No More Learning

LXXV. There was also another man of the name of Plato, a philosopher of Rhodes, a disciple of Panaetius, as Seleucus, the grammarian, says in the first book of his treatise on Philosophy; and another was a Peripatetic, a pupil of Aristotle; and there was a third, a pupil of Praxiphanes; and there was besides all these, the poet of the Old Comedy.

1. This figure was like a barbed arrow, according to Zevort.


























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF SPEUSIPPUS


I. THE long account which I have given of Plato was compiled to the best of my power, and in it I collected with great zeal and industry all that was reported of the man.

II. And he was succeeded by Speusippus, the son of Eurymedon, and a citizen of Athens, of the Myrrhinusian burgh, and he was the son of Plato's sister Potone.

III. He presided over his school for eight years, beginning to do so in the hundred and eighth olympiad. And he set up images of the Graces in the temple of the Muses, which had been built in the Academy by Plato.

IV. And he always adhered to the doctrines which had been adopted by Plato, though he was not of the same disposition as he. For he was a passionate man, and a slave to pleasure. Accordingly, they say that he once in a rage threw a puppy into a well; and that for the sake of amusement, he went all the way to Macedonia to the marriage of Cassander.

V. The female pupils of Plato, Lasthenea of Mantinea, and Axiothea of Phlius, are said to have become disciples of Speusippus also. And Dionysius, writing to him in a petulant manner, says, "And one may learn philosophy too from your female disciple from Arcadia; moreover, Plato used to take his pupils without exacting any fee from them; but you collect tribute from yours, whether willing or unwilling. "

VI. He was the first man, as Diodorus relates in the first book of his Commentaries, who investigated in his school what was common to the several sciences; and who endeavoured, as far as possible, to maintain their connection with each other. He was also the first who published those things which Isocrates called secrets, as Caeneus tells us. And the first too who found out how to make light baskets of bundles of twigs.

VII. But he became afflicted with paralysis, and sent to Xenocrates inviting him to come to him, and to become his successor in his school.

VIII. And they say that once, when he was being borne in a carriage into the Academy, he met Diogenes, and said, "Hail;" and Diogenes replied, "I will not say hail to you, who, though in such a state as you are, endure to live. "

IX. And at last in despair he put an end to his life, being a man of a great age. And we have written this epigram on him:

Had I not known Speusippus thus had died,
No one would have persuaded me that he
Was e'er akin to Plato; who would never
Have died desponding for so slight a grief.
But Plutarch, in his Life of Lysander, and again in his Life of Sylla, says that he was kept in a state of constant inflammation by lice. For he was of a weak habit of body, as Timotheus relates in his treatise on Lives.

X. Speusippus said to a rich man who was in love with an ugly woman, "What do you want with her? I will find you a much prettier woman for ten talents. "

XI. He left behind him a great number of commentaries, and many dialogues; among which was one on Aristippus; one on Riches; one on Pleasure; one on Justice; one on Philosophy; one on Friendship; one on the Gods; one called the Philosopher; one addressed to Cephalus; one called Cephalus; one called Clinomachus, or Lysias; one called the Citizen; one on the Soul; one addressed to Gryllus; one called Aristippus; one called the Test of Art. There were also Commentaries by way of dialogues; one on Art; and ten about those things which are alike in their treatment. There are also books of divisions and arguments directed to similar things; Essays on the Genera and Species of Examples; an Essay addressed to Amartynus; a Panegyric on Plato; Letters to Dion, and Dionysius, and Philip; an Essay on Legislation. There is also, the Mathematician; the Mandrobulus; the Lysias; Definitions; and a series of Commentaries. There are in all, forty-three thousand four hundred and seventy-five lines.

Simonides dedicated to him the Histories, in which he had related the actions of Dion and Bion. And in the second book of his Commentaries, Favorinus states that Aristotle purchased his books for three talents.

XII. There was also another person of the name of Speusippus, a physician of the school of Herophilus,1 a native of Alexandria.




1. Herophilus was one of the most celebrated physicians of antiquity, who founded the Medical School at Alexandria, in the time of the first Ptolemy.


























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF XENOCRATES


I. XENOCRATES was the son of Agathenor, and a native of Chalcedon. From his early youth he was a pupil of Plato, and also accompanied him in his voyages to Sicily.

II. He was by nature of a lazy disposition, so that they say that Plato said once, when comparing him to Aristotle,-- "The one requires the spur, and the other the bridle. " And on another occasion, he said, "What a horse and what an ass am I dressing opposite to one another! "

III. In other respects Xenocrates was always of a solemn and grave character, so that Plato was continually saying to him,--"Xenocrates, sacrifice to the Graces. " And he spent the greater part of his time in the Academy, and whenever he was about to go into the city, they say all the turbulent and quarrelsome rabble in the city used to make way for him to pass by. And once, Phryne the courtesan wished to try him and pretending that she was pursued by some people, she fled and took refuge in his house; and he admitted her indeed, because of what was due to humanity; and as there was but one bed in the room, he, at her entreaty, allowed her to share it with him; but at last, in spite of all her entreaties, she got up and went away, without having been able to succeed in her purpose; and told those who asked her, that she had quitted a statue and not a man. But some say that the real story is, that his pupils put Lais into his bed, and that he was so continent, that he submitted to some severe operations of excision and cautery.

