which he contributed an astonishing number of works of his own, on
every conceivable branch of knowledge.

The after history of Aristotle's library, including the MSS. of his own
works, is interesting and even romantic. Aristotle's successor in the
school was Theophrastus, who added to the library bequeathed him by
Aristotle many works of his own, and others purchased by him.
Theophrastus bequeathed the entire library to Neleus, his friend and
pupil, who, on leaving Athens to reside at Scepsis in the Troad, took
the library with him. There it remained for nearly two hundred years
in possession of the Neleus family, who kept the collection hidden in a
cellar for fear it should be seized to increase the royal library of
Pergamus. In such a situation the works suffered much harm from worms
and damp, till at last (_circa_ 100 B.C.) they were brought out {176}
and sold to one Apellicon, a rich gentleman resident in Athens, himself
a member of the Peripatetic school. In 86 B.C. Sulla, the Roman
dictator, besieged and captured Athens, and among other prizes conveyed
the library of Apellicon to Rome, and thus many of the most important
works of Aristotle for the first time were made known to the Roman and
Alexandrian schools. It is a curious circumstance that the philosopher
whose influence was destined to be paramount for more than a thousand
years in the Christian era, was thus deprived by accident of his
legitimate importance in the centuries immediately following his own.

But his temporary and accidental eclipse was amply compensated in the
effect upon the civilised world which he subsequently exercised. So
all-embracing, so systematic, so absolutely complete did his philosophy
appear, that he seemed to after generations to have left nothing more
to discover. He at once attained a supremacy which lasted for some two
thousand years, not only over the Greek-speaking world, but over every
form of the civilisation of that long period, Greek, Roman, Syrian,
Arabic, from the Euphrates to the Atlantic, from Africa to Britain.
His authority was accepted equally by the learned doctors of Moorish
Cordova and the Fathers of the Church; to know Aristotle was to have
all {177} knowledge; not to know him was to be a boor; to deny him was
to be a heretic.

His style has nothing of the grace of Plato; he illuminates his works
with no myths or allegories; his manner is dry, sententious, familiar,
without the slightest attempt at