times and seasons. Arcesilaus shall also cancel the agreement made by Strato with Olympichus and Ameinias and deposited with Philocrates the son of Tisamenus. With regard to my monument they shall make it as Arcesilaus, Olympichus and Lyco shall approve."
Such are the terms of his extant will, according to the Collection of Ariston of Ceos. Strato himself, however, was, as stated above, a man entitled to a)/cios. This phrase might be taken as Diogenes Laertius's defence for his inclusion of the Life of Strato. According to the scheme of i. 14, 15, the Peripatetics ended with Theophrastus, whose successors were often held to be vastly inferior, and unworthy to rank beside him; see Cicero, De Fin. v. §§ 12, 13; Strabo xiii. 609. The latter alleges as the reason for this decline the well-known story that the school was deprived of Aristotle's library, which had been carried away to Scepsis. since he excelled in every branch of learning, and most of all in that which is styled "physics," a branch of philosophy more ancient and important than the others.
Strato's successor was Lyco, the son of Astyanax of Troas, a master of expression and of the foremost rank in the education of boys. For he used to say that modesty and love of honour were as necessary an equipment for boys as spur and bridle for horses.
His eloquence and sonorousness of diction appear from the following fact; he speaks of a penniless maiden as follows: "A grievous burden to a father is a girl, when for lack of a dowry she runs past the flower of her age." Hence the remark which Antigonus is said to have made about him, that it was not possible to transfer elsewhere the fragrance and charm of the apple, but each separate expression must be contemplated in the speaker himself as every single apple is on the tree.
This was because Lyco's voice was exceedingly sweet, so that some persons altered his name to Glyco, by prefixing a G. But in writing he fell off sadly. For instance, those who regretted their neglect to learn when they had the opportunity and wished they had done so he would hit off neatly as follows, remarking that "they were their own accusers, betraying, by vain regret, repentance for an incorrigible laziness."
Those who deliberated wrongly he used to say were out in their calculations, as if they had used a crooked rule to test something straight, or looked at the reflection of a face in troubled water or a distorting mirror. Again, "Many go in search of the garland of the market-place; few or none seek the crown at Olympia." He often gave the Athenians advice on various subjects and thus conferred on them the greatest benefits.
In his dress he was most immaculate, so that the clothes he wore were unsurpassed for the softness of the material, according to Hermippus. Furthermore, he was well practised in gymnastics and kept himself in condition, displaying all an athlete's habit of body, with battered ears and skin begrimed with oil, so we are told by Antigonus of Carystus. Hence it is said that he not only wrestled but played the game of ball common in his birthplace of Ilium. He was esteemed beyond all other philosophers by Eumenes and Attalus, who also did him very great service. Antiochus too tried to get hold of him, but without success.
He was so hostile to Hieronymus the Peripatetic that he alone declined to meet him on the anniversary which we have mentioned in the Life of Arcesilaus. iv. 41.
He presided over the school forty-four years after Strato had bequeathed it to him by his will in the 127th Olympiad. 274-270 b.c. Not but what he also attended the lectures of the logician Panthoides. He died at the age of seventy-four after severe sufferings from gout. This is my epitaph upon him Anth.
Pal. vii. 112.: Nor, I swear! will I pass over Lyco either, for all that he died of the gout. But this it is which amazes me the most, if he who formerly could walk only with the feet of others, did in a single night traverse the long, long road to Hades.
Other men have borne the name of Lyco: (1) a Pythagorean, (2) our present subject, (3) an epic poet, (4) a poet who wrote epigrams.
I have also come across this philosopher's will.
It is this: "These are my dispositions concerning my property, in case I should be unable to sustain my present ailment. All the goods in my house I give to my brothers Astyanax and Lyco, and from this source should, I think, be paid all the money I have laid out at Athens, whether by borrowing or by purchase, as well as all the cost of my funeral and the other customary charges.
But my property in town and at Aegina I give to Lyco because he bears the same name with me, and has resided for a long time with me to my entire satisfaction, as became one whom I treated as my son. I leave the Peripatus to such of my friends as choose to make use of it, to Bulo, Callinus, Ariston, Amphion, Lyco, Pytho, Aristomachus, Heracleus, Lycomedes, and my nephew Lyco. They shall put over it any such person as in their opinion will persevere in the work of the school and will be most capable of extending it.