IV. And he was a very trustworthy man; so that, though it was not lawful for men to give evidence except on oath, the Athenians made an exception in his favour alone.

V. He was also a man of the most contented disposition; accordingly they say that when Alexander sent him a large sum of money, he took three thousand Attic drachmas, and sent back the rest, saying, that Alexander wanted most, as he had the greatest number of mouths to feed. And when some was sent him by Antipater, he would not accept any of it, as Myornianus tells us in his Similitudes. And once, when he gained a golden crown, in a contest as to who could drink most, which was offered in the yearly festival of the Choes by Dionysius, he went out and placed the crown at the feet of the statue of Mercury, which was at the gate, where he was also accustomed to deposit his garlands of flowers. It is said also, that he was once sent with some colleagues as an ambassador to Philip; and that they were won over by gifts, and went to his banquets and conversed with Philip; but that he would do none of these things, nor could Philip propitiate him by these means; on which account, when the other ambassadors arrived in Athens, they said that Xenocrates had gone with them to no purpose; and the people were ready to punish him; but when they had learnt from him that they had now more need than ever to look to the welfare of their city, for that Philip had already bribed all their counsellors, but that he had been unable to win him over by any means, then they say that the people honoured him with redoubled honour. They add also, that Philip said afterwards, that Xenocrates was the only one of those who had come to him who was incorruptible. And when he went as ambassador to Antipater on the subject of the Athenian captives at the time of the Samian war, and was invited by him to a banquet, he addressed him in the following lines :

I answer, Goddess human, is thy breast
By justice sway'd, by tender pity prest?
Ill fits it me, whose friends are sunk to beasts,
To quaff thy bowls, or riot in thy feasts:
Me would'st thou please, for them thy cares employ,
And them to me restore, and me to joy?
(Hom. Od. 10. 387. Pope's Version, 450)
And Antipater, admiring the appropriateness of the quotation, immediately released them.

VI. On one occasion, when a sparrow was pursued by a hawk, and flew into his bosom, he caressed it, and let it go again, saying that we ought not to betray a suppliant. And being ridiculed by Bion, he said that he would not answer him, for that tragedy, when ridiculed by comedy, did not condescend to make a reply. To one who had never learnt music, or geometry, or astronomy, but who wished to become his disciple, he said, "Be gone, for you have not yet the handles of philosophy. " But some say that he said, "Be gone, for I do not card wool here. " And when Dionysius said to Plato that some one would cut off his head, he, being present, showed his own, and said, "Not before they have cut off mine. "

VII. They say too that once, when Antipater had come to Athens and saluted him, he would not make him any reply before he had finished quietly the discourse which he was delivering.

VIII. Being exceedingly devoid of every kind of pride, he often used to meditate with himself several times a day; and always allotted one hour of each day, it is said, to silence.

IX. And he left behind him a great number of writings, and books of recommendation, and verses, which are these,--six books on Natural Philosophy; six on Wisdom; one on Riches, the Arcadian; one volume on the Indefinite; one on a Child; one on Temperance; one on the Useful; one on the Free; one on Death; one on the Voluntary; two on Friendship; one on Courtesy; two on Contraries; two on Happiness; one on Writing; one on Memory; one on Falsehood; the Callicles one; two on Prudence; one on Oeconomy; one on Temperance; one on the Power of Law; one on Political Constitutions; one on Piety; one to show that Virtue may be transmitted; one about the Existent; one on Fate; one on the Passions; one on Lives; one on Unanimity; two on Pupils; one on Justice; two on Virtue; one on Species; two on Pleasure; one on Life; one on Manly Courage; one on The One; one on Ideas; one on Art; two on the Gods; two on the Soul; one on Knowledge; one on the Statesman; one on Science; one on Philosophy; one on the School of Parmenides; one the Archidemus, or an essay on Justice; one on the Good; eight of those things which concern the Intellect; ten essays in solution of the difficulties which occur respecting Orations; six books on the study of Natural Philosophy; the Principal, one; one treatise on Genus and Species; one on the doctrines of the Pythagoreans; two books of Solutions; seven of Divisions; several volumes of Propositions; several also about the method of conducting Discussions. Besides all this, there are one set of fifteen volumes, and another of sixteen, on the subject of those studies which relate to Speaking; nine more which treat of Ratiocination; six books on Mathematics; two more books on subjects connected with the Intellect; five books on Geometry; one book of Reminiscences; one of Contraries; one on Arithmetic; one on the Contemplation of Numbers; one on Intervals; six on Astronomy; four of elementary suggestions to Alexander, on the subject of Royal Power; one addressed to Arybas; one addressed to Hephaestion; two on Geometry; seven books of Verses.

X. But the Athenians, though he was such a great man, once sold him, because he was unable to pay the tax to which the metics were liable. And Demetrius Phalereus purchased him, and so assisted both parties, Xenocrates by giving him his freedom, and the Athenians in respect of the tax upon metics. This circumstance is mentioned by Myronianus of Amastra, in the first book of his chapters of Historical Coincidences.

XI. He succeeded Speusippus, and presided over the school for twenty-five years, beginning at the archonship of Lysimachides, in the second year of the hundred and tenth olympiad.

