Oscar Wilde: Complete Works of Oscar Wilde

1Despot of aristocratic origin.

2Polybius, vi. 9.

3Lasting possession.

4Prize of the immediate present.

1Base superstitious fears and that interest in the marvellous which is characteristic in women (Polybius, xii. 24).

1Polybius, I. 4, viii. 4, specially; and really passim

2He makes one exception.

3Polybius, viii. 4.

4Chance.

1Polybius, xvi. 12.

2Polybius, viii. 4.

3The unique nature of their form of government.

4Polybius resembled Gibbon in many respects. Like him he held that all religions were to the philosopher equally false, to the vulgar equally true, to the statesman equally useful.

1Cf. Polybius, xii. 25.

2The why, and how and wherefore.

3A discourse.

4A significant piece of learning.

1Polybius, xxii. 22.

2Not about trivial issues but arising from trivial causes.

3Cause.

4Origin.

5Pretext.

1I mean particularly as regards his sweeping denunciation of the complete moral decadence of Greek society during the Peloponnesian War which, from what remains to us of Athenian literature, we know must have been completely exaggerated. Or, rather, he is looking at men merely in their political dealings: and in politics the man who is personally honourable and refined will not scruple to do anything for his party.

2Uniformity of structure.

1Example.

1The bard and the hero.

1The divided road.

1Middle way.

1Aldo Menuzio, a Roman and a lover of Greece.