of Luxury: Persia, Greece and Rome The ancient world developed a high cultural standard. Luxury commodities became important. Persia was the country of highest refinement, producing perfumes and dances before the Milesians imported much of that culture: But the Milesians, above all the rest, discover'd the indulging Temper, surpassed them all in the Accuracy of their Pleasures, and shew'd the most singular Taste for Delicacies. They were the first who introduced the Art of Romancing among the Persians, when they had had such Success in it themselves, that the Milesian fables, the same with Romances, full of Love Adventures, and Licentious Relations, advanced into the Highest Reputation: 'Tis probable Romances were Innocent 'till they fell into their hands, and before recounted only singular and memorable Adventures. But these were the first who corrupted them [...] One does not have any material artefacts to prove this, yet the ancient historians help us here with their accounts. The Ionians influenced the Greeks. Alexander the Great did much to widen their cultural concepts. The Milesian Fables by Aristides of Miletus were finally translated into Latin. The book was criticized in Rome's Senate as hardly serving the purposes of a Rome involved in wars. Huet mentions names and develops a canon of texts and reaches Heliodorus who has to be compared with Jamblicus, the author of the Babylonics, which have only survived in fragments:Heliodorus excell'd him in the Desposition of his Subject, and indeed in every other Particular. Hitherto the World had not seen any thing better designed, and more compleat in Romance, than the Adventures of Theagenes and Chariclia: Nothing can be more chaste than their Loves. By this it appears, (beside the Honour of the Christian Reli|<50>gion which he professed) that he had in his own Nature such an Air of Virtue, as shines throughout the Work; in which not only Jambicus, but almost all the rest, are much his Inferiors. His Merit advanc'd him to the Dignity of an Episcopal See: He was Bishop of Tricca, a City of Thessaly. Socrates reports, that he introduced into that Diocese, the Custom of Deposing such of the Clergy, as did not abstain from the Women they had contracted before their Admission into Orders. This makes me very much suspect what Nicephorus, a credulous Writer, of little Judgement or Sincerity relates; That a Provincial Synod, understanding|<51> the Danger which the Reading this Romance (so