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EPACT, the number of days in the moon's age at the beginning of the year.

the victory and neither gained any advantage: indecision, trouble, and confusion, more than ever before that battle pervaded Greece.'

Whether Epaminondas could much longer have upheld Thebes in the rank to which he had raised her, is very doubtful: without him she fell at once to her former obscurity. His character is certainly one of the fairest recorded in Greek history. His private life was moral and refined; his public conduct uninfluenced by personal ambition, or by personal hatred. He was a sincere lover of his country, and if, in his schemes for her advancement, he was indifferent to the in

Dr. Brown mentions 24 genera and 144 species of this I had the same decisive success, but that in the critical moorder in his work upon the New Holland Flora, but a con-ment, when the Lacedæmonian line was just broken, he siderable number has to be added. received a mortal wound. The Theban army was paralyzed by this misfortune; nothing was done to improve a victory which might have been made certain, and this battle, on EPAMINONDAS, a Theban statesman and soldier, in which the expectation of all Greece waited, led to no imwhose praise, both for talents and virtue, there is a remark-portant result. Each party,' says Xenophon, claimed able concurrence of antient writers. Nepos observes that, before Epaminondas was born, and after his death, Thebes was always in subjection to some other power: on the contrary, while he directed her councils, she was the head of Greece. His public life extends from the restoration of democracy, by Pelopidas and the other exiles, B.C. 379, to the battle of Mantineia, B.C. 362. In the conspiracy by which that revolution was effected he took no part, refusing to stain his hands with the blood of his countrymen; but thenceforward he became the prime mover of the Theban state. His policy was first directed to assert the right and to secure the power to Thebes of controlling the other cities of Boo-jury done to other members of the Grecian family, this is tia, several of which claimed to be independent. In this cause he ventured to engage his country, single-handed, in war with the Spartans, who marched into Boeotia, B.C. 371, with a force superior to any which could be brought against them. The Theban generals were divided in opinion whether a battle should be risked: for to encounter the Lacedæmonians with inferior numbers was universally esteemed hopeless. Epaminondas prevailed with his colleagues to venture it; and devised on this occasion a new method of attack. Instead of joining battle along the whole line, he concentrated an overwhelming force on one point, directing the weaker part of his line to keep back. The Spartan right wing being broken, and the king slain, the rest of the army found it necessary to abandon the field. This memorable battle was fought at Leuctra. The moral effect of it was much more important than the mere loss inflicted on Sparta, for it overthrew the prescriptive superiority in arms claimed by that state ever since its reformation by Lycurgus.

This brilliant success led Epaminondas to the second object of his policy-the overthrow of the supremacy of Sparta, and the substitution of Thebes as the leader of Greece in the democratical interest. In this hope a Theban army, under his command, marched into Peloponnesus early in the winter, B.C. 369, and, in conjunction with the Eleians, Arcadians, and Argians, invaded and laid waste a large part of Laconia. Numbers of the Helots took that opportunity to shake off a most oppressive slavery; and Epaminondas struck a deadly blow at the power of Sparta, by establishing these descendants of the old Messenians [ARISTOMENES] on Mount Ithome, in Messenia, as an independent state, and inviting their countrymen, scattered through Sicily and Italy, to return to their antient patrimony. Numbers, after the lapse of 200 years, obeyed the call. This memorable event is known in history as the return of the Messenians.

In 368 B.C. Epaminondas again led an army into Peloponnesus; but not fulfilling the expectations of the people, he was disgraced, and, according to Diodorus (xv. 71), was ordered to serve in the ranks. In that capacity he is said to have saved the army in Thessaly, when entangled in dangers which threatened it with destruction; being required by the general voice to assume the command. He is not again heard of in a public capacity till B.C. 366, when he was sent to support the democratic interest in Achaia, and by his moderation and judgment brought that whole confederation over to the Theban alliance without bloodshed or banishment.

a fault from which, perhaps, no Greek statesman, except Aristides, was free. (Xenophon, Hellen.; Plutarch, Pelopidas, Agis, &c.)

EPAULEMENT originally signified a mass of earth, about 7 feet 6 inches high and 18 or 20 feet thick, which was raised for the purpose either of protecting a body of troops at one extremity of their line, or of forming a wing or shoulder of a battery to prevent the guns from being dismounted by an enfilading fire. The term is now, improperly however, used to designate the whole mass of earth or other material which protects the guns in a battery both in front and on either flank; and it can only be distinguished from a parapet by being without a banquette, or step, at the foot of the interior side, on which the men stand to fire over a parapet. That part of the epaulement which is between every two embrasures is called a merlon; and the part under the embrasure is called the genouillère.

EPE'E, CHARLES MICHEL DE L'. A comparative estimate of L'Epée's character and labours has been given under DEAF AND DUMB: the following are a few biographical particulars respecting him.

