I propose to review briefly the main grounds of attack on the Classics, and the defence and vindication that can be put forward; to suggest that it is Latin which is open to the attacks, and Greek which holds the key to the defence.…

Towards the end of the winter 1939–40 I was asked by a nephew, who is the Mayor of a Midland town and had to request his Council to confer the freedom of the borough on some notable, whether there was not in Demosthenes an appropriate compliment for him to quote, expressing the high qualities of the candidate for the honour. I guessed that my nephew had a vague recollection from his school-days of the De Corona, and I found what I thought was in his mind in § 84—the spurious decree granting a crown to Demosthenes because he had always been friendly to the city, and had always said and done all the good in his power on its behalf. My nephew was pleased and used the quotation in his speech. I was then moved to explore the De Corona for myself, and very soon was startled by remarkable parallels to events in Europe in 1940; and the idea of this paper came to me. In the presence of experts, may I ask indulgence for my ignorance? My knowledge of Greek history, especially of this period, is but the sediment of what was never more than a very small cupful.

This passage has suggested that it might be interesting to collect, as far as possible, the passages dealing with the use of dogs in ancient warfare and make a comparison with modern practice. The references which I have discovered, and which seem mainly to refer to Greek warfare, are numerous, but no doubt there are others which I have failed to trace.

‘Omnes vero se Britanni vitro inficiunt, quod caeruleum efficit colorem, atque hoc horribiliores sunt in pugna aspectu.’ Every schoolboy is familiar with the passage, and the general accuracy of the statement is everywhere accepted; although the hypercritical might question the omnes. For Caesar cannot be speaking from his own knowledge, since his acquaintance with the British was limited; and the use of woad being a peculiarly British institution—I know of no evidence of its use on the Continent—it would not be surprising if some at least of the tribes in the south of Britain, who had been established there for not more than two or three generations, were slow to adopt what must have seemed to them a very barbarous habit.

Aristotle's theory of poetry is based upon two main propositions: the first, that poetry is imitation (μίμησις), and the second, that it aims at universality. The first of these propositions has seemed so shocking to modern aestheticians that they have endeavoured to modify it by translating μίμησις as ‘representation’, or, like Mr. Carritt, suggesting that what Aristotle was trying to say was that poetry is expression, as in Croce's theory of art as the expression of feeling. Yet Aristotle himself makes it quite clear that he did mean imitation by μίμησις, for in explanation he speaks of ‘making likenesses’ (ἀπεικάʒοντες) of objects. He also describes how painters and poets make likenesses which are better or worse than, or exactly like the real people, and discusses the enjoyment which we derive from looking at likenesses (εἰκόνας) even of things which are most unpleasant in real life. This shows that Aristotle was not thinking of ‘expression’ in the modern aesthetic sense.

I don't quite know why I have decided to set down the story of my life on tablets. It is very doubtful whether anyone will be interested in it but myself. But that is, perhaps, the reason; it has seemed interesting to me, as I have lived it, and, now that it is near its end, I have the wish to unroll it again and judge whether it really has been what it has seemed. It has been a hard climb over steep, rough rocks; my hands are sore, but not as dirty as they might have been. But the time is short now. Since my master Pallas died, I have lost my chief motive for living. Whether I hold my post here in Rome or fly, in quest of safety, to my native Antioch, there will not be much to add to the tale. I do not grumble. I have known the upward, as well as the downward turn of Fortune's wheel.