And all my other friends should co-operate for love of me and of the spot. Bulo and Callinus, together with their colleagues, shall provide for my funeral and cremation, so as to avoid meanness on the one hand and extravagance on the other.
After my decease Lyco shall make over, for the use of the young men, the oil from the olive-trees belonging to me in Aegina for the due commemoration--so long as they use it--of myself and the benefactor who did me honour. He shall also set up my statue, and shall choose a convenient site where it shall be erected, with the assistance of Diophantus and Heraclides the son of Demetrius. From my property in town Lyco shall repay all from whom I have borrowed anything after his departure. Bulo and Callinus shall provide the sums expended upon my funeral and other customary charges. These sums they shall recover from the moneys in the house bequeathed by me to them both in common.
They shall also remunerate the physicians Pasithemis and Medias who for their attention to me and their skill deserve far higher reward. I bequeath to the child of Callinus a pair of Thericlean cups, and to his wife a pair of Rhodian vessels, a smooth carpet, a rug with nap on both sides, a sofa cover and two cushions the best that are left, that, so far as I have the means of recompensing them, I may prove not ungrateful.
With regard to the servants who have waited upon me, my wishes are as follows. To Demetrius I remit the purchase-money for the freedom which he has long enjoyed, and bequeath to him five minas and a suit of clothes to ensure him a decent maintenance, in return for all the toil he has borne with me.
To Crito of Chalcedon I also remit the purchasemoney for his freedom and bequeath to him four minas. And Micrus I emancipate; and Lyco shall keep him and educate him for the next six years.
And Chares I emancipate, and Lyco shall maintain him, and I bequeath him two minas and my published writings, while those which have not been given to the world I entrust to Callinus, that he may carefully edit them. To Syrus who has been set free I give four minas and Menodora, and I remit to him any debt he owes me. And to Hilara I give five minas and a double-napped rug, two cushions, a sofa-cover and a bed, whichever she prefers. I also set free the mother of Micrus as well as Noëmon, Dion, Theon, Euphranor and Hermias. Agathon should be set free after two years, and the litter-bearers Ophelio and Posidonius after four years' further service.
To Demetrius, to Crito and to Syrus I give a bed apiece and such bed-furniture out of my estate as Lyco shall think proper. These shall be given them for properly performing their appointed tasks. As regards my burial, let Lyco bury me here if he chooses, or if he prefers to bury me at home let him do so, for I am persuaded that his regard for propriety is not less than my own. When he has managed all these things, he can dispose of the property there, and such disposition shall be binding. Witnesses are Callinus of Hermione, Ariston of Ceos, Euphronius of Paeania."
Thus while his shrewdness is seen in all his actions, in his teaching and in all his studies, in some ways his will is no less remarkable for carefulness and wise management, so that in this respect also he is to be admired Chapter 5. DEMETRIUS (perhaps 350-280 B.C.; supreme in Athens 318-307 B.C.)
Demetrius, the son of Phanostratus, was a native of Phalerum. He was a pupil of Theophrastus, but by his speeches in the Athenian assembly he held the chief power in the State for ten years and was decreed 360 bronze statues, most of them representing him either on horseback or else driving a chariot or a pair of horses. And these statues were completed in less than 300 days, so much was he esteemed. He entered politics, says Demetrius of Magnesia in his work on Men of the Same Name, when Harpalus, fleeing from Alexander, 324 b.c.
came to Athens. As a statesman he rendered his country many splendid services. For he enriched the city with revenues and buildings, though he was not of noble birth. For he was one of Conon's household servants, The first sentence is paralleled by Aelian, Var. Hist.
xii. 43 gene/sqai le/gousin reference to the family of Conon has had the effect of separating two clauses which ought to be closely joined: kai/per ou)k eu)genh\s w)/n (the last words of § 75) and Suidas emphasizes the beauty of Demetrius.
In a modern book the statement that, according to Favorinus, Demetrius was in Conon's family would find a more suitable place in a footnote. according to Favorinus in the first book of his Memorabilia; yet Lamia, with whom he lived, was a citizen of noble family, as Favorinus also states in his first book. Further, in his second book Favorinus alleges that he suffered violence from Cleon, while Didymus in his Table-talk relates how a certain courtesan nicknamed him Charito-Blepharos ("having the eyelids of the Graces"), and Lampito ("of shining eyes"). He is said to have lost his sight when in Alexandria and to have recovered it by the gift of Sarapis; whereupon he composed the paeans which are sung to this day.