He was born at Versailles, in November, 1712. His father was the king's architect, a man of talent and probity. Young L'Epée was educated for the church, a profession

which his mild, cheerful, and pious disposition peculily fitted him. There were difficulties at first in the way of his admission to the priesthood. He was required, according to the established practice of the diocese of Paris, to sign a formulary of faith; and this being opposed to his own opinions (which were Jansenist), he could not do so conscientiously. He was however admitted to the rank of deacon, but was told never to pretend to holy orders. This obstruction led him to the study of the law, but this profession did not suit the bias of his mind. At last he succeeded in obtaining holy orders, being ordained by the bishop of Troyes, a nephew of Bossuet. From him M. de l'Epée received a canonry in the cathedral of Troyes.

An accidental circumstance led him to devote himself to the instruction of the deaf and dumb. Business took him one day to a house where he found only two young women, who were busily engaged in needlework, but paid no attention to his questions. The mother of the young women arriving shortly afterwards, explained to him with tears that they were deaf and dumb. An ecclesiastic named Vanin had commenced the education of these young persons by means of pictures; but death had removed him, and no other person had offered to instruct the mutes. Believing,' says M. de l'Epée, that these two children would live and die in ignorance of their religion, if I did not attempt some means of instructing them, I was touched with compassion, and told the mother that she might send them daily to my house, and that I would do whatever I might find possible for them.'

John Paul Bonet's book came in the way of M. de

As the narrowness of our limits forbids us to trace the motives which led to the formation of so powerful a Theban party in Peloponnesus, so we cannot enter into the causes of its decline, except by saying, that it soon became plain that a mere change of masters, Thebes instead of Sparta, would be of no service to the other states. Achaia first, then Elis, then Mantineia and great part of Arcadia, returned to the Lacedæmonian alliance. To check this de-l'Epée; a person offered a copy of it to him, urging him to fection Epaminondas led an army into Peloponnesus for the fourth time, B.C. 362. Joined by the Argians, Messenians, and part of the Arcadians, he entered Laconia, and endeavoured to take Sparta by surprise; but the vigilance of Agesilaus just frustrated this scheme. Epaminondas then marched against Mantineia, near which was fought the celebrated battle in which he fell. The disposition of his troops on this occasion was an improvement on that by which he had gained the battle of Leuctra, and would have

buy it, which he at first refused, not knowing the nature of the work, and alleging that he did not understand Spanish, and that the book was therefore of no use to him. Opening it casually, he found the copper-plate engraving of Bonet's one-handed alphabet. The book was immediately bought, and De l'Epée learned Spanish to enable him to read it.

M. de l'Epée was persevering and disinterested in his in-. struction of the deaf and dumb. He persevered until he converted opposition and contempt into approbation. His

Income was about 400%., of which he allowed about 1007. for his own expenses, and appropriated the remainder to the support and instruction of indigent mutes. The rich,' he said, only come to my house by tolerance; it is not to them that I devote myself-it is to the poor; but for them, I should never have undertaken the education of the deaf

and dumb.'

M. de l'Epée died December 23, 1789, aged 77. His memory received various honours; his funeral oration was pronounced by the Abbé Fauchet, the king's preacher. He ranks deservedly among those whose lives have been devoted to the amelioration of the condition of their fellow men, and the fruit of whose labours do not die with them. (Gallery of Portraits.)

assigns the place of a planet for a number of successive days an ephemeris of the planet. [ALMANAC.]

