PLATO, the most illustrious of the philosophers of antiquity, was a native of Athens, about the 88th Olympiad, 430 years before Christ, born and educated in the highest grade of Athenian splendor. Grammar, mathematics, music and painting, were his juvenile studies and attainments; and while a youth, gave scope to his poetic genius. Wrote odes, dithyrambics and epic poems, which last he burned, because he thought them inferior to Homer, the immortal Grecian poet. He also wrote Tragedies, and prepared one for the prize at the Olympic Theatre, but hearing the production of Socrates, and charmed with his mode of treating his subject, not only waved his competition and forbore the contest, but destroyed his play, and neglected poetry forever after. About the 20th year of his age, he entered the school of Socrates, and was so devoted to his interest, that when his enemies imprisoned him, he raised large sums of money to effect his liberation, which being ineffectual, he boldly mounted the rostrum, and disclosed the powers of his eloquence, in a harrangue to the people, which was begun in so powerful and pathetic a manner, that the magistrates ordered him to be silenced, lest he should occasion a tumult and uproar, in that city famous for such ebulitions; having at last obtained the releasement of his friend, he lived with him eight years, in which period he committed to writing the substance of his venerable master's most excellent Discourses and Dissertations on Morality and Philoso phý. On the death of Socrates, Plato travelled for the complete finishing of his education. At Megara, he was kindly and hospitably entertained by Euclid, who had been one of Socrates first scholars, and the father of the mathematics; from thence to Italy, dove strenuously into the most profound and mysterious secrets of Pythagoras and his doctrines, to illucidate which, he went to Cyrene, and became a pupil to Theodorus; thence to Egypt to learn their theology and astronomy: settled for years at Sais, learning of

the wise men, their ideas and hypothesis of the universe, where Pausanias affirms he learned the transmigration as well as the immortality of the soul; here also he found the books of Moses, and studied under Sechnuphis the learned Jew of Heliopolis. Thus saith ancient History, the evidence of which we have whereon to ground our assertions. St. Austin believed that Plato held a conference with Jeremiah, and unsatisfied in his researches, he travelled into Persia, to consult the Magi concerning their religion, and was progressing into the Indies to have obtained the learning of the Brachmans; but the Asiatic wars endangered and forbid his enterprize. He then returned to Athens and applied himself to teach philosophy, which at that time, was a profession the most honorable; set up his academy, but contracting a Tertian or Quartan Ague, relinquished his sedentary and secluse situation for further travels, and foreign voyages. He went to Sicily to see the fiery ebulitions of mount Etna, and visited Dionysius the tyrant of Syracuse, and instead of playing the courtier and flattering him, he, like a stern philosopher, faithfully reproved him for the disorder, tyranny and injustice of his court. The tyrant enraged at the disagreeable truths, would have put him to death, had not Dion and Aristomenes formerly his pupils, and now favorites at court, most powerfully interceded for the venerable philosopher.

Dionysius was persuaded only to save his life, and delivered him over to the Lacedemonian envoy, whose nation was at war with the Athenians, and this en-. voy touching at Ægina, sold him for a slave to a merchant of Cyrene, who politely sent him safely to Athens. Plato soon after made another voyage to Sicily, in the reign of Dionysius the younger, who sent Dion his minister and favorite to invite him to court, and condescended to request that he might learn from this great philosopher the art of governing well. Plato accepted the invitation and went, but the intimacy with Plato and Dion, soon roused a jea

lousy in that tyrant's breast, who sent Plato to Athens and disgraced Dion. The latter being, after a lapse of time re-admitted to favor, persuaded the prince to send again for Plato, who received him with all the marks of friendship and good will in his power. Plato's complaints however, soon- exasperated Dio-' nysius, who again in turn, resolved to put him to death, had not Archytas the favorite at court, who had great interest with the tyrant, interceded for the philosopher, for the sake of Dion, and obtained leave for him to retire. To Athens he returned, where he was received with all the warmth of friendship the Athenians could possibly exhibit.