For all his popularity with the Athenians he nevertheless suffered eclipse through all-devouring envy.
Having been indicted by some persons on a capital charge, he let judgement go by default; and, when his accusers could not get hold of his person, they disgorged their venom on the bronze of his statues. These they tore down from their pedestals; some were sold, some cast into the sea, and others were even, it is said, broken up to make bedroom-utensils.
Only one is preserved in the Acropolis. In his Miscellaneous History Favorinus tells us that the Athenians did this at the bidding of King Demetrius.
And in the official list the year in which he was archon was styled "the year of lawlessness," according to this same Favorinus.
Hermippus tells us that upon the death of Casander, being in fear of Antigonus, he fled to Ptolemy Soter.
There he spent a considerable time and advised Ptolemy, among other things, to invest with sovereign power his children by Eurydice. To this Ptolemy would not agree, but bestowed the diadem on his son by Berenice, who, after Ptolemy's death, thought fit to detain Demetrius as a prisoner in the country until some decision should be taken concerning him. There he lived in great dejection, and somehow, in his sleep, received an asp-bite on the hand which proved fatal. He is buried in the district of Busiris near Diospolis.
Here are my lines upon him Anth.
Pal. vii. 113.: A venomous asp was the death of the wise Demetrius, an asp withal of sticky venom, darting, not light from its eyes, but black death.
Heraclides in his epitome of Sotion's Successions of Philosophers says that Ptolemy himself wished to transmit the kingdom to Philadelphus, but that Demetrius tried to dissuade him, saying, "If you give it to another, you will not have it yourself." At the time when he was being continually attacked in Athens, Menander, the Comic poet, as I have also learnt, was very nearly brought to trial for no other cause than that he was a friend of Demetrius. However, Telesphorus, the nephew of Demetrius, begged him off.
In the number of his works and their total length in lines he has surpassed almost all contemporary Peripatetics. For in learning and versatility he has no equal. Some of these works are historical and others political; there are some dealing with poets, others with rhetoric. Then there are public speeches and reports of embassies, besides collections of Aesop's fables and much else. He wrote: Of Legislation at Athens, five books.
Of the Constitutions of Athens, two books.
Of Statesmanship, two books.
On Politics, two books.
Of Laws, one book.
On Rhetoric, two books.
On Military Matters, two books.
On the Iliad, two books.
On the Odyssey, four books.
And the following works, each in one book: Ptolemy.
Concerning Love.
Phaedondas.
Maedon.
Cleon.
Socrates.
Artaxerxes.
Concerning Homer.
Aristides.
Aristomachus.
An Exhortation to Philosophy.
Of the Constitution.
On the ten years of his own Supremacy.
Of the Ionians.
Concerning Embassies.
Of Belief.
Of Favour.
Of Fortune.
Of Magnanimity.
Of Marriage.
Of the Beam in the Sky. "Of the Beam in the Sky." Some render this "Of Opinion," but the word used in this sense is do/khsis: cf.
Schäf.
Schol. Par. Ap. Rh. ii. 1088.
Of Peace.
On Laws.
On Customs.
Of Opportunity.
Dionysius.
Concerning Chalcis.
A Denunciation of the Athenians.
On Antiphanes.
Historical Introduction.
Letters.
A Sworn Assembly.
Of Old Age.
Rights.
Aesop's Fables.
Anecdotes.
His style is philosophical, with an admixture of rhetorical vigour and force. When he heard that the Athenians had destroyed his statues, "That they may do," said he, "but the merits which caused them to be erected they cannot destroy." He used to say that the eyebrows formed but a small part of the face, and yet they can darken the whole of life by the scorn they express. Again, he said that not only was Plutus blind, but his guide, Fortune, as well; that all that steel could achieve in war was won in politics by eloquence. On seeing a young dandy, "There," quoth he, "is a four-square Hermes for you, with trailing robe, belly, beard and all." Since Herms at Athens show neither drapery nor belly, but archaic hair, this saying would seem either to be incorrectly reported or to need a fresh interpretation. It has been suggested that a long lock pendent over the shoulder may lurk under su/rma me/nei ploka/mwn, and Ael.