EPHESIANS, ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE, is the fifth, in numerical order, of the fourteen apostolical letters of St. Paul, contained in the canon of the New Testament. Throughout the primitive ages of Christianity it was generally regarded by the principal fathers as being of genuine and sacred authority. According to Dr. Lardner (Credibility of Gosp. Hist., vol. ii.) the writings of Ignatius, who was St. Paul's contemporary, contain seven citations from this epistle. It is also cited by Irenæus, Clemens Alexandrinus, Tertullian, Origen, and many subsequent Christian writers. There were, however, several important and numerous sects, as the Nazarenes, or Ebionites (paupers EPERIES, or Pressova, a royal free town, and the and the Severians, Encratite and other followers of Tatian, capital of the county of Sáros, in Upper Hungary: in 48° who, in the first and second centuries, denied both the 58 N. lat., and 21° 15' E. long. It is situated in an agree- genuineness and the authenticity of this and the other able country on the banks of the Tartsza, is surrounded writings of St. Paul; rejecting them as a tissue of errors, and with walls defended by bastions, which are encircled by denouncing St. Paul himself as an apostate, and a perverter extensive gardens and inclosures, among which are the of the original system of Jesus of Nazareth. (Origen contra suburbs. it contains about 960 houses and 7660 inhabit- Celsum, 1. v.; Euseb. Eccles. Hist., 1. iii., c. 21 and 27; Epiants. The streets are broad, and embellished with several phanius, Hares. 30; Hieron. in Math., c. 12; Nicephorus, handsome buildings, among which are the county hall, four Hist. Eccles., 1. iv., c. 4, 1. v., c. 12; Toland's Nazarenus, p. 25 Roman Catholic churches, a Lutheran church, a synagogue, -29.) A second epistle of St. Paul to the Ephesians is menthe quadrangular buildings of the Protestant college, a tioned by Jerome (De Scriptoribus Eccles.) and by EpiphaRoman Catholic high-school, attached to the monastery of nius (Hom. 42). The place and date generally assigned to this Franciscans, who conduct it, a head Normal school, a epistle by biblical critics are Rome, A.D. 61, that is, in the first chapter-house, town-hall, orphan asylum, and refuge for the year of the apostle's imprisonment at Rome (ch. iii. 1, ch. iv. 1, indigent. It is the seat of a Greek Catholic bishopric ch. vi. 20, and the postscript), but Mr. Greswell, in his elaboerected in 1807, has a good episcopal library, and is fre-rate chronological disquisition on the harmony of the Gospels, quented by the pious for the sake of an imitation of Mount says, St. Paul wrote no epistles in his first imprisonment.' Calvary, on which several chapels are built. Eperies manu- Much has been written by commentators for and against factures woollens and linens, and possesses a large earthen- the opinion that St. Paul addressed this letter to the Epheware manufactory and breweries, as well as a considerable sians; and notwithstanding the words of the first verse, to trade in cattle, wine, and grain, to which the annual fairs the saints at Ephesus' (iv 'Epέow), appear in all the antient greatly contribute. About four miles from the town, the envi- MSS., and that the postscript says, 'written from Rome unto rons of which are agreeably diversified, there is an esteemed the Ephesians,' this is doubted and denied to be the fact chalybeate, called Cremete or Krasyna-voda, with baths. by Grotius, Mill, Wetstein, Vitringa, Benson, Paley, and EPERNAY, a town in France, in the department of Greswell, who adopt the statement, said by Tertullian to Marne, on the south bank of the river Marne, 73 miles in a have been made by Marcion, that it was written to the Laostraight line east by north of Paris. dicaans. Macknight, Lardner, Hartwell Horne, and many others, see no difficulty in believing it to have been addressed to the Ephesians, though Greswell (vol. ii. p. 67) maintains that by its internal evidence it is undoubtedly shown to have been addressed, not to the Christians at Ephesus, where Paul had resided three years (Acts xx. 31), but to personal strangers (i. 15, iii. 2, &c.); that it has been miscalled by mistake; and that, if it be not the epistle which Paul wrote to the Laodicæans (Coloss. iv. 16), that apostolical epistle must have been lost, for the one with this title inserted in the Codex Fabricii' and in Jones's work on the Canon, though of a very early date, is regarded as a forgery. Usher, Bengel, Michaelis, and Hug suppose it to be encyclical, that is, intended for circulation. The style is exceedingly animated and fluent, and has less of the metaphorical obscurity which generally characterizes the compositions of St. Paul. The object appears to be to establish an earnest faith in the doctrines of Christianity, by giving exalted notions of their importance and moral excellence, and to encourage a perseverance in the Christian warfare with temporal and spiritual enemies. The three first chapters are occupied in especially setting forth the principles of predestinarianism (i. 4, 5, 11, iv. 30), and the three last are devoted chiefly to the enjoining of moral duties with respect to husbands, wives, parents, children, Macknight, can read the doctrinal part of this epistle without being impressed and roused by it, as by the sound of a trumpet.' On the undesigned coincidences with the Acts' see Paley's Hora Paulina, p. 208—234. The moral and doctrinal precepts of this epistle, with respect chiefly to election, have occasioned theological critics, especially those of Germany, to write elaborately on its proper interpretation. See the comments of Bucer, Röell, Bosc, Schütze, Cramer, Rosenmüller, Koppe, Müller, Brinkmann, Ziegler, Krause, and Bemmelin, cited in Seiler's Biblical Hermeneutics by Dr. Wright; also Macknight's Translation and Commentary on the Epistles, 4to., vol. ii. ; Michaelis's Introduct., vol. iv.; Horne's Introduct., vol. iv.; and the list of Commentators and Sermons on Ephesians in Watt's Biblioth. Britannica.

The antient name of the town is said to have been Aquæ Perennes, from which came first Aixperne and afterwards Epernay. At an early period Epernay belonged to the archbishops of Reims, by whom a fortress was built here. In the wars of the English in France Epernay was twice besieged. In the earlier part of the sixteenth century it was burnt by Francois I. in order to destroy the stores which the Emperor Charles V. had established here. In the religious contests of the same century it was also an object of contest: it was besieged and taken by the Spaniards and Leaguers; and retaken in 1592 by Henri IV. In 1657 Epernay was ceded to the duke of Bouillon in exchange for the sovereignty of Sedan; but the duke never exercised all his rights.