Cicero informs that this extraordinary man, having survived eighty-one years, at an entertainment where he was writing, died an easy and tranquil death. His mind, his life and death, were philosophic.

His writings have descended to this age, and will reach eternity.

PIZARRO, (FRANCIS) was to the Spanish crown, what Columbus, or Vespatius Americanus was to the English; a discoverer, conqueror and planter of new countries.

Pizarro was furnished by the court of Spain, with a fleet and army, of which he was General and commander in Chief, while Don Diego Almagro, was Admiral of the fleet. If comparisons would bear in this work, we might easily raise them, but a delineation of facts obtained from authentic history, is alone our task. In 1740, their armament sailed for, and arrived at Peru in South America, where history charges them with horrid cruelties, and more than savage barbarities, to the natives and inhabitants of those southern climes. So sanguinary, avaricious, jealous and ambitious were they, that not content with extirpating by blood and slaughter, the innocent natives, and indulging their most ambitious and avari

cious designs in accumulating the wealth of Peru, they grew jealous of each other, and we are told that the Admiral revolted, and was pursued and conquered by the General, and immediately beheaded, for which, the friends of Almagro, never rested till they accomplished the assassination of Pizarro.

PLINIUS CÆCILIUS, (CAIUS) Nephew of Caius Plinius II. was born in the ninth year of Nero, and the sixty-second year of the christian æra; Cælius the name of his father, and Plinius Secundus of his uncle who adopted him. This youth brought into the world with him brilliant parts, and an elegant taste; other Biographers say he frequented the schools of the Rhetoricians, Virginius his tutor and guardian. He was only eighteen years old when his uncle died. On his return from Misenum, he began pleading in the forum, which was the usual road to dignities. In his nineteenth year he assumed the military character and went to Syria, with the commission of Tribune: after a campaign or two he returned, married, and settled at Rome. Domitian being emperor, he again resumed his profession of pleading in the forum, at which he was distinguished not only for his eloquence and argument, not only for his uncommon abilities and Rhetoric, but also for his boldness and courage, which enabled him to press forward with resolution and undauntedness, at a time so critical that others durst scarce speak at all. On these accounts he was singled out by the Senate, to impeach the governors for plundering the Provinces, and to manage other causes of singular importance and danger.

He was decorated by the offices of Questor and Tribune, and luckily went through the reign of Domitian. Though the sudden death of the tyrant effected Plinius's deliverance for his name was enrolled on the tablets of D. as one devoted to destruction;

he would otherwise doubtless have suffered the fate of many great and distinguished men.

He lost his wife in the beginning of Nerva's reign, and the charming and beloved Calphurnia became his second, of whom we read so much in his Epistles; had no children by either; was promoted by Trajan in 100, to a Consulate, and pronounced that famous panegyric, which succeeding generations have so universally admired, as well for the copiousness of the topics, as for the peculiar elegance of its address. He was also elected Augur, and created pro-Consul of Bithinia, whither he went and returned, but little is registered of him in the rolls of antiquity, after that period. We cannot learn whether he lived at Rome or his country houses, nor can we learn the time of his death; but it is conjectured that he died about the time that his much admired Emperor Trajan did, and although one of the shrudest wits of antiquity and one of the worthiest of men, who wrote and published a great number of things, yet none have escaped the ravages of time, except his book of Letters, and the Panegyric upon his beloved Trajan.

PLOTINUS, was an illustrious philosopher, born in Egypt in the city of Lycopolis, in 204. Early discovering a thirst after knowledge, he was introduced to the professors of Alexandria. Disliking their lectures, he was shewn to Ammonius, whose first lecture struck him powerfully, as the man he sought. He spent eleven years with that eminent and great philosopher; but his acquirements served only to increase his zeal for more extensive ones. He heard the Persian and Indian lecturers on philosophy, he followed the Emperor in his wars into Persia, and just alone saved bis life by flight, after Gordianus was slain. At the age of forty he settled down at Rome, and read lectures in that city. Ten years