Var. Hist. xii. 14 a)nasesu/rqai ), or that a Herm might sometimes have been made by cutting down a larger, draped, statue; or perhaps on festal days Herms were decked with robes. In Stobaeus, Flor. iv. 68, Philip is credited with a sneer to the same effect on Athenians at large. When men are haughty and arrogant, he declared we should cut down their tall stature and leave them their spirit unimpaired. Children should honour their parents at home, out-of-doors everyone they meet, and in solitude themselves.
In prosperity friends do not leave you unless desired, whereas in adversity they stay away of their own accord. All these sayings seem to be set down to his credit.
There have been twenty noteworthy men called Demetrius: (1) a rhetorician of Chalcedon, older than Thrasymachus; (2) the subject of this notice; (3) a Peripatetic of Byzantium; (4) one called the graphic writer, clear in narrative; he was also a painter; (5) a native of Aspendus, a pupil of Apollonius of Soli; (6) a native of Callatis, who wrote a geography of Asia and Europe in twenty books; (7) a Byzantine, who wrote a history of the migration of the Gauls from Europe into Asia in thirteen books, and another work in eight books dealing with Antiochus and Ptolemy and their settlement of Libya; (8) the sophist who lived at Alexandria, author of handbooks of rhetoric; (9) a grammarian of Adramyttium, surnamed Ixion because he was thought to be unjust to Hera; (10) a grammarian of Cyrene, surnamed Wine-jar, an eminent man; (11) a native of Scepsis, a man of wealth and good birth, ardently devoted to learning; he was also the means of bringing his countryman Metrodorus into prominence; (12) a grammarian of Erythrae enrolled as a citizen of Mnos; (13) a Bithynian, son of Diphilus the Stoic and pupil of Panaetius of Rhodes; (14) a rhetorician of Smyrna. The foregoing were prose authors. Of poets bearing this name the first belonged to the Old Comedy; the second was an epic poet whose lines to the envious alone survive: While he lives they scorn the man whom they regret when he is gone; yet, some day, for the honour of his tomb and lifeless image, contention seizes cities and the people set up strife; the third of Tarsus, writer of satires; the fourth, a writer of lampoons, in a bitter style; the fifth, a sculptor mentioned by Polemo; the sixth, of Erythrae, a versatile man, who also wrote historical and rhetorical works.
Chapter 6. HERACLIDES (floruit 360 B.C.)
Heraclides, son of Euthyphro, born at Heraclea in the Pontus, was a wealthy man. At Athens he first attached himself to Speusippus. He also attended the lectures of the Pythagoreans and admired the writings of Plato. Last of all he became a pupil of Aristotle, as Sotion says in his Successions of Philosophers. That Heraclides was a member of the Academy is established beyond all doubt by the fact that he was a candidate for the headship of the School on the death of Speusippus: Index Acad. p. 38 Mekler. However, not only does Diogenes Laertius make him, on Sotion's authority, a pupil of Aristotle, but Aëtius also seems, iii. 2. 5, to associate him with the Peripatetics ( kaqa/per a)me/lei pa/ntes oi( *peripathtikoi/ ). He wore fine soft clothes, and he was extremely corpulent, which made the Athenians call him Pompicus rather than Ponticus. He was mild and dignified of aspect. Works by him survive of great beauty and excellence. There are ethical dialogues: Of Justice, three books.
Of Temperance, one book.
Of Piety, five books.
Of Courage, one book.
Of Virtue in general, one book.
A second with the same title.
Of Happiness, one book.
Of Government, one book.
On Laws, one book, and on subjects kindred to these.
Of Names, one book.
Agreements, one book.
On the Involuntary, one book.
Concerning Love, and Clinias, one book.
Others are physical treatises: Of Reason.
Of the Soul, and a separate treatise with the same title.
Of Nature.
Of Images.
Against Democritus.
Of Celestial Phenomena, one book Of Things in the Under-world.
On Various Ways of Life, two books.
The Causes of Diseases, one book.
Of the Good, one book.
Against Zeno's Doctrines, one book.
A Reply to Metron's Doctrines, one book.
