Trips to the Moon | Page 3

Lucian a vessel of his own for the voyage onward, and gave
instructions to the sailors that they were to find a convenient time and
place for throwing their passenger into the sea; but when the convenient

time had come the goodwill of the master of the vessel saved Lucian's
life. He was landed, therefore, at AEgialos, where he found some
ambassadors to Eupator, King of Bithynia, who took him onward upon
his way.
It is believed that Lucian lived to be ninety, and it is assumed, since he
wrote a burlesque drama on gout, that the cause of his death was not
simply old age. Gout may have been the immediate cause of death.
Lucian must have spent much time at Athens, and he held office at one
time in his later years as Procurator of a part of Egypt.
The works of Lucian consist largely of dialogues, in which he battled
against what he considered to be false opinions by bringing the satire of
Aristophanes and the sarcasm of Menippus into disputations that
sought chiefly to throw down false idols before setting up the true. He
made many enemies by bold attacks upon the ancient faiths. His earlier
"Dialogues of the Gods" only brought out their stories in a way that
made them sound ridiculous. Afterwards he proceeded to direct attack
on the belief in them. In one Dialogue Timocles a Stoic argues for
belief in the old gods against Damis an Epicurean, and the gods, in
order of dignity determined by the worth of the material out of which
they are made, assemble to hear the argument. Damis confutes the Stoic,
and laughs him into fury. Zeus is unhappy at all this, but Hermes
consoles him with the reflection that although the Epicurean may speak
for a few, the mass of Greeks, and all the barbarians, remain true to the
ancient opinions. Suidas, who detested such teaching, wrote a Life of
him, in which he said that Lucian was at last torn to pieces by dogs.
Dr. Francklin prefaced his edition with a Life, written by a friend in the
form of a Dialogue of the Dead in the Elysian Fields between Lord
Lyttelton--who had been, in his Dialogues of the Dead, an imitator of
the Dialogues so called in Lucian--and Lucian himself. "By that
shambling gait and length of carcase," says Lucian, "it must be Lord
Lyttelton coming this way." "And by that arch look and sarcastic
smile," says Lyttelton, "you are my old friend Lucian, whom I have not
seen this many a day. Fontenelle and I have just now been talking of
you, and the obligations we both had to our old master: I assure you

that there was not a man in all antiquity for whom, whilst on earth, I
had a greater regard than yourself." After Lucian has told Lyttelton
something about his life, his lordship thanks Lucian for the little history,
and says, "I wish with all my heart I could convey it to a friend of mine
in the other world"-- meaning Dr. Francklin--"to whom, at this juncture,
it would be of particular service: I mean a bold adventurer who has
lately undertaken to give a new and complete translation of all your
works. It is a noble design, but an arduous one; I own I tremble for
him." Lucian replies, "I heard of it the other day from Goldsmith, who
knew the man. I think he may easily succeed in it better than any of his
countrymen, who hitherto have made but miserable work with me; nor
do I make a much better appearance in my French habit, though that I
know has been admired. D'Ablancourt has made me say a great many
things, some good, some bad, which I never thought of, and, upon the
whole, what he has done is more a paraphrase than a translation." Then,
says Lord Lyttelton, "All the attempts to represent you, at least in our
language, which I have yet seen, have failed, and all from the same
cause, by the translator's departing from the original, and substituting
his own manners, phraseology, expression, wit, and humour instead of
yours. Nothing, as it has been observed by one of our best critics, is so
grave as true humour, and every line of Lucian is a proof of it; it never
laughs itself, whilst it sets the table in a roar; a circumstance which
these gentlemen seem all to have forgotten: instead of the set features
and serious aspect which you always wear when most entertaining, they
present us for ever with a broad grin, and if you have the least smile
upon your countenance make you burst into a vulgar horse-laugh: they
are generally, indeed, such bad painters, that the daubing would never
be taken