pictures so exactly resemble the persons represented, that the physiognomists were able to form a judgment as readily from his portraits, as if they had seen the originals. His readiness and dexterity at taking a likeness was of singular service in extricating him from a difficulty in which he was involved at the court of Egypt. He had not the good fortune to be in favour with Ptolemy, but a storm forced him to take shelter at Alexandria, during the reign of this prince; where a mischievous fellow went to him, and in the king's name invited him to dinner. Apelles went; and seeing the king in a violent passion, told him, by way of excuse, that he should not have come to his table but by his order. He was commanded to shew the man who had invited him; which was. impossible, the person who had put the trick upon him not being present : Apelles, however, drew a sketch of his image upon the wall with a coal, the first lines of which discovered him immediately to Ptolemy.

Apelles left many excellent pictures, which are mentioned with great honour by the ancients; but his Venus Anadyomene is reckoned his master-piece. His Antigonus has also been much celebrated this was drawn with a side-face, to hide the deformity of Antigonus, who had lost an eye. His picture of Calumny has also been much noticed, and is thus explained by Lucian: Antiphilus the painter, being piqued at the favour shown to Apelles at the court of Ptolemy, accused him of being an accomplice in the conspiracy of Theodotus, governor of Phoenicia : he affirmed that he had seen Apelles at dinner with Theodotus, and whispering to him all the time of his entertainment. Ptolemy was also informed by the same person, that by the advice of Apelles, the city of Tyre had revolted, and that of Pelusium was taken. Although it was certain that Apelles had never been at Tyre, and that he was not acquainted with Theodotus, Ptolemy was so enraged, that, without examining into the affair, he determined to put to death the person accused; and if one of the conspirators had not convinced him that this was a mere calumny of Antiphilus, Apelles must undoubtedly have suffered death upon this accusation. But as soon as Ptolemy knew the truth of this affair, he condemned Antiphilus to be a slave to Apelles, and gave the latter a hundred talents. Mr. Bayle remarks upon this account of Lucian, that he has fallen into a great anachronism; for

the conspiracy of Theodotus was in the reign of Ptolemy Philopater, which did not begin till an hundred years after the death of Alexander the Great; and for what he asserts, he quotes the authority of Polybius (lib. iv. and v.) "We must therefore," says he, "suppose one or other of these two things; either that Lucian speaks of an Apelles, different from him who was in such reputation at Alexandria; or that he has confounded some plot which was contrived under Ptolemy Philadelphus, with the conspiracy of Theodotus."

To this account of Apelles, taken principally from Bayle, it may be necessary to add the opinion of a very superior critic, who observes, that "The name of Apelles in Pliny is the synonime of unrivalled and unattainable excellence, but the enumeration of his works points out the modification which we ought to apply to that superiority: it neither comprises exclusive sublimity of invention, the most acute discrimination of character, the widest sphere of comprehension, the most judicious and best balanced composition, nor the deepest pathos of expression: his great prerogative consisted more in the unison than in the extent of his powers: he knew better what he could do, what ought to be done, at what point he could arrive, and what lay beyond his reach, than any other artist. Grace of conception and refinement of taste were his elements, and went hand in hand with grace of execution and taste in finish, powerful and seldom possessed singly, irresistible when united: that he built both on the firm basis of the former system, not on its subversion, his well-known contest of lines with Protogenes, not a legendary tale, but a well-attested fact, irrefragably proves; what those lines were, drawn with nearly miraculous subtlety in different colours, one upon the other, or rather within each other, it would be equally unavailing and useless to inquire; but the corollaries we may deduce from the contest, are obviously these: that the schools of Greece recognized all one elemental principle; that acuteness and fidelity of eye and obedience of hand form precision, precision proportion, proportion beauty that it is the little more or less' imperceptible to vulgar eyes, which constitutes grace, and establishes the superiority of one artist over another; that the knowledge of the degrees of things, or taste, presupposes a perfect knowledge of the things themselves: that colour, grace, and taste, are ornaments, not substitutes of form, expres

:

sion, and character, and when they usurp that title, degenerate into splendid faults. Such were the principles on which Apelles formed his Venus, or rather the personification of the birthday of love, the wonder of art, the despair of artists; whose outline baffled every attempt at emendation, whilst imitation shrunk from the purity, the force, the brilliancy, the evanescent gradations of her tints." 1

He

APELLES, an heretic of the second century, was a native of Syria; whence coming to Rome, he was corrupted in his doctrine by a woman, who was called Philumena, and pretended to prophetic illuminations. became a rigid disciple of Marcus, but, being excommunicated for his incontinence, he fled to Alexandria, where he broached a new heresy, which chiefly diffused itself through Egypt and Asia. Tertullian speaks thus: "The Holy Ghost foresaw an angel of seduction in a certain virgin named Philumena, transforming itself into an angel of light, by whose delusion Apelles should be taught a new heresy." By the oracular responses of this demoniac virgin, he learned to deny the veracity of the prophets, the resurrection of the body, to reject the law of Moses, and in many writings to blaspheme the divine oracle. Deceived by her diabolical possession, he wrote the revelations which he learned from her. The book was entitled "The Prophecies and Revelations of Philumena," but no part of his works is extant, and indeed much of his history is doubtful. Apelles lived to be very old, and in his latter days ap1 peared very grave and rigid. Du Fresnoy places this sect A. D. 175; Echard, A. D. 180; Danæus, 181. They were called Apellites, Apelleians, or Apellicians. "

2

APER (MARCUS), one of the finest orators of his time, was a Gaul by birth, and flourished in the first century. His inclination leading him to travelling, he extended his journey as far as Britain, but afterwards returned to Rome, where he fixed his residence, attended the bar, and acquired great reputation for wit and eloquence. Although considered at Rome as a foreigner, this circumstance did not prevent his rising to the highest offices, as he became senator, questor, tribune, and prætor; but none of these promotions had charms so attractive to him as his original

Gen. Dict.-Fuseli's Lectures.