To grammar and criticism belong: Of the Age of Homer and Hesiod, two books Of Archilochus and Homer, two books.
Of a literary nature are: A work on passages in Euripides and Sophocles, three books.
On Music, two books.
Solutions of Homeric Problems, two books.
Of Theorems, one book.
On the Three Tragic Poets, one book.
Characters, one book.
Of Poetry and Poets, one book.
Of Conjecture, one book.
Concerning Prevision, one book.
Expositions of Heraclitus, four books.
Expositions in Reply to Democritus, one book.
Solutions of Eristic Problems, two books.
Logical Proposition, one book.
Of Species, one book.
Solutions, one book.
Admonitions, one book.
A Reply to Dionysius, one book.
To rhetoric belongs: Of Public Speaking, or Protagoras.
To history: On the Pythagoreans.
Of Discoveries.
Some of these works are in the style of comedy, for instance the tracts On Pleasure and On Temperance; others in the style of tragedy, as the books entitled Of those in Hades, Of Piety, and Of Authority.
Again, he has a sort of intermediate style of conversation which he employs when philosophers, generals and statesmen converse with each other.
Furthermore, he wrote geometrical and dialectical works, and is, besides, everywhere versatile and lofty in diction, and a great adept at charming the reader's mind.
It seems that he delivered his native city from oppressions by assassinating its ruler, as is stated in his work on Men of the Same Name by Demetrius of Magnesia, who also tells the following story about him: "As a boy, and when he grew up, he kept a pet snake, and, being at the point of death, he ordered a trusted attendant to conceal the corpse but to place the snake on his bier, that he might seem to have departed to the gods.
All this was done. But while the citizens were in the very midst of the procession and were loud in his praise, the snake, hearing the uproar, popped up out of the shroud, creating widespread confusion. Subsequently, however, all was revealed, and they saw Heraclides, not as he appeared, but as he really was."
I have written of him as follows Anth.
Pal. vii. 104.: You wished, Heraclides, to leave to all mankind a reputation that after death you lived as a snake. Or, reading a)/parti for a)/pasi, "wished to leave a report behind you that immediately after death you became a living snake." But you were deceived, you sophist, for the snake was really a brute beast, and you were detected as more of a beast than a sage.
Hippobotus too has this tale.
Hermippus relates that, when their territory was visited by famine, the people of Heraclea besought the Pythian priestess for relief, but Heraclides bribed the sacred envoys as well as the aforesaid priestess to reply that they would be rid of the calamity if Heraclides, the son of Euthyphro, were crowned with a crown of gold in his lifetime and after his death received heroic honours. The pretended oracle was brought home, but its forgers got nothing by it.
For directly Heraclides was crowned in the theatre, he was seized with apoplexy, whereupon the envoys to the oracle were stoned to death. Moreover, at the very same time the Pythian priestess, after she had gone down to the shrine and taken her seat, was bitten by one of the snakes and died instantly.
Such are the tales told about his death.
Aristoxenus the musician asserts that Heraclides also composed tragedies, inscribing upon them the name of Thespis. Chamaeleon complains that Heraclides' treatise on the works of Homer and Hesiod was plagiarized from his own. Furthermore, Autodorus the Epicurean criticizes him in a polemic against his tract Of Justice. Again, Dionysius the Renegade, or, as some people call him, the "Spark," when he wrote the Parthenopaeus, entitled it a play of Sophocles; and Heraclides, such was his credulity, in one of his own works drew upon this forged play as Sophoclean evidence.
Dionysius, on perceiving this, confessed what he had done; and, when the other denied the fact and would not believe him, called his attention to the acrostic which gave the name of Pancalus, of whom Dionysius was very fond.
Heraclides was still unconvinced. Such a thing, he said, might very well happen by chance. To this Dionysius, "You will also find these lines: a. An old monkey is not caught by a trap. We should say, "An old bird is not caught with chaff."
b. Oh yes, he's caught at last, but it takes time."
And this besides: "Heraclides is ignorant of letters and not ashamed of his ignorance." Von Arnim's emendation the story, viz. "And this besides: `Heraclides is ignorant of letters.' This made Heraclides blush."