XII. And he died in consequence of stumbling by night against a dish, being more than eighty-two years of age. And in one of our epigrams we speak thus of him:

He struck against a brazen pot,
And cut his forehead deep,
And crying cruel is my lot,
In death he fell asleep,
So thus Xenocrates did fall,
The universal friend of all.
XIII. And there were five other people of the name of Xenocrates. One was an ancient tactician, a fellow citizen, and very near relation of the philosopher of whom we have been speaking; and there is extant an oration of his which is scribed, On Arsinoe, and which was written on the death of Arsinoe. A third was a philosopher who wrote some very indifferent elegiac poetry; and that is not strange, for when poets take to writing in prose, they succeed pretty well; but when prose writers try their hand at poetry, they fail; from which it is plain, that the one is a gift of nature, and the other a work of art. The fourth was a statuary; the fifth a writer of songs, as we are told by Aristoxenus.



























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF POLEMO


I. POLEMO was the son of Philostratus, an Athenian, of the burgh of Aea. And when he was young, he was so very intemperate and profligate, that he used always to carry money about with him, to procure the instant gratification of his passions; and he used also to hide money in the narrow alleys, for this purpose. And once there was found in the Academy a piece of three obols, hidden against one of the columns, which he had put there for some purpose like that which I have indicated; and on one occasion he arranged beforehand with some young men, and rushed, adorned with a garland, and drunk, into the school of Xenocrates. But he took no notice of him, and continued his discourse as he had begun it, and it was in praise of temperance; and the young man, hearing it, was gradually charmed, and became so industrious, that he surpassed all the rest of the disciples, and himself became the successor of Xenocrates, in his school beginning in the hundred and sixteenth olympiad.

II. And Antigonus, of Carystus, says in his Lives, that his father had been the chief man of the city, and had kept chariots for the Olympic games.

III. He also asserts that Polemo was prosecuted by his wife, on the charge of ill-treatment, because he indulged in illicit pleasures, and despised her.

IV. But that when he began to devote himself to philosophy, he adopted such a rigorous system of morals, that he for the future always continued the same in appearance, and never even changed his voice, on which account Crantor was charmed by him. Accordingly, on one occasion, when a dog was mad and had bitten his leg, he was the only person who did not turn pale; and once, when there was a great confusion in the city, he, having heard the cause, remained where he was without fleeing. In the theatres too he was quite immoveable; accordingly, when Nicostratus the poet, who was surnamed Clytaemnestra, was once reading something to him and Crates, the latter was excited to sympathy, he behaved as though he heard nothing. And altogether, he was such as Melanthius, the painter, describes in his treatise on Painting; for he says that some kind of obstinacy and harshness ought to exist in works of art as in morals.

And Polemo used to say that a man ought to exercise himself in action, and not in dialectic speculations, as if one had drunk in and dwelt upon a harmonious kind of system of art, so as to be admired for one's shrewdness, in putting questions; but to be inconsistent with one's self in character. He was, then, a well-bred and high-spirited man, avoiding what Aristophanes says of Euripides, speeches of vinegar and assafoetida, such as he says himself:

Are base delights compared with better things?
V. And he did not use to lecture on the propositions before him while sitting down; but he would walk about, it is said, and so discuss them. And he was much honoured in the city because of his noble sentiments; and after he had been walking about, he would rest in his garden; and his pupils erected little cabins near it, and dwelt near his school and corridor.

VI. And as it seems, Polemo imitated Xenocrates in everything; and Aristippus, in the fourth book of his treatise on Ancient Luxury, says that Xenocrates loved him; at all events, Polemo used to be always speaking of him, and praising his guileless nature, and his rigorous virtues, and his chaste severity, like that of a Doric building.

VII. He was also very fond of Sophocles, and especially of those passages where, according to one of the comic poets, he seemed to have had a Molossian hound for his colleague in composing his poems; and when there was, to use the expression of Phrynichus:

No sweet or washy liquor, but purest Pramnian wine.
And he used to say that Homer was an epic Sophocles, and Sophocles a tragic Homer.

VIII. And he died when he was very old, of decline, having left behind him a great number of writings. And there is this epigram of ours upon him:--

Do you not hear, we've buried Polemo,
Whom sickness, worst affliction of mankind
Attacked, and bore off to the shades below;
Yet Polemo lies not here, but Polemo's body,
And that he did himself place here on earth,
Prepared in soul to mount up to the skies.

























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF CRATES


I. CRATES was the son of Antigenes, and of the Thriasian burgh, and a pupil and attached friend of Polemo. He was also his successor as president of his school.

II. And they benefited one another so much, that not only did they delight while alive in the same pursuits, but almost to their latest breath did they resemble one another, and even after they were both dead they shared the same tomb. In reference to which circumstance Antagoras has written an epigram on the pair, in which he expresses himself thus:--

Stranger, who passest by, relate that here
The God-like Crates lies, and Polemo;
Two men of kindred nobleness of mind;
Out of whose holy mouths pure wisdom flowed,
And they with upright lives did well display,
The strength of all their principles and teaching.
And they say too that it was in reference to this that Arcesilaus, when he came over to them from Theophrastus, said that they were some gods, or else a remnant of the golden race; for they were not very fond of courting the people, but had a disposition in accordance with the saying of Dionysodorus the flute player, who is reported to have said, with great exultation and pride, that no one had ever heard his music in a trireme or at a fountain as they had heard Ismenius.

