Of all the other writings of Porphyry, besides those translated in this volume, few unfortunately have been preserved entire ¹, the greater part of what remains being fragments. Among these fragments, however, there is one very important one, lately found by Angelus Maius and published by him (Mediolanum, 1816, 8vo). It is nearly the whole of the Epistle of Porphyry to his wife Marcella, in which I have discovered the

¹ For even with respect to the treatise On Abstinence from Animal Food, there is every reason to believe that something is missing at the end.