Here lies Timocreon, the Rhodian; he
Loved slander, drunkenness, and gluttony.
This is certainly pithy.
Stepmothers, in those days, would seem to have been just as bad as at present, when they have become a very proverb. Here is a kind of epitaph by Callimachus, containing a hit at them which certainly has no very great merit:
Στηλην μητρυιης. κ. τ. λ.
On his step-mother's tomb, this youth piously placed
Some flowers, that it might be properly graced.
For he thought, as this life had abandoned her view,
That her vices, no doubt, had abandoned her too.
But, while he was thus standing close to the tomb,
It fell, and it crushed him, Oh! terrible doom!
Then youths! let this warning sink deep in your breasts,
Shun each step-mother, e'en when in Oreus she rests.
These are ample, as specimens of Grecian wit, which, as here exhibited, is certainly of no very refined or exalted description.
In taking a general and comprehensive glance over Greek Epitaphs and Inscriptions, we see that they are usually characterized by deep feeling, expressed concisely, and with the utmost simplicity. We rarely find any catches, any evident striving after effect, and, in consequence, to an ear not accustomed to them, they may frequently seem meagre, and even bald. But, by studying them, a meaning seems to grow out of the very words; and the more that we examine them, and the oftener that we read them, the more we find them expressive of 'thoughts that lie too deep for words,' thoughts which can be expressed but darkly, and which, concealed in this garb of simplicity, must be passed over by those who are not content to pause and ponder. Whether the pleasure derived from this be worth the labor that must be spent over them, even though it be a labor of love, is a question which each must answer for himself, according to his own tastes. If they lead him to it, he will have discovered an almost inexhaustible source of pure and elevated gratification; if not
——'frustra laborum
Ingratum trahit.'