III. Antigonus relates that he used to be a messmate of Crantor, and that these philosophers and Arcesilaus lived together; and that Arcesilaus lived in Crantor's house, but that Polemo and Crates lived in the house of one of the citizens, named Lysicles; and he says that Crates was, as I have already mentioned, greatly attached to Polemo, and so was Arcesilaus to Crantor.

IV. But when Crates died, as Apollodorus relates in the third book of his Chronicles, he left behind him compositions, some on philosophical subjects and some on comedy, and some which were speeches addressed to assemblies of the people, or delivered on the occasion of embassies.

V. He also left behind him some eminent disciples, among whom were Arcesilaus, about whom we shall speak presently, for he too was a pupil of his, and Bion of the Borysthenes, who was afterwards called a Theodorean, from the sect which he espoused, and we shall speak of him immediately after Arcesilaus.

VI. But there were ten people of the name of Crates. The first was a poet of the old comedy; the second was an orator of Tralles, a pupil of Isocrates; the third was an engineer who served under Alexander; the fourth a Cynic, whom we shall mention hereafter; the fifth a Peripatetic philosopher; the sixth the Academic philosopher, of whom we are speaking; the seventh a grammarian of Malos; the eighth a writer in geometry; the ninth an epigrammatic poet; the tenth was an Academic philosopher, a native of Tarsus.


























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF CRANTOR


I. CRANTOR, a native of Soli, being admired very greatly in his own country, came to Athens and became a pupil of Xenocrates at the same time with Polemo.

II. And he left behind him memorials, in the shape of writings, to the number of 30,000 lines, some of which, however, are by some writers attributed to Arcesilaus.

III. They say of him that when he was asked what it was that he was so charmed with in Polemo, he replied, "That he had never heard him speak in too high or too low a key. "

IV. When he was ill he retired to the temple of Aesculapius, and there walked about, and people came to him from all quarters, thinkng that he had gone thither, not on account of any disease, but because he wished to establish a school there.

V. And among those who came to him was Arcesilaus, wishing to be recommended by him to Polemo, although he was much attached to him, as we shall mention in the life of Arcesilaus. But when he got well he became a pupil of Polemo, and was excessively admired on that account. It is said, also, that he left his property to Arcesilaus, to the amount of twelve talents; and that, being asked by him where he would like to be buried, he said :

It is a happy fate to lie entombed
In the recesses of a well-lov'd land.
VI. It is said also that he wrote poems, and that he sealed them up in the temple of Minerva, in his own country; and Meaetetus the poet wrote thus about him:

Crantor pleased men; but greater pleasure still
He to the Muses gave, ere he aged grew.
Earth, tenderly embrace the holy man,
And let him lie in quiet undisturb'd.
And of all writers, Crantor admired Homer and Euripides most; saying that the hardest thing possible was to write tragically and in a manner to excite sympathy, without departing from nature; and he used to quote this line out of the Bellerophon :

Alas! why should I say alas! for we
Have only borne the usual fate of man.
The following verses of Antagoras the poet are also attributed to Crantor; the subject is love, and they run thus :

My mind is much perplexed; for what, O Love,
Dare I pronounce your origin? May I
Call you chiefest of the immortal Gods,
Of all the children whom dark Erebus
And Royal Night bore on the billowy waves
Of widest Ocean? Or shall I bid you hail,
As son of proudest Venus? or of Earth?
Or of the untamed winds? so fierce you rove,
Bringing mankind sad cares, yet not unmixed
With happy good, so two-fold is your nature.
And he was very ingenious at devising new words and expressions; accordingly, he said that one tragedian had an unhewn (apeleketos) voice, all over bark; and he said that the verses of a certain poet were full of moths; and that the propositions of Theophrastus had been written on an oyster shell. But the work of his which is most admired is his book on Mourning.

VII. And he died before Polemo and Crates, having been attacked by the dropsy; and we have written this epigram on him:--

The worst of sicknesses has overwhelmed you,
O Crantor, and you thus did quit the earth,
Descending to the dark abyss of Hell.
Now you are happy there; but all the while
The sad Academy, and your native land
Of Soli mourn, bereaved of your eloquence.


























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF ARCESILAUS


I. ARCESILAUS was the son of Seuthes or Scythes, as Apollodorus states in the third book of his Chronicles, and a native of Pitane in Aeolia.

II. He was the original founder of the Middle Academy, and the first man who professed to suspend the declaration of his judgment, because of the contrarieties of the reasons alleged on either side. He was likewise the first who attempted to argue on both sides of a question, and who also made the method of discussion, which had been handed down by Plato, by means of question and answer, more contentious than before.