Epernay is in a small valley in the midst of a romantic country, well wooded, and producing the finest Champagne wines. It is a handsome town. It has a church of modern construction, built in the place of one of greater antiquity, of which only the gate remains. There are some remains of the antient fortifications of the town, consisting of a gate and two towers. The population in 1832 was 5318. The inhabitants carry on a considerable trade in wine, which is deposited in deep and extensive cellars hollowed out in the chalk on which the town is built. They manufacture a great quantity of earthenware. Of the utensils manu-masters, and servants. No real Christian,' says Dr. factured half are sent to Paris in boats which descend the Marne, and a quarter into Lorraine; the rest is sent into Picardie or is retained for home use. The clay of which it is made is dug about fifteen miles from Epernay: large quantities of it are sent in an unwrought state to Paris and into the departments of Meurthe and Aisne. Millstones are quarried in the neighbourhood of the town; and sand is dug, which is much sought after for making glass, and is sent by land-carriage into Lorraine and even into Alsace. Many women are employed in making hats, purses, bags, &c., of silk twist. Hosiery and woollen yarn are manufactured. There are at Epernay a theatre, a high-school, and a library of 10,000 volumes. It is the capital of an arrondissement, which contained in 1832 a population of 83,278. EPHE'MERIS (ionμepis, from iri, and nμépa), a name given to almanacs, from their containing matter for each day. In astronomy it is usual to call any table which

E'PHESUS, a city of Asia Minor, and one of the twelve that belonged to the Ionian confederation. (Herod. i. 142.)

302

hill.

a strong wall, which was a double wall to the south. Within the enclosure were four open courts, that is, one on each side of the temple; and on each side of the court to the west there was a large open portico, or colonnade, of four columns deep, extending to the lake: on these columns arches of brick were turned. The front of the temple was to the east. The temple was built on arches, and the foundation appears to have been most solidly constructed. This agrees with the statement of Pliny (xxxvi. 14), who, speaking of the great temple which existed in his time, said that it was built on marshy ground, as being thus more secure against earthquakes, and that the foundations were formed of rammed charcoal and wool. In the narrow archways of the foundation Pococke saw a great number of earthen pipes. In the front of the temple was a large portico, constructed with grey and red granite columns, some of the fragments of which are fifteen feet long and three feet six inches in diameter. Similar columns form part of the mosque of St. John at Aiasalouk, with a most beautiful composite capital. Pococke judges from the remains which he saw, that the whole building was cased with marble, and that arches were turned on the columns. The temple itself has something of the figure of a cross, and is divided into several chambers. There was probably a portico on the side opposite to the great entrance. The length of the temple, according to Pliny, was 425 feet, the breadth 220, and it contained 137 columns 60 feet high.

The ruins of the city are situated near the river Cayster, at a short distance from the place where it falls into the Bay of Ephesus, and near a modern village called Aiasalouk. The city, according to Pococke's plan, was irregularly enclosed with solid walls. Towards the east the external wall crosses a hill, called Lepre, which has a channel or hollow in the middle. The wall is then continued southward on the edge of a valley, which is bounded by another hill, called the Corresus. (Strab. 640.) Other internal walls extend further south across another valley, and communicate with wall-works running east and west along the side of Mount Corresus. The walls then turn northward, and extend along the side of a lake, probably Lake Selinusia, near the temple of Diana, which is about a furlong to the west of the hill Lepre. On this, the west wall, is a tower, called the Prison of St. Paul, which is a building with Gothic or pointed arches. The walls, after leaving the lake, curve on the north, and run straight toward the east on a slight eminence. Near the circus the walls are set back a short distance, and then are continued straight till they turn with a curve, and join the boundary on the Lepre The whole compass of the walls, according to Pococke, is about four miles. They are built in a rough manner, but cased with hewn stone, and defended in places with square towers. In some parts the walls remain almost entire; in others the foundations only are visible, and are ten feet thick. The site of Ephesus has been frequently changed, and Lysimachus, one of Alexander's generals, is said to have adopted the expedient of stopping the drains in the low parts of the city, in order to drive the inhabitants into the higher, or, what he conceived, the most advantageous situation for the city, which he had enclosed. (Strab. 640.) Pococke is of opinion that the ruins of the present walls are the work of Lysimachus. Part of one of the entrance-gates, adorned with some bas-reliefs remarkable for their fine taste, still remains. Within the city there were extant, at the time of Pococke's visit, ruins of theatres, a cireus, and other public buildings; and without the city, on the south-cut holes in the rock in order to deposit their dead there. east side of Lepre, are the ruins of an extensive and magnificent edifice, which Pococke supposed to be a gymnasium. The outer walls are of brick and stone, formed of four or five courses of each, laid alternately, and constructed with great solidity.

