GIFT OF 
 Phi Delta Kappa- 
 Lambda Chapter 
 
^ 
 
BOHN'S CLASSICAL LIBRARY 
 
 PLUTARCH'S MORALS 
 
PLUTAKCH'S MOKALS 
 
 ETHICAL ESSAYS 
 
 TRANSLATKD 
 
 WITH NOTES AND INDEX 
 
 BY ARTHUR RICHARD SHILLETO, M.A. 
 
 Sometime Scholar of Trinity College, Ca^nhridgc, 
 Translator of Pausanias. 
 
 I must think we are more deeply indebted to Plutarch than 
 to all the ancient writers." — R. W, Emerson. 
 
 LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS, YORK STREET 
 COVENT GARDEN 
 
 1888 
 

 GIFT OP 
 
 i hi X^lfa Kfippi^ 
 
 Ei5trcArit)"n* riftpT. 
 
 CHISVVICK PRESS: — C WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, 
 CHANCERY LANE. 
 
B 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 PLUTARCH, who was born at Chasronea in Boeotia, 
 probably about a.d. 50, and was a contemporary of 
 Tacitus and Pliny, has written two works still extant, 
 the well-known Lives, and the less-known Moralia. The 
 Lives have often been translated, and have always been a 
 popular work. Great indeed was their power at the period 
 of the French Revolution. The Moralia, on the other hand, 
 consisting of various Essays on various subjects (only 
 twenty-six of which are directly ethical, though they have 
 given their name to the Moralia), are declared by Mr, Paley 
 " to be practically almost unknown to most persons in 
 Britain, even to those who call themselves scholars." ' 
 Hahent etiam sua fata lihelli. 
 
 In older days the Moralia were more valued. Montaigne, 
 who was a great lover of Plutarch, and who observes in 
 one passage of his Essays that " Plutarch and Seneca were 
 the only two books of solid learning he seriously settled 
 himself to read," quotes as much from the Moralia as from 
 the Lives. And in the seventeenth century I cannot but 
 think the Moralia were largely read at our Universities, at 
 ieast at the University of Cambridge. For, not to mention 
 ^jhe wonderful way in which the famous Jeremy Taylor has 
 taken the cream of " Conjugal Precepts " in his Sermon 
 called " The Marriage Ring," or the large and copious use 
 
 ^ See article Plutarch, in Encyclopaedia Britannica, Ninth Edition. 
 
Vlll PREFACE , 
 
 he has made in his " Holy Living " of three other Essays 
 in this volume, namely, those " On Curiosity," " On Re- 
 straining Anger," and " On Contentedness of Mind," prov- 
 ing conclusively what a storehouse he found the Moralia, 
 we have evidence that that most delightful poet, Robert 
 Herrick, read the Moralia, too, when at Cambridge, so that 
 one cannot but think it was a work read in the University 
 course generally in those days. For in a letter to his uncle 
 written from Cambridge, asking for books or money for 
 books, he makes the following remark : " How kind Arcisi- 
 laus the philosopher was unto Apelles the painter, Plutark 
 in his Morals will tell you."^ 
 
 In 1882 the Reverend C. W. King, Senior Fellow of 
 Trinity College, Cambridge, translated the six " Theosophi- 
 cal Essays " of the Moralia, forming a volume in Bohn's 
 Classical Library. The present volume consists of the 
 twenty-six " Ethical Essays," which are, in my opinion, 
 the cream of the Moralia, and constitute a highly interesting 
 series of treatises on what might be called " The Ethics of 
 the Hearth and Home." I have grouped these Essays in 
 such a manner as to enable the reader to read together 
 such as touch on the same or on kindred subjects. 
 
 As is well known, the text of the Moralia is very corrupt, 
 and the reading very doubtful, in many places. In eight 
 of the twenty-six Essays in this volume I have had the 
 invaluable help of the text of Rudolf Hercher ; help so 
 invaluable that one cannot but sadly regret that only one 
 volume of the Moralia has yet appeared in the Bihliotheca 
 Teuhneriana. Wyttenbach's text and notes I have always 
 used when available, and when not so have fallen back 
 upon Reiske. Reiske is always ingenious, but too fond of 
 correcting a text, and the criticism of him by Wyttenbach 
 
 ^ Grosart's Herrick, vol. i. p. liii. See in this volume, p. 180, and 
 also note to p. 28S. Kichard Baxter again is always quoting the 
 
 Moralia. 
 
PREFACE. ^ IX 
 
 is perhaps substantially correct. " In nullo anctore babita- 
 bat ; vagabatur per omnes : nee apud quemquam tamdiu 
 divertebat, ut in paulo interiorem ejus consuetudinem se 
 insinuaret." I have also had constantly before me the 
 Didot Edition of the Moralia, edited by Frederic Diibner. 
 
 Let any reader who wishes to know more about Plutarch ^ 
 consult the article on Plutarch, in the Ninth Edition of the 
 Encyclopaedia Britannica, by the well-known scholar F. A. 
 Paley. He will also do well to read an Essay on Plutarch 
 by R. W. Emerson, reprinted in Volume III. of the Bohn's- 
 Standard Library Edition of Emerson's Works, and Five 
 Lectures on Plutarch by the late Archbishop Trench, pub- 
 lished by Messrs. Macmillan and Co. in 1874 All these 
 contain much of interest, and will repay perusal. 
 
 In conclusion, I hope this little volume will be the means 
 of making popular some of the best thoughts of one of the 
 most interesting and thoughtful of the ancients, ^\'ho often 
 seems indeed almost a modern. 
 
 Cambridge, 
 
 March, 1888. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ON Education 1 
 
 On Love to one's Offspring 21 
 
 On Love 29 
 
 Conjugal Precepts 70 
 
 Consolatory Letter to his Wife 85 
 
 That Virtue may be taught 92 
 
 On Virtue and Vice 95 
 
 On moral Virtue 98 
 
 How ONE MAY BE AWARE OF ONE'S PROGRESS IN VIRTUE 118 
 
 Whether Vice is sufficient to cause Unhappiness , 138 
 
 Whether the disorders of mind or body are worse 142 
 
 On Abundance of Friends 145 
 
 How one may discern a Flatterer from a Friend . 153 
 
 How A MAN may be BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES . . . 201 
 
 On Talkativeness 214 
 
 On Curiosity 238 
 
 On Shyness . 252 
 
 On Restraining Anger 267 
 
 On Contentedness of Mind 289 
 
 On Envy and Hatred 312 
 
 How ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING EnVY 315 
 
 On THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DeITY LATE . . 331 
 
 Against borrowing Money 365 
 
 Whether "Live Unknown" be a wise precept . . 373 
 
 On Exile 378 
 
 On Fortune 394 
 
PLUTARCH'S MORALS. 
 
 ON EDUCATION. 
 
 § I. Come let ns consider what one miglit say on the 
 education of free children, andby what training they would 
 become good citizens. 
 
 § II. It is perhaps best to begin with birth : I would 
 therefore warn those who desire to be fathers of notable 
 sons, not to form connections with any kind of women, 
 such as courtesans or mistresses : for those who either on 
 the father or mother's side are ill-born have the disgrace 
 of their origin all their life long irretrievably present with 
 them, and oft'er a ready handle to abuse and vituperation. 
 So that the poet was wise, who said, " Unless the founda- 
 tion of a house be well laid, the descendants must of neces- 
 sity be unfortunate."^ Grood birth indeed brings with it a 
 store of assurance, which ought to bo greatly valued by 
 all who desire legitimate offspring. For the spirit of those 
 who are a spurious and bastard breed is apt to be mean and 
 abject: for as the poet truly says, "It makes a man even 
 of noble spirit servile, when he is conscious of the ill fame 
 of either his father or mother." ^ On the other hand 
 the sons of illustrious parents are full of pride and arro- 
 gance. As an instance of this it is recorded of Diophantus,' 
 the son of Themistocles, that he often used to say to various 
 people " that he could do what he pleased with the Athe- 
 nian people, for what he wished his mother wished, and 
 what she wished Themistocles wished, and what Themis- 
 
 ' Euripides, "Here. Fur." 1261, 1262. 
 
 2 Euripides, " Hippol." 424, 425. 
 
 * Cleophantus is the name given to this lad by other writers. 
 
[^\^< I \ ,c . ', y PLUTARCH S MOEALS. 
 
 tocles wished all the Athenians wished." All praise also 
 ought we to bestow on the Lacedaemonians for their loftiness 
 of soul in fining their king Archidamus for venturing to 
 marry a small woman, for they charged him with intending 
 to furnish them not with kings but kinglets. 
 
 § III. Next must we mention, what was not overlooked 
 even by those who handled this subject before us, that 
 those who approach their wives for procreation must do so 
 either without having drunk any wine or at least very little. 
 For those children, that their parents begot in drink, are 
 wont to be fond of wine and apt to turn out drunkards. 
 And so Diogenes, seeing a youth out of his mind and 
 crazy, said, " Young man, your father was drunk when 
 he begot you." Let this hint serve as to procreation : 
 now let us discuss education. 
 
 § IV. To speak generally, what we are wont to say about 
 the arts and sciences is also true of moral excellence, for to 
 its perfect development three things must meet together, 
 natural ability, theory, and practice. By theory I mean 
 training, and by practice working at one's craft. Now the 
 foundation must be laid in training, and practice gives 
 facility, but perfection is attained only by the junction of 
 all three. For if any one of these elements be wanting, 
 excellence must be so far deficient. For natural ability with- 
 out training is blind : and training without natural ability 
 is defective, and practice without both natural ability 
 and training is imperfect. For just as in farming the first 
 requisite is good soil, next a good farmer, next good seed, 
 so also here : the soil corresponds to natural ability, the 
 training to the farmer, the seed to precepts and instruction. 
 I should therefore maintain stoutly that these three ele- 
 ments were found combined in the souls of such universally 
 famous men as Pythagoras, and Socrates, and Plato, and 
 of all who have won undying fame. Happy at any rate 
 and dear to the gods is he to whom any deity has vouch- 
 safed all these elements ! But if anyone thinks that those 
 who have not good natural ability cannot to some extent 
 make up for the deficiencies of nature by right training 
 and practice, let such a one know that he is very wide of 
 the mark, if not out of it altogether. For good natural 
 parts are impaired by sloth ; while inferior ability is 
 
ON EDUCATION. 6 
 
 mended by training : and while simple things escape the 
 eyes of the careless, difficult things are reached by pains- 
 taking. The wonderful efficacy and power of long and 
 continuous labour you may see indeed every day in the 
 world around yon.^ Thus water continually dropping 
 wears away rocks : and iron and steel are moulded by the 
 hands of the artificer : and chariot wheels bent by some 
 strain can never recover their original symmetry : and the 
 crooked staves of actors can never be made straight. But 
 by toil what is contrary to nature becomes stronger than 
 even nature itself. And are these the only things that 
 teach the power of diligence ? Not so : ten thousand 
 things teach the same truth. A soil naturally good be- 
 comes by neglect barren, and the better its original con- 
 dition, the worse its nltimate state if uncared for. On the 
 other hand a soil exceedingly rough and sterile by being 
 farmed well produces excellent crops. And what trees do 
 not by neglect become gnarled and unfruitful, whereas by 
 pruning they become fruitful and productive? And what 
 constitution so good but it is marred and impaired by sloth, 
 luxury, and too full habit ? And what weak constitution 
 has not derived benefit from exercise and athletics ? And 
 what horses broken in young are not docile to their riders ? 
 while if they are not broken in till late they become hard- 
 mouthed and unmanageable. And why should we be sur- 
 prised at similar cases, seeing that we find many of the 
 savagest animals docile and tame by training ? Rightly 
 answered the Thessalian, who was asked who the mildest 
 Thessalians were, "Those who have done with fig-htingf."^ 
 But why pursue the line of argument further ? For the 
 Greek name for moral virtue is only habit : and if anyone 
 defines moral virtues as habitual virtues, he will not be beside 
 the mark. But I will employ only one more illustration, 
 and dwell no longer on this topic. Lycurgus, the Lace- 
 dcemonian legislator, took two puppies of the same parents, 
 and brought them up in an entirely different way : the one 
 he pampered and cosseted up, while he taught the other to 
 hunt and be a retriever. Then on one occasion, when the 
 
 * Compare Sophocles, " CEdipus Tyrannus," 112, 113. 
 ^ The Thessalians were very pugnacious. Cf. Isocrates, '' Oratio de 
 Pace," p. 316. o'l ^tv (QerraXol) acphiv avroXg del Ttoktfiovaiv. 
 
4 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 Lacedaemonians were convened in assembly, lie said, 
 "Mighty, Lacedaemonians, is the influence on moral 
 excellence of habit, and education, and training, and modes 
 of life, as I will prove to you at once." So saying he pro- 
 duced the two puppies, and set before them a platter and a 
 hare : the one darted on the hare, while the other made 
 for the platter. And when the Lacedasmonians could not 
 guess what his meaning was, or with what intent he had 
 produced the puppies, he said, " These puppies are of the 
 same parents, but by virtue of a different bringing up the one 
 is pampered, and the other a good hound." Let so much 
 suffice for habit and modes of life. 
 
 § Y. The next point to discuss will be nutrition. In my 
 opinion mothers ought to nurse and suckle their own chil- 
 dren. For they will bring them up with more sympathy 
 and care, if they love them so intimately and, as the pro- 
 verb puts it, "from their first growing their nails." ^ 
 Whereas the affection of wet or dry nurses is spurious and 
 counterfeit, being merely for pay. And nature itself teaches 
 that mothers ought themselves to suckle and rear those 
 they have given birth to. And for that purpose she has 
 supplied every female parent with milk. And providence 
 has wisely provided women with two breasts, so that if they 
 should bear twins, they would have a breast for each. And 
 besides this, as is natural enough, they would feel more 
 affection and love for their children by suckling them. 
 For this supplying them with food is as it were a tightener 
 of love, for even the brute creation, if taken away from 
 their young, pine away, as we constantly see. Mothers 
 must therefore, as I said, certainly try to suckle their own 
 children : but if they are unable to do so either through 
 physical weakness (for this contingency sometimes occurs), 
 or in haste to have other children, they must select wet 
 and dry nurses with the greatest care, and not introduce 
 into their houses any kind of women. First and foremost 
 they must be Greeks in their habits. For just as it is 
 necessary immediately after birth to shapen the limbs of 
 children, so that they may grow straight and not crooked, 
 so from the beginning must their habits be carefully 
 
 ^ A proverbial expression among the ancients for earliest childhood. 
 See Erasmus, " Adajria." 
 
ON EDUCATION. 5 
 
 attended to. For infancy is supple and easily moulded, and 
 what children learn sinks deeply into their souls while they 
 are young and tender, whereas everything hard is softened 
 only with great difhculty. For just as seals are impressed 
 on soft wax, so instruction leaves its permanent mark on 
 the minds of those still young. And divine Plato seems to 
 me to give excellent advice to nurses not to tell their 
 children nny kind of fables, that their souls may not in 
 the very dawn of existence be full of folly or corruption.^ 
 Phocylides the poet also seems to give admirable advice 
 when he says, " We must teach good habits while the 
 pupil is still a boy." 
 
 § VI. Attention also must be given to this point, that 
 the lads that are to wait upon and be with young people 
 must be first and foremost of good morals, and able to 
 speak Greek distinctly and idiomatically, that they may not 
 by contact with foreigners of loose morals contract any of 
 their viciousness. For as those who are fond of quoting 
 proverbs say not amiss, " If you live with a lame man, you 
 w^ill learn to halt."^ 
 
 § VII. Next, when our boys are old enough to be put into 
 the hands of tutors,^ great care must be taken that we do 
 not hand them over to slaves, or foreigners, or flighty per- 
 sons. For what happens nowadays in many cases is highly 
 ridiculous : good slaves are made farmers, or sailors, or 
 merchants, or stewards, or money-lenders ; but if they find 
 a winebibbing, greedy, and utterly useless slave, to him 
 parents commit the charge of their sons, whereas the good 
 tutor ought to be such a one as was Phcenix, the tutor of 
 Achilles. The point also which I am now going to speak 
 about is of the utmost importance. The schoolmasters we 
 ought to select for our boys should be of blameless life, of 
 pure character, and of great experience. For a good 
 training is the source and root of gentlemanly behaviour. 
 And just as farmers prop up their trees, so good school- 
 masters prop up the young by good advice and suggestions, 
 
 1 Plato, " Eepiiblic," ii. p. 429, E. ^ ggg Erasmus, " Adagia." 
 
 ^ It is difficult to know how to render the word Traidayojyug'm English. 
 
 He was the slave who took the boy to school, and generally looked 
 
 after him from his seventh year upward. Tutor or governor seems the 
 
 lest rendering. He iiad great power over the boy entrusted to him. 
 
t) PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 that they may become upright. How one must despise, 
 therefore, some fathers, wlio, whether from ignorance or 
 inexperience, before putting the intended teachers to the 
 test, commit their sons to the charge of untried and un- 
 tested men. If they act so through inexperience it is not 
 so ridiculous ; but it is to the remotest degree absurd when, 
 though perfectly aware of both the inexperience and worth- 
 lessness of some schoolmasters, they yet entrust their sons 
 to them : some overcome by flattery, others to gratify 
 friends who solicit their favours ; acting just as if any- 
 body ill in body, passing over the experienced physician, 
 should, to gratify his friend, call him in, and so throw 
 away his life ; or as if to gratify one's friend one should 
 reject the best pilot and choose him instead. Zeus and all 
 the gods ! can anyone bearing the sacred name of father 
 put obliging a petitioner before obtaining the best education 
 for his sons ? Were they not then wise w^ords that the 
 time-honoured Socrates used to utter, and say that lie 
 would proclaim, if he could, climbing up to the highest 
 part of the city, "Men, w^hat can you be thinking of, who 
 move heaven and earth to make money, while you bestow 
 next to no attention on the sons you are going to leave 
 that money to ? " ^ I would add to this that such fathers 
 act very similarly to a person who should be very careful 
 about his shoe but care nothing about his foot. Many 
 persons also are so niggardly about their children, and in- 
 different to their interests, that for the sake of a paltry 
 saving, they prefer worthless teachers for their children, 
 practising a vile economy at the expense of their children's 
 ignorance. Apropos of this, Aristippus on one occasion 
 rebuked an empty-headed parent neatly and wittily. For 
 being asked how much money a parent ought to pay for 
 his son's education, he answered, " A thousand drachmae." 
 And he replying, " Hercules, what a price ! I could buy a 
 slave for as much ; " Aristippus answered, " You shall 
 have two slaves then, your son and the slave you buy." ^ 
 And is it not altogether strange that you accustom your 
 son to take his food in his right hand, and chide him if he 
 
 1 Plato, " Clitophon," p. 255, D. 
 * Compare Diogenes Laertius, ii. 72. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 7 
 
 offers his left, whereas you care very little aboat his hearing 
 good and sound discourses ? I will tell you what happens 
 to such admirable fathers, when they have educated and 
 brought up their sons so badly : when the sons grow to 
 man's estate, they disregard a sober and well-ordered life, 
 and rush headlong into disorderly and low vices ; then at 
 the last the parents are sorry they have neglected their 
 education, bemoaning bitterly when it is too late their sons' 
 debasement. For some of them keep flatterers and para- 
 sites in their retinue — an accursed set of wretches, the 
 defilers and pest of youth; others keep mistresses and 
 common prostitutes, wanton and costly ; others waste their 
 money in eating ; others come to grief through dice and 
 revelling ; some even go in for bolder profligacy, being 
 whoremongers and defilers of the marriage bed,^ who would 
 madly pursue their darling vice if it cost them their lives. 
 Had they associated with some philosopher, they would 
 not have lowered themselves by such practices, but would 
 have remembered the precept of Diogenes, whose advice 
 sounds rather low, but is really of excellent moral intent,^ 
 *' Go into a brothel, my lad, that you may see the little 
 difference between vice and virtue." 
 
 § VIII. I say, then, to speak comprehensively (and I 
 might be justly considered in so saying to speak as an 
 oracle, not to be delivering a mere precept), that a good 
 education and sound bringing-up is of the first and middle 
 and last importance ; and I declare it to be most instru- 
 mental and conducive to virtue and happiness. For all 
 other human blessings compared to this are petty and in- 
 significant. For noble birth is a great honour, but it is an 
 advantage from our forefathers. And wealth is valuable, 
 but it is the acquisition of fortune, who has often taken it 
 away from those who had it, and brought it to those who 
 little expected it ; and much wealth is a sort of mark for 
 villanous slaves and informers to shoot at to fill their own 
 
 "^ Reading KoirofOopovvTsg, the excellent emendation of Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ From the heathen standpoint of course, not from the Cliristian. 
 Compare the advice of Cato in Horace's " Satires," Book i. Sat. ii. 31- 
 35. It is a little difficult to know what Diogenes' pi-ecept really means. 
 Is it that vice is universal ? Like Shakespeare's " Measure for Measure," 
 Act ii. Sc. ii. 5. " All sectsy all ages smack of this vice." 
 
8 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 purses ; and, what is a most important point, even the 
 greatest villains have money sometimes. And glory is 
 noble, but insecure. And beauty is highly desirable, but 
 shortlived. And health is highly valuable, but soon im- 
 paired. And strength is desirable, but illness or age soon 
 make sad inroads into it. And generally speaking, if any- 
 one prides himself on his bodily strength, let him know 
 that he is deficient in judgment. For how much inferior 
 is the strength of a man to that of animals, as elephants, 
 bulls, and lions ! But education is of all our advantages 
 the only one immortal and divine. And two of the most 
 powerful agencies in man's nature are mind and reason. 
 And mind governs reason, and reason obeys mind ; and 
 mind is irremovable by fortune, cannot be taken away by in- 
 formers, cannot be destroyed by disease, cannot have inroads 
 made into it by old age. For the mind alone flourishes in 
 age ; and while time takes away everything else, it adds 
 wisdom to old age. Even war, that sweeps away every- 
 thing else like a winter torrent, cannot take away education. 
 And Stilpo, the Megarian, seems to me to have made a 
 memorable answer when Demetrius enslaved Megara and 
 rased it to the ground. On his asking whether Stilpo had 
 lost anything, he replied, " Certainly not, for war can 
 make no havoc of virtue." Corresponding and consonant 
 to this is the answer of Socrates, who when asked, I think 
 by Gorgias,^ if he had any conception as to the happiness of 
 the King of Persia, replied, " I do not know his position in 
 regard to virtue and education : for happiness lies in these, 
 and not in adventitious advantages." 
 
 § IX. And as I advise parents to think nothing more 
 important than the education of their children, so I main- 
 tain that it must be a sound and healthy education, and 
 that our sons must be kept as far as possible from vulgar 
 twaddle. For v/hat pleases the vulgar displeases the wise. 
 I am borne out by the lines of Euripides, " Unskilled am I 
 in the oratory that pleases the mob ; but amongst the few 
 that are my equals I am reckoned rather wise. For those 
 who are little thought of by the wise, seem to hit the taste 
 
 * He was asked by Polus, see Plato, *' Gorgias," p. 290, F. 
 
ON EDUCATION. Vl 
 
 of the vulgar." ' And I have myself noticed that those 
 w^ho practise to speak acceptably and to the gratification 
 of the masses promiscuously, for the most part become 
 also profligate and lovers of pleasure in their lives. Natu- 
 rally enough. For if in giving pleasure to others they 
 neglect the noble, they would be hardly likely to put the 
 lofty and sound above a life of luxury and pleasure, and 
 to prefer moderation to delights. Yet what better advice 
 could we give our sons than to follow this ? or to what 
 could we better exhort them to accustom themselves ? For 
 perfection is only attained by neither speaking nor acting 
 at random — as the proverb says. Perfection is only attained 
 hy practice.^ Whereas extempore oratory is easy and facile, 
 mere windbag, having neither beginning nor end. And 
 besides their other shortcomings extempore speakers fall 
 into great disproportion and repetition, whereas a well con- 
 sidered speech preserves its due proportions. It is re- 
 corded by tradition that Pericles, when called on by the 
 people for a speech, frequently refused on the plea that he 
 was unprepared. Similarly Demosthenes, his state-rival, 
 when the Athenians called upon him for his advice, refused 
 to give it, saying, " I am not prepared." But this you will 
 say, perhaps, is mere tradition without authority. But in 
 his speech against Midias he plainly sets forth the utility 
 of preparation, for he says, " I do not deny, men of Athens, 
 that I have prepared this speech to the best of my ability : 
 for I should have been a poor creature if, after suffering so 
 much at his hands, and even still suffering, I had neglected 
 how to plead my case." ^ Not that I would altogether 
 reject extempore oratory, or its use in critical cases, but it 
 should be used only as one would take medicine.* Up, 
 indeed, to man's estate I would have no extempore speak- 
 ing, but when anyone's powers of speech are rooted and 
 grounded, then, as emergencies call for it, I would allow 
 his words to flow freely. For as those who have been for 
 a long time in fetters stumble if unloosed, not being able 
 
 1 " Hippolytus," 986-989. 
 
 ^ Cf. Plato, "Cratylus," p. 2.57, E. ui ttoI 'Ittttovikov 'EpfioytvEg, 
 TvaXaia Trapoiixla, on xoXeTra ra KoXd tariv ottjj t'^ft fiaOeiv. So Horace, 
 *' Sat." i. ix. 59, 60, " Nil sine masjno Vita labore dedit mortalibus." 
 
 ^ " Midias," p. 41 1, C. * i.e., occasionally and sparingly. 
 
10 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 to walk from being long used to tlieir fetters, so those who 
 for a long time have used compression in their words, if 
 they are suddenly called upon to speak off-hand, retain the 
 same character of expression. But to let mere lads speak 
 extempore is to give rise to the acme of foolish talk. A 
 wretched painter once showed Apelles, they say, a picture, 
 and said, " I have just done it." Apelles replied, " With- 
 out your telling me, I should know it was painted quickly; 
 I only wonder you haven't painted more such in the time." 
 As then (for I now return from my digression), I advise 
 to avoid stilted and bombastic language, so again do I urge 
 to avoid a finical and petty style of speech ; for tall talk is 
 unpopular, and petty language makes no impression. And 
 as the body ought to be not only sound but in good condi- 
 tion, so speech ought to be not only not feeble but vigorous. 
 For a safe mediocrity is indeed praised, but a bold venture- 
 someness is also admired. I am also of the same opinion 
 with regard to the disposition of the soul, which ought to 
 be neither audacious nor timid and easily dejected : for the 
 one ends in impudence and the other in servility ; but to 
 keep in all things the mean between extremes is artistic 
 and proper. And, while I am still on this topic, I wish to 
 give my opinion, that I regard a monotonous speech first 
 as no small proof of want of taste, next as likely to gene- 
 rate disdain, and certain not to please long. For to harp 
 on one string is always tiresome and brings satiety ; where- 
 as variety is pleasant always whether to the ear or eye. 
 
 § X. Next our freeborn lad ought to go in for a course 
 of what is called general knowledge, but a smattering of 
 this will be sufiicient, a taste as it were (for perfect know- 
 ledge of all subjects would be impossible) ; but he must 
 seriously cultivate philosophy. I borrow an illustration 
 to show my meaning : it is well to sail round many cities, 
 but advantageous to live in the best. It was a witty re- 
 mark of the philosopher Bion,^ that, as those suitors who 
 could not seduce Penelope took up with her maids as a 
 fis alter, so those who cannot attain philosophy wear them- 
 selves out in useless pursuits. Philosophy, therefore, ought 
 
 '^ Diogenes Laertius assigns the remark to Aristippiis, while Stobseus 
 fathei's it on Aristo. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 11 
 
 to be regarded as the most important branch of study. 
 For as regards tlie cure of the body, men have found two 
 branches, medicine and exercise : the former of which 
 gives health, and the latter good condition of body ; but 
 philosophy is the only cure for the maladies and disorders 
 of the soul. For with her as ruler and guide we can know 
 what is honourable, what is disgraceful; what is just, what 
 unjust ; generally speaking, what is to be sought after, what 
 to be avoided ; how we ought to behave to the gods, to 
 parents, to elders, to the laws, to foreigners, to rulers, to 
 friends, to women, to children, to slaves : viz., that we 
 ought to worship the gods, honour parents, reverence 
 elders, obey the laws, submit ourselves to rulers, love our 
 friends, be chaste in our relations with women, kind to our 
 children, and not to treat our slaves badly ; and, what is of 
 the greatest importance, to be neither over elated in pros- 
 perity nor over depressed in adversity,^ nor to be dissolute in 
 pleasures, nor fierce and brutish in anger. These I regard 
 as the principal blessings that philosophy teaches. For to 
 enjoy prosperity nobly shows a man ; and to enjoy it with- 
 out exciting envy shows a moderate man ; and to conquer 
 the passions by reason argues a wise man ; and it is not 
 everybody who can keep his temper in control. And those 
 who can unite political ability with philosophy I regard as 
 perfect men, for I take them to attain two of the greatest 
 blessings, serving the state in a public capacity, and living 
 the calm and tranquil life of philosophy. For, as there are 
 three kinds of life, the practical, the contemplative, and 
 the life of enjoyment, and of these three the one devoted 
 to enjoyment is a paltry and animal life, and the practical 
 without philosophy an unlovely and harsh life, and the 
 contemplative without the practical a useless life, so we 
 must endeavour with all our power to combine public life 
 with philosophy as far as circumstances will permit. Such 
 was the life led by Pericles, by Archytas of Tarentum, by 
 Dion of Syracuse, by Epaminondas the Theban, one of 
 whom was a disciple of Plato (viz., Dion). And as to 
 education, I do not know that I need dwell any more on it. 
 
 ^ A favourite thought with the ancients. Compare Isoerates, '*' Ad- 
 monitio ad Demonicum," p. 18 ; and Aristotle, " Nic. Eth.," iv. 3 
 
12 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 But in addition to what 1 have said, it is useful, if not neces- 
 sary, not to neglect to procure old books, and to make a col- 
 lection of them, as is usual in agriculture. For the nse of 
 books is an instrument in education, and it is profitable in 
 learning to go to the fountain head. 
 
 § XI. Exercise also ought not to be neglected, but we 
 ought to send onr boj'S to the master of the gymnasium to 
 train them duly, partly with a view to carrying the body 
 well, partly with a view to strength. For good habit of 
 body in boys is the foundation of a good old age. For 
 as in fine weather we ought to lay up for winter, so in 
 youth one ought to form good habits and live soberly so 
 as to have a reserve stock of strength for old age. Yet 
 ought we to husband the exertions of the body, so as not 
 to be wearied out by them and rendered unfit for study. 
 For, as Plato says,^ excessive sleep and fatigue are enemies 
 to learning. But why dwell on this ? For I am in a hurry 
 to pass to the most important point. Our lads must be 
 trained for warlike encounters, making themselves efficient 
 in hurling the javelin and darts, and in the chase. For 
 the possessions of those who are defeated in battle belong 
 to the conquerors as booty of war ; and war is not the place 
 for delicately brought up bodies : it is the spare warrior 
 that makes the best combatant, who as an athlete cuts his 
 way through the ranks of the enemies. Supposing anyone 
 objects : " How so ? As you undertook to give advice 
 on the education of freeborn children, do you now neglect 
 the poor and plebeian ones, and give instructions only suit- 
 able to the rich ? " It is easy enough to meet such critics. 
 I should prefer to make my teaching general and suitable 
 to all ; but if any, through, their poverty, shall be unable to 
 follow up my precepts, let them blame fortune, and not the 
 author of these hints. We must try with all our might to 
 procure the best education for the poor as well as the rich, 
 but if that is impossible, then we must put up with the 
 practicable. I inserted those matters into my discourse 
 here, that I might hereafter confine myself to all that 
 appertains to the right education of the young. 
 
 § XII. And this I say that we ought to try to draw our 
 boys to good pursuits by entreaties and exhortation, but 
 1 " Republic," vii. p. 489, E. 
 
ON EDUCATION. Vd 
 
 certainly not by blows or abusive language. For that seems 
 to be more fitting for slaves than the freeborn. For slaves 
 try to shirk and avoid their work, partly because of the 
 pain of blows, partly on account of being reviled. But 
 praise or censure are far more useful than abuse to the 
 freeborn, praise pricking them on to virtue, censure deter- 
 ring them from vice. But one must censure and praise 
 alternately : when they are too saucy we must censure- 
 them and make them ashamed of themselves, and again 
 encourage them by praise, and imitate those nurses who, 
 when their children sob, give them the breast to comfort 
 them. But we must not puff them up and make them con- 
 ceited with excessive praise, for that will make them vain 
 and give themselves airs. 
 
 § XIII. And I have ere now seen some fathers, whose ex- 
 cessive love for their children has turned into hatred. My 
 meaning I will endeavour to make clearer by illustration. 
 While they are in too great a hurry to make their sons take- 
 the lead in everything, they lay too much work upon them, 
 so that they faint under their tasks, and, being overbur- 
 dened, are disinclined for learning. For just as plants, 
 grow with moderate rain, but are done for by too much 
 rain, so the mind enlarges by a proper amount of work, 
 but by too much is unhinged. We must therefore give- 
 our boys remission from continuous labour, bearing in 
 mind that all our life is divided into labour and rest ; 
 thus we find not only wakefulness but sleep, not only war 
 but peace, not only foul weather but fine also, not only 
 working days but also festivals. And, to speak concisely, 
 rest is the sauce of labour. And we can see this not only 
 in the case of animate, but even inanimate things, for wo 
 make bows and lyres slack that we may be able to stretch 
 them. And generally the body is preserved by repletion 
 and evacuation, and the soul by rest and work. We ought 
 also to censure some fathers who, after entrusting their 
 sons to tutors and preceptors, neither see nor hear how the- 
 teaching is done. This is a great mistake. For they ought 
 after a few days to test the progress of their sons, and not, 
 to base their hopes on the behaviour of a hireling ; and tho 
 preceptors will take all the more pains with the bo^^s, if they 
 have from time to time to give an account of their progress.. 
 
14 plutaech's morals. 
 
 Hence tbe propriety of that remark of the groom, that 
 nothing fats the horse so much as the king's eye/ And 
 especial attention, in my opinion, mnst be paid to cultivat- 
 ing and exercising the memory of boys, for memory is, as 
 it were, the storehouse of learning ; and that was why they 
 fabled Mnemosyne to be the mother of the Muses, hinting 
 and insinuating that nothing so generates and contributes 
 to the growth of learning as memory. And therefore the 
 memory must be cultivated, whether boys have a good one 
 by nature, or a bad one. For we shall so add to natural 
 good parts, and make up somewhat for natural deficiencies, 
 so that the deficient will be better than others, and the 
 clever will outstrip themselves. For good is that remark 
 of Hesiod, " If to a little you keep adding a little, and do 
 so frequently, it will soon be a lot." ^ And let not fathers 
 forget, that thus cultivating the memory is not only good 
 for education, but is also a great aid in the business of life. 
 For the remembrance of past actions gives a good model 
 how to deal wisely in future ones. 
 
 § XIV. We must also keep our sons from filthy language. 
 For, as Democritus says, Language is the shadow of action. 
 They must also be taught to be affable and courteous. For as 
 want of affability is justly hateful, so hojs will not be dis- 
 agreeable to those they associate with, if they yield occa- 
 sionally in disputes. For it is not only excellent to know 
 how to conquer, but also to know how to be defeated, when 
 victory would be injurious, for there is such a thing as a 
 Cadmean victory.^ I can cite wise Euripides as a witness 
 of the truth of what I say, who says, " When two are talk- 
 ing, and one of them is in a passion, he is the wiser who 
 first gives way."* 
 
 1 will next state something quite as important, in- 
 deed, if anything, even more important. That is, that 
 life must be spent without luxury, the tongue must be 
 
 ^ A famous Proverb. It is " the master's eye " generally, as in 
 Xenophon, " CEconom." xii. 20 ; and Aristotle, " CEconom." i. 6. 
 
 2 " Works and Days," 361, 362. The lines were favourite ones with 
 our author. He quotes them again, § 3, of " How one may be aware of 
 one's Progress in Virtue." 
 
 * See Pausanias, ix. 9. Also Erasmus, " Adagia." 
 
 * A fragment from the " Protesilaus" of Euripides. Our " It takes 
 two to make a quaiTel." 
 
ON EDUCATION. 15 
 
 under control, so mnst the temper and the hands. All 
 this is of extreme importance, as I will show by examples. 
 To begin with the last case, some who have put their hands 
 to unjust gains, have lost all the fruits of their former life, 
 as the Lacedaemonian Gylippus,^ who was exiled from 
 Sparta for embezzling the public money. To be able to 
 govern the temper also argues a wise man. For Socrates, 
 when a very impudent and disgusting young fellow kicked 
 him on one occasion, seeing all the rest of his class vexed 
 and impatient, even to the point of wanting to prosecute 
 the young man, said, " What ! If a young ass kicked me 
 would you have me kick it back ? " Not that the young 
 fellow committed this outrage on Socrates with impunity, 
 for as all reviled him and nicknamed him the kicker, he 
 hung himself. And when Aristophanes brought his 
 " Clouds'^ on the stage, and bespattered Socrates with his 
 gibes and flouts, and one of the spectators said, " Aren't 
 you vexed, Socrates, at his exhibiting you on the stage in 
 this comic light ? " he answered, " Not I, by Zeus, for I 
 look upon the theatre as only a large supper party. "^ 
 Very similar to this was the behaviour of Archytas of 
 Tarentum and Plato. The former, on his return from 
 war, where he had been general, finding his land neglected, 
 called his bailiff, and said to him, "You would have caught 
 it, had I not been very angry." And Plato, very angry with a 
 gluttonous and shameless slave, called his sister's son 
 Speusippus, and said, " Go and beat him, for I am too 
 angry." But someone will say, these examples are diffi- 
 cult and hard to follow. I know it. But we must try, as 
 far as possible, following these examples, to avoid un- 
 governable and mad rage. For we cannot in other respects 
 equal those distinguished men in their ability and virtue, 
 nevertheless we must, like initiating priests of the gods 
 and torchbearers of wisdom, attempt as far as possible 
 to imitate and nibble at their practice. Then, again, if 
 anyone thinks it a small and unimportant matter to govern 
 the tongue, another point I promised to touch on, he is 
 very far from the reality. For silence at the proper season 
 is wisdom, and better than any speech. And that is, I 
 
 ' See Plutarch's Lysander. 
 
 ^ Or symposium, where all sorts of liberties were taken. 
 
16 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 think, the reason why the ancients instituted the mysteries 
 that we, learning therein to be silent, might transfer our 
 secrecy to the gods to human affairs. And no one ever 
 yet repented of his silence, while multitudes have repented 
 of their speaking. And what has not been said is easy to 
 say, while what has been once said can never be recalled. 
 I have heard of myriads who have fallen into the greatest 
 misfortunes through inability to govern their tongues. 
 Passing over the rest, I will mention one or two cases in 
 point. When Ptolemy Philadelphus married his sister 
 Arsinoe, Sotades said, " You are contracting an unholy 
 marriage."^ For this speech he long lingered in prison, 
 and paid the righteous penalty for his unseasonable bab- 
 bling, and had to weep a long time for making others 
 laugh. Theocritus the Sophist similarly cracked his jokes, 
 and had to pay even a greater penalty. For when Alex- 
 ander ordered the Greeks to furnish him with purple robes 
 to wear at the sacrifices on his triumphal return from war 
 against the barbarians, and his subjects contributed so 
 much per head, Theocritus said, " Before I doubted, but now 
 I am sure, that this is the purple death Homer speaks of."^ 
 By this speech he made Alexander his enemy. The same 
 Theocritus put Antigonus, the King of the Macedonians, a 
 one-eyed man, into a thundering rage by alluding to his 
 misfortune. For the King sent his chief cook, Eutropio, 
 an important person at his court, to go and fetch Theo- 
 critus before him to confer with him, and when he had fre- 
 quently requested him to come without avail, Theocritus 
 at last said, " I know well you wish to serve me up raw 
 to the Cyclops ; " flouting the King as one-eyed and the 
 cook with his profession. Eutropio replied, " You shall 
 lose your head, and pay the penalty for this babbling and 
 mad insolence ;" and reported his words to the King, who 
 sent and had his head taken off. Our boys must also be 
 taught to speak the truth as a most sacred duty ; for to lie 
 is servile, and most hateful in all men, hardly to be par- 
 doned even in poor slaves. 
 
 § XV. Thus much have I said about the good conduct 
 
 ^ I have softened his phrase. His actual words were very coarse, 
 and would naturally be resented by Ptolemy. See Athensaus, 62 1, A. 
 2 See " Iliad," v. 83 ; xvi. 334 ; xx. 477. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 17 
 
 and self-control of bojs without any doubt or hesitation : 
 but as to what I am now going to say I am doubtful and 
 undecided, and like a person weighed in the scales against 
 exactly his weight, and feel great hesitation as to whether 
 I should recommend or dissuade the practice. But I must 
 speak out. The question is this — whether we ought to let 
 the lovers of our boys associate and be with them, or on 
 the contrary, debar them from their company and scare 
 them off. For when I look at fathers self-opinionated 
 sour and austere, who think their sons having lovers a dis- 
 grace not to be borne, I am rather afraid of recommending 
 the practice. But when, on the other hand, I think of 
 Socrates, Xenophon, ^schines, Cebes, and all the com- 
 pany of those men who have approved of male loves, and 
 who have introduced their minions to learning, to high 
 positions in the State, and to good morals, I change my 
 opinion, and am moved to emulate those men. And 
 Euripides seems to favour these views in the passage, " But 
 there is among mortals another love, that of the righteous 
 temperate and pure soul."^ Nor must we omit the re- 
 mark of Plato, which seems to mix seriousness with mirth, 
 that " those who have distinguished themselves ought to 
 be permitted to kiss any handsome boy they like."^ Those 
 then that seek only carnal enjoyment must be kept off, but 
 those that love the soul must be encouraged. And while 
 the loves common at Thebes and Elis, and the so-called 
 rape at Crete, must be avoided, the loves of Athens and 
 Lacedaemon should be emulated. 
 
 § xvi. As to this matter, therefore, let every parent 
 follow his inclination. And now, as I have spoken about 
 the good and decent behaviour of boys, I shall change my 
 subject and speak a little about youths. For I have often 
 censured the introducers of bad habits, who have set over 
 boys tutors and preceptors, but have given to youths full 
 liberty, when they ought, on the contrary, to have watched 
 and guarded them more than boys. For who does not 
 know that the offences of boys are petty and easily cured, 
 and proceed from the carelessness of tutors or want of 
 
 A fragment from the " Dictys " of Euripides. 
 " Eepubl." V. 463, F. sq. 
 
 C 
 
18 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 obedience to preceptors ; but the faults of young men are 
 often grave and serious, as gluttony, and robbing their 
 fathers, and dice, and revellings, and drinking-bouts, and 
 deflowering of maidens, and seducing of married women. 
 Such outbreaks ought to be carefully checked and curbed. 
 For that prime of life is prodigal in pleasure, and frisky, 
 and needs a bridle, so that those parents who do not 
 strongly check that period, are foolishly, if unawares, giv- 
 ing their youths license for vice.^ Sensible parents, there- 
 fore, ought during all that period to guard and watch and 
 restrain their youths, by precepts, by threats, by entreaties, 
 by advice, by promises, by citing examples,^ on the one 
 hand, of those who have come to ruin by being too fond of 
 pleasure, on the other hand, of those who by their self- 
 control have attained to praise and good report. For these 
 are, as it were, the two elements of virtue, hope of honour, 
 and fear of punishment ; the former inciting to good prac- 
 tices, the latter deterring from bad. 
 
 § XVII. We ought, at all hazards, to keep our boys also 
 from association with bad men, for they will catch some of 
 their villany. This was the meaning of Pythagoras' enig- 
 matical precepts, which I shall quote and explain, as they 
 give no slight momentum towards the acquisition of virtue : 
 as, Do not touch hlach tails : that is, do not associate with 
 bad men.^ Do not go beyond the halance : that is, we must 
 pay the greatest attention to justice and not go beyond it. 
 Do not sit on a measure: that is, do not be lazy, but earn 
 to-morrow's bread as well as to-day's. Do not give everyone 
 your right hand : that is, do not be too ready to strike up a 
 friendship. Do not wear a tight ring : that is, let your life 
 be free, do not bind yourself by a chain. Do not poke the 
 fire ivith a sword : that is, do not provoke an angry person, 
 jbut yield to such. Do not eat the heart : do not wear away 
 the heart by anxiety. Abstain from beans: that is, do not 
 meddle in state affairs, for the voting for offices was 
 formerly taken by beans. Do not put your food in the 
 chamber-pot : that is, do not throw your pearls before swine, 
 lOr words are the food of the mind, and the villany of men 
 
 ' Cf. Shakespeare's " Winter Tale," Act iii. sc. iii. 59-63. 
 
 ' As Horace's father did. See " Satires," Book i. Sat. iv. 105-129. 
 
 ^ What we call black sleep. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 19 
 
 twist them to a corrupt meaning. When you have come to 
 the end of a joiirney do not look bach : that is, when people 
 are going to die and see that their end is near, thej ought to 
 take it easily and not be dejected. But I will return from 
 my digression. We must keep our boys, as I said, from 
 association with all bad men, but especially from flatterers. 
 For, as I have often said to parents, and still say, and will 
 constantly affirm, there is no race more pestilential, nor 
 more sure to ruin youths swiftly, than the race of flatterers, 
 who destroy both parents and sons root and branch, 
 making the old age of the one and the youth of the others 
 miserable, holding out pleasure as a sure bait. The sons 
 of the rich are by their fathers urged to be sober, but by 
 them to be drunk ; by their fathers to be chaste, by them 
 to wax wanton ; by their fathers to save, by them to spend ; 
 by their fathers to be industrious, by them to be lazy. For 
 they say, " ' Our life's but a span ;'^ we can only live once ; 
 why should you heed your father's threats ? he's an old 
 twaddler, he has one foot in the grave ; we shall soon hoist 
 him up and carry him off to burial." Some even pimp for 
 them and supply them with prostitutes or even married 
 women, and cut huge slices off the father's savings for old 
 age, if they don't run off with them altogether. An 
 accursed tribe, feigning friendship, knowing nothing of real 
 freedom, flatterers of the rich, despisers of the poor, drawn 
 to young men by a sort of natural logic,^ showing their 
 teeth and grinning all over when their patrons laugh,^ 
 misbegotten brats of fortune and bastard elements in life, 
 living according to the nod of the rich, free in their cir- 
 cumstances, but slaves by inclination, when they are not 
 insulted thinking themselves insulted, because they are 
 parasites to no purpose. So, if any father cares for the 
 good bringing-up of his sons, he must banish from his 
 house this abominable race. He must also be on his guard 
 against the viciousness of his sons' schoolfellows, for they 
 are quite sufficient to corrupt the best morals. 
 
 § XVIII. What I have said hitherto is apropos to my 
 
 ^ From Simonides. Cf. Seneca, " Epist." xlix. " Punctum est quod 
 vivimus, et adhuc puncto minus." 
 
 ^ Reading with Wyttenbach, ojg k Xoytsfyg tsx^vq- 
 ^ Like Carker in Dombey. 
 
20 plutaech's morals. 
 
 subject: I will now speak a word to tlie men. Parents 
 must not be over harsh and rough in their natures, but 
 must often forgive their sons' offences, remembering that 
 they themselves were once young. And just as doctors by- 
 infusing a sweet flavour into their bitter potions find 
 delight a passage to benefit, so fathers must temper the 
 severity of their censure by mildness ; and sometimes relax 
 and slacken the reins of their sons' desires, and again 
 tighten them ; and must be especially easy in respect to 
 their faults, or if they are angry must soon cool down. 
 For it is better for a father to be hot-tempered than sullen, 
 for to continue hostile and irreconcilable looks like hating 
 one's son. And it is good to seem not to notice some 
 faults, but to extend to them the weak sight and deafness 
 of old age, so as seeing not to see, and hearing not to hear, 
 their doings. We tolerate the faults of our friends ; why 
 should we not that of our sons ? often even our slaves* 
 drunken debauches we do not expose. Have you been 
 rather near ? spend more freely. Have you been vexed ? 
 let the matter pass. Has your son deceived you by the 
 help of a slave ? do not be angry. Did he take a yoke of 
 oxen from the field, did he come home smelling of yes- 
 terday's debauch ? wink at it. Is he scented like a perfume 
 shop ? say nothing. Thus frisky youth gets broken in.^ 
 
 § XIX. Those of our sons who are given to pleasure and 
 pay little heed to rebuke, we must endeavour to marry, 
 for marriage is the surest restraint upon youth. And we 
 must marry our sons to wives not much richer or better 
 born, for the proverb is a sound one, " Marry in your own 
 walk of life."^ For those who marry wives superior to 
 themselves in rank are not so much the husbands of their 
 wives as unawares slaves to their dowries.^ 
 
 § XX. I shall add a few remarks, and then bring my 
 subject to a close. Before all things fathers must, by a 
 good behaviour, set a good example to their sons, that, 
 looking at their lives as a mirror, they may turn away from 
 
 ^ Compare the character of Micio in the " Adelphi " of Terence. 
 
 2 This saying is assij^ned by Diogenes Laertius to Pittacus. 
 
 3 Compare Plautus, " Asinaria," i. 1. 74. " Argentum accepi : doto 
 imperium vendidi." Compare also our author, " Whether Vice is suffi- 
 cient to cause Unhappiness, " § i. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 21 
 
 l)ad deeds and words. For those fathers who censnre their 
 sons' faults while they themselves commit the same, are 
 really their own accusers, if they know it not, under their 
 sons' name ; and those who live a depraved life have no 
 right to censure their slaves, far less their sons. And 
 besides this they will become counsellors and teachers of 
 their sons in wrongdoing ; for where old men are shameless 
 j^ouths will of a certainty have no modesty. We must 
 therefore take all jiains to teach our sons self-control, 
 emulating the conduct of Eurydice, who, though an 
 Illyrian and more than a barbarian, to teach her sons 
 educated herself though late in life, and her love to them 
 is well depicted in the inscription which she offered to 
 the Muses : " Eurydice of Hierapolis made this offering to 
 the Muses, having conceived a vast love for knowledge. 
 Eor when a mother with sons full-grown she learnt letters, 
 the preservers of knowledge." 
 
 To carry out all these precepts would be perhaps a 
 visionary scheme ; but to attain to many, though it would 
 need a happy disposition and much care, is a thing possible 
 to human nature.^ 
 
 ON" LOYE TO ONE'S OFFSPRING. 
 
 § I. Appeals to foreign law-courts were first devised 
 among the Greeks through mistrust of one another's justice, 
 for they looked on justice as a necessity not indigenous 
 among them. Is it not on much the same principle that 
 the philosophers, in regard to some of their questions, 
 owing to their variety of opinion, have appealed to the 
 brute creation as to a strange state, and submitted the 
 decision to their instincts and habits as not to be talked over 
 
 ^ Wyttenbach thinks this treatise is not Plutarch's. He bases his 
 conclusion partly on external, partly on internal, grounds. It is not 
 quoted by Stobseus, or any of the ancients, before the fourteenth 
 century. And its style is not Plutarch's ; it has many words foreign 
 to Plutarch: it has "nescio quid novum ac peregrinum, ab ilia 
 Plutarchea copia et gravitate diversum leve et inane." Certainly its 
 matter is superior to its manner. 
 
22 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and impartial ? Or is it a general charge against human in- 
 firmity that, having different opinions on the most necessary 
 and important things, we seek in horses and dogs and birds 
 how to marry and beget and rear children, as though we 
 had no means of making our own nature known, and appeal 
 to the habits and instincts of the brute creation, and call 
 them in to bear witness against the many deviations from 
 nature in our lives, which from the first are confused and 
 disorderly. For among the brutes nature remains ever 
 the same, pure and simple, but in men, owing to reason 
 and habit, like oil in the hands of the perfumers, being 
 mixed up with many added opinions, it becomes various 
 and loses its original simplicity. And let us not wonder 
 that the brutes follow nature more closely than human 
 beings, for in that respect even they are outstripped by 
 inanimate things, which, being dowered neither with imagi- 
 nation nor any appetite or inclination contrary to nature, 
 ever continue in the one path which nature has prescribed 
 for them, as if they were tied and bound. But in brutes 
 the gentleness of mood inspired by reason, the subtlety, 
 the love of freedom, are not qualities found in excess, but 
 they have unreasonable appetites and desires, and act in a 
 roundabout way within certain limits, riding, as it were, 
 at the anchor of nature, and only going straight under bit 
 and bridle. But in man reason, which is absolute master, 
 inventing different modes and fashions of life, has left no 
 plain or evident trace of nature/ 
 
 § II. Consider in their marriages how much the animals 
 follow nature. For they do not wait for any legislation 
 about bachelor or late-married, like the citizens of Lycurgus 
 and Solon, nor do they fear penalties for childlessness, nor 
 are they anxious for the jits trimn liherorum,^ like many of 
 the Romans, who only marry and have children for the 
 privileges it bestows, not to have heirs, but to be qualified 
 for succeeding themselves to inheritances. Then, again, 
 
 ^ Much of this is very corrupt in the Greek. I have tried to get the 
 best sense I could ; but it is very obscure. Certainly Plutarch's style 
 is often very harsh and crabbed. 
 
 ^ The jus trium liberorum assigned certain privileges to the father of 
 three children, under the Roman Emperors. Frequent allusions are 
 made to this law by the ancient writers. 
 
ON LOYE TO one's OFFSPRING. 23 
 
 the male animal does not go with the female at all times ; 
 for its aim is not pleasure but procreation : so in the season 
 of spring, the most appropriate time for such pairings,^ the 
 female being submissive and tender attracts the male by 
 her beautiful condition of body, coming as she does from 
 the dew and fresh pastures, and when pregnant modestly 
 retires and takes thought for the birth and safety of her 
 offspring. We cannot adequately describe all this, but every 
 animal exhibits for its young affection and forethought 
 and endurance and unselfishness. We call the bee wise, and 
 celebrate its "making the yellow honey,"^ flattering it for its 
 tickling sweetness ; but we neglect the wisdom and in- 
 genuity of other creatures, both as regards the birth and 
 bringing up of their young. For example, the kingfisher after 
 conception weaves its nest with the thorns of the marine 
 needle, making it round and oblong in shape like a fisher- 
 man's basket, and after deftly and closely weaving it 
 together, subjects it to the action of the sea waves, that its 
 surface may be rendered waterproof by this plash and 
 cement, and it is hard for even iron or stone to break it. 
 And what is more wonderful still, so symmetrically is the 
 entrance of the nest adjusted to the kingfisher's shape and 
 size, that no beast either greater or smaller can enter 
 it, they even say that it does not admit the sea, or even the 
 very smallest things. And cats, when they breed, very 
 often let their kittens go out and feed, and take them back 
 into their entrails again. ^ And the bear, a most savage 
 and ugly beast, gives birth to its young without shape or 
 joints, and with its tongue as with an instrument moulds 
 its features, so that it seems to give form as well as life 
 to its progeny. And the lion in Homer, " whom the 
 hunters meet in the wood with its whelps, exulting in its 
 strength, which so frowns that it hides its eyes," does it 
 not intend to bargain with the hunters for its whelps ? For 
 universally the love of animals for their offspring makes 
 timid ones bold, and lazy ones energetic, and greedy ones 
 
 ^ Compare Lucretius, i. 10-20. 
 * A quotation from Simonides. 
 
 ^ We are not bound to swallow all the ancients tell us. Credat 
 Judaeus Apella ! * ♦' Iliad," xvii. 134-136. 
 
24 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 unselfish. And so the bird in Homer, feeding its young 
 " with its beak, with whatever it has captured, even though 
 it goes ill with itself,"^ nourishes its young at the cost 
 of its own hunger, and when the food is near its maw 
 abstains from it, and holds it tightly in its mouth, that it 
 may not gulp it down unawares. "And so a bitch be- 
 striding her tender pups, barks at a strange man, and 
 yearns for the fray,"^ making her fear for them a sort of 
 second anger. And partridges when they are pursued 
 with their young let them fly on, and, contriving their 
 safety, themselves fly so near the sportsmen as to be almost 
 caught, and then wheel round, and again fly back and make 
 the sportsmen hope to catch them, till at last, having thus 
 provided for the safety of their young, they lead the sports- 
 men on a long way. As to hens, we see every day how they 
 watch over their chicks, dropping their wings over some, 
 and letting others climb on their backs, or anywhere about 
 them, and clucking for joy all the time : and though they 
 fly from dogs and dragons when only afraid for themselves, 
 if they are afraid for their chicks they stand their ground 
 and fight valiantly. Are we to suppose then that nature 
 has only implanted these instincts in fowls and dogs and 
 bears, anxious only about their offspring, to put us mortals 
 out of countenance and to give us a bad name ? considering 
 these examples for us to follow, while disgrace justly 
 attaches to our inhumanity, for mankind only is accused 
 of having no disinterested affection, and of not knowing how 
 to love except in regard to advantage. For that line is 
 greatly admired in the theatres, " Man loves man only for 
 reward," and is the view of Epicurus, who thinks that 
 the father so loves his son, the mother her child, children 
 their parents. Whereas, if the brutes could understand 
 conversation, and if anyone were to introduce horses and 
 cows and dogs and birds into a common theatre,^ and 
 were to change the sentiment into " neither do dogs love 
 their pups, nor horses their foals, nor birds their young, out 
 
 ' " Iliad," ix. 324. Quoted again in " Ilowone may be aware of one's 
 Progress in Virtue," §'8. ^ '* Odyssey," xx. 14, 15. 
 
 ^ A theatre, that is, in which animals and bii-ds and human beings 
 should meet in common. 
 
ON LOVE TO one's OFFSPRING. 25 
 
 of interest, but gratuitously and by nature," it would be 
 recognized by the affections of all of them to be a true 
 sentiment. Why it would be disgraceful, great God, that 
 birth and travail and procreation should be gratis and 
 mere nature among the beasts, while among mankind they 
 should be merely mercenary transactions ! 
 
 § III. But such a statement is not true or worthy of 
 credit. For as nature, in wild growths, such as wild vines, 
 wild figs, or wild olives, makes the fruit imperfect and 
 inferior to the fruit of cultivated trees, so has she given to 
 the brutes an imperfect affection for their kind, one neither 
 marked by justice nor going beyond commodity : whereas 
 to man, a logical and social animal, she has taught jastice 
 and law, and honour to the gods, and building of cities, 
 and philanthropy, and has contributed the noble and goodly 
 and fruitful seeds of all these in love to one's offspring, 
 thereby following the very first elements that are found in 
 the construction of the body. For nature is everywhere 
 perfect and artistic and complete, and, to borrow the ex- 
 pression of Erasistratus, has nothing tawdry about her: 
 but one cannot adequately describe all the processes apper- 
 taining to birth, nor would it be perhaps decent to pry too 
 closely into such hidden matters, and to particularize too 
 minutely all their wondrous ingenuity. But her contrivance 
 and dispensation of milk alone is sufficient to prove nature's 
 wonderful care and forethought. For all the superfluous 
 blood in women, that owing to their languor and thinness 
 of spirit floats about on the surface and oppresses them, 
 has a safety-valve provided by nature in the menses, which 
 relieve and cleanse the rest of the body, and fit the womb 
 for conception in due season. But after conception nature 
 stops the menses, and arrests the flow of the blood, using 
 it as aliment for the babe in the womb, until the time 
 arrives for its birth, and it requires a different kind of food. 
 At this stage the blood is most ingeniously changed into a 
 supply of milk, not diffused all over the body, but externally 
 in the breasts, so that the babe can with its mouth imbibe 
 the gentle and soothing nutriment.^ But all these various 
 
 ^ All that is said here about the milk, the menses, and the blood, I 
 have been obliged somewhat to condense and paraphrase. The ancients 
 
26 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 processes of nature, all this economy, all this forethought, 
 would be useless, had not nature also implanted in mothers 
 love to their offspring and anxiety for their welfare. 
 
 " For of all things, that on the earth do breathe 
 Or creep, man is by far the wretchedest." ^ 
 
 And the poet's words are especially applicable to a new- 
 born babe. For there is nothing so imperfect, so helpless, 
 so naked, so shapeless, so foul as a newborn babe: to whom 
 almost alone nature has given an impure outlet to the light 
 of day : being kneaded with blood, and full of defilement, 
 and like one killed rather than born : which no one would 
 touch, or lift up, or kiss, or embrace, but from natural 
 affection. And that is why all the animals have their 
 udders under the belly, women alone have their breasts 
 high on their bodies, that they can lift up their babes to 
 kiss, to dandle, and to fondle : seeing that their bearing 
 and rearing children comes not from necessity but love. 
 