III. He met with Crantor in the following manner. He was one of four brothers, two by the same father and two by the same mother. Of those who were by the same mother the eldest was Pylades, and of those by the same father the eldest was Maereas, who was his guardian; and at first he was a pupil of Autolycus the mathematician, who happened to be a fellow citizen of his before he went to Athens; and with Autolycus he travelled as far as Sardis. After that he became a pupil of Xanthus the musician, and after that attended the lectures of Theophrastus, and subsequently came over to the Academy to Crantor. For Maereas his brother, whom I have mentioned before, urged him to apply himself to rhetoric; but he himself had a preference for philosophy, and when he became much attached to him Crantor asked him, quoting a line out of the Andromeda of Euripides:--

O virgin, if I save you, will you thank me?
And he replied by quoting the next line to it:--

O take me to you, stranger, as your slave,
Or wife, or what you please.
And ever after that they became very intimate, so that they say Theophrastus was much annoyed, and said, "That a most ingenious and well-disposed young man had deserted his school. "

IV. For he was not only very impressive in his discourse, and displayed a great deal of learning in it, but he also tried his hand at poetry, and there is extant an epigram which is attributed to him, addressed to Attalus, which is as follows :

Pergamus is not famed for arms alone,
But often hears its praise resound
For its fine horses, at the holy Pisa.
Yet, if a mortal may declare,
Its fate as hidden in the breast of Jove,
It will be famous for its woes.
There is another addressed to Menodorus the son of Eudamus, who was attached to one of his fellow pupils:--

Phrygia is a distant land, and so
Is sacred Thyatira, and Cadanade,
Your country Menodorus.
But from all,
As the unvaried song of bards relates,
An equal road does lie to Acheron,
That dark unmentioned river; so you lie
Here far from home; and here Eudamus raises
This tomb above your bones, for he did love you,
Though you were poor, with an undying love.
But he admired Homer above all poets, and always used to read a portion of his works before going to sleep; and in the morning he would say that he was going to the object of his love, when he was going to read him. He said, too, that Pindar was a wonderful man for filling the voice, and pouring forth an abundant variety of words and expressions. He also, when he was a young man, wrote a criticism on Ion.

V. And he was a pupil likewise of Hipponicus, the geometrican, whom he used to ridicule on other points as being lazy and gaping; but he admitted that in his own profession he was clear sighted enough, and said that geometry had flown into his mouth while he was yawning. And when he went out of his mind, he took him to his own house, and took care of him till he recovered his senses.

VI. And when Crates died, he succeeded him in the presidency of his schools, a man of the name of Socrates willingly yielding to him.

VII. And as he suspended his judgment on every point, he never, as it is said, wrote one single book. But others say that he was once detected correcting some passages in a work of his; and some assert that he published it, while others deny it, and affirm that he threw it into the fire.

VIII. He seems to have been a great admirer of Plato, and he possessed all his writings. He also, according to some authorities, had a very high opinion of Pyrrho.

IX. He also studied dialectics, and the discussions of the Eretrian school; on which account Ariston said of him:--

First Plato comes, and Pyrrho last,
And in the middle Diodorus.
And Timon speaks thus of him:

For having on this side the heavy load
Of Menedemus plac'd beneath his breast,
He'll to stout Pyrrho run, or Diodorus.
And presently afterwards he represents him as saying:

I'll swim to Pyrrho, or that crooked sophist
Called Diodorus.
X. He was exceedingly fond of employing axioms, very concise in his diction, and when speaking he laid an emphasis on each separate word.

XI. He was also very fond of attacking others, and very free spoken, on which account Timon in another passage speaks of him thus:--

You'll not escape all notice while you thus
Attack the young man with your biting sarcasm.
Once, when a young man was arguing against him with more boldness than usual, he said, "Will no one stop his mouth with the knout? "1 And to a man who lay under the general imputation of low debauchery, and who argued with him that one thing was not greater than another, he asked him whether a cup holding two pints was not larger than one which held only one. There was a certain Chian named Hemon, exceedingly ugly, but who fancied himself good looking, and always went about in fine clothes; this man asked him one day, "If he thought that a wise man could feel attachment to him;" "Why should he not," said he, "when they love even those who are less handsome than you, and not so well-dressed either? " and when the man, though one of the vilest characters possible, said to Arcesilaus as if he were addressing a very rigid man:

O, noble man, may I a question put,
Or must I hold my tongue?
Arcesilaus replied:

O wretched woman, why do you thus roughen
Your voice, not speaking in your usual manner?
And once, when he was plagued by a chattering fellow of low extraction, he said:

The sons of slaves are always talking vilely. 2
Another time, when a talkative man was giving utterance to a great deal of nonsense, he said, that "He had not had a nurse who was severe enough. " And to some people he never gave any answer at all. On one occasion a usurer, who made pretence to some learning, said in his hearing that he did not know something or other, on which he rejoined:

For often times the passing winds do fill
The female bird, except when big with young. 3
And the lines come out of the Aenomaus of Sophocles. He once reminded a certain dialectician, a pupil of Aleximes, who was unable to explain correctly some saying of his master, of what had been done by Philoxenus to some brick-makers. For when they were singing some of his songs very badly he came upon them, and trampled their bricks under foot, saying, "As, you spoil my works so will I spoil yours. "

XII. And he used to be very indignant with those who neglected proper opportunities of applying themselves to learning; and he had a peculiar habit, while conversing, of using the expression, "I think," and "So and so," naming the person, "will not agree to this. " And this was imitated by several of his pupils who copied also his style of expression and everything about him. He was a man very ready at inventing new words, and very quick at meeting objections, and at bringing round the conversation to the subject before him, and at adapting it to every occasion, and he was the most convincing speaker that could be found, on which account numbers of people flocked to his school, in spite of being somewhat alarmed at his severity, which however they bore with complacency, for he was a very kind man, and one who inspired his hearers with abundant hope, and in his manner of life he was very affable and liberal, always ready to do any one a service without any parade, and shrinking from any expression of gratitude on the part of those whom he had obliged. Accordingly once, when he had gone to visit Ctesibius who was ill, seeing him in great distress from want, he secretly slipped his purse under his pillow; and when Ctesibius found it, "This," said he, "is the amusement of Arcesilaus. " And at another time he sent him a thousand drachmas. He it was also who introduced Archias the Arcadian to Eumenes, and who procured him many favours from him.