In The Antiquities of Ionia,' vol. ii., published by the Dilletanti Society, there is an interesting view of this gymnasium, and also a plan. (See Plate 40, and following plates.) The Cryptoporticus is full of Exedræ. There is also a Palæstra and an Ephebium, with rooms on the right and left, having a communication with the Palæstra only. A passage leads from the Ephebium to the apartments of the baths, of which there were two sets for bathing. There is however only one Laconicum. In the niche of the Calidarium, on the right hand, are painted several sorts of fish, and boys swimming on dolphins: the colours of the painting are so well preserved as to show the water to be of a light green. The Laconicum is vaulted, and is totally dark. Plate 43 gives some details of the architecture of this building.

The remains of a temple at Ephesus are given in plates 44 and 45 of the same work. This temple was 130 feet long and 80 broad. The cella is constructed of large coarse stone; the portico is of marble, and of the Corinthian order. The columns are nearly 47 feet high, and the shafts are fluted, and of one piece of stone. The style is Roman, and the temple was constructed, probably with the permission of Augustus Cæsar, to the deified Julius.

The circus is a very curious building, 780 feet long, and 290 broad: the width of the chariot-course is 135 feet. On the north side the seats are constructed on a series of arches, but on the south they are laid on Mount Lepre. The circus was entered by descending the hill side, as the boundary was surmounted with a wall, having arched openings three feet wide at about forty feet distant from each other. The masonry consists of rusticated stone-work, and the Ionic order appears to have been used in some of the decorative parts of the architecture. The great theatre, which is partly constructed, and partly hollowed out of the hill, is about 330 feet in diameter, the plan being a large segment of a circle, with thirty rows of seats.

The temple of Diana has a lake on the west side of it, which is now a morass, extending westward to the Cayster. This building and the courts about it were surrounded with

Ruins still remain on the lower part of the hill Lepre, and there seems to have been a suburb on the south side of Lepre, and near a mile from the south-east corner of it towards that hill, about which the present village of Aiasalouk is situated. On another hill is a Turkish castle, and round the top of the hill are extensive ruins of thick brick walls, with numerous small arches, which Pococke judges to be of the time of the Greek emperors. To the east of Mount Lepre are the burial-places. Pococke saw there a very large marble coffin (sarcophagus), with an imperfect inscription on it, and he says he has reason to think that they

There are several arches all round the hill, and on some of them are ruins of an aqueduct. On the low ground between the hill Lepre and the village of Aiasalouk there are remains of many square piers, made of single stones laid one on another. Not only on the sides of Mount Lepre, but on Mount Corresus, as well as in the valley between them, there are still great ruins of the antient city.

Mounts Lepre and Corresus being of marble, probably supplied abundant materials for building. (Pococke's Travels; and The Antiquities of Ionia, by the Dilletanti Society.)

According to Strabo, the oldest inhabitants of the site of Ephesus were Carians and Leleges, most of whom were ejected by the settlers from Greece under Androclus. Lysimachus, as Strabo observes, built the walls which existed when he wrote, and which are doubtless those described by Pococke. He also gave the place the name of his wife Arsinoë, but the old name was afterwards restored. The first great temple of Diana was built by Chersiphron, which having been set on fire by Herostratus and destroyed, the great edifice described by Pliny was erected. Strabo says that the priests of the temple were once eunuchs, but that in his time the usages of the place were somewhat changed. This temple was a noted asylum for malefactors and for debtors, till this privilege was taken away by Augustus. In Strabo's time Ephesus was a place of great trade, and the chief commercial city of the western part of Asia Minor; and it would appear from the Acts of the Apostles ( xix.) that it was a place of some note for workers in silver.

N

Coin of Ephesus.

British Museum. Actual Size. Silver. Weight, 176; grains. '

E'PHORI (¿popo), a body of magistrates at Sparta, who were possessed of great privileges. The institution of this office is usually ascribed to Theopompus, the grandson of

that it does not and is not intended to apply to any single epic or lyric poem. With the exception perhaps of some of our old national romances, there does not exist an epic poem of any length which is perfectly free from lyrical passages; but this is no reason why we should confound the two forms of art, and not assign to poetry the one name or the other according to the proportion which it contains of either element.