Fourteen persons have borne the name of Heraclides: (1) the subject of this notice; (2) a fellowcitizen of his, author of Pyrrhic verses and tales; (3) a native of Cyme, who wrote of Persia in five books; (4) another native of Cyme, who wrote rhetorical textbooks; (5) of Callatis or Alexandria, author of the Succession of Philosophers in six books and a work entitled Lembeuticus, from which he got the surname of Lembus (a fast boat or scout); (6) an Alexandrian who wrote on the Persian national character; (7) a dialectician of Bargylis, who wrote against Epicurus; (8) a physician of the school of Hicesius; (9) another physician of Tarentum, an empiric; (10) a poet who was the author of admonitions; (11) a sculptor of Phocaea; (12) a Ligurian poet, author of epigrams; (13) Heraclides of Magnesia, who wrote a history of Mithradates; (14) the compiler of an Astronomy.
BOOK VI Chapter 1.
Antisthenes, Cf. Clem. Alex. Strom. i.
66. the son of Antisthenes, was an Athenian. It was said, however, that he was not of pure Attic blood. Hence his reply to one who taunted him with this: "The mother of the gods too is a Phrygian." Cf. Plutarch, De exilio, 607 a; Sen. De const.
sap. c. 18, 5. For his mother was supposed to have been a Thracian. Hence it was that, when he had distinguished himself in the battle of Tanagra, Probably the battle in 426 b.c. mentioned in Thuc. iii. 91. he gave Socrates occasion to remark that, if both his parents had been Athenians, he would not have turned out so brave. He himself showed his contempt for the airs which the Athenians gave themselves on the strength of being sprung from the soil by the remark that this did not make them any better born than snails or wingless locusts.
To begin with, he became a pupil of Gorgias the rhetorician, and hence the rhetorical style that he introduces in his dialogues, and especially in his Truth and in his Exhortations.
According to Hermippus he intended at the public gathering for the Isthmian games to discourse on the faults and merits of Athenians, Thebans and Lacedaemonians, but begged to be excused when he saw throngs arriving from those cities.
Later on, however, he came into touch with Socrates, and derived so much benefit from him that he used to advise his own disciples to become fellow-pupils with him of Socrates. He lived in the Peiraeus, and every day would tramp the five miles to Athens in order to hear Socrates. From Socrates he learned his hardihood, emulating his disregard of feeling, and thus he inaugurated the Cynic way of life. He demonstrated that pain is a good thing by instancing the great Heracles and Cyrus, drawing the one example from the Greek world and the other from the barbarians.
He was the first to define statement (or assertion) by saying that a statement is that which sets forth what a thing was or is. He used repeatedly to say, "I'd rather be mad than feel pleasure," and "We ought to make love to such women as will feel a proper gratitude." When a lad from Pontus was about to attend his lectures, and asked him what he required, the answer was, "Come with a new book, a new pen, and new tablets, if you have a mind to" (implying the need of brains as well). There is the same untranslateable pun upon kainou== "new" and kai\ nou= ="a mind too," as in ii. § 118. When someone inquired what sort of wife he ought to marry, he said, "If she's beautiful, you'll not have her to yourself; if she's ugly, you'll pay for it dearly." Being told that Plato was abusing him, he remarked, "It is a royal privilege to do good and be ill spoken (of Alexander).
When he was being initiated into the Orphic mysteries, the priest said that those admitted into these rites would be partakers of many good things in Hades. "Why then," said he, "don't you die?"
Being reproached because his parents were not both free-born, "Nor were they both wrestlers," quoth he, "but yet I am a wrestler." To the question why he had but few disciples he replied, "Because I use a silver rod to eject them." When he was asked why he was so bitter in reproving his pupils he replied, "Physicians are just the same with their patients." One day upon seeing an adulterer running for his life he exclaimed, "Poor wretch, what peril you might have escaped at the price of an obol." He used to say, as we learn from Hecato in his Anecdotes, that it is better to fall in with crows than with flatterers; for in the one case you are devoured when dead, in the other case while alive.
Being asked what was the height of human bliss, he replied, "To die happy." When a friend complained to him that he had lost his notes, "You should have inscribed them," said he, "on your mind instead of on paper."
As iron is eaten away by rust, so, said he, the envious are consumed by their own passion. Those who would fain be immortal must, he declared, live piously and justly. States, said he, are doomed when they are unable to distinguish good men from bad. Once, when he was applauded by rascals, he remarked, "I am horribly afraid I have done something wrong."