 § lY. Refer the question to the ancient inhabitants of the 
 earth, to the first mothers and fathers. There was no 
 law ordering them to have families, no expectation of 
 advantage or return to be got out of them, I should rather 
 say that mothers would be likely to be hostile and bear 
 malice to their babes, owing to the great danger and pains 
 of travail. And women say the lines, " When the sharp 
 pangs of travail seize on the pregnant woman, then come 
 to her aid the Ilithyiae, who help women in hard child- 
 birth, those daughters of Hera, goddesses of travail,"^ were 
 not written by Homer, but by some Homerid who had been 
 a mother, or was even then in the throes of travail, and 
 who vividly felt the sharp pain in her womb. But the 
 love to one's offspring implanted by nature, moves and 
 influences the mother even then : in the very height of 
 her throes, she neglects not nor flees from her babe, but 
 turns to it and smiles at it, and takes it up and caresses it, 
 though she derives no pleasure or utility from it, but with 
 pain and sorrow receives it, " warming it and fostering it 
 
 sometimes speak more plainly than we can. Ever and anon one must 
 pare down a phrase or word in translating an ancient author. It is in- 
 evitable. Verbum sat sapienti. 
 
 » Homer, " Iliad," xvii. 446, 447. 
 
 2 Ibid. xi. 269-271. 
 
ON LOVE TO one's OFFSPRING. 27 
 
 in swaddling clothes, with unintermittent assiduity both 
 night and day." ^ What hope of gain or advantage had 
 they in those days ? nay, or even now ? for the hopes of 
 parents are uncertain, and have to be long waited for. He 
 who plants a vine in the spring equinox, gleans its vintage 
 in the aotumnal equinox ; he who sows corn when the 
 Pleiads set, reaps it when they rise ; cattle and horses and 
 birds have produce at once fit for use ; whereas man's 
 bringing up is toilsome, his growth slow ; and as ex- 
 cellence flowers late, most fathers die before their sons 
 attain to fame. Neocles lived not to see Themistocles' 
 victory at Salamis, nor Miltiades Cimon's at the Eurymedon, 
 nor did Xanthippus hear Pericles haranguing, nor did 
 Aristo hear Plato philosophizing, nor did their fathers 
 know of the triumphs of Euripides and Sophocles. They 
 heard them faltering in speech and lisping in syllables, the 
 poor parents saw their errors in revelling and drinking and 
 love-affairs, so that of all Evenus' ^ lines, that one alone is 
 most remembered and quoted, " to a father a son is always 
 a cause of fear or pain." N^evertheless, parents do not 
 cease to bring up sons, even when they can least need 
 them. For it is ridiculous to suppose that the rich, when 
 they have sons, sacrifice and rejoice that they will have 
 people to take care of them and to bury them ; unless 
 indeed they bring up sons from want of heirs ; as if one 
 could not find or fall in with anyone who would be willing 
 to have another's property ! Why, the sand on the sea 
 shore, and the dust, and the wings of birds of varied note, 
 are less numerous than the number of would-be heirs. 
 For had Danaus, the father of fifty daughters, been child- 
 less, he would have had more heirs, and of a different 
 spirit. For sons have no gratitude, nor regard, nor venera- 
 tion for inheritance ; but take it as a debt ; whereas the 
 voices of strangers which you hear round the childless man, 
 are like those lines in the play, " People, first bathe, 
 after one decision in the courts, then eat, drink, gobble, 
 take the three-obol-piece."^ And what Euripides has 
 said, " Money finds friends for men, and has the greatest 
 
 ^ A fragment from Euripides, according to Xylander, 
 ^ Evenus of Paros was an Elegiac Poet, 
 ^ Aristophanes, "Equites," 50, 51. 
 
28 plutaech's morals. 
 
 power among mankind," is not merely a general truth, but 
 is espeoiallj true in the case of the childless. For those 
 the rich entertain to dinner, those great men pay court to, 
 to those alone orators give their services gratis. " A 
 mighty personage is a rich man, whose heir is unknown." 
 It has at any rate made many much loved and honoured, 
 whom the possession of one child would have made un- 
 loved and insignificant. Whence we see that there is no 
 power or advantage to be got from children, but that the 
 love of them, alike in mankind as among the animals, pro- 
 ceeds entirely from nature. 
 
 § v. What if this natural affection, like many other 
 virtues, is obscured by badness, as a wilderness chokes a 
 garden ? Are we to say that man does not love himself 
 by nature, because many cut their throats or throw them- 
 selves down precipices ? Did not CEdipus put out his 
 eyes ? And did not Hegesias by his speeches make many 
 of his hearers to commit suicide ? ^ " Fatality has many 
 different aspects." ^ But all these are diseases and maladies 
 of the soul driving a man contrary to nature out of his 
 wits : as men themselves testify even against themselves. 
 For if a sow destroys one of its litter, or a bitch one of its 
 pups, men are dejected and troubled, and think it an evil 
 omen, and sacrifice to the gods to avert any bad results, on 
 the score that it is natural to all to love and cherish their 
 offspring, unnatural to destroy it. For just as in mines the 
 gold is conspicuous even though mixed up with earth, so 
 nature manifests plainly love to offspring even in instances 
 of faulty habits and affections. For when the poor do not 
 rear their children, it is from fear that if reared to man's 
 estate they would be more than ought to be the case servile, 
 and have little culture, and be debarred of all advantages : 
 so, thinking poverty the worst of all evils, they cannot bear 
 to give it their children, any more than they would some 
 bad disease.'* 
 
 1 See Cicero " Tusciil." i. 34. 
 
 2 Eux-ipides, "Alcestis," 1159; "Helena," 1688; "Andromache," 
 1284; "Bacchffi," 1388. 
 
 3 The discoul-se breaks off abruptly. It is directed ^^gainst the 
 Epicureans. It throws ridicule on appealing to tlie affection of brutes 
 for their offspring instead of appealing to human nature. 
 
ON LOTE. 29 
 
 ON LOVE. 
 
 FLAVIANUS AND AUTOBULUS, THE OPENERS OF THE DIALOGUE, 
 ARE BROTHERS. THE OTHER SPEAKERS ARE THEIR FATHER, 
 DAPHNiEUS, PROTOGENES, PISIAS, AND OTHERS. 
 
 I. Flavianus. — You say that it was on Mount Helicon, 
 Autobulus, that those conversations took place about Love, 
 which you are now about to narrate to us at our request, 
 as you either wrote them down, or at least remember them 
 from frequently asking our father about them. 
 
 Autohulus. — It was on Mount Helicon among the Muses, 
 Flavianus, when the people of Thespise were celebrating 
 their Festival to the God of Love, which they celebrate 
 very magnificently and splendidly every five years to that 
 God, as also to the Muses. 
 
 Flavianus. — Do you know what all of us who have como 
 to this audience intend to ask of you ? 
 
 Autohulus. — No, but I shall know if you tell me. 
 
 Flavianus. — Remove from your discourse for this one© 
 the poet's meadows and shades, and talk about ivy and 
 yews, and all other commonplaces of that kind that writers 
 love to introduce, with more zeal than discretion, in imita- 
 tion of Plato's Ilissus and the famous willow and tho 
 gentle slope of grass. ^ 
 
 Autobulus. — My dear Flavianus, my narrative needs not 
 any such exordium. The occasion that caused the conver- 
 sation simply demands a chorus for the action and a stage, 
 nothing else is wanting to the drama, let us only pray to 
 the Mother of the Muses to be propitious, and give me 
 memory for my narrative. 
 
 § II. Long ago our father, before we were born, having 
 lately married our mother, had gone to sacrifice to the God 
 of Love, in consequence of a dispute and variance that 
 broke out among their parents, and took our mother to the 
 Festival, for she also had her part in the vow and sacrifice. 
 Some of their intimate friends journeyed with them from 
 the town where they lived, and when they got to Thespian 
 
 * The allusion is to Plato's " Pheedrus," p, 230, B, Much, indeedj 
 of the subject-matter here is, we shall find, somewhat similar to that ol 
 the Phjedrus. 
 
*S0 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 they found there Daphnaeus the son of Archidamus, a 
 lover of Lysandra the daughter of Simo, and of all her 
 suitors the one who stood highest in her favour, and 
 Soclarus the son of Aristio, vrho had come from Tithorea. 
 And there were there also Protogenes of Tarsus, and 
 Zeuxippus from Sparta, strangers, and my father said most 
 of the most notable Boeotians were there also. For two or 
 three days they went about the town in one another's 
 company, as it was likely they would do, quietly carrying 
 on philosophical discussions in the wrestling- schools and 
 theatres : after that, to avoid a wearisome contest of 
 harpers, decided beforehand by canvassing and cabal, most 
 broke up their camp as if they had been in a hostile 
 country, and removed to Mount Helicon, and bivouacked 
 there with the Muses. In the morning they were visited 
 by Anthemion and Pisias, both men of good repute, and 
 very great friends of Baccho, who was surnamed the Hand- 
 some, and also rivals of one another somewhat through 
 their affection for him. Now you must know that there 
 was at Thespise a lady called Ismenodora, famous for her 
 wealth and good family, and of uncommon good repute for 
 her virtuous life : for she had been a widow some time 
 without a breath of slander lighting upon her, though she 
 was young and good-looking. As Baccho was the son of a 
 friend and crony of hers, she had tried to bring about a 
 marriage between him and a maiden who was her own 
 relation, but by frequently being in his company and talk- 
 ing to him she had got rather smitten with him herself. 
 And hearing much in his favour, and often talking about 
 him, and seeing that many noble young men were in love 
 with him, she fell violently in love with him, and, being 
 resolved to do nothing unbecoming to her fair fame, 
 •determined to marry and live openly with him. And the 
 matter seeming in itself rather odd, Baccho's mother looked 
 rather askance at the proposed matrimonial alliance as 
 being too high and splendid for her son, while some of his 
 companions who used to go out hunting with him, frighten- 
 ing him and flouting him with Ismenodora's being rather 
 too old for him, really did more to break off the match 
 than those who seriously opposed it. And Baccho, being 
 only a youth, somehow felt a little ashamed at the idea of 
 
ON LOVE. 31 
 
 marrying a widow, but, neglecting the opinions of every- 
 body else, he submitted the decision as to the expediency 
 of the marriage to Pisias and Anthemion, the latter being 
 his cousin, though older than him, and the former the 
 gravest * of his lovers. Pisias objected to the marriage, and 
 upbraided Anthemion with throwing the youth away on 
 Ismenodora. Anthemion replied that it was not well in 
 Pisias, being a good fellow in other respects, to imitate 
 depraved lovers by shutting out his friend from house and 
 marriage and wealth, merely that he might enjoy the sight 
 of him as long as possible naked and in all his virgin 
 bloom at the wrestling-schools. 
 
 § III. To avoid getting estranged by provoking one 
 another on the question, they came and chose our father 
 and his companions as umpires on the matter. And of the 
 other friends, as if by concerted arrangement, Daphnaeus 
 espoused the view of Anthemion, and Protogenes the view 
 of Pisias. And Protogenes inveighing somewhat too freely 
 against Ismenodora, Daphnaeus took him up and said, 
 *' Hercules, what are we not to expect, if Protogenes is 
 going to be hostile to love ? he whose whole life, whether 
 in work or at play, has been devoted to love, in forgetful- 
 ness of letters, in forgetfulness of his country, not like 
 Laius, away from his country only five days, his was 
 only a torpid and land love : whereas your love ' unfold- 
 ing its swift wings,' flew over the sea from Cilicia to 
 Athens, merely to gaze at and saunter about with handsome 
 boys. For that was the original reason, doubtless, of 
 Protogenes' journey abroad." 
 
 § IV. And some laughter ensuing, Protogenes replied, 
 *' Do I really seem to you now to be hostile to love, and 
 not to be fighting for love against ungovernable lust, 
 which with most disgraceful acts and emotions assumes 
 the most honourable of titles ? " Whereupon Daphnaeus, 
 "Do you call the marriage and union of man and woman 
 most disgraceful, than which no holier tie exists nor ever 
 
 ^ It is difficult to know what the best English word here is. Yrora 
 the sly thrust in § ix. Pisias was evidently grey. I have therefore 
 selected the word gravest. But the most aiistere, the most sensible, the 
 most solid, the most sedate, all might express the Greek word also. Let 
 the reader take which he likes best. 
 
32 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 did ? " Protogenes replied, " Why, as all this is necessary 
 for the human race to continue, our legislators do not act 
 amiss in crying up marriage and eulogizing it to the 
 masses, but of genuine love there is not a particle in the 
 woman's side of a house ; ^ and I also say that you who 
 are sweet on women and girls only love them as flies love 
 milk, and bees the honey-comb, and butchers and cooks 
 calves and birds, fattening them up in darkness.^ But as 
 nature leads one to eat and drink moderately and suflB.- 
 ciently, and excess in this is called gluttony and gorman- 
 dizing, so the mutual desires between men and women are 
 natural; but that headlong, violent, and uncontrollable 
 passion for the sex is not rightly called love. For love, 
 when it seizes a noble and young soul, ends in virtue 
 through friendship ; but these violent passions for women, at 
 the best, aim only at carnal enjoyment and reaping the 
 harvest of a beauteous prime, as Aristippus showed in his 
 answer to one who told him Lais loved him not, ' No more,' 
 he said, ' do meat and wine love me, but I gladly enjoy 
 both.' ^ For the end of passion is pleasure and fruition : but 
 love, when it has once lost the promise of friendship, will 
 not remain and continue to cherish merely for beauty that 
 which gives it pain, where it gives no return of friendship 
 and virtue. You remember the husband in the play saying 
 to his wife, ' Do you hate me ? I can bear that hatred 
 very easily, since of my dishonour I make money.' Not a 
 whit more really in love than this husband is the one, who, 
 not for gain but merely for the sexual appetite, puts up 
 with a peevish and unsympathetic wife, as Philippides, the 
 comic poet, ridiculed the orator, Stratocles, 'You scarce 
 can kiss her if she turns her back on you.' If, however, 
 we ought to give the name of love to this passion, then is 
 it an effeminate and bastard love, and like at Cynosarges,* 
 taking us to the woman's side of the house : or rather as 
 
 '■ In a Greek house the women and men had each their own separate 
 apartments. This must be borne in mind here to explain the allusion. 
 
 ^ That is, from interested and selfish motives. 
 
 3 On Lais and Aristippus see Cicero, " Ad. Fam.," ix. 26. 
 
 ^ Pausanias, i. 19, shows us that there was at Athens a Temple of 
 Hercules called Cynosarges. But the matter is obscure. What the 
 exact allusion is I cannot say. 
 
ON LOYE. 33 
 
 they say there is a genuine mountain eagle, which Homer 
 called ' black, and a bird of prey,' and there are other 
 kinds of spurious eagles, which catch fisli and lazy birds 
 in marshes, and often in want of food emit an hungry wail : 
 so the genuine love is the love of boys, a love not ' flashing 
 with desire,' as Anacreon said the love of maidens was, nor 
 * redolent of ointment and sprightly,' but you will see it 
 plain and without airs in the schools of the philosophers, 
 or perhaps in the gymnasiums and wrestling-schools, 
 keenly and nobly pursuing youths, and urging on to virtue 
 those who are well worthy of attention : but that soft 
 and stay-at-home love, spending all its time in women's 
 bosoms and beds, always pursuing effeminate delights, and 
 enervated by unmanly, unfriendly, and unimpassioned 
 pleasures, we ought to condemn as Solon condemned it : 
 for he forbade slaves to love boys or to anoint them with 
 oil, while he allowed them to associate with women. For 
 friendship is noble and refined, whereas pleasure is vulgar 
 and illiberal. Therefore, for a slave to love boys is neither 
 liberal or refined : for it is merely the love of copulation, as 
 the love of women." 
 
 § Y. Protogenes was intending to go on at greater length, 
 when Daphneeus stopped him and said, " You do well, by 
 Zeus, to mention Solon, and we too may use him as the 
 test of an amorous man. Does he not define such a one 
 in the lines, ' As long as you love boys in the glorious flower 
 of their youth for their kisses and embraces.' And add to 
 Solon the lines of ^schylus, ' You did not disdain the 
 honour of the thighs, thankless one after all my fre- 
 quent kisses.' ^ For some laugh at them if they bid lovers, 
 like sacrificing priests and seers, to inspect thighs and loins ; 
 but I think this a mighty argument in behalf of the love 
 of women. For if the unnatural commerce with males does 
 not take away or mar the amorous propensity, much more 
 likely is it that the natural love of women will end in 
 friendship after the favour. For, Protogenes, the yielding 
 of the female to the male was called by the ancients the 
 favour. Thus Pindar says Hephaestus was the son of Hera 
 
 ^ Fragment of ^schylus. See Athenaeus, xiii. p. 602, E, which 
 explains the otherwise obscure allusion, 
 
 D 
 
34 plutakch's morals. 
 
 * without any favours' :^ and Sappho, addressing a girl not 
 yet ripe for marriage, says to her, 'You seemed to me a little 
 girl, too young for the favour.' And someone asks Hercules, 
 
 * Did you obtain the girl's favour by force or by persuasion? ' 
 But the love of males for males, whether rape or voluntary 
 — pathicks effeminately submitting, to use Plato's words, 
 
 * to be treated bestially ' — is altogether a foul and unlovely 
 favour. And so I think Solon wrote the lines quoted above 
 
 * in his hot youth,' as Plato puts it; but when he became 
 older wrote these other lines, ' Now I delight in Cyprus- 
 born Aphrodite, and in Dionysus, and in the Muses : all 
 these give joys to men ' : as if, after the heat and tempest 
 of his boyish loves, he had got into a quiet haven of mar- 
 riage and philosophy. But indeed, Protogenes, if we look 
 at the real facts of the case, the love for boys and women is 
 really one and the same passion : but if you wish in a dispu- 
 tatious spirit to make any distinction, you will find that this 
 boy-love goes beyond all bounds, and, like some late-born 
 and ill-begotten bastard brat, seeks to expel its legitimate 
 brother the older love, the love of women. For indeed, 
 friend, it is only yesterday or the day before, since the 
 strippings and exposures of the youths in the gymnasiums, 
 that this boy-love crept in, and gently insinuated itself and 
 got a footing, and at last in a little time got fully-fledged 
 in the wrestling-schools, and has now got fairly unbearable, 
 and insults and tramples on conjugal love, that love that 
 gives immortality to our mortal race, when our nature has 
 been extinguished by death, kindling it again by new births. 
 And this boy-love denies that pleasure is its aim : for it is 
 ashamed and afraid to confess the truth : but it needs some 
 specious excuse for the liberties it takes with handsome boys 
 in their prime : the pretext is friendship and virtue. So your 
 boy-lover wallows in the dust, bathes in cold water, raises his 
 eyebrows, gives himself out for a philosopher, and lives 
 chaste abroad because of the law : but in the stillness of 
 night 
 
 ' Sweet is the ripe fruit when the guard's withdrawn.' ^ 
 
 * That is the son of Hera alone, who was unwilling to be outdone by 
 Zeus, who had given birth to Pallas Athene alone. Hesiod has the 
 same view, " Theog." 927. 
 
 * dmopa is so used also in ^Esch. "Suppl.," 998, 1015. See also 
 
ON LOVE. 35 
 
 But if, as Protogenes says, there is no carnal intercourse 
 in these boy- familiarities, how is it Love, if Aphrodite is 
 not present, whom it is the destiny of Love to cherish and 
 pay court to, and to partake of just as much honour and 
 power as she assigns to him ? But if there is any Love 
 without Aphrodite, as there is drunkenness without wine 
 in drinks made from figs and barley, the disturbing it will 
 be fruitless and without effect, and surfeiting and dis- 
 gusting." 
 
 § VI. At the conclusion of this speech, it was clear that 
 Pisias was vexed and indignant with Daphnseus ; and after 
 a moment's silence he began : " Hercules ! what levity 
 and audacity for men to state that they are tied' to women 
 as dogs to bitches, and to banish the god of Love from the 
 gymnasiums and public walks, and light of day and open 
 intercourse, and to restrict him to brothels ^ and philtres 
 and incantations of wanton women : for to chaste women, 
 I am sure, it belongs not either to love or be loved." At 
 this point our father told me he interposed, and took 
 Protogenes by the hand, and said to him : 
 
 " ' This word of jours rouses the Argive host,' 
 
 and of a verity Pisias makes us to side with Daphngeus 
 by his extravagant language, charging man-iage with being 
 a loveless intercourse, and one that has no participation in 
 divine friendship, although we can see that it is an inter- 
 course, if erotic persuasion and favour fail, that cannot be 
 restrained by shame and fear as by bit and bridle." There- 
 upon Pisias said, " I care little about his arguments ; but 
 I see that Daphnseus is in the same condition as brass : for, 
 just as it is not worked upon so much by the agency of fire 
 as by the molten and liquid brass fused with it, so is he 
 not so much captivated by the beauty of Lysandra as by 
 his association with one who is the victim of the gentle 
 passion ; and it is plain that, if he doesn't take refuge with 
 
 " Athenfeus," 608, F. Daphngeus implies these very nice gentlemen, 
 like the same class described by Juvenal, " Curios simulant et Baccha- 
 nalia vivunt." 
 
 ^ I omit Kai KOTTiSag as a gloss or explanation of the old reading 
 fiuKsXeXa instead of narpvXna. Nothing can be made of kuI Komdag in 
 the context. 
 
36 pltjtaech's morals. 
 
 us, lie will soon melt away in the flame altogether. But I 
 see, what Anthemion would very much like, that I am 
 offending the Court, so I stop." "You amuse us," said 
 Anthemion : " but you ought from the first to have spoken 
 to the point." 
 
 § VII. " I say then," continued Pisias, " and give it out 
 boldly, as far as lam concerned, let every woman have a lover; 
 but we ought to guard against giving the wealth of Ismeno- 
 dora to Baccho, lest, if we involve him in so much grandeur 
 and magnificence, we unwittingly lose him in it, as tin is 
 lost in brass. For if the lad were to marry quite a plain 
 and insignificant woman, it would be great odds whether 
 he would keep the upper hand, as wine mixed with water ; 
 and Ismenodora seems already marked out for sway and 
 command ; for otherwise she would not have rejected such 
 illustrious and wealthy suitors to woo a lad hardly yet 
 arrived at man's estate, and almost requiring a tutor still. 
 And therefore men of sense prune the excessive wealth of 
 their wives, as if it had wings that required clipping ; for 
 this same wealth implants in them luxury, caprice, and 
 vanity, by which they are often elated and fly away alto- 
 gether : but if they remain, it would be better to be bound 
 by golden fetters, as in Ethiopia, than to a woman's 
 wealth." 
 
 § VIII. Here Protogenes put in, "You say nothing about 
 the risk we run of unseasonably and ridiculously reversing 
 the well-known advice of Hesiod : 
 
 ' If seasonable marriage you would make, 
 Let about thirty be the bridegroom's age, 
 The bride be in the fifth year of her womanhood : ' * 
 
 if we thus marry a lad hardly old enough for marriage to a 
 woman so many years older than himself, as dates and figs 
 are forced. You will say she loves him passionately : who 
 prevents her, then, from serenading at his doors, singing 
 her amorous ditty, putting garlands on his statues, and 
 wrestling and boxing with her rivals in his affections? 
 For all these are what people in love do. And let her 
 lower her eyebrows, and give up the airs of a coquette, and 
 
 > *' Works and Days," 606-608. 
 
ON LOVE. 
 
 37 
 
 assume the appearance of those that are deeply smitten. 
 But if she is modest and chaste, let her decorously stay at 
 home and await there her lovers and sweethearts ; for any 
 sensible man would be disgusted and flee from a woman 
 who took the initiative in love, far less would he be likely 
 to marry her after such a barefaced wooing." 
 
 § IX. When Protogenes had done speaking, my father 
 said, " Do you see, Anthemion, that they force us to inter- 
 vene again, who have no objection to dance in the retinue 
 of conjugal Love ? " "I do," said Anthemion, " but pray 
 defend Love at some length, as you are on his side, and 
 moreover come to the rescue of wealth,^ with which Pisias 
 seeks to scare us." Thereupon my father began, "What 
 on earth will not be brought as a charge against a woman, 
 if we are to reject Ismenodora because she is in love and 
 has money ? Granted she loves sway and is rich ? What 
 then, if she is young and handsome ? And what if she 
 plumes herself somewhat on the lustre of her race ? Have 
 not chaste women often something of the morose and peevish 
 in their character almost past bearing ? Do they not 
 sometimes get called waspish and shrewish by virtue of 
 their very chastity ? Would it be best then to marry off 
 the street some Thracian Abrotonus, or some Milesian 
 Bacchis, and seal the bargain by the present of a handful 
 of nuts ? But we have known even such turn out intoler- 
 able tyrants, Syrian flute-girls and ballet-dancers, as Aris- 
 tonica, and QCnanthe with her tambourine, and Agatho- 
 clea, who have lorded it over kings' diadems.^ Why 
 Syrian Semiramis was only the servant and concubine of 
 one of king Ninus's slaves, till Ninus the great king seeing 
 and falling in love with her, she got such power over him 
 that she thought so cheap of him, that she asked to be 
 allowed one day to sit on the royal throne, with the royal 
 diadem on her head, and to transact state affairs. And 
 
 ^ I follow here the reading of Wyttenbach. Through the whole of 
 this essay the reading is very uncertain frequently. My text in it has 
 been formed from a careful collation of Wyttenbach, Keiske, and 
 Diibner. I mention this here once for all, for it is unnecessary in a 
 translation to minutely specify the various readings on evei-y occasion. 
 I am not editing the "Moralia." 
 
 '^ '' l)e CEnantha et Agathoclea, v. Polyb. excerpt. I. xr." — Eciske. 
 
38 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Ninns having granted her permission, and having ordered 
 all his subjects to obey her as himself, she first gave several 
 very moderate orders to make trial of the guards ; but 
 when she saw that they obeyed her without the slightest 
 hesitation, she ordered them to seize I^inus and put him in 
 fetters, and at last put him to death ; and all her commands 
 being obeyed, she ruled over Asia for a long time with 
 great lustre. And was not Belestiche a foreign woman off 
 the streets, although at Alexandria she has shrines and 
 temples, with an inscription as Aphrodite Belestiche, which 
 she owes to the king's love ? And she who has in this 
 very town ^ a temple and rites in common with Eros, and 
 at Delphi stands in gold among kings and queens, by what 
 dowry got she her lovers ? But just as the lovers of 
 Semiramis, Belestiche, and Phryne, became their prey un- 
 consciously through their weakness and effeminacy, so on 
 the other hand poor and obscure men, having contracted 
 alliances with rich women of rank, have not been thereby 
 spoilt nor merged their personality, but have lived with 
 their wives on a footing of kindness, yet still kept their 
 position as heads of the house. But he that abases his 
 wife and makes her small, like one who tightens the ring 
 on a finger too small for it fearing it will come off,'^ is like 
 those who cut their mares' tails off and then take them to a 
 river or pond to drink, when they say that sorrowfully dis- 
 cerning their loss of beauty these mares lose their self-respect 
 and allow themselves to be covered by asses. ^ To select a 
 wife for wealth rather than for her excellence or family is 
 dishonourable and illiberal ; but it is silly to reject wealth 
 when it is accompanied by excellence and family. Anti- 
 gonus indeed wrote to his officer who had garrisoned 
 Munychia'* to make not only the collar strong but the dog 
 lean, that he might undermine the strength of the Athenians ; 
 but it becomes not the husband of a rich or handsome 
 woman to make his wife poor or ugly, but by his self-con- 
 
 ^ Thespiae. The alhision is to Phryne. See Pausanias, ix. 27; x. 15. 
 2 Peading with Wyttenbach, wairtp daKrvXiov SaKTvXov hxvov, dig 
 
 ^ Perhaps cur = coward, was originally cur-tail. 
 
 * One of tlie three ports at Athens. See Pausanias, i. 1. 
 
ON LOVE. 39 
 
 trol and good sense, and bj not too extravagantly showing 
 his admiration for her, to exhibit himself as her equal not 
 her slave, and (to borrow an illustration from the scales) 
 to add just so much weight to his character as shall over- 
 balance her, yet only just. Moreover, both Ismenodora 
 and Baccho are of a suitable age for marriage and pro- 
 creation of children ; Ismenodora, I hear, is still in her 
 prime, and " (here my father smiled slily at Pisias) " she 
 is certainly not a bit older than her rivals, and has no 
 grey hairs, as some of those who consort with Baccho 
 have. And if their union is seasonable, who knows 
 but that she may be a better partner for him than any 
 young woman ? For young couples do not blend and mix 
 well together, and it takes a long time and is not an easy 
 process for them to divest themselves of their pride and 
 spirit, and at first there's a good deal of dirty weather and 
 they don't pull well together, and this is oftenest the case 
 when there's love on both sides, and, just as a storm wrecks 
 the ship if no pilot is on board, so their marriage is trouble 
 and confusion, neither party knowing how either to rule or 
 to give way properly. And if the baby is under the nurse, 
 and the boy under the master, and the lad under the master 
 of the gymnasium, and the youth under his lover, and the 
 full-grown man under the law and magistrate, and no one 
 is his own master and exempt from obedience to someone, 
 what wonder would it be if a sensible woman rather older 
 than her husband would direct well the life of a young 
 man, being useful to him by reason of her superior wisdom, 
 and acceptable to him for her sweetness and gentleness ? 
 And to sum up the whole matter," said he, " we Boeotians 
 ought to revere Hercules, and so find no fault in any in- 
 equality of age in marriages, seeing that he gave his own 
 wife Megara in marriage to lolaus, though he was only 
 sixteen and she three- and- thirty." ^ 
 
 § X. As the conversation was going on, our father said 
 that a friend of Pisias came galloping up from the town to 
 report an act of marvellous audacity. Ismenodora, it 
 appears, thinking Baccho had no personal dislike to the 
 
 1 lolaus was the nephew of Hercules, and was associated with him in 
 many of his Labours. See Pausanias, i. 19 ; vii. 2 ; viii. 14, 45. 
 
40 , Plutarch's morals. 
 
 match, bat only stood in awe of Ins friends who tried to 
 dissuade him from it, determined that she would not let the 
 young fellow slip through her fingers. Accordingly, she 
 sent for the most active and intimate ^ of her male friends, 
 and for some of her female cronies, and instructed them as 
 to what part they should play, and waited for the hour 
 when Baccho was accustomedregularly to pass by her house 
 on his way to the wrestling- school. And as he passed by 
 on this occasion with two or three of his companions, 
 anointed for the exercise, Ismenodora met him at the door 
 and just touched his cloak, and her friends rushed out all 
 together and prettily seized the pretty fellow as he was in 
 his cloak and jersey,^ and hurried him into the house and 
 at once locked the doors. And the women inside at once 
 divested him of his cloak and put on him a bridal robe ; 
 and the servants ran about the town and put olive wreaths 
 and laurel garlands at the doors of Baccho's house as well 
 as Ismenodora's, and a flute-girl went up and down the 
 street playing and singing the wedding-song. And some 
 of the inhabitants of Thespiae and the strangers laughed, 
 others were indignant and tried to make the superintendents 
 of the gymnasium move in the matter, for they have great 
 power in Thespiae over the youths, and pay great attention 
 to their actions. And now there was no more talk about 
 the sports, but everyone left the theatre for the neighbour- 
 hood of Ismenodora's house, and there stood in groups 
 talking and disputing about what had happened. 
 
 § XI. Now when Pisias' friend had come up like an aide- 
 de-camp in war, " bloody with spurring, fiery red with 
 haste," to report this news that Ismenodora had seized 
 Baccho, my father said that Zeuxippus smiled, and being a 
 great lover of Euripides repeated the line, 
 
 " Lady, though rich, thou hast thy sex's feehngs." 
 But Pisias jumped up and cried out, "Ye gods, what 
 will be the end of license like this which will overthrow 
 our town ? Already we are fast tending to lawlessness 
 through our independence. And yet it is perhaps ridicu- 
 
 ^ I read awoapi^ovraQ. The general reading avvepwvTag will hardly 
 do here. Wyttenbach suggests (Tweapi^ovrag. 
 
 '■^ What the SifSoXla was is not quite clear. I have supposed a jersey. 
 
ON LOVE. 41 
 
 lous to be indignant about law and justice, when nature 
 itself is trampled upon by being thus subjected to women ? 
 Saw even Lemnos ever the like of this ? ^ Let us go," he 
 continued, " let us go and hand over to the women the 
 gymnasium and council-hall, if the townsmen have lost all 
 their nerve." Pisias then left the company, and Protogenes 
 went with him, partly sympathizing with his indignation, 
 but still endeavouring to cool him. And Anthemion said, 
 *' 'Twas a bold deed and certainly does savour somewhat of 
 Lemnos — I own it now we are alone — this Ismenodora must 
 be most violently in love." Hereupon Soclarus said, with 
 a sly smile, " You don't think then that this rape and de- 
 tention was an excuse and stratagem on the part of a wily 
 young man to escape from the clutches of his lovers, and fly 
 of his own volition to the arms of a rich and handsome 
 widow ? " " Pray don't say so, Soclarus," said Anthemion, 
 " pray don't entertain any such suspicions of Baccho, for 
 even if he were not by nature most simple and na'ive, he 
 would not have concealed the matter from me to whom he 
 divulges all his secrets, especially as he knows that I have 
 always been very anxious he should marry Ismenodora. 
 But as Heraclitus says truly. It is more difficult to control 
 love than anger ; for whatever love has a fancy to, it will 
 buy even at the cost of life, money, and reputation. Who 
 lives a more quiet life in our town than Ismenodora ? 
 When did ever any ugly rumour attach itself to her ? When 
 did ever any breath of suspicion sully her house ? Some 
 divine inspiration, beyond human calculation, seems now to 
 have possessed her." 
 
 § XII. Then Pemptides laughed and said, " Of course 
 you know that there is a certain disease of the body called 
 the sacred disease.^ It is no wonder, therefore, if some call 
 the greatest and most insane passion of the soul sacred and 
 divine. However, as in Egypt I once saw two neighbours 
 
 1 The women of Lemnos were very masterful. On one memorable 
 occasion they killed all their husbands in one night. Thus the line of 
 Ovid has almost a pi'overbial force, " Lemniadesque viros nimium 
 quoque vincere norunt." — Heroides, vi. 53. Siebelis in his Pi'eface to 
 Fausanias, p. xxi, gives from an old Scholia a sort of excuse for the 
 action of the women of Lemnos. 
 
 • Pi'obably the epilepsy. See Herodotus, iii. 33. 
 
42 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 disputing when a serpent passed by them on the road, both 
 calling it a good omen, but each claiming the blessing as 
 his alone ; so seeing lately that some of you drag Love to 
 the men's apartments, while others confine it to the women's 
 side of the house, while all of you regard it as a divine and 
 superlative blessing, I do not wonder, since it is a passion 
 that has such power and honour, that those who ought to 
 banish it from every quarter and clip its wings do them- 
 selves add to its influence and power. And hitherto I held 
 my peace, for I saw that the discussion turned rather on 
 private than public interests, but now that we have got rid 
 of Pisias, I would gladly hear from you to what they had 
 an eye who first called Love a god." 
 
 § XIII. Just as Pemptides had left off, and our father was 
 about to answer his question, another messenger came 
 from the town, sent by Ismenodora to summon Anthemion, 
 for the tumult had increased, and there was a difference of 
 opinion between the superintendents of the gymnasium, one 
 thinking they ought to demand the liberation of Baccho, the 
 other thinking they ought not to interfere. Anthemion got 
 up at once and went off. And our father, addressing Pemp- 
 tides especially, said, '* You seem to me, my dear Pemptides, 
 to be handling a great and bold matter, or rather to be 
 discussing things that ought not to be discussed, in asking 
 for a reason in each case for our opinion about the gods. 
 Our ancient and hereditary faith is sufficient, a better 
 argument than which we cannot either utter or find, 
 
 ' Not e'en if wisdom in our brains resides ; ' ^ 
 
 but if this common foundation and basis of all piety be dis- 
 turbed, and its stability and time-honoured ideas be un- 
 settled, it becomes undermined and is suspected by every- 
 body. You have heard, of course, what hot water Euri- 
 pides got into, when he wrote at the beginning of his 
 ' Melanippe,' 
 
 ' Zeus, whosoe'er he is, I do not know 
 Except by hearsay,' ^ 
 
 but if he changed the opening line, he had confidence, 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Bacchae," 203. 
 
 * Euripides, Fragment of the " Melanippe." 
 
ON LOYE. 43 
 
 it seems, that his play would go down with the public un- 
 commonly well/ so he altered it into 
 
 * Zeus the divine, as he is truly called.' ■•* 
 And what difference is there between calling in question 
 the received opinion about Zeus or Athene, and that about 
 Love ? For it is not now for the first time that Love asks 
 for an altar and sacrifices, nor is he a strange god intro- 
 duced by foreign superstition, as some Attis or Adonis, fur- 
 tively smuggled in by hermaphrodites and women, and 
 secretly receiving honours not his own, to avoid an indict- 
 ment among the gods for coming among them under false 
 pretences. And when, my friend, you hear the words of 
 Empedocles, 
 
 ' Friendship is there too, of same length and breadth, 
 But with the mind's eye only can you see it, 
 Till with the sight your very soul is thralled,' 
 
 you must suppose that they refer to Love. For this god is in- 
 visible, but to be extolled by us as one of the very oldest gods. 
 And if you demand proofs about everyone of the gods, laying 
 a profane hand on every temple, and bringing a learned 
 doubt to every altar, you will scrutinize and pry into every- 
 thing. But we need not go far to find Love's pedigree. 
 
 ' See you how great a goddess Aphrodite is ? 
 She 'tis that gave us and engendered Love, 
 Whereof come all that on the earth do live.'^ 
 
 And so Empedocles calls Aphrodite Life-giving,^ and 
 Sophocles calls her Fruitful, both very appropriate epithets. 
 And though the wonderful act of generation belongs to 
 Aphrodite only, and Love is only present in it as a subor- 
 dinate, yet if he be absent the whole affair becomes unde- 
 sirable, and low, and tame. For a loveless coition brings 
 only satiety, as the satisfaction of hunger and thirst, and 
 has nothing noble resulting from it, whereas by Love 
 Aphrodite removes the cloying element in pleasure, and 
 
 ^ I take Wyttenbach's suggestion as to the reading here. 
 
 ^ This line is taken bodily by Aristophanes in his "Frogs," 12-14. 
 
 ^ The first Hue is the first line of a passage from Euripides, consisting 
 of thirteen lines, containing similar sentiments to this. See Athena;us, 
 xiii. p. 699, F. The last two lines are from Euripides, " Hippolytus," 
 449, 450. 
 
 * Compare Lucretius, i. 1-5. 
 
44 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 prodnces harmonious friendship. And so Parmenides de- 
 clares Love to be the oldest of the creations of Aphrodite, 
 writing in his Cosmogony, 
 
 ' Of all the gods first Love she did contrive.' 
 But Hesiod, more naturally in my opinion, makes Love 
 the most ancient of all, so that all things derive their 
 existence from him.^ If we then deprive Love of his an- 
 cient honours, those of Aphrodite will be lost also. For we 
 cannot argue that, while some revile Love, all spare Aphro- 
 dite, for on the same stage we hear of Love, 
 
 ' Love is an idle thing and for the idle : ' ' 
 
 and again of Aphrodite, 
 
 ' Cypris, my boys, is not her only name, 
 For many names has she. She is a hell, 
 A power remorseless, nay a raging madness.'' 
 
 Just as in the case of the other gods there is hardly one 
 that has not been reviled, or escaped the scurrility of ig- 
 norance. Look, for example, at Ares, who may be con- 
 sidered as it were the counterpart of Love, what honours 
 he has received from men, and again what abuse, as 
 ' Ares is blind, ye women, has no eyes. 
 And with his pig's snout roots up all good things.'^ 
 And Homer calls him ' blood-stained ' and ' fickle.' ' 
 And Chrysippus brings a grievous charge against him, in 
 defining his name to mean destroyer,'' thereby giving a 
 handle to those who think that Ares is only the fighting, 
 wrangling, and quarrelsome instinct among mankind. 
 Others again will tell us that Aphrodite is simply desire, 
 and Hermes eloquence, and the Muses the arts and sciences, 
 and Athene wisdom. You see what an abyss of impiety 
 opens up before us, if we describe each of the gods, as only 
 a passion, a power, or a virtue ! " 
 
 § XIV. "I see it," said Pemptides, "and it is impious 
 either to make the gods passions, or to do just the con- 
 
 1 Hesiod, '•' Thengony," 116-120. 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Danae," Frag. Compare Ovid, " Cedit amor rebus : 
 res age, tutus eris." 
 
 ^ Sophocles, Fragm. 678, Dindorf. Compare a remark of Sophocles, 
 recorded by Cicero, " De Senectute," ch. xiv. 
 
 * Sophocles, Fragm. 720. Reading Koka with Eeiske. 
 
 * Iliad, V. 831. ^ Connecting *AjO?jg with dvaipuv. 
 
ON LOVE. 45 
 
 trary, and make the passions gods." " What then ? " said 
 my father, " do you consider Ares a god, or only a human 
 passion ? " And Pemptides, answering that he looked on 
 Ares as god of the passionate and manly element in man- 
 kind, "What," cried my father, "shall the passionate and 
 warlike and antagonistic instincts in man have a god, 
 but the affectionate and social and clubable have none ? 
 Shall Ares, under his names of i]nyalius and Stratius, pre- 
 side over arms and war and sieges and sacks of cities, and 
 shall there be no god to witness and preside over, to direct 
 and guide, conjugal affection, that friendship of closest 
 union and communion ? Why even those who hunt 
 gazelles and hares and deer have a silvan deity who harks 
 and halloos them on, for to Aristsous ^ they pay their vows 
 when in pitfalls and snares they trap wolves and bears, 
 
 ' For Aristseus first set traps for animals.' 
 And Hercules invoked another god, when he was about to 
 shoot at the bird, as the line of ^schylus shows, 
 
 ' Hunter Apollo, make my bolt go straight ! ' - 
 And shall no god or good genius assist and prosper tha 
 man who hunts in the best chase of all, the chase of friend- 
 ship ? For I cannot for my part, my dear Daphneeus,, 
 consider man a less beautiful or important plant than the 
 oak, or sacred olive, or the vine which Homer glorifies,^ 
 seeing that man too has his growth and glorious prime 
 alike of soul and body." 
 
 § XV. Then said Daphnaeus, " In the name of the gods» 
 who thinks differently ? " " All those certainly must," 
 answered my father, " who think that the gods care only 
 about ploughing and planting and sowing. Have they not 
 Nymphs attending upon them, called Dryads, ' whose age 
 is coeval with the trees they live in : and Dionysus the 
 mirth-giving does he not increase the yield of the trees, 
 the sacred splendour of Autumn,' as Pindar says ? ^ And if 
 they care about all this, is there no god or genius who is 
 interested in the nurture and growth of boys and youths in 
 all their glorious flower ? is there no one that cares that 
 
 ^ The Saint Hiibert of the Middle Ages. 
 
 - -<Eschylus, Frag. 1911. Dindorf. 
 
 3 Odyssey, v. 69. ^ Fragm. 146, 125. 
 
46 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the growing man may be upright and virtuous, and that 
 the nobility of his nature may not be warped and corrupted, 
 either through want of a guardian or by the depravity of 
 those he associates with ? Is it not monstrous and thankless 
 to say so, seeing that we enjoy the divine bounty, which is 
 dealt out to us richly, and never abandons us in our straits ? 
 And yet some of these same straits have more necessity than 
 beauty. For example, our birth, in spite of the unpleasant 
 circumstances attending it, is witnessed by the divine 
 Ilithyia and Artemis : and it would be better not to be 
 born at all than to become bad through want of a good 
 guardian and guide. Moreover in sickness the god who is 
 over that province does not desert us, nor even in death : 
 for even then there is a conductor and guide for the de- 
 parted, to lay them to sleep, and convey their souls to 
 Hades,^ as the poet says, 
 
 ' Night bore me not to be lord of the lyre, 
 Nor to be seer, or healer of diseases, 
 But to conduct the souls of the departed.' 
 
 And yet these duties involve much unpleasantness, whereas 
 we cannot mention a holier work, nor any struggle or con- 
 test more fitting for a god to attend and play the umpire in, 
 than the guidance of the young and beautiful in the prose- 
 cution of their love-affairs. For there is here nothing of an 
 unpleasant nature, no compulsion of any kind, but persua- 
 sion and grace, truly making toil sweet and labour delight- 
 ful, lead the way to virtue and friendship, and do not 
 arrive at that desired goal without the deity, for they have 
 as their leader and lord no other god than Love, the com- 
 panion of the Muses and Graces and Aphrodite. For 
 Love ' sowing in the heart of man the sweet harvest of 
 desire,' to borrow the language of Melanippides, mixes the 
 sweetest and most beautiful things together. But per- 
 haps you are of a different opinion, Zeuxippus." 
 
 § XVI. " N'ot I, by Zeus," replied Zeuxippus. " To have 
 a different opinion would be ridiculous." "Then," con- 
 tinued my father, " is it not also ridiculous, if there are 
 four kinds of friendship, for so the ancients distinguished, 
 the natural first, the second that to one's kindred, the third 
 
 ^ Hermes is alhided to. 
 
ON LOYE. 47 
 
 that to one's companions, tlie fourth the friendship of love, 
 and each of the first three have a god as patron, either a 
 god of friendship, or a god of hospitality, or a god of the 
 family, or a god of the race,' whereas the friendship of love 
 only, as something altogether unholy, is left M^ithout any 
 patron god, and that, too, when it needs most of all atten- 
 tive direction ? " " It is," said Zeuxippus, " highly ridicu- 
 lous." My father continued, " The language of Plato is 
 very suggestive here, to make a slight digression. One kind 
 of madness (he says) is conveyed to the soul from the body 
 through certain bad temjDcraments or mixtures, or through 
 the prevalence of some noxious spirit, and is harsh, difficult 
 to cure, and baneful. Another kind of madness is not un- 
 inspired or from within, but an afflatus from without, a 
 deviation from sober reason, originated and set in motion 
 by some higher power, the ordinary characteristic of which 
 is called enthusiasm. For, as one full of breath is called 
 eixTTvoog, and as one full of sense is called ifx^puv, so the 
 name enthusiasm is given to the commotion of the soul 
 caused by some Divine agency.^ Thus there is the pro- 
 phetic enthusiasm which proceeds from Apollo, and the 
 Bacchic enthusiasm which comes from Dionysus, to 
 which Sophocles alludes where he says, * Dance with the 
 Corybantes ; ' for the rites of Cybele and Pan have great 
 affinities to the orgies of Bacchus. And the third madness 
 proceeds from the Muses, and possesses an impressionable 
 and pure soul, and stirs up the poetry and music in a man. 
 As to the martial and warlike madness, it is well known 
 from what god it proceeds, namely, Ares, 'kindling tear- 
 ful war, that puts an end to the dance and the song, and 
 exciting civic strife.' ^ There remains, DaphuEeus, one 
 more kind of madness in man, neither obscure nor tranquil, 
 as to which I should like to ask Pemptides here, 
 
 ' AVhat god it is that shakes the fruitful thyrsus ? ' 
 
 I refer to that love-fury for modest boys and chaste women, 
 
 ^ All these four were titles of Zeus. They are very difficult to put 
 into English so as to convey any distinctive and definite idea to an 
 English reader. 
 
 * Enthusiasm is the being tv9eoQ, or inspired by some god. 
 
 ^ From ^schylus, " Supplices," 681, 682. 
 
48 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 which is far the keenest and fiercest passion of all. For 
 have jou not observed how the soldier, when he lays aside 
 his arms, ceases from his warlike fury, as the poet says, 
 
 ' Then from him 
 Right gladly did his squires remove the armour,' ^ 
 
 and sits down a peaceful spectator of others ? ^ The Bacchic 
 and Corybantic dances one can also modulate and quell, by 
 changing the metre from the trochaic and the measure from 
 the Phrygian. Similarly, too, the Pythian priestess, when 
 she descends from her tripod, possesses her soul in peace. 
 Whereas the love-fury, when once it has really seized on a 
 man and inflamed him, can be laid by no Muse, no charm 
 or incantation, no change of place ; but present they burn, 
 absent they desire, by day they follow their loves about, by 
 night they serenade them, sober call for them, and drunken 
 sing about them . And he who said that poetic fancies, owing 
 to their vividness, were dreams of people awake, would 
 have more truly spoken so of the fancies of lovers, who, a» 
 if their loves were present, converse with them, greet them, 
 chide them. For sight seems to paint all other fancies on 
 a wet ground, so soon do they fade and recede from the 
 memory, but the images of lovers, painted by the fancy as- 
 it were on encaustic tiles, leave impressions on the memory, 
 that move, and live, and speak, and are permanent for all 
 time. The Roman Cato, indeed, said that the soul of the 
 lover resided in the soul of the loved one, and I should extend 
 the remark to the appearance, the character, the life, and the 
 actions, conducted by which he travels a long journey in a 
 short time, as the Cynics say they have found a short cut 
 and, as it were, forced march to virtue, for there is also a 
 short cut to friendship and love when the god is propitious. 
 To sura up, the enthusiasm of lovers is not a thing uninspired, 
 and the god that guides and governs it is none other than 
 the god whose festival we are now keeping, and to whom 
 we are now sacrificing. Nevertheless, as we judge of a god 
 mainly from his power and usefulness (as among human 
 advantages we reckon and call these two the most divine,. 
 
 1 "Iliad," vii. 121, 122. 
 
 2 Like the character described in Lucretius, ii. 1-6. 
 
ON LOVE. 49' 
 
 dominion and virtue), it is high time to consider, before we 
 proceed any further, whether Love yields to any of the gods 
 in power. Certainly, as Sophocles says, ' Wonderful is 
 the power which the Cyprian Queen exerts so as always to 
 win the victory : ' ^ great also is the might of Ares ; and in 
 some sort we see the power of all the other gods divided 
 among these two ; for Aphrodite has most intimate con- 
 nection with the beautiful, and Ares is in our souls from 
 the first to combat against the sordid, to borrow the idea 
 of Plato. Let us consider, then, to begin with, that the 
 venereal delight can be purchased for six obols, and that no 
 one ever yet put himself into any trouble or danger about 
 it, unless he was in love. And not to mention here such 
 famous courtesans as Pliryne or Lais, Gnathsenium, 'kind- 
 ling her lamp at evening time,' on the look-out for lovers 
 and inviting them, is often passed by ; ' yet, if some sud- 
 den whiff arise ' of mighty love and desire, it makes this 
 very delight seem equal to the fabled wealth of Tantalus 
 and his domains. So feeble and cloying is the venereal 
 indulgence, if Love inspires it not. And you will see this 
 more plainly still from the following consideration. Many 
 have allowed others to share in their venereal enjoyments, 
 prostituting not only their mistresses but their wives, like 
 that Roman Galba, who used to ask Maecenas to dinner, 
 and when he saw from his nods and winks that he had a 
 mind to do with his wife, turned his head gently aside as 
 if asleep ; but when one of his slaves came up to the table 
 and stole some wine, his eyes were wide open enough, and 
 he said, ' Villain, don't you know that I am asleep only for 
 Maecenas ? ' '" But this is not perhaps so strange, consi- 
 dering Galba was a buffoon. But at Argos Nicostratus 
 and Phayllus were great political rivals : so when King 
 Philip visited that city, Phayllus thought if he prostituted 
 his wife, who was very handsome, to the King, he would 
 get from him some important office or place. And Nicos- 
 tratus getting wind of this, and walking about the doors of 
 Phayllus' house with some of his servants on the qui vive^ 
 
 ' Sophocles, " Trachiniae," 497. The Cyprian Queen is, of course, 
 Aphrodite. 
 
 ^ Hence the famous Proverb, " Non omnibus dormio." See Cic. 
 " Ad. Fam." vii. 24. 
 
 £ 
 
50 PLUTARCn's MORALS. 
 
 Phajllus made his wife put on men's boots, and a military 
 cloak, and a Macedonian broad-brimmed bat, and so smug- 
 gled her into the King, without being detected, as one of 
 the King's young men. But, of all the multitude of lovers, 
 did you ever hear of one that prostituted his boy-love even 
 for the honours of Zeus ? I think not. Why, though 
 no one will generally either speak or act against tyrants, 
 many will who find them their rivals and are jealous about 
 their handsome minions. Yon must have heard how 
 Aristogiton of Athens, and Antileon of Metapontum, and 
 Melanippus of Agrigentum, rose not against tyrants, 
 a,lthough they saw how badly they managed affairs, and 
 what drunken tricks they played, yet, when they attempted 
 the chastity of their boy-loves, they retaliated on them, 
 jeoparding their lives, as if they were defending the inviola- 
 bility of temples and sanctuaries. It is also recorded that 
 Alexander wrote to Theodorus, the brother of Proteas, 
 * Send me your singing-girl, unless you love her yourself, 
 and I will give you ten talents ; ' and when Antipatridas, 
 one of his companions, came to revel with him, bringing 
 with him a female harper, he fancied the girl not a little, 
 and asked Antipatridas if he cared very much about her. 
 And when he replied that he did immensely, Alexander 
 said, * Plague take you,' but nevertheless abstained from 
 touching the girl. 
 
 § XVII. " Consider also how Love excels in M^arlike feats, 
 and is by no means idle, as Euripides called him,^ nor a 
 carpet-knight, nor ' sleeping on a maiden's soft cheeks.' ^ 
 For a man inspired by Love needs not Ares to help him 
 when he goes out as a warrior against the enemy, but at 
 the bidding of his own god is ' ready ' for his friend ' to 
 go through fire and water and whirlwinds.' And in 
 Sophocles' play,^ when the sons of Niobe are being shot at 
 and dying, one of them calls out for no helper or assister 
 but his lover. And you know of course how it was that 
 Cleomachus the Pharsalian fell in battle ? " " We cer- 
 
 ^ Above, in § xiii. 
 
 2 See Sophocles, " Antigone," 783, 784. And compare Horace, " Odes," 
 Book iv. Ode xiii, 6-8, " llle vii-entis et Doctse psallere Chios Pulchris 
 excuhat in gen is.'' 
 
 ^ The " Niobe," which exists only in a few fragments. 
 
ON LOVE. 51 
 
 tainly don't," said Pemptides and those near him, " but we 
 should very much like to." " Well," said mj father, " the 
 tale's vrorth hearing. When the vrar between the Eretrians 
 and Chalcidians was at its height, Cleomachus had come 
 to aid the latter with a Thessalian force ; and the Chalcidian 
 infantry seemed strong enough, but they had great diffi- 
 culty in repelling the enemy's cavalry. So they begged 
 that high-souled hero Cleomachus to charge the Eretrian 
 cavalry first. And he asked his boy-love, who was by, if 
 he would be a spectator of the fight, and he saying he 
 would, and affectionately kissing him and putting his 
 helmet on his head, Cleomachus with a proud joy put 
 himself at the head of the bravest of the Thessalians, and 
 charged the enemy's cavalry with such impetuosity that he 
 threw them into disorder and routed them ; and the Eretrian 
 infantry also fleeing in consequence, the Chalcidians won a 
 splendid victory. However, Cleomachus got killed, and 
 they show his tomb in the market-place at Chalcis, over 
 which a huge pillar stands to this day, and whereas before 
 that the people of Chalcis had censured boy-loves, from 
 that time forward they preferred that kind of love to the 
 normal love. Aristotle gives a slightly different account, 
 namely, that this Cleomachus came not from Thessaly, but 
 from Chalcis in Thrace, to the help of the Chalcidians in 
 Eubcea ; and that that was the origin of the song in vogue 
 among the Chalcidians, 
 
 * Ye boys, who come of noble sires and beauteous are in face, 
 Grudge not to give to valiant men the joy of your embrace : 
 For Love that does the Hrabs relax combined with bravery 
 In the Chalcidian cities has fame that ne'er shall die.' 
 
 But according to the account of the poet Dionysius, in his 
 * Causes,' ^ the name of the lover was Anton, and that of the 
 boy-love was Philistus. And among you Thebans, Pemp- 
 tides, is it not usual for the lover to give his boy-love a com- 
 plete suit of armour when he is enrolled among the men ? 
 And did not the erotic Pammenes change the disposition of 
 the heavy-armed infantry, censuring Homer as knowing 
 nothing about love, because he drew up the Achaaans in 
 
 ^ This was the name of Dionysius' Poem. He was a Corinthian poet. 
 
52 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 order of battle in tribes and clans, and did not put lover 
 and love together, that so 
 
 ' Spear should be next to spear, helmet to helmet,' ^ 
 
 seeing that Love is the only invincible general.^ For men 
 in battle will leave in the lurch clansmen and friends, aye, 
 and parents and sons, but what warrior ever broke through 
 or charged through lover and love, seeing that even when 
 there is no necessity lovers frequently display their bravery 
 and contempt of life. As Thero the Thessalian, who put 
 his left hand on a wall, and drew his sword, and chopped 
 off his thumb, and challenged his rival to do the same. 
 And another in battle falling on his face, as his enemy 
 was about to give him the coup-de-grace, begged him to 
 wait a little till he could turn round, that his love should 
 not see him with a wound in his back. And not only are 
 the most warlike nations most amorous, as the Boeotians 
 the Lacedaemonians and the Cretans, but also of the old 
 heroes, who were more amorous than Meleager, Achilles, 
 Aristomenes, Cimon, and Epaminondas. Why, Epaminon- 
 das had as his boy-loves Asopichus and Cephisodorus, the 
 latter of whom fell with him at Mantinea, and is buried 
 near him. As to . . . , who was most formidable and a 
 source of terror to the enemy, Eucnamus of Amphissa, 
 who first stood up against him and smote him, received 
 hero honours from the Phocians for his exploit. And as 
 to all the loves of Hercules, it would take up too much time 
 to enumerate them, but those who think that lolaus was 
 one of them do up to this day worship and honour him, and 
 make their loves swear fidelity at his tomb. Hercules is 
 also said, having understood the art of healing, to have 
 preserved the life of Alcestis, when she was given up by the 
 doctors, to gratify Admetus, who passionately loved his 
 wife, and was Hercules' minion. They say also in legend 
 that Apollo was enamoured of Admetus, 
 
 * And was his hired slave for one long year.' 
 
 It was a happy thought our remembering Alcestis, for 
 
 ' « Iliad," xiii. 131. 
 
 ^ Reading according to the conjectm*e of Wyttenbach, ojg tov 'Epwra 
 uovov afiTTJiTov ovra tCjv aTpaTtjyoJv, 
 
ON LOVE. 53 
 
 though women have not mucli of Ares in them, yet when 
 possessed by Love they are bold even to the death, beyond 
 what one would expect from their nature. For if we may 
 credit legendary lore, the stories about Alcestis, and 
 Protesilaus, and Eurydice the wife of Orpheus, show that 
 the only one of the gods that Hades pays attention to is 
 Love ; although to everybody else, as Sophocles says, " he 
 knows of no forbearance or favour, or anything but strict 
 justice ; " yet before lovers his genius stands rebuked, and 
 they alone find him neither implacable nor relentless. 
 Wherefore although, my friend, it is an excellent thing to 
 be initiated in the Eleusinian mysteries, yet I see that the 
 votaries and initiated of Love have a better time of it in 
 Hades than they have, * * ^ though in regard to legendary 
 lore I stand in the position of one who neither altogether 
 believes nor altogether disbelieves. For legendary lore 
 speaks well, and by a certain wonderful good fortune lights 
 upon the truth, in saying that lovers have a return from 
 Hades to the light of day, but it knows not by what way 
 or how, having as it were got benighted on the road which 
 Plato first discovered by philosophy. There are, indeed, 
 some slender and obscure particles of truth scattered about 
 in the mythology of the Egyptians, but they require a 
 clever man to hunt them out, a man capable of getting 
 great results from small data. Wherefore let that matter 
 pass. And now next to the mighty power of Love let ns 
 consider its good will and favour to mankind, I do not 
 mean as to whether it bestows many gifts on its votaries — 
 that is palpable to all — but whether they derive any fur- 
 ther advantage from it. For Euripides, though very 
 amorous, admired a very small matter, when be wrote the 
 line — 
 
 ' LoA'e teaches letters to a man unlearn'd.'* 
 
 For it makes one previously sluggish quick and intelligent, 
 and, as has been said before, it makes the coward brave, as 
 people harden wood in the fire and make it strong from 
 being weak. And every lover becomes liberal and genuine 
 
 ' Something has probably dropped out here, as Diibner suspects. 
 ^ Fragment from the *' Stheneboea " of Euripides. 
 
