year of the
reign. Cassius left his son Moecianus in Alexandria with the title of
Pretorian Prefect, while he himself marched into Syria to secure that
province. There the legions followed the example of their brethren in
Egypt, and the Syrians were glad to acknowledge a general of the Eastern
armies as their sovereign. But on Marcus leading an army into Syria he
was met with the news that the rebels had repented, and had put Cassius
to death, and he then moved his forces towards Egypt; but before his
arrival the Egyptian legions had in the same manner put Moecianus to
death, and all had returned to their allegiance.

When Marcus arrived in Alexandria the citizens were agreeably surprised
by the mildness of his conduct. He at once forgave his enemies; and
no offenders were put to death for having joined in the rebellion. The
severest punishment, even to the children of Cassius, was banishment
from the province, but without restraint, and with the forfeiture of
less than half their patrimony. In Alexandria the emperor laid aside the
severity of the soldier, and mingled with the people as a fellow-citizen
in the temples and public places; while with the professors in the
museum he was a philosopher, joining them in their studies in the
schools.

Borne and Athens at this time alike looked upon Alexandria as the centre
of the world's learning. The library was then in its greatest glory;
the readers were numerous, and Christianity had as yet raised no doubts
about the value of its pagan treasures. All the wisdom of Greece,
written on rolls of brittle papyrus or tough parchment, was ranged in
boxes on the shelves. Of these writings the few that have been saved
from the wreck of time are no doubt some of the best, and they are
perhaps enough to guide our less simple taste towards the unornamented
grace of the Greek model. But we often fancy those treasures most
valuable that are beyond our reach, and hence when we run over the names
of the authors in this library we think perhaps too much of those which
are now missing. The student in the museum could have read the lyric
poems of Alcaeus and Stersichorus, which in matter and style were
excellent enough to be judged not quite so good as Homer; the tender
lamentations of Simonides; the warm breathings of Sappho, the tenth
muse; the pithy iambics of Archilochus, full of noble flights and
brave irregularities; the comedies of Menander, containing every kind
of excellence; those