85

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influence; but there is nothing there like
Pythagorean doctrine, unless it be the Cabbala.
On the whole it is quite incredible that
Pythagoras was for any long time in Babylon.
The assertion of Eusebius that Pythagoras was influenced by
the Chaldean wise men can therefore be an inference from his supposed long residence in Babylon.
So here again our conjecture is confirmed.

Pythgoras, then, was carried to Ecbatana;
and there, of course, he was a slave. Upon that
there can be no shadow of doubt. Let us ask, then,
would slavery suit the disposition of Pythagoras? The answer is
that everything we are told of him shows him
to have been an excessively dominating
spirit. One might as well imagine Napoleon
Bonaparte a slave. It is certain,
then, that he would seek to escape, and that
by the most feasible route. What, then,