54 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and generous, even if lie was mean before, his littleness 
 and miserliness melting away like iron in the fire, so that 
 they rejoice to give to their loves more than they do to 
 receive themselves from others. You know of course that 
 Anytus, the son of Anthemion, was in love with Alcibiades, 
 and was on one occasion sumptuously entertaining several 
 of his friends, when Alcibiades broke in and took from the 
 table half the cups and went away again ; and when some 
 of the guests were indignant and said, ' The stripling has 
 used you most insolently and contemptuously,' Anytus 
 replied, 'Nay, rather, he has dealt kindly with me, for 
 when he might have taken all he has left me half.' " 
 
 § XVIII. Zeuxippus was pleased with this story, and said, 
 ^' O Hercules, you have been within an ace of making me 
 forget my hereditary hatred to Anytus for his behaviour to 
 Socrates and philosophy,^ since he was so mild and noble 
 to his love." "Be it so," said my father, "Love also 
 makes peevish and gloomy persons kind and agreeable to 
 those they live with ; for as * when the fire blazes the house 
 looks brighter, '^ so man, it seems, becomes more cheerful 
 through the heat of love. But most people are affected 
 rather curiously ; if they see by night a light in a house, 
 they look on it with admiration and wonder ; but if they 
 see a little, mean, and ignoble soul suddenly filled with 
 noble-mindedness, freedom, dignity, grace, and liberality, 
 they do not feel constrained to say with Telemachus, ' Surely, 
 some god is there within.'^ And is it not wonderful, 
 DaphnaBus," continued my father,* " in the name of the 
 Graces, that the lover who cares about hardly anything, 
 either his companions and friends, or even the laws and 
 magistrates and kings, who fears nothing, admires nothing, 
 courts nothing, but can even endure to gaze on ' the forked 
 lightning,'^ yet directly he looks on his love 'he crouches 
 like a cock with drooping feathers,' and his boldness is 
 
 ^ Anytus was one of the accusers of Soci'ates, and so one of the causers 
 of his death. So Horace calls Socrates "Anyti reum," " Sat." ii. 4, 3. 
 
 ^ Homeric Epitrrammata, xiii. 5. Quoted also in " On Virtue and 
 Vice,'^§l. 
 
 ^ Odyssey, xix. 40. 
 
 * I adopt the suggestion of Wyttenbach, tiTrev, ai AaxpvaU. 
 
 5 Finder, "Pyth."i.8. 
 
ON LOVE. 55 
 
 broken and his pride is cowed. And among the Muses 
 it would not be amiss to mention Sappho ; for as the 
 Romans say Cacus the son of Hephcestus vomited out of 
 his mouth fire and flames, so she really speaks words that 
 burn like fire, and in her songs shows the warmth of her 
 heart, as Philoxenus puts it, ' by euphonious songs assuag- 
 ing the pains of love.' And if you have not in your love 
 for Lysandra forgot all your old love-songs, do repeat to 
 us, Dai3hna)us, the lines in which beautiful Sappho says 
 that ' when her love appeared her voice failed and her body 
 burned, and she was seized with paleness and trembling 
 and vertigo.' " And when Daphnasus had repeated the 
 lines, my father resumed, " In the name of Zeus, is not 
 this plainly a divine seizure ? Is not this a wonderful com- 
 motion of soul ? Why, the Pythian priestess on the tripod 
 is not moved so much as this ! Who of those inspired by 
 Cybele are made beside themselves to this extent by the flute 
 and the kettledrum ? Moreover, while many see the same 
 body and the same beauty, only the lover is taken by it. 
 Why is this the case? We get no light on it from 
 Menander's words, ' Love is opportunity ; and he that is 
 smitten is the only one wounded.' But the god is the 
 cause of it, striking one and letting another go scot-free. 
 But I will not pass over now, ' since it has come into my 
 mouth,' as ^schylus says, what perhaps would have been 
 better spoken before, for it is a very important point. 
 Perhaps, my friend, of all other things which we do not 
 perceive through the senses, some got believed through 
 legend, some through the law, some through reason ; 
 whereas we owe our conception of the gods altogether to 
 the poets and legislators and philosophers : all alike teach- 
 ing the existence of gods, but greatly differing as to their 
 number and order, nature and power. For the gods of the 
 philosophers ' know nothing of disease or old age or pain, 
 and have not to cross the resounding Acheron ; ' nor do 
 the philosophers accept as gods Strifes, or Prayers, which are 
 found in poetry ; ^ nor will they admit Terror and Fear as 
 gods or as the sons of Ares. And on many points also they 
 are at variance with the legislators, as Xenophanes bade the 
 
 ^ See for example Homer, Iliad, xi. 3, 73 ; ix. 502. 
 
56 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Egyptians, if they regarded Osiris as mortal, not to honour 
 him as a god ; but if they thought him a god not to mourn 
 for him. And, again, the poets and legislators will not 
 listen to, nor can they understand, the philosophers who 
 make gods of ideas and numbers and units and spirits. 
 And their views generally are very different. As there were 
 formerly three parties at Athens, the Parali, the Epacrii, 
 and the Pediei, all at variance with one another, yet all 
 agreed to vote for Solon, and chose him with one accord as 
 their mediator and ruler and lawgiver, as he seemed indis- 
 putably to hold the first place in merit ; so the three parties 
 that entertain different views about the gods are all unani- 
 mous on one point, for poets legislators and philosophers all 
 alike register Love as one of the gods, ' loudly singing his 
 praises with one voice,' as Alcaeus says the people of 
 Mitylene chose Pittacus as their monarch. But our king 
 and ruler and governor, Love, is brought down crowned 
 from Helicon to the Academy by Hesiod and Plato and 
 Solon, and in royal apparel rides in a chariot drawn by 
 friendship and intimacy (not such as Euripides speaks of 
 in the line, 'he has been bound in fetters not of brass,' ^ 
 shamefully throwing round him cold and heavy necessity), 
 and soars aloft to the most beautiful and divine things, 
 about which others have spoken better than I can." 
 
 § XIX. "When my father had spoken thus much, Soclarus 
 began, " Do you see that a second time you have committed 
 the same fault, not cancelling your debtsas you ought to do 
 — for I must speak my mind — but evading them on purpose, 
 and not delivering to us your promised ideas on a sacred 
 subject ? For as some little time back you only just 
 touched on Plato and the Egyptians as if unwilling to enter 
 on the subject more fully, so now you are doing again. 
 However, as to what has been ' eloquently told '^ by Plato, 
 or rather by the Muses through Plato's mouth, do not tell 
 us that, my good friend, even if we ask for it ; but as to 
 your hint that the Egyptian legend about Love corre- 
 sponded with Plato's views, you need not discuss it fully 
 and minutely, we shall be satisfied if we hear a little of 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Pirithoiis," Fragm. 591. Dindorf. 
 ^ An allusion to Homer, " Odyssey," xii. 453. 
 
ON LOYE. 04 
 
 sucli mighty matters." And as the rest of the company- 
 made the same request, my father said, " The Egyptians, 
 (like the Greeks) recognize two Loves, the Pandemian and 
 the Celestial, to which they add the Snn, they also highly 
 venerate Aphrodite. We also see much similarity between 
 Love and the Sun, for neither is a fire, as some think, but 
 a sweet and productive radiance and warmth, the Sun 
 bringing to the body nourishment and light and growth, 
 and Love doing the same to the soul. And as the heat of 
 the Sun is more powerful when it emerges from clouds and 
 after mist, so Love is sweeter and hotter after a jealous tiff 
 with the loved one,^ and moreover, as some think the Sun 
 is kindled and extinguished, so also do people conceive of 
 Love as mortal and uncertain. Moreover, just as without 
 training the body cannot easily bear the heat of the Sun, so 
 neither can the untrained soul easily bear the yoke of 
 Love, but both are equally out of tune and suffer, for which 
 they blame the deity and not their own weakness. But in 
 this respect they seem to differ, in that the Sun exhibits to 
 the eye things beautiful and ugly alike, whereas Love throws 
 its light only on beautiful things, and persuades lovers to 
 concentrate their attention on these, and to neglect all 
 other things. As to those that call Aphrodite the Moon, 
 they, too, find some points in common between them ; for 
 the Moon is divine and heavenly and a sort of halfway- 
 house between mortal and immortal, but inactive in itself 
 and dark without the presence of the Sun, as is the case 
 with Aphrodite in the absence of Love. So we may say 
 that Aphrodite resembles the Moon, and Love the Sun, 
 more than any other deities, yet are not Love and the Sun 
 altogether the same, for just as body and soul are not the 
 same, but something different, so is it with the Sun and 
 Love, the former can be seen, the latter only felt. And if 
 it should not seem too harsh a saying, one might argue 
 that the Sun acts entirely opposite to Love, for it turns 
 the mind away from the world of fancy to the world of 
 reality, beguiling us by its grace and splendid appearance, 
 and persuading us to seek for truth and everything else in 
 and round it and nowhere else. For as Euripides says, 
 
 ^ So Terence, " Andria," 555. " Amantium irje amoris integratiost." 
 
58 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 * Too passionately do we love the Sun, 
 Because it always shines upon the eai'th, 
 From inexperience of another life,'^ 
 
 or rather from forgetfulness of those tilings which Love 
 brings to our remembrance. For as when we are woke by 
 a great and bright light, everything that the soul has seen 
 in dreams is vanished and fled, so the Sun is wont to banish 
 the remembrance of past changes and chances, and to be- 
 witch the intelligence, pleasure and admiration causing 
 this forgetfulness. And though reality is really there, yet 
 the soul cleaves to dreams and is dazzled by what is most 
 beautiful and divine. ' For round the soul are poured 
 sweet yet deceiving dreams,' so that the soul thinks every- 
 thing here good and valuable, unless it obtain divine and 
 chaste Love as its physician and preserver. For Love 
 brings the soul through the body to truth and the region 
 of truth, where pure and guileless beauty is to be found, 
 kindly befriending its votaries like an initiator at the 
 mysteries. And it associates with the soul only through the 
 body. And as geometricians, in the case of boys who can- 
 not yet be initiated into the perception of incorporeal and 
 impassive substance, convey their ideas through the medium 
 of spheres, cubes, and dodecahedrons, so celestial Love has 
 contrived beautiful mirrors of beautiful things, and ex- 
 hibits them to us glittering in the shapes colours and 
 appearances of youths in all their flower, and calmly stirs 
 the memory which is inflamed first by these. Consequently 
 some, through the stupidity of their friends and intimates, 
 who have endeavoured by force and against reason to ex- 
 tinguish the flame, have got no advantage from it, but 
 filled themselves with smoke and confusion, or have rushed 
 into secret and lawless pleasures and ingloriously wasted 
 their prime. But as many as by sober reason and modesty 
 have abated the extravagance of the passion, and left in 
 the soul only a bright glow — not exciting a tornado of pas- 
 sion, but a wonderful and productive difi^usion, as in a 
 growing plant, opening the pores of complaisance and 
 friendliness — these in no long time cease to regard the per- 
 sonal charms of those they love, and study their inward 
 
 ^ Euripider, "H]polytup," X94-196. 
 
ON LOVE. 59 
 
 characters, and gaze at one another with unveiled eyes, and 
 associate with one another in words and actions, if they 
 find in their minds any fragment or image of the beautiful ; 
 and if not they bid them farewell and turn to others, like 
 bees that only go to those flowers from which they can get 
 honey. But wherever they find any trace or emanation 
 or pleasing resemblance of the divine, in an ecstasy of 
 pleasure and delight they indulge their memory, and revive 
 to whatever is truly lovely and felicitous and admired by 
 everybody." 
 
 § XX. " The poets indeed seem for the most part to have 
 written and sung about Love in a playful and merry manner, 
 but have sometimes spoken seriously about him, whether 
 out of their own mind, or the god helping them to truth. 
 Among these are the lines about his birth, ' Well-sandalled 
 Iris bare the most powerful of the gods to golden-haired 
 Zephyr.' ^ But perhaps the learned have persuaded 
 you that these lines are only a fanciful illustration of the 
 variety and beauty of love." " Certainly," said Daphnaeus, 
 "what else could they mean?" "Hear me," said my 
 father, " for the heavenly phenomenon compels us so to 
 speak. The rainbow^ is, I suppose, a reflection caused 
 by the sun's rays falling on a moist cloud, making us think 
 the appearance is in the cloud. Similarly erotic fancy in 
 the case of noble souls causes a reflection of the memory, 
 from things which here appear and are called beautiful, to 
 what is really divine and lovely and felicitous and wonder- 
 ful. But most lovers pursuing and groping after the 
 semblance of beauty in boys and women, as in mirrors,^ can 
 derive nothing more certain than pleasure mixed with 
 pain. And this seems the love-delirium of Ixion, who 
 instead of the joy he desired embraced only a cloud, as 
 children who desire to take the rainbow into their hands, 
 clutching at whatever they see. But different is the be- 
 
 ^ The lines are from Alcaeus. Thus Love was the child of the Rain- 
 bow and the West Wind. A pretty conceit. 
 
 2 Greek iris. 
 
 ^ The mirrors of the ancients were of course not like our mirrors. 
 They were only burnished bronze. Hence the view in them would be at 
 best somewhat obscure. This explains 1 Cor. xiii. 12; 2 Cur. iii. 18; 
 James i. 23. 
 
60 PLUTAECH's MORA.LS. 
 
 haviour of the noble and chaste lover : for he reflects on 
 the divine beauty that can only be felt, while he uses the 
 beauty of the visible body only as an organ of the memory, 
 tbough lie embraces it and loves it, and associating with it 
 is still more inflamed in mind. And so neither in the body 
 do tliey sit ever gazing at and desiring this light, nor after 
 death do they return to this world again, and skulk and 
 loiter abont the doors and bedchambers of newly-married 
 people, disagreeable ghosts of pleasure-loving and sensual 
 men and women, who do not rightly deserve the name of 
 lovers. For the true lover, when he has got into the other 
 world and associated with beauties as much as is lawfnl, 
 has wings and is initiated and passes his time above in the 
 presence of his Deity, dancing and waiting npon him, until 
 he goes back to the meadows of the Moon and Aphrodite, 
 and sleeping there commences a new existence. But this 
 is a subject too high for the present occasion. However, it 
 is with Love as with the other gods, to borrow the words 
 of Euripides, ' he rejoices in being honoured by mankind,'^ 
 and vice versa, for he is most propitious to those that 
 receive him properly, but visits his displeasure on those 
 that affront him. For neither does Zeus as god of Hospi- 
 tality punish and avenge any outrages on strangers or sup- 
 pliants, nor as god of the family fulfil the curses of parents, 
 as quickly as Love hearkens to lovers unfairly treated, 
 being the chastiser of boorish and haughty persons. Why 
 need I mention the story of Euxynthetus and Leucomantis, 
 the latter of whom is called The Peeping Girl to this day 
 in Cyprus ? But perhaps you have not heard of the 
 punishment of the Cretan Gorgo, a somewhat similar case 
 to that of Leucomantis, except that she was turned into 
 stone as she peeped out of window to see her lover carried 
 out to burial. For this Gorgo had a lover called Asander, 
 a proper young man and of a good family, but reduced in 
 fortune, though he thought himself worthy to mate with 
 anybody. So he wooed Gorgo, being a relation of hers, 
 and though he had many rivals, as she was much run after 
 for her wealth belike, yet he had won the esteem of all the 
 guardians and relations of the young girl.^ * * * * 
 
 ^ See Euripides, " Hippolytus," 7, 8. 
 
 ^ Here the story unfortunately ends, and for all time we sliall know 
 
ON LOVE. 61 
 
 § XXI. * * * Now the origins and causes of Love are not 
 peculiar to either sex, but common to both. For those 
 attractions that make men amorous may as well proceed 
 from women as from bojs.^ And as to those beautiful and 
 holy reminiscences and invitations to the divine and 
 genuine and Olympian beauty, by which the soul soars 
 aloft, what hinders but that they may come either from 
 boys or lads, maidens or grown women, whenever a chaste 
 and orderly nature and beauteous prime are associated 
 together (just as a neat shoe exhibits the shapeliness of 
 the foot, to borrow the illustration of Aristo), whenever 
 connoisseurs of beauty descry in beautiful forms and pure 
 bodies clear traces of an upright and unenervated soul.^ For 
 if ^ the man of pleasure, who was asked whether " he was 
 most given to the love of women or boys," and answered, 
 " I care not which so beauty be but there," is considered 
 to have given an appropriate answer as to his erotic 
 desires, shall the noble lover of beauty neglect beauty and 
 nobility of nature, and make love only with an eye to the 
 sexual parts ? Why, the lover of horses will take just as 
 much pleasure in the good points of Podargus, as in those 
 of JEthe, Agamemnon's mare,^ and the sportsman rejoices 
 not only in dogs, but also rears Cretan and Spartan bitches,^ 
 and shall the lover of the beautiful and of humanity be 
 unfair and deal unequally with either sex, and think that 
 the difference between the loves of boys and women is 
 only their different dress ? And yet they say that beauty 
 is a flower of virtue ; and it is ridiculous to assert that the 
 female sex never blossoms nor make a goodly show of virtue, 
 for as ^schylus truly says, 
 
 ' I never can mistake the burning eye 
 
 Of the young woman that has once known man.' ^ 
 
 Shall the indications then of a forward wanton and corrupt 
 
 no more of it. Reiske somewhat forcibly says, " Vel lippus videat. 
 Gorgus historiara non esse finitam, et multa, ut et alias, periisse." 
 
 ^ Like Reiske we condense here a little. 
 
 ^ Reading with Reiske opOijg km dOpvTTTov. 
 
 ^ I read d yap. 
 
 ^ See " Iliad," xxiii. 295. Podargus was an entire horse. 
 
 ^ See Ovid, " Metamorph." iii. 206-208. 
 
 ^ jEschylus, " Toxotides," Fragm. 224. 
 
62 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 character be fonnd in the faces of women, and shall there 
 be no gleam of chastity and modesty in their appearance ? 
 IS'ay, there are many such, and shall they not move and 
 23rovoke love ? To doubt it would be neither sensible nor 
 in accordance with the facts, for generally speaking, as has 
 been pointed out, all these attractions are the same in both 
 
 sexes Bat, Daphnaeus, let us combat those views 
 
 which Zeuxippus lately advanced, making Love to be only 
 irregular desire carrying the soul away to licentiousness, 
 not that this was so much his own view as what he had often 
 heard from morose men who knew nothing of love : some 
 of whom marry unfortunate women for their dowries, and 
 force on them economy and illiberal saving, and quarrel 
 with them every day of their lives : while others, more 
 desirous of children than wives, when they have made 
 those women they come across mothers, bid farewell to mar- 
 riage, or regard it not at all, and neither care to love nor 
 be loved. Now the fact that the word for conjugal love 
 differs only by one letter from the word for endurance, 
 the one being crrepyeiv the other or/yeir, seems to empha- 
 size the conjugal kindness mixed by time and intimacy 
 with necessity. But that marriage which Love has inspired 
 will in the first place, as in Plato's Republic, know 
 nothing of Meum and Tuum, for the proverb, ' whatever 
 belongs to a friend is common property,'^ is especially 
 true of married persons who, though disunited in body, 
 are perforce one in soul, neither wishing to be two, nor 
 thinking themselves so. In the second place there will be 
 mutual respect, which is a vital necessity in marriage. For as 
 to that external respect which has in it more of compulsion 
 than choice, being forced by the law and shame and fear, 
 
 " Those needful bits and curbs to headstrong weeds,'' ^ 
 that will always exist in wedlock. But in Love there is 
 such self-control and decorum and constancy, that if the 
 god but once enter the soul of a licentious man, he makes 
 him give up all his amours, abates his pride, and breaks 
 down his haughtiness and dissoluteness, putting in their 
 place modesty and silence and tranquillity and decorum, 
 
 ^ A very favourite proverb among the ancients. See Plat. " Phaedr." 
 fin. Martial, ii. 43. 
 ^ Soph. Fragm. 712. 
 
ON LOYE. 63 
 
 and makes him constant to one. You have heard of conrse 
 ■of the famous courtesan Lais/ how she set all Greece on 
 fire with her charms, or rather was contended for bj two 
 seas,^ and how, when she fell in love with Hippolochus the 
 Thessalian, * she left Acro-Corinthus washed by the green 
 sea,' ^ and deserted all her other lovers, that great army, 
 and went off to Thessaly and lived faithful to Hippo- 
 lochus. But the women there, envious and jealous of her 
 for her surpassing beauty, dragged her into the temple of 
 Ai3hrodite, and there stoned her to death, for which reason 
 probably it is called to this day the temple of Aphrodite 
 the Murderess.* We have also heard of servant girls who 
 have refused the embraces of their masters, and of private 
 individuals who have scorned an amour with queens, when 
 Love has had dominion in their hearts. For as in Rome, 
 when a dictator is proclaimed, all other magistrates lay 
 down their offices, so those over whom Love is lord are free 
 henceforward from all other lords and masters, and pass 
 the rest of their lives dedicate to the god and slaves in his 
 temple. For a noble woman united by Love to her lawful 
 husband would prefer the embraces of bears and dragons to 
 those of any other man." 
 
 § XXII. "Although there are plenty of examples of this 
 virtue of constancy, yet to you, that are the festive votaries 
 of the god,^ it will not be amiss to relate the story of the 
 Galatian Gamma. She was a woman of most remarkable 
 beauty, and the wife of the tetrarch Sinatus, whom 
 Sinorix, one of the most influential men in Galatia, and 
 desperately in love with Gamma, murdered, as he could 
 neither get her by force or persuasion in the lifetime of her 
 husband. And Gamma found a refuge and comfort in her 
 grief in discharging the functions of hereditary priestess 
 to Artemis, and most of her time she spent in her temple, 
 
 ^ On Lais, see Pausanias, ii. 2. Her Thessalian lover is thei'e called 
 Hippostratus. Her favours were so costly that the famous proverb is 
 said to owe its origin to her, " Non cuivis homini contingit adire 
 Corinthum." 
 
 2 The^gean and Ionian. Cf. Horace, " Odes,"i. 7, 2. 
 
 ^ On Acro-Corinthus, see Pausanias, ii. 4. The words in inverted 
 commas are from Euripides, Fragm. 921. 
 
 ^ On Lais generally, and her end, see Athenseus, xiii. 54, 55. 
 
 ^ See § I. The Festival of Love was being kept at this very time. 
 
64 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and, though many kings and potentates wooed her, she 
 refused them all. But when Sinorix boldly proposed 
 marriage to her, she declined not his offer, nor blamed him 
 for what he had done, as though she thought he had only 
 murdered Sinatus out of excessive love for her, and not in 
 sheer villany. He came, therefore, with confidence, and 
 asked her hand, and she met him and greeted him and led 
 him to the altar of the goddess, and pledged him in a cup 
 of poisoned mead, drinking half of it herself and giving 
 him the rest. And when she saw that he had drunk it up, 
 she shouted aloud for joy, and calling upon the name of 
 her dead husband, said, ' Till this day, dearest husband, I 
 have lived, deprived of you, a life of sorrow : but now take 
 me to yourself with joy, for I have avenged you on the 
 worst of men, as glad to share death with him as life with 
 you.' Then Sinorix was removed out of the temple on a 
 litter, and soon after gave up the ghost, and Gamma lived 
 the rest of that day and following night, and is said to have 
 died with a good courage and even with gaiety." '^ 
 
 § XXIII. "As many similar examples might be adduced, 
 both among ourselves and foreigners, who can feel any 
 patience with those that reproach Aphrodite with hinder- 
 ing friendship when she associates herself with Love as a 
 partner ? Whereas any reflecting person would call the 
 love of boys wanton and gross lasciviousness, and say with 
 the poet : 
 
 * This is an outrage, not an act of love.' 
 
 All willing pathics, therefore, we consider the vilest of man- 
 kind, and credit them with neither fidelity, nor modesty, 
 nor friendship, for as Sophocles says : 
 
 * Those who shall lose such friends may well be glad, 
 And those who have such pray that they may lose them.''^ 
 
 But as for those who, not being by nature vicious, have 
 been seduced or forced, they are apt all their life to despise 
 and hate their seducers, and when an opportunity has 
 presented itself to take fierce vengeance. As Crateus, 
 who murdered Archelaus, and Pytholaus, who murdered 
 
 ^ This story is also told by Plutarch, " De Mulierum Virtutibus," § xx. 
 2 Sophocles, Fragm. 741. Quoted again in " On Abundance of 
 Friends," § iii. 
 
ON LOVE. 65 
 
 Alexander of Pherge. And Periander, the tyrant of the 
 Ambraciotes, having asked a most insulting question of his 
 minion, was murdered by him, so exasperated was he. 
 But with women and wives all this is the beginning of 
 friendship, and as it were an initiation into the sacred 
 mysteries. And pleasure plays a very small part in this, 
 but the esteem and favour and mutual love and constancy 
 that result from it, proves that the Delphians did not talk 
 nonsense in giving the name of Arma^ to Aphrodite, nor 
 Homer in giving the name of friendship^ to sexual love, 
 and testifies to the fact that Solon was a most experienced 
 legislator in conjugal matters, seeing that he ordered 
 husbands not less than thrice a month to associate with 
 their wives, not for pleasure, but as states at certain 
 intervals renew their treaties with one another, so he wished 
 that by such friendliness marriage should, as it were, b& 
 renewed after any intervening tiffs and diiferences. But 
 you will tell me there is much foUy and even madness in 
 the love of women. Is there not more extravagance in the 
 love of boys ? 
 
 ' Seeing my many rivals I grow faint. 
 
 The lad is beardless, smooth and soft and handsome, 
 
 O that I might in his embraces die, 
 
 And have the fact recorded on my tomb.' 
 
 Such extravagant language as this is madness not love. 
 And it is absurd to detract from woman's various ex- 
 cellence. Look at their self-restraint and intelligence, 
 their fidelity and uprightness, and that bravery courage 
 and magnanimity so conspicuous in many ! And to say 
 that they have a natural aptitude for all other virtues, but 
 are deficient as regards friendship alone, is monstrous. 
 For they are fond of their children and husbands, and 
 generally speaking the natural affection in them is not 
 only, like a fruitful soil, capable of friendship, but is also 
 accompanied by persuasion and other graces. And as 
 poetry gives to words a kind of relish by melody and 
 metre and rhythm, making instruction thereby more in- 
 teresting, but what is injurious more insidious, so nature, 
 
 ' A Delphic word for love. Can it be connected with iipfxa ? 
 ^ Very frequent in Homer, e.ff., " Iliad," ii. 232 5 vi. 165 j xiii. 636 ; 
 xiv. 353, etc. 
 
66 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 investing womaii witL. beautiful appearance and attractive 
 voice and bewitching figure, does much for a licentious 
 woman in making her wiles more formidable, but makes a 
 modest one more apt thereby to win the goodwill and 
 friendship of her husband. And as Plato advised Xeno- 
 crates, a great and noble man in all other respects, but too 
 austere in his temperament, to sacrifice to the Graces, so 
 one might recommend a good and modest woman to 
 sacrifice to Love, that her husband might be a mild and 
 agreeable partner, and not run after any other woman, so 
 as to be compelled to say like the fellow in the comedy, 
 ' What a wretch I am to ill-treat such a woman ! ' For 
 to love in marriage is far better than to be loved, for it 
 prevents many, nay all, of those offences which spoil and 
 mar marriage. 
 
 § XXIV. As to the passionate affection in the early days 
 of marriage,^ my dear Zeuxippus, do not fear that it will 
 leave any sore or irritation, though it is not wonderful that 
 there should be some friction at the commencement of 
 anion with a virtuous woman, just as at the grafting of 
 trees, as there is also pain at the beginning of conception, 
 for there can be no complete union without some suffering. 
 Learning puts boys out somewhat when they first go to 
 school, as philosophy does young men at a later day, but 
 the ill effects are not lasting, either in their cases or in the 
 case of lovers. As in the fusion of two liquors, love does 
 indeed at first cause a simmering and commotion, but 
 eventually cools down and settles and becomes tranquil. 
 For the union of lovers is indeed a complete union, whereas 
 the union of those that live together without love resembles 
 only the friction and concussion of Epicurus' atoms in 
 collision and recoil, forming no such union as Love 
 makes, when he presides over the conjugal state. For 
 nothing else produces so much pleasure, or such lasting 
 advantages, or such beautiful remarkable and desirable 
 friendship, 
 
 * As when husband and wife live in one house, 
 
 Two souls beating as one.' ''' 
 
 And the law gives its countenance, and nature shows that 
 
 ^ See Lucretius, iv. 1105-1114. I tone down the original here a little. 
 2 Homer, " Odyssey," vi. 183, 184. Cf. Eurip. "Medea," 14, 15. 
 
ON LOVE. 67 
 
 even the gods themselves require love for the production 
 of everything. Thus the poets tell us that ' th^O earth loves 
 a shower, and heaven loves the earth,' and the natural 
 philosophers tell us that the sun is in love with the moon, 
 and that they are husband and wife, and that the earth is 
 the mother of man and beast and the producer of all 
 plants. Would not the world itself then of necessity come 
 to an end, if the great god Love and the desires implanted 
 by the god should leave matter, and matter should cease 
 to yearn for and pursue its lead ? But not to seem to 
 wander too far away and altogether to trifle, you know 
 that many censure boy-loves for their instability, and 
 jeeringly say that that intimacy like an egg is destroyed 
 by a hair,^ for that boy-lovers like Nomads, spending 
 the summer in a blooming and flowery country, at once 
 decamp then as from an enemy's territory. And still more 
 vulgarly Bion the Sophist called the sprouting beards of 
 beautiful boys Harmodiuses and Aristogitons,^ inasmuch as 
 lovers were delivered by them from a pleasant tyranny. 
 But this charge cannot justly be brought against genuine 
 lovers, and it was prettily said by Euripides, as he embraced 
 and kissed handsome Agatho whose beard was just sprout- 
 ing, that the Autumn of beautiful youths was lovely as 
 well as the Spring. And I maintain that the love of 
 beautiful and chaste wives flourishes not only in old age 
 amid grey hairs and wrinkles, but even in the grave and 
 monument. And while there are few such long unions in 
 the case of boy-loves, one might enumerate ten thousand 
 such instances of the love of women, who have kept their 
 fidelity to the end of their lives. One such case I will 
 relate, which happened in my time in the reign of the 
 Emperor Vespasian. 
 
 § XXV. Julius, who stirred up a revolt in Galatia, among 
 several other confederates had one Sabinus, a young man 
 of good family, and for wealth and renown the most con- 
 spicuous of all the men in those parts. But having attempted 
 
 1 This means when the moustache and beard and whiskers begin 
 to grow. 
 
 2 The whole story about Harmodius and Aristogiton and how they 
 killed Hipparchus is told by Thucydides, vi. 64-59. Bion therefore 
 practically called these sprouting beards tyrant-killers, tyramiicides. 
 
68 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 wliat was too nmcli for them tlaey were foiled, and expect- 
 ing to pay the penalty, some committed suicide, others fled 
 and were captured. Tjfow Sabinus himself could easily have 
 got out of the way and made his escape to the barbarians, 
 but he had married a most excellent wife, whose name in 
 that part of the world was Empone, but in Greek would 
 be Herois, and he could neither leave her behind nor take 
 her with him. As he had in the country some underground 
 caves, known only to two of his freedmen, where he used 
 to stow away things, he dismissed all the rest of his slaves, 
 as if he intended to poison himself, and taking with him 
 these two trusty freedmen he descended with them into those 
 underground caves, and sent one of them, Martialis, to tell 
 his wife that he had poisoned himself, and that his body was 
 burnt in the flames of his country-house, for he wanted his 
 wife's genuine sorrow to lend credit to the report of his death. 
 And so it happened. For she, throwing herself on to the 
 ground, groaned and wailed for three days and nights, and 
 took no food. And Sabinus, being informed of this, and 
 fearing that she would die of grief, told Martialis to inform 
 her secretly that he was alive and well and in hiding, and to 
 beg her not to relax her show of grief, but to keep up the 
 farce. And she did so with the genius of a professional 
 actress, but yearning to see her husband she visited him 
 by night, and returned without being noticed, and for six 
 or seven months she lived with him this underground life. 
 And she disguised him by changing his dress, and cutting 
 off his beard, and re-arranging his hair, so that he should 
 not be known, and took him to Rome, having some hopes of 
 obtaining his pardon. But being unsuccessful in this she 
 returned to her own country, and spent most of her time with 
 her husband underground, but from time to time visited the 
 town, and showed herself to some ladies who were her friends 
 and relations. But what is most astonishing of all is that, 
 though she bathed with them, she concealed her pregnancy 
 from them. For the dye which women use to make their 
 hair a golden auburn, has a tendency to produce corpulence 
 and flesh and a full habit, and she rubbed this abundantly 
 over all parts of her body, and so concealed her pregnancy. 
 And she bare the pangs of travail by herself, as a lioness 
 bears her whelps, having hid herself in the cave with her 
 
ON LOVE. by 
 
 husband, and there she gave birth to two boys, one of 
 whom died in Egypt, the other, whose name was Sabinus, 
 was among us only the other day at Delphi. Vespasian 
 eventually put her to death, but paid the penalty for it, 
 his whole progeny in a short time being wiped off the 
 face of the earth.^ For during the whole of his reign he 
 did no more savage act, nor could gods or demons have 
 turned away their eyes from a crueller sight. And yet her 
 courage and bold language abated the pity of the spectators, 
 though it exasperated Vespasian, for, despairing of her 
 safety, she bade them go and tell the Emperor, 'that 
 it was sweeter to live in darkness and underground than to 
 wear his crown.' " ^ 
 
 § xxvr. Here my father said that the conversation 
 about Love which took place at Thespiae ended. And at 
 this moment Diogenes, one of Pisias' companions, was 
 noticed coming up at a faster pace than walking. And 
 while he was yet a little way off, Soclarus hailed him with, 
 "You don't announce war, Diogenes," and he replied, 
 " Hush ! it is a marriage ; come with me quickly, for the 
 sacrifice only waits for you." All were delighted, and 
 Zeuxippus asked if Pisias was still against the marriage. 
 "As he was first to oppose it," said Diogenes, " so he was 
 first to yield the victory to Ismenodora, and he has now put 
 on a crown and robed himself in white, so as to take his 
 place at the head of the procession to the god through the 
 market-place." "Come," said ray father, "in Heaven's 
 name, let us go and laugh at him, and worship the god ; 
 for it is clear that the god has taken delight in what has 
 happened, and been propitious." 
 
 ^ " Scriptus igitur liic libcllus est post caedem Domitiani." — BeisTce. 
 
 ^ Vespasian certainly was not cruel generally. " Non temere quis 
 pnnitus insons reperietur, nisi absente eo et ignaro aut certe invito atque 
 
 decepto Sola est, in qua merito culpetur, pecuniae cupiditas."— 
 
 Suetonius, " Divus Vespasianus," 15, 16. 
 
70 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 COI^JUGAL PRECEPTS. 
 
 PLUTARCH SENDS GREETING TO POLLIANUS AND EURYDICE. 
 
 After tlie customary marriage rites, by which the Priestess 
 of Demeter has united you together, I think that to make 
 an appropriate discourse, and one that will chime in with 
 the occasion, will be useful to you and agreeable to the 
 law. For in music one of the tunes played on the flute is 
 called Hippothorus,* which is a tune that excites fierce 
 desire in stallions to cover mares ; and though in philosophy 
 there are many goodly subjects, yet is there none more 
 worthy of attention than that of marriage, on which subject 
 philosophy spreads a charm over those who are to pass life 
 together, and makes them gentle and mild to one another. 
 I send therefore as a gift to both of you a summary of 
 what you have often heard, as you are both well versed in 
 philosophy, arranging my matter in a series of short observa- 
 tions that it may be the more easily remembered, and I pray 
 that the Muses will assist and co-operate with Aphrodite, so 
 that no lyre or lute could be more harmonious or in tune 
 than your married life, as the result of philosophy and con- 
 cord. And thus the ancients set up near Aphrodite statues 
 of Hermes, to show that conversation was one of the great 
 charms of marriage, and also statues of Peitho^ and the 
 Graces, to teach married people to gain their way with one 
 another by persuasion, and not by wrangling or contention. 
 
 § I. Solon bade the bride eat a quince the first night of 
 marriage, intimating thereby, it seems, that the bridegroom 
 was to expect his first pleasure from the bride's mouth and 
 conversation. 
 
 § II. In Bceotia they dress up the bride with a chaplet 
 
 * This tune is again alluded to by Plutarch in "Queestion. Convival.,'* 
 p. 704, F. See also Clemens Alexandrinus, " Peedagog." ii. p. 164, A. 
 ToXg de "lttttoiq fiiyvvfisvaig olov vnevaiog k-KavXtiTai vofxog avXujSiag' 
 'nnroOopov rovrov KtK\i]Ka(nv oi MovcriKoi. 
 
 ^ Peitho means Persuasion, and is represented as one of the Graces 
 by Hermes. anax. See Pausanias, ix. 35. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 71 
 
 of asparagus, for as the asparagus gives most excellent 
 fruit from a thorny stalk, so the bride, by not being too 
 reluctant and coy in the first approaches, will make the 
 married state more agreeable and pleasant. But those 
 husbands who cannot put up with the early peevishness of 
 their brides, are not a whit wiser than those persons who 
 pluck unripe grapes and leave the ripe grapes for others/ 
 On the other hand, many brides, being at first disgusted 
 with their husbands, are like those that stand the bee's sting 
 but neglect the honey. 
 
 § III. Married people should especially at the outset 
 beware of the first quarrel and collision, observing that 
 vessels when first fabricated are easily broken up into 
 their component parts, but in process of time, getting 
 compact and firmly welded together, are proof against either 
 fire or steel. 
 
 § lY. As fire gets kindled easily in chaff or in a wick 
 or in the fur of hares, but is easily extinguished again, if 
 it find no material to keep it in and feed it, so we must 
 not consider that the love of newly-married people, that 
 blazes out so fiercely in consequence of the attractions of 
 youth and beauty, will be durable and lasting, unless it be 
 fixed in the character, and occupy the mind, and make a 
 living impression.^ 
 
 § V. As catching fish by drugged bait is easy, but makes 
 the fish poor to eat and insipid, so those wives that lay 
 traps for their husbands by philtres and charms, and become 
 their masters by pleasure, have stupid senseless and spoiled 
 husbands to live with. For those that were bewitched by 
 Circe did her no good, nor could she make any use of them 
 when they were turned into swine and asses, but she was 
 greatly in love with the prudent Odysseus who dwelt with 
 her sensibly. 
 
 § Yi. Those women who would rather lord it over fools 
 than obey sensible men, resemble those people who would 
 rather lead the blind on a road, and not people who have 
 eyesight and know how to follow. 
 
 § VII. Women disbelieve that Pasiphae, a king's wife, 
 
 ^ Compare the Proverb HiKeXbg oiKpaKiltrai, and Tibullus, iii. 5, 19 : 
 " Quid fraudare juvat vitem crescentibus uvis ? " 
 
 '^ Cf. Shakspere, " Eomeo and Juliet," A. ii. Sc. vi. 9-15. 
 
72 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 was enamoured of a bull, although they see some of their 
 sex despising grave and sober men, and preferring to asso- 
 ciate with men who are the slaves of intemperance and 
 pleasure, and like dogs and he-goats. 
 
 § Yiii. Men who through weakness or effeminacy cannot 
 vault upon their horses' backs, teach them to kneel and so 
 receive their riders. Similarly, some men that marry noble 
 or rich wives, instead of making themselves better humble 
 their wives, thinking to rule them easier by lowering them. 
 But one ought to govern with an eye to the merit of a 
 woman, as much as to the size of ahorse. 
 
 § IX. We see that the moon when it is far from the sun 
 is bright and glorious, but pales and hides its light when 
 it is near. A modest wife on the contrary ought to be 
 seen chiefly with her husband, and to stay at home and in 
 retirement in his absence. 
 
 § X. It is not a true observation of Herodotus, that a 
 woman puts off her modesty with her shift. ^ On the con- 
 trary, the modest woman puts on her modesty instead, and 
 great modesty is a sign of great conjugal love. 
 
 § XI. As where two voices are in unison the loudest 
 prevails ; so in a well-managed household everything is 
 done by mutual consent, but the husband's supremacy is 
 exhibited, and his wishes are consulted. 
 
 § XII. The Sun beat the North Wind.2 For when it 
 blew a strong and terrible blast, and tried to make the man 
 remove his cloak, he only drew it round him more closely, 
 but when the Sun came out with its warm rays, at first 
 warmed and afterwards scorched, he stripped himself of 
 coat as well as cloak. Most woman act similarly : if their 
 husbands try to curtail by force their luxury and extrava- 
 gance, they are vexed and fight for their rights, but if they 
 are convinced by reason, they quietly drop their expensive 
 habits, and keep within bounds. 
 
 § XIII. Cato turned out of the Senate a man who kissed 
 his own wife in the presence of his daughter. This was 
 perhaps too strong a step, but if it is unseemly, as indeed it 
 is, for husband and wife in the presence of others to fondle 
 
 ^ Herodotus, i. 8. 
 
 ' An allusion to the well-known Fable of JEsoTp, No. 82 in Halm's 
 edition. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 73 
 
 and kiss and embrace one anotlier, is it not far more un- 
 seemly in the presence of others to quarrel and jangle ? Just 
 as conjugal caresses and endearments ought to be private, 
 so ought admonition and scolding and plain speaking, 
 
 § XIV. Just as there is little use in a mirror adorned with 
 gold or precious stones, unless it conveys a true likeness, so 
 there is no advantage in a rich wife, unless she conforms 
 her life and habits to her husband's position. For if when 
 a man is joyful the mirror makes him look sad, and when 
 he is put out and sad it makes him look gay and smiling 
 from ear to ear, the mirror is plainly faulty. So the wife 
 is faulty and devoid of tact, who frowns when her husband 
 is in the vein for mirth and jollity, and who jokes and 
 laughs when he is serious : the former conduct is disagree- 
 able, the latter contemptuous.^ And, just as geometricians 
 say lines and surfaces do not move of themselves, but only 
 in connection with bodies, so the wife ought to have no 
 private emotions of her own, but share in her husband's 
 gravity or mirth, anxiety or gaiety. 
 
 § XV. As those husbands who do not like to see their 
 wives eating and drinking in their company only teach 
 them to take their food on the sly, so those husbands who 
 are not gay and jolly with their wives, and never joke or 
 smile with them, only teach them to seek their pleasures 
 out of their company. 
 
 § XVI. The kings of Persia have their wedded wives at 
 their side at banquets and entertainments ; but when they 
 have a mind for a drunken debauch they send them away,^ 
 and call for singing-girls and concubines, rightly so doing, 
 for so they do not mix up their wives with licentiousness 
 and drunkenness. Similarly, if a private individual, lustful 
 and dissolute, goes astray with a courtesan or maid-servant, 
 the wife should not be vexed or impatient, but consider 
 that it is out of respect to her that he bestows upon another 
 all his wanton depravity. 
 
 ^ This comparison of the mirror is beautifully used by Keble in his 
 " Cliristian Year : " 
 
 " Without a hope on earth to find 
 A mirror in an answei-ing mind." 
 
 Wednesday before Easter. 
 2 Does this throw light on Esther, i. 10-12 ? 
 
74 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 § XYii. As kings make ^ if fond of mnsic many musi- 
 cians, if lovers of learning many men of letters, and 
 many athletes if fond of gymnastics, so the man who has 
 an eye for female charms teaches his wife to dress well, 
 the man of pleasure teaches his meretricious tricks and 
 wantonness, while the true gentleman makes his virtuous 
 and decorous. 
 
 § XVIII. A Lacedgemonian maiden, when someone asked 
 her if she had yet had dealings with a man, replied, " No, 
 but he has with me." This methinks is the line of con- 
 duct a matron should pursue, neither to decline the 
 embraces of a husband when he takes the initiative, nor to 
 provoke them herself, for the one is forward and savours 
 of the courtesan, the other is haughty and unnatural. 
 
 § XIX. The wife ought not to have her own private friends, 
 but cultivate only those of the husband. Now the gods are 
 our first and greatest friends, so the wife ought only to 
 worship and recognize her husband's gods, and the door 
 ought to be shut on all superflaous worship and strange 
 superstitions, for none of the gods are pleased with stealthy 
 and secret sacrifices on the part of a wife. 
 
 § XX. Plato says that is a happy and fortunate state, 
 where the words Meiim and Tuum are least heard,'^ because 
 the citizens regard the common interest in all matters of 
 importance. Far more essential is it in marriage that the 
 words should have no place. For, as the doctors say, that 
 blows on the left shoulders are also felt on the right,^ so is 
 it good^ for husband and wife to mutually sympathize 
 with one another, that, just as the strength of ropes comes 
 from the twining and interlacing of fibres together, so the 
 marriage knot may be confirmed and strengthened by the 
 interchange of mutual affection and kindness. Nature 
 itself teaches this by the birth of children, which are so 
 much a joint result, that neither husband nor wife can dis- 
 
 ^ By their patronage. 
 
 2 " Republic," v. p. 462, C. 
 
 3 By the power of syrapathy. This is especially true of eyes. 
 Wyttenbach compares the Epigram in the Anthology, i. 46. 9. Kai 
 yap dkS,iov ofifia KciKovfjiEvov ofifiari Xai^ IIoXXaKi toiiq tciovg avriCiduxn 
 ■novovQ. 
 
 * Reading koKov with Hercher. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 75 
 
 criminate or discern which part of the child is theirs. 
 So, too, it is well for married persons to have one pnrse, 
 and to throw all their property into one common stock, 
 that here also there may be no Meum and Tuum. And 
 just as we call the mixture of water and wine by the 
 name of wine, even though the water should prepon- 
 derate,* so we say that the house and property belongs to 
 the man, even though the wife contribute most of the 
 money. 
 
 § XXI. Helen was fond of wealth, Paris of pleasure, 
 whereas Odysseus was prudent, Penelope chaste. So the 
 marriage of the last two was happy and enviable, while 
 that of the former two brought an Iliad of woe on Greeks 
 and barbarians alike. 
 
 § XXII. The Roman who was taken to task by his friends 
 for repudiating a chaste wealthy and handsome wife, showed 
 them his shoe and said, " Although this is new and hand- 
 some, none of you know where it pinches me."^ A wife 
 ought not therefore to put her trust in her dowry, or 
 family, or beauty, but in matters that more vitally concern 
 her husband, namely, in her disposition and companion- 
 ableness and complaisance with him, not to make every- 
 day life vexatious or annoying, but harmonious and cheer- 
 ful and agreeable. For as doctors are more afraid of 
 fevers that are generated from uncertain causes, and from 
 a complication of ailments, than of those that have a clear 
 and adequate cause, so the small and continual and daily 
 matters of offence between husband and wife, that the 
 world knows nothing about, set the household most at 
 variance, and do it the greatest injury. 
 
 § XXIII. King Philip was desperately enamoured of a 
 Thessalian woman,^ who was accused of bewitching him ; 
 his wife Olympias therefore wished to get this woman into 
 her power. But when she came before her, and was 
 
 ^ The ancients hardly ever drank wine neat. Hence the allusion. 
 The symposiarch, or arbiter bibendi, settled the proportions to be used. 
 
 ^ Compare the French proverb, " Le beau souUer blesse souvent le 
 pied." 
 
 3 Thessaly was considered by the ancients famous for enchantments 
 and spells. So Juvenal, vi. 610, speaks of " Thessala philtia," and see 
 Horace, " Odes," i. 27. 21, 22 ; ♦' Epodes," v. 45. 
 
76 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 evidently very handsome, and talked to her in a noble and 
 sensible manner, Olympias said, " Farewell to calumny ! 
 Your charms lie in yourself."^ So invincible are the 
 charms of a lawful wife to win her husband's affection by 
 her virtuous character, bringing to him in herself dowry, 
 and family, and philtres, and even Aphrodite's cestus." 
 
 § XXIV. Olympias, on another occasion, when a young 
 courtier had married a wife who was very handsome, but 
 whose reputation was not very good, remarked, " This 
 fellow has no sense, or he would not have married with his 
 eyes." We ought neither to marry with our eyes, nor 
 with our fingers, as some do, who reckon up on their 
 fingers what dowry the wife will bring, not what sort of 
 partner she will make. 
 
 § XXV. It was advice of Socrates, that when young men 
 looked at themselves in the mirror, those who were not 
 handsome should become so through virtue, and those who 
 were so should not by vice deform their beauty. Good 
 also is it for the matron, when she has the mirror in her 
 hands, if not handsome to say to herself, " What should I 
 be, if I were not virtuous ?" and if handsome to say to her- 
 self, " How good it were to add virtue to beauty ! " for it 
 is a feather in the cap of a woman not handsome to be 
 loved for herself and not for good looks. 
 
 § xxvT. Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, sent some costly 
 dresses and necklaces to the daughters of Lysander, but he 
 would not receive them, and said, " These presents will 
 bring my daughters more shame than adornment." And 
 Sophocles said still earlier than Lysander, " Your madness 
 of mind will not appear handsome, wretch, but most un- 
 handsome." For, as Crates says, " that is adornment which 
 adorns," and that adorns a woman that makes her more 
 comely ; and it is not gold or diamonds or scarlet robes 
 that make her so, but her dignity, her correct conduct, and 
 her modesty. 
 
 § XXVII. Those who sacrifice to Hera as goddess of 
 
 "^ Wyttenbach well compares the lines of Menandcr : — 
 tvEffT dXr]6^g (piXTpov evyvMjjKjJv TpoiroQ^ 
 rovrq) KaTaKpariiv avdpog eiioOtv yvvr]. 
 
 ^ An allusion to Homer, '• Iliad," xiv. 214-217. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 11 
 
 marriage/ do not burn the gall with the other parts of the 
 victim, but when they have drawn it throw it away beside 
 the altar : the lawgiver thus liintmg that gall and rage 
 have no place in marriage. For the austerity of a matron 
 should be, like that of wine, wholesome and pleasant, not 
 bitter as aloes, or like a drug. 
 
 § xxviii. Plato advised Xenocrates, a man rather austere 
 but in all other respects a fine fellow, to sacrifice to the 
 Graces. I think also that a chaste wife needs the graces 
 with her husband that, as Metrodorus said, " she may live 
 agreeably with him, and not be bad-tempered because she 
 is chaste." For neither should the frugal wife neglect neat^ 
 ness, nor the virtuous one neglect to make herself attractive, 
 for peevishness makes a wife's good conduct disagreeable, 
 as untidiness makes one disgusted with simplicity. 
 
 § XXIX. The wife who is afraid to laugh and jest with 
 her husband, lest she should appear bold and wanton, 
 resembles one that will not anoint herself with oil lest she 
 should be thought to use cosmetics, and will not wash her 
 face lest she should be thought to paint. We see also in 
 the case of those poets and orators, that avoid a popular 
 illiberal and alfected style, that they artificially endeavour 
 to move and sway their audience by the facts, and by a 
 skilful arrangement of them, and by their gestures. Con- 
 sequently a matron will do well to avoid and repudiate 
 over-preciseness meretriciousness and pomposity, and to 
 use tact in her dealings with her husband in every-day life, 
 accustoming him to a combination of pleasure and decorum. 
 But if a wife be by nature austere and apathetic, and no 
 lover of pleasure, the husband must make the best of it, 
 for, as Phocion said, when Antipater enjoined on him an 
 action neither honourable nor becoming, "You cannot 
 have me as a friend and flatterer both," so he must say 
 to himself about his strict and austere wife, "I cannot 
 have in the same woman wife and mistress." 
 
 § XXX. It was a custom among the Egyptian ladies not 
 to wear shoes, that they might stay at home all day and 
 not go abroad. But most of our women will only stay at 
 
 ' Called by the Romans " pronuba Juno," See Verg. " ^neid," iv, 
 166 : Ovid, " Heroides," vi. 43. 
 
78 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 home if yon strip tlaem of their golden shoes, and bracelets, 
 and shoe- buckles, and purple robes, and pearls. 
 
 § XXXI. Theano, as she was putting on her shawl, dis- 
 played her arm, and somebody observing, " What a hand- 
 some arm!" she replied, "But not common." So ought 
 not even the speech, any more than the arm, of a chaste 
 woman, to be common, for speech must be considered as 
 it were the exposing of the mind, especially in the pre- 
 sence of strangers. For in words are seen the state of 
 mind and character and disposition of the speaker. 
 
 § XXXII. Phidias made a statue of Aphrodite at Elis, 
 with one foot on a tortoise,^ as a symbol that women should 
 stay at home and be silent. For the wife ought only to 
 speak either to her husband, or by her husband, not being 
 vexed if, like a flute-player, she speaks more decorously by 
 another mouth-piece. 
 
 § XXXIII. When rich men and kings honour philosophers, 
 they really pay homage to themselves as well ; but when 
 philosophers pay court to the rich, they lower themselves 
 without advancing their patrons. The same is the case 
 with women. If they submit themselves to their husbands 
 they receive praise, but if they desire to rule, they get less 
 credit even than the husbands who submit to their rule. 
 But the husband ought to rule his wife, not as a master 
 does a chattel, but as the soul governs the body, by sym- 
 pathy and goodwill. As he ought to govern the body by 
 not being a slave to its pleasures and desires, so he ought 
 to rule his wife by cheerfulness and complaisance. 
 
 § XXXIV. The philosophers tell us that some bodies are 
 composed of distinct parts, as a fleet or army; others of 
 connected parts, as a house or ship; others united and 
 growing together, as every animal is. The marriage of 
 lovers is like this last class, that of those who marry for 
 dowry or children is like the second class, and that of those 
 who only sleep together is like the first class, who may be 
 said to live in the same house, but in no other sense to live 
 together. But, just as doctors tell us that liquids are the 
 only things that thoroughly mix, so in married people 
 there must be a complete union of bodies, wealth, friends, 
 
 ' See Pausanias, vi. 25. The statue was made of ivory and gold. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 79 
 
 and relations. And thus the Roman legislator forbade 
 married people to exchange presents with one another, not 
 that they should not go shares with one another, but that 
 they should consider everything as common property. 
 
 § xxxY. At Leptis, a town in Libya, it is the custom for 
 the bride the day after marriage to send to her mother-in- 
 law's house for a pipkin, who does not lend her one, but 
 says she has not got one, that from the first the daughter- 
 in-law may know her mother-in-law's stepmotherly mind,^ 
 that if afterwards she should be harsher still, she should 
 be prepared for it and not take it ill. Knowing this the 
 wife ought to guard against any cause of olfence, for the 
 bridegroom's mother is jealous of his affection to his wife. 
 But there is one cure for this condition of mind, to con- 
 ciliate privately the husband's affection, and not to divert 
 or diminish his love for his mother. 
 
 § XXXVI. Mothers seem to love their sons best as able to 
 help them, and fathers their daughters as needing their help ; 
 perhaps also it is in compliment to one another, that eaoh 
 prefers the other sex in their children, and openly favours 
 it. This, however, is a matter perhaps of little importance. 
 But it looks very nice in the wife to show greater respect 
 to her husband's parents than to her own, and if anything 
 unpleasant has happened to confide it to them rather than 
 to her own people. For trust begets trust,'-^ and love love. 
 
 § xxxvii. The generals of the Greeks in Cyrus's army 
 ordered their men to receive the enemy silently if they 
 came up shouting, but if they came up silently to rush out 
 to meet them with a shout. So sensible wives, in their 
 husband's tantrums, are quiet when they storm, but if 
 they are silent and sullen talk them round and appease 
 them. 
 
 § xxxYiii. Rightly does Euripides ^ censure those who 
 introduce the lyre at wine-parties, for music ought to be 
 
 ^ Compare Terence, " Hecyra," 201. " Uno animo omnes socrus 
 oderunt nurus." As to stepmotherly feelings, the " injusta noverca " has 
 passed into a proverb with all nations. See for example Hesiod, 
 " Works and Days," 823, aXKore ixijrpvu) TrsXei VfJ-^prj, aXKore fi))Trjp. 
 
 2 Wyttenbach compares Seneca's " Fidelem si putaveris facies." 
 " Ep." iii. p. 6. 
 
 ' Euripides, " Medea," 190-198. 
 
80 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 called in to assuage anger and grief, rather tlian to ener- 
 vate the voluptuous still more than before. Think, there- 
 fore, those in error who sleep together for pleasure, but 
 when they have any little difference with one another sleep 
 apart, and do not then more than at any other time invoke 
 Aphrodite, who is the best physician in such cases, as the 
 poet, I ween, teaches us, where he introduces Hera, saying : 
 
 " Their long-continued strife I now will end, 
 For to the bed of love I will them send." ^ 
 
 § XXXIX. Everywhere and at all times should husband 
 and wife avoid giving one another cause of offence, but 
 most especially when they are in bed together. The woman 
 who was in labour and had a bad time said to those that 
 urged her to go to bed, " How shall the bed cure me, which 
 was the very cause of this trouble? "'-^ And those diffe- 
 rences and quarrels which the bed generates will not easily 
 be put an end to at any other time or place. 
 
 § XL. Hermione seems to speak the truth where she 
 says : 
 
 " The visits of bad women ruined me." ^ 
 
 But this case does not happen naturally, but only when dis- 
 sension and jealousy has made wives open not only their 
 doors but their ears to such women. But that is the very 
 time when a sensible wife will shut her ears more than at 
 any other time, and be especially on her guard against 
 whisperers, that fire may not be added to fire,'* and re- 
 member the remark of Philip, who, when his friends tried 
 to excite him against the Greeks, on the ground that they 
 were treated well and yet reviled him, answered, " What 
 will they do then, if I treat them ill ? " Whenever, then, 
 calumniating women come and say to a wife, " How badly 
 your husband treats you, though a chaste and loving- 
 wife ! " let her answer, " How would he act then, if I were 
 to begin to hate him and injure him ? " 
 
 § XLi. The master who saw his runaway slave a long 
 
 1 Homer, " Iliad," xiv. 205, 209. 
 
 2 See Mulier Parturiens, Phaedrus' " Fables," i. 18. 
 ^ Euripides, " Andromache," 930. 
 
 ^ Proverb. Cf. Horace, " Oleum adde camino," ii. " Sat." iii. 321. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 81 
 
 time after he had run away, and chased him, and came up 
 with him just as he had got to the mill, said to him, "In 
 what more appropriate place could I have wished to find 
 you ? " ^ So let the wife, who is jealous of her husband, and 
 on the point of writing a bill of divorce in her anger, say 
 to herself, " In what state would my rival be better pleased 
 to see me in than this, vexed and at variance with my hus- 
 band, and on the point of abandoning his house and bed ? " 
 
 § XLii. The Athenians have three sacred seedtimes : the 
 first at Scirus, as a remembrance of the original sowing of 
 corn, the second at Rharia, the third under Pelis, which is 
 called Buzygium.'^ But a more sacred seedtime than all 
 these is the procreation of children, and therefore Sophocles, 
 did well to call Aphrodite "fruitful Cytherea." Where- 
 fore it behoves both husband and wife to be most careful 
 over this business, and to abstain from lawless and unholy 
 breaches of the marriage vow, and from sowing in quarters- 
 where they desire no produce, or where, if any produce 
 should come, they would be ashamed of it and desire to 
 conceal it.^ 
 
 § XLiii, When Gorgias the Rhetorician recited his speech 
 at Olympia recommending harmony to the Greeks, Melan- 
 thius cried out, "He recommend harmony to us! Why, 
 he can't persuade his wife and maid to live in harmony, 
 though there are only three of them in the house ! " Gor- 
 gias belike had an intrigue with the maid, and his wife 
 was jealous. He then must have his own house in good 
 order who undertakes to order the affairs of his friends 
 and the public, for any ill-doings on the part of husbands 
 to their wives is far more likely to come out and be known 
 to the public than the ill-doings of wives to their hus- 
 bands. 
 
 § XLiv. They say the cat is driven mad by the smell of 
 perfumes. If it happens that wives are equally affected 
 
 ' See ^sop's Fables, No. 121. Halme. ApaTrertjg is the title. All 
 readers of Plautus and Terence know what a bugbear to slaves the 
 threat of being sent to the mill was. They would have to turn it instead 
 of horses, or other cattle. 
 
 * That is, Yoking oxen for the plovgh. 
 
 ^ Procreation of children was among the ancients frequently called 
 Ploughing and Sowing. Hence the allusions in this paragraph. So, too, 
 Shakspere, " Measure for Measure," Act i. Sc. iv. 41-44. 
 
 G 
 
82 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 by perfumes, it is monstrous that their husbands should 
 not abstain from using perfumes, rather than for so small 
 a pleasure to incommode so grievously their wives. And 
 since they suffer quite as much when their husbands go 
 with other women, it is unjust for a small pleasure to pain 
 and grieve wives, and not to abstain from connection with 
 other women, when even bee-keepers will do as much, 
 because bees are supposed to dislike and sting those that 
 have had dealings with women. 
 