Lardner's Hist, of Heretics.-Cave, vol. I,

profession. He is most celebrated for his "Dialogue on the corruption of eloquence," the object of which is to prefer the modern to the ancient eloquence. This dialogue is supposed to have been written in the 16th year of Vespasian, or the year 74 of our æra, and his death has been fixed at the year 83. The dialogue, however, has been attributed to Quintilian and to Tacitus, and is usually printed in their works, but modern critics are of opinion it was not written by either, and D. Rivet, from whom this article is taken, attributes it, in his literary history of France, to Aper, and advances such proofs as appear to have great weight. An excellent dissertation on it may be seen in Murphy's translation of Tacitus, vol. IV. p. 445. 1

1

APHTHONIUS, of Antioch, a celebrated rhetorician and sophist, who lived in the third century, wrote in Greek a treatise on rhetoric which has descended to us, and some other works. His rhetoric has been translated into Latin, The best edition was printed by the Elzivirs at Amsterdam, 1645, 12mo, under the title "Aphthonii Progymnasmata, partim à Rodolpho Agricola, partim à Joanne-Maria Catanæo latinitate donata, cum scholiis R. Lorichii."*

APICIUS. There were three ancient Romans of this name, all very illustrious; not for genius, for virtue, for great or good qualities, but for gluttony: or, if we may soften the term in complaisance to the growing taste of the times we write in, for the art of refining in the science of eating. The first lived under Sylla, the second under Augustus and Tiberius, and the third under Trajan, The second however is the most illustrious personage of the three, and is doubtless the same of whom Seneca, Pliny, Juvenal, Martial, &c. so much speak. Athenæus places him under Tiberius, and tells us, that he spent immense sums in gratifying his appetite, and invented divers sorts of cakes, which bore his name. We learn from Seneca, that he lived in his time, and kept as it were a school of gluttony at Rome; that he spent two millions and an half in entertainments; that, finding himself very much in debt, he was forced at length to look into the state of his affairs ; and that, seeing he had but 250,000 crowns remaining, he poisoned himself from an apprehension of being starved with such a sun. Dion relates the same story. Pliny

་་

1 Chaufepie.-Rivet's Hist. Litt. vol. I. p. 218-223.-Moreri. 2 Moreri-Suidas in Apth.-Saxii Onomast.

mentions very frequently the ragouts he invented, and calls him the completest glutton that ever appeared in the world: "nepotum omnium altissimus gurges." The third Apicius lived under Trajan: he had an admirable secret to preserve oysters, which he shewed by sending Trajan some as far as Parthia, very fresh when they arrived.

The name of Apicius was applied long after to several sorts of meat: it made also a sect among the cooks. There is extant a treatise," De re culinaria," under the name of Cælius Apicius, which is judged by the critics to be very ancient, though they do not suppose it to be written by any of the above three. A fair edition of it was given by Martin Lister, with the title of "De obsoniis et condimentis, sive de arte coquinaria," London, 1705, 8vo, and reprinted at Amsterdam in 1709, 12mo. Bernhold published a new edition at Lubeck, in 1791, 8vo. It was humourously ridiculed by Dr. King in his "Art of Cookery."1

APIAN, or APPIAN (PETER), called in German BIENEWITZ, a celebrated astronomer and mathematician, was born at Leisnig or Leipsic in Misnia, 1495, and made professor of mathematics at Ingolstadt in 1524, where he died in 1552, aged fifty-seven. He wrote treatises upon many of the mathematical sciences, and greatly improved them, especially astronomy and astrology, which in that age were much the same thing: also geometry, geography, arithmetic. He particularly enriched astronomy with many instruments, and observations of eclipses, comets, &c. His principal work was the "Astronomicum Cæsareum," published in folio at Ingolstadt in 1540, and which contains a number of interesting observations, with the descriptions and divisions of instruments. In this work he predicts eclipses, and constructs the figures of them in plano. In the second part of the work, or the "Meteoroscopium Planum," he gives the description of the most accurate astronomical quadrant, and its uses. To it aré added observations of five different comets, viz. in the years 1531, 1582, 1533, 1538, and 1539: where he first shows that the tails of a comet are always projected in a direction from the sun.

! Apian also wrote a treatise, entitled "Cosmographia," of which there have been many editions, from 1529, when Frisius published it in 4to, to 1575. In 1533 he made, at

"

1 Gen. Dict.-Fabric. Bibl. Lat.-Saxii Onomasticon,