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CHAPTER III.
Ethical aspect of Græco-Roman Society in the period of Plutarch: difficulty of obtaining an impartial view of it—Revival of moral earnestness concurrent with the establishment of the Empire: the reforms of Augustus a formal expression of actual tendencies—Evidences of this in philosophical and general literature—The differences between various Schools modified by the importance of the ethical end to which all their efforts were directed—Endeavour made to base morality on sanctions already consecrated by the philosophies and religious traditions of the Past—Plutarch's "Ethics" the result of such an endeavour.
Few ages have left to posterity a character less easy to define, or more subjected to the ravages of mutually destructive schools of criticism, than that which gave the Religion of Christ to the Western world, and witnessed the moulding of Pagan Religion and Philosophy—or rather of Pagan religions and philosophies—into that systematized shape which they afterwards presented against the progress of Christianity. Many ancient and some modern apologists of Christianity have appeared to think it essential to the honour and glory of their Creed that the world, before its rise, should be regarded as sunk in iniquity to such a depth that nothing but a Divine Revelation could serve to