 § XLV. Those that approach elephants do not dress in 
 white, nor those that approach bulls in red, for these 
 colours render those animals savage ; and tigers they say 
 at the beating of drums go quite wild, and tear themselves 
 in their rage. Similarly, as some men cannot bear to see 
 scarlet and purple dresses, and others are put out by cym- 
 bals and drums,^ what harm would it do wives to abstain 
 from these things, and not to vex or provoke husbands, but 
 to live with them quietly and meekly ? 
 
 § XLVi. A woman said to Philip, who against her will 
 was pulling her about, " Let me go, all women are alike 
 when the lamp is put out." ^ A good remark to adulterers 
 and debauchees. But the married woman ought to show 
 when the light is put out that she is not like all other 
 women, for then, when her body is not visible, she ought 
 to exhibit her chastity and modesty as well as her personal 
 affection to her husband. 
 
 § XLVii. Plato ^ recommended old men to act with 
 decorum especially before young men, that they too might 
 show respect to them ; for where the old behave shame- 
 lessly, no modesty or reverence will be exhibited by the 
 young. The husband ought to remember this, and show 
 no one more respect than his wife, knowing that the bridal 
 chamber will be to her either a school of virtue or of vice. 
 And he who enjoys pleasures that he forbids his wife, is 
 like a man that orders his wife to go on fighting against an 
 enemy to whom he has himself surrendered. 
 
 § XLViii. As to love of show, Eurydice, read and try to 
 
 ' The reference is to the rites of Cybele. See Lucretius, ii. 618. 
 ^ See Erasmus, " Adagia." The French proverb is '"' La nuit tous les 
 chats sont gris." 
 
 3 « Laws," p. 729, C. 
 
CONJUGAL PRECEPTS. 83 
 
 remember what was written by Timoxena to Arlstylla : 
 and do you, Pollianus, not suppose that your wife will 
 abstain from extravagance and expense, if she sees that 
 yon do not despise such vanities in others, but delight in 
 gilt cups, and pictures in houses, and trappings for mules, 
 and ornaments for horses. For it is not possible to banish 
 extravagance from the women's side of the house if it is 
 always to be seen in the men's apartments. Moreover, 
 Pollianus, as you are already old enough for the study of 
 philosophy, adorn your character by its teaching, whether 
 it consists of demonstration or constructive reasoning, by 
 associating and conversing with those that can profit you. 
 And for your wife gather honey from every quarter, as the 
 bees do, and whatever knowledge you have yourself ac- 
 quired impart to her, and converse with her, making the 
 best arguments well known and familiar to her. For now 
 
 " Father thou art to her, and mother dear, 
 And brother too." ' 
 
 And no less decorous is it to hear the wife say, " Husband, 
 you are my teacher and philosopher and guide in the most 
 beautiful and divine subjects." For such teaching in the 
 first place detaches women from absurdities : for the woman 
 who has learnt geometry will be ashamed to dance, nor will 
 she believe in incantations and spells, if she has been charmed 
 by the discourses of Plato and Xenophon ; and if anyone 
 should undertake to draw the moon down from the sky, 
 she will laugh at the ignorance and stupidity of women 
 that credit such nonsense, well understanding geometry, 
 and having heard how Aglaonice, the daughter of the 
 Thessalian Hegetor, having a thorough knowledge of the 
 eclipses of the moon, and being aware beforehand of the 
 exact time when the moon would be in eclipse, cheated the 
 women, and persuaded them that she herself had drawn it 
 down from the sky. For no woman was ever yet credited 
 with having had a child without intercourse with a man, 
 for those shapeless embryos and gobbets of flesh that take 
 form from corruption are called moles. We must guard 
 against such false conceptions as these arising in the minda 
 
 ^ From the words of Andromache to Hector, " Iliad," vi. 429, 430. 
 
84 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 of women, for if they are not well informed by good pre- 
 cepts, and share in the teaching that men get, they 
 generate among themselves many foolish and absurd ideas 
 and states of mind. But do you, Eurydice, study to make 
 yourself acquainted with the sayings of wise and good 
 women, and ever have on your tongue those sentiments 
 which as a girl you learnt with us, that so you may make 
 your husband's heart glad, and be admired by all other 
 women, being in yourself so wonderfully and splendidly 
 adorned. For one cannot take or put on, except at great 
 expense, the jewels of this or that rich woman, or the silk 
 dresses of this or that foreign woman, but the virtues that 
 adorned Theano,^ and Cleobuline, and Gorgo the wife of 
 Leonidas, and Timoclea the sister of Theagenes, and the 
 ancient Claudia,^ and Cornelia the sister of Scipio,^ and all 
 other such noble and famous women, these one may array 
 oneself in without money and without price, and so adorned 
 lead a happy and famous life. For if Sappho plumed her- 
 self so much on the beauty of her lyrical poetry as to write 
 to a certain rich woman, " You shall lie down in your tomb, 
 nor shall there be any remembrance of you, for you have 
 no part in the roses of Pieria," how shall you not have a 
 greater right to plume yourself on having a part not in the 
 roses but in the fruits which the Muses bring, and which 
 they freely bestow on those that admire learning and philo- 
 sophy ? * 
 
 ^ Theano was the wife of Pythagoras. 
 
 2 See Livy, xxix. 14. Fropertius, v. 11. 51, 52. Ovid, " Fasti," iv. 
 305 sq. 
 
 ^ And mother of the Gracchi. 
 
 ^ Jei-emy Taylor, in his beautiful sermon on " Tlie Marriage King,"^ 
 has borrowed not a few hints from this treatise of Plutarch, as usual 
 investing with a new beauty whatever he borrows, fi-om whatever 
 source. He had the classics at his fingers' end, and much of his unique 
 charm he owes to them. But he read them as a philosopher, and not as 
 a grammarian. 
 
CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE. 85 
 
 CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE. 
 
 § I. Plutarch to his wife sends greeting. The messenger 
 that you sent to me to announce the death of our little girl 
 seems to have missed his waj en route for Athens ; but 
 when I got to Tanagra I heard the news from my niece. 
 I suppose the funeral has already taken place, and I hope 
 everything went off so as to give you least sorrow both now 
 and hereafter. But if you left undone anything you 
 wished to do, waiting for my opinion, and thinking your 
 grief would then be lighter, be it without ceremoniousness 
 or superstition, both which things are indeed foreign to 
 your character. 
 
 § II. Only, my dear wife, let us both be patient at this 
 calamity. I know and can see very clearly how great it is, 
 but should I find your grief too excessive, it would trouble 
 me even more than the event itself. And yet I have not a 
 heart hard as heart of oak or fllntstone, as you yourself 
 know very well, who have shared with me in the bringing 
 up of so many children, as they have all been educated at 
 home by ourselves. And this one I know was more 
 especially beloved by you, as she was the first daughter after 
 four sons, when you longed for a daughter, and so I gave 
 her your name.^ And as you are very fond of children your 
 grief must have a peculiar bitterness when you call to mind 
 her pure and simple gaiety, which was without a tincture 
 of passion or querulousness. For she had from nature a 
 wonderful contentedness of mind and meekness, and her 
 affectionateness and winning ways not only pleased one 
 but also afforded a means of observing her kindliness of 
 heart, for she used to bid her nurse^ give the teat not only 
 to other children but even to her favourite playthings, and 
 so invited them as it were to her table in kindliness of 
 heart, and gave them a share of her good things, and pro- 
 vided the best entertainment for those that pleased her. 
 
 § iiL But I see no reason, my dear wife, why these and 
 similar traits in her character, that gave us delight in her life- 
 
 ^ Timoxena, as we see later on, § ix. 
 
 * Adopting Keiske's reading, naarbv KeXsvovaa, TrpoeKaXetro KaOdirsp, 
 
86 plutaech's morals. 
 
 time, sbould now, when recalled to the memory, grieve and 
 trouble us. Though, on the other hand, I fear that if we 
 cease to grieve we may also cease to remember her, like 
 Clymene, who says in the Play ^ — 
 
 " I hate the supple bow of cornel-wood, 
 And Avould put down athletics," 
 
 because she ever avoided and trembled at anything that re- 
 minded her of her son, for it brought grief with it, and it 
 is natural to avoid everything that gives us pain. But as 
 she gave us the greatest pleasure in embracing her and 
 even in seeing and hearing her, so ought her memory 
 living and dwelling with us to give us more, aye, many 
 times more, joy than grief, since those arguments that we 
 have often used to others ought to be profitable to us in the 
 present conjuncture, nor should we sit down and rail 
 against fortune, opposing to those joys many more griefs. 
 
 § IV. Those who were present at the funeral tell me with 
 evident surprise that you put on no mourning, and that 
 you bedizened up neither yourself nor your maids with the 
 trappings of woe, and that there was no ostentatious ex- 
 penditure of money at the funeral, but that everything was 
 done orderly and silently in the presence of our relations. 
 I am not myself surprised that you, who never made a dis- 
 play either at the theatre or on any other public occasion, 
 and thought extravagance useless even in the case of 
 pleasure, should have been frugal in your grief. For not 
 only ought the chaste woman to remain uncorrupt in 
 Bacchanalian revels,^ but she ought to consider her self- 
 control not a whit less necessary in the surges of sorrow 
 and emotion of grief, contending not (as most people think) 
 against natural affection, but against the extravagant wishes 
 of the soul. For we are indulgent to natural affection in 
 the regret, and honour, and memory that it pays to the dead : 
 but the insatiable desire for a passionate display of funeral 
 grief, coming to the climax in coronachs and beatings of 
 the breast, is not less unseemly than intemperance in 
 
 ^ Euripides' " Phaethon," which exists only in fragme:its. Clymene 
 was I he daughter of Oceanus, and mother of Phaethon. 
 ^ An allusion to Euripides, *' Bacchae," 317, 318. 
 
CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE. 87 
 
 pleasure and is unreasonably^ forgiven only because pain 
 and grief instead of delight are elements in the unseemly 
 exhibition. For what is more unreasonable than to curtail 
 excessive laughter or any other demonstration of joy, and 
 to allow a free vent to copious lamentation and wailing that 
 come from the same source ? And how unreasonable is it, 
 as some husbands do, to quarrel with their wives about 
 perfume and purple robes, while they allow them to shear 
 their heads in mourning, and to dress in black, and to sit 
 in idle grief, and to lie down in weariness ! And what is 
 worst of all, how unreasonable is it for husbands to inter- 
 fere if their wives chastise the domestics and maids im- 
 moderately or without sufficient cause, yet allow them to 
 ill-treat themselves cruelly in cases and conjunctures that 
 require repose and kindness ! 
 
 § V. But between us, my dear wife, there never was any 
 occasion for such a contest, nor do I think there ever will 
 be. For as to your economy in dress and simple way of 
 living, there is no philosopher with whom you are acquainted 
 whom you did not amaze, nor is there any citizen who has 
 not observed^ how plainly you dressed at sacred rites, and 
 sacrifices, and theatres. You have also already on similar 
 painful occasions exhibited great fortitude, as when you lost 
 your eldest son, and again when our handsome Chaeron died. 
 For when I was informed of his death, I well remember 
 some guests from the sea were coming home with me to my 
 house as well as some others, but when they saw the great 
 quiet and tranquillity of the household, they thought, as they 
 afterwards told some other people, that no such disaster had 
 really happened, but that the news was untrue. So well 
 had you ordered everything in the house, at a time when 
 there would have been great excuse for disorder. And yet 
 you had suckled that son, though your breast had had to be 
 lanced owing to a contusion. This was noble conduct and 
 showed your great natural affection. 
 
 § VI. But most mothers we see, when their children are 
 
 ^ Eeadiiig with Reiske ovckvt Xoyy bt, or aXoywf 5k. Some such 
 reading seems necessary to comport with the re yup aXoycjTepov two 
 lines later. 
 
 2 Reading irapeXxee with Xylander. 
 
88 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 brought to them clean and tidj, take them into their hands 
 as playthings, and when they die burst out into idle and 
 unthankful grief, not so much out of affection — for affec- 
 tion is thoughtful and noble — but a great yearning for vain 
 glory' mixed with a little natural affection makes their grief 
 fierce and vehement and hard to appease. And this does 
 not seem to have escaped -^sop's notice, for he says that 
 when Zeus assigned their honours to various gods, Grief 
 also claimed his. And Zeus granted his wish, with this 
 limitation that only those who chose and wished need pay 
 him honour.^ It is thus with grief at the outset, everyone 
 welcomes it at first, but after it has got by process of time 
 settled, and become an inmate of the house, it is with diffi- 
 culty dislodged again, however much people may wish to dis- 
 lodge it. Wherefore we ought to keep it out of doors, and 
 not let it approach the garrison by wearing mourning or 
 shearing the hair, or by any similar outward sign of sorrow. 
 For these things occurring daily and being importunate 
 make the mind little, and narrow, and unsocial, and harsh, 
 and timid, so that, being besieged and taken in hand by 
 grief, it can no longer laugh, and shuns daylight, and avoids 
 society. This evil will be followed by neglect of the body, 
 and dislike to anointing and the bath and the other usual 
 modes of life : whereas the very opposite ought to be the 
 case, for the mind ill at ease especially requires that the 
 body should be in a sound and healthy condition. For much 
 of grief is blunted and relaxed when the body is permeated 
 by calm, like the sea in fine weather. But if the body get 
 into a dry and parched condition from a low diet, and gives 
 no proper nutriment to the soul, but only feeds it with 
 sorrow and grief, as it were with bitter and injurious ex- 
 halations, it cannot easily recover its tone however people 
 may wish it should. Such is the state of the soul that has 
 been so ill-treated. 
 
 § VII. Moreover, I should not hesitate to assert ^ that the 
 
 ' A great craving for sympathy would be the modern way of putting 
 it. 
 
 - See the Fable of -^sop, entitled UevQovc yepag, No. 355. Halme. 
 See also Plutarch's "Consolation to Apollonius," § xix., where the 
 Fable is told at some length. 
 
 3 Reading with Reiske ovk av eiTraiv 0o/3»j9£ijjv. 
 
CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE. 80 
 
 most formidable peril in connection with this is " the visits 
 of bad women," ^ and their chatter, and joint lamentation, 
 all which things fan the fire of sorrow and aggravate it, and 
 suffer it not to be extinguished either by others or by itself. 
 I am not ignorant what a time of it you had lately, when 
 you went to the aid of Theon's sister, and fought against 
 the women who came on a visit of condolence and rushed up 
 with lamentation and wailing, adding fuel as it were to 
 her fire of grief in their simplicity. For when people see 
 their friends' houses on fire they put it out as quickly and 
 energetically as they can, but when their souls are on fire 
 they themselves bring fuel. And if anybody has anything 
 the matter with his eyes they will not let him put his hands 
 to them, however much he wish, nor do they themselves 
 touch the inflamed part ; but a person in grief sits down 
 and gives himself up to every chance comer, like a river 
 [that all make use of], to stir up and aggravate the sore, 
 so that from a little tickling and discomfort it grows into 
 a great and terrible disease. However, as to all this I know 
 you will be on your guard. 
 
 § VIII. Try also often to carry yourself back in memory 
 to that time when, this little girl not having been then 
 born, we had nothing to charge Fortune with, and to com- 
 pare that time and this together, as if our circumstances 
 had gone back to what they were then. Otherwise, my 
 dear wife, we shall seem discontented at the birth of our 
 little daughter, if we consider our position before her birth 
 as more perfect. But we ought not to erase from our 
 memory the two years of her life, but to consider them as 
 a time of pleasure giving us gratification and enjoyment, 
 and not to deem the shortness of the blessing as a great 
 evil, nor to be unthankful for what was given us, because 
 Fortune did not give us a longer tenure as we wished. For 
 ever to be careful what we say about the gods, and to be 
 cheerful and not rail against Fortune, brings a sweet and 
 goodly profit ; and he who in such conjunctures as ours 
 mostly tries to remember his blessings, and turns and diverts 
 his mind from the dark and disturbing things in life to the 
 
 ^ An allusion to Euripides, " Andromache," 930. See Plutarch's 
 " Conjugal Precepts," § xl. 
 
90 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 bright and radiant, either altogether extinguishes his grief or 
 makes it small and dim from a comparison with his comforts. 
 For as perfume gives pleasure to the nose, and is a remedy 
 against disagreeable smells, so the remembrance of past 
 happiness in present trouble gives all the relief they require 
 to those who do not shut out of their memory the blessings of 
 the past, or always and everywhere rail against Fortune. 
 And this certainly ought not to be our case, that we should 
 slander all our past life because, like a book, it has one erasure 
 in it, when all the other pages have been bright and clean. 
 § IX. You have often heard that happiness consists in 
 right calculations resulting in a healthy state of mind, and 
 that the changes which Fortune brings about need not up- 
 set it, and introduce confusion into our life. But if we too 
 must, like most people, be governed by external events, 
 and make an inventory of the dealings of Fortune, and 
 constitute other people the judges of our felicity, do not 
 now regard the tears and lamentations of those who visit 
 you, which by a faulty custom are lavished on everybody, 
 but consider rather how happy you are still esteemed by 
 them for your family, your house, and life. For it would 
 be monstrous, if others would gladly prefer your destiny to 
 theirs, even taking into account our present sorrow, that you 
 should rail against and be impatient at our present lot, 
 and in consequence of our bitter grief not reflect how much 
 comfort is still left to us. But like those who quote im- 
 perfect verses of Homer ^ and neglect the finest passages of 
 his writings, to enumerate and complain of the trials of 
 life, while you pay no attention to its blessings, is to 
 resemble those stingy misers, who heap up riches and make 
 no use of them when they have them, but lament and are 
 impatient if they are lost. And if you grieve over her 
 dying unmarried and childless, you can comfort yourself 
 with the thought that you have had both those advantages. 
 For they should not be reckoned as great blessings in the 
 case of those who do not enjoy them, and small blessings 
 in the case of those who do. And that she has gone to a 
 
 ' The whole subject is discussed in full by Athenseus, p. 632^ T. F. 
 A false quantity we see was a bugbear even before the da}S of 
 Universities. 
 
CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE. 91 
 
 place where she is out of pain ought not to pain us, for 
 what evil can we mourn for on her account if her pains are 
 over ? For even the loss of important things does not 
 grieve us when we have no need of them. But it was only 
 little things that your Timoxena was deprived of, little things 
 only she knew, and in little things only did she rejoice ; and 
 how can one be said to be deprived of things of which one 
 had no conception, nor experience, nor even desire for ? 
 
 § X. As to what you hear from some people, who get 
 many to credit their notion, that the dead suffer no evil or 
 pain, I know that you are prevented from believing that by 
 the tradition of our fathers and by the mystic symbols of the 
 mysteries of Dionysus, for we are both initiated. Consider 
 then that the soul, being incorruptible, is in the same con- 
 dition after death as birds that have been caught. For if 
 it has been a long time in the body, and during this mortal 
 life has become tame by many affairs and long habit, it 
 swoops down again and a second time enters the body, and 
 does not cease to be involved in the changes and chances of 
 this life that result from birth. For do not suppose that 
 old age is abused and ill-spoken of only for its wrinkles 
 and white hair and weakness of bod^'-, but this is the worst 
 feature about it, that it makes the soul feeble in its re- 
 membrance of things in the other world, and strong in its 
 attachment to things in this world, and bends and presses 
 it, if it retain the form which it had in the body from its 
 experience. But that soul, which does indeed enter the 
 body, but remains only a short time in it, being liberated 
 from it by the higher powers, rears as it were at a damp 
 and soft turning post in the race of life, and hastens on to 
 its destined goal. For just as if anyone put out a fire, and 
 light it again at once, it is soon rekindled, and burns up 
 again quickly, but if it has been out a long time, to light it 
 again will be a far more difficult and irksome task, so the 
 soul that has sojourned only a short time in this dark and 
 mortal life, quickly recovers the light and blaze of its 
 former bright life, whereas for those who have not had the 
 good fortune very early, to use the language of the poet, 
 " to pass the gates of Hades," ^ nothing remains but a great 
 
 1 Homer, " Iliad," v. 646; xxiii. 71. 
 
92 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 passion for the things of this life, and a softening of the 
 soul through contact with the body, and a melting away of 
 it as if by the agency of drugs/ 
 
 § XI. And the truth of this is rendered more apparent in 
 our hereditary and time-honoured customs and laws. For 
 when infants die no libations are poured out for them, nor 
 are any other rites performed for them, such as are always 
 performed for adults. For they have no share in the earth 
 or in things of the earth, nor do parents haunt their tombs 
 or monuments, or sit by their bodies when they are laid 
 out. For the laws do not allow us to mourn for such, 
 seeing that it is an impious thing to do so in the case of 
 persons who have departed into a better and more divine 
 place and sphere. I know that doubts are entertained 
 about this, but since to doubt is harder for them than to 
 believe, let us do externally as the laws enjoin, and in- 
 ternally let us be more holy and pure and chaste.^ 
 
 THAT VIRTUE MAY BE TAUGHT. 
 
 § I. As to virtue we deliberate and dispute whether good 
 sense, and justice, and rectitude can be taught : and then 
 we are not surprised that, while the works of orators, and 
 pilots, and musicians, and house-builders, and farmers, are 
 innumerable, good men are only a name and expression, 
 like Centaurs and Griants and Cyclopes, and that it is im- 
 possible to find any virtuous action without alloy of base 
 motives, or any character free from vice : but if nature 
 produces spontaneously anything good, it is marred by 
 much that is alien to it, as fruit choked by weeds. Men 
 learn to play on the harp, and to dance, and to read, and 
 to farm, and to ride on horseback : they learn how to put 
 on their shoes and clothes generally : people teach hovv^ 
 
 ^ This section is di*eadfully corrupt. I have adopted, it will be seen, 
 the suggestions of Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ This Consolatory Letter ends rather abruptly. It is probable that 
 there was more of it. 
 
THAT VIRTUE MAY BE TAUGHT. 93 
 
 to pour out wine, how to cook ; and all these things 
 cannot be properly performed, without being learned. 
 The art of good living alone, though all those things I 
 have mentioned only exist on its account, is untaught, 
 unmethodical, inartistic, and supposed to come by the light 
 of nature ! 
 
 § II. O sirs, by asserting that virtue is not a thing to bo 
 taught, why are we making it unreal ? For if teaching 
 prodaces it, the deprivation of teaching prevents it. And 
 yet, as Plato says, a discord and false note on the lyro 
 makes not brother go to war with brother, nor sets friends 
 at variance, nor makes states hostile to one another, so as 
 to do and suffer at one another's hands the most dreadful 
 things : ^ nor can anyone say that there was ever a dissen- 
 sion in any city as to the pronunciation of Telchines : nor 
 in a private house any difference between man and wife as 
 to woof and warp. And yet no one without learning would 
 undertake to ply the loom, or write a book, or play on the 
 lyre, though he would thereby do no great harm, but he fears 
 making himself ridiculous, for as Heraclitus says, "It is 
 better to hide one's ignorance," yet everyone thinks himself 
 competent to manage a house and wife and the state and 
 hold any magisterial office. On one occasion, when a boy 
 was eating rather greedily, Diogenes gave the lad's tutor a 
 blow Avith his fist, ascribing the fault not to the boy, who 
 had not learnt how to eat properly, but to the tutor who 
 had not taught him. And can one not properly handle a dish 
 or a cup, unless one has learnt from a boy, as Aristophanes 
 bids us, " not to giggle, nor eat too fast, nor cross our 
 legs," " and yet be perfectly fit to manage a family and city, 
 and wife, and live well, and hold office, when one has not 
 learnt how one should behave in the conduct of life ? 
 When Aristippus was asked by someone, " Are you every- 
 where then ? " he smiled and said, " If I am everywhere, I 
 lose my passage money." ^ Why should not you also say, 
 " If men are not better for learning, the money paid to tutors 
 is also lost ? " For just as nurses mould with their hands 
 
 ^ Plato, " Clitophon," p. 407, C. 
 
 ^ Aristophanes, " Clouds," 983. 
 
 ^ Does Juvenal aHude to this, viii. 97 ? 
 
94 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the child's body, so tutors, receiving it immediately it is 
 weaned, mould its soul, teaching it by habit the first 
 vestiges of virtue. And the Lacedasmonian, who was asked, 
 what good he did as a tutor, replied, " I make what is good 
 pleasant to boys." Moreover tutors teach boys to walk 
 in the streets with their heads down,^ to touch salt fish with 
 one finger only, other fish bread and meat with two, to 
 scratch themselves in such a way, and in such a way to 
 put on their cloak.^ 
 
 § in. What then ? He that says that the doctor's skill 
 is wanted in the case of a slight skin-eruption or whitlow, 
 but is not needed in the case of pleurisy, fever, or lunacy, in 
 what respect does he differ from the man that says that 
 schools and teaching and precepts are only for small and 
 boyish duties, while great and important matters are to 
 be left to mere routine and accident? For, as the man is 
 ridiculous who says we ought to learn to row but not to 
 steer, so he who allows all other arts to be learnt, but not 
 virtue, seems to act altogether contrary to the Scythians. 
 For they, as Herodotus tells us,^ blind their slaves that 
 they may remain with them, but such an one puts the eye 
 of reason into slavish and servile arts, and takes it away 
 from virtue. And the general Iphicrates well answered 
 Callias, the son of Chabrias, who asked him, " What are 
 you? an archer? a targe teer ? cavalry, or infantry?" 
 "None of these," said he, "but the commander of them 
 all." Ridiculous therefore is he who says that the use of 
 the bow and other arms and the sling and riding are to be 
 taught, but that strategy and how to command an army 
 comes by the light of nature. Still more ridiculous is he 
 who asserts that good sense alone need not be taught, with- 
 out which all other arts are useless and profitless, seeing that 
 she is the mistress and orderer and arranger of all of them, 
 and puts each of them to their proper use. For example, 
 what grace would there be in a banquet, though the servants 
 had been well- trained, and had learnt how to dress and cook 
 
 ^ So as to look modest and be " Ingenui vultus pueri, ingenuique 
 pudoris." 
 
 ' Reading with Salmasius, dvaftaXelv. 
 
 ^ Herodotus, iv. 2. The historian, however, assigns other reasons 
 for blinding them. 
 
THAT VIRTUE MAY BE TAUGHT. 95 
 
 the meat and poar out the wine,"^ unless there was good 
 order and method among the waiters ? ^ 
 
 ON VIRTUE AND VICE. 
 
 § I. Clothes seem to warm a man, not by throwing out 
 heat themselves (for in itself every garment is cold, whence 
 in great heat or in fevers people frequently change and 
 shift them), but the heat which a man throws out from 
 his own body is retained and wrapped in by a dress fitting 
 close to the body, which does not admit of the heat being 
 dissipated when once it has got firm hold. A somewhat 
 similar case is the idea that deceives the mass of mankind, 
 that if they could live in big houses, and get together a 
 quantity of slaves and money, they would have a happy 
 life. But a happy and cheerful life is not from without, 
 on the contrary, a man adds the pleasure and gratification 
 to the things that surround him, his temperament being as 
 it were the source of his feelings.^ 
 
 " But when the fire blazes the house is brighter to look at." * 
 
 So, too, wealth is pleasanter, and fame and power more 
 splendid, when a man has joy in his heart, seeing that men 
 can bear easily and quietly poverty and exile and old age 
 if their character is a contented and mild one. 
 
 § II. For as perfumes make threadbare coats and rags to 
 smell sweet, while the body of Anchises sent forth a fetid 
 
 1 A line from " Odyssey," xv. 323. 
 
 2 " Malim ^aiTVfiovaQ." Wyttenbach, who remarks generally on this 
 short treatise, " Non integra videtur esse nee continua disputatio, sed 
 disputationis, Plutarchese tamen, excerptum compendium." 
 
 3 Happiness comes from within, not from without. The true seat of 
 happiness is the mind. Compare Milton, " Paradise Lost," Book i. 
 254, 255 :— 
 
 " The mind is its own place, and in itself 
 Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven." 
 
 •* Homeric Epigrammata, xiii. 5. 
 
96 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 discharge, " distilling from his back on to his linen robe," 
 so every kind of life with virtue is painless and pleasurable, 
 whereas vice if infused into it makes splendour and wealth 
 and magnificence painful, and sickening, and unwelcome to 
 its possessors. 
 
 " He is deemed happy in the market-place, 
 But when he gets him home, thrice miserable. 
 His wife rules all, quarrels, and dumineers." ' 
 
 And yet there would be no great diflB.culty in getting rid of a 
 bad wife, if one was a man and not a slave. Bat a man can- 
 not by writing a bill of divorce to his vice get rid of all 
 trouble at once, and enjoy tranquillity by living apart : for 
 it is ever present in his vitals, and sticks to him night and 
 day, " and burns without a torch, and consigns him to gloomy 
 old age," ^ being a disagreeable fellow-traveller owing to 
 its arrogance, and a costly companion at table owing to its 
 daintiness, and an unpleasant bed-fellow, disturbing and 
 marring sleep by anxiety and care and envy. For during 
 such a one's sleep the body indeed gets rest, but the mind 
 has terrors, and dreams, and perturbations, owing to super- 
 stition, 
 
 " For when my trouble catches me asleep, 
 I am undone by the most fearful dreams," 
 
 as one says. For thus envy, and fear, and anger, and lust 
 affect one. During the daytime, indeed, vice looks abroad 
 and imitates the behaviour of others, is shy and conceals 
 its evil desires, and does not altogether give way to its 
 propensities, but often even resists and fights stoutly against 
 them ; but in sleep it escapes the observation of people 
 and the law, and, being as far as possible removed from 
 fear or modesty, gives every passion play, and excites its 
 depravity and licentiousness, for, to borrow Plato's expres- 
 sion,^ " it attempts incest with its mother, and procures for 
 itself unlawful meats, and abstains from no action what- 
 
 ^ Wyttenbach thinks these lines are by Menander. Plutarch quotes 
 them again " On Contentedness of Mind," § xi. 
 
 2 Hesiod, " Works and Days," 705. 
 
 2 Plato, " Republic," ix. p. 571, D. Quoted again, " How one may 
 be aware of one's Progi*ess in Virtue," § xu. 
 
ON YIRTUE AND YICE. 97 
 
 ever," and enjoys lawlessness as far as is practicable in 
 visions and phantasies, that end in no complete pleasure or 
 satisfaction, but can only stir up and inflame the passions 
 and morbid emotions. 
 
 § III. Where then is the pleasure of vice, if there is no- 
 where in it freedom from anxiety and pain, or independence, 
 or tranquillity, or rest ? ^ A healthy and sound constitu- 
 tion does indeed augment the pleasures of the body, but 
 for the soul there can be no lasting joy or gratification, 
 unless cheerfulness and fearlessness and courage supply a 
 calm serenity free from storms; for otherwise, even if hope 
 or delight smile on the soul, it is soon confused and dis- 
 turbed by care lifting up its head again, so that it is but 
 the calm of a sunken rock. 
 
 § IV. Pile up gold, heap up silver, build covered walks, 
 fill your house with slaves and the town with debtors, 
 unless you lay to rest the passions of the soul, and put a 
 curb on your insatiable desires, and rid yourself of fear and 
 anxiety, you are but pouring out wine for a man in a fever, 
 and giving honey to a man who is bilious, and laying out 
 a sumptuous banquet for people who are suffering from, 
 dysentery, and can ' neither retain their food nor get 
 any benefit from it, but are made even worse by it. 
 Have you never observed how sick persons turn against 
 and spit out and refuse the daintiest and most costly 
 viands, though people offer them and almost force them 
 down their throats, but on another occasion, when their 
 condition is different, their respiration good, their blood in 
 a healthy state, and their natural warmth restored, they 
 get up, and enjoy and make a good meal of simple bread 
 and cheese and cress ? Such, also, is the effect of reason 
 on the mind. You will be contented, if you have learned 
 what is good and honourable. You will live daintily 
 and be a king in poverty, and enjoy a quiet and private 
 life as much as the public life of general or states- 
 man. By the aid of philosophy you will live not unplea- 
 santly, for you will learn to extract pleasure from all places 
 
 ^ And so Dr. Young truly says, — 
 
 " A man of pleasure is a man of pains." 
 
 Night Thoicghts. 
 
98 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and things : wealth will make you happy, because it will 
 enable you to benefit many ; and poverty, as you will not 
 then have many anxieties ; and glory, for it will make you 
 honoured ; and obscurity, for you will then be safe from 
 envy. 
 
 ON MORAL VIRTUE. 
 
 § I. I propose to discuss what is called and appears to 
 be moral virtue (which differs mainly from contemplative 
 virtue in that it has emotion for its matter, and reason for 
 its form), what its nature is, and how it subsists, and 
 whether that part of the soul which takes it in is furnished 
 with reason of its own, or participates in something foreign, 
 and if the latter, whether as things that are mixed with 
 something better than themselves, or rather as that which 
 is subject to superintendence and command, and may be 
 said to share in the power of that which commands. For 
 I think it is clear that virtue can exist and continue alto- 
 gether free from matter and mixture. My best course will 
 be to run briefly over the views of others, not so much to 
 display my research as because, when their ideas have been 
 set forth, mine will become more clear and be on a firmer 
 basis. 
 
 § II. Menedemus of Eretria took away the number and 
 differences of virtues, on the ground that virtue was one 
 though it had many names ; for that just as mortal is 
 synonymous with man, so temperance and bravery and 
 justice were the same thing. And Aristo of Chios also 
 made virtue one in substance, and called it soundness of 
 mind : its diversities and varieties only existing in certain 
 relations, as if one called our sight when it took in white 
 objects white-sight, and when it took in black objects 
 black-sight, and so on. For virtue, when it considers what 
 it ought to do and what it ought not to do, is called 
 prudence ; and when it curbs passion, and sets a fit and 
 proper limit to pleasure, it is called self-control; and when 
 it is associated with our dealings and covenants with one 
 another, it is called justice ; just as a knife is one article, 
 
ON MORAL YIRTUE. 99 
 
 though at different times it cuts different things in half : 
 and so, too, fire acts on different matter though it has but 
 one property. And Zeno of Cittium seems to incline 
 somewhat to the same view, as he defines prudence in dis- 
 tribution as justice, in choice as self-control, in endurance 
 as fortitude : and those who defend these views maintain 
 that by the term prudence Zeno means knowledge. But 
 Chrysippus, thinking each particular virtue should be 
 arranged under its particular quality, unwittingly stirred 
 up, to use Plato's language, "a whole swarm of virtues," ^ 
 unusual and unknown. For as from brave we get bravery, 
 and from mild mildness, and from just justice, so from 
 acceptable he got acceptableness, and from good good- 
 ness, and from great greatness, and from the honourable 
 honourableness, and he made virtues of many other such 
 clevernesses, affabilities, and versatilities, and filled philo- 
 sophy, which did not at all require it, with many strange 
 names. 
 
 § III. I>row all these agree in supposing virtue to be a 
 disposition and faculty of the governing part of the soul 
 set in motion by reason, or rather to be reason itself con- 
 formable and firm and immutable. They think further 
 that the emotional and unreasoning part of the soul is not 
 by any natural difference distinct from the reasoning part, 
 but that that same part of the soul, which they call intel- 
 lect and the leading principle of action, being altogether 
 diverted and changed by the passions, and by the alterations 
 which habit or disposition have brought about, becomes 
 either vice or virtue, without having in itself any unreason- 
 ing element, but that it is called unreasoning when, by the 
 strong and overpowering force of appetite, it launches out 
 into excesses contrary to the direction of reason. For 
 passion, according to them, is only vicious and intemperate 
 reason, getting its strength and power from bad and faulty 
 judgement. But all of those philosophers seem to have 
 been ignorant that we are all in reality two-fold and com- 
 posite, though they did not recognize it, and only saw the 
 more evident mixture of soul and body. And yet that there 
 is in the soul itself something composite and two-fold and 
 
 ^ See " Meno," p. 72, A. 
 
100 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 dissimilar (the unreasoning part of it, as if another hody, 
 being by necessity and nature mixed up with and united to 
 reason), seems not to have escaped the notice even of 
 Pythagoras, as we infer from his zeal for music, which he 
 introduced to calm and soothe the soul, as knowing that it 
 was not altogether amenable to precept and instruction, or 
 redeemable from vice only by reason, but that it needed 
 some other persuasion and moulding and softening influence 
 to co-operate with reason, unless it were to be altogether 
 intractable and refractory to philosophy. And Plato saw 
 very plainly and confidently and decidedly that the soul 
 of this universe is not simple or uncomposite or uniform, 
 but is made up of forces that work uniformly and differently, 
 in the one case it is ever marshalled in the same order and 
 moves about in one fixed orbit, in the other case it is 
 divided into motions and orbits contrary to each other and 
 changing about, and thus generates differences in things. 
 So, too, the soul of man, being a part or portion of the soul 
 of the universe, and compounded upon similar principles 
 and proportions, is not simple or entirely uniform, but has 
 one part intelligent and reasoning, which is intended by 
 nature to rule and dominate in man, and another part un- 
 reasoning, and subject to passion and caprice, and dis- 
 orderly, and in need of direction. And this last again is. 
 divided into two parts, one of which, being most closely 
 connected with the body, is called desire, and the other, 
 sometimes taking part with the body, sometimes with 
 reason, lending its influence against the body, is called 
 anger. And the difference between reason and sense on 
 the one hand, and anger and desire on the other, is shown 
 by their antipathy to one another, so that they are often at 
 variance with one another as to what is best.^ These were 
 at first ^ the views of Aristotle, as is clear from his writings, 
 though afterwards he joined anger to desire, as if anger 
 were nothing but a desire and passion for revenge. How- 
 ever, he always considered the emotional and unreasoning 
 part of the soul as distinct from the reasoning, not that it 
 is altogether unreasoning as the perceptive, or nutritive, or 
 
 ^ Omitting 'irfpa, which Reiske justly suspects. 
 ^ Eeading Trpwrov with Wyttenbach. 
 
ON MORAL \1RTU*:. l(l)l. 
 
 vegetative portions of the soul, for these are always deaf 
 and disobedient to reason, and in a certain sense are oif- 
 shoots from the flesh, and altogether attached to the bodj; 
 but the emotional, though it is destitute of any reason of 
 its own, yet is naturally inclined to listen to reason and 
 sense, and turn and submit and mould itself accordingly, 
 unless it be entirely corrupted by brute pleasure and a life 
 of indulgence. 
 
 § IT. As for those who wonder that what is unreasoning 
 should obey reason, they do not seem to me to recognize 
 the power of reason, how great it is, and how far-reaching 
 its dominion is — a power not gained by harsh and repelling 
 methods, but by attractive ones, as mild persuasion which 
 always accomplishes more than compulsion or violence. 
 For even the spirit and nerves and bones, and other parts 
 of the body, though devoid of reason, yet at any instigation 
 of reason, when she shakes as it were the reins, are all on 
 the alert and compliant and obedient, the feet to run, and 
 the hands to throw or lift, at her bidding. Right excel- 
 lently has the poet set forth in the following lines the 
 sympathy and accordance between the unreasoning and 
 
 " Thus were her beauteous cheeks diffused with tears, 
 Weeping her husband really present then. 
 But though Odysseus pitied her in heart, 
 His eyes like horn or steel impassive stood 
 Within their lids, and craft his tears repressed." ^ 
 
 So completely under the control of judgement did he keep 
 his spirit and blood and tears. The same is shown by the 
 subsidence of our passions, which are laid to rest in the 
 presence of handsome women or boys, whom reason and 
 the law forbid us to touch ; a case which most frequently 
 happens to lovers, when they hear that they have unwit- 
 tingly fallen in love with a sister or daughter. For at 
 once passion is laid at the voice of reason, and the body 
 exhibits its members as subservient to decorum. And fre- 
 quently in the case of dainty food, people very much 
 attracted by it, if they find out at the time or learn after- 
 wards that they have eaten what is unclean or unlawful, 
 
 ^ Homer, *' Odyssey," xix. 208-212. 
 
102 p\utaech's morals. ' 
 
 not only suffer distress and grief in their imagination, but 
 even their very body is upset by the notion, and violent 
 retchings and vomitings follow.^ I fear I should seem to 
 be introducing merely novel and enticing arguments, if I 
 were to enumerate stringed instruments and lyres, and 
 harps and flutes, and other harmonious musical instruments, 
 which, although inanimate, yet speak to man's passions, 
 rejoicing with him, and mourning with him, and chiming 
 in with him, and rioting with him, — in a word, falling in 
 with the vein and emotions and characters of those that 
 play on them. And they say that Zeno on one occasion, 
 going into the theatre when Amoebeus ^ was playing on the 
 harp, said to the pupils, "Let us go and learn what music 
 can be produced by guts and nerves and wood and bones, 
 when they preserve proportion and time and order." Bat 
 passing these things over, I would gladly learn from them, 
 if, when they see dogs and horses and birds domes- 
 ticated, and by habit and training uttering sounds that 
 can be understood, and making obedient movements and 
 gestures, and acting quietly and usefully to us, and when 
 they notice that Achilles in Homer cheers on horses as 
 well as men to the fight,^ they still wonder and doubt, 
 whether the passionate and emotional and painful and 
 pleasurable elements in us are by nature obedient to the 
 voice of reason, and influenced and affected by it, seeing 
 that those elements are not apart from us or detached from 
 us, or formed from outside, or hammered into us by force, 
 but are innate in us, and ever associate with us, and are 
 nourished within us, and abound in us through habit. 
 Accordingly moral character is well called by the Greeks 
 r'ldoQ, for it is, to speak generally, a quality of the unrea- 
 soning element in man, and is called >/0oc because the un- 
 reasoning element moulded by reason receives this quality 
 and difference by habit, which is called edog^ I^ot that 
 reason wishes to expel passion altogether (that is neither 
 
 ^ As in the story in " Gil Bias " of the person who, after eating a 
 ragout of rabbit, was told it was a ragout of cat. — Book X. chapter xii. 
 
 ^ As to Amcebeus, see Athenseus, p. 623. D. 
 
 3 « Iliad," xvi. 167. 
 
 * Generally speaking £6*0^ is the habit, rjOog the moral character gene- 
 rated by habit. The former is Aristotle's tvspyeia, the latter his e^ig. 
 
ON MORAL YIRTUE. 103 
 
 possible, nor advisable), but only to keep it within bounds 
 and order, and to engender the moral virtues, vrhich are 
 not apathetic, but hold the due proportion and mean in 
 regard to passion. And this she does by reducing the 
 power of passion to a good habit. For there are said to be 
 three things existing in the soul, power, passion, and habit. 
 Power is the principle or matter of passion, as power to be 
 angry, ashamed, or confident : and passion is the actual 
 setting in motion of that power, being itself anger, con- 
 fidence, or shame; and habit is the strong formation of 
 power in the unreasoning element engendered by use, being 
 vice if the passions are badly tutored by reason, virtue if 
 they are well tutored. 
 
 § v. But since they do not regard every virtue as a 
 mean, nor call it moral, we must discuss this difference by 
 approaching the matter more from first principles. Some 
 things in the world exist absolutely, as the earth, the sky, 
 the stars, and the sea ; others have relation to us, as good 
 and evil, as what is desirable or to be avoided, as pleasant 
 and painful : and since reason has an eye to both of these 
 classes, when it considers the former it is scientific and 
 contemplative, when it considers the latter it is deliberative 
 and practical. And prudence is the virtue in the latter 
 case, as knowledge in the former. And there is this diffe- 
 rence between prudence and knowledge, prudence consists 
 in applying the contemplative to the practical and emotional 
 so as to make reason paramount. On which account it 
 often needs the help of fortune ; whereas knowledge needs 
 neither the help of fortune nor deliberation to gain its 
 ends : for it considers only things which are always the 
 same. And as the geometrician does not deliberate about 
 the triangle, as to whether its interior angles are together 
 equal to two right angles, for he knows it as a fact — and 
 deliberation only takes place in the case of things which 
 differ at different times, not in the case of things which 
 are certain and unchangeable — so the contemplative mind 
 having its scope in first principles, and things that are 
 fixed, and that ever have one nature which does not 
 admit of change, has no need for deiiberation. But 
 prudence, which has to enter into matters full of obscurity 
 and confusion, frequently has to take its chance, and 
 
104 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 to deliberate about things which are nn certain, and, 
 in carrying the deliberation into practice, has to co- 
 operate with the nnreasoning eleraent, which comes to its 
 help, and is involved in its decisions, for they need an 
 impetus. Now this impetus is given to passion by the 
 moral character, an impetus requiring reason to regulate 
 it, that it may render moderate and not excessive help, and 
 at the seasonable time. For the emotional and unreasoning 
 elements are subject to motions sometimes too quick and 
 vehement, at other times too remiss and slow. And so 
 everything we do may be a success from one point of view, 
 but a failure from many points of view ; as to hit the mark 
 one thing only is requisite, but one may miss it in various 
 ways, as one may shoot beyond or too short. This then is 
 the function of practical reason following nature, to prevent 
 our passions going either too far or too short. For where 
 from weakness and want of strength, or from fear and 
 hesitation, the impetus gives in and abandons what is good, 
 there reason is by to stir it up and rekindle it ; and where 
 on the other hand it goes ahead too fast and in disorder, 
 there it represses and checks its zeal. And thus setting 
 bounds to the emotional motions, it engenders in the un- 
 reasoning part of the soul moral virtues, which are the 
 mean between excess and deficiency. Not that we can 
 say that all virtue exists in the mean, but knowledge and 
 prudence being in no need of the unreasoning element, 
 and being situated in the pure and unemotional part of the 
 soal, is a complete perfection and power of reason, whereby 
 we get the most divine and happy fmit of understanding. 
 But that virtue which is necessary because of the body, and 
 needs the help of the passions as an instrument towards the 
 practical, not destroying or doing away with but ordering 
 and regulating the unreasoning part of the soul, is per- 
 fection as regards its power and quality, but in quantity is 
 is a mean correcting both excess and deficiency. 
 
 § VI. But since the word mean has a variety of meanings 
 — for there is one kind of mean compounded of two simple 
 extremes, as grey is the mean between white and black ; 
 and there is another kind of mean, where that which con- 
 tains and is contained is the mean between the containing 
 and contained, as eight is the mean between twelve and 
 
ON MORAL VIRTUE. 105 
 
 four; and there is a third kind of mean vvhicli has part in 
 neither extreme, as the indifferent is the mean between 
 good and bad, — virtue cannot be a mean in any of these 
 ways. For neither is it a mixture of vices, nor containing 
 that which is defective is it contained by that which is 
 excessive, nor is it again altogether free from emotional 
 storms of passion, wherein are excess and deficiency. But 
 it is, and is commonly so called, a mean like that in music 
 and harmony. For as in music there is a middle note 
 between the highest and lowest in the scale, which being 
 perfectly in tune avoids the sharpness of the one and the 
 flatness of the other ; so virtue, being a motion and power 
 in the unreasoning part of the soul, takes away the remiss- 
 ness and strain, aud generally speaking the excess and 
 defect of the appetite, by reducing each of the passions to 
 a state of mean and rectitude. For example, they tell us 
 that bravery is the mean between cowardice and foolhardi- 
 ness, whereof the former is a defect, the latter an excess 
 of anger : and that liberality is the mean between stinginess 
 and prodigality : and that meekness is the mean between 
 insensibility and savageness : and so of temperance and 
 justice, that the latter, being concerned with contracts, is 
 to assign neither too much nor too little to litigants, and that 
 the former ever reduces the passions to the proper mean 
 between apathy (or insensibility) and gross intemperance. 
 This last illustration serves excellently to show us the 
 radical difference between the unreasoning and reasoning 
 parts of the soul, and to prove to us that passion and 
 reason are wide as the poles asunder. For the difference 
 would not be discernible between temperance and conti- 
 nence, nor between intemperance and incontinence, in 
 pleasure and desires, if the appetite and judgement were in 
 the same portion of the soul. Now temperance is a state, 
 wherein reason holds the reins, and manages the passions 
 as a quiet and well-broken-in animal, finding them obedient 
 and submissive to the reins and masters over their desires.^ 
 Continence on the other hand is not driven by reason 
 without some trouble, not being docile but jibbing and 
 
 ^ I have adopted, it will be seen, the suggestion of Wyttenbach, 
 " Tip Xoyi(Tj.iii) mutandum videtur in rov xaXivoj/." 
 
106 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 kicking, like an animal compelled by bit and bridle and 
 whip and backing, being in itself full of struggles and com- 
 motion. Plato explains this by his simile of the chariot- 
 horses of the soul, the worse one of which ever kicking 
 against the other and disturbing the charioteer, he is 
 obliged ever to hold them in with all his might, and to 
 tighten the reins, lest, to borrow the language of Simonides, 
 *' he should drop from his hands the purple reins." And 
 so they do not consider continence to be an absolute virtue^ 
 but something less than a virtue ; for no mean arises from 
 the concord of the worse with the better, nor is the excess 
 of the passion curtailed, nor does the appetite obey or act 
 in unison with reason, but it both gives and suffers trouble, 
 and is constrained by force, and is as it were an enemy in a 
 town given up to faction. 
 
 " The town is full of incense, and at once 
 Eesounds with ti'iumph-songs and bitter wailing." ^ 
 
 Snch is the state of soul of the continent person owing to 
 his conflicting condition. On the same grounds they con- 
 sider incontinence to be something less than vice, but 
 intemperance to be a complete vice. For it, having both 
 its appetite and and reason depraved, is by the one carried 
 away to desire disgraceful things,^ by the other, through 
 bad judgement consenting to desire, loses even the percep- 
 tion of wrongdoing. But incontinence keeps its judgement 
 sound through reason, but is carried away against its judge- 
 ment by passion which is too strong for reason, whence it 
 differs from intemperance. For in the one case reason is 
 mastered by passion, in the other it does not even make a 
 fight against it, in the one case it opposes its desires even 
 when it follows them, in the other it is their advocate 
 and even leader, in the one case it gladly participates in 
 what is wrong, in the other sorrowfully, in the one case it 
 willingly rnshes into what is disgraceful, in the other it 
 abandons the honourable unwillingly. And as there is a 
 difference in their deeds, so no less manifest is the difference 
 
 * Sophocles, " OEdipus Tyrannus," 4, 5. Quoted by our author again 
 " On Abundance of Friends," § vi. 
 
 ■^ Eeading with " Keiske," i^dytrai irpbg to ImQvutiv ra ala-)(pa. 
 
ON MORAL TIRTUE. 107 
 
 in their language. For these are the expressions of the 
 intemperate. " What grace or pleasure in life is there 
 without golden Aphrodite ? May I die, when I care no 
 longer for these things ! " And another says, " To eat, to 
 drink, to enjoy the gifts of Aphrodite is everything, for all 
 other things I look upon as supplementary," as if from 
 the bottom of his soul he gave himself up to pleasures, and 
 was completely subverted by them. And not less so he 
 who said, " Let me be ruined, it is best for me," had his 
 judgement diseased through his passion. But the sayings 
 of incontinence are quite different, as 
 
 " My nature forces me against my judgement," ' 
 
 and 
 
 " Alas ! it is poor mortals' plague and bane, 
 To know the good, yet not the good pursue." ^ 
 
 And again- 
 
 " My anger draws me on, has no control, 
 'Tis but a sandy hook against a tempest." 
 
 Here he compares not badly to a sandy hook, a sorry kind 
 of anchor, the soul that is unsettled and has no steady 
 reason, but surrenders judgment through flabbiness and 
 feebleness. And not unlike this image are the lines, 
 
 " As some ship moored and fastened to the shore. 
 If the wind blows, the cables cannot hold it." 
 
 By cables he means the judgement which resists what is 
 disgraceful, though sometimes it gives way under a tre- 
 mendous storm of passion. For indeed it is with full sail 
 that the intemperate man is borne on to pleasure by his 
 desires, and surrenders himself to them, and even plays 
 the part of pilot to the vessel ; whereas the incontinent 
 man is dragged sidelong into the disgraceful, and is its vic- 
 tim, as it were, while he desires eagerly to resist and over- 
 come his passion, as Timon bantered Anaxarchus : " The 
 recklessness and frantic energy of Anaxarchus to rush any- 
 where seemed like a dog's courage, but he being aware of 
 it was miserable, so people said, but his voluptuous nature 
 ever plunged him into excesses again, nature which even 
 
 ^ In the " Chrysippus " of Euripides, Fragra. 
 ^ Compare liomans viii. 19. 
 
108 plutaech's morals, 
 
 most sophists are afraid of." For neither is the wise man 
 continent bnt temperate, nor the fool incontinent but intem- 
 perate ; for the one delights in what is good, and the other 
 is not vexed at what is bad. Incontinence, therefore, is a 
 mark of a sophistical soul, endued with reason which can- 
 not abide by what it knows to be right. 
 
 § Yii. Such, then, are the differences between inconti- 
 nence and intemperance, and continence and temperance 
 have their counterpart and analogous differences ; for re- 
 morse and trouble and annoyance are companions of con- 
 tinence, whereas in the soul of the temperate person there 
 is everywhere such equability and calm and soundness, by 
 which the unreasoning is adjusted and harmonized to 
 reason, being adorned with obedience and wonderful mild- 
 ness, that looking at it you would say with the poet, " At 
 once the wind was laid, and a wondrous calm ensued, for 
 the god allayed the fury of the waves," ^ reason having ex- 
 tinguished the vehement and furious and frantic motions 
 of the desires, and making those which nature necessarily 
 requires sympathetic and obedient and friendly and co- 
 operative in carrying purposes out in action, so that they 
 do not outrun or come short of reason, or behave disorderly 
 and disobediently, but that every appetite is tractable, " as 
 sucking foal runs by the side of its dam."^ And this con- 
 firms the saying of Xenocrates about true philosophers, 
 that tliey alone do w^illingly what all others do unwillingly 
 at the compulsion of the law, as dogs are turned away from 
 their pleasures by a blow, or cats by a noise, looking at 
 nothing but their danger. It is clear then that there is 
 in the soul a perception of such a generic and specific 
 difference in relation to the desires, as of something fight- 
 ing against and opposing them. But some say that there 
 is no radical distinction difference or variance between 
 reason and passion, but that there is a shifting of one and 
 the same reason from one to the other, which escapes our 
 notice owing to the sharpness and quickness of the change, 
 so that we do not see at a glance that desire and repent- 
 ance, anger and fear, giving way to what is disgraceful 
 
 ' " Odyssey," xii. 168, 169. 
 
 ■■^ This line is from Simonides, and is quoted sgain in " How one may 
 b? aware of one's Progress in Virtue," $ xiv. 
 
ON MORAL YIRTUE. lOJ) 
 
 through passion, and recovery from the same, are the same 
 natural property of the soul. For desire and fear and 
 anger and the like they consider only depraved opinions 
 and judgements, not in one portion of the soul only but in 
 all its leading principles, inclinations and yieldings, and 
 assents and impulses, and generally speaking in its energies 
 soon changed, like the sallies of children, whose fury and 
 excessive violence is unstable by reason of their weakness. 
 But these views are, in the first place, contrary to evidence 
 and observation ; for no one observes in himself a change 
 from passion to judgement, and from judgement back to 
 passion ; nor does anyone cease from loving when he reflects 
 that it would be well to break the affair olf and strive with 
 all his might against it ; nor again, does he put on one side 
 reflection and judgement, when he gives way and is over- 
 come by desire. Moreover, when he resists passion by 
 reason, he does not escape passion altogether ; nor again, 
 when he is mastered by passion does he fail to discern his 
 fault through reason : so that neither by passion does he 
 abolish reason, nor does he by reason get rid of passion, but 
 is tossed about to and fro alternately between passion and 
 reason. And those who suppose that the leading principle 
 in the soul is at one time desire, and at another time reason 
 in opposition to desire, are not unlike people who would 
 make the hunter and the animal he hunts one and the same 
 person, but alternately changing from hunter to animal, 
 from animal to hunter. As their eyesight is plainly defi- 
 cient, so these are faulty in regard to their perceptions, 
 seeing that they must perceive in themselves not a change 
 of one and the same thing, but a diiference and struggle 
 between two opposing elements. " What then," say they, 
 " does not the deliberative element in a man often hold 
 different views, and is it not swayed to different opinions as 
 to expediency, and yet it is one and the same thing?" 
 Certainly, I reply ; but the case is not similar. For the 
 rational part of the soul does not fight against itself, but 
 though it has only one faculty, it makes use of different 
 reasonings ; or rather the reasoning is one, but employs 
 itself in different subjects as on different matter. And so 
 there is neither pain in reasonings without passion, nor are 
 men compelled, as it were, to choose something contrary to 
 
110 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 tlieir judgement, unless indeed some passion, as in a balance, 
 secretly predominates in the scale. For this often happens, 
 reason not opposing reason, but ambition, or contention, or 
 favour, or jealousy, or fear opposing reason, that we do but 
 think there is a difference between two reasons, as in the line, 
 " They were ashamed to refuse, and feared to accept,"^ or, 
 *' To die in battle is dreadful but glorious ; but not to die, 
 though cowardly, is more pleasant." Moreover, in judge- 
 ments about contracts passions come in and cause the 
 greatest delay ; and in the councils of kings those who 
 speak to ingratiate themselves do not favour either of the 
 two cases, but give themselves up to passion without re- 
 gard to what is expedient ; and so those that rule in aris- 
 tocracies do not allow orators to be pathetic in their plead- 
 ings. For reasoning without passion has a direct tendency 
 to justice, while if passion is infused, a contest and diffe- 
 rence is excited between pleasure and pain on the one hand, 
 and judgement and justice on the other. For otherwise 
 how is it that in philosophical speculations people are 
 with little pain frequently induced by others to change 
 their opinions, and even Aristotle himself and Democritus 
 and Chrysippus have rejected without trouble or pain, and 
 even with pleasure, some of the opinions which they for- 
 merly advocated ? For no passion stands in the way in 
 the theoretic and scientific part of the soul, and the un- 
 reasoning element is quiet and gives no trouble therein. 
 And so reason gladly inclines to the truth, when it is 
 evident, and abandons error; for in it, and not in passion, 
 lies a willingness to listen to conviction and to change 
 one's opinions on conviction. But the deliberations and 
 judgements and arbitrations of most people as to matters of 
 fact being mixed up with passion, give reason no easy or 
 pleasant access, as she is held fast and incommoded by the 
 unreasonable, which assails her through pleasure, or fear, 
 or pain, or desire. And the decision in these cases lies 
 with sense which has dealings with both passion and 
 reason, for if one gets the better of the other the other is 
 not destroyed, but only dragged along by force in spite of 
 its resistance. For he who is dissatisfied with himself for 
 
 ' « Iliad," vii. 93. 
 
ON MORAL YIRTUE. Ill 
 
 falling in love calls in reason to his aid to overcome his 
 passion, for both reason and passion are in his soul, and he 
 perceives thej are contrary one to the other, and violently 
 represses the inflammatory one of the two. On the other 
 Land, in deliberations and speculations without passion 
 (such as the contemplative part of the soul is most con- 
 versant with), if they are eveidy balanced no decision takes 
 place, but the matter is left in doubt, which is a sort of 
 stationary position of the mind in conflicting arguments. 
 But should there be any inclination to one of the two sides, 
 the most powerful opinion carries the day, yet without giv- 
 ing pain or creating hostility. And, generally speaking, 
 when reason seems opposed to reason, there is no percep- 
 tion of two distinct things, but only of one under different 
 phases, whereas when the unreasoning has a controversy 
 with reason, since there can be no victory or defeat with- 
 out pain, forthwith they tear the soul in two,^ and make the 
 difference between them apparent. 
 
 § VIII. And not only from their contest, but quite as 
 much from their agreement, can we see that the source of 
 the passions is something quite distinct from that of reason. 
 For since ^ one may love either a good and excellent child 
 or a bad and vicious one, and be unreasonably angry with 
 one's children or parents, yet in behalf of them show a just 
 anger against enemies or tyrants ; as in the one case there 
 is the perception of a difference and struggle between pas- 
 sion and reason, so in the other there is a perception of 
 persuasion and agreement inclining, as it were, the scale, and 
 giving their help. Moreover a good man marrying a wife 
 according to the laws is minded to associate and live with 
 her justly and soberly, but as time goes on, his intercourse 
 with her having engendered a strong passion for her, he 
 perceives that his love and affection are increased by reason. 
 Just so, again, young fellows falling in with kindly teachers 
 at first submit themselves to them out of necessity and 
 emulation for learning, but end by loving them, and instead 
 of being their pupils and scholars become and get the titleof 
 their lovers. The same is the case in cities in respect to good 
 
 Reading with Reiske, sig 5vo. 
 
 Reading tTrel with Reiske and Wyttenbach. 
 
