CHAP. XIV.
With him likewise the best principle originated of a guardian attention to the concerns of men, and which ought to be pre-assumed by those who intend to learn the truth about other things. For he reminded many of his familiars, by most clear and evident indications, of the former life which their soul lived, before it was bound to this body, and demonstrated by indubitable arguments, that he had been Euphorbus the son of Panthus, who conquered Patroclus. And he especially praised the following funeral Homeric verses pertaining to himself, sung them most elegantly to the lyre, and frequently repeated them.
“The shining circlets of his golden hair,
Which ev’n the Graces might be proud to wear,
Instarr’d with gems and gold, bestrow the shore
With dust dishonor’d, and deform’d with gore.
As the young olive in some sylvan scene,
Crown’d by fresh fountains with eternal green,
Lifts the gay head, in snowy flowrets fair,
And plays and dances to the gentle air;
When lo! a whirlwind from high heav’n invades
The tender plant, and withers all its shades;
It lies uprooted from its genial bed,
A lovely ruin now defac’d and dead.
Thus young, thus beautiful, Euphorbus lay,
While the fierce Spartan tore his arms away.”[16]
But what is related about the shield of this Phrygian Euphorbus, being dedicated among other Trojan spoils to Argive Juno, we shall omit, as being of a very popular nature. That, however, which he wished to indicate through all these particulars is this, that he knew the former lives which he had lived, and that from hence he commenced his providential attention to others, reminding them of their former life.