XIII. And being a very liberal man and utterly regardless of money, he made the most splendid display of silver plate, and in his exhibition of gold plate he vied with that of Archecrates and Callecrates; and he was constantly assisting and contributing to the wants of others with money; and once, when some one had borrowed from him some articles of silver plate to help him entertain his friends, and did not offer to return them, he never asked for them back or reclaimed them; but some say that he lent them with the purpose that they should be kept, and that when the man returned them, he made him a present of them as he was a poor man. He had also property in Pitana, the revenues from which were transmitted to him by his brother Pylades.

XIV. Moreover Eumenes, the son of Philetaerus, supplied him with many things, on which account he was the only king to whom he addressed any of his discourses. And when many philosophers paid court to Antigonus and went out to meet him when he arrived, he himself kept quiet, not wishing to make his acquaintance. But he was a great friend of Hierocles, the governor of the harbours of Munychia and the Piraeus; and at festivals he always paid him a visit. And when he constantly endeavoured to persuade him to pay his respects to Antigonus, he would not; but though he accompanied him as far as his gates, he turned back himself. And after the sea-fight of Antigonus, when many people went to him and wrote him letters to comfort him for his defeat, he neither went nor wrote; but still in the service of his country, he went to Demetrias as ambassador to Antigonus and succeeded in the object of his mission.

XV. And he spent all his time in the Academy, and avoided meddling with public affairs, but at times he would spend some days in the Piraeus of Athens, discoursing on philosophical subjects, from his friendship for Hierocles, which conduct of his gave rise to unfavourable reports being raised against him by some people.

XVI. Being a man of very expensive habits, for he was in this respect a sort of second Aristippus, he often went to dine with his friends. He also lived openly with Theodote and Philaete, two courtesans of Elis; and to those who reproached him for this conduct, he used to quote the opinions of Aristippus. He was also very fond of the society of young men, and of a very affectionate disposition, on which account Aristi, the Chian, a Stoic philosopher, used to accuse him of being a corrupter of the youth of the city, and a profligate man. He is said also to have been greatly attached to Demetrius, who sailed to Cyrene, and to Cleochares of Mydea, of whom he said to his messmates, that he wished to open the door to him, but that he prevented him.

XVII. Demochares the son of Laches, and Pythocles the son of Bugelus, were also among his friends, and he said that he humoured them in all their wishes because of his great patience. And, on this account, those people to whom I have before alluded, used to attack him and ridicule him as a popularity hunter and vain-glorious man. And they set upon him very violently at an entertainment given by Hieronymus, the Peripatetic when he invited his friends on the birthday of Alcymeus, the son of Antigonus, on which occasion Antigonus sent him a large sum of money to promote the conviviality. On this occasion, as he avoided all discussion during the continuance of the banquet, when Aridelus proposed to him a question which required some deliberation, and entreated him to discourse upon it, it is said that he replied, "But this is more especially the business of philosophy, to know the proper time for everything. " With reference to the charge that was brought against him of being a popularity hunter, Timon speaks, among other matters, mentioning it in the following manner:--

He spoke and glided quick among the crowd,
They gazed on him as finches who behold
An owl among them. You then please the people!
Alas, poor fool, 'tis no great matter that;
Why give yourself such airs for such a trifle?
XVIII. However, in all other respects he was so free from vanity, that he used to advise his pupils to become the disciples of other men; and once, when a young man from Chios was not satisfied with his school, but preferred that of Hieronymus, whom I have mentioned before, he himself took him and introduced him to that philosopher, recommending him to preserve his regularity of conduct. And there is a very witty saying of his recorded. For when some one asked him once, why people left other schools to go to the Epicureans, but no one left the Epicureans to join other sects, he replied, "People sometimes make eunuchs of men, but no one can ever make a man out of an eunuch. "

XIX. At last, when he was near his end, he left all his property to his brother Pylades, because he, without the knowledge of Maereas, had taken him to Chios and had brought him from thence to Athens. He never married a wife, and never had any children. He made three copies of his will, and deposited one in Eretria with Amphicritus, and one at Athens with some of his friends, and the third he sent to his own home to Thaumasias, one of his relations, entreating him to keep it. And he also wrote him the following letter:--

ARCESILAUS TO THAUMASIAS.
"I have given Diogenes a copy of my will to convey to you. For, because I am frequently unwell and have got very infirm, I have thought it right to make a will, that if anything should happen to me I might not depart with the feelings of having done you any injury, who have been so constantly affectionate to me. And as you have been at all times the most faithful to me of all my friends, I entreat you to preserve this for me out of regard for my old age and your regard for me. Take care then to behave justly towards me, remembering how much I entrust to your integrity, so that I may appear to have managed my affairs well, as far as depends on you; and there is another copy of this will at Athens, in the care of some of my friends, and another at Eretria, in the hands of Amphicritus. "

