the happiest and most
virtuous of nations. They were soon astonished by the natural discovery,
that Persia resembled the other countries of the globe; that Chosroes,
who affected the name of a philosopher, was vain, cruel, and ambitious;
that bigotry, and a spirit of intolerance, prevailed among the Magi;
that the nobles were haughty, the courtiers servile, and the magistrates
unjust; that the guilty sometimes escaped, and that the innocent were
often oppressed. The disappointment of the philosophers provoked them
to overlook the real virtues of the Persians; and they were scandalized,
more deeply perhaps than became their profession, with the plurality
of wives and concubines, the incestuous marriages, and the custom of
exposing dead bodies to the dogs and vultures, instead of hiding them in
the earth, or consuming them with fire. Their repentance was expressed
by a precipitate return, and they loudly declared that they had rather
die on the borders of the empire, than enjoy the wealth and favor of
the Barbarian. From this journey, however, they derived a benefit which
reflects the purest lustre on the character of Chosroes. He required,
that the seven sages who had visited the court of Persia should be
exempted from the penal laws which Justinian enacted against his Pagan
subjects; and this privilege, expressly stipulated in a treaty of peace,
was guarded by the vigilance of a powerful mediator. Simplicius and his
companions ended their lives in peace and obscurity; and as they left no
disciples, they terminate the long list of Grecian philosophers, who may
be justly praised, notwithstanding their defects, as the wisest and most
virtuous of their contemporaries. The writings of Simplicius are now
extant. His physical and metaphysical commentaries on Aristotle have
passed away with the fashion of the times; but his moral interpretation
of Epictetus is preserved in the library of nations, as a classic book,
most excellently adapted to direct the will, to purify the heart, and
to confirm the understanding, by a just confidence in the nature both of
God and man.

About the same time that Pythagoras first invented the appellation of
philosopher, liberty and the consulship were founded at Rome by the
elder Brutus. The revolutions of the consular office, which may be
viewed in the successive lights of a substance, a shadow, and a name,
have been occasionally mentioned in the present History. The first
magistrates of the rep