Charilaus the Proclid. but it has been inferred from the existence of an ephoralty in other Dorian states before the time of Theopompus, and from its being apparently placed among the institutions of Lycurgus by Herodotus (i. 65) and Xenophon (de Rep. Lac., viii. 3) that it was an antient Dorian magistracy. Dr. Arnold supposes (Thucyd., vol. i., p. 646) that the ephori, who were five in number, were coeval with the first settlement of the Dorians in Sparta, and were merely the municipal magistrates of From what we know of the operations of our own minds, the five hamlets which composed the city (see Müller, and of the analogy which subsists between the growth of Dorians, ii., p. 550, Engl. transl.); but that afterwards, when individual and national intellect, it appears most natural the Heraclidae began to encroach upon the privileges of the that epic should be the earliest species of poetry. A child, other Dorians, and, it would seem, in the reign of Thec- borne into a crowd of circumstances all claiming his attenpompus, who endeavoured to diminish the powers of the tion and exciting his interest, busies himself with the exgeneral assembly of the Spartan aristocracy, the Dorians, internal world long before it ever occurs to him to examine the struggle which ensued, gained for the ephori an exten- what is going on within himself. Nay, more than this, his sion of authority which placed them virtually at the head imagination, the idealizing faculty, takes the models of its of the state, although the nominal sovereignty was still left exertions entirely from the external world. His dreams, in the hands of the Heraclidæ. Thus the ephori were popular his reveries, his waking fancies are active and epical, as magistrates as far as the Dorians themselves were con- any one who has watched the movements of children must cerned, and were in fact the guardians of their rights from | acknowledge; but the time when he begins to notice his the encroachments of the kings, though they were in rela- own thoughts and feelings-the lyrical age-does not come tion to the Perioci (epioikot) the oppressive instruments of till later.* an overbearing aristocracy. (Plato, Legg., iv., p. 712 p.) The ephori were chosen in the autumn of every year; the first gave his name to the year; every Spartan was eligible to the office without any regard to age or wealth. They were empowered to fine whom they pleased, and exact immediate payment of the fine; they could suspend the functions of any other magistrate, and arrest and bring to trial even the kings. (Xenophon de Rep. Laced., viii. 4.) They presided and put the vote in the public assemblies (Thucyd., i., 87), and performed all the functions of sovereignty in receiving and dismissing embassies (Xen. Hell., ii., 13, 19), treating with foreign states (Herod., ix., 8), and sending out military expeditions. (Xen., Hellen., ii., 4, 29.) The king, when he commanded, was always attended by two of the ephori, who exercised a controlling power over his movements. (Herod., ix., 76.) The ephori were murdered on their seats of justice by Cleomenes III, and their office overthrown (Plutarch, Vit. Cleomen., c. viii.); but they were restored by Antigonus Doson and the Achæans in 222 B.C. (Polyb., ii., 70; Pausan., ii., 9, 2); and the office subsisted under the Roman dominion. (See Böckh, Corpus Inscriptionum, i., p. 604613.) On the ephoralty, the reader may consult Müller's Dorians, book iii., c. 6; Plass's Geschichte des alten Griechenlands, vol. ii., p. 113; and Tittmann's Darstellung der Griech. Staatsverfassungen, p. 104-117.

E'PHORUS, a Greek historian, born at Cyme in Æolis, in the year 405 B.C. (Suidas.) He survived the passage of Alexander into Asia (333 B.C.), which he mentioned in his history (Clem. Al., Strom., i., p. 337 A.). He studied rhetoric under Isocrates, but with so little success that after he had returned from Athens his father Demophilus sent him back to the rhetorician for fresh instructions. (Plutarch, Vit. Isocratis, p. 366 Wyttenb.) Isocrates perceiving his unfitness for public speaking, recommended him to turn his attention to historical composition (Seneca de Tranquillit. Animi, c. vi.); but his style was low and slovenly even in his histories (Dio., i., p. 479); and Plutarch remarks upon the silliness of the set speeches which he introduced. (Polit. Præcon., p. 803 B.) Polybius observes that, though in his account of naval matters he is sometimes happy, he always fails in describing battles by land, and was entirely ignorant of tactics. (Excerpt. Vatican., p. 391.) Ephorus wrote-1. A History of Greece, in 30 books, beginning with the siege of Troy, and terminating with the siege of Perinthus (340 B.C.). Part of the thirtieth book was written by his son Demophilus. (Diod., xvi., 14.) 2. On Inventions, in 2 books. 3. On Goods and Ills, in 24 books. 4. On remarkable Objects in various Countries, 15 books. 5. The Topography of Cyme. 6. On Diction. The fragments of these works have been collected by Meier Marx, Carlsruhe, 1815.

EPHYRA. [MEDUSA]
EPIALTUS. [MADE]

EPIC POETRY is that form of art which produces an imaginative description of external facts and occurrences, as distinguished from lyric poetry, which employs itself in registering, in an imaginative manner, all those internal facts and occurrences which go by the name of feelings and emotions.