XX. He died, as Hermippus relates after having drunk an excessive quantity of wine, and then became delirious, when he was seventy-five years old; and he was more beloved by the Athenians than any one else had ever been. And we have written the following epigram on him:

O wise Arcesilaus, why didst thou drink
So vast a quantity of unmixed wine,
As to lose all your senses, and then die?
I pity you not so much for your death,
As for the insult that you thus did offer
The Muses, by your sad excess in wine.
XXI. There were also three other persons of the name of Arcesilaus; one a poet of the old Comedy; another an elegiac poet; the third a sculptor, on whom Simonides wrote the following epigram:

This is a statue of chaste Dian's self
The price two hundred Parian drachmas fine,
Stamp 'd with the image of the wanton goat.
It is the work of wise Arcesilaus,
The son of Aristodicus: a man,
Whose hands Minerva guided in his art.
The philosopher of whom we have been speaking flourished, as Apollodorus tells us in his Chronicles, about the hundred and twentieth olympiad.




1. Perhaps there is a pun here; astragalos means not only a knout composed of small bones strung together, but also a die.

2. This is a quotation from some lost play of Euripides slightly altered; the line, as printed in the Variorum Edition, vol vii. , Mc. Trag. cxxx. is--

akolasta panta ginetai, doulon tekna.
3. There is a pun here which is untranslateable. The Greek is plen otan tokos pare, meaning usury, and also offspring or delivery.


























THE LIVES AND OPINIONS OF EMINENT PHILOSOPHERS
BY DIOGENES LAERTIUS, TRANSLATED BY C. D. YONGE
LIFE OF BION


I. BION was a native of the country around the Borysthenes; but as to who his parents were, and to what circumstances it was owing that he applied himself to the study of philosophy, we know no more than what he himself told Antigonus. For when Antigonus asked him:--

What art thou, say! from whence, from whom you came,
Who are your parents? tell thy race, thy name;
(Hom. Od. x. 335. Pope's Version, 387. )
He, knowing that he had been misrepresented to the king, said to him, "My father was a freedman, who used to wipe his mouth with his sleeve," (by which he meant that he used to sell salt fish). "As to his race, he was a native of the district of the Borysthenes; having no countenance, but only a brand in his face, a token of the bitter cruelty of his master. My mother was such a woman as a man of that condition might marry, taken out of a brothel. Then, my father being in arrears to the tax-gatherers, was sold with all his family, and with me among them; and as I was young and good looking, a certain orator purchased me, and when he died he left me everything. And I, having burnt all his books, and torn up all his papers, came to Athens and applied myself to the study of Philosophy:

Such was my father, and from him I came,
The honoured author of my birth and name.
(Hom. Il. vi. 211. Pope's Version, 254. )
This is all that I can tell you of myself: so that Persaeus and Philonides may give up telling these stories about me: and you may judge of me on my own merits. "

II. And Bion was truly a man of great versatility, and a very subtle philosopher, and a man who gave all who chose great opportunities of practising philosophy. In some respects he was of a gentle disposition, and very much inclined to indulge in vanity.

III. And he left behind him many memorials of himself in the way of writings, and also many apophthegms full of useful sentiments. As for instance, once when he was reproved for having failed to charm a young man, he replied, "You cannot possibly draw up cheese with a hook before it has got hard. " On another occasion he was asked who was the most miserable of men, and replied, "He who has set his heart on the greatest prosperity. " When he was asked whether it was advisable to marry (for this answer also is attributed to him), he replied, "If you marry an ugly woman you will have a punishment (poine), and if a handsome woman you will have one who is common" (koine). He called old age a port to shelter one from misfortune; and accordingly, he said that every one fled to it. He said that glory was the mother of years; that beauty was a good which concerned others rather than one's self; that riches were the sinews of business. To a man who had squandered his estate he said "The earth swallowed up Amphiaraus, but you have swallowed up the earth. " Another saying of his was that it was a great evil not to be able to bear evil. And he condemned those who burnt the dead as though they felt nothing, and then mocked them as though they did feel. And he was always saying that it was better to put one's own beauty at the disposal of another, than to covet the beauty of others; for that one who did so was injuring both his body and his soul. And he used to blame Socrates saying, that if he derived no advantage from Alcibiades he was foolish, and if he never derived any advantage from him he then deserved no credit. He used to say that the way to the shades below was easy; and accordingly, that people went there with their eyes shut. He used to blame Alcibiades, saying that while he was a boy he seduced husbands from their wives, and when he had become a young man he seduced the wives from their husbands. While most of the Athenians at Rhodes practised rhetoric, he himself used to give lectures on philosophical subjects; and to one who blamed him for this he said, "I have bought wheat, and I sell barley. "