11*2 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 magistrates, and neighbours, and connections by marriage ; 
 for beginning at first to associate with one another from 
 necessity and propriety, they afterwards go on to love 
 almost insensibly, reason drawing over and persuading the 
 emotional element. And he who said — 
 
 " There are two kinds of shame, the one not bad. 
 The other a sad burden to a family," ^ 
 
 is it not clear that he felt this emotion in himself often 
 contrary to reason and detrimental by hesitation and delay 
 to opportunities and actions ? 
 
 § IX. In a certain sense yielding to the force of these 
 arguments, they call shame modesty, pleasure joy, and 
 timidity caution ; nor would anyone blame them for this 
 euphemism, if they only gave those specious names to the 
 emotions that are consistent with reason, while they gave 
 other kinds of names to those emotions that resist and do 
 violence to reason. But whenever, though convicted by 
 their tears and tremblings and changes of colour, they avoid 
 the terms pain and fear, and speak of bitings and states of 
 excitement, and gloss over the passions by calling them 
 inclinations, they seem to contrive evasions and flights from 
 facts by names sophistical, and not philosophical. And 
 yet again they seem to use words rightly when they call 
 those joys and wishes and cautions not apathies but good 
 conditions of the mind. For it is a happy disposition of 
 the soul when reason does not annihilate passion, but orders 
 and arranges it in the case of temperate persons. But what 
 is the condition of worthless and incontinent persons, who, 
 when they judge they ought to love their father and 
 mother better than some boy or girl they are enamoured 
 of, yet cannot, and yet at once love their mistress or flat- 
 terer, when they judge they ought to hate them ? For if 
 passion and judgement were the same thing, love and hate 
 would immediately follow the judging it right to love and 
 hate, whereas the contrary happens, passion following some 
 judgements, but declining to follow others. Wherefore 
 they acknowledge, the facts compelling them to do so, that 
 every judgement is not passion, but only that judgement 
 that is provocative of violent and excessive impulse : ad- 
 
 1 Euripides, " Hippolytus," 385, 386. 
 
ON MORAL VIRTUE. 
 
 113 
 
 mitting that judgement and passion in us are something 
 different, as what moves is different from what is moved. 
 Even Chrysippus himself, by his defining in many places 
 endurance and continence to be habits that follow the lead 
 of reason, proves that he is compelled by the facts to admit, 
 that that element in us which follows absolutely is some- 
 thing different from that which follows when persuaded, 
 but resists when not persuaded. 
 
 § X. ISTow as to those who make all sins and offences 
 equal, it is not now the occasion to discuss if in other 
 respects they deviate from truth : but as regards the pas- 
 sions ^ they seem to go clean contrary to reason and evi- 
 dence. For according to them every passion is a sin, and 
 everyone who grieves, or fears, or desires, commits sin. 
 Bub in good truth it is evident that there are great diffe- 
 rences between passions, according as one is more or less 
 affected by them. For who would say that the craven 
 fear of Dolon^ was not something very different from the 
 fear of Ajax, " who retreated with his face to the enemy and 
 at a foot's pace, drawing back slowly knee after knee " ? ^ 
 Or who would say that the grief of Plato at the death of 
 Socrates was identical with the grief of Alexander at the 
 death of Clitus, when he attempted to lay violent hands on 
 himself ? For grief is beyond measure intensified by falling 
 out against expectation : and the calamity that comes un- 
 locked for is more painful than that we may reasonably fear : 
 as if when expecting to see one's friend basking in pros- 
 perity and admiration, one should hear that he had been put 
 to the torture, as Parmenio heard about Philotas. And who 
 would say that the anger of Magas against Philemon was 
 equal to that of Nicocreon against Anaxarchus ? Both 
 Magas and Nicocreon had been insulted, but whereas 
 Nicocreon brayed Anaxarchus to death with iron pestles 
 and made mincemeat of him, Magas contented himself with 
 bidding the executioner lay his naked sword on Philemon's 
 neck, and then let him go.* And so Plato called anger the 
 
 ^ Reading with Reiske irdQiai for TrXeiotri. 
 
 2 See " Iliad," x. 374, sq. ^ u i]iad," xi. 547. 
 
 * '• De Anaxarchi supplicio nota res. v. Menage ad Diog. Laert. 9, 59. 
 De Magae, reguli Cyrenarum, adAersus Philemonem lenitate v. De 
 Cohibenda Ira, § ix." — Reiske. 
 
114 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 nerves of the mind, since it can be both intensified by 
 bitterness, and slackened bj mildness. To evade these 
 and similar arguments, they deny that intensity and excess 
 of passion are according to judgement, wherein is the pro- 
 pensity to fault, but maintain that they are bites and con- 
 tractions and diffusings capable of increase or diminution 
 through the unreasoning element. And yet it is evident 
 that there are differences as regards judgements ; for some 
 judge poverty to be no evil, while others judge it to be a 
 great evil, and others again the very greatest evil, insomuch 
 that they even throw themselves headlong down rocks and 
 into the sea on account of it. Again as to death, some think 
 it an evil only in depriving us of good things, whereas 
 others think it so in regard to eternal punishments and 
 awful torments in the world below. Health again is valued 
 by some as natural and advantageous, while to others it 
 seems the greatest blessing of life, in comparison with 
 which they reckon little either of wealth or children or 
 " royal power that makes one equal to the gods," and at last 
 come to think even virtue useless and unprofitable, if health 
 be absent. Thus it is clear that even with regard to judge- 
 ments themselves some err more, some less. But I shall 
 bring no further proof of this now, but this one may assume 
 therefrom, that they themselves concede that the unreason- 
 ing element is something different from judgement, in that 
 they allow that by it passion becomes greater and more 
 violent, and while they quarrel about the name and word 
 they give up the thing itself to those who maintain that 
 the emotional and unreasoning part of the soul is distinct 
 from the reasoning and judging element. And in his 
 treatise on Anomaly,^ Chrysippus, after telling us that 
 anger is blind, and frequently does not let one see what is 
 obvious, frequently also obscures what we do get a sight 
 of, goes on to say, " The encroachment of the passions blots 
 out reason, and makes things look different to what they 
 should look, violently forcing people on unreasonable acts." 
 And he quotes as witness Menander, who says, " Alas ! 
 
 ' "Celebres fuere quondam Chrysippi sex libri Trepl TtJQ Kara tclq Xrj^eig 
 dvojfiaXiag, in quibus auctore Varrone, propositum habuit ostendere, 
 similes res dissimilihus verbis et similibus dissimiles esse notatas vooabulis. 
 V. Menage ad Diog. Laert. 7, 192." — Beiske. 
 
ON MORAL VIRTUE. 115 
 
 poor me, wherever were my brains in my body at the time 
 when I chose that line of conduct, and not this ? " And 
 Chrysippus proceeds, " Though every living creature en- 
 dowed with reason is naturally inclined to use reason and 
 to be governed by it on every occasion, yet often do we 
 reject it, being borne away by a more violent impulse ; " 
 thus admitting what results from the difference between 
 passion and reason. For otherwise it is ridiculous, as 
 Plato says, to argue that a man is sometimes better than 
 himself, sometimes worse, sometimes master of himself, 
 sometimes not master of himself. 
 
 § XI. For how is it possible that the same person can be 
 both better and worse than himself, both master of himself 
 and not master, unless everyone is in some way twofold, 
 having in himself both a better and worse self ? For so he 
 that makes the baser element subject to the better has self- 
 control and is a superior man, whereas he who allows the 
 nobler element of the soul to follow and be subservient to 
 the incorrigible and unreasoning element, is inferior to 
 what he might be, and is called incontinent, and is in an 
 unnatural condition. For by nature it appertains to reason, 
 which is divine, to rule and govern the unreasoning ele- 
 ment, which has its origin from the body, which it also 
 naturally resembles and participates in its passions, being 
 placed in it and mixed up with it, as is proved by the im- 
 pulses to bodily delights, which are always fierce or languid 
 according to the changes of the body. And so it is that 
 young men are keen and vehement in their desires, being 
 red hot and raging from their fulness of blood and animal 
 heat, whereas with old men the liver, which is the seat of 
 desire, is dried up and weak and feeble, and reason has more 
 power with them than passion which decays with the body. 
 This principle also no doubt characterizes the nature of 
 animals as regards the sexual appetite. For it is not of 
 course from any fitness or unfitness of opinions, that some 
 animals are so bold and resolute in the presence of danger, 
 while others are helpless and full of fear and trembling ; but 
 this difference of emotion is produced by the workings of the 
 blood and spirit and body, the emotional part growing out 
 of the flesh, as from a root, and carrying along with it its 
 quality and temperament. And that the body of man 
 
116 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 sympatlaizes with and is affected bj the emotional impulses 
 is proved by pallors, and blushings, and tremblings, and 
 palpitations of the heart, as on the other hand by an all- 
 pervading joy in the hope and expectation of pleasures. 
 But whenever the mind is by itself and unmoved by pas- 
 sion, the body is in repose and at rest, having no partici- 
 pation or share in the working of the intellect, unless it 
 involve the emotional, or the unreasoning element call it 
 in. So that it is clear that there are two distinct parts of 
 the soul differing from one another in their faculties. 
 
 § XII. And generally speaking of all existing things, as 
 they themselves admit and is clear, some are governed by 
 nature, some by habit, some by an unreasoning soul, some 
 by a soul that has reason and intelligence. Man too par- 
 ticipates in all this, and is subject to all those differences 
 here mentioned, for he is affected by habit, and nourished by- 
 nature, and uses reason and intelligence. He has also a 
 share of the unreasoning element, and has the principle of 
 passion innate in him, not as a mere episode in his life but 
 as a necessity, which ought not therefore to be entirely 
 rooted out, but requires care and attention. For the 
 function of reason is no Thracian or Lycurgean one to root 
 up and destroy all the good elements in passion indis- 
 criminately with the bad, but, as some genial and mild 
 god, to prune what is wild, and to correct disproportion, 
 and after that to train and cultivate the useful part. For 
 as those who are afraid to get drunk do not pour on the 
 ground their wine, hut mix it ivith water, so those who are 
 afraid of the disturbing element in passion do not eradicate 
 passion altogether but temper it. Similarly with oxen and 
 horses people try to restrain their mad bounds and restive- 
 ness, not their movements and powers of work, and so 
 reason makes use of the passions when they have become 
 tame and docile, not by cutting out the sinews or altogether 
 mutilating the serviceable part of the soul. For as Pindar 
 says, " The horse to the chariot, and the ox to the plough, 
 while he that meditates destruction for the boar must find a 
 staunch hound." ^ But much more useful than these are 
 the whole tribe of passions when they wait on reason and 
 
 ' Compare " On Contentedness of Mind,"' § xiii. 
 
ON MORAL YIRTUE. ]17 
 
 run parallel to virttie. Thus moderate anger is useful to 
 courage, and hatred of evil to uprightness, and righteous 
 indignation against those who are fortunate beyond their 
 deserts, when they are inflamed in their souls with folly 
 and insolence and need a check. And no one if they wished 
 could pluck away or sever ^ natural affection from friend- 
 ship, or pity from philanthropy, or sympathy both in joy 
 and grief from genuine good- will. And if those err who 
 wish to banish love because of erotic madness, neither are 
 they right who blame all desire because of love of money, 
 but they act like people who refuse to run because they 
 might stumble, or to throw because they might throw wide 
 of the mark, or object to sing altogether because they might 
 make a false note. For as in sounds music does not create 
 melody by the banishment of sharps and flats, and as in 
 bodies the art of the physician procures health not by the 
 doing away of cold and heat but by their being blended in 
 due proportions and quantities, so is victory won in the 
 soul by the powers and motions of the passions being 
 reduced by reason to moderation and due proportion. For 
 excessive grief or fear or joy in the soul (I speak not of mere 
 joy grief or fear), resembles a body swollen or inflamed. 
 And Homer when he says excellently, 
 
 " The brave man's colour never changes, nor 
 Is he much frightened," ^ 
 
 does not take away all fear but only excessive fear, that 
 bravery may not become recklessness, nor confidence fool- 
 hardiness. So also in regard to pleasure we must do away 
 with excessive desire, and in regard to vengeance with 
 excessive hatred of evil. For so in the former case one 
 will not be apathetic but temperate, and in the latter one 
 will not be savage or cruel but just. But if the passions 
 were entirely removed, supposing that to be possible, 
 reason would become in many duller and blunter, like the 
 pilot in the absence of a storm. And no doubt it is from 
 having noticed this that legislators try to excite in states 
 ambition and emulation among their townsmen, and stir up 
 and increase their courage and pugnacity against enemies 
 
 ^ Reading with Reiske, a.TroppijE.eiev. 
 ^ " Iliad," xiii. 284, 285. 
 
118 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 by the sound of trumpets and flutes. For it is not only in 
 poems, as Plato says, that he that is inspired by the Muses, 
 and as it were possessed by them, will laugh to shame the 
 plodding artist, but also in fighting battles passion and en- 
 thusiasm will be irresistible and invincible, such as Homer 
 makes the gods inspire men with, as in the line, 
 
 and, 
 
 *' Thus speaking he infused great might in Hector, 
 The shepherd of the people." '■ 
 
 He is not mad like this withoiit the god, 
 
 as if the god had added passion to reason as an incitement 
 and spur. And you may see those very persons, whose 
 opinions I am combating, frequently urging on the young 
 by praises, and frequently checking them by rebukes, 
 though pleasure follows the one, pain the other. For 
 rebukes and censure produce repentance and shame, the 
 one bringing grief, the other fear, and these they mostly 
 make use of for purposes of correction. And so Diogenes, 
 when Plato was being praised, said, " What has he to vaunt 
 of, who has been a philosopher so long, and yet never gave 
 pain to anyone ? " For one could not say, to use the words 
 of Xenocrates, that the mathematics are such handles to 
 philosophy as are the emotions of young men, such as shame, 
 desire, repentance, pleasure, pain, ambition, whereon reason 
 and the law laying a suitable grip succeed in putting the 
 young man on the right road. So that it was no bad remark 
 of the Lacedaemonian tutor, that he would make the boy 
 entrusted to his charge pleased with what was good and 
 displeased with what was bad,^ for a higher or nobler aim 
 cannot be proposed in the education fit for a freeborn lad. 
 
 HOW ONE MAY BE AWARE OF ONE'S 
 PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 
 
 § I. What amount of argument, Sossius Senecio, will 
 make a man know that he is improving in respect to virtue, 
 
 ^ '' Hiad," XV. 262. ^ " Hiad," v. 1 85. 
 
 3 Compare " That Virtue may be Taught," § ii. 
 
PROGRESS IN YIRTUE. 119 
 
 if his advances in it do not bring about some diminution 
 in folly, but vice, weighing equally with all his good inten- 
 tions, "acts like the lead that makes the net go down?"^ 
 For neither in music nor grammatical knowledge could 
 anyone recognize any improvement, if he remained as 
 unskilful in them as before, and had not lost some of his 
 old ignorance. Nor in the case of anyone ill would medical 
 treatment, if it brought no relief or ease, by the disease 
 somewhat yielding and abating, give any perception of 
 improvement of health, till the opposite condition was com- 
 pletely brought about by the body recovering its full 
 strength. But just as in these cases there is no improve- 
 ment unless, by the abatement of what weighs them down 
 till they rise in the opposite scale, they recognize a 
 change, so in the case of those who profess philosophy no 
 improvement or sign of improvement can be supposed, 
 unless the soul lay aside and purge itself of some of its 
 imperfection, and if it continue altogether bad until it 
 become absolutely good and perfect. For indeed a wise 
 man cannot in a moment of time change from absolute 
 badness to perfect goodness, and suddenly abandon for 
 ever all that vice, of which he could not during a long 
 period of time divest himself of any portion. And yet you 
 know, of course, that those who maintain these views fre- 
 quently give themselves much trouble and bewilderment 
 about the difficulty, that a wise man does not perceive 
 that he has become wise, but is ignorant and doubtful 
 that in a long period of time by little and little, by remov- 
 ing some things and adding others, there will be a secret 
 and quiet improvement, and as it were passage to virtue. But 
 if the change were so great and sudden that the worst man 
 in the morning could become the best man at night, or 
 should the change so happen that he went to bed vicious 
 and woke up in the morning wise, and, having dismissed 
 from his mind all yesterday's follies and errors, should say, 
 
 " False dreams, away, you had no meaning then! "^ 
 who on earth could be ignorant of so great a change 
 happening to himself, of virtue blazing forth so completely 
 
 ^ See Erasmus, Adagia, " Eadem pensari trutina." 
 2 Euripides, " Iphigenia in Tauris," 569. 
 
120 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 all at once ? I myself am of opinion that anyone, like 
 Caeneus,^ wlio, according, to his prayer, got changed from 
 a woman into a man, would sooner be ignorant of the 
 transformation, than that a man should become at once, 
 from a cowardly and senseless person with no powers of 
 self-control, brave and sensible and perfect master of him- 
 self, and should in a moment change from a brutish life to 
 a divine without being aware of it. 
 
 § II. That was an excellent observation, Measure the 
 stone by the mason's rule, not the rule by the stone.^ But 
 the Stoics, not applying dogmas to facts but facts to their 
 own preconceived opinions, and forcing things to agree 
 that do not by nature, have filled philosophy with many 
 difficulties, the greatest of which is that all men but the 
 perfect man are equally vicious, which has produced the 
 enigma called progress, one little short of extreme folly, 
 since it makes those who have not at once under its 
 guidance given up all passions and disorders equally un- 
 fortunate as those who have not got rid of a single vile 
 propensity. However they are their own confuters, for 
 while they lay down in the schools that Aristides was as 
 unjust as Phalaris, and Brasidasas great a craven as Dolon, 
 and Plato actually as senseless as Meletus, in life and its 
 affairs they turn away from and avoid one (dass as implac- 
 able, while they make use of the others and trust them in 
 most important matters as most worthy people. 
 
 § III. But we who see that in every kind of evil, but 
 especially in a disordered and unsettled state of mind, there 
 are degrees of more and less (so that the progress made 
 differs in different cases, badness abating, as a shadow 
 flees away, under the influence of reason, which calmly 
 illuminates and cleanses the soul), cannot consider it un- 
 reasonable to think that the change will be perceived, as 
 people who come up out of some ravine can take note of 
 the progress they make upwards. Look at the case from 
 the following point of view first. Just as mariners sailing 
 with full sail over the gaping^ ocean measure the course 
 
 ^ See Ovid, " Metamorphoses," xii. 189, sq. 
 
 2 See Erasmus, " Adagia," p. 1103. 
 
 3 Compare Shakspere, " Tempest," A. i. Sc. i, 63, " And gape at 
 widest to glut him." 
 
PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 121 
 
 they have made by the time they have taken and the force 
 of the wind, and compute their progress accordingly, so 
 anyone can compute his progress in philosophy by his con- 
 tinuous and unceasing course, by his not making many 
 halts on the road, and then again advancing by leaps and 
 bounds, but by his quiet and even and steady march forward 
 guided by reason. For the words of the poet, " If to a 
 little you keep adding a little, and do so frequently, it will 
 soon he a lot,"^ are not only true of the increase of money, 
 but are universally applicable, and especially to increase in 
 virtue, since reason invokes to her aid the enormous force 
 of habit. On the other hand the inconsistencies and dul- 
 nesses of some philosophers not only check advance, as it 
 were, on the road, but even break up the journey altogether, 
 since vice always attacks at its leisure and forces back 
 whatever yields to it.^ The mathematicians tell us that 
 planets, after completing their course, become stationary ; 
 but in philosophy there is no such intermission or stationary 
 position from the cessation of progress, for its nature is ever 
 to be moving and, as it were, to be weighed in the scales, 
 sometimes being overweighted by the good preponderating, 
 sometimes by the bad. If, therefore, imitating the oracle 
 given to the Amphictyones by the god, " to fight against the 
 people of Cirrha every day and every night,"^ you are con- 
 scious that night and day you ever maintain a fierce fight 
 against vice, not often relaxing your vigilance, or long off 
 your guard, or receiving as heralds to treat of peace* the 
 pleasures, or idleness, or stress of business, you may reason- 
 ably go forward to the future courageously and confidently. 
 § IV. Moreover, if there be any intermissions in philo- 
 sophy, and yet your later studies are firmer and more con- 
 tinuous than your former ones, it is no bad indication that 
 your sloih has been expelled by labour and exercise ; for the 
 contrary is a bad sign, when after a short time your lapses 
 
 ^ Hesiod, " Works and Days," 361, 362. Quoted again by our author, 
 " On Education," § 13. 
 
 ^ " In via ad virtutem qui non progreditur, is non stat et manet, sed 
 regreditur." — Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ Adopting the reading of Hercher. See Pausanias, x. 37, where the 
 oracle is somewhat different. 
 
 ^ For the town which parleys surrenders. 
 
122 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 from zeal become many and continuous, as if your zeal were 
 dying away. For as in tlie growth of a reed, which shoots up 
 from the ground finely and beautifully to an even and con- 
 tinuous height, though at first from its great intervals it is 
 hindered and baffled in its growth, and afterwards through 
 its weakness is discouraged by any breath of air, and 
 though strengthened by many and frequent joints, yet a 
 violent wind gives it commotion and trembling, so those who 
 at first make great launches out into philosophy, and after- 
 wards find that they are continually hindered and baffled, 
 and cannot perceive that they make any progress, finally 
 get tired of it and cry off. " But he who is as it were 
 winged," ^ is by his simplicity borne along to his end, and 
 by his zeal and energy cuts through impediments to his 
 progress, as merely obstacles on the road. As it is a sign 
 of the growth of violent love, not so much to rejoice in 
 the presence of the loved one, for everyone does that, 
 as to be distressed and grieved at his absence,^ so many 
 feel a liking for philosophy and seem to take a wonderful 
 interest in the study, but if they are diverted by other 
 matters and business their passion evaporates and they take 
 it very easily. *' But whoever is strongly smitten with love 
 for his darling " ^ will show his mildness and agreeableness 
 in the presence of and joint pursuit of wisdom with the loved 
 one, but if he is drawn away from him and is not in his 
 company you will see him in a stew and ill at ease and 
 peevish whether at work or leisure, and unreasonably for- 
 getful of his friends, and wholly impelled by his passion 
 for philosophy. For we ought not to rejoice at discourses 
 only when we hear them, as people like perfumes only when 
 they smell them, and not to seek or care about them in 
 their absence, but in the same condition as people who are 
 hungry and thirsty are in if torn away from food and drink, 
 we ought to follow after true proficiency in philosophy, 
 whether marriage, or wealth, or friendship, or military ser- 
 vice, strike in and produce a separation. For just as more 
 
 1 From Homer, " Iliad," xix. 386. 
 
 ^ Compare Aristotle, Rhetoric, i. 11. kcu apx') ^^ '''ov IpujTOQ yiyvETai 
 avTT] Tzaaiv, orav firi fiovov Trapovrog ^aipwcrtv, aXKa kuI cnrovTog 
 fieiivr]fiivoi tpCJaii: 
 
 ^ The line is a Fragment of Sophocles. 
 
PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 
 
 123 
 
 is to be got from philosophy, so much the more does what 
 we fail to obtain trouble ns. 
 
 § V. Either precisely the same as this or very similar is 
 Hesiod's ^ very ancient definition of progress in virtue, 
 namely, that the road is no longer very steep or arduous, 
 but easy and smooth and level, its roughness being toned 
 down by exercise, and casting the bright light of philosophy 
 on doubt and error and regrets, such as trouble those who 
 give themselves to philosophy at the outset, like people who 
 leave a land they know, and do not yet descry the land they 
 are sailing to. For by abandoning the common and 
 familiar, before they know and apprehend what is better, 
 they frequently flounder about in the middle and are fain 
 to return. As they say the Roman Sextius, giving up for 
 philosophy all his honours and offices in Rome, being after- 
 wards discontented with philosophy from the difficulties he 
 met with in it at first, very nearly threw himself out of 
 window. Similarly they relate of Diogenes of Siuope,^ 
 when he began to be a philosopher, that the Athenians 
 were celebrating a festival, and there were public banquets 
 and shows and mutual festivities, and drinking and re- 
 velling all night, and he, coiled up in a corner of the market- 
 place intending to sleep, fell into a train of thought likely 
 seriously to turn him from his purpose and shake his 
 resolution, for he reflected that he had adopted without 
 any necessity a toilsome and unusual kind of life, and by 
 his own fault sat there debarred of all the good things. At 
 that moment, however, they say a mouse stole up and be- 
 gan to munch some of the crumbs of his barley -cake, and 
 he plucked up his courage and said to himself, in a railing 
 and chiding fashion, " What say yon, Diogenes ? Do 
 your leavings give this mouse a sumptuous meal, while 
 you, the gentleman, wail and lament because you are 
 not getting drunk yonder and reclining on soft and 
 luxurious couches ? " Whenever such depressions of mind 
 are not frequent, and the mind when they take place quickly 
 recovers from them, after having put them to flight as it 
 were, and when such annoyance and distraction is easily 
 
 ^ See Hesiod, " Works and Days," 289-292. 
 ^ The well-known Cynic philosopher. 
 
124 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 got rid of, then one may consider one's progress in virtue 
 as a certainty. 
 
 § VI. And since not only the things that in themselves 
 shake and turn them in the opposite direction are more 
 powerful in the case of weak philosophers, but also the 
 serious advice of friends, and the playful and jeering objec- 
 tions of adversaries bend and soften people, and have ere 
 now shaken some out of philosophy altogether, it will be no 
 slight indication of one's progress in virtue if one takes 
 all this very calmly, and is neither disturbed nor aggravated 
 by people who tell us and mention to us that some of 
 our former comrades are flourishing in kings' courts, or 
 have married wives with dowries, or are attended by a 
 crowd of friends when they come down to the forum 
 to solicit some office or advocateship. He that is not 
 moved or affected by all this is already plainly one upon 
 whom philosophy has got a right hold ; for it is impossible 
 that we should cease to be envious of what most people 
 admire, unless the admiration of virtue was strongly im- 
 planted in us. For over- confidence may be generated in 
 some by anger and folly, but to despise what men admire is 
 not possible without a true and steady elevation of mind. 
 And so people in such a condition of mind, comparing it with 
 that of others, pride themselves on it, and say with Solon, 
 " We would not change virtue for wealth, for while virtue 
 abides, wealth changes hands, and now one man, now another, 
 has it."^ And Diogenes compared his shifting about from 
 Corinth to Athens, and again from Thebes to Corinth, to 
 the different residences of the King of Persia, as his spring 
 residence at Susa, his winter residence at Babylon, and his 
 summer residence in Media. And Agesilaus said of the 
 great king, " How is he better than me, if he is not more 
 upright ? " And Aristotle, writing to Antipater about 
 Alexander, said, " that he ought not to think highly of 
 himself because he had many subjects, for anyone who had 
 right notions about the gods was entitled to think quite 
 as highly of himself." And Zeno, observing that Theo- 
 phratus was admired for the number of his pupils,^ said, 
 
 1 Bergk. fr. 15. Compare Homer, "Iliad," vi. 339. viicr] S' tTra/iEifiEraL 
 drSpag. 
 
 2 We ai-e told by Diogenes Laertius, v. 37, that Theophrastus had 
 2,000 hearers sometimes at once. 
 
PROGRESS IN YIRTUE. 125 
 
 " His choir is, I admit, larger than mine, but mine is more 
 harmonious." 
 
 § Yii. Whenever then, by thus comparing the advantages 
 of virtne with external things, yon get rid of envies and 
 jealousies and those things which fret and depress the minds 
 of many who are novices in philosophy, this also is a great 
 indication of your progress in virtue. Another and no slight 
 indication is a change in the style of yonr discourses. For 
 generally speaking all novices in philosophy adopt most such 
 as tend to their own glorification ; some, like birds, in their 
 levity and ambition soaring to the height and brightness of 
 physical things ; others like young puppies, as Plato ^ says, 
 rejoicing in tearing and biting, betake themselves to strifes 
 and questions and sophisms ; but most plunging themselves 
 into dialectics immediately store themselves for sophistry ; 
 and some collect sentences ^ and histories and go about (as 
 Anacharsis said he saw the Greeks used money for no other 
 purpose but to count it up), merely piling up and comparing 
 them, but making no practical use of them. Applicable 
 here is that saying of Antiphanes, which someone applied 
 to Plato's pupils. Antiphanes said playfully that in a 
 certain city words were frozen directly they were spoken, 
 owing to the great cold, and were thawed again in the 
 summer, so that one could then hear what had been said in 
 the winter. So he said of the words which were spoken by 
 Plato to young men, that most of them only understood 
 them late in life when they were become old men. And 
 this is the condition people are in in respect to all philoso- 
 phy, until the judgement gets into a sound and healthy state, 
 and begins to adapt itself to those things which can produce 
 character and greatness of mind, and to seek discourses 
 whose footsteps turn inwards rather than outwards, to 
 borrow the language of ^sop.^ For as Sophocles said he 
 had first toned down the pompous style of -^schylus, then 
 his harsh and over-artificial method, and had in the third 
 
 1 " Republic," vii. p. 539, B. 
 
 2 Sentences borrowed from some author or other, such as we still 
 possess from the hands of Hermogenes and Aphthonius ; compare the 
 collection of bon-mots of Greek courtesans in Athenaeus. 
 
 ^ A reference to -^sop's Fable, Aicjv kuI 'AXwtt?/^. Cf. Horace, 
 " Epistles," i. i. 73-75. 
 
126 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 place changed his manner of diction, a most important point 
 and one that is most intimately connected with the 
 character, so those who go in for philosophy, when they 
 have passed from flattering and artificial discourses to such 
 as deal with character and emotion, are beginning to make 
 genuine and modest progress in virtue. 
 
 § VIII. Furthermore, take care, in reading the writings of 
 philosophers or hearing their speeches, that you do not 
 attend to words more than things, nor get attracted more 
 by what is difficult and curious than by what is serviceable 
 and solid and useful. And also, in studying poems or 
 history, let nothing escape you of what is said to the point, 
 which is likely either to correct the character or to calm 
 the passions. For as Simonides says the bee hovers among 
 the flowers *' making the yellow honey," ^ while others value 
 and pluck flowers only for their beauty and fragrance, 
 so of all that read poems for pleasure and amusement he 
 alone that finds and gathers what is valuable seems capable 
 of knowledge from his acquaintance with and friendship 
 for what is noble and good.^ For those who study Plato 
 and Xenophon only for their style, and cull out only what 
 is pure and Attic, and as it were the dew and the bloom, do 
 they not resemble people who love drugs for their smell 
 and colour, but care not for them as anodynes or purges, 
 and are not aware of those properties ? Whereas those who 
 have more proficiency can derive benefit not from dis- 
 courses only, but from sights and actions, and cull what is 
 good and useful, as is recorded of ^schylus and other 
 similar kind of men. As to ^schylus, when he was 
 watching a contest in boxing at the Isthmus, and the whole 
 theatre cried out upon one of the boxers being beaten, he 
 nudged with his elbow Ion of Chios, and said, " Do you 
 observe the power of training ? The beaten man holds his 
 peace, while the spectators cry out." And Brasidas having 
 caught hold of a mouse among some figs, being bitten by it 
 let it go, and said to himself, " Hercules, there is no 
 creature so small or weak that it will not fight for its life !" 
 
 ^ This passage is alluded to also in " On Love to one's Offspring, 
 ii. 
 ' Madvig's text. 
 
PROGRESS IN YIRTUE. 127 
 
 And Diogenes, seeing a lad drinking watei- out of the palm 
 of his hand, threw away the cup which he kept in his 
 wallet. So much does attention and assiduous practice 
 make people perceptive and receptive of what contributes 
 to virtue from any source. And this is the case still more 
 with those who mix discourses with actions, who not only, 
 to use the language of Thucydides,^ " exercise themselves 
 in the presence of danger," but also in regard to pleasures 
 and strifes, and judgements, and advocateships, and magis- 
 trateships make a display of their opinions, or rather form 
 their opinions by their practice. For we can no more think 
 those philosophers who are ever learning and busy and in- 
 vestigating what they have got from philosophy, and then 
 straightway publish it in the market-place or in the haunt 
 of young men, or at a royal supper-party, any more than we 
 give the name of physicians to those who sell drugs and 
 mixtures. Nay rather such a sophist differs very little at 
 all from the bird described in Homer,^ offering his scholars 
 like it whatever he has got, and as it feeds its callow young 
 from its own mouth, " though it goes ill with itself," so 
 he gets no advantage or food from what he has got for 
 himself. 
 
 § IX. We must therefore see to it that our discourse be 
 serviceable to ourselves, and that it may not appear to 
 others to be vain-glorious or ambitious, and we must show 
 that we are as willing to listen as to teach, and especially 
 must we lay aside all disputatiousness and love of strife 
 in controversy, and cease bandying fierce words with one 
 another as if we were contending with one another at 
 boxing, and leave off rejoicing more in smiting and knock- 
 ing down one another than in learning and teaching. For 
 in such cases moderation and mildness, and to commence 
 arguing without quarrelsomeness and to finish without get- 
 ting into a rage, and neither to be insolent if you come off 
 best in the argument, nor dejected if you come off worst, is 
 a sufficient sign of progress in virtue. Aristippus was an ex- 
 cellent example of this, when overcome in argument by the 
 
 1 Thucydides, i. 18. 
 
 2 Homer, " Iliad," ix. 323, 324. Quoted also in " On Love to One's 
 Offspring," § ii. 
 
128 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 sophistry of a man, who had plenty of assurance, but was 
 generally speaking mad or half-witted. Observing that he 
 was in great joy and very puffed up at his victory, he said, 
 "I who have been vanquished in the argument shall have 
 a better night's rest than my victor." We can also test 
 ourselves in regard to public speaking, if we are not timid 
 and do not shrink from speaking when a large audience has 
 unexpectedly been got together, nor dejected when we have 
 only a small one to harangue to, and if we do not, when we 
 have to speak to the people or before some magistrate, miss 
 the opportunity through, want of proper preparation ; for 
 these things are recorded both of Demosthenes and Alci- 
 biades. AsforAlcibiades, though hepossessedamost excellent 
 understanding, yet from want of confidence in speaking he 
 often broke down, and in trying to recall a word or thougbt 
 that slipped his memory had to stop short. ^ And Homer 
 did not deny that his first line was unmetrical," though he 
 had sufficient confidence to follow it up by so many other 
 lines, so great was his genius. Much more then ought 
 those who aim at virtue and what is noble to lose no 
 opportunity of public speaking, paying very little attention 
 to either uproar or applause at their speeches. 
 
 § X. And not only ought each to see to his discourses 
 but also to his actions whether he regards utility more 
 than show, and truth more than display. For if a genuine 
 love for youth or maiden seeks no witnesses, but is con- 
 tent to enjoy its delights privately, far more does it become 
 the philosopher and lover of the beautiful, who is con- 
 versant with virtue through his actions, to pride himself on 
 his silence, and not to need people to praise or listen to 
 him. As that man who called his maid in the house, and 
 cried out to her, " See, Dionysia, I am angry no longer,"^ 
 so he that does anything agreeable and polite, and then 
 goes and spreads it about the town, plainly shows that he 
 looks for public applause and has a strong propensity to 
 vain- glory, and as yet has no acquaintance with virtue as 
 a reality but only as a dream, restlessly roving about amid 
 
 ' The remark about Demosthenes has somehow slipped out, as 
 Wyttenbach has suggested. 
 
 * Does this refer to UrjXri'iaSsb) before 'Axi^rjoQ in " Iliad," i. 1 ? 
 
 ^ An allusion to some passage in a Play that has not come down to us. 
 
PROGKESS IN YIRTUE. 129 
 
 phantoms and shadows, and making a display of whatever 
 he does as painters display a picture. It is therefore a sign 
 of progress in virtue not merely to have given to a friend 
 or done a good turn to an acquaintance without mention- 
 ing it to other people, but also to have given an honest vote 
 among many unjust ones, and to have withstood the dis- 
 honourable request of some rich man or of some man in 
 office, and to have been above taking bribes, and, by Zeus, 
 to have been thirsty all night and not to have drunk, or, 
 like Agesilaus,^ to have resisted, though strongly tempted, 
 the kiss of a handsome youth or maiden, and to have kept 
 the fact to oneself and been silent about it. For one's 
 being satisfied with one's own good opinion ^ and not 
 despising it, but rejoicing in it and acquiescing in it as 
 competent to see and decide on what is honourable, proves 
 that reason is rooted and grounded within one, and that, to 
 borrow the language of Democritus, one is accustomed to 
 draw one's delights from oneself. And just as farmers 
 behold with greater pleasure those ears of corn which bend 
 and bow down to the ground, while they look upon those 
 that from their lightness stand straight upright as empty 
 pretenders, so also among those young men who wish to 
 be philosophers those that are most empty and without 
 any solidity show the greatest amount of assurance in their 
 appearance and walk, and a face full of haughtiness and 
 contempt that looks down on everybody, but when they 
 begin to grow full and get some fruit from study they lay 
 aside their proud and vain^ bearing. And just as in 
 vessels that contain water the air is excluded, so with men 
 that are full of solid merit their pride abates, and their 
 estimate of themselves becomes a lower one, and they cease 
 to plume themselves on a long beard and threadbare cloak,* 
 and transfer their training to the mind, and are most severe 
 and austere to themselves, while they are milder in their 
 intercourse with everybody else ; and they do not as before 
 
 ^ Compare our Author, De Audiendis Poetis, § xi. axnrep 6 'AyricriXaog 
 ovK VTrkjXHvtv VTTO Tov KoXov (pikr\Qi]vai irpoaiovTOQ. 
 
 2 Heading with Madvig and Hercher, to yap avrov, sq. 
 
 ' Literally cork-like, so vain, empty. So Horace, " levior cortice," 
 " Odes," iii. 9, 22. 
 
 * Marks of a philosopher among the ancients. Compare our Author, 
 " How one may discern a flatterer from a friend," § vii. 
 
 K 
 
130 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 eagerly snatch at the name and reputation of philosopher, nor 
 do they write themselves down as sucli, but even if he were 
 addressed by that title by anyone else, an ingenuous young 
 m.an would say, smiling and blushing, " I am not a god : why 
 do you liken me to the immortals ? " ^ For as ^schylns 
 says, 
 
 " I never can mistake the burning eye 
 
 Of the young woman that has once known man," ^ 
 
 so to the young man who has tasted of true progress in philo- 
 sophy the following lines of Sappho are applicable, " My 
 tongue cleaves to the roof of my mouth, and a fire courses 
 all over my lean body," and his eye will be gentle and mild, 
 and you would desire to hear him speak. For as those who 
 are initiated come together at first with confusion and noise 
 and jostle one another, but when the mysteries are being 
 performed and exhibited, they give their attention with awe 
 and silence, so also at the commencement of philosophy you 
 will see round its doors much confusion and assurance and 
 prating, some rudely and violently jostling their way to 
 reputation, but he who once enters in, and sees the great 
 light, as when shrines are open to view, assumes another 
 air and is silent and awe-struck, and in humility and 
 decorum follows reason as if she were a god. And the 
 playful remark of Menedemus seems to suit these very 
 well. He said that the majority of those who went to 
 school at Athens became first wise, and then philosophers, 
 after that orators, and as time went on became ordinary 
 kind of people, the more they had to do with learning, so 
 much the more laying aside their pride and high estimate 
 of themselves. 
 
 § XI. Of people that need the help of the physician some, 
 if their tooth ache or even finger smart, run at once to the 
 doctor, others if they are feverish send for one and implore 
 his assistance at their own home, others who are melan- 
 choly or crazy or delirious will not sometimes even see the 
 doctor if he comes to their house, but drive him away, or 
 avoid him, ignorant through their grievous disease that 
 they are diseased at all. Similarly of those who have done 
 
 ^ " Odyssey," xvi. 187. 
 
 ' -^schylus, " Toxotides," Fragm. 224. Quoted again by our author, 
 " On Love," § xxi. 
 
PROGRESS IN YIRTUE. 131 
 
 what is wrong some are incorrigible, being hostile and in- 
 dignant and furious at those who reprove and admonish 
 them, while others are meeker and bear and allow reproof. 
 N^ow, when one has done what is wrong, to offer one- 
 self for reproof, to expose the case and reveal one's wrong- 
 doing, and not to rejoice if it lies hid, or be satisfied if it is 
 not known, but to make confession of it and ask for inter- 
 ference and admonishment, is no small indication of pro- 
 gress in virtue. And so Diogenes said that one who wished 
 to do what was right ought to seek either a good friend or 
 red-hot enemj, that either by rebuke or mild entreaty he 
 might flee from vice. But as long as anyone, making a 
 display of dirt or stains on his clothes, or a torn shoe, prides 
 himself to outsiders on his freedom from arrogance, and, 
 by Zeus, thinks himself doing something very smart if he 
 jeers at himself as a dwarf or hunchback, but wraps up 
 and conceals as if they were ulcers the inner vileness of 
 his soul and the deformities of his life, as his envy, his 
 malignity, his littleness, his love of pleasure, and will not 
 let anyone touch or look at them from fear of disgrace, 
 such a one has made little progress in virtue, yea rather 
 none. But he that joins issue with his vices, and shows 
 that he himself is even more pained and grieved about 
 them than anyone else, or, what is next best, is able and 
 willing to listen patiently to the reproof of another and to 
 correct his life accordingly, he seems truly to be disgusted 
 at his depravity and resolute to divest himself of it. We 
 ought certainly to be ashamed of and shun every appear- 
 ance of vice, but he who is more put about by his vice itself 
 than by the bad reputation that ensues upon it, will not 
 mind either hearing it spoken against or even speaking 
 against it himself if it make him a better man. That was 
 a witty remark of Diogenes to a young man, who when 
 seen in a tavern retired into the kitchen : " The more," said 
 he, "you retire, the more are you in the tavern."^ Even 
 so the more a vicious man denies his vice, the more does it 
 
 ^ " Turpe habitum fuisse in caupona conspici, et hoc exemplo apparet, 
 et alia sunt indicia. Isocrates Orat. Areopagitica laudans antiquorum 
 Atheniensium mores, p. 257 : sv KaTr/jXcty Se (paydv >/ melv ovdalg dv 
 oiKSTtjQ sTrieiKiqg eroX/irjffe : quem locum citans Athenaeus alia etiam 
 adfert xiii. p. 566, F." — Wyttenbach. 
 
132 plutaech's morals. 
 
 insinuate itself and master him : as those people really 
 poor who pretend to be rich get still more poor from their 
 false display. But he who is really making progress in 
 virtue imitates Hippocrates, who confessed publicly and 
 put into black and white that he had made a mistake about 
 the sutures of the skull/ for he will think it monstrous, if 
 that great man declared his mistake, that others might not 
 fall into the same error, and yet he himself for his own 
 deliverance from vice cannot bear to be shown he is in 
 the wrong, and to confess his stupidity and ignorance. 
 Moreover the sayings of Bion and Pyrrho will test not so 
 much one's progress as a greater and more perfect habit of 
 virtue. Bion maintained that his friends might think they 
 had made progress, when they could listen as patiently 
 to abuse as to such language as the following, " Stranger, 
 you look not like a bad or foolish person," ^ " Health and 
 joy go with you, may the gods give you happiness ! " ^ 
 While as to Pyrrho they say, when he was at sea and in 
 peril from a storm, that he pointed out a little pig that was 
 quietly enjoying some grain that had been scattered about, 
 and said to his companions that the man who did not wish 
 to be disturbed by the changes and chances of life should 
 attain a similar composedness of mind through reason and 
 philosophy. 
 
 § XII. Look also at the opinion of Zeno, who thought 
 that everybody might gauge his progress in virtue by his 
 dreams, if he saw himself in his dreams pleasing himself 
 with nothing disgraceful, and neither doing nor wishing to 
 do anything dreadful or unjust, but that, as in the clear 
 depths of a calm and tranquil sea, his fancy and passions 
 were plainly shown to be under the control of reason. And 
 this had not escaped the notice of Plato,* it seems, who had 
 earlier expressed in form and outline the part that fancy 
 and unreason played in sleep in the soul that was by nature 
 tyrannical, " for it attempts incest," he says, " with its 
 mother, and procures for itself unlawful meats, and gives 
 
 ' Wyttenbach compares Quintilian, " Institut. Orat." iii. 6, p. 255: 
 " Nam et Hippocrates clarus arte medicinse videtur honestissime fecisse, 
 qui quosdam errores suos, ne posteri errarent, confessus est." 
 
 2 Homer, " Odyssey," vi. 187. ^ Homer, " Odyssey," xxiv. 402. 
 
 * Plato, " Republic," ix. p. 571, D. 
 
PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 133 
 
 itself up to the most abandoned desires, such as in daytime 
 the law through shame and fear debars people from." As 
 then beasts of burden that have been well-trained do not, 
 even if their driver let go the reins, attempt to turn aside 
 and leave the proper road, but go forward orderly as usual, 
 pursuing their way without stumbling, so those whose un- 
 reason has become obedient and mild and tempered by 
 reason, will not easily wish, either in dreams or in illnesses, 
 to deal insolently or lawlessly through their desires, but 
 will keep to their usual habits, which acquire their power 
 and force by attention. For if the body can by training 
 make itself and its members so subject to control, that the 
 eyes in sorrow can refrain from tears, and the heart from pal- 
 pitating in fear, and the passions can be calm in the presence 
 of beautiful youths and maidens, is it not far more likely 
 that the training of the passions and emotions of the soul 
 will allay, tame down, and mould their propensities even 
 in dreams ? A story is told about the philosopher Stilpo,^ 
 that he thought he saw in a dream Poseidon angry with 
 him because he had not sacrificed an ox to him, as was 
 usual among the Megarians :^ and that he, not a bit fright- 
 ened, said, " What are you talking about, Poseidon ? Do 
 you come here as a peevish boy, because I have not with 
 borrowed money filled the town with the smell of sacrifice, 
 and have only sacrificed to you out of what I had at home 
 on a modest scale ? " Then he thought that Poseidon 
 smiled at him, and held out his right hand, and said that 
 for his sake he would give the Megarians a large shoal of 
 anchovies. Those, then, that have such pleasant, clear, and 
 painless dreams, and no frightful, or harsh, or malignant, or 
 untoward apparition, may be said to have reflections of their 
 progress in virtue ; whereas agitation and panics and ignoble 
 flights, and boyish delights, and lamentations in the case 
 of sad and strange dreams, are like the waves that break 
 on the coast, the soul not having yet got its proper com- 
 posure, but being still in course of being moulded by 
 opinions and laws, from which it escapes in dreams as far 
 
 ^ A somewhat similar story about Stilpo is told in Athengeus, x. p. 
 423, D. 
 
 ^ So Haupt and Herscher very ingeniously for iepevaii^. 
 
134 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 as possible, so that it is once again set free and open to the 
 passions. Do you investigate all these points too, as to 
 whether thej are signs of progress in virtue, or of some 
 habit which has already a settled constancy and strength 
 through reason. 
 
 § XIII. Now since entire freedom from the passions is a 
 great and divine thing, and progress in virtue seems, as 
 we say, to consist in a certain remissness and mildness of 
 the passions, we must observe the passions both in them- 
 selves and in reference to one another to gauge the diffe- 
 rence : in themselves as to whether desire, and fear, and 
 rage are less strong in us now than formerly, through our 
 quickly extinguishing their violence and heat by reason; 
 and in reference to one another as to whether we are ani- 
 mated now by modesty more than by fear, and by emulation 
 more than by envy, and by love of glory rather than by love 
 of riches, and generally speaking whether — to use the 
 language of musicians — it is in the Dorian more than in 
 the Lydian measures that we err either by excess or de- 
 ficiency,^ whether we are plainer in our manner of living 
 or more luxurious, whether we are slower in action or 
 quicker, whether we admire men and their discourses 
 more than we should or despise them. For as it is a good 
 sign in diseases if they turn aside from vital parts of the 
 body, so in the case of people who are making progress in 
 virtue, when vice seems to shift to milder passions, it is a 
 sign it will soon die out. When Phrynis added to the seven 
 chords two chords more, the Ephors asked him. which he 
 preferred to let them cut off, the upper or lower ones ; ^ so 
 we must cut off both above and below, if we mean to attain 
 to the mean and to due proportion : for progress in virtue 
 first diminishes the excess and sharpness of the passions, 
 
 " That sharpness for which madmen are so vehement," 
 
 as Sophocles says. 
 
 § xiY. I have already said that it is a very great indica- 
 tion of progress in virtue to transfer our judgement to action, 
 
 ^ Adopting the suggestion of Wyttenbach as to the reading. The 
 Dorian measure was grave and severe, the Lydian soft and effeminate. 
 ^ See our author, " Apophthegmata Laconica," p. 220 C. 
 
PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 135 
 
 and not to let our words remain merely words, but to make 
 deeds of them. A manifestation of this is in the first place 
 emulation as regards what we praise, and a zeal to do what 
 we admire, and an unwillingness either to do or allow what 
 we censure. To illustrate my meaning by an example, it 
 is probable that all Athenians praised the daring and bravery 
 of Miltiades ; but Themistocles alone said that the trophy of 
 Miltiades would not let him sleep, but woke him up of a 
 night, and not only praised and admired him, but manifestly 
 emulated and imitated his glorious actions. Small, therefore, 
 can we think the progress we have made, as long as our 
 admiration for those who have done noble things is barren, 
 and does not of itself incite us to imitate them. For as there 
 is no strong love without jealousy, so there is no ardent and 
 energetic praise of virtue, which does not prick and goad 
 one on, and make one not envious but emulous of what is 
 noble, and desirous to do something similar. For not only 
 at the discourses of a philosopher ought we, as Alcibiades 
 said,^ to be moved in heart and shed tears, but the true 
 proficient in virtue, comparing his own deeds and actions 
 with those of the good and perfect man, and grieved at the 
 same time at the knowledge of his own deficiency, yet 
 rejoicing in hope and desire, and full of impulses that will 
 not let him rest, is, as Simonides says, 
 
 " Like sucking foal running by side of dam," ^ 
 
 being desirous all but to coalesce with the good man. For 
 it is a special sign of true progress in virtue to love and 
 admire the disposition of those whose deeds we emulate, 
 and to resemble them with a good- will that ever assigns 
 due honour and praise to them. But whoever is steeped 
 in contentiousness and envy against his betters, let him 
 know that he may be pricked on by a jealous desire for 
 glory or power, but that he neither honours nor admires 
 virtue. 
 
 § XV. Whenever, then, we begin so much to love good 
 men that we deem happy, " not only," as Plato ' says, 
 " the temperate man himself, but also the man who hears 
 
 ^ Plato, " Symposium," p. 25, E. 
 
 2 This line is quoted again by our author, " On Moral Virtue," § vii. 
 
 3 Plato, "Laws," iv. p. 711, E. 
 
136 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the words that flow from his wise lips," and even admire 
 and are pleased with his figure and walk and look and 
 smile, and desire to adapt ourselves to his model and 
 to stick closely to him, then may we think that we are 
 making genuine progress. Still more will this be the case, 
 if we admire the good not only in prosperity, but like lovers ■ 
 who admire even the lispings and paleness of those in their 
 flower,^ as the tears and dejection of Panthea in her grief 
 and aiBiction won the affections of Araspes,^ so we fear 
 neither the exile of Aristides, nor the prison of Anaxagoras, 
 nor the poverty of Socrates, nor the condemnation of 
 Phocion, but think virtue worthy our love even under sach 
 trials, and join her, ever chanting that line of Euripides, 
 
 " Unto the noble everything is good." ^ 
 
 For the enthusiasm that can go so far as not to be dis- 
 couraged at the sure prospect of trouble, but admires and 
 emulates what is good even so, could never be turned away 
 from what is noble by anybody. Such men ever, whether 
 they have some business to transact, or have taken upon them 
 some office, or are in some critical conjuncture, put before 
 their eyes the example of noble men, and consider what 
 Plato would have done on the occasion, what Epaminondas 
 would have said, how Lycurgus or Agesilaus would have 
 dealt ; that so, adjusting and re-modelling themselves, as 
 it were, at their mirrors, they may correct any ignoble 
 expression, and repress any ignoble passion. For as those 
 that have learnt the names of the Idsean Dactyli* make use 
 of them to banish their fear by quietly repeating them 
 over, so the bearing in mind and remembering good men, 
 which soon suggests itself forcibly to those who have made 
 some progress in virtue in all their emotions and difficulties, 
 keeps them upright and not liable to fall. Let this also 
 then be a sign to you of progress in virtue. 
 
 § xvL In addition to this, not to be too much disturbed, 
 
 ^ See those splendid lines of Lucretius, iv. 1155-1169. 
 
 ^ *' Res valde celebrata ex Institutione Cyri Xenophontea, v. 1,2; 
 vi. 1, \i:'—Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ This line is very like a Fragment in the " Danae " of Euripides. 
 Dind. (328). 
 
 * On these see Pausanias, v. 7. 
 
PROGRESS IN VIRTUE. 137 
 
 nor to blush, nor to trj and conceal oneself, or make any 
 change in one's dress, on the sudden appearance of a 
 man of distinction and virtue, but to feel confident and 
 go and meet such a one, is the confirmation of a good 
 conscience. It is reported that Alexander, seeing a mes- 
 senger running up to him full of joy and holding out his 
 right hand, said, " My good friend, what are yon going to 
 tell me? Has Homer come to life again?" For he thought 
 that his own exploits required nothing but posthumous 
 fame.^ And a young man improving in character instinc- 
 tively loves nothing better than to take pride and pleasure 
 in the company of good and noble men, and to display his 
 house, his table, his wife, his amusements, his serious pur- 
 suits, his spoken or written discourses ; insomuch that he 
 is grieved when he remembers that his father or guardian 
 died without seeing him in that condition in life, and would 
 pray for nothing from the gods so much, as that they could 
 come to life again, and be spectators of his life and 
 actions ; as, on the contrary, those that have neglected 
 their affairs, and come to ruin, cannot look upon their 
 relatives even in dreams without fear and trembling. 
 
 § XVII. Add, if you please, to what I have already said, 
 as no small indication of progress in virtue, the thinking no 
 wrong-doing small, but being on your guard and heed 
 against all. For as people who despair of ever being rich 
 make no account of small expenses, thinking they will 
 never make much by adding little to little,^ but when 
 hope is nearer fruition, then with wealth increases the love of 
 it,^ so in things that have respect to virtue, not he that 
 generally assents to such sayings as " Why trouble about 
 hereafter ? " " If things are bad now, they will some day be 
 better," "* but the man who pays heed to everything, and is 
 vexed and concerned if vice gets pardon, when it lapses into 
 even the most trifling wrongdoing, plainly shows that he has 
 
 ' Such as Homer could have brought. Compare Horace, " Odes," 
 iv, ix. 25-28 ; and Cicero, " pro Archia," x. " Magnus ille Alexander — 
 cum in Sigeo ad Achillis tumulum adstidsset, O fortunate, inquit, ado- 
 lescens, qui tuae virtutis Homerum prseconem inveneris." 
 
 '^ Contrary to Hesiod's saw, « Works and Days," 361, 362. 
 
 3 So Juvenal, xiv. 138-140. 
 
 * Like Horace's " Non si male nunc, et olim Sic erit.'' "Odes," 
 ii. X. 16, 17. 
 
138 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 already attained to some degree of purity, and deigns not to 
 contract defilement from anything whatever. For the idea 
 that we have nothing of any importance to bring disgrace 
 upon, makes people inclined to what is little and careless.^ To 
 those who are building a stone wall or coping it matters not 
 if they lay on any chance wood or common stone, or some 
 tombstone that has fallen down, as bad workmen do, heaping 
 and piling up pell-mell every kind of material ; but those 
 who have made some progress in virtue, whose life " has 
 been wrought on a golden base,"' like the foundation of 
 some holy or royal building, undertake nothing carelessly, 
 but lay and adjust everything by the line and level of 
 reason, thinking the remark of Polycletus superlatively 
 good, that that work is most excellent, where the model 
 stands the test of the nail.^ 
 
 WHETHER VICE IS SUFFICIElSrT TO CAUSE 
 UNHAPPINESS.' 
 
 § I. . . . He who gets a dowry with his wife sells himself 
 for it, as Euripides says," but his gains are few and uncertain ; 
 but he who does not go all on fire through many a funeral pile, 
 but through a regal pyre, full of panting and fear and sweat 
 got from travelling over the sea as a merchant, has the wealth 
 of Tantalus, but cannot enjoy it owing to his want of 
 leisure. For that Sicyonian horse-breeder was wise, who gave 
 Agamemnon as a present a swift mare, "that he should 
 not follow him to wind-swept Ilium, but delight himself 
 at home," '^ in the quiet enjoyment of his abundant riches 
 
 * Noblesse oblige in fact. ^ Pindar, Frag. 206. 
 
 ^ Like Horace's /actus ad ungicem, because the sculptor tries its 
 polish and the niceness of the joints by drawing his nail over the surface. 
 Casaub. Pers, i. 64 ; Horace, " Sat." i. v. 32, 33 , A. P. 294 ; Erasmus, 
 '« Adagia," p. 507. 
 
 ^ The beginning of this short Treatise is lost. Nor is the first para- 
 graph at all clear. We have to guess somewhat at the meaning. 
 
 ^ In a fragment of the " Phaethon." Compare also "On Educa- 
 tion," § 19. 
 
 6 " Iliad," xxiii, 297, 298. 
 
WHETHER VICE IS SUFFICIENT TO CAUSE UNHAPPINESS. 139 
 
 and painless leisure. But nowadays courtiers, and people 
 wlio think tliey have a turn for affairs, thrust themselves 
 forward of their own accord uninvited into courts and 
 toilsome escorts and bivouacs, that thej may get a horse, 
 or brooch, or some such piece of good luck. " But his wife 
 is left behind in Phylace, and tears her cheeks in her 
 sorrow, and his house is only half complete without him," ^ 
 while he is dragged about, and wanders about, and wastes 
 his time in idle hopes, and has to put up with much insult. 
 And even if he gets any of those things he desires, giddy 
 and dizzy at Fortune's rope-dance, he seeks retirement, and 
 deems those happy who live obscure and in security, while 
 they again look up admiringly at him who soars so high 
 above their heads. ^ 
 
 § II. Vice has universally an ill effect on everybody, being 
 in itself a sufficient producer of infelicity, needing no in- 
 struments nor ministers. For tyrants, anxious to make 
 those whom they punish wretched, keep executioners and 
 torturers, and contrive branding-irons and other instru- 
 ments of torture to inspire fear^ in the brute soul, whereas 
 vice attacks the soul without any such apparatus, and 
 crushes and dejects it, and fills a man with sorrow, and 
 lamentation, and melancholy, and remorse. Here is a 
 proof of what I say. Many are silent under mutilation, and 
 endure scourging or torture at the hand of despots or 
 tyrants without uttering a word, whenever their soul, 
 abating the pain by reason, forcibly as it were checks and 
 represses them : but you can never quiet anger or smother 
 grief, or persuade a timid person not to run away, or one 
 suffering from remorse not to cry out, nor tear his hair, 
 nor smite his thigh. Thus vice is stronger than fire and 
 sword. 
 
 § III. You know of course that cities, when they desire 
 to publicly contract for the building of temples or 
 colossuses, listen to the estimates of the contractors who 
 compete for the job, and bring their plans and charges, and 
 finally select the contractor who will do the work at least 
 
 ' ''Iliad," ii. 700, 701. 
 
 ^ 'Tis ever so. Compare Horace, " Sat." i. i. 1-14. 
 
 ^ Adopting Reiske's reading. 
 
140 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 expense, and best, and quickest. Let us suppose then that 
 we publicly contract to make the life of man miserable, 
 and take the estimates of Fortune and Vice for this object. 
 Fortune shall come forward, provided with all sorts of in- 
 struments and costly apparatus to make life miserable and 
 wretched. She shall come with robberies and wars, and 
 the blood-guiltiness of tyrants, and storms at sea, and 
 lightning drawn down from the sky, she shall compound 
 hemlock, she shall bring swords, she shall levy an army 
 of informers, she shall cause fevers to break out, she shall 
 rattle fetters and build prisons. It is true that most of 
 these things are owing to Vice rather than Fortune, but let 
 us suppose them all to come from Fortune. And let Vice 
 stand by naked, without any external things against man, 
 and let her ask Fortune how she will make man un- 
 happy and dejected. Fortune, dost thou threaten poverty ? 
 Metrocles laughs at thee, who sleeps during winter among 
 the sheep, in summer in the vestibules of temples, and 
 challenges the king of the Persians,^ who winters at 
 Babylon, and summers in Media, to vie with him in hap- 
 piness. Dost thou bring slavery, and bondage, and sale ? 
 Diogenes despises thee, who cried out, as he was being 
 sold by some robbers, "Who will buy a master? " Dost 
 thou mix a cup of poison ? Didst not thou offer such 
 a one to Socrates ? And cheerfully, and mildly, without 
 fear, without changing colour or countenance, he calmly 
 drank it up : and when he was dead, all who survived 
 deemed him happy, as sure to have a divine lot in Hades. 
 And as to thy fire, did not Decius, the general of the 
 Romans, anticipate it for himself, having piled up a funeral 
 pyre between the two armies, and sacrificed himself to 
 Cronos, dedicating himself for the supremacy of his 
 country ? And the chaste and loving wives of the Indians 
 strive and contend with one another for the fire, and she 
 that wins the day and gets burnt with the body of her 
 husband, is pronounced happy by the rest, and her praises 
 sung. And of the wise men in that part of the world no 
 one is esteemed or pronounced happy, who does not in his 
 
 ^ Proverbial for extreme good fortune. Cf. Horace, '* Odes," iii. 
 ix. 4, " Persarum vigui rege beatior." 
 