Those who find this definition insufficient must remember

The progress of literature bears a close analogy to that growth of an individual mind which we have just described. Men look round them before looking within, and thus it is that natural philosophy has always preceded metaphysics, and epic poetry, as far as we know, been prior to lyrical. Again, the imagination gets the start of the logical faculty. Men can invent before they can argue, and thus it appears that facts, real or supposed, are usually put in the imaginative form of epic poetry before they are recorded and examined with regard to the conclusions which they suggest, as in political history. (Schelling, Vorlesungen über die Methode des Academischen Studium, p. 226.) It may be objected to this theory, that if we assert every individual to have gone through both epical and lyrical periods, there is no reason why the two forms of art which we suppose to have arisen from the prevalence of either set of feelings should not have been contemporaneously produced; but it will be seen that a sufficient reason is supplied for the priority of that form which addresses itself to the spirit of action, in the fact that this spirit predominates in the earliest ages of society, to the complete repression - we might almost say destruction-of those contemplative feelings which in after ages are allowed full and unrestrained exercise. The heroic age of Greece, for instance, as far as we know anything about it, was very little likely to encourage reflection, much less reflective poetry, and accordingly we hear nothing of such poetry for centuries after it had ceased.

The earliest specimens of this form of art, which probably consisted of tales rhythmically arranged and recited to a very simple musical accompaniment, no doubt belonged to the unconscious æra, during which the poet, setting before him no aim, or seeing it at best but very imperfectly, acts purely from the stirring impulse of his own imagination. Into this class we may perhaps admit some of our oldest and simplest romances, but the poetry of Homer and Hesiod, the twofold epic of the Greeks, cannot be denied to be, in great measure at least, the work of conscious artists. We shall notice the writings of the early Greeks first in order; and as it would swell this article to an unnecessary length were we to examine in detail the principal epic poems which we possess, we shall confine ourselves, in a great measure, to those which were composed during the periods both of antient and modern history, when epic poetry could be said to be the poetry of the age, and leave those detached productions which owe their existence to the imagination of isolated men, in times long after the disappearance of the living epos, for a separate examination.

There are two divisions into which the epic poetry of the Greeks naturally falls; the heroic or romantic epos of Homer and of the Cyclic poets, and the hieratic epos of Hesiod. The attention of that age was centered, as ours is at present, on two grand ideas, the state and religion; whence we find a political and a hieratic epos. The Hiad and Odyssey are the two poems which remain as specimons of the former kind, and they are particularly worth the attention of all who are interested in the history of epic

We are aware that this is opposed to the assertion of a late German duced any arguments which lead us to change our opinion on the point, writer (Wilhelm Müller, Homerische Vorschule, p. 5); but he has not ad

poetry, as they afford by far the most perfect instance of poems of that kind composed in an age differing but little in its characteristics from that to which they refer, and stand consequently in strong contrast to the Æneid, a poem with which they are most frequently compared. The Æneid, in common with most Latin poetry, depends more on beauty of language and arrangement than on anything in the story, exquisitely managed as it is, to excite the interest of its readers. As it traces the life of an individual, it stands in closer juxta-position with the Odyssey than with the Iliad; but how superior is Ulysses to Æneas, and how much more romantic are the adventures of the Greek than those of the Trojan hero!

Perhaps there is not in the whole compass of literature a more perfectly drawn character than Ulysses, certainly none proceeding from so early a source. His touching exhibions of feeling, the inimitable circumstantiality of the fictions which he spins in such profusion, apparently for no purpose except to confound his auditors; the manner in which all the interest of the story winds around him, the comic nature of the interludes, and the peculiarities attaching to the supernatural parts of his adventures, all unite to render the Odyssey a poem more fitted perhaps than the Iliad itself to interest an age like ours, when everything which gives a lyrical character to poetry is so much although so unconsciously sought for.

It usually happens that sacred poetry partakes strongly of a lyrical character, and Hesiod has perhaps struck out the only path which an epic writer in a simple age could follow without lapsing into the lyrical spirit as he approached theological subjects. The only poet of antiquity with whom he can be compared is Lucretius, but the 'De Rerum Natura' approaches so much more nearly to the character of a treatise on philosophy, that it is hard to give it the name of an epie poem, although it, as well as all didactic works like Virgil's Georgics, come under the definition. The reason why we are slow to recognize them as epics arises from the habit of taking the heroic epos, one species, although the primary one, for the whole class, which really includes other species, as a reference to our definition cannot fail to show.

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Beowulf,' in Anglo-Saxon, The Poem of the Cid,' in Spanish, and the Nibelungen Lied,' in old German, are quite sufficient proofs of the coincidence of epic spirit with an early stage of society.

The Italian epic arose somewhat later than that of any of the northern nations, which may be attributed to the fact that it was only to a strong admixture of barbarian blood that the Italians owed their restoration to political existence. The dregs of a nation never possess a national literature.

Coleridge has observed that Gothic art depends on a symbolical expression of the infinite,' or what cannot be circumscribed within the limits of actual sensuous being, while in antient art everything was finite and material. (Lit. Remains, vol. i. p. 68.) This applies more directly to architecture, but in a measure also to literature, although we think that the introduction of Christianity had more to do with it than the cause which Coleridge assigns, namely the wild liberty of the Northman's habits and manners and the imagery of nature which surrounded him. Perhaps the greatest difference which is traceable between the antient and the modern epic has been produced by that spirit of devotion to the female sex which characterizes all the Gothic nations; and arising as it does, partly from the refinement of an instinct and partly from religious impres sions, is very superior, as a motive of action, to the mere unmitigated instinct for war which constitutes the prevailing feature of the antient epic, or at least of the heroic poems.