When brothers agree, no fortress is so strong as their common life, he said. The right outfit for a voyage, he said, is such as, even if you are shipwrecked, will go through the water with you. One day when he was censured for keeping company with evil men, the reply he made was, "Well, physicians are in attendance on their patients without getting the fever themselves." "It is strange," said he, "that we weed out the darnel from the corn and the unfit in war, but do not excuse evil men from the service of the state." When he was asked what advantage had accrued to him from philosophy, his answer was, "The ability to hold converse with myself." Some one having called upon him over the wine for a song, he replied, "Then you must accompany me on the pipe." When Diogenes begged a coat of him, he bade him fold his cloak around him double.
Being asked what learning is the most necessary, he replied, "How to get rid of having anything to unlearn." And he advised that when men are slandered, they should endure it more courageously than if they were pelted with stones.
And he used to taunt Plato with being conceited. At all events when in a procession he spied a spirited charger he said, turning to Plato, "It seems to me that you would have made just such a proud, showy steed." This because Plato was constantly praising horseflesh. And one day he visited Plato, who was ill, and seeing the basin into which Plato had vomited, remarked, "The bile I see, but not the pride."
He used to recommend the Athenians to vote that asses are horses. Cf. Plato, Phaedrus 260 c. When they deemed this absurd, his reply was, "But yet generals are found among you who had had no training, but were merely elected." "Many men praise you," said one. "Why, what wrong have I done?" was his rejoinder. When he turned the torn part of his cloak so that it came into view, Socrates no sooner saw this than he said, "I spy your love of fame peeping through your cloak." Cf.
Aelian, Var. Hist. ix. 35. Phanias in his work on the Socratics tells us how some one asked him what he must do to be good and noble, and he replied, "You must learn from those who know that the faults you have are to be avoided." When some one extolled luxury his reply was, "May the sons of your enemies live in luxury."
To the youth who was posing fantastically as an artist's model he put this question, "Tell me, if the bronze could speak, on what, think you, would it pride itself most?" "On its beauty," was the reply. "Then," said he, "are you not ashamed of delighting in the very same quality as an inanimate object?" When a young man from Pontus promised to treat him with great consideration as soon as his boat with its freight of salt fish should arrive, he took him and an empty wallet to a flour-dealer's, got it filled, and was going away. When the woman asked for the money, "The young man will pay," said he, "when his boatload of salt fish arrives."
Antisthenes is held responsible for the exile of Anytus and the execution of Meletus.
For he fell in with some youths from Pontus whom the fame of Socrates had brought to Athens, and he led them off to Anytus, whom he ironically declared to be wiser than Socrates; whereupon (it is said) those about him with much indignation drove Anytus out of the city. If he saw a woman anywhere decked out with ornaments, he would hasten to her house and bid her husband bring out his horse and arms, and then, if the man possessed them, let his extravagance alone, for (he said) the man could with these defend himself; but, if he had none, he would bid him strip off the finery.
Favourite themes Here follow three extracts of Cynic maxims or rules of conduct; for, strictly speaking, they had no The last ( § 13) seems to be derived from Diocles. with him were the following. He would prove that virtue can be taught; that nobility belongs to none other than the virtuous.
And he held virtue to be sufficient in itself to ensure happiness, since it needed nothing else except the strength of a Socrates. And he maintained that virtue is an affair of deeds and does not need a store of words or learning; that the wise man is selfsufficing, for all the goods of others are his; that ill repute is a good thing and much the same as pain; that the wise man will be guided in his public acts not by the established laws but by the law of virtue; that he will also marry in order to have children from union with the handsomest women; furthermore that he will not disdain to love, for only the wise man knows who are worthy to be loved.
Diocles records the following sayings of his: To the wise man nothing is foreign or impracticable. A good man deserves to be loved. Men of worth are friends. Make allies of men who are at once brave and just. Virtue is a weapon that cannot be taken away.
It is better to be with a handful of good men fighting against all the bad, than with hosts of bad men against a handful of good men.
Pay attention to your enemies, for they are the first to discover your mistakes. Esteem an honest man above a kinsman. Virtue is the same for women as for men. Good actions are fair and evil actions foul. Count all wickedness foreign and alien.
Wisdom is a