WHETHER YICE IS SUFFICIENT TO CAUSE UNHAPPINESS. 141 
 
 lifetime, in good health and in full possession of all his 
 faculties, separate soul from body hy fire, and emerge pure 
 from flesh, having purged away his mortal part. Or wilt 
 thou reduce a man from a splendid property, and house, 
 and table, and sumptuous living, to a threadbare coat and 
 wallet, and begging of daily bread ? Such was the beginning 
 of happiness to Diogenes, of freedom and glory to Crates. 
 Or wilt thou nail a man on a cross, or impale him on a stake ? 
 What cares Theodoras whether he rots above ground or 
 below ? Such was the happy mode of burial amongst the 
 Scythians,^ and among the Hyrcanians dogs, among the 
 Bactrians birds, devour according to the laws the dead 
 bodies of those who have made a happy end. 
 
 § IV. Who then are made unhappy by these things ? 
 Those who have no manliness or reason, the enervated and 
 untrained, who retain the opinions they had as children. 
 Fortune therefore does not produce perfect infelicity, un- 
 less Vice co-operate. For as a thread saws through a bone 
 that has been soaked in ashes and vinegar, and as people bend 
 and fashion ivory only when it has been made soft and 
 supple by beer, and cannot under any other circumstances, 
 so Fortune, lighting upon what is in itself faulty and soft 
 through Vice, hollows it out and wounds it. And as the 
 Parthian juice, though hurtful to no one else nor injurious 
 to those who touch it or carry it about, yet if it be com- 
 municated to a wounded man straightway kills him through 
 his previous susceptibility to receive its essence, so he who 
 will be upset in soul by Fortune must have some secret 
 internal ulcer or sore to make external things so piteous 
 and lamentable. 
 
 § V. Does then Vice need Fortune to bring about in- 
 felicity ? By no means. She lashes not up the rough and 
 stormy sea, she girds not lonely mountain passes with 
 robbers lying in wait by the way, she makes not clouds of 
 hail to burst on the fruitful plains, she suborns not Meletus 
 or Anytus or Callixenus as accusers, she takes not away 
 wealth, excludes not people from the praetorship to make 
 them wretched ; but she scares the rich, the well-to-do, 
 and great heirs ; by land and sea she insinuates herself and 
 
 * See Herodotus, iv. 72. 
 
142 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 sticks to people, infusing lust, inflaming with anger, 
 afflicting them with superstitious fears, tearing them in 
 pieces with envj. 
 
 WHETHER THE DISORDERS OF MIND OR 
 BODY ARE WORSE. 
 
 § I. Homer, looking at the mortality of all living 
 creatures, and comparing them with one another in their 
 lives and habits, gave vent to his thoughts in the words, 
 
 ' ' Of all the things that on the earth do breathe, 
 Or creep, man is by far the wretchedest ; " * 
 
 assigning to man an unhappy pre-eminence in extreme mis- 
 fortune. But let us, assuming that man is, as thus publicly 
 declared, supreme in infelicity and the most wretched of all 
 living creatures, compare him with himself, in the estimate 
 of his misery dividing body and soul, not idly but in a very 
 necessary way, that we may learn whether our life is more 
 wretched owing to Fortune or through our own fault. For 
 disease is engendered in the body by nature, but vice and 
 depravity in the soul is first its own doing, then its settled 
 condition. And it is no slight aid to tranquillity of 
 mind if what is bad be capable of cure, and lighter and less 
 violent. 
 
 § II. The fox in ^sop^ disputing with the leopard as to 
 their respective claims to variety, the latter showed its body 
 and appearance all bright and spotted, while the tawny 
 skin of the former was dirty and not pleasant to look at. 
 Then the fox said, " Look inside me, sir judge, and you will 
 see that I am more full of variety than my opponent," re- 
 ferring to his trickiness and versatility in shifts. Let us 
 similarly say to ourselves, Many diseases and disorders, good 
 sir, thy body naturally produces of itself, many also it re- 
 ceives from without; but if thou lookest at thyself within 
 thou wilt find, to borrow the language of Democritus, a 
 
 ' Homer, " Iliad," xvii. 446, 447. 
 
 * See the Fable 'AXwttt/^ kuI ndpdaXig. No. 42, Ed. Halme. 
 
WHETHER THE DISORDERS OF MIND OR BODY ARE WORSE. 143 
 
 varied and susceptible storehouse and treasury of what is 
 bad, not flowing in from without, but having as it were 
 innate and native springs, which vice, being exceedingly 
 rich and abundant in passion, produces. And if diseases 
 are detected in the body by the pulse and by pallors and 
 flushes,^ and are indicated by heats and sudden pains, while 
 the diseases of the nynd, bad as they are, escape the notice 
 of most people, the latter are worse because they deprive 
 the sufferer of the perception of them. For reason if it be 
 sound perceives the diseases of the body, but he that is 
 diseased in his mind cannot judge of his sufferings, for he 
 suffers in the very seat of judgement. We ought to account 
 therefore the first and greatest of the diseases of the mind 
 that ignorance,^ whereby vice is incurable for most people, 
 dwelling with them and living and dying with them. For 
 the beginning of getting rid of disease is the perception of 
 it, which leads the sufferer to the necessary relief, but he 
 who through not believing he is ill knows not what he re- 
 quires refuses the remedy even when it is close at hand. 
 For amongst the diseases of the body those are the worst 
 which are accompanied by stupor, as lethargies, headaches, 
 epilepsies, apoplexies, and those fevers which raise inflam- 
 mation to the pitch of madness, and disturb the brain as in 
 the case of a musical instrument, 
 
 "And move the mind's strings hitherto untouched." ^ 
 
 § III. And so doctors wish a man not to be ill, or if he is 
 ill to be ignorant of it, as is the case with all diseases of the 
 soul. For neither those who are out of their minds, nor the 
 licentious, nor the unjust think themselves faulty — some 
 even think themselves perfect. For no one ever yet called 
 a fever health, or consumption a good condition of body, or 
 gout swift-f ootedness, or paleness a good colour ; but many 
 call anger manliness, and love friendship, and envy compe- 
 
 ^ Reading with Wyttenbach, wxptdcrfcri xrai kpvOrjfiaffi. 
 
 ^ Foi'te ayvoiai/." — Wyttenbach. The oi'dinary reading is avoiav. 
 " E coelo descendit yv&Oi (reavrov,'^ says Juvenal truly, xi. 27. 
 
 ^ Compare the image in Shakspere, "Hamlet," A. iii. Sc. 1. 165, 166. 
 " Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, 
 Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh." 
 
144 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 tition, and cowardice prudence. Then again those that are 
 ill in body send for doctors, for thej are conscious of what 
 they need to counteract their ailments ; bat those who are 
 ill in mind avoid philosophers, for they think themselves 
 excellent in the very matters in which they come short. 
 And it is on this account that we maintain that ophthalmia 
 is a lesser evil than madness, and gout than frenzy. For 
 the person ill in body is aware of it and calls loudly for the 
 doctor, and when he comes allows him to anoint his eye, 
 to open a vein, or to plaster up his head ; but you hear mad 
 Agave in her frenzy not knowing her dearest ones, but 
 crying out, " We bring from the mountain to the halls a 
 young stag recently torn limb from limb, a fortunate cap- 
 ture."^ Again he who is ill in body straightway gives up 
 and goes to bed and remains there quietly till he is well, 
 and if he toss and tumble about a little when the fit is on 
 him, any of the people who are by saying to him, 
 
 " Gently, 
 Stay in the bed, poor wretch, and take your ease," ^ 
 
 restrain him and check him. But those who suffer from a 
 diseased brain are then most active and least at rest, for 
 impulses bring about action, and the passions are vehement 
 impulses. And so they do not let the mind rest, but when 
 the man most requires quiet and silence and retirement, 
 then is he dragged into the open air, and becomes the victim 
 of anger, contentiousness, lust, and grief, and is compelled 
 to do and say many lawless things unsuitable to the 
 occasion. 
 
 § IV. As therefore the storm which prevents one's putting 
 into harbour is more dangerous than the storm which will 
 not let one sail, so those storms of the soul are more for- 
 midable which do not allow a man to take in sail, or to calm 
 his reason when it is disturbed, but without a pilot and 
 without ballast, in perplexity and uncertainty through 
 contrary and confusing courses, he rushes headlong and 
 falls into woeful shipwreck, and shatters his life. So that 
 
 ' Euripides, " Bacchse," 1170-1172. Agave's treatment of her son 
 Pentheus was a stock philosophical comparison. See for example 
 Horace, ii. " Sat." iii. 303, 304, and context. 
 
 2 Euripides, " Orestes," 258. 
 
ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS. 145 
 
 from these points of view it is worse to be diseased in mind 
 than body, for the latter only suffer, but the former do ill 
 as well as suffer ill. But why need I speak of our various 
 passions ? The very times bring them to our mind. Do 
 you see yon great and promiscuous crowd jostling against 
 one another and surging round the rostrum and forum ? 
 They have not assembled here to sacrifice to their country's 
 gods, nor to share in one another's rites ; they are not 
 bringing to Ascraean Zeus the firstfruits of Lydian pro- 
 duce,^ nor are they celebrating in honour of Dionysus the 
 Bacchic orgies on festival nights with common revellings ; 
 but a mighty plague stirring up Asia in annual cycles 
 drives them here for litigation and suits at law at stated 
 times : and the mass of business, like the confluence of 
 mighty rivers, has inundated one forum, and festers and 
 teems with miners and ruined. What fevers, what agues, 
 do not these things cause ? What obstructions, what 
 irruptions of blood into the air-vessels, what distempera- 
 ture of heat, what overflow of humours, do not result ? If 
 you examine every suit at law, as if it were a person, as to 
 where it originated, where it came from, you will find that 
 one was produced by obstinate temper, another by frantic 
 love of strife, a third by some sordid desire.*'^ 
 
 ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS. 
 
 § I. Menon the Thessalian, who thought he was a per- 
 fect adept in discourse, and, to borrow the language of 
 Empedocles, "had attained the heights of wisdom," was 
 asked by Socrates, what virtue was, and upon his answering 
 quickly and glibly, that virtue was a different thing in boy 
 and old man, and in man and woman, and in magistrate 
 and private person, and in master and servant, " Capital," 
 said Socrates, "you were asked about one virtue, but you 
 
 ^ '^ Anrwm -pvLta. Pactolus enim aurum fert. Videturdictio e Pindaro 
 desumta esse." — Reiske. 
 
 - " Libellus hie fine carere videtur. Quare autem opuseulum hoc 
 Plutareho indignum atque suppositum visum Xylandro fuerit, non in- 
 telligo.'' — Reiske. 
 
 L 
 
146 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 have raised up a whole swarm of them," ^ conjecturing not 
 amiss that the man named many because he knew not one. 
 Might not someone jeer at us in the same way, as being 
 afraid, when we have not yet one firm friendship, that we 
 shall without knowing it fall upon an abundance of friends ? 
 It is very much the same as if a man maimed and blind 
 should be afraid of becoming hundred-handed like Briareus 
 or all eyes like Argus. And yet we wonderfully praise the 
 young man in Menander, who said that he thought anyone 
 wonderfully good, if he had even the shadow of a friend." 
 
 § II. But among many other things what stands chiefly 
 in the way of getting a friend is the desire for many friends, 
 like a licentious woman who, through giving her favours 
 indiscriminately, cannot retain her old lovers, who are 
 neglected and drop off ; ^ or rather like the foster-child of 
 Hypsipyle, " sitting in the meadow and plucking flower 
 after flower, snatching at each prize with gladsome heart, 
 insatiable in its childish delight,"^ so in the case of each of 
 us, owing to our love of novelty and fickleness, the recent 
 flower ever attracts, and makes us inconstant, frequently 
 laying the foundations of many friendships and intimacies 
 that come to nothing, neglecting in love of what we 
 eagerly pursue what we have already possession of. To 
 begin therefore with the domestic hearth,^ as the saying 
 is, with the traditions of life that time has handed down to us 
 about constant friends, let us take the witness and counsel 
 of antiquity, according to which friendships go in pairs, as 
 in the cases of Theseus and Pirithous, Achilles and Patroclus, 
 Orestes and Pylades, Phintias and Damon, Epaminondas 
 and Pelopidas. For friendship is a creature that goes in 
 pairs, and is not gregarious, or crow-like,'^ and to think a 
 
 1 Plato, "Men." p. 71 E. 
 
 ^ Quoted more fully by our author, " De Fraterno Amere," § iii. 
 
 3 *' Eadem comparatione utitur Lucianus in Toxari T. ii. p. .351 : 
 offTig av TToXixpiKoQ y ofioiog yfxlv doKtl toxq Koivalq ravraiQ Kai /xoixfi'O- 
 fikvaig -Yvvai^i' koI oiofxtB^ oiiKkff bfioioiQ i(rxvpdv rijv fiXiav avrov dvai 
 TcpoQ TToXXdg Evi'oiag diaipeOtlaav." — Wyttenhach. 
 
 * From the " Hypsipyle " of Euripides. 
 
 ° A well-known proverb for beginning at the beginning. Aristophanes, 
 " Vespte." 846 ; Plato, " Euthyphro," 3 A ; Strabo, 9. 
 
 ^ An allusion to the well-known proverb, KoXoibg tvotI koXolov. See 
 Erasmus, '^Adagia," p. 1644. 
 
ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS. 147 
 
 friend a second self, and to call him companion as it were 
 second one/ shows that friendship is a dual relation. For 
 we can get neither many slaves nor many friends at small 
 expense. What then is the purchase-money of friendship ? 
 Benevolence and complaisance conjoined with virtue, and 
 yet nature has nothing more rare than these. And so to 
 love or be loved very much cannot find place with many 
 persons ; for as rivers that have many channels and 
 cuttings have a weak and thin stream, so excessive love in 
 the soul if divided out among many is weakened. Thus 
 love for their young is most strongly implanted in those 
 that bear only one, as Homer calls a beloved son " the only 
 one, the child of old age," ^ that is, when the parents 
 neither have nor are likely to have another child. 
 
 § III. Not that we insist on only one friend, but among 
 the rest there should be one eminently so, like a child of 
 old age, who according to that well-known proverb 
 has eaten a bushel of salt with one,^ not as nowadays 
 many so-called friends contract friendship from drinking 
 together once, or playing at ball together, or playing to- 
 gether with dice, or passing the night together at some inn, 
 or meeting at the wrestling- school or in the market. And 
 in the houses of rich and leading men people congratulate 
 them on their many friends, when they see the large and 
 bustling crowd of visitors and handshakers and retainers : 
 and yet they see more flies in their kitchens, and as the 
 flies only come for the dainties, so they only dance atten- 
 dance for what they can get. And since true friendship has 
 three main requirements, virtue, as a thing good ; and fami- 
 liarity, as a thing pleasant ; and use, as a thing serviceable; 
 for we ought to choose a friend with judgement, and rejoice 
 in his company, and make use of him in need ; and all 
 these things are prejudicial to abundance of friends, espe- 
 cially judgement, which is the most important point ; we 
 must first consider, if it is impossible in a short time to test 
 dancers who are to form a chorus, or rowers who are to 
 pull together, or slaves who are to act as stewards of estates, 
 
 ^ The paronomasia is on halpoQ, srepog. 
 2 " Iliad," ix. 482; " Odyssey," xvi. 19. 
 ^ Cf. Cicero, "De Amicitia," xix. 
 
148 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 or as tutors of one's sons, far more difficult is it to meet 
 with many friends who will take off their coats to aid you in 
 every fortune, each of whom " offers his services to you in 
 prosperity, and does not object to share your adversity." 
 For neither does a ship encounter so many storms at sea, 
 nor do they fortify places with walls, or harbours with 
 defences and earthworks, in the expectation of so many 
 and great dangers, as friendship tested well and soundly 
 promises defence and refuge from. But if friends slip in 
 without being tested, like money proved to be bad, 
 
 " Those who shall lose such friends may well be glad, 
 And those who have such pray that they may lose them."^ 
 
 Yet is it difficult and by no means easy to avoid and bring 
 to a close an unpleasant friendship : as in the case of food 
 which is injurious and harmful, we cannot retain it on the 
 stomach without damage and hurt, nor can we expel it as 
 it was taken into the mouth, but only in a putrid mixed 
 up and changed form, so a bad friend is troublesome both 
 to others and himself if retained, and if he be got rid of 
 forcibly it is with hostility and hatred, and like the voiding 
 of bile. 
 
 § IV. We ought not, therefore, lightly to welcome or 
 strike up an intimate friendship with any chance comers, 
 or love those who attach themselves to us, but attach our- 
 selves to those who are worthy of our friendship. For 
 what is easily got is not always desirable : and we pass 
 over and trample upon heather and brambles that stick to 
 us^ on our road to the olive and vine : so also is it good 
 not always to make a friend of the person who is expert in 
 twining himself around us, but after testing them to attach 
 ourselves to those who are worthy of our affection and 
 likely to be serviceable to us. 
 
 § V. As therefore Zeuxis, when some people accused 
 him of painting slowly, replied, " I admit that I do, but 
 then I paint to last," so ought we to test for a long time 
 the friendship and intimacy that we take up and mean to 
 
 ' Sophocles, Fragm. 741. Quoted again by our author, " On Love," 
 § xxiii. 
 
 2 For the image compare Lucio's speech, Shakspere, " Measure for 
 Measure," A. iv. So. iii. 189, 190 : " Nay, friar, I am a kind of burr; 
 I shall stick," 
 
ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS. 149 
 
 keep. Is it not easy then to put to the test many friends, 
 and to associate with many friends at the same time, or is 
 this impossible ? For intimacy is the full enjoyment of 
 friendship, and most pleasant is companying with and 
 spending the day with a friend. " ]!^ever again shall we 
 alive, apart from dear friends, sit and take counsel alone 
 together."^ And Menelaus said about Odysseus, "Nor 
 did anything ever divide or separate us, who loved and 
 delighted in one another, till death's black cloud over- 
 shadowed us."^ The contrary effect seems to be produced by 
 abundance of friends. For the friendship of a pair of friends 
 draws them together and puts them together and holds 
 them together, and is heightened by intercourse and kindli- 
 ness, " as when the juice of the fig curdles and binds the 
 white milk,"^ as Empedocles says, such unity and com- 
 plete union will such a friendship produce. Whereas 
 having many friends puts people apart and severs and dis- 
 unites them, by transferring and shifting the tie of friend- 
 ship too frequently, and does not admit of a mixture and 
 welding of goodwill by the diffusing and compacting of 
 intimacy. And this causes at once an inequality and diffi- 
 culty in respect of acts of kindness, for the uses of friend- 
 ship become inoperative by being dispersed over too wide 
 an area. "One man is acted upon by his character, another 
 by his reflection." * For neither do our natures and impulses 
 always incline in the same directions, nor are our fortunes 
 in life identical, for opportunities of action are, like the 
 winds, favourable to some, unfavourable to others. 
 
 § VI. Moreover, if all our friends want to do the same 
 things at the same time, it will be difficult to satisfy them 
 all, whether they desire to deliberate, or to act in state 
 affairs, or wish for office, or are going to entertain guests. 
 If again at the same time they chance to be engaged in 
 different occupations and interests and ask you all together, 
 one who is going on a voyage that you will sail with him, 
 another who is going to law that you will be his advocate, 
 another who is going to try a case that you will try it with 
 him, another who is selling or buying that you will go into 
 
 ^ " Iliad," xxiii. 77, 78. 2 « Odyssey," iv. 178-180. 
 
 * " Iliad," V. 902, altered somewhat. * Bergk. p. 1344^. 
 
150 plutaech's morals. 
 
 partnership with him, another who is going to marry that 
 yon will join him in the sacrifice, another who is going to 
 bnry a relation that yon will be one of the monrners, 
 
 " The town is full of incense, and at once 
 Kesounds with triumph-songs and bitter wailing,"^ 
 
 that is the frnit of many friends ; to oblige all is impossible, 
 to oblige none is absnrd, and to help one and offend many 
 is grievous. 
 
 " No lover ever yet fancied neglect."^ 
 
 And yet people bear patiently and without anger the care- 
 lessness and neglect of friends, if they get from them such 
 excuses as " I forgot," " I did it unwittingly." But he 
 who says, " I did not assist you in your lawsuit, for I was 
 assisting another friend," or " I did not visit you when you 
 had your fever, for I was helping so-and-so who was 
 entertaining his friends," excusing himself for his inatten- 
 tion to one by his attention to another, so far from making 
 the oifence less, even adds jealousy to his neglect. But 
 most people in friendship regard only, it seems, what can 
 be got out of it, overlooking what will be asked in return, 
 and not remembering that he, who has had many of his 
 own requests granted, must oblige others in turn by grant- 
 ing their requests. And as Briareus with his hundred 
 hands had to feed fifty stomachs, and was therefore no better 
 provided than we are, who with two hands have to supply 
 the necessities of only one belly, so in having many friends^ 
 one has to do many services for them, one has to share in 
 their anxiety, and to toil and moil with them. For we 
 must not listen to Euripides when he says, " mortals ought 
 to join in moderate friendships for one another, and not 
 love with all their heart, that the spell may be soon broken, 
 and the friendship may either be ended or become closer 
 at will,"'* that so it may be adjusted to our requirements, 
 like the sail of a ship that we can either slacken or haul 
 
 ^ Sophocles, " CEdipus Tyrannus," 4, 5. Quoted again " On Moral 
 Virtue," § vi. 
 
 2 A line from Menander. Quoted again '' De Fraterno Amore," § xx. 
 
 ^ Reading with Halm and Hercher h> t<^ ttoXXoTc (piXolg xp^if^dai. 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Hippolytus," 253-257, where Dindorf and Hercher 
 agree in the reading. 
 
ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS. 151 
 
 tight. But let US transfer, Euripides, these lines of yours 
 to enmities, and bid people make their animosities moderate, 
 and not hate with all their heart, that their hatred, and 
 wrath, and querulousness, and suspicions, may be easily 
 broken. Recommend rather for our consideration that 
 saying of Pythagoras, " Do not give many your right 
 hand,"^ that is, do not make many friends, do not go in for 
 a common and vulgar friendship, which is sure to cause 
 anyone much trouble ; for its sharing in others' anxieties 
 and griefs and labours and dangers is quite intolerable 
 to free and noble natures. And that was a true saying of 
 the wise Chilo^ to one who told him he had no enemy, 
 " Neither," said he, " do you seem to me to have a friend." 
 For enmities inevitably accompany and are involved in 
 friendships. 
 
 § VII. It is impossible I say not to share with a friend in 
 his injuries and disgraces and enmities, for enemies at once 
 suspect and hate the friend of their enemies, and even 
 friends are often envious and jealous and carp at him. As 
 then the oracle given to Timesias about his colony foretold 
 him, " that his swarm of bees would soon be followed by a 
 swarm of wasps," so those that seek a swarm of friends 
 have sometimes lighted unawares on a wasp's-nest of 
 enemies. And the remembrance of wrongs done by an 
 enemy and the kindness of a friend do not weigh in the 
 same balance. See how Alexander treated the friends and 
 intimates of Philotas and Parmenio, how Dionysius treated 
 those of Dion, Nero those of Plautus, Tiberius those of 
 Sejanus, torturing and putting them to death. For as 
 neither the gold nor rich robes of Creon's daughter ^ 
 availed her or her sire, but the flame that burst out 
 suddenly involved him in the same fate as herself, as he 
 ran up to embrace her and rescue her, so some friends, 
 though they have had no enjoyment out of their friends' 
 prosperity, are involved in their misfortunes. And this is 
 especially the case with philosophers and kind people, as 
 Theseus, when his friend Pirithous was punished and im- 
 
 ^ Compare " On Education," § xvii. 
 
 - Chilo was one of the Seven Wise Men. See Pausanias, iii. 16; 
 X. 24. 
 
 ^ For the circumstances see Euripides, " Medea," 1136 sq. 
 
152 PLUTARCH'S MORALS. 
 
 prisoned, " was also bound in fetters not of brass." ^ And 
 Thucydides tells us that during the plague at Athens 
 those that most displayed their virtue perished with their 
 friends that were ill, for they neglected their own lives in 
 going to visit them.'"^ 
 
 § VIII. We ought not therefore to be too lavish with our 
 virtue, binding it together and implicating it in various 
 people's fortunes, but we ought to preserve our friendship 
 for those who are worthy of it, and are capable of recipro- 
 cating it. For this is indeed the greatest argument against 
 many friends that friendship is originated by similarity. 
 For seeing that even the brutes can hardly be forced to 
 mix with those that are unlike themselves, but crouch 
 down, and show their dislike, and run away, while they mix 
 freely with those that are akin to them and have a similar 
 nature, and gently and gladly make friends with one another 
 then, how is it possible that there should be friendship be- 
 tween people differing in characters and temperaments and 
 ideas of life ? For harmony on the harp or lyre is attained by 
 notes in unison and not in unison, sharp and flat somehow 
 or other producing concord, but in the harmony of friend- 
 ship there must be no unlike, or uneven, or unequal element, 
 but from all alike must come agreement in opinions and 
 wishes and feeling, as if one soul were put into several bodies. 
 
 § IX. What man then is so industrious, so changeable, 
 and so versatile, as to be able to make himself like and 
 adapt himself to many different persons, and not to laugh 
 at the advice of Theognis, " Imitate the ingenuity of the 
 polypus, that takes the colour of whatever stone it sticks 
 to." ^ And yet the changes in the polypus do not go deep 
 but are only on the surface, which from its thickness or 
 thinness takes the impression of everything that approaches 
 it, whereas friends endeavour to be like one another in 
 character, and feeling, and language, and pursuits, and 
 disposition. It requires a not very fortunate or very good 
 Proteus,* able by jugglery to assume various forms, to be 
 
 ^ For the friendship of Theseus and Pirithous, see Pausanias, i. ] 7 ; 
 X. 29. The line is from Euripides, '•' Pirithous," Fragm. 591. Cf. "On 
 Shyness," § x. 
 
 2 Thucydides, ii. 51. ^ Bergk. p. oOO^. 
 
 * On Proteus, see Verg. "Georg." iv. 387 sq.; Ovid, "Art." i, 761 ; 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 153 
 
 frequently at the same time a student with the learned, and 
 readj to try a fall with wrestlers, or to go a hunting with 
 people fond of the chase, or to get drunk with tipplers, or to 
 go a canvassing with politicians, having no fixed character 
 of his own.^ And as the natuml philosophers say of un- 
 formed and colourless matter when subjected to external 
 change, that it is now fire, now water, now air, now solid 
 earth, so the soul suitable for many friendships must be 
 impressionable, and versatile, and pliant, and changeable. 
 But friendship requires a steady constant and unchange- 
 able character, a person that is uniform in his intimacy. 
 And so a constant friend is a thing rare and hard to find. 
 
 HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM 
 A FRIEND. 
 
 § I. Plato says,"^ Antiochus Philopappus, that all men 
 pardon the man who acknowledges that he is excessively fond 
 of himself, but that there is among many other defects this 
 very grave one in self-love, that by it a man becomes incapable 
 of being a just and impartial judge about himself, for love is 
 blind in regard to the loved object, unless a person has learnt 
 and accustomed himself to honour and pursue what is 
 noble rather than his own selfish interests. This gives a 
 great field for the flatterer in friendship, who finds a wonder- 
 ful base of operations in our self-love, which makes each 
 person his own first and greatest flatterer, and easily 
 admits a flatterer from without, who will be, so he thinks 
 and hopes, both a witness and confirmer of his good opinion 
 of himself. For he that lies open to the reproach of being 
 fond of flatterers is very fond of himself, and owing to his 
 
 i. i. 90 : " Quo teneam vultus mutantem Protea nodo 
 
 ^ Literally, " having no hearth of character," the hearth being an 
 emblem of stability. Compare " How One may Discern a Flatterer 
 from a Friend," § vii., where the same image is employed. 
 
 ^ Plato, "Laws," v. p. 731 I), E. 
 
154 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 goodwill to himself wishes to possess all good qualities, 
 and thinks he actually does ; the wish is not ridiculous, 
 but the thought is misleading and requires a good deal of 
 caution. And if truth is a divine thing, and, according to 
 Plato,^ the beginning of all good things both to the gods 
 and men, the flatterer is likely to be an enemy to the gods, 
 and especially to Apollo, for he always sets himself against 
 that famous saying, "Know thyself,""^ implanting in every- 
 body's mind self-deceit and ignorance of his own good or 
 bad qualities, thus making his good points defective and 
 imperfect, and his bad points altogether incorrigible. 
 
 § II. If however, as is the case with most other bad 
 things, the flatterer attacked only or chiefly ignoble or 
 worthless persons, the evil would not be so mischievous or 
 so difficult to guard against. But since, as wood- worms 
 breed most in soft and sweet wood, those whose charac- 
 ters are honourable and good and equitable encourage and 
 support the flatterer most, — and moreover, as Simonides 
 says, "rearing of horses does not go with the oil-flask,'' but 
 with fruitful fields," so we see that flattery does not join 
 itself to the poor, the obscure, or those without means, but 
 is the snare and bane of great houses and estates, and often 
 overturns kingdoms and principalities, — it is a matter of no 
 small importance, needing much foresight, to examine the 
 question, that so flattery may be easily detected, and neither 
 injure nor discredit friendship. For just as lice leave 
 dying persons, and abandon bodies when the blood on 
 which they feed is drying up, so one never yet saw flatterers 
 dancing attendance on dry and cold poverty, but they 
 fasten on wealth and position and there get fat, but speedily 
 decamp if reverses come. But we ought not to wait to 
 experience that, which would be unprofitable, or rather 
 injurious and dangerous. For not to find friends at a time 
 when you want them is hard, as also not to be able to exchange 
 an inconstant and bad friend for a constant and good one. 
 For a friend should be like money tried before being re- 
 
 1 " Laws," V. p. 730 C. 
 
 ^ Inscribed in the vestibule of the temple of Apollo at Delphi. See 
 Pausanias, x. 24. 
 
 ^ Used here appai'ently proverbially for poverty or low position in 
 life. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 155 
 
 quired, not found faulty in our need. For we ought not 
 to have our wits about us only when the mischief is done, 
 but we ought to try and prevent the flatterer doing any harm 
 to us : for otherwise we shall be in the same plight as people 
 who test deadly poisons by first tasting them, and kill or 
 nearly kill themselves in the experiment. We do not 
 praise such, nor again all those who, looking at their friend 
 simply from the point of view of decorum and utility, 
 think that they can detect all agreeable and pleasant com- 
 panions as flatterers in the very act. For a friend ought 
 not to be disagreeable or unpleasant, nor ought friendship 
 to be a thing high and mighty with sourness and austerity, 
 but even its decorous deportment ought to be attractive 
 and winning,' for by it 
 
 *' The Graces and Desire have pitched their tents," ^ 
 
 and not only to a person in misfortune " is it sweet to look 
 into the eyes of a friendly person," as Euripides ^ says, but 
 no less does it bring pleasure and charm in good fortune, 
 than when it relieves the sorrows and difficulties of adver- 
 sity. And as Evenus said " fire was the best sauce, "^ so the 
 deity, mixing up friendship with life, has made everything 
 bright and sweet and acceptable by its presence and the 
 enjoyment it brings. How else indeed could the flatterer in- 
 sinuate himself by the pleasure he gives, unless he knew 
 that friendship admitted the pleasurable element ? It 
 would be impossible to say. But just as spurious and 
 mock gold only imitates the brightness and glitter of real 
 gold, so the flatterer seems to imitate the pleasantness and 
 agreeableness of the real friend, and to exhibit himself 
 ever merry and bright, contradicting and opposing nothing. 
 We must not however on that account suspect all who 
 
 ^ Wyttenbach well compares Cicero, " De Amicitia," xviii. : "Accedat 
 hue suaA'itas qvuedam oportet sermonum atque morum, haudquaquara 
 mediocre condimentum amicitije. Tristitia autem et in omni re severitas, 
 habet ilia quidem gravitatem : sed amicitia remissior esse debet, et 
 liberior, et dulcior, et ad omnem comitatem t'acilitatemque proclivior." 
 
 2 Hesiod, " Theogony,"' 64. 
 
 3 Euripides, '• Ion," 732. 
 
 * Our author assigns this saying to Prodicus, " De Sanitate Prae- 
 cepta," § viii. But to Evenus, " Qusest. Conviv." Lib. vii. Proajmium, 
 and " Platonicse Qusestiones," x. § iii. 
 
156 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 praise as simple flatterers. For friendship requires praise 
 as much as censure on the proper occasion. Indeed 
 peevishness and querulousness are altogether alien to friend- 
 ship and social life : but when goodwill bestows praise 
 ungrudgingly and readily upon good actions, people endure 
 also easily and without pain admonition and plainspeaking, 
 believing and continuing to love the person who took such 
 pleasure in praising, as if now he only blamed out of neces- 
 sity. 
 
 § III. It is difficult then, someone may say, to distinguish 
 between the flatterer and the friend, if they differ neither 
 in the pleasure they give nor in the praise they bestow ; 
 for as to services and attentions you may often see friend- 
 ship outstripped by flattery. Certainly it is so, I should 
 reply, if we are trying to find the genuine flatterer who 
 handles his craft with cleverness and art, but not if, like 
 most people, we consider those persons flatterers who are 
 called their own oil-flask-carriers and table-men, men who 
 begin to talk, as one said, the moment their hands have 
 been washed for dinner,^ whose servility, ribaldry, and want 
 of all decency, is apparent at the first dish and glass. It 
 did not of course require very much discrimination to 
 detect Melanthius the parasite of Alexander of Pherae of 
 flattery, who, to those who asked how Alexander was mur- 
 dered, answered, " Through his side into my belly " : or 
 those who formed a circle round a wealthy table, " whom 
 neither fire, nor sword, nor steel, would keep from running 
 to a feast" :^ or those female flatterers in Cyprus, who after 
 they crossed over into Syria were nicknamed " step- 
 ladders,"^ because they lay down and let the kings' wives 
 use their bodies as steps to mount their carriages. 
 
 § IV. What kind of flatterer then must we be on our 
 guard against ? The one who neither seems to be nor 
 acknowledges himself to be one : whom you will not always 
 find in the vicinity of your kitchen, who is not to be 
 
 ^ As was usual. See Homer, " Odyssej," i. 146. Cf. Plautus, 
 " Persa," v. iii. 16: "Hoc age, aecumbe: hunc diem suavem meum 
 natalem agitemus araoeiium : date aquam manibus : apponite mensam." 
 
 '^ From a play of Eupolis called " The Flatterers." Cf. Terence, 
 "Eunuchus," 489-491. 
 
 ^ See Athenseus, 256 D. Compare also Valerius Maximus, ix. 1. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND, 157 
 
 caught watching the dial to see how near it is to dinner- 
 time,^ nor gets so drunk as to throw himself down anyhow, 
 but one who is generally sober, and a busybody, and thinks 
 he ought to have a hand in your affairs, and wishes to 
 share in your secrets, and as to friendship plays rather a 
 tragic than a satyric or comic part. For as Plato says, 
 "it is the height of injustice to appear to be just when you 
 are not really so,"^ so we must deem the most dangerous 
 kind of flattery not the open but the secret, not the playful 
 but the serious. For it throws suspicion even upon a 
 genuine friendship, which we may often confound with it, 
 if we are not careful. When Gobryas pursued one of the 
 Magi into a dark room, and was on the ground wrestling 
 with him, and Darius came up and was doubtful how he 
 could kill one without killing both, Gobryas bade him 
 thrust his sword boldly through both of them ; ^ but we, 
 since we give no assent to that saying, " Let friend perish 
 so the enemy perish with him," ^ in our endeavour to dis- 
 tinguish the flatterer from the friend, seeing that their 
 resemblances are so many, ought to take great care that 
 we do not reject the good with the bad, nor in sparing 
 what is beneficial fall in with what is injurious. For as 
 wild grains mixed up with wheat, if very similar in size 
 and appearance, are not easily kept apart, for if the sieve 
 have small holes they don't pass through, and if large holes 
 they pass with the corn, so flattery is not easily distin- 
 guished from friendship, being mixed up with it in feeling 
 and emotion, habit and custom. 
 
 § V. Because however frie»dship is the most pleasant 
 of all things, and nothing more glads the heart of man, 
 therefore the flatterer attracts by the pleasure he gives, 
 pleasure being in fact his field. And because favours and 
 good services accompany friendship, as the proverb says 
 " a friend is more necessary than fire or water," ^ therefore 
 
 ^ " Videatur Casaubonus ad Athenaeum, vi. p. 243 A." — Wyttenbach. 
 
 2 " Republic,-' p. 361 A. 
 
 •^ See Herodotus, iii. 78. 
 
 '* See Erasmus, " Adagia," p. 1883. 
 
 ' " Proverbium etiam a Cicerone laudatura ' De Amicitia,' cap. vi. : 
 Itaque non aqua, non igne, ut aiunt, pluribus locis utimur, quam 
 amicitia. Notavit etiam Erasmus 'Adag.' p. 112." — Wyttenbach. 
 
158 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the flatterer volunteers all sorts of services, and strives to 
 show himself on all occasions zealous and obliging and 
 ready. And since friendship is mainly produced by a simi- 
 larity of tastes and habits, and to have the same likes and 
 dislikes first brings people together and unites them through 
 sympathy,^ the flatterer observing this moulds himself like 
 material and demeans himself accordingly, seeking com- 
 pletely to imitate and resemble those whom he desires to 
 ingratiate himself with, being supple in change, and plausible 
 in his imitations, so that one would say, 
 
 "Achilles' son, O no, it is himself." ^ 
 
 But his cleverest trick is that, observing that freedom of speech 
 is both spoken of and reckoned as the peculiar and natural 
 voice of friendship, while not speaking freely is considered 
 unfriendly and disingenuous, he has not failed to imitate 
 this trait of friendship also. But just as clever cooks infuse 
 bitter sauces and sharp seasoning to prevent sweet things 
 from cloying, so these flatterers do not use a genuine or 
 serviceable freedom of speech, but merely a winking and 
 tickling innuendo. He is therefore difficult to detect, like 
 those creatures which naturally change their colour and 
 take that of the material or place near them.^ But since 
 he deceives and conceals his true character by his imitations, 
 it is our duty to unmask him and detect him by the diffe- 
 rences between him and the true friend, and to show that 
 he is, as Plato says, " tricked out in other people's colours 
 and forms, from lack of any of his own."* 
 
 § VI. Let us examine the matter then from the beginning. 
 I said that friendship originated in most cases from a similar 
 disposition and nature, generally inclined to the same 
 habits and morals, and rejoicing in the same pursuits, 
 studies, and amusements, as the following lines testify : 
 " To old man the voice of old man is sweetest, to boy that 
 of boy, to woman is most acceptable that of woman, to the 
 sick person that of sick person, while he that is overtaken 
 
 ^ Compare Sallust, " De Catilinse Conjuratione," cap. xx. : " Nam 
 idem velle atque idem nolle, ea demum firma amicitia est." 
 
 2 " Proverbiale, quo utitur Plutarchus in Alcibiade, p. 203 D. 
 Iambus Tragici esse videtur, ad Neoptolemum dictus." — Wyttenbach. 
 
 ' As the polypus, or chameleon. * Plato, '* Plisedrus," p. 239 D. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 159 
 
 by misfortune is a comforter to one in trouble." The 
 flatterer knowing then that it is innate in us to delight in, 
 and enjoy the company of, and to love, those who are 
 like ourselves, attempts first to approach and get near a 
 person in this direction, (as one tries to catch an animal in 
 the pastures,) by the same pursuits and amusements and 
 studies and modes of life quietly throwing out his bait, 
 and disguising himself in false colours, till his victim give 
 him an opportunity to catch him, and become tame and 
 tractable at his touch. Then too he censures the things 
 and modes of life and persons that he knows his victim 
 dislikes, while he praises those he fancies immoderately, 
 overdoing it indeed ^ with his show of surprise and exces- 
 sive admiration, making him more and more convinced 
 that his likes and dislikes are the fruits of judgement and 
 not of caprice. 
 
 § VII. How then is the flatterer convicted, and by what 
 differences is he detected, of being only a counterfeit, and 
 not really like his victim ? We must first then look at the 
 even tenor and consistency of his principles, if he always 
 delights in the same things, and always praises the same 
 things, and directs and governs his life after one pattern, 
 as becomes the noble lover of consistent friendship and 
 familiarity. Such a person is a friend. But the flatterer 
 having no fixed character of his own,^ and not seeking to 
 lead the life suitable for him, but shaping and modelling 
 himself after another's pattern, is neither simple nor uni- 
 form, but complex and unstable, assuming different appear- 
 ances, like water poured from vessel to vessel, ever in a 
 state of flux and accommodating himself entirely to the 
 fashion of those who entertain him. The ape indeed, 
 as it seems, attempting to imitate man, is caught imitating 
 his movements and dancing like him, but the flatterer 
 himself attracts and decoys other men, imitating not all 
 alike, for with one he sings and dances, with another he 
 wrestles and gets covered with the dust of the palaestra, 
 
 ^ Wyttenbach compares Juvenal, iii. 100-108. 
 
 2 See my note " On Abundance of Friends," § ix. Wyttenbach well 
 points out the felicity of the expression here, " siquidem parasitus est 
 doiKog Kal dvsffTioQ." 
 
160 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 while he follows a third fond of hunting and the chase 
 all but shouting out the words of Phsedra, 
 
 '• How I desire to halloo on the dogs, 
 Chasing the dappled deer," ^ 
 
 and yet he has really no interest in the chase, it is the 
 hunter himself he sets the toils and snares for. And if the 
 object of his pursuit is some young scholar and lover of 
 learning, he is all for books then, his beard flows down to 
 his feet,"^ he's quite a sight with his threadbare cloak, has 
 all the indifference of the Stoic, and speaks of nothing but 
 the rectangles and triangles of Plato. But if any rich and 
 careless fellow fond of drink come in his way, 
 
 ' ' Then wise Odysseus stript him of his rags," ^ 
 
 his threadbare cloak is thrown aside, his beard is shorn off 
 like a fruitless crop, he goes in for wine-coolers and tankards, 
 and laughs loudly in the streets, and jeers at philosophers. 
 As they say happened at Syracuse, when Plato went there, 
 and Dionysius was seized with a furious passion for philo- 
 sophy, and so great was the concourse of geometricians 
 that they raised up quite a cloud of dust in the palace, but 
 when Plato fell out of favour, and Dionysius gave up 
 philosophy, and went back again headlong to wine and 
 women and trifles and debauchery, then all the court was 
 metamorphosed, as if they all had drunk of Circe's cup, for 
 ignorance and oblivion and silliness reigned rampant. I 
 am borne out in what I say by the behaviour of great 
 flatterers and demagogues,"* the greatest of whom Alcibiades, 
 a jeerer and horse-rearer at Athens, and living a gay and 
 merry life, wore his hair closely shaven at Lacedaemon, and 
 washed in cold water, and attired himself in a threadbare 
 cloak ; while in Thrace he fought^ and drank ; and at 
 Tissaphernes' court lived delicately and luxuriously and 
 in a pretentious style ; and thus curried favour and was 
 
 J Euripides, "Hippolytus," 219, 218. Cf. Ovid, " Heroides," iv. 41,42. 
 
 ^ Compare " How one may be aware of one's progress in virtue," 
 § X. Cf. also Horace, " Satires," ii. iii. 35 ; Quintilian, xi, 1. 
 
 3 " Odyssey," xxii. 1. 
 
 ^ The demagogue is a kind of flatterer. See Aristotle, " Pol." iv. 4. 
 
 ^ Cf. Aristophanes, " Acharnians," 153, oirep fiaxilJ-<oTaTov Opq,Kutv 
 Wvog. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 161 
 
 popular with everybody by imitating their habits and ways. 
 Such was not the way however in which Epaminondas or 
 Agesilaus acted, for though they associated with very many 
 men and states and different modes of life, they maintained 
 everywhere their usual demeanour, both in dress and diet 
 and language and behaviour. So Plato ^ at Syracuse was 
 exactly the same man as in the Academy, the same with 
 Dionysius as with Dion. 
 
 § VIII. As to the changes of the flatterer, which resemble 
 those of the polypus,^ a man may most easily detect them 
 by himself pretending to change about frequently, and by 
 censuring the kind of life he used formerly to praise, and 
 anon approving of the words actions and modes of life 
 that he used to be displeased with. He will then see that the 
 flatterer is never consistent or himself, never loving hating 
 rejoicing grieving at his own initiative, but like a mirror, 
 merely reflecting the image of other people's emotions and 
 manners and feelings. Such a one will say, if you censure 
 one of your friends to him, " You are slow in finding the 
 fellow out, he never pleased me from the first." But if on 
 the other hand you change your language and praise him, 
 he will swear by Zeus that he rejoices at it, and is himself 
 under obligations to the man, and believes in him. And if 
 you talk of . the necessity of changing your mode of life, of 
 retiring from public life to a life of privacy and ease, he 
 says, " We ought long ago to have got rid of uproar^ and 
 envy." But if you think of returning again to public 
 life, he chimes in, " Your sentiments do you honour : retire- 
 ment from business is pleasant, but inglorious and mean," 
 One ought to say at once to such a one, " ' Stranger, quite 
 different now you look to what you did before.'^ I do not 
 need a friend to change his opinions with me and to assent 
 to me in everything, my shadow will do that better, but 
 I need one that will speak the truth and help me with his 
 judgement." This is one way of detecting the flatterer. 
 
 ^ Plato was somewhat of a traveller, he three times visited Syracuse, 
 and also travelled in Egypt. 
 
 2 As to the polypus, see " On Abundance of Friends," § ix. 
 
 ^ As " Fumum et opes strepitumque Romae." — Horace, " Odes," iii. 
 29. 12. 
 
 '• Homer, " Odyssey," xvi. 181. 
 
 M 
 
162 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 § IX. We must also observe another difference in the 
 resemblance between the friend and flatterer. The true 
 friend does not imitate you in everything, nor is he too 
 keen to praise, but praises only what is excellent, for as 
 Sophocles says, 
 
 " He is not born to share in hate but love," ' 
 
 yes, by Zeus, and he is born to share in doing what is right 
 and in loving what is noble, and not to share in wrong- doing 
 or misbehaviour, unless it be that, as a running of the eyes is 
 catching, so through companionship and intimacy he may 
 against his will contract by infection some vice or ill 
 habit, as they say Plato's intimates imitated his stoop, 
 Aristotle's his lisp, and king Alexander's his holding his 
 head a little on one side, and rapidity of utterance in con- 
 versation,^ for people mostly pick up unawares such traits 
 of character. But the flatterer is exactly like the chameleon,^ 
 which takes every colour bat white, and so he, though unable 
 to imitate what is worth his while, leaves nothing that is 
 bad unimitated. And just as poor painters unable to make 
 a fine portrait from inefficiency in their craft, bring out the 
 likeness by painting all the wrinkles, moles and scars, so 
 the flatterer imitates his friend's intemperance, superstition, 
 hot temper, sourness to domestics, suspicion of his friends 
 and relations. For he is by nature inclined to what is 
 worst, and thinks that imitation of what is bad is as far as 
 possible removed from censure. For those are suspected 
 who have noble aims in life, and seem to be vexed and dis- 
 gusted at their friends' faults, for that injured and even 
 ruined Dion with Dionysius, Samius with Philip, and Cleo- 
 menes with Ptolemy. But he that wishes to be and appear 
 at the same time both agreeable and trustworthy pretends 
 
 1 Sophocles, " Antigone," 523. 
 
 ^ As to these traits in Plato and Aristotle, compare ''De Audiendis 
 Poetis," § viii. And as to Alexander, Plutarch tells us in his Life 
 that he used to hold his head a little to the left, " Life," p. 666 B. See 
 also " De Alexandri Fortuna aut Virtute," § ii. 
 
 3 " De Chamseleonte Aristoteles 'Hist. Animal.' i. 11; 'Part. 
 Animal.' iv. 11 ; Theophrastus Eclog. ap. Photium edit. Aristot. 
 Sylburg. T. viii. p. 329 : /xera/^aXXet Sa 6 xa^uaiXewv eig Travra to. 
 Xpojfiara' 7r\r)v rr)v eig to XevKuv Kai to ipvdpbv ov dsxfTUi fxeTajSoXriv. 
 Similiter Plinius 'Hist. Nat.' viii. 51." — Wyttenbach. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 163 
 
 to rejoice more in what is bad, as being through excessive 
 love for his friend not even offended at his vices, but as 
 one with him in feeling and nature in all matters. And so 
 they claim to share in involuntary and chance ailments, 
 and pretend to have the same complaints, in flattery to 
 those who suffer from any, as that their eyesight and sense 
 of hearing are deficient, if their friends are somewhat blind 
 or deaf, as the flatterers of Dionysius, who was rather short- 
 sighted, jostled one another at a dinner party, and knocked 
 the dishes off the table, as if from defect of vision.^ And 
 some to make their cases more similar wind themselves in 
 closer, and dive even into family secrets for parallels. For 
 seeing that their friends are unfortunate in marriage, or 
 suspicious about the behaviour of their sons or relations, 
 they do not spare themselves, but make quite a Jeremiad 
 aboat their own sons, or wife, or kinsfolk, or relations, pro- 
 claiming loudly their own family secrets. For similarity 
 in situation makes people more sympathetic, and their 
 friends having received as it were hostages by their con- 
 fessions, entrust them in return with their secrets, and 
 having once made confidants of them, dare not take back 
 their confidence." I actually know of a man who turned his 
 wife out of doors because his friend had put away his ; but 
 as he secretly visited her and sent messages to her, he was 
 detected by his friend's wife noticing his conduct. So 
 little did he know the nature of a flatterer that thought 
 the following lines more applicable to a crab than a 
 flatterer, " His whole body is belly, his eye is on every- 
 thing, he is a creature creeping on his teeth," for such is a 
 true picture of the parasite, " friends of the frying-pan, 
 hunting for a dinner," to borrow the language of Eupolis. 
 § X. However let us put off all this to its proper place in 
 the discourse. But let us not fail to notice the wiliness of 
 the flatterer's imitation, in that, even if he imitates any good 
 points in the person he flatters, he always takes care to give 
 him the palm. Whereas among real friends there is no 
 rivalry or jealousy of one another, but they are satisfied 
 and contented alike whether they are equal or one of them 
 
 ' See Athenseus, 249 F ; 435 E. 
 
 ^ Cf. Juv. iii. 113 : " Scire volunt secreta domus, atque inde timeri. 
 
164 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 is superior. But the flatterer, ever remembering that he is 
 to play second fiddle/ makes his copj always fall a little 
 short of the original, for he admits that he is everywhere 
 outstripped and left behind, except in vice. For in that 
 alone he claims pre-eminence,' for if his friend is peevish, he 
 says he is atrabilious ; if his friend is superstitious, he says 
 he is a fanatic ; if his friend is in love, he says he is madly 
 in love ; if his friend laughs, he will say, " You laughed a 
 little unseasonably, but I almost died of laughter." But 
 in regard to any good points his action is quite the oppo- 
 site. He says he can run quickly, but his friend flies ; he 
 says he can ride pretty well, but his friend is a Centaur 
 on horseback. He says " I am not a bad poet, and don't 
 write very bad lines, 
 
 " 'But your sonorous vei'se is like Jove's thundei*.'" 
 
 Thus he shows at once that his friend's aims in life are 
 good, and that his friend has reached a height he cannot 
 soar to. Such then are the differences in the resemblances 
 between the flatterer and the friend. 
 
 § XI. But since, as has been said before, to give plea- 
 sure is common to both, for the good man delights in his 
 friends as much as the bad man in his flatterers, let us con- 
 sider the difference between them here too. The difference 
 lies in the different aim of each in giving pleasure. Look 
 at it this way. There is no doubt a sweet smell in per- 
 fume. So there is also in medicine. But the difference 
 is that while in perfume pleasure and nothing else is de- 
 signed, in medicine either purging, or warming, or adding 
 flesh to the system, is the primary object, and the sweet 
 smell is only a secondary consideration. Again painters 
 mix gay colours and dyes : there are also some drugs which 
 are gay in appearance and not unpleasing in colour. What 
 then is the difference between these ? Manifestly we dis- 
 tinguish by the end each aims at. So too the social life of 
 friends employs mirth to add a charm to some good and 
 useful end," and sometimes makes joking and a good table 
 and wine, aye, and even chaff and banter, the seasoning to 
 
 ^ Cf. Menander apud Stob. p. 437 : Ta devrsp' aiei Ty]v yvvalKa del 
 Xkyeiv, Trjv ^' r'lyefioviav roJv o\(t)v tov dvSp' t)(tiv. 
 
 2 As Lord Slowell used to say that " dinners lubricated business." 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 165 
 
 noble and serious matters, as in the line, 
 
 " Much thej enjo^'ed talking to one another," ^ 
 
 and again, 
 
 '' Never did ought else 
 Disturb our love or joy in one another." * 
 
 But the flatterer's whole aim and end is to cook up and 
 season his joke or word or action, so as to produce pleasure. 
 And to speak concisely, the flatterer's object is to please in 
 everything he does, whereas the true friend always does 
 what is right, and so often gives pleasure, often pain, not 
 wishing the latter, but not shunning it either, if he deems 
 it best. For as the physician, if it be expedient, infuses 
 saffron or spikenard, aye, or uses some soothing fomenta- 
 tion or feeds his patient up liberally, and sometimes orders 
 castor, 
 
 "Or poley,^ that so strong and foully smells," 
 or pounds hellebore and compels him to drink it, — neither 
 in the one case making unpleasantness, nor in the other 
 pleasantness, his end and aim, but in both studying only 
 the interest of his patient, — so the friend sometimes by 
 praise and kindness, extolling him and gladdening his 
 heart, leads him to what is noble, as Agamemnon, 
 
 " Teucer, dear head, thou son of Telamon, 
 Go on thus shooting, captain of thy men ; " * 
 
 or Diomede, 
 
 " How could I e'er forget divine Odysseus ? " '" 
 But where on the other hand there is need of correction, 
 then he rebukes with biting words and with the freedom 
 worthy of a friend, 
 
 " Zeus-cherished Menelaus, art thou mad, 
 And in thy folly tak'st no heed of safety ? " " 
 
 Sometimes also he joins action to word, as Menedemus 
 sobered the profligate and disorderly son of his friend 
 Asclepiades, by shutting him out of his house, and not 
 speaking to him. And Arcesilaus forbade Bato his school, 
 
 1 Homer, "Iliad," xi. 643. ^ Homer, "Odyssey," iv. 178, 179. 
 
 3 Pei'haps the poley- germander. See Pliny, " Nat. Hist." xxi. 84, 
 The line is from Nicander Theriac. 64. 
 
 * " Iliad " viii. 281, 282. ' " Iliad," x. 243. ^ "Iliad," vii. 109, 110. 
 
166 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 when he wrote a line in one of his plays against Cleanthes, 
 and only got reconciled with him after he repented and 
 made his peace with Cleanthes. For we ought to give our 
 friend pain if it will benefit him, but not to the extent 
 of breaking off our friendship ; but just as we make use of 
 some biting medicine, that will save and preserve the life 
 of the patient. And so the friend, like a musician, in 
 bringing about an improvement to what is good and ex- 
 pedient, sometimes slackens the chords, sometimes tightens 
 them, and is often pleasant, but always useful. But the 
 flatterer, always harping on one note, and accustomed to 
 play his accompaniment only with a view to please and to 
 ingratiate himself, knows not how either to oppose in 
 deed, or give pain in word, but complies only with 
 every wish, ever chiming in with and echoing the senti- 
 ments of his patron. As then Xenophon says Agesilaus 
 took pleasure in being praised by those who would also 
 censure him,^ so ought we to think that to please and 
 gratify us is friendly in the person who can also give us 
 pain and oppose us, but to feel suspicion at an intercourse 
 which is merely for pleasure and gratification, and never 
 pungent, aye and by Zeus to have ready that saying of the 
 Lacedaemonian, who, on hearing king Charillus praised, 
 said, " How can he be a good man, who is not severe even 
 to the bad ? " 
 
 § XII. They say the gadfly attacks bulls, and the tick 
 dogs, in the ear : so the flatterer besieges with praise the 
 ears of those who are fond of praise, and sticks there and 
 is hard to dislodge. We ought therefore here to make a 
 wide-awake and careful discrimination, whether the praise 
 is bestowed on the action or the man. It is bestowed on 
 the action, if people praise the absent rather than the present, 
 if also those that have the same aims and aspirations praise 
 not only us but all that are similarly disposed, and do not 
 evidently say and do one thing at one time, and the direct 
 contrary at another; and the greatest test is if we are 
 conscious, in the matters for which we get the praise, that 
 we have not regretted them, and are not ashamed at them, 
 and would not rather have said and done differently. For 
 
 ^ Xenophon, " Agesilaus," xi. 5. p. 673 C. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 167 
 
 our own inward judgement, testifying the contrary and not 
 admitting the praise, is above passion, and impregnable 
 and proof against the flatterer. But I know not how it is 
 that most people in misfortune cannot bear exhortation, but 
 are captivated more by condolence and sympathy, and 
 when they have done something wrong and acted amiss, 
 he that by censure and blame implants in them the stings of 
 repentance is looked upon by them as hostile and an accuser, 
 while they welcome and regard as friendly and well-dis- 
 posed to them the person who bestows praise and pane- 
 gyric on what they have done. Those then that readily 
 praise and join in applauding some word or action on the part 
 of someone whether in jest or earnest, only do temporary 
 harm for the moment, but those who injure the character 
 by their praise, aye, and by their flattery undermine the 
 morals, act like those slaves who do not steal from the bin, 
 but from the seed corn.^ For they pervert the disposition, 
 which is the seed of actions, and the character, which is 
 the principle and fountain of life, by attaching to vice 
 names that belong properly only to virtue. For as Thucy- 
 dides says,^ in times of faction and war " people change 
 the accustomed meaning of words as applied to acts at 
 their will and pleasure, for reckless daring is then con- 
 sidered bravery to one's comrades, and prudent delay 
 specious cowardice, and sober-mindedness the cloak of 
 the coward, and taking everything into account before 
 action a real desire to do nothing." So too in the case of 
 flattery we must observe and be on our guard against 
 wastefulness being called liberality, and cowardliness pru- 
 dence, and madness quick-wittedness, and meanness fru- 
 gality, and the amorous man called social and affectionate, 
 and the term manly applied to the passionate and vain 
 man, and the term civil applied to the paltry and mean 
 man. As I remember Plato ^ says the lover is a flatterer 
 
 ^ To filch the grain from the bin or granary would not of course be 
 so important a theft as to steal the seed-stock preserved fur sowing. So 
 probably Cato, " De Re Rustica," v. § iv. : " Segetem ne defrudet," sc. 
 villicus. 
 
 2 Thucydides, iii. 82. 
 
 3 Plato, " Republic," v. p. 474 E. Compare also Lucretius, iv. 
 1160-1170; Horace, " Satires," i. 3. 38 sq. 
 
168 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 of the beloved one, and calls the snub nose graceful, and the 
 aquiline nope royal, and swarthy people manly, and fair 
 people the children of the gods, and the olive complexion 
 is merely the lover's phrase to gloss over and palliate 
 excessive pallor. And yet the ugly man persuaded he is 
 handsome, or the short man persuaded he is tall, cannot 
 long remain in the error, and receives only slight injury 
 from it, and not irreparable mischief : but praise applied to 
 vices as if they were virtues, so that one is not vexed but 
 delighted with a vicious life, removes all shame from wrong- 
 doing, and was the ruin of the Sicilians, by calling the 
 savage cruelty of Dionysius and Phalaris detestation of 
 wickedness and uprightness. It was the ruin of Egypt, 
 by styling Ptolemy's eifeminacy, and superstition, and 
 bowlings, and beating of drums, religion and service to the 
 gods.^ It was nearly the overthrow and destruction of the 
 ancient manners of the Romans, palliating the luxury and 
 intemperance and display of Antony as exhibitions of 
 jollity and kindliness, when his power and fortune were at 
 their zenith. What else invested Ptolemy" with his pipe 
 and fiddle ? What else brought Nero ^ on the tragic stage, 
 and invested him with the mask and buskins ? Was it not 
 the praise of flatterers ? And are not many kings called 
 ApoUos if they can just sing a song,* and Dionysuses if 
 they get drunk, and Herculeses if they can wrestle, and do 
 they not joy in such titles, and are they not dragged into 
 every kind of disgrace by flattery? 
 