It was a saying of his that the inhabitants of the shades below would be more punished if they carried water in buckets that were whole, than in such as were bored. To a chattering fellow who was soliciting him for aid, he said, "I will do what is sufficient for you, if you will send deputies to me, and forbear to come yourself. " Once when he was at sea in the company of some wicked men, he fell into the hands of pirates; and when the rest said, "We are undone, if we are known. " "But I," said he, "am undone if we are not known. " He used to say that self-conceit was the enemy of progress. Of a rich man who was mean and niggardly, he said, "That man does not possess his estate, but his estate possesses him. " He used to say that stingy men took care of their property as if it was their own, but derived no advantage from it as if it belonged to other people. Another of his sayings was, that young men ought to display courage, but that old men ought to be distinguished for prudence. And that prudence was as much superior to the other virtues as sight was to the other senses. And that it was not right to speak of old age, at which every one is desirous to arrive. To an envious man who was looking gloomy, he said, "I know not whether it is because some misfortune has happened to you, or some good fortune to some one else. " One thing that he used to say was, that a mean extraction was a bad companion to freedom of speech. For:--

It does enslave a man, however bold
His speech may be. 1
And another was that we ought to keep our friends, whatever sort of people they may be, so that we may not seem to have been intimate with wicked men, or to have abandoned good men.

IV. Very early in his career he abandoned the school of the Academy, and at the same time became a disciple of Crates. Then he passed over to the sect of the Cynics, taking their coarse cloak and wallet. For what else could ever have changed his nature into one of such apathy? After that he adopted the Theodorean principles, having become a disciple of Theodorus the Atheist, who was used to employ every kind of reasoning in support of his system of philosophy. After leaving him, he became a pupil of Theophrastus, the Peripatetic.

V. He was very fond of theatrical entertainments, and very skilful in distracting his hearers by exciting a laugh, giving things disparaging names. And because he used to avail himself of every species of reasoning, they relate that Eratosthenes said that Bion was the first person who had clothed philosophy in a flowery robe.

VI. He was also very ingenious in parodying passages, and adapting them to circumstances as they arose. As for instance, I may cite the following:--

Tender Archytas, born of tuneful lyre,
Whom thoughts of happy vanity inspire;
Most skilled of mortals in appeasing ire. 2
And he jested on every part of music and geometry.

VII. He was a man of very expensive habits, and on this account he used to go from city to city, and at times he would contrive the most amazing devices.

VIII. Accordingly, in Rhodes, he persuaded the sailors to put on the habiliments of philosophical students and follow him about; and then he made himself conspicuous by entering the gymnasium with this train of followers.

IX. He was accustomed also to adopt young men as his sons, in order to derive assistance from them in his pleasures, and to be protected by their affection for him. But he was a very selfish man, and very fond of quoting the saying, "The property of friends is common;" owing to which it is that no one is spoken of as a disciple of his, though so many men attended his school. And he made some very shameless; accordingly, Betion, one of his intimate acquaintances, is reported to have said once to Menedemus, "So Menedemus constantly spends the evening with Bion, and I see no harm in it. " He used also to talk with great impiety to those who conversed with him, having derived his opinions on this subject from Theodorus.

X. And when at a later period he became afflicted with disease, as the people of Chalcis said, for he died there, he was persuaded to wear amulets and charms, and to show his repentance for the insults that he had offered to the Gods. But he suffered fearfully for want of proper people to attend him, until Antigonus sent him two servants. And he followed him in a litter, as Favorinus relates in his Universal History. And the circumstances of his death we have ourselves spoken of in the following lines:

We hear that Bion the Borysthenite,
Whom the ferocious Scythian land brought forth,
Used to deny that there were Gods at all.
Now, if he'd persevered in this opinion,
One would have said he speaks just as he thinks;
Though certainly his thoughts are quite mistaken.
But when a lengthened sickness overtook him,
And he began to fear lest he should die;
This man who heretofore denied the Gods,
And would not even look upon a temple,
And mocked all those who e'er approached the Gods
With prayer or sacrifice; who ne'er, not even
For his own hearth, and home, and household table,
Regaled the Gods with savoury fat and incense,
Who never once said, "I have sinned, but spare me. "
Then did this atheist shrink, and give his neck
To an old woman to hang charms upon,
And bound his arms with magic amulets,
With laurel branches blocked his doors and windows,
Ready to do and venture anything
Rather than die. Fool that he was, who thought
To win the Gods to come into existence,
Whenever he might think he wanted them.
So wise too late when now mere dust and ashes,
He put his hand forth, Hail, great Pluto, Hail!
XI. There were ten people of the name of Bion. First of all, the one who flourished at the same time with Pherecydes of Syros, and who has left two books behind him, which are still extant; he was a native of Proconnesas. The second was a Syracusan, the author of a system of rhetoric. The third was the man of whom we have been speaking. The fourth was a pupil of Democritus, and a mathematician, a native of Abdera, who wrote in both the Attic and Ionic dialect. He was the person who first asserted that there were countries where there was night for six months, and day for six months. The fifth was a native of Soli; who wrote a history of Aethiopia. The sixth was a rhetorician, who has left behind him nine books, inscribed with the names of the Muses, which are still extant. The eighth was a Milesian statuary, who is mentioned by Polemo. The ninth was a tragic poet of the number of those who are called Tarsicans. The tenth was a statuary, a native of Clazomenae or Chios, who is mentioned by Hipponax.







1. This is a quotation from the Hippolytus of Euripides, v. 424.

2. I doubt if the wit of these parodies will be appreciated by the modern reader.