ABSTRACT
Leaving aside the works of rhetoricians, scholars, compilers,
grammarians, etc., and the technical treatises, such as those of Galen on medicine and Ptolemy on geography, there remain in the second century great or fair names, those of the moralists: Dio Chrysostom, Plutarch, Epictetus, Lucian(c. 125-c. 192), the latter unrivalled. This Semite, a Syrian of Samosata, who wrote in Greek, by his satirical, witty and fanciful turn of mind, almost passes beyond the limits of Antiquity; his mind shows kinship with many a modern French author, with Voltaire for example. Lucian seems to be the creator of the satirical dialogue, of the pamphlet and of the tale of phantasy.