 § XIII. Wherefore we must be especially on our guard 
 against the flatterer in regard to praise ; as indeed he is 
 very well aware himself, and clever to avoid suspicion. If 
 he light upon some dandy, or rustic in a thick leather 
 garment, he treats him with nothing but jeers and mocks," 
 as Struthias insulted Bias, ironically praising him for his 
 stupidity, saying, " You have drunk more than king Alex- 
 
 ^ This Ptolemy was a A'otary of Cybele, and a spiritual ancestor of 
 General Booth. The worship of Cybele is well described by Lucretius, 
 ii. 598-643. 
 
 ^ This was Ptolemy Auletes, as the former was Ptolemy Philopator. 
 
 ^ See Suetonius, " Nero," ch. 21. 
 
 ■* '• Plerumque minuta voce cantillare." — Wyttenhach. What Milton 
 would have called " a lean and flashy song." 
 
 ^ Naso suspendit adunco, as Horace, " Sat." i. 6. 5. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 169 
 
 ander," ^ and, " that lie was ready to die of laughing at his 
 tale about the Cyprian." ^ But when he sees people more 
 refined very much on their guard, and observing both time 
 and place, he does not praise them directly, but draws off 
 a little and wheels round and approaches them noiselessly, 
 as one tries to catch a wild animal. For sometimes he 
 reports to a man the panegyric of other persons upon him, 
 (as orators do, introducing some third person,) saying that 
 he had a very pleasant conversation in the market with 
 some strangers and men of worth, who mentioned how they 
 admired his many good points. On another occasion he 
 concocts and fabricates some false and trifling charges 
 against him, pretending he has heard them from other 
 people, and runs up with a serious face and inquires, where 
 he said or did such and such a thing. And upon his deny- 
 ing he ever did, he pounces on him at once^ and com- 
 pliments his man with, " I thought it strange that you 
 should have spoken ill of your friends, seeing that you 
 don't even treat your enemies so : and that you should 
 have tried to rob other people, seeing that you are so lavish 
 with your own money." 
 
 § XIV. Other flatterers again, just as painters heighten the 
 effect of their pictures by the combination of light and 
 shade, so by censure abuse detraction and ridicule of the 
 opposite virtues secretly praise and foment the actual vices 
 of those they flatter. Thus they censure modesty as merely 
 rustic behaviour in the company of profligates, and greedy 
 people, and villains, and such as have got rich by evil and 
 dishonourable courses ; and contentment and uprightness 
 they call having no spirit or energy in action ; and when 
 they associate with lazy and idle persons who avoid all 
 public duties, they are not ashamed to call the life of a 
 citizen wearisome meddling in other people's affairs, and 
 the desire to hold office fruitless vain-glory. And some ere 
 now to flatter an orator have depreciated a philosopher, and 
 others won favour with wanton women by traducing those 
 wives who are faithful to their husbands as constitutionally 
 cold and countrybred. And by an acme of villainy flatterers 
 
 ^ See Athenseus, p. 434 C. 
 
 2 As Gnatho in Terence, " Eunuch." 496-498. 
 
 ^ Reading e\u)v, as Courier, Ilercher. 
 
170 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 do not always spare even themselves. For as wrestlers 
 stoop that the J may the easier give their adversaries a fall, 
 so by censuring themselves they glide into praising others. 
 " I am a cowardly slave," says such a one, " at sea, I shirk 
 labour, I am madly in rage if a word is said against me ; 
 but this man fears nothing, has no vices, is a rare good 
 fellow, patient and easy in all circumstances." But if a 
 person has an excellent idea of his own good sense, and 
 desires to be austere and self-opinionated, and in his moral 
 rectitude is ever spouting that line of Homer, 
 
 " Tydides, neither px'aise nor blame me much," ' 
 
 the artistic flatterer does not attack him as he attacked 
 others, but employs against such a one a new device. For 
 he comes to him about his own private affairs, as if desirous 
 to have the advice of one wiser than himself ; he has, he 
 says, more intimate friends, but he is obliged to trouble him ; 
 " for whither shall we that are deficient in judgement go ? 
 whom shall we trust ? " And having listened to his 
 utterance he departs, saying he has received an oracle not 
 an opinion. And if he notices that somebody lays claim to 
 experience in oratory, he gives him some of his writings, and 
 begs him to read and correct them. So, when king Mithri- 
 dates took a fancy to play the surgeon, several of his friends 
 offered themselves for operating upon, as for cutting or 
 cauterizing, flattering in deed and not in word, for his 
 being credited by them would seem to prove his skill.'^ 
 
 " For Providence has many different aspects." ^ 
 
 But we can test this kind of negative praise, that needs 
 more wary caution, by purposely giving strange advice and 
 suggestions, and by adopting absurd corrections. For if 
 he raises no objection but nods assent to everything, and 
 approves of everything, and is always crying out, " Good ! 
 How admirable ! " he is evidently 
 
 " Asking advice, but seeking something else," 
 wishing by praise to puff you up. 
 
 ^ " Iliad," X. 249. They are words of Odysseus, 
 * This was carrying flattery rather far. " Mithridatis medicinse 
 scientia multis memorata veterum," — WyUenbach. 
 ^ Euripides, " Alcestis," 1159. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 171 
 
 § XY. Moreover, as some have defined painting to be 
 silent poetry/ so is there praise in silent flattery. For as 
 hunters are more likely to catch the objects of their chase 
 unawares, if they do not openly appear to be so engaged, 
 but seem to be walking, or tending their sheep, or looking 
 after the farm, so flatterers obtain most success in their 
 praise, when they do not seem to be praising but to be 
 doing something else. For he who gives up his place or 
 seat to the great man when he comes in, and while making 
 a speech to the people or senate breaks off even in the 
 middle, if he observes any rich man wants to speak, and 
 gives up to him alike speech and platform, shows by his 
 silence even more than he would by any amount of vocife- 
 ration that he thinks the other the better man, and superior 
 to him in judgement. And consequently you may always 
 see them occupying the best places at theatres and public 
 assembly rooms, not that they think themselves worthy of 
 them, but that they may flatter the rich by giving up their 
 places to them ; and at public meetings they begin speaking 
 first, and then make way as for better men, and most 
 readily take back their own view, if any influential or rich 
 or famous person espouse the contrary view. And so one 
 can see plainly that all such servility and drawing back on 
 their part is a lowering their sails, not to experience or 
 virtue or age, but to wealth and fame. Not so Apelles the 
 famous painter, who, when Megabyzus sat with him, and 
 wished to talk about lines and shades, said to him, " Do 
 you see my lads yonder grinding colours, they admired 
 just now your purple and gold, but now they are laughing 
 at you for beginning to talk about what you don't under- 
 stand." " And Solon, when Croesus asked him about 
 happiness, replied that Tellus, an obscure Athenian, and 
 Bito and Cleobis were happier than he was.^ But flatterers 
 proclaim kings and rich men and rulers not only happy 
 and fortunate, but also pre-eminent for wisdom, and art, 
 and every virtue. 
 
 ^ Our author gives this definition to Simonides, " De Gloria Athe- 
 niensium,'' § iii. 
 
 ^ So our author again, " On Contentedness of Mind," § xii. 
 
 ^ See Herodotus, i. 30, 33 ; Juvenal, x. 274, 275 ; and Pausanias, 
 ii. 20. 
 
172 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 § XVI. Now some cannot bear to hear the assertion of 
 the Stoics ^ that the wise man is at once rich, and hand- 
 some, and noble, and a king; but flatterers declare that 
 the rich man is at once orator and poet, and (if he likes) 
 painter, and flnte-piayer, and swift-footed, and strong, 
 falling down if he wrestles with them, and if contending 
 with him in running letting him win the race, as Crisso of 
 Himera purposely allowed Alexander to outrun him, which 
 vexed the king very much when he heard of it.^ And 
 Carneades said that the sons of rich men and kings learnt 
 nothing really well and properly except how to ride, for 
 their master praised and flattered them in their studies, 
 and the person who taught them wrestling always let 
 them throw him, whereas the horse, not knowing or caring 
 whether his rider were a private person or ruler, rich or 
 poor, soon threw him over his head if he could not ride 
 well. Simple therefore and fatuous was that remark of 
 Bion, " If you could by encomiums make your field to yield 
 well and be fruitful, you could not be thought wrong in 
 tilling it so rather than digging it and labouring in it : nor 
 would it be strange in you to praise human beings if by so 
 doing you could be useful and serviceable to them." For 
 a field does not become worse by being praised, but those 
 who praise a man falsely and against his deserts puff him 
 up and ruin him. 
 
 § XVII. Enough has been said on this matter : let us now 
 examine outspokenness. For just as Patroclus put on the 
 armour of Achilles, and drove his horses to the battle, only 
 durst not touch his spear from Mount Felion, but let that 
 alone, so ought the flatterer, tricked out and modelled in 
 the distinctive marks and tokens of the friend, to leave 
 untouched and uncopied only his outspokenness, as the 
 special burden of friendship, "heavy, huge, strong."^ But 
 since flatterers, to avoid the blame they incur by their 
 bufl^oonery, and drinking, and gibes, and jokes, sometimes 
 work their ends by frowns and gravity, and intermix cen- 
 
 ^ " Nobile StOc-e Pai-adoxum. Cicero Fin. iii. 22, ex persona 
 Catonis. Hox*atius ridet Epistol. i. 1. 106-108. Ad summam sapiens 
 uno minor est Jove : dives, Liber, lionoratus, pulcher, rex denique 
 regum 5 Prsecipue sanus, nisi quum pituita molesta est." — Wyttenhach. 
 
 ^ See also " On Contentedness of Mind," § xii. 
 
 ^ Homer, '• Iliad," xvi. 141. See the context also fi'om 130 sq. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRJEND. 173 
 
 sure and reproof, let us not pass this over either without 
 examination. And I think, as in Menander's Play the sham 
 Hercules comes on the stage not with a club stout and 
 strong, but with a light and hollow cane, so the outspoken- 
 ness of the flatterer is to those who experience it mild and 
 soft, and the very reverse of vigorous, and like those 
 cushions for women's heads, which seem able to stand 
 their ground, but in reality yield and give way under 
 their pressure; so this sham outspokenness is puffed up 
 and inflated with an empty and spurious and hollow 
 bombast, that when it contracts and collapses draws in the 
 person who relies on it. For true and friendly outspoken- 
 ness attacks wrong-doers, bringing pain that is salutary 
 and likely to make them more careful, like honey biting 
 but cleansing ulcerated parts of the body,^ but in other 
 respects serviceable and sweet. But we will speak of this 
 anon." But the flatterer first exhibits himself as disagreeable 
 and passionate and unforgiving in his dealings with others. 
 For he is harsh to his servants, and a terrible fellow to 
 attack and ferret out the faults of his kinsmen and friends, 
 and to look up to and respect nobody who is a stranger, 
 but to look down upon them, and is relentless and mischief - 
 making in making people provoked with others, hunting after 
 the reputation of hating vice, as one not likely knowingly to 
 mince matters with the vicious, or ingratiate himself with 
 them either in word or deed. Next he pretends to know 
 nothing of real and great crimes, but he is a terrible fellow 
 to inveigh against trifling and external shortcomings, and 
 to fasten on them with intensity and vehemence, as if he sees 
 any pot or pipkin out of its place, or anyone badly housed, 
 or neglecting his beard or attire, or not adequately attend- 
 ing to a horse or dog. But contempt of parents, and neg- 
 lect of children, and bad treatment of wife, and haughtiness 
 to friends, and throwing away money, all this he cares 
 nothing about, but is silent and does not dare to make any 
 allusion to it : just as if the trainer in a gymnasium were 
 to allow the athlete to get drunk and live in debauchery,^ 
 
 ^ Our author has used this illustration again in " Phocion,'' p. 
 742 B. 
 
 ^ Namely in § xxvii, where Trapprjaia is discussed. 
 
 ^ Contrary to the severe training he ought to undergo, well expressed 
 by Horace, " De Arte Poetica," 412-414. 
 
174 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and yet be vexed at tlie condition of his oil-flask or 
 strigil if out of order ; or as if the schoolmaster scolded a 
 boy about his tablet and pen, but paid no attention to a 
 solecism or barbarism. The flatterer is like a man who 
 should make no comment on the speech of a silly and 
 ridiculous orator, but should find fault with his voice, and 
 chide him for injuring his throat by drinking cold water ; 
 or like a person bidden to read some wretched composition, 
 who should merely find fault with the thickness of the 
 paper, and call the copyist a dirty and careless fellow. So 
 too when Ptolemy seemed to desire to become learned, his 
 flatterers used to spin out the time till midnight, disputing 
 about some word or line or history, but not one of them all 
 objected to his cruelty and outrages, his torturing and 
 beating people to death. ^ Just as if, when a man has 
 tumours and fistulas, one were to cut his hair and nails 
 with a surgeon's knife, so flatterers use outspokenness only 
 in cases where it gives no pain or distress. 
 
 § XVIII. Moreover some of them are cleverer still and 
 make their outspokenness and censure a means of impart- 
 ing pleasure. As Agis the Argive," when Alexander be- 
 stowed great gifts on a buffoon, cried out in envy and dis- 
 pleasure, "What a piece of absurdity!" and on the king 
 turning angrily to him and saying, " What are you talking 
 about ? " he replied, " I admit that I am vexed and put out, 
 when I see that all you descendants of Zeus alike take de- 
 light in flatterers and jesters, for Hercules had his Cercopes, 
 and Dionysus his Sileni, and with you too I see that such 
 are held in good repute." And on one occasion, when the 
 Emperor Tiberius entered the senate, one of his flatterers 
 got up and said, that being free men they ought to be out- 
 spoken, and not suppress or conceal anything that might 
 be important, and having by this exordium engaged every- 
 body's attention, a dead silence prevailing, and even Tibe- 
 rius being all attention, he said, " Listen, Caesar, to what 
 we all charge you with, although no one ventures to tell 
 you openly of it ; you neglect yourself, and are careless 
 
 ' Reading with Hercher airorvfiTravi^ovTOQ Koi (jrpi^XovvTOQ. This 
 was Ptolemy Physcon. 
 
 ^ '•' Unus ex Alexandri adulatx)ribus : memoratus Curtio viii. 5, 6." 
 
 — Wyttenhach. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCf^RN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 175 
 
 about your health, and wear yourself out with anxiety and 
 labour on our behalf, taking no rest either by night or day." 
 And on his stringing much more together in the same 
 strain, they say the orator Cassius Severus said, " This 
 outspokenness will ruin the man." 
 
 § XIX. These are indeed trifling matters : but the follow- 
 ing are more important and do mischief to foolish people, 
 when flatterers accuse them of the very contrary vices and 
 passions to those to which they are really addicted ; as 
 Himerius the flatterer twitted a very rich, very mean, and 
 very covetous Athenian with being a careless spendthrift, and 
 likely one day to want bread as well as his children ; or on the 
 other hand if they rail at extravagant spendthrifts for mean- 
 ness and sordidness, as Titus Petronius railed at Nero; or ex- 
 hort rulers who make savage and cruel attacks on their sub- 
 jects to lay aside their excessive clemency, and unseasonable 
 and inexpedient mercy. Similar to these is the person who 
 pretends to be on his guard against and afraid of a silly 
 stupid fellow as if he were clever and cunning ; and the 
 one who, if any person fond of detraction, rejoicing in defa- 
 mation and censure, should be induced on any occasion to 
 praise some man of note, fastens on him and alleges against 
 him that he has an itch for praising j^eople. " You are 
 always extolling people of no merit : for who is this fellow, 
 or what has he said or done out of the common ? " But it 
 is in regard to the objects of their love that they mostly 
 attack those they flatter, and additionally inflame them. 
 For if they see people at variance w^th their brothers, or 
 despising their parents, or treating their wives contemp- 
 tuously, they neither take them to task nor scold them, but 
 fan the flame of their anger still more. " You don't suffi- 
 ciently appreciate yourself," they say, "you are yourself 
 the cause of your being put upon in this way, through your 
 constant submissiveness and humility." And if there is 
 any tiff or fit of jealousy in regard to some courtesan or 
 adulteress, the flatterer is at hand wiih. remarkable out- 
 spokenness, adding fuel to flame,^ and taking the lady's part, 
 and accusing her lover of acting in a very unkind harsh 
 and shameful manner to her, 
 
 ' A common proverb among the ancients. See " Conjugal Precepts," 
 § xl. ; Erasmus, " Adagia," pp. 1222, 1838. 
 
176 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 " O ingrate, after all those frequent kisses ! " ' 
 Thus Antony's friends, when he was passionately in love 
 with the Egyptian woman, ^ persuaded him that he was 
 loved by her, and twitted him with being cold and haughty 
 to her. " She," they said, " has left her mighty kingdom 
 and happy mode of life, and is wasting her beauty, taking 
 the field with you like some camp-follower, 
 
 " The while your heart is proof 'gainst all her charms," ^ 
 
 as you neglect her love-lorn as she is." But he that is 
 pleased at being reproached with his wrong-doing, and 
 delights in those that censure him, as he never did in those 
 that praised him, is unconscious that he is really perverted 
 also by what seems to be rebuke. For such outspoken- 
 ness is like the bites of wanton women,^ that while seeming 
 to hurt really tickle and excite pleasure. And just as if 
 people mix pure wine, which is by itself an antidote against 
 hemlock, with it and so offer it, they make the poison quite 
 deadly, being rapidly carried to the heart by the warmth," 
 so ill-disposed men, knowing that outspokenness is a great 
 antidote to flattery, make it a means of flattering. And so 
 it was rather a bad answer Bias" made, to the person 
 who inquired what was the most formidable animal, " Of 
 wild animals the tyrant, and of tame the flatterer." For it 
 would have been truer to observe that tame flatterers are 
 those that are found round the baths and table, but the 
 one that intrudes into the interior of the house and into the 
 women's apartments with his curiosity and calumny and 
 malignity, like the legs and arms of the polypus, is wild 
 and savage and unmanageable. 
 
 § XX. Now one kind of caution against his snares is to 
 
 ' A line out of ^schylus' " Myrmidons." Quoted again by our 
 author, " Of Love," § v. 
 
 ^ Cleopatra. 
 
 3 Homer, " Odyssey," x. 329. They are the words of Circe to Odysseus. 
 But the line was suspected even by old grammarians, and is put in 
 brackets in modern editions of the " Odyssey." 
 
 ■* See Lucretius, iv. 1079-1085. 
 
 '" So Pliny, " Hist. Nat."xxv. 95: " Remedio est (cicutae), priusquam 
 perveniat ad vitalia, vini natura excalfactoria : sed in vino pota irreme- 
 diabilis existimatur." 
 
 " Assigned to Pittacus by our author, " Septem Sapientum Con- 
 vivium," § ii. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 177 
 
 know and ever remember that, whereas the soul contains 
 true and noble and reasoning elements, as also unreasoning 
 and false and emotional ones, the friend is always a coun- 
 sellor and adviser to the better instincts of the soul, as the 
 physician improves and maintains health, whereas the 
 flatterer works upon the emotional and unreasoning ones, 
 and tickles and titillates them and seduces them from 
 reason, employing sensuality as his bait. As then there 
 are some kinds of food which neither benefit the blood or 
 spirit, nor brace up the nerves and marrow, but stir the 
 passions, excite the lower nature, and make the flesh un- 
 sound and rotten, so the language of the flatterer adds 
 nothing to soberness and reason, but encourages some 
 love passion, or stirs up foolish rage, or incites to envy, 
 or produces the empty and burdensome vanity of pride, or 
 joins in bewailing woes, or ever by his calumnies and hints 
 makes malignity and illiberality and suspicion sharp and 
 timid and jealous, and cannot fail to be detected by those 
 that closely observe him. For he is ever anchoring himself 
 upon some passion, and fattening it, and, like a bubo, 
 fastens himself on some unsound and inflamed parts of the 
 soul. Are you angry ? Have your revenge, says he. Do 
 you desire anything ? Get it. Are you afraid ? Let us 
 flee. Do you suspect ? Entertain no doubts about it. 
 But if he is difficult to detect in thus playing npon our 
 passions, since they often overthrow reason by their in- 
 tensity and strength, he will give a handle to find him 
 out in smaller matters, being consistent in them too. For 
 if anyone feels a little uneasy after a surfeit or excess in 
 drink, and so is a little particular about his food and doubts 
 the advisability of taking a bath, a friend will try and check 
 him from excess, and bid him be careful and not indulge, 
 whereas the flatterer will drag him to the bath, bid him 
 serve up some fresh food, and not starve himself and so 
 injure his constitution. And if he see him reluctant about 
 a journey or voyage or some business or other, he will say 
 that there is no hurry, that it's all one whether the business 
 be put off, or somebody else despatched to look after it. 
 And if you have promised to lend or give some money to a 
 friend, but have repented of your offer, and yet feel 
 ashamed not to keep your promise, the flatterer will throw 
 
 N 
 
178 pluta-RCh's morals. 
 
 his influence into the worse scale, he will confirm your 
 desire to save your purse, he will destroy your reluctance, 
 and will bid you be careful as having many expenses, and 
 others to think about besides that person. And so, unless 
 we are entirely ignorant of our desires, our shamelessness, 
 and our timidity, the flatterer cannot easily escape our 
 detection. For he is ever the advocate of those passions, 
 and outspoken when we desire to repress them.^ But so 
 much for this matter. 
 
 § XXI. Now let us pass on to useful and kind services, 
 for in them too the flatterer makes it very difficult and 
 confusing to detect him from the friend, seeming to be 
 zealous and ready on all occasions and never crying off. 
 For, as Euripides says,^ a friend's behaviour is, "like the 
 utterance of truth, simple," and plain and inartificial, while 
 that of the flatterer "is in itself unsound, and needs wise 
 remedies," aye, by Zeus, and many such, and not ordinary 
 ones. As for example in chance meetings the friend often 
 neither speaks nor is spoken to, but merely looks and smiles, 
 and then passes on, showing his inner affection and good- 
 will only by his countenance, which his friend also re- 
 ciprocates, but the flatterer runs up, follows, holds out his 
 hand at a distance, and if he is seen and addressed first, 
 frequently protests with oaths, and calls witnesses to prove, 
 that he did not see you. So in business friends neglect 
 many unimportant points, are not too punctilious and 
 officious, and do not thrust themselves upon every service, 
 but the flatterer is persevering and unceasing and in- 
 defatigable in it, giving nobody else either room or place 
 to help, but putting himself wholly at your disposal, and if 
 you will not find him something to do for you, he is 
 troubled, nay rather altogether dejected and lamenting 
 loudly.'^ 
 
 § XXII. To all sensible people all this is an indication, 
 not of true or sober friendship, but of a meretricious one, 
 
 * So Wyttenbach, who reads ivaraaaQ, and translates, " et libertate 
 loquendi in nobis reprehendendis utitur, quando nos cupiditatibus mor- 
 bisque animi nostri non indulgere, sed resistere, volumus." 
 
 2 '' Phoenissai, " 469-472. 
 
 ^ Like Juvenal's " Grseculus esuriens in caelum, jusseris, ibit." — 
 Juvenal, iii. 78. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 179 
 
 that embraces you more warmly than there is any occasion 
 for. Nevertheless let us first look at the difference 
 between the friend and flatterer in their promises. For it 
 has been well said by those who have handled this subject 
 before us, that the friend's promise is, 
 
 "If I can do it, and 'tis to be done," 
 
 btit the flatterer's is, 
 
 '" Speak out your mind, whate'er it is, to me." ^ 
 
 And the comic dramatists put such fellows on the stage, 
 
 " Nicomaelius, pit me against that soldier, 
 
 See if I beat him not into a jelly, 
 
 And make his face e'en softer than a sponge."^ 
 
 In the next place no friend participates in any matter, 
 unless he has first been asked his advice, and put the 
 matter to the test, and set it on a suitable and expedient 
 basis. But the flatterer, if anyone allows him to examine 
 a matter and give his opinion on it, not only v^^ishes to 
 gratify him by compliance, but also fearing to be looked 
 upon with suspicion as nnwilling and reluctant to en- 
 gage in the business, gives in to and even urges on his 
 friend's desire. For there is hardly any king or rich man 
 who would say, 
 
 " O that a beggar I could find, or worse 
 Than beggar, if, with good intent to me. 
 He would lay bare his heart boldly and honestly ; "^ 
 
 but, like the tragedians, they require a chorus of sympa- 
 thizing friends, or the applause of a theatre. And so 
 Merope gives the following advice in the tragedy, 
 
 " Choose you for friends those who will speak their mind. 
 For those bad men that only speak to please 
 See that you bolt and bar out of your house."* 
 
 But they act just the contrary, for they turn away with 
 horror from those who speak their mind, and hold different 
 
 ^ These are two successive lines found three times in Homer, " Iliad," 
 xiv. 195, 196 ; xviii. 426, 427 ; '' Odyssey," v. 89, 90. The two lines are 
 in each case spoken by one person. 
 
 ^ Probably lines from " The Flatterer " of Menander. 
 
 ^ From the " Ino" of Euripides. 
 
 * From the " Erechtheus " of Euripides. 
 
180 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 views as to what is expedient, while they welcome those 
 bad and illiberal impostors (that only speak to please them) 
 not only within their houses, but also to their affections 
 and secrets. Now the simpler of these do not think right 
 or claim to advise you in important matters, but only to 
 assist in the carrying out of them : but the more cunning 
 one stands by during the discussion, and knits his brows, 
 and nods assent with his head, but says nothing, but if his 
 friend express an opinion, he then says, " Hercules, you 
 only just anticipated me, I was about to make that very 
 remark." For as the mathematicians tell us that surfaces 
 and lines neither bend nor extend nor move of themselves, 
 being without body and only perceived by the mind, but 
 only bend and extend and change their position with the 
 bodies whose extremities they are : so you will catch the 
 flatterer ever assenting with, and agreeing with, aye, and 
 feeling with, and being angry with, another, so easy of 
 detection in all these points of view is the difference 
 between the friend and the flatterer. Moreover as regards 
 the kind of good service. For the favour done by a friend, 
 as the principal strength of an animal is within, is not for 
 display or ostentation, but frequently as a doctor cures his 
 patient imperceptibly, so a friend benefits by his interven- 
 tion, or by paying off creditors, or by managing his friend's 
 affairs, even though the person who receives the benefit 
 may not be aware of it. Such was the behaviour of 
 Arcesilaus on various occasions, and when Apelles^ of Chios 
 was ill, knowing his poverty, he took with him twenty 
 drachmas when he visited him, and sitting down beside 
 him he said, " There is nothing here but those elements of 
 Empedocles, ' fire and water and earth and balmy expanse 
 of air,' but you don't lie very comfortably," and with that 
 he moved his pillow, and privately put the money under it. 
 And when his old housekeeper found it, and wonderingly 
 told Apelles of it, he laughed and said, " This is some 
 trick of Arcesilaus." And the saying is also true in 
 philosophy that "children are like their parents."^ For 
 
 1 We know from Athenaeus, p. 420 D, that Apelles and Arcesilaus 
 were friends. 
 
 ^ An allusion to Hesiod, *' Works and Days," 235. Cf. Horace, 
 " Odes,-' iv. 5. 23. 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 181 
 
 when Ce})liisocrates had to stand his trial on a bill of 
 indictment, Lacjdes (who was an intimate friend of Arce- 
 silaus) stood bj him with several other friends, and 
 when the prosecutor asked for his ring, which was the 
 principal evidence against him, Cephisocrates quietly 
 dropped it on the ground, and Lacydes noticing this put 
 his foot on it and so hid it. And after sentence was pro- 
 nounced in his favour, Cephisocrates going up to thank 
 the jury, one of them who had seen the artifice told him 
 to thank Lacydes, and related to him all the matter, 
 though Lacydes had not said a word about it to anybody. 
 So also I think the gods do often perform benefits secretly, 
 taking a natural delight in bestowing their favours and 
 bounties.^ But the good service of the flatterer has no 
 justice, or genuineness, or simplicity, or liberality about it ; 
 but is accompanied with sweat, and running about, and 
 noise, and knitting of the brow, creating an impression 
 and appearance of toilsome and bustling service, like a 
 painting over-curiously wrought in bold colours, and with 
 bent folds wrinkles and angles, to make the closer re- 
 semblance to life. Moreover he tires one by relating what 
 journeys and anxieties he has had over the matter, how 
 many enemies he has made over it, the thousand bothers 
 and annoyances he has gone through, so that you say, 
 "The affair was not worth all this trouble." For being 
 reminded of any favour done to one is always unpleasant 
 and disagreeable and insufferable : ^ but the flatterer not 
 only reminds us of his services afterwards, but even during 
 the very moment of doing them upbraids us with them 
 and is importunate. But the friend, if he is obliged to 
 mention the matter, relates it modestly, and says not a 
 word about himself. And so, when the Lacedeemonians 
 sent corn to the people of Smyrna that needed it, and the 
 people of Smyrna wondered at their kindness, the Lacedae- 
 monians said, " It was no great matter, we only voted that 
 
 ' See the beautiful story of Baucis and Philemon, Ovid, " Meta- 
 morphoses," viii. 626-724 : " Cura pii dis sunt, et qui coluere coluntur.'" 
 
 ^ Compare Terence, " Andria," 43, 44. So too Seneca, " De Bene- 
 ficiis,'"' ii. 10 : " Hsec enim beneficii inter duos lex est : alter statim 
 oblivisci debet dati, alter accepti nunquam. Lacerat aniraum et premit 
 frequens meritorum commemoratio." 
 
182 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 we and our beasts of burden should go without our dinner 
 one day, and sent what was so saved to you."^ Not only 
 is it handsome to do a favour in that way, but it is more 
 pleasant to the receivers of it, because they think those 
 who have done them the service have done it at no great 
 loss to themselves. 
 
 § XXTII. But it is not so much by the importunity of 
 the flatterer in regard to services, nor by his facility in 
 making promises, that one can recognize his nature, as 
 by the honourable or dishonourable kind of service, and 
 by the regard to please or to be of real use. For the 
 friend is not as Gorgias defined him, one who will ask 
 his friend to help him in what is right, while he will 
 himself do many services for his friend that are not 
 right. 
 
 " For friend should share in good not in bad action."^ 
 
 He will therefore rather try and turn him away from what 
 is not becoming, and if he cannot persuade him, good is 
 that answer of Phocion to Antipater, " You cannot have 
 me both as friend and flatterer," ^ that is, as friend and no 
 friend. For one must indeed assist one's friend but not do 
 anything wrong for him, one must advise with him but not 
 plot with him, one must bear witness for him but not join 
 him in fraud, one must certainly share adversity with him 
 but not crime. For since we should not wish even to 
 know of our friends' dishonourable acts, much less should 
 we desire to share their dishonour by acting with them. 
 As then the Lacedaemonians, when conquered in battle by 
 Antipater, on settling the terms of peace, begged that he 
 would lay upon them what burdens he pleased, provided 
 he enjoined nothing dishonourable, so the friend, if any 
 necessity arise involving expense or danger or trouble, is 
 the first to desire to be applied to and share in it with 
 alacrity and without crying off, but if there be anything 
 disgraceful in connection with it he begs to have nothing 
 to do with it. The flatterer on the contrary cries off from 
 
 ' A similar story about the Samians and Lacedaemonians is told by 
 Aristotle, " GEconom." ii. 9. 
 
 ^ A line from Euripides, " Iphigenia in Aulis," 407. 
 ^ Also in " Conjugal Precepts," § xxix. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 183 
 
 toilsome and dangerous employments, and if you put him 
 to the test by ringing him,^ he returns a hollow and 
 spurious sound, and finds some excuse ; whereas use him in 
 disgraceful and low and disreputable service, and trample 
 upon him, he will think no treatment too bad or igno- 
 minious. Have you observed the ape ? He cannot guard 
 the house like the dog, nor bear burdens like the horse, nor 
 plough like the ox, so he has to bear insult and ribaldry, 
 and put up with being made sport of, exhibiting himself 
 as an instrument to produce laughter. So too the flatterer, 
 who can neither advocate your cause, nor give you useful 
 counsel, nor share in your contention with anybody, but 
 shirks all labour and toil, never makes any excuses in 
 underhand transactions, is sure to lend a helping hand in 
 any love affair, is energetic in setting free some harlot, and 
 not careless in clearing off the account of a drinking score, 
 nor remiss in making preparations for banquets, and obse- 
 quious to concubines, but if ordered to be uncivil to your 
 relations, or to help in turning your wife out of doors, he 
 is relentless and not to be put out of countenance. So that 
 he is not hard to detect here too. For if ordered to do 
 anything you please disreputable or dishonourable, he is 
 ready to take any pains to oblige you. 
 
 § XXIV. One might detect again how greatly the flatterer 
 differs from the friend by his behaviour to other friends. For 
 the friend is best pleased with loving and being beloved by 
 many, and also always tries to contrive for his friend that 
 he too may be much loved and honoured, for he believes in 
 the proverb " the goods of friends are common property," "^ 
 and thinks it ought to apply to nothing more than to 
 friends ; but the false and spurious and counterfeit friend, 
 knowing how much he debases friendship, like debased and 
 spurious coin, is not only by nature envious, but shows 
 his envy even of those who are like himself, striving to 
 outdo them in scurrility and gossip, while he quakes 
 and trembles at any of his betters, not by Zeus " merely 
 walking on foot by their Lydian chariot," but, to use the 
 language of Simonides, " not even having pure lead by 
 
 ^ See Persius, iii. 21, 22, with Jahn's Note. 
 2 See " On Love," § xxi. 
 
184 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 comparison with their refined gold." ^ Whenever then, 
 being light and counterfeit and false, he is put to the test 
 at close quarters with a true and solid and cast-iron friend- 
 ship, he cannot stand the test but is detected at once, and 
 imitates the conduct of the painter that painted some 
 wretched cocks, for he ordered his lad to scare away all live 
 cocks as far from his picture as possible. So he too scares 
 away real friends and will not let them come near if he can 
 help it, but if he cannot prevent that, he openly fawns upon 
 them, and courts them, and admires them as his betters, 
 but privately runs them down and spreads calumnies about 
 them. And when secret detraction has produced a sore 
 feeling,^ if he has not effected his end completely, he re- 
 members and observes the teaching of Medius, who was 
 the chief of Alexander's flatterers, and a leading sophist in 
 conspiracy against the best men. He bade people confi- 
 dently sow their calumny broadcast and bite with it, 
 teaching them that even if the person injured should 
 heal his sore, the scar of the calumny would remain. Con- 
 sumed by these scars, or rather gangrenes and cancers, 
 Alexander put to death Callisthenes, and Parmenio, and 
 Philotas ; while he himself submitted to be completely out- 
 witted by such as Agnon, and Bagoas, and Agesias, and 
 Demetrius, who worshipped him and tricked him up and 
 feigned him to be a barbaric god. So great is the 
 power of flattery, and nowhere greater, as it seems, than 
 among the greatest people. For their thinking and 
 wishing the best about themselves makes them credit the 
 flatterer, and gives him courage.^ For lofty heights are 
 difficult of approach and hard to reach for those who 
 
 ^ " Auri plumbique oppositio fere proverbialis est. Petronius, ' Saty- 
 ricon,' 43. Plane fortunnp filius : in manu illius plumbum aureum 
 fiebat." — Wyttenhach. The passage about the Lydian chariot is said 
 to be by Pindar in our author, " Nicias," p. 523 D. 
 
 ^ Wyttenbach compai'es Seneca, " Epist." cxxiii. p. 495 : " Horum 
 sermo multuni nocet : nam etiamsi non statim officit, semina in animo 
 relinquit, sequiturque nos etiam cum ab illis discesserimus, resurrec- 
 turum postea malum." 
 
 ^ Compare Cicero, " De Amicitia," xxvi. : ♦' Assentatio, quamvis per- 
 niciosa sit, nocere tamen nemini potest, nisi ei, qui earn recipit atque ea 
 delectiitur, Ita fit, ut is assentatoribus patefaciat aures suas maxime, 
 qui ipse sibi assentetur et se maxime ipse delectet." 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 185 
 
 endeavour to scale them, but the highmindedness and 
 conceit of a person thrown off his balance by good fortune 
 or good natural parts is easily reached by mean and petty 
 people. 
 
 § XXY. And so we advised at the beginning of this dis- 
 course, and now^ advise again, to cut off self-love and too high 
 an opinion of ourselves ; for that flatters us first, and makes 
 ns more impressionable and j^repared for external flatterers. 
 But if we hearken to the god, and recognize the immense 
 importance to everyone of that saying, " Know thyself," ^ and 
 at the same time carefully observe our nature and education 
 and training, with its thousand shortcomings in respect to 
 good, and the large proportion of vice and vanity mixed up 
 with our words and deeds and feelings, we shall not make our- 
 selves so easy a mark for flatterers. Alexander said that he 
 disbelieved those who called him a god chiefly in i^egard to 
 sleep and the sexual delight, for in both those things he 
 was more ignoble and emotional than in other respects.^ 
 So we, if we observe the blots, blemishes, shortcomings, 
 and imperfections of our private selves, shall perceive 
 clearly that we do not need a friend who shall bestow upon 
 us praise and panegyric, but one that will reprove us, and 
 speak plainly to us, aye, by Zeus, and censure us if we 
 have done amiss. For it is only a few out of many that 
 venture to speak plainly to their friends rather than 
 gratify them, and even among those few you will not 
 easily find any who know how to do so properly, for they 
 think they are outspoken when they abuse and scold. And 
 yet, just as in the case of any other medicine, to employ 
 freedom of speech unseasonably is only to give needless pain 
 and trouble, and in a manner to do so as to produce vexa- 
 tion the very thing the flatterer does so as to produce 
 pleasure. For it does people harm not only to praise them 
 "unseasonably but also to blame them unseasonably, and es- 
 pecially exposes them to the successful attack of flatterers, 
 for, like water, they abandon the rugged hills for the soft 
 grassy valleys. And so outspokenness ought to be 
 tempered with kindness, and reason ought to be called in 
 
 ' Compare § i. 
 
 ^ Compare our Author, *' Quaestiones Convivalium," viii. p. 717 F. 
 
186 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 to correct its excessive tartness, (as we tone down the 
 too powerful glare of a lamp), that people may not, by 
 being troubled and grieved at continual blame and rebuke, 
 fly for refuge to the shade of the flatterer, and turn aside 
 to him to free themselves from annoyance. For we ought, 
 Philopappus, to banish all vice by virtue, not by the opposite 
 vice, as some hold,' by exchanging modesty for impudence, 
 and countrified ways for town ribaldry, and by removing 
 their character as far as possible from cowardice and effemi- 
 nacy, even if that should make people get very near to auda- 
 city and foolhardiness. And some even make superstition 
 a plea for atheism, and stupidity a plea for knavery, per- 
 verting their nature, like a stick bent double, from inability 
 to set it straight. But the basest disowning of flattery is 
 to be disagreeable without any purpose in view, and it 
 shows an altogether inelegant and clumsy unfitness for 
 social intercourse to shun by unpleasing moroseness the 
 suspicion of being mean and servile in friendship ; like the 
 freedman in the comedy who thought railing only enjoying 
 freedom of speech. Seeing then that it is equally disgrace- 
 ful to become a flatterer through trying only to please, as 
 in avoiding flattery to destroy all friendship and intimacy 
 by excessive freedom of speech, we must avoid both these 
 extremes, and, as in any other case, make our freedom of 
 speech agreeable by its moderation. So the subject itself 
 seems next to demand that I should conclude it by dis- 
 cussing that point. 
 
 § XXVI. As then v^e see that much trouble arises from 
 excessive freedom of speech, let us first of all detach from 
 it any element of self-love, being carefully on our guard 
 that we may not appear to upbraid on account of any 
 private hurt or injury. For people do not regard a speech 
 on the speaker's own behalf as arising from goodwill, but 
 from anger, and reproach rather than admonition. For 
 freedom in speech is friendly and has weight, but reproach 
 is selfish and little. And so people respect and admire 
 those that speak their mind freely, but accuse back and 
 despise those that reproach them : as Agamemnon would 
 not stand the moderate freedom of speech of Achilles, but 
 
 ^ So Horace, " Satires,'' i. 2, 24 : " Dum vitant stulti vitia in con- 
 traria currunt." 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCEEN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 187 
 
 submitted to and endured the bitter attack and speech of 
 Odysseus, 
 
 " Pernicious chief, would that thou didst command 
 Some sorry host, and not such men as these ! " ^ 
 
 for he was restrained by the carefulness and sobriety of his 
 speech, and also Odysseus had no private motive of anger 
 but only spoke out on behalf of Oreece," whereas Achilles 
 seemed rather vexed on his own account. And Achilles 
 himself, though not sweet-tempered or mild of mood, but 
 " a terrible man, and one that would perchance blame an 
 innocent person," '^ yet silently listened to Patroclus 
 bringing against him many such charges as the following, 
 
 " Pitiless one, thy sire never was 
 Knight Peleus, nor thy mother gentle Thetis, 
 But the blue sea and steep and rocky crags 
 Thy parents were, so flinty is thy heart." ^ 
 
 For as Hyperides the orator bade the Athenians consider 
 not only whether he spoke bitterly, but whether he spoke 
 so from interested motives,^ so the rebuke of a friend void 
 of all private feeling is solemn and grave and what one dare 
 not lightly face. And if anyone shows plainly in his free- 
 dom of speech, that he altogether passes over and dismisses 
 any offences his friend has done to himself, and only blames 
 him for other shortcomings, and does not spare him but 
 gives him pain for the interests of others, the tone of his 
 outspokenness is invincible, and the sweetness of his 
 manner even intensifies the bitterness and austerity of his 
 rebuke. And so it has well been said, that in anger and 
 differences with our friends we ought more especially to 
 act with a view to their interest or honour. And no less 
 friendly is it, when it appears that we have been passed over 
 and neglected, to boldly put in a word for others that are 
 neglected too, and to remind people of them, as Plato, when 
 he was out of favour with Dionysius, begged for an 
 
 ^ Homer, "Iliad," xiv. 84, 85. 
 
 - Compare Cicero, " De Ofticiis," i. 25 : " Omnis autem animadversio 
 et castigatio contumelia vacare debet : neque ad ejus, qui punitur 
 aliquem aut verbis fatigat, sed ad reipublicae utilitatem referri." 
 
 ^ " Ihad," xi. 654. * " Ihad," xvi. 33-35. 
 
 ' Cf. Plutarch, " Phocion," p. 746 D. 
 
188 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 audience, and Dionysius granted it, thinking that Plato 
 had some personal grievance and was going to enter into it, 
 but Plato opened the conversation as follows, " If, Dio- 
 njsius, you knew that some enemy had sailed to Sicily 
 with a view to do you some harm, but found no opportunity, 
 would you allow him to sail back again, and go off scot- 
 free ? " " Certainly not, Plato," replied Dionysius, "for 
 we must not only hate and punish the deeds of our 
 enemies, but also their intentions." " If then," said Plato, 
 "anyone has come here for your benefit, and wishes to 
 do you good, and you do not find him an opportunity, is 
 it right to let him go away with neglect and without 
 thanks ? " And on Dionysius asking, who he meant, he 
 replied, " I mean ^schines, a man of as good a character 
 as any of Socrates' pupils whatever, and able to improve 
 by his conversation any with whom he might associate : 
 and he is neglected, though he has made a long voyage 
 here to discuss philosophy with you." This speech so 
 affected Dionysius, that he at once threw his arms round 
 Plato and embraced him, admiring his benevolence and 
 loftiness of mind, and treated ^schines well and hand- 
 somely. 
 
 § XXVII. In the next place, let us clear away as it were 
 and remove all insolence, and jeering, and mocking, and 
 ribaldry, which are the evil seasonings of freedom of speech. 
 For as, when the surgeon performs an operation, a certain 
 neatness and delicacy of touch ought to accompany his use 
 of the knife, but all pantomimic and venturesome and 
 fashionable suppleness and over-finicalness ought to be far 
 away from his hand, so freedom of speech admits of dex- 
 terity and politeness, provided that a pleasant way of put- 
 ting it does not destroy the power of the rebuke, for impu- 
 dence and coarseness and insolence, if added to freedom of 
 speech, entirely mar and ruin the effect. And so the 
 harper plausibly and elegantly silenced Philip, who ven- 
 tured to dispute with him about proper playing on the 
 harp, by answering him, " God forbid that you should be so 
 unfortunate, king, as to understand harping better than 
 me." But that was not a right answer of Epicharmus, 
 when Hiero a few days after putting to death some of his 
 friends invited him to supper, " You did not invite me," he 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 189 
 
 said, "the other dav, when you sacrificed your friends." 
 Bad also was that answer of Antiphon, who, when Diony- 
 sius asked him " which was the best kind of bronze," 
 answered, " That of which the Athenians made statues of 
 Harmodius and Aristogiton," For this unpleasant and 
 bitter kind of language profits not those that use it, nor 
 does scurrility and puerile jesting please, but such kind of 
 speeches are indications of an incontinent tongue inspired 
 by hate, and full of malignity and insolence, and those who 
 use such language do but ruin themselves, recklessly dancing 
 on the verge of a well.^ For Antiphon was put to death by 
 Dionysius, and Timagenes lost the friendship of Augustus, 
 not by using on any occasion too free a tongue, but at 
 supper-parties and walks always declining to talk seriously, 
 " only saying what he knew would make the Argives 
 laugh," ^ and thus virtually charging friendship with being 
 only a cloak for abuse. For even the comic poets have in- 
 troduced on the stage many grave sentiments well adapted 
 to public life, but joking and ribaldry being mixed with 
 them, like insipid sauces with food, destroy their effect and 
 make them lose their nourishing power, so that the comic 
 poets only get a reputation for malignity and coarseness, 
 and the audience get no benefit from what is said. We 
 may on other occasions jest and laugh with our friends, but 
 let our outspokenness be coupled with seriousness and 
 gravity, and if it be on important matters, let our speech 
 be trustworthy and moving from its pathos, and animation, 
 and tone of voice. And on all occasions to let an oppor- 
 tunity slip by is very injurious, but especially does it 
 destroy the usefulness of freedom of speech. It is plain 
 therefore that we must abstain from freedom of speech 
 when men are in their cups. For he disturbs the harmony 
 of a social gathering^ who, in the midst of mirth and 
 jollity, introduces a topic that shall knit the brows and 
 contract the face, and shall act as a damper to the Lysian "* 
 
 ^ A proverb of persons on the brink of destruction. Wells among the 
 ancients were uncovered. 
 
 ^ " Iliad," ii, 215, of Thersites. As to Theagenes, see iSeneca, " De 
 Ira," ii. 23. 
 
 ^ Literally, " brings a cloud over fair weather." 
 
 * The MSS. have Lydian. Lysian Dionysus is also found in Pau- 
 
190 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 god, wlio, as Pindar says, " looses the rope of all our cares 
 and anxieties." There is also great danger in such ill- 
 timed freedom of speech. For wine makes people easily 
 slip into rage, and oftentimes freedom of speech in liquor 
 makes enemies. And generally speaking it is not noble or 
 brave but cowardly to conceal your ideas when people are 
 sober and to give free vent to them at table, snarling like 
 cowardly dogs. We need say no more therefore on this 
 head. 
 
 § XXVIII. But since many people do not think fit or even 
 dare to find fault with their friends when in prosperity, but 
 think that condition altogether out of the reach and range 
 of rebuke, but inveigh against them if they have made 
 a slip or stumble, and trample upon them if they are in de - 
 jection and in their power, and, like a stream swollen above 
 its banks, pour upon them then the torrent of all their elo- 
 quence,^ and enjoy and are glad at their reverse of fortune, 
 owing to their former contempt of them when they were 
 poor themselves, it is not amiss to discuss this somewhat, 
 and to answer those words of Euripides, 
 
 " What need of friends, when things go well with us ? " ^ 
 
 for those in prosperity stand in especial need of friends 
 who shall be outspoken to them, and abate their excessive 
 pride. For there are few who are sensible in prosperity, 
 most need to borrow wisdom from others, and such consi- 
 derations as shall keep them lowly when puffed up and 
 giving themselves airs owing to their good fortune. But 
 when the deity has abased them and stripped them of their 
 conceit, there is something in their very circumstances to 
 reprove them and bring about a change of mind. And so 
 there is no need then of a friendly outspokenness, nor of 
 weighty or caustic words, but truly in such reverses " it is 
 sweet to look into the eyes of a friendly person," ^ consoling 
 
 sanias, ix. 16. Lyaeus is suggested by Wyttenbach, and read by 
 Hercher. Lysius or Lyaeus will both be connected with Xvuj, and so refer 
 to Dionysus as the god that looses or frees us from care. See Horace, 
 "Epodes,"ix. 37, 38. 
 
 ^ Compare Juvenal, iii. 73, 74 : " Sermo Promptus et Isseo torren- 
 tior." 
 
 2 " Orestes," 667. ^ Euripides, " Ion,'' 732. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 191 
 
 and cheering one up : as Xenophon ^ tells us that the sight 
 of Clearchus in battle and dangers, and his calm benevolent 
 face, inspired courage in his men when in peril. But he 
 who uses to a man in adversity too great freedom and 
 severity of speech, like a man applying too pungent a 
 remedy to an inflamed and angry eye, neither cures him nor 
 abates his pain, but adds anger to his grief, and exasperates 
 his mental distress. For example anyone well is not at all 
 angry or fierce with a friend, who blames him for his 
 excesses with women and wine, his laziness and taking no 
 exercise, his frequent baths, and his unseasonable surfeit- 
 ing : but to a person ill all this is unsufferable, and even 
 worse than his illness to hear, *' All this has happened to you 
 through your intemperance, and luxury, your dainty food, 
 and love for women." The patient answers, " How 
 unseasonable is all this, good sir ! I am making my will, 
 the doctors are preparing me a dose of castor and scam- 
 mony, and you are scolding me and plying me with philo- 
 sophy." And thus the affairs of the unfortunate do not 
 admit of outspokenness and a string of Polonius-like saws, 
 but they require kindness and help. For when children 
 fall down their nurses do not run up to them and scold, but 
 pick them up, and clean them, and tidy their dress, and after- 
 wards find fault and correct them. The story is told of 
 Demetrius of Phalerum, when an exile from his native 
 country, and living a humble and obscure life at Thebes, 
 that he was not pleased to see Crates approaching, for he 
 expected to receive from him cynical outspokenness and 
 harsh language. But as Crates talked kindly to him, and 
 discussed his exile, and pointed out that there was no evil 
 in it, or anything that ought to put him about, for he had 
 only got rid of the uncertainties and dangers of public life, 
 and at the same time bade him trust in himself and his 
 condition of mind, Demetrius cheered up and became 
 happier, and said to his friends, " Out upon all my former 
 business and employments, that left me no leisure to know 
 such a man as this ! " 
 
 " For friendly speech is good to one in grief, 
 While bitter language only suits the fool." ^ 
 
 ^ "Anabasis," ii. 6, 11. "^ Perhaps by Euripides. 
 
192 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 This is the way with generous friends. But the ignoble 
 and low flatterers of those in prosperity, as Demosthenes 
 says fractures and sprains always give us pain again when 
 the body is not well,^ adhere to them in reverses, as if they 
 were pleased at and enjoyed them. But indeed if there be 
 any need of reminding a man of the blunders he committed 
 through unadvisedly following his own counsel, it is enough 
 to say, " This was not to my mind, indeed I often tried to 
 dissuade you from it," ^ 
 
 § XXIX. In what cases then ought a friend to be vehe- 
 ment, and when ought he to use emphatic freedom of lan- 
 guage ? When circumstances call upon him to check some 
 headlong pleasure or rage or insolence, or to curtail avarice, 
 or to correct some foolish negligence. Thus Solon spoke 
 out to Croesus, who was corrupted and enervated by inse- 
 cure good fortune, bidding him look to the end.^ Thus 
 Socrates restrained Alcibiades, and wrung from him 
 genuine tears by his reproof, and changed his heart.'* Such 
 also was the plain dealing of Cyrus with Cyaxares, and of 
 Plato with Dion, for when Dion was most famous and 
 attracted to himself the notice of all men, by the splendour 
 and greatness of his exploits, Plato warned him to fear and 
 be on his guard against " pleasing only himself, for so he 
 would lose all his friends." " Speusippus also wrote to him 
 not to plume himself on being a great person only with lads 
 and women, but to see to it that by adorning Sicily with 
 piety and justice and good laws he might make the Academy 
 glorious. On the other hand Euctus and Eulaeus, com- 
 panions of Perseus, in the days of his prosperity ingra- 
 tiated themselves with him, and assented to him in all 
 things, and danced attendance upon him, like all the other 
 courtiers, but when he fled after his defeat by the Romans 
 at Pydna, they attacked him and censured him bitterly, re- 
 minding him and upbraiding him in regard to everything 
 he had done amiss or neglected to do, till he was so greatly 
 
 1 " Olynth." ii. p. 8 C ; "Pro Corona," 34] C. 
 
 2 Homer, " Iliad," ix. 108, 109. Tliey are the words of Nestor to Aga- 
 memnon, 
 
 3 See Herodotus, i. 30-32. 
 
 * See Plato's " Symposium," p. 215 E. 
 5 See Plato, " Epist." iv. p. 321 B. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND, 193 
 
 exasperated both from grief and rage that he whipped out 
 his sword and killed both of them. 
 
 § XXX. Let so much suffice for general occasions of free- 
 dom of speech. There are also particular occasions, which 
 our friends themselves furnish, that one who reallj cares for 
 his friends will not neglect, but make use of. In some 
 cases a question, or narrative, or the censure or praise of 
 similar things in other people, gives as it were the cue for 
 freedom of speech. Thus it is related that Demaratus 
 came to Macedonia from Corinth at the time when Philip 
 was at variance with his wife and son, and when the king 
 asked if the Grreeks were at harmony with one another, 
 Demaratus, being his well-wisher and friend, answered, 
 "It is certainly very rich of you, Philip, inquiring as to 
 concord between the Athenians and Peloponnesians, when 
 you don't observe that your own house is full of strife and 
 variance." ^ Good also was the answer of Diogenes, who, 
 when Philip was marching to fight against the Greeks, 
 stole into his camp, and was arrested and brought before 
 him, and the king not recognizing him asked if he was a 
 spy, " Certainly," replied he, " Philip, I have come to spy 
 out your inconsiderate folly, which makes you, under no 
 compulsion, come here and hazard your kingdom and life on 
 a moment's ^ cast of the die." This was perhaps rather too 
 strong a remark. 
 
 § XXXI. Another suitable time for reproof is when people 
 have been abused by others for their faults, and have con- 
 sequently become humble, and abated their pride. The 
 man of tact will ingeniously seize the occasion, checking 
 and baffling those that used the abuse, but privately speak- 
 ing seriously to his friend, and reminding him, that he 
 ought to be more careful if for no other reason than to take 
 off the edge of his enemies' satire. He will say, " How can 
 they open their mouths against you, or what can they 
 urge, if you give up and abandon what you get this bad 
 name about ? " Thus pain comes only from abuse, but 
 profit from reproof. And some correct their friends more 
 
 ^ See our author, " Apophthegmata,'' p. 179 C. 
 ' Compare Horace, "" Satires," i. 1. 7, 8 : "Quid enim, concurritur: 
 horse Momento cita mors venit aut victoria Iseta." 
 
 
 
194 plutaech's morals. 
 
 daintily by blaming others ; censuring otters for what they 
 know are their friends' faults. Thus my master Am- 
 monius in afternoon school, noticing that some of his pupils 
 had not dined sufficiently simply, bade one of his freedmen 
 scourge his own son, charging him with beiug unable 
 to get through his dinner without vinegar,^ but in acting 
 thus he had an eye to us, so that this indirect rebuke 
 touched the guilty persons. 
 
 § XXXII. We must also beware of speaking too freely to 
 a friend in the company of many people, remembering the 
 well-known remark of Plato. For when Socrates reproved 
 one of his friends too vehemently in a discussion at table, 
 Plato said, " Would it not have been better to have said 
 this privately ? " Whereupon Socrates replied, " And you 
 too, sir, would it not have become you to make this 
 remark also privately ? " And Pythagoras having re- 
 buked one of his pupils somewhat harshly before many 
 people, they say the young fellow went off and hung him- 
 self, and from that moment Pythagoras never again 
 rebuked anyone in another's presence. For, as in the case 
 of some foul disease, so also in the case of wrong-doing we 
 ought to make the detection and exposure private, and 
 not ostentatiously public by bringing witnesses and spec- 
 tators. For it is not the part of a friend but a sophist to 
 seek glory by the ill-fame of another, and to show off in 
 company, like the doctors that perform wonderful cures in 
 the theatres as an advertisement.^ And independently of 
 the insult, which ought not to be an element in any cure, 
 we must remember that vice is contentious and obstinate. 
 For it is not merely "love," as Euripides says, that "if 
 checked becomes more vehement," but an unsparing rebuke 
 before many people makes every infirmity and vice more 
 impudent. As then Plato ^ urges old men who want to teach 
 the young reverence to act reverently to them first them- 
 selves, so among friends a gentle rebuke is gently taken, and 
 
 1 And so being dainty. See Athenjeus, ii. ch. 76. 
 
 2 We see from this and other places that the mountebanks and 
 quacks of the Middle Ages and later times existed also among the 
 ancients. Human nature in its great leading features is ever the same. 
 " Omne ignotum pro magnifico est." 
 
 » " Laws,'' p. 729 C. 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 195 
 
 a cautious and careful approach and mild censure of the 
 wrong-doer undermines and destroys vice, and makes its 
 own modesty catching. So that line is most excellent, 
 " holding his head near, that the others might not hear." ^ 
 And most especially indecorous is it to expose a husband 
 in the hearing of his wife, or a father before his children, 
 or a lover in the presence of the loved one, or a master 
 before his scholars. For people are beside themselves with 
 pain and rage if reproached before those with whom they 
 desire to be held in good repute. And I think it was not so 
 much wine that exasperated Alexander with Clitus, as his 
 seeming to put him down in the presence of many people. 
 And Aristomenes, the tutor of Ptolemy,^ because he went 
 up to the king and woke him as he was asleep in an 
 audience of some ambassadors, gave a handle to the king's 
 flatterers who professed to be indignant on his behalf, and 
 said, "If after your immense state-labours and many vigils 
 you have been overpowered by sleep, he ought to have 
 rebuked you privately, and not put his hands upon you 
 before so many people." And Ptolemy sent for a cup of 
 poison and ordered the poor man to drink it up. And 
 Aristophanes said Cleon blamed him for " railing against 
 the state when strangers were present,"^ and so irritating 
 the Athenians. We ought therefore to be very much on our 
 guard in relation to this point too as well as others, if we 
 wish not to make a display and catch the public ear, but 
 to use our freedom of speech for beneficial purposes and to 
 cure vice. Moreover, what Thucydides has represented 
 the Corinthians saying of themselves, that "they had a 
 right to blame their neighbours," ^ is not a bad precept for 
 those to remember who intend to use freedom of speech. 
 Lysander, it seems, on one occasion said to a Megarian, 
 who was speaking somewhat boldly on behalf of Greece 
 among the allies, " Your words require a state to back 
 
 1 Homer, " Odyssey," i. 157 ; iv. 70 ; xvii. 592. 
 
 2 Ptolemy V., Epiphanes. The circumstances are related by 
 Polybius, XV. 29 ; xvii. 35. 
 
 3 See " Acharnians,'' 501, 502. 
 
 ♦ Thucydides, i. 70 : kuI llfia, e"nrep Tiveg Kal aXKoi, vofiii:^of^ev d^ioi 
 elvai Tolg wiXag \p6yov Eirfveyktlv. 
 