We have been at no pains to notice those detached epic poems which have appeared at different times since the revival of learning, although some of the most noble specimens of this style of poetry are to be numbered amongst them; still less have we intended to give anything like sketches of any which we have mentioned, as this is properly done under the heads of the several authors.

(Thirlwall's History of Greece, vol. i.; Ulrici, Geschichte der Hellenischen Dichtkunst; Dunlop, History of Roman Literature; Baehr, Abriss der Römischen Literatur-Geschichte; History of Spain in the Cabinet Cyclopædia, vol. ii., Appendix H.)

It has been observed by a German writer (Schelling, EPICHARMUS, the son of Helothales, was born in the Vorlesungen, &c., p. 224) that, properly speaking, an epic island of Cos, and accompanied Cadmus, the son of Scythes, poem has no regular beginning or end; it is a metrical and to Sicily about the year 485 B.C. He must have arrived at imaginative production, which, if it consist of narrative, maturity by this time; for he was a pupil of Pythagoras may take it up and lay it down at any period. This is the (who died in 497 B.C), and according to Aristotle (Poet. iii. case with the Iliad, as well as with the Odyssey and Æneid, 5), lived long before Chionides and Magnes (who, if we although the two last are considerably more complex in the may believe Šuidas, began to exhibit in 487 B.C.); so that arrangement of the narrative, and evidently draw to a more there can be no truth in the statement of Diogenes, that decided close than the Iliad. There appears however to be Epicharmus was brought from Cos to Sicily when a child a greater unity in the plot of the Odyssey than in that of of three months old (viii. 78). He and his brother were Virgil's poem, in this respect, that the events never get the physicians, and therefore, perhaps, belonged to the Coan upper hand of the hero. We are interested in his adven-house of the Asclepiads. It appears that he resided some tures because they are his; while in the Eneid they strike us rather as embellishments intended to possess indepen

dent merit.

The early romantic epos deserves notice as the first distinct form of modern art. Much discussion has been expended in order to ascertain whence arose those cycles of metrical romances which have for their subjects the exploits of Alexander the Great, King Arthur, and other heroes; but it rather concerns us here to notice that the second birth of civilization which ensued on the breaking up of the Roman empire was productive of a series of events in literary history, parallel, as far as we can judge, to those which

occurred in the times of Homer.

short time at Megara, and possibly removed to Syracuse when Gelo transported the inhabitants of Megara thither (484 B.C.). It was at Megara that Epicharmus probably got the idea of writing comedies; for the Megareans, as well in Greece as in Sicily, are always spoken of as the originators of that branch of the drama. Epicharmus is called by Theocritus (Epigram. xvii.) the inventor of comedy, and Plato says that he was the chief comedian, just as Homer was the chief tragedian. (Theætet., p. 152, E.) The latter remarks refer, we believe, to his having first furnished the comus, or band of revellers, who were the original chorus in comedy, with a systematic dialogue and a plot of an epic character. That the comedies of Epicharmus had a chorus, and that this chorus was the representative of the comus, as in the old Athenian comedy, appears probable from the fact that one of his dramas was called Vulcan,' or the ' Comasta. The subjects of the plays of Epicharmus,' says Müller (Dorians, iv. 7, §. 2), were mostly mythological, ie., parodies or travesties of mythology, nearly in the style of the satirical drama of We find that the northern nations possessed numerous Athens. Thus, in the comedy of "Busiris," Hercules was poems of an epical kind, some of which remain, and are or represented in the most ludicrous light, as a voracious might be read with considerable interest. The cycles of glutton; and he was again exhibited in the same character romances on Troy and Alexander the Great compose a form (with a mixture, perhaps, of satirical remarks on the luxury of art which could only exist in a revival of imaginative of the times) in "The Marriage of Hebe," in which an astospirit, as they derive their subjects from an older date and nishing number of dishes was mentioned. He also, like a different country, although, as regards every thing but the Aristophanes, handled political subjects and invented comic name of Greek or Trojan, the hero is usually the country-characters like the later Athenian poets; and indeed the man of the bard; but the numerous poems on Arthur, with extent of his subjects was very wide. The piece called 'Havelok the Dane,' and 'Horn Child,' in our own language,

The traces of heroic poetry which remain in Livy's History are plain enough to enable us to infer with considerable probability that a series of epic poets appeared in Rome about the time of the Tarquins onwards; but as no fragments remain, we are too much in the dark as to the nature of their writings to enable us to refer to them as we do to Homer.

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The worship of the virgin in particular. (Coleridge, ubi supra.

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