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AUTOBULUS. Yet that is the very source, my dear Soclarus, from which they say insensibility spread among men and the sort of savagery that learned the taste of slaughter on its hunting trips Cf. Porphyry, De Abstinentia, iii. 20. and has grown accustomed to feel no repugnance for the wounds and gore of beasts, but. to take pleasure in their violent death. The next step is like what happened at AthensSee 998 b infra and cf. Müller, Hist. Graec. Frag. i. p. 269, Ephorus, frag. 125; it is not, however, accepted as from Ephorus by Jacoby (cf. Sallust, Catiline, li. 28-31). We must remember, during the following discussion, that zoology used to be the handmaid of ethics.: the first man put to death by the Thirty was a certain informer who was said to deserve it, and so was the second and the third; but after that they went on, step by step, until they were laving hands on honest men and eventually did not spare even the best of the citizens. Just so the first man Cf. 993 b infra. The Age of Cronus, when beasts were unharmed, is admirably described in Plato, Politicus, 270 c ff. to kill a bear or a wolf won praise; and perhaps some cow or pig was condemned as suitable to slay because it had tasted the sacred meal placed before it. That is, they put grain on the altar to make the animal volunteer, as it were, to die (Post); and the consent of the victim was secured by pouring water on it to make it shake its head. See Mor. 729 e and the article Opfer in RE, xviii. 612. So from that point, as they now went on to eat the flesh of deer and hare and antelope, men were introduced to the consumption of sheep and, in some places, of dogs and horses. The tame goose and the dove upon the hearth, as SophoclesNauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. p. 314, frag. 782; Pearson, vol. III, p. 68, frag. 866. says, were dismembered and carved for food - not that hunger compelled men as it does weasels and cats, but for pleasure and as an appetizer. Cf. 991 d, 993 b, 995 c infra. Or as meat to go with their bread; for fowl is not ordinarily an appetizer. Thus the bruteFrom this point to the end of chapter 5 (963 f) the greater part of the text is excerpted by Porphyry, De Abstinentia, iii. 20-24 (pp. 211-220, ed. Nauck). This indirect transmission, with its not infrequent changes, omissions, and variations, gives valuable evidence; but obvious errors on either side have not been mentioned here. and the natural lust to kill in man were fortified and rendered inflexible to pity, while gentleness was, for the most part, deadened. It was in this way, on the contrary, that the Pythagoreans, Cf. 964 f, 993 a infra, and Mor. 86 d, 729 e. The practice is correctly stated; the alleged motive is not. The taboo on meat stemmed from belief in the transmigration of souls (Andrews). to inculcate humanity and compassion, made a practice of kindness to animals; for habituation has a strange power to lead men onward by a gradual familiarization of the feelings.