196 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 them" : ^ similarly every man's freedom of speecli requires 
 character behind it, and especially true is this in regard to 
 those who censure and correct others. Thus Plato said 
 that his life was a tacit rebuke to Speusippus : and doubt- 
 less Xenocrates by his mere presence in the schools, and by 
 his earnest look at Polemo, made a changed man of him. 
 Whereas a man of levity and bad character, if he ventures 
 to rebuke anybody, is likely to hear the line, 
 
 " He doctors others, all diseased himself." ^ 
 § XXXIII. Yet since circumstances frequently call on 
 people who are bad themselves in association with other 
 such to reprove them, the most convenient mode of reproof 
 will be that which contrives to include the reprover in the 
 same indictment as the reproved, as in the case of the 
 line, 
 
 " Tydides, how on earth have we forgot 
 
 Our old impetuous courage ? " ^ 
 and, 
 
 " Now are we all not worth one single Hector." * 
 
 In this mild way did Socrates rebuke young men, as not 
 himself without ignorance, but one that needed in common 
 with them to prosecute virtue, and seek truth. For they 
 gain goodwill and influence, who seem to have the same 
 faults as their friends, and desire to correct themselves as 
 well as them. But he who is high and mighty in setting 
 down another, as if he were himself perfect and without 
 any imperfections, unless he be of a very advanced age, or 
 has an acknowledged reputation for virtue and worth, does 
 no good, but is only regarded as a tiresome bore. And so 
 it was wisely done of Phoenix to relate his own mishaps, 
 how he had meant killing his father, but quickly repented 
 at the thought " that he would be called by the Achseans 
 parricide," ^ that he might not seem to be rebuking 
 Achilles, as one that had himself never suffered from excess 
 of rage. For kindness of this sort has great influence, 
 
 ^ See our Author, " Apophthegmata," p. 190 E. 
 
 2 A line of Euripides, quoted again in " How a Man may be bene- 
 fited by his Enemies," § iv. 
 
 3 Homer, " Iliad," xi. 313. * Do. viii. 234, 235. 
 5 Do. ix. 461. • 
 
HOW ONE MAT DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 197 
 
 and people yield more to those who seem to be sympa- 
 thetic and not supercilious. And since we ought not to 
 expose an inflamed eye to a strong light, and a soul a prey 
 to the passions cannot bear unmixed reproof and rebuke, 
 one of the most useful remedies will be found to be a 
 slight mixture of praise, as in the following lines, 
 
 " Ye will not sure give up your valiant courage, 
 The best men in the host ! I should not care 
 If any coward left the fight, not I ; 
 But you to do so cuts me to the heart." ^ 
 And, 
 
 " Where is thy bow, where thy wing'd arrows, Pandarus, 
 Where thy great fame, which no one here can match ? " ^ 
 
 Such language again plainly cheers very much those that 
 are down as, 
 
 " Where now is CEdipus, and his famous riddles ? " ^ 
 and, 
 
 " Does much-endux-ing Hercules say this ? " * 
 
 For not only does it soften the harsh imperionsness of 
 censure, but also, by reminding a man of former noble 
 deeds, implants a desire to emulate his former self in 
 the person who is ashamed of what is low, and makes 
 himself his own exemplar for better things. But if we 
 make a comparison between him and other men, as his 
 contemporaries, his fellow-citizens, or his relations, then 
 the contentious spirit inherent in vice is vexed and ex- 
 asperated, and is often apt to chime in angrily, " Why 
 don't you go off to my betters then, and leave off bother- 
 ing me ? " We must therefore be on our guard against 
 praising others, when we are rebuking a man, unless indeed 
 it be their parents, as Agamemnon says in Homer, 
 
 " Little like Tydeus is his father's son ! " ' 
 or as Odysseus in the play called " The Scyrians," ' 
 
 " Dost thou card wool, and thus the lustre smirch 
 
 Of thy illustrious sire, thy noble race ? " 
 
 1 '' Iliad," xiii. 116-119. 2 j^^ y 171^ 173, 
 
 3 Euripides, " Phoenissse," 1688. 
 
 * Euripides, " Hercules Furens," 1250. 
 
 ^ " Iliad," V. 800. Athene is the speaker. 
 
 ® A play by Sophocles, now only in fragments, relating the life of 
 Achilles in the island of Scyros, the scene of his amour with Deidamia, 
 the daughter of Lycomedes, by whom he became the father of Pyrrhus. 
 
198 plutaech's morals. 
 
 § xxxiY. But it is by no means fitting when rebuked to 
 rebuke back, and when spoken to plainly to answer back, 
 for that soon kindles a flame and causes dissension ; and 
 generally speaking such altercation will not look so much 
 like a retort as an inability to bear freedom of speech. It 
 is better therefore to listen patiently to a friend's rebuke, 
 for if he should afterwards do wrong himself and so need 
 rebuke, he has set you the example of freedom of speech. 
 For being reminded without any malice, that he himself 
 has not been accustomed to spare his friends when they 
 have done wrong, but to convince them and show them 
 their fault, he will be the more inclined to yield and give 
 himself up to correction, as it will seem a return of goodwill 
 and kindness rather than scolding or rage. 
 
 § XXXV. Moreover, as Thucydides says " he is well advised 
 who [only] incurs envy in the most important matters," ^ 
 so the friend ought only to take upon himself the un- 
 pleasant duty of reproof in grave and momentous cases. 
 For if he is always in a fret and a fume, and rates his 
 acquaintances more like a tutor than a friend, his rebuke 
 will be blunt and ineffective in cases of the highest im- 
 portance, and he will resemble a doctor who dispenses 
 some sharp and bitter, but important and costly, drug in 
 trifling cases of common occurrence, where it was not at 
 all needed, and so will lose all the advantages that might 
 come from a judicious use of freedom of speech. He will 
 therefore be very much on his guard against continual 
 fault-finding, and if his friend is always pettifogging about 
 minute matters, and is needlessly querulous, it will give him 
 a handle against him in more important shortcomings. 
 Philotimus the doctor, when a patient who had abscesses 
 on his liver showed him his sore finger, said to him, " My 
 friend, it is not the whitlow that matters." '-^ So an oppor- 
 tunity sometimes offers itself to a friend to say to a man, 
 who is always finding fault on small and trivial points, 
 "Why are we always discussing mere child's play, tippling,^ 
 
 ' Thucydides, ii. 64. Quoted again in " On Shyness," § xviii. 
 ^ See also " De Audiendo," § x. 
 
 ^ iroTovg comes in rather curiously here. Can any other word lurk 
 under it ? 
 
HOW ONE MAY DISCERN A FLATTERER FROM A FRIEND. 199 
 
 and trifles ? Let such a one, my dear sir, send away his 
 mistress, or give up playing at dice, he will then be in my 
 opinion in all respects an excellent fellow." For he who 
 receives pardon on small matters is content that his friend 
 should rebuke him on matters of more moment : but the 
 man who is ever on the scold, everywhere sour and glum, 
 knowing and prying into everything, is scarcely tolerable 
 to his children or brothers, and insufferable to his slaves. 
 
 § XXXVI. But since " neither," to use the words of Euri- 
 pides, " do all troubles proceed only from old age," * nor from 
 the stupidity of our friends, we ought to observe not only 
 the shortcomings but also the good points of our friends, aye, 
 by Zeus, and to be ready to praise them first, and only 
 censure them afterwards. For as iron receives its con- 
 sistency and temper by first being submitted to fire and so 
 made soft and then dipped into cold water, so when friends 
 have been first warmed and melted with praises we can 
 afterwards use gentle remonstrance, which has a similar 
 effect to that of dipping in the case of the metal. For 
 an opportunity will offer itself to say, "Are those actions 
 worthy to be compared with these ? Do you see what 
 fruits virtue yields ? These are the things we your friends 
 ask of you, these become you, for these you are designed 
 by nature ; but all that other kind of conduct we must 
 reject with abhorrence, ' cast it away on a mountain, or 
 throw it into the roaring sea.' "^ For as a clever doctor 
 would prefer to cure the illness of his patient by sleep and 
 diet rather than by castor or scammony, so a kind friend 
 and good father or teacher delight to use praise rather 
 than blame to correct the character. For nothing makes 
 rebuke less painful or more beneficial than to refrain from 
 anger, and to inveigh against wrong-doing mildly and 
 kindly. And so we ought not sharply to drive home 
 the guilt of those who deny it, or prevent their making 
 their defence, but even contrive to furnish them with 
 specious excuses, and if they seem reluctant to give a bad 
 motive for their action we ought ourselves to find for them 
 a better, as Hector did for his brother Paris, 
 
 " Unhappy man, thy anger was not goi)d," ^ 
 
 1 " Phcenissje, " 528, 529. ^ Homer, " Iliad," vi. 347. ' Do. vi. 326. 
 
200 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 suggesting- that his absconding from the battle was not 
 running awaj or cowardice, but only anger. And Nestor 
 says to Agamemnon, 
 
 " You only yielded to your lofty passion."^ 
 
 For it has, I think, a better moral tendency to say " You 
 forgot," or " You did it inadvertently," than to say " You 
 acted unfairly," or " You behaved shamefully : " as also 
 " Don't contend with your brother," than " Don't envy 
 your brother ; " and " Avoid the woman who is your ruin," 
 than " Stop ruining the woman." Such is the language 
 employed in rebuke that desires to reform and not to 
 wound ; that rebuke which looks merely at the effect to be 
 produced acts on another principle. For when it is neces- 
 sary to stop people on the verge of wrong-doing, or to 
 check some violent and irregular impulse, or if we wish to 
 rouse and infuse vigour in those who prosecute virtue only 
 feebly and languidly, we may then assign strange and un- 
 becoming motives for their behaviour. As Odysseus in 
 Sophocles' play,"^ striving to rouse Achilles, says he is not 
 angry about his supper,'^ but " that he is afraid now that he 
 looks upon the walls of Troy," and when Achilles was vexed 
 at this, and talked of sailing home again, he said, 
 
 " I know what 'tis you shun : 'tis not ill fame : 
 But Hector's near, it is not safe to beard him," 
 
 Thus by frightening the high-spirited and courageous man 
 by the imputation of cowardice, and the sober and orderly 
 man by that of licentiousness, and the liberal and munifi- 
 cent man by that of meanness and avarice, people urge 
 them on to what is good, and deter them from what is 
 bad, showing moderation in cases past remedy, and exhibit- 
 ing in their freedom of speech more sorrow and sympathy 
 than fault-finding ; but in the prevention of wrong-doing 
 and in earnest fighting against the passions they are vehe- 
 ment and inexorable and assiduous : for that is the time 
 
 ' Homer, "Iliad," ix. 109, 110, 
 
 2 In Dindorf's " Poetse Scenici Grseci," Fragment 152, 
 ^ As it is not quite clear why Achilles should have been angry about 
 his supper, dia to Senrvbv, apropos of the context, Wyttenbach in- 
 geniously suggests, as this lost play of Sophocles was called I,vv deiin'ov, 
 that Plutarch may have written iv t(^ Aeiirvq). 
 
HOW A MAN MAY BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 201 
 
 for downright plainness and truth. Besides we see that 
 enemies censure one another for what they have done 
 amiss, as Diogenes said/ he who wished to lead a good 
 life ought to have good friends or red-hot enemies, for the 
 former told you what was right, and the latter blamed you 
 if you did what was wrong. But it is better to be on our 
 guard against wrong actions, through listening to the per- 
 suasion of those that advise us well, than to repent, after 
 we have done wrong, in consequence of the reproaches of 
 our enemies. And so we ought to employ tact in our free- 
 dom of speech, as it is the greatest and most powerful 
 remedy in friendship, and always needs a well-chosen 
 occasion, and moderation in applying it. 
 
 § KXXYit. Since then, as I have said before, freedom of 
 speech is often painful to the person who is to receive 
 benefit from it, we must imitate the surgeons, who, when 
 they have performed an operation, do not leave the suffering 
 part to pain and smart, but bathe and foment it ; so those 
 who do their rebuking daintily run^ off after paining and 
 smarting, and by different dealing and kind words soothe 
 and mollify them, as statuaries smooth and polish images 
 which have been broken or chipped. But he that is broken 
 and wounded by rebuke, if he is left sullen and swelling 
 with rage and off his equilibrium, is henceforth hard to win 
 back or talk over. And so people who reprove ought to be 
 especially careful on this point, and not to leave them too 
 soon, nor break off tlieir conversation and intercourse with 
 their acquaintances at the exasperating and painful stage. 
 
 HOW A MAN MAY BE BENEFITED BY 
 HIS ENEMIES. 
 
 § I. I am well aware, Cornelius Pulcher, that you prefer 
 the mildest manners in public life, by which you can be at 
 once most useful to the community, and most agreeable in 
 
 1 Compare " How One may be aware of one's Progress in Virtue," § xi. 
 
 2 " Ductum e proverbiali dictione j3a\6vTa iKcptvyuv, emisso telo 
 aufugere." — Wyttenbach. 
 
202 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 private life to those who have any dealings with you. But 
 since it is difficult to find any region without wild beasts, 
 though it is related of Crete ; ^ and hitherto there has been 
 no state that has not suffered from envy, rivalry, and strife, 
 the most fruitful seeds of hostility ; (for, even if nothing 
 else does, our friendships involve us in enmities, as Chile" 
 the wise man perceived, who asked the man who told him 
 he had no enemy, whether he had a friend either), it seems 
 to me that a public man ought not only to examine the 
 whole question of enemies in its various ramifications, but 
 also to listen to the serious remark of Xenophon,^ that a 
 sensible man will receive profit even from his enemies. 
 The ideas therefore that lately occurred to me to deliver, I 
 have now put together nearly in the identical words and 
 send them to you, with the exception of some matter also 
 in " Political Precepts,"* a treatise which I have often 
 noticed in your hands. 
 
 § II. People in old times were well satisfied if they were 
 not injured by strange and wild beasts, and that was the 
 only motive of their fights with them, but those of later 
 days have by now learnt to make use of them, for they feed 
 on their flesh, and clothe themselves with their wool, and 
 make medical use of their gall and beestings, and turn 
 their hides into shields, so that we might reasonably fear, 
 if beasts failed man, that his life would become brutish, 
 and wild, and void of resources. Similarly since all others 
 are satisfied with not being injured by their enemies, but 
 the sensible will also (as Xenophon says) get profit out of 
 them, we must not be incredulous, but seek a method and 
 plan how to obtain this advantage, seeing that life without 
 an enemy is impossible. The husbandman cannot cultivate 
 every tree, nor can the hunter tame every kind of animal, 
 so both seek means to derive profit according to their 
 several necessities, the one from his barren trees, the other 
 from his wild animals. Sea- water also is undrinkable and 
 brackish, but it feeds fish, and is a sort of vehicle to convey 
 and transport travellers anywhere. The Satyr, when he 
 
 ' So Pliny, viii. 83 : " In Creta Insula non vulpes ursive, atque 
 omnino nullum maleficum animal pi'seter phalangium." 
 
 ^ See the same remark of Chilo, " On Abundance of Friends," § vi. 
 ^ " CEconom." i. 15, '^ A treatise of Plutarch still extant. 
 
HOW A MAN MAT BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 203 
 
 saw fire for the first time, wished to kiss it and embrace it, 
 but Prometheus warned him, 
 
 " Goat, thou wilt surely mourn thy loss of beard." ^ 
 
 For fire burns whoever touches it, but it also gives light and 
 warmth, and is an instrument of art to all those who know 
 how to use it.^ Consider also in the case of the enemy, if 
 he is in other respects injurious and intractable, he some- 
 how or other gives us a handle to make "use of him by, and 
 so is serviceable. And many things are unpleasant and 
 detestable and antagonistic to those to whom they happen, 
 but you must have noticed that some use even illnesses as a 
 period of rest for the body, and others by excessive toil 
 have strengthened and trained their bodily vigour, and 
 some have made exile and the loss of money a passage to 
 leisure and philosophy, as did Diogenes and Crates. And 
 Zeno, when he heard of the wreck of the ship which con- 
 tained all his property, said, " Thou hast done well. Fortune, 
 to confine me to my threadbare cloak." ^ 
 
 For as those animals that have the strongest and healthiest 
 stomachs eat and digest serpents and scorpions, and some 
 even feed on stones and shells, which they convert into 
 nourishment by the strength and heat of their stomachs, 
 while fastidious people out of health almost vomit if offered 
 bread and wine, so foolish people spoil even their friend- 
 ships, while the wise know how to turn to account even 
 their enmities. 
 
 § III. In the first place then it seems to me that what is 
 most injurious in enmity may become most useful to those 
 that pay attention to it ? To what do I refer ? Why, to 
 the way in which your enemy ever wide awake pries into 
 all your affairs, and analyzes your whole life, trying to get 
 a handle against you somewhere, able not only to look 
 through a tree, like Lynceus,"* or through stones and shells, 
 
 ^ A line from a lost Satyric Play of -^schylus, called " Prometheus 
 Purphoros." 
 
 '^ So fire is called Trdvrexvov in -^schylus, " Prometheus Desmotes," 7. 
 
 •^ Compare Seneca, "t>e Animi Tranquillitate," cap. xiii. : "Zeno 
 noster cum omnia sua audiret submersa, Jubet, inquit, me fortuna 
 expeditius philosophari." 
 
 * See Horace, " Epistles,"' i. I. 28 ; Pausanias, iv. 2. 
 
204 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 but through jour friend and domestic and every intimate 
 acquaintance, as far as possible detecting your doings, 
 and digging and ferreting into your designs. For our 
 friends are ill and often die without our knowing anything 
 about it through our delay and carelessness, but we almost 
 pry into even the dreams of our enemies ; and our enemy 
 knows even more than we do ourselves of our diseases and 
 debts and differences with our wives. ^ But they pay most 
 attention to our faults and hunt them out : and as vultures 
 follow the scent of putrid carcases, and cannot perceive 
 sound and wholesome ones, so the diseases and vices and 
 crimes of life attract the enemy, and on these those that 
 hate us pounce, these they attack and tear to pieces. Is 
 not this an advantage to us ? Certainly it is. For it teaches 
 us to live warily and be on our guard, and neither to do or 
 say anything carelessly or without circumspection, but ever 
 to be vigilant by careful mode of living that we give no 
 handle to an enemy. For the cautiousness that thus 
 represses the passions and follows reason implants a care 
 and determination to live well and without reproach. For 
 as those states that have been sobered by wars with their 
 neighbours and continual campaigns love the blessings of 
 order and peace, so those people who are compelled to lead 
 a sober life owing to their enemies, and to be on their 
 guard against carelessness and negligence, and to do every- 
 thing with an eye to utility, imperceptibly glide into a fault- 
 less mode of life, and tone down their character, even without 
 requiring much, assistance from precepts. For those who 
 always remember the line, 
 
 " Ah I how would Priam and his sons rejoice,"^ 
 
 are by it diverted from and learn to shun all such things 
 as their enemies would rejoice and laugh at. Again we 
 see actors^ and singers on the stage oftentimes slack and 
 remiss, and not taking sufficient pains about their per- 
 formances in the theatres when they have it all to them- 
 selves ; but when there is a competition and contest with 
 
 1 See Plautus, " Trinummus," 205-211. ^ Homer, " Iliad," i, 255, 
 ^ Literally " the artists of Dionysus." We know what they were frcim 
 
 our author's " Qusestiones Romanse," § 107 : Sid tl tovq rrefji tqv 
 
 Aiovvcrov Texvirag iffTpiiovng 'Pw/^aioi KuXovaiv ; 
 
HOW A MAN MAT BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 205 
 
 others, they not only wake up but tune their instruments, 
 and adjust their chords, and play on the flute with more 
 care. Similarly whoever knows that his enemy is an- 
 tagonistic to his life and character, pays more attention to 
 himself, and watches his behaviour more carefully, and 
 regulates his life. For it is peculiar to vice to be more 
 afraid of enemies than friends in regard to our faults. And 
 so Nasica, when some expressed their opinion that the 
 Roman Republic was now secure, since Carthage was rased 
 to the ground and Achaia reduced to slavery, said, " Nay 
 rather we are now in a critical position, since we have none 
 left to fear or respect." 
 
 § IV. Consider also that very philosophical and witty 
 answer of Diogenes to the man who asked, " How shall I 
 avenge myself on my enemy?" "By becoming a good 
 and honest man." ^ Some people are terribly put about 
 if they see their enemies' horses in a good condition, or 
 hear their dogs praised ; if they see their farm well-tilled, 
 their garden well-kept, they groan aloud. What a state 
 think you then they would be in, if you were to exhibit 
 yourself as a just man, sensible and good, in words excel- 
 lent, in deeds pure, in manner of life decorous, " reap- 
 ing fruit from the deep soil of the soul, where good 
 counsels grow." ' Pindar says ^ " those that are conquered 
 are reduced to complete silence :" but not absolutely, not 
 all men, only those that see they are outdone by their 
 enemies in industry, in goodness, in magnanimity, in 
 humanity, in kindnesses ; these, as Demosthenes says, " stop 
 the tongue, block up the mouth, choke people, and make 
 them silent." ^ 
 
 •'* Be better than the bad : 'tis in your power," ° 
 
 If you wish to vex the man who hates you, do not abuse 
 him by calling him a pathick, or effeminate, or intemperate, 
 or a low fellow, or illiberal ; but be yourself a man, and 
 temperate, and truthful, and kind and just in all your 
 
 ^ Compare " De Audiendis Poetis," § iv. 
 
 2 ^schylus, " Septem contra Thebas," 593, 594. 
 
 ^ Pindar, " Pragm," 253. 
 
 * Demosthenes, " De Palsa Legatione," p. 406. 
 
 * Euripides, "Orestes," 251. 
 
206 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 dealings with those you come across. But if yon are 
 tempted to use abuse, mind that you yourself are very far 
 from what you abuse him for, dive down into your own 
 soul, look for any rottenness in yourself, lest someone 
 suggest to you the line of the tragedian, 
 
 " You doctor others, all diseased yourself." ^ 
 
 If you say your enemy is uneducated, increase your own 
 love of learning and industry ; if you call him coward, stir 
 up the more your own spirit and manliness ; and if you 
 say he is wanton and licentious, erase from your own soul 
 any secret trace of the love of pleasure. For nothing is 
 more disgraceful or more unpleasant than slander that 
 recoils on the person who sets it in motion ; for as the 
 reflection of light seems most to injure weak eyes, so does 
 censure when it recoils on the censurer, and is borne out 
 by the facts. For as the north-east wind attracts clouds, so 
 does a bad life draw upon itself rebukes. 
 
 § V. Whenever Plato was in company with people who 
 behaved in an unseemly manner, he used to say to himself, 
 " Am I such a person as this ? " ^ So he that censures 
 another man's life, if he straightway examines and mends 
 his own, directing and turning it into the contrary direc- 
 tion, will get some advantage from his censure, which will 
 be otherwise idle and unprofitable. Most people laugh if 
 a bald-pate or hump-back jeer and mock at others who are 
 so too : it is quite as ridiculous to jeer and mock if one lies 
 open to retort oneself, as Leo of Byzantium showed in his 
 answer to the hump-back who jeered at him for weakness 
 of eyes, " You twit me with an infirmity natural to man, 
 while you yourself carry your Nemesis on your back."^ 
 And so do not abuse another as an adulterer, if you yourself 
 are mad after boys : nor as a spendthrift, if you yourself 
 are niggardly. Alcmaeon said to Adrastus, " You are 
 near kinsman to a woman that slew her husband." What 
 
 ^ A line from Euripides. Quoted also " De Adulatore et Amico," 
 § xxxii. 
 
 •^ Compare " De Audiendo," § vi. See also Horace, " Satires," i. 4. 
 136, 137. 
 
 ^ The story is somewhat differently told, " Quaist. Conviv.," Lib. ii, 
 §ix. 
 
HOW A MAN MAY BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 207 
 
 was his reply ? He retaliated on him with the appropriate 
 retort, " Bat you killed with your own hand the mother 
 that bare you." ^ And Domitius said to Crassus, " Did 
 you not weep for the lamprey that was bred in your fish- 
 pond, and died ? " To which Crassus replied, " Did you 
 weep, when you buried your three wives ?" He therefore 
 that intends to abuse others must not be witty and noi.sy 
 and impudent, but a man that does not lie open to counter- 
 abuse and retort, for the god seems to have enjoined upon 
 no one the precept " Know thyself " so much as on the person 
 who is censorious, to prevent people saying just what they 
 please, and hearing what don't please them. For such a 
 one is wont, as Sophocles ''' says, " idly letting his tongue 
 flow, to hear against his will, what he willingly says ill of 
 others." 
 
 § VI. This use and advantage then there is in abusing 
 one's enemy, and no less arises from being abused and ill- 
 spoken of oneself by one's enemies. And so Antisthenes ^ 
 said well that those who wish to lead a good life ought to 
 have genuine friends or red-hot enemies ; for the former 
 deterred you from what was wrong by reproof, the latter 
 by abuse'. But since friendship has nowadays become 
 very mealy-mouthed in freedom of speech, voluble in 
 flattery and silent in rebuke, we can only hear the truth 
 from our enemies. For as Telephus * having no surgeon of 
 his own, submitted his wound to be cured by his enemy's 
 spear, so those who cannot procure friendly rebuke 
 must content themselves with the censure of an enemy that 
 hates them, reprehending and castigating their vices, and 
 regard not the animus of the person, but only his matter. 
 For as he who intended to kill the Thessalian Prometheus' 
 
 ' From a lost play of Euripides. 
 
 2 In some lost play. Compare Hesiod, " Works and Bays," 719-721 ; 
 Terence, " Andria," 920. 
 
 ^ The sentiment is assigned to Diogenes twice elsewhere by our 
 author, namely, " How One may be aware of one's Progress in Virtue," 
 § xi. , and " How One may discern a Flatterer from a Friend," § xxxvi. 
 
 ^ See Propertius, ii. 1. 63, 64; Ovid, "Metamorphoses," xii. 112; 
 xiii. 171 ; " Tristia," v. 2. 15, 16 ; " Reraedia Amoris," 47, 48 ; Erasmus, 
 " Adagia,"p.221. 
 
 * *' Jason Pherjeus cognomine Prometheus dictus est. Vide Cice- 
 ronem, ' Nat. Deor,' iii. 29 ; Plinium, vii. 51 ; Valerium Maximiim, 
 i. 8, Extern. 6." — Wyttenhach. 
 
208 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 only stabbed a tumour, and so lanced it that the man's 
 life was saved, and he was rid of the tumour by its bursting, 
 so oftentimes abuse, suddenly thrust on a man in anger or 
 hatred, has cured some disease in his soul which he was 
 ignorant of or neglected. But most people when they are 
 abused do not consider whether the abuse really belongs to 
 them properly, but look round to see what abuse they can 
 heap on the abuser, and, as wrestlers get smothered with 
 the dust of the arena, do not wipe off the abuse hurled at 
 themselves, but bespatter others, and at last get on both, 
 sides grimy and discoloured. But if anyone gets a bad 
 name from an enemy, he ought to clear himself of the im- 
 putation even more than he would remove any stain on his 
 clothes that was pointed out to him ; and if it be wholly 
 untrue, yet he ought to investigate what originated the 
 charge, and to be on his guard and be afraid lest he had 
 unawares done something very near akin to what was im- 
 puted to him. As Lacydes, the king of the Argives, by 
 the way he wore his hair and by his mincing walk got 
 charged with effeminacy : and Pompey's scratching his 
 head with one finger was construed in the same way, though 
 both these men were very far from effeminacy or wanton- 
 ness. And Crassus was accused of an intrigue with one 
 of the Vestal Virgins, because he wished to purchase from 
 her a pleasant estate, and therefore frequently visited her 
 and waited upon her. And Postumia, from her readiness 
 to laugh and talk somewhat freely with men, got accused 
 and even had to stand her trial for incest,^ but was, how- 
 ever, acquitted of that charge : but Spurius Minucius the 
 Pontifex Maximus, when he pronounced her innocent, urged 
 her not to be freer in her words than she was in her life. 
 And though Themistocles' was guiltless of treason, his 
 intimacy with Pausanias, and the letters and messages that 
 frequently passed between them, laid him under suspicion. 
 § VII. Whenever therefore any false charge is made 
 against us, we ought not merely to despise and neglect it 
 as false, but to see what word or action, either in jest or 
 earnest, has made the charge seem probable, and this we 
 
 ' She was a Vestal Virgin. See Livy, iv. 44. 
 2 See Thucydides, i. 135, 136. 
 
HOW A MAN MAT BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 209 
 
 must for the future be earnestly on our ^uard against and 
 shun. For if others falling into unforeseen trouble and 
 difficulties teach us what is expedient, as Merope says, 
 " Fortune has made me wise, though she has ta'en 
 My dearest ones as wages," ^ 
 why should we not take an enemy, and pay him no wages, 
 to teach us, and give us profit and instruction, in matters 
 which had escaped our notice ? For an enemy has keener 
 perception than a friend, for, as Plato ^ says, " the lover is 
 blind as respects the loved one," and hatred is both curious 
 and talkative. Hiero was twitted by one of his enemies 
 for his foul breath, so he went home and said to his wife, 
 " How is this ? You never told me of it." But she being 
 chaste and innocent replied, " I thought all men's breath 
 was like that." ^ Thus perceptible and material things, 
 and things that are plain to everybody, are sooner learnt 
 from enemies than from friends and intimates. 
 
 § VIII. Moreover to keep the tongue well under control, 
 no small factor in moral excellence, and to make it always 
 obedient and submissive to reason, is not possible, unless 
 by practice and attention and painstaking a man has sub- 
 dued his worst passions, as for example anger. For such ex- 
 pressions as " a word uttered involuntarily," and "escaping 
 the barrier of the teeth," ^ and " words darting forth spon- 
 taneously," well illustrate what happens in the case of ill- 
 disciplined souls, ever wavering and in an unsettled con- 
 dition through infirmity of temper, through unbridled fancy, 
 or through faulty education. But, according to divine Plato,' 
 though a word seems a very trivial matter, the heaviest 
 penalty follows upon it both from gods and men. But 
 silence can never be called to account, is not only not 
 thirsty, to borrow the language of Hippocrates, but when 
 abused is dignified and Socratic, or rather Herculean, if 
 indeed it was Hercules who said, 
 
 " Sharp words he heeded not so much as flies." ^ 
 
 ^ From a lost play of Euripides. Compare the proverb, iraOrifiaTa 
 fiaQi]naTa. ^ " Laws," v. p. 731 E. 
 
 3 Told again " Reg. et Imperator. Apophthegm.," p. 175 B. 
 
 * A favourite image of Homer, employed " Iliad," iv. 350 ; xiv. 83 ; 
 " Odyssey," i. 64 ; xxiii. 70. 
 
 ^ " Laws," xi. p. 935 A. Quoted again " On Talkativeness," § vii, 
 
 '^ See Pausanias, v. 14. 
 
 P 
 
210 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Not more dignified and noble than this is it to keep silent 
 when an enemy reviles you, "as one swims by a smooth 
 and mocking cliff," but in practice it is better. I£ you 
 accustom yourself to bear silently the abuse of an enemy, 
 you w^U very easily bear the attack of a scolding wife, and 
 will remain undisturbed when you hear the sharp language 
 of a friend or brother, and will be calm and placid when 
 you are beaten or have something thrown at your head by 
 your father or mother. For Socrates put up with Xan- 
 thippe, a passionate and froward woman, which made him 
 a more easy companion with others, as being accustomed to 
 submit to her caprices ; and it is far better to train and 
 accustom the temper to bear quietly the insults and rages 
 and jeers and taunts of enemies and estranged persons, and 
 not to be distressed at it. 
 
 § IX. Thus then must we exhibit in our enmities meek- 
 ness and forbearance, and in our friendships still more sim- 
 plicity and magnanimity and kindness. For it is not so 
 graceful to do a friend a service, as disgraceful to refuse to 
 do so at his request; and not to revenge oneself on an 
 enemy when opportunity offers is generous. But the man 
 who sympathizes with his enemy in affliction, and assists 
 him in distress, and readily holds out a helping hand to his 
 children and family and their fortunes when in a low con- 
 dition, whoever does not admire such a man for his humanity, 
 and praise his benevolence, 
 
 " He has a black heart made of adamant 
 Or iron or bronze." ^ 
 
 When Caesar ordered the statues of Pompey that had been 
 thrown down to be put up again,^ Cicero said, " You have 
 set up again Pompey's statues, and in so doing have erected 
 statues to yourself." We ought not therefore to be 
 niggardly in our praise and honour of an enemy that 
 deserves a good name. For he who praises another receives 
 on that account greater praise himself, and is the more 
 credited on another occasion when he finds fault, as not 
 having any personal ill-feeling against the man, but only 
 
 ^ From a Fragment of Pindar. 
 
 ^ See Suetonius, *' Divus Julius," 75 : " Sed et statuas L. Sullaeatque 
 Pompeii a plebe disjectas reposuit." 
 
HOW A MAN MAT BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 211 
 
 disapproving of his act ; aud what is most noble and 
 advantageous, the man who is accustomed to praise his 
 enemies, and not to be vexed or malignant at their pros- 
 perity, is as far as possible from envying the good fortune 
 of his friends, and the success of his intimates. And yet 
 what practice will be more beneficial to our minds, or bring 
 about a happier disposition, than that which banishes from 
 us all jealousy and envy ? For as in war many necessary 
 things, otherwise bad, are customary and have as it were 
 the sanction of law, so that they cannot be abolished in 
 spite of the injury they do, so enmity drags along in its 
 train hatred, and envy, and jealousy, and malignity, and 
 revenge, and stamps them on the character. Moreover 
 knavery, and deceit, and villainy, that seem neither bad nor 
 unfair if employed against an enemy, if they once get 
 planted in the mind are difiB.cult to dislodge ; and even- 
 tually from force of habit get used also against friends, 
 unless they are forewarned and forearmed through their 
 previous acquaintance with the tricks of enemies. If then 
 Pythagoras,^ accustoming his disciples to abstain from all 
 cruelty and inhumanity to the brute creation, did right to 
 discountenance bird-fowling, and to buy up draughts of 
 fishes and bid them be thrown into the water again, and to 
 forbid killing any but wild animals, much more noble is it, 
 in dissensions and differences with human beings, to be a 
 generous, just and true enemy, and to check and tame all 
 bad and low and knavish propensities, that in all inter- 
 course with friends a man may keep the peace and abstain 
 from doing an injury. Scaurus was an enemy and accuser 
 of Domitius, but when one of Domitius' slaves came to him 
 to reveal some important matters which were unknown to 
 Scaurus, he would not hear him, but seized him and sent 
 him back to his master. And when Cato was prosecuting 
 Murena for canvassing, and was getting together his 
 evidence, he was accompanied as was usual by people who 
 watched what he was doing,^ and would often ask him if he 
 intended that day to get together his witnesses and open 
 the case, and if he said " No," they believed him and went 
 
 ^ Compare our author, " Quaestiones Convivalium," viii. p. 729 E. 
 ^ No doubt in the interest of the defendant. See our author, " Cato 
 Minor," p. 769 B. 
 
212 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 their way. All this is the greatest proof of the credit 
 which was reposed in Cato, but it is better and more im- 
 portant, that we should accustom ourselves to deal justly 
 even with our enemies, and then there will be no fear that 
 we should ever act unjustly and treacherously to our friends 
 and intimates. 
 
 § X. But since, as Simonides says, " all larks must have 
 their crests,"^ and every man's nature contains in it pugnacity 
 and jealousy and envy, which last is, as Pindar says, " the 
 companion of empty-headed men," one might get consider- 
 able advantage by purging oneself of those passions against 
 enemies, and by diverting them, like sewers, as far as 
 possible from companions and friends." And this it seems 
 the statesmanlike Onomademus had remarked, for being 
 on the victorious side in a disturbance at Chios, he urged 
 his party not to expel all of the different faction, but to 
 leave some, " in order," he said, " that we may not begin 
 to quarrel with our friends, when we have got entirely rid 
 of our enemies." So too our expending these passions 
 entirely on our enemies will give less trouble to our friends. 
 For it ought not to be, as Hesiod^ says, that " potter envies 
 potter, and singer envies singer, and neighbour neighbour," 
 and cousin cousin, and brother brother, "if hastening to get 
 rich " and enjoying prosperity. But if there is no other 
 way to get rid of strife and envy and quarrels, accustom 
 yourself to be vexed at your enemies' good fortune, and 
 sharpen and accentuate on them your acerbity. For as 
 judicious gardeners think they produce finer roses and 
 violets by planting alongside of them garlic and onions, 
 that any bitter or strong elements may be transferred to 
 them, so your enemy's getting and attracting your envy 
 and malignity will render you kinder and more agreeable 
 to your prosperous friends. And so let us be rivals of our 
 enemies for glory or office or righteous gain, not only being 
 vexed if they get ahead of us, but also carefully observing 
 all the steps by which they get ahead, and trying to*outdo 
 
 ^ A Greek proverb, see Erasmus, " Adagia," p. 921. 
 
 - So Cicero, " Nat. Deor." ii. 56 : " In aedibus architecti arertunt ab 
 oculis naribusque dominorum ea quae profluentia necessario tsetri essent 
 aliquid habitura." 
 
 2 " Works and Days," 23-26. Our " Two of a trade seldom agree." 
 
HOW A MAN MAY BE BENEFITED BY HIS ENEMIES. 213 
 
 them in industry, and hard work, and soberness, and pru- 
 dence ; as Themistocles said Miltiades' victory at Marathon 
 would not let him sleep/ For he who thinks his enemy 
 gets before him in offices, or advocacies, or state affairs, or in 
 favour with his friends or great men, if from action and emu- 
 lation he sinks into envy and despondency, makes his life 
 become idle and inoperative. But he who is not blinded by 
 hate,^ but a discerning spectator of life and character and 
 words and deeds, will perceive that most of what he envies 
 comes to those who have them from diligence and prudence 
 and good actions, and exerting himself in the same direction 
 he will increase his love of what is honourable and noble, 
 and will eradicate his vanity and sloth. 
 
 § XI. But if our enemies seem to us to have got either by 
 flattery, or fraud, or bribery, or venal services, ill-got and 
 discreditable power at court or in state, it ought not to 
 trouble us but rather inspire pleasure in us, when we 
 compare our own liberty and purity and independence of 
 life. For, as Plato ^ says, " all the gold above or below the 
 earth is not of equal value with virtue." And we ought 
 ever to remember the precept of Solon, "We will not 
 exchange our virtue for others' wealth."'' Nor will we 
 give up our virtue for the applause of banqueting theatres, 
 nor for honours and chief seats among eunuchs and harlots, 
 nor to be monarchs' satraps ; for nothing is to be desired 
 or noble that comes from what is bad. But since, as Plato" 
 says, "the lover is blind as respects the loved one," and 
 we notice more what our enemies do amiss, we ought not 
 to let either our joy at their faults or our grief at their 
 success be idle, but in either case we ought to reflect, how 
 we may become better than them by avoiding their errors, 
 and by imitating their virtues not come short of them. 
 
 ^ Compare "How One may be aware of one's Progress in Virtue," 
 §xiv. 
 
 ^ For as the English proverb says, " Hatred is blind as well as love." 
 
 3 " Laws," V. p. 728 A. 
 
 * Quoted more fully " How One may be aware of one's Progress in 
 Virtue," § vi. 
 
 ^ " Laws," v. p. 731 E. See also above, § vii. 
 
214 PLUTAROe's MORALS. 
 
 ON TALKATIVENESS.' 
 
 § I. Philosophy finds talkativeness a disease very difficult 
 and hard to cure. For its remedy, conversation, requires 
 hearers : but talkative people hear nobody, for they are 
 ever prating. And the first evil this inability to keep 
 silence produces is an inability to listen. It is a self -chosen 
 deafness of people who, I take it, blame nature for giving 
 us one tongue and two ears. If then the following advice 
 of Euripides to a foolish hearer was good, 
 
 " I cannot fill one that can nought retain, 
 Pumping up wise words for an unwise man ; " 
 
 one might more justly say to a talkative man, or rather 
 about a talkative man, 
 
 " I cannot fill one that will nothing take, 
 Pumping up wise words for an unwise man ; " 
 
 or rather deluging with words one that talks to those who 
 don't listen, and listens not to those who talk. Even if 
 he does listen for a short time, talkativeness hurries off 
 what is said like the retiring sea, and anon brings it up 
 again multiplied with the approaching tide. The portico 
 at Olyiupia that returns many echoes to one utterance is 
 called seven- voiced,^ and if the slightest utterance catches 
 the ear of talkativeness, it at once echoes it all round, 
 
 '* Moving the mind's chords all unmoved before." ^ 
 
 For their ears can certainly have no passages leading to the 
 brain but only to the tongue. And so while other people 
 retain what they hear, talkative people lose it altogether, 
 and, being empty-headed, they resemble empty vessels, and 
 go about making much noise.* 
 
 ^ Or Garrulity^ Chattering, Prating. It is Talkativeness in a bad 
 sense. 
 
 ^ Or Heptaphonos. See Pausanias, v. 21. 
 
 ^ Some unknown poet's words. I suppose they mean driving one 
 mad, making one " Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh." 
 
 * So our English proverb, " Empty vessels make the greatest sound." 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 215 
 
 § II. If however it seems that no attempt at cure has 
 been left untried, let us say to the talkative person, 
 
 " Be silent, boy ; silence has great advantages ; " 
 
 two of the first and foremost of which are hearing and 
 being heard, neither of which can happen to talkative 
 people, for however they desire either so unhappy are they 
 that they must desist from it. For in all other diseases of 
 the soul, as love of money, love of glory, or love of pleasure, 
 people at any rate attain the desired object : but it is the 
 cruel fate of talkative people to desire hearers but not to 
 get them, for everyone flees from them with headlong 
 speed ; and if people are sitting or walking about in any 
 public place,' and see one coming they quickly pass the 
 word to one another to shift quarters. And as when there 
 is dead silence in any assembly they say Hermes has joined 
 the company, so when any prater joins some drinking 
 party or social gathering of friends, all are silent, not 
 wishing to give him a chance to break in, and if he un- 
 invited begin to open his mouth, they all, " like before a 
 storm at sea, when Boreas is blowing a gale round some 
 headland," foreseeing tossing about and nausea, disperse. 
 And so it is their destiny to find neither willing table- 
 companions, nor messmates when they are travelling by 
 land or by sea, but only such as cannot help themselves ; 
 for such a fellow is always at you, plucking hold of your 
 clothes or chin, or giving you a dig in the ribs with his 
 elbow. " Most valuable are the feet in such a conjuncture," 
 according to Archilochus, nay according to the wise Aris- 
 totle himself. For he being bothered with a talkative 
 fellow, and wearied out with his absurd tales, and his 
 frequent question, " Is not this wonderful, Aristotle ? " 
 *' Not at all," said he, " but it is wonderful that anyone 
 with a pair of legs stops here to listen to you." And to 
 another such fellow, who said after a long rigmarole, "Did 
 I weary you, philosopher, by my chatter ? " " Not you, by 
 Zeus," said he, "for I paid no attention to you." For 
 
 ^ Literally in a semi-circular place. It is not quite clear whether the 
 front seats of the theatre are meant, or, as I have taken it, more gene- 
 rally, of some public place for entertainment or meeting, some pro- 
 menade or piazza. 
 
216 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 even if talkative people force you to listen/ the mind can 
 give them only its outward ears to deluge, while it unfolds 
 and pursues some other thoughts within ; so they find 
 neither hearers to attend to them, nor credit them. They 
 say those that are prone to Venus are commonly barren: 
 so the prating of talkative people is ineffectual and fruit- 
 less. 
 
 § 111. And yet nature has fenced and barricaded in us 
 nothing so much as the tongue, having put the teeth 
 before it as a barrier, so that if, when reason holds tight 
 her "glossy reins," ^ it hearken not, nor keep within 
 bounds, we may check its intemperance, biting it till the 
 blood comes. For Euripides tells us that, not from un- 
 bolted houses or store-rooms, but " from unbridled mouths 
 the end is misfortune."^ But those persons who think 
 that houses without doors and open purses are no good to 
 their possessors, and yet keep their mouths open and un- 
 shut, and allow their speech to flow continually like the 
 waves of the Euxine,* seem to regard speech as of less value 
 than anything. And so they never get believed, though 
 credit is the aim of every speech ; for to inspire belief in 
 one's hearers is the proper end of speech, but praters are 
 disbelieved even when they tell the truth. For as corn 
 stowed away in a granary is found to be larger in quantity 
 but inferior in quality, so the speech of a talkative man is 
 increased by a large addition of falsehood, which destroys 
 his credit. 
 
 § IV. Then again every man of modesty and propriety 
 would avoid drunkenness, for anger is next door neighbour 
 to madness as some think,' but drunkenness lives in the 
 same house : or rather drunkenness is madness, more 
 short-lived indeed, but more potent also through voli- 
 tion, for it is self-chosen. Nor is drunkenness censured 
 for anything so much as its intemperate and endless 
 talk. 
 
 ^ Reading clkovhv, which seems far the best reading. 
 '■^ Homer, " Iliad," v. 226 ; " Odyssey," vi. 81. 
 3 "Bacchje," 385-387. 
 * See Ovid, " Tristia," iv. 4, 55-58. 
 
 ^ For example, Horace, " Epistles," i. 2. 62 : " Ira furor brevis est. 
 I read oyioToixoQ with Mez. 
 
ON TALKATIYENESS. 217 
 
 " Wine makes a prudent man begin to sing, 
 And gently laugh, and even makes him dance." ^ 
 
 And yet there is no harm in all this, in singing and laugh- 
 ing and dancing. But the poet adds — 
 
 " And it compels to say what's best unsaid."^ 
 
 This is indeed dreadful and dangerous. And perhaps the 
 poet in this passage has solved that problem of the philo- 
 sophers, and stated the difference between being under the 
 influence of wine and being drunk, mirth being the condition 
 of the former, foolish talk of the latter. For as the proverb 
 tells us, "What is in the heart of the sober is on the 
 tongue of the drunken."^ And so Bias, being silent at a 
 drinking bout, and jeered at by some young man in the 
 company as stupid, replied, " What fool could hold his 
 tongue in liquor ? " And at Athens a certain person gave 
 an entertainment to the king's ambassadors, and at their 
 desire contrived to get the philosophers there too, and as 
 they were all talking together and comparing ideas, and 
 Zeno alone was silent, the strangers greeted him and 
 pledged him, and said, " What are we to tell the king 
 about you, Zeno ? " And he replied, " Nothing, but that 
 there is an old man at Athens that can hold his tongue at 
 a drinking bout." So profound and mysterious and sober 
 is silence, while drunkenness is talkative : for it is void of 
 sense and understanding, and so is loquacious. And so 
 the philosophers define drunkenness to be silly talk in wine. 
 Drinking therefore is not censured, if silence go with it, 
 but foolish prating turns being under the influence of wine 
 into drunkenness. And the drunken man prates only in 
 his cups ; but the talkative man prates everywhere, in the 
 market-place, in the theatre, out walking, by night and by 
 day. If he is your doctor, he is more trouble to you than 
 your disease : if he is on board ship with you, he disgusts 
 you more than sea-sickness ; if he praises you, he is more 
 fulsome than blame. It is more pleasure associating with 
 bad men who have tact than with good men who prate. 
 
 ^ Homer, " Odyssey," xiv. 463-465. ^ jj^j^ 456. 
 
 ^ Compare the German proverb, " Thought when sober, said when 
 drunk " — " Nuchtern gedacht, voll gesagt." 
 
218 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 Nestor indeed in Sophocles' Play, trying by his words to 
 soothe exasperated Ajax, said to him mildly, 
 
 " I blame you not, for though your words are bad, 
 Your acts are good : " 
 
 but we cannot feel so to the talkative man, for his want of 
 tact in words destroys and nndoes all the grace of his 
 actions. 
 
 § V. Lysias wrote a defence for some accused person, 
 and gave it him, and he read it several times, and came to 
 Lysias in great dejection and said, *' When I first perused 
 this defence, it seemed to me wonderful, but when I read it 
 a second and third time, it seemed altogether dull and in- 
 effective. Then Lysias laughed, and said, "What then? 
 Are you going to read it more than once to the jury ? " 
 And yet do but consider the persuasiveness and grace of 
 Lysias' style ;^ for he "I say was a great favourite with 
 the dark-haired Muses. "^ And of the things which have 
 been said of Homer the truest is that he alone of all poets 
 has survived the fastidiousness of mankind, as being ever 
 new and still at his acme as regards giving pleasure, and 
 yet saying and proclaiming about himself, " I hate to spin 
 out a plain tale over and over again," ^ he avoids and fears 
 that satiety which lies in ambush for every narrative, and 
 takes the hearer from one subject to another, and relieves 
 by novelty the possibility of bein surfeited. But the 
 talkative worry one's ears to death with their tautologies, 
 as people scribble the same things over and over again on 
 palimpsests.* 
 
 § VI. Let us remind them then first of this, that just as in 
 the case of wine, which was intended for pleasure and mirth, 
 those who compel people to drink it neat and in large quan- 
 tities bring some into a disgusting condition of drunkenness, 
 so with speech, which is the pleasantest social tie amongst 
 
 ' Cf. Quintilian, x. 1, 78 : " His setate Lysias major, subtilis atque 
 elegans et quo nihil, si oratori satis est docere, quoeras perfectius. 
 Nihil enim est inane, niliil arcessitum ; puro tamen fonti quam magno 
 flumini propior." Cf. ix. 4, 17. 
 
 ^ Somewhat like Pindar, " Pyth." i. 1.1, 2. 
 
 » " Odyssey," xii. 452, 453. 
 
 * See Cicero, " Ad Fam." vii. 18 ; Catullus, xxii. 5, 6. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 219 
 
 mankind, those who make a bad and ill-advised use of it 
 render it unpleasing and unfit for company, paining those 
 whom they think to gratify, and become a laughing-stock 
 to those who they think admire them, and objectionable to 
 those who they think love them. As then he cannot be a 
 favourite of the goddess v^ho with Aphrodite's charmed 
 girdle^ repels and drives away those who associate with 
 him, so he who with his speech bores and disgusts one is 
 without either taste or refinement. 
 
 § VII. Of all other passions and disorders some are dan- 
 gerous, some hateful, some ridiculous, but in talkative- 
 ness all these elements are combined. For praters are 
 jeered at for their commonplaces, and hated when they 
 bring bad news, and run into danger when they reveal 
 secrets. And so Anacharsis, when he was feasted by 
 Solon and lay down to sleep, and was observed with his 
 left hand on his private parts, and his right hand on his 
 mouth, for he thought his tongue needed the stronger 
 restraint, was right in his opinion. For it would be diffi- 
 cult to find as many men who have been ruined by 
 venereal excesses as cities and leading states that have 
 been undone by the utterance of a secret. When Sulla 
 was besieging Athens, and had no time to waste there, 
 " for he had other fish to fry,"^ as Mithridates was ravag- 
 ing Asia, and the party of Marius was again in power at 
 Rome, some old men in a barber's shop happened to 
 observe to one another that the Heptachalcon was not well 
 guarded, and that their city ran a great risk of being cap- 
 tured at that point, and some spies who overheard this con- 
 versation reported it to Sulla. And he at once marched up 
 his forces, and about midnight entered the city with his 
 army, and all but rased it to the ground, and filled it with 
 slaughter and dead bodies, insomuch that the Ceramicus 
 ran with blood : and he was thus savage against the 
 Athenians for their words rather than their deeds, for they 
 had spoken ill of him and his wife Metella, jumping on to 
 the walls and calling out in a jeering way, 
 
 " Sulla is a mulberry bestrewn with barley meal," 
 
 » See " Iliad," xiv. 214-217. 
 
 2 *' Allusio ad Homericum tTret ttovoq dWog ineiyei.'^ — Xylander. 
 
220 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and much similar banter. Thus they drew down upon 
 themselves for words, which, as Plato ^ says, are a very 
 small matter, a very heavy punishment." The prating of 
 one man also prevented Rome from becoming free by the 
 removal of Nero. For it was only the night before the 
 tyrant was to be murdered, and all preparations had been 
 made, when he that was to do the deed going to the 
 theatre, and seeing someone in chains near the doors who 
 was about to be taken before Nero, and was bewailing his 
 sad fortune, went up close to him and whispered, " Pray 
 only, good sir, that to-day may pass by, to-morrow you 
 will owe me many thanks." He guessing the meaning of 
 the riddle, and thinking, I take it, " he is a fool who gives 
 up what is in his hand for a remote contingency,"^ pre- 
 ferred certain to honourable safety. For he informed 
 Nero of what the man had said, and he was immediately 
 arrested, and torture, and fire, and scourging were applied 
 to him, who denied now in his necessity what before he 
 had divulged without necessity, 
 
 § Yiii. Zeno the philosopher,* that he might not against 
 his will divulge any secrets when put to the torture, bit 
 off his tongue, and spit it at the tyrant. Famous also was 
 the reward which Leeena had for her taciturnity.^ She was 
 the mistress of Harmodius and Aristogiton, and, although 
 a woman, participated in their hopes of success in the con- 
 spiracy against the tyrants : for she had revelled in the 
 glorious cup of love, and had been initiated in their secrets 
 through the god. When then they had failed in their attempt 
 and been put to death, and she was examined and bidden to 
 reveal the names of the other conspirators, she refused to 
 do so, and held out to the end, showing that those famous 
 men in loving such a one as her had done nothing un- 
 worthy of them. And the Athenians erected to her 
 
 1 "Laws,"xi. p. 935 A. 
 
 ^ So true are the words of ^schylus, yXMCFffy fiaraig, Z,r]jxia 
 7rpo(Trpt/3Erai.— "Proni." 329. 
 
 3 Our " A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush." 
 
 * " Non Cittieus, sed Eleates. v. Cic. Tuscul. ii. 22, et Nat. Deor. 
 3, SZ.''—Reiske. 
 
 ° See Pausanias, i. 23. Leaena means ''lioness." On the con- 
 spiracy see Thucydides, vi. 54-59. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 221 
 
 memory a bronze lioness without a tongue, and placed it 
 near the entrance to the Acropolis, signifying her daunt- 
 less courage by the nobleness of that animal, and by its 
 being without a tongue her silence and fidelity. For no 
 spoken word has done as much good as many unspoken 
 ones. For at some future day we can give utterance if we 
 like to what has been not said, but a word once spoken 
 cannot be recalled, but flies about and runs all round the 
 world. And this is the reason, I take it, why men teach 
 us to speak, but the gods teach us to be silent, silence being 
 enjoined on us in the mysteries and in all religious rites. 
 Thus Homer has described the most eloquent Odysseus, 
 and Telemachus, and Penelope, and the nurse, as all re- 
 markable for their taciturnity. You remember the nurse 
 saying, 
 
 " I'll keep it close as heart of oak or steel." ^ 
 
 And Odysseus sitting by Penelope, 
 
 " Though in his heart he pitied her sad grief. 
 His eyes like horn or steel impassive stood 
 Within their lids, and craft his tears repressed." "^ 
 
 So great control had he over all his body, and so much 
 were all his members under the sway and rule of reason, 
 that he commanded his eyes not to weep, his tongue not to 
 speak, and his heart not to tremble or quake.^ 
 
 " So calm and passive did his heart remain,"* 
 
 reason penetrating even to the irrational instincts, and 
 making spirit and blood obedient and docile to it. Such 
 also were most of his companions, for though they were 
 dashed to the ground and dragged along by the Cyclops, 
 they said not a word about Odysseus, nor did they show 
 the stake of wood that had been put into the fire and pre- 
 pared to put out Polyphemus' eye, but they would rather 
 have been eaten alive than divulge secrets, such wonderful 
 
 ^ Homer, " Odyssey," xix. 494. Plutarch quotes from memory. The 
 nurse's name was Euryclea. 
 
 2 "Odyssey," xix. 210-212. Quoted again " On Moral Virtue," § iv. 
 
 3 Literally barJc. See " Odyssey," xx. 13, 16. 
 ^ " Odyssey," xx. 23. 
 
222 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 self-control and fidelity had thej.^ And so it was not 
 amiss of Pittacus, when the king of Egypt sent him a 
 victim, and bade him take from it the best and worst piece 
 of it, to pull out the tongue and send that to the king, as 
 being the instrument of the greatest blessings and withal 
 the greatest mischiefs. 
 
 § IX. So Ino in Euripides, speaking plainly about her- 
 self, says she knows " how t9 be silent when she should, 
 and to speak when speech is safe."^ For those who have 
 enjoyed a truly noble and royal education learn first to be 
 silent and then to speak. So the famous king Antigonus, 
 when his son asked him, " When are we going to shift our 
 quarters ? " answered, " Are you afraid that you only will 
 not hear the trumpet ? " Was he afraid then to entrust a 
 secret to him, to whom he intended one day to leave his 
 kingdom ? Nay rather, it was to teach him to be close and 
 guarded on such matters. Metellus ^ also, the well-known 
 veteran, when questioned somewhat similarly about an ex- 
 pedition, said, "If I thought my coat knew the secret, 
 I would strip it off and throw it into the fire." And Eu- 
 menes, when he heard that Craterus was marching against 
 him, told none of his friends, but pretended that it was 
 Neoptolemus ; for his soldiers despised Neoptolemus, but 
 they admired the glory and loved the virtue of Craterus ; 
 and no one but Eumenes knew the truth, and they engaged 
 and were victorious, and unwittingly killed Craterus, and 
 only recognized his dead body. So great a part did silence 
 play in the battle, concealing the name of the enemy's 
 general : so that Eumenes' friends marvelled more than 
 found fault at his not having told them the truth. And if 
 anyone should receive blame in such a case, it is better to 
 be censured when one has done well by keeping one's 
 counsel, rather than to have to accuse others through 
 having come to grief by trusting them. 
 
 § X. But, generally speaking, who has the right to blame 
 the person who has not kept his secret ? For if it was not 
 to be known, it was not well to tell another person of it at 
 
 * See " Odyssey," ix. Kv/cXoiTreia. 
 2 Euripides, "Ino." Fragment, 416. 
 
 ^ " Significat Q. Csecilium Metellum, de quo Liv. xl. 45, 46." 
 — Beiske. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 223 
 
 all, and if you divulged your secret yourself and expected 
 another person to keep it, you had more faith in another 
 than in yourself. And so should he be such another as 
 yourself you are deservedly undone, and should he be a better 
 man than yourself, your safety is more than you could 
 have reckoned on, as it involved finding a man more to 
 be trusted than yourself. But you will say, He is my 
 friend. Yes, but he has another friend, whom he reposes 
 confidence in as much as you do in your friend, and that 
 other friend has one of his own, and so on, so that the 
 secret spreads in many quarters from inability to keep it 
 close in one. For as the unit never deviates from its orbit, 
 but (as its name signifies) always remains one, but the 
 number two contains within it the seeds of infinity, for 
 when it departs from itself it becomes plurality at once by 
 doubling, so speech confined in one person's breast is truly 
 secret, but if it be communicated to another it soon gets 
 noised abroad. And so Homer calls words " winged," for as 
 he that lets a bird go from his hands cannot easily get it 
 back again, so he that lets a word go from his mouth cannot 
 catch or stop it, but it is borne along " whirling on swift 
 wings," and dispersed from one person to another. When 
 a ship scuds before the gale the mariners can stop it, or at 
 least check its course with cables and anchors, but when the 
 spoken word once sails out of harbour, so to speak, there is 
 no roadstead or anchorage for it, but borne along with much 
 noise and echo it dashes its utterer on the rocks, and brings 
 him into imminent danger of shipwreck, 
 
 " As one might set on fire Ida's woods 
 
 With a small toi'ch, so what one tells one person 
 
 Is soon the property of all the citizens." ' 
 
 § XI. The Roman Senate had been discussing for several 
 days a secret matter, and there was much, doubt and sus- 
 picion about it. And one of the senator's wives, discreet 
 in other matters but a very woman in curiosity, pressed 
 her husband close, and entreated him to tell her what the 
 secret was ; she vowed and swore she would not divulge it, 
 and did not refrain from shedding tears at her not being 
 trusted. And he, nothing loth to convince her of her folly, 
 
 ^ Euripides, "Ino." Fragm. 415. Compare St. James, iii. 5, 6. 
 
224 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 said, " Your importunity, wife, has prevailed, listen to a 
 dreadful and portentous matter. It has been told us by 
 the priests that a lark has been seen flying in the air witb 
 a golden helmet and spear : it is this portent that we are 
 considering and discussing with the augurs, as to whether 
 it be a good or bad omen. But say nothing about it." 
 Having said these words he went into the Forum. But 
 bis wife seized on the very first of her maids that entered 
 the room, and smote her breast, and tore ber hair, and 
 said, " Alas ! for my husband and country ! What will 
 become of us ? " wishing and teaching her maid to say, 
 " Whatever's up ? " So when she inquired she told her 
 all about it, adding that refrain common to all praters, 
 " Tell no one a word about it." The maid however had 
 scarce left her mistress when she told one of her fellow- 
 servants who was doing little or nothing, and she told her 
 lover who happened to call at that moment. So the news 
 spread to the Forum so quickly that it got the start of its 
 original author, and one of his friends meeting him said, 
 " Have you only just left your house ? " " Only just," he 
 replied. "Didn't you hear the news ?" said his friend. 
 "What news?" said he, "Why, that a lark has been 
 seen flying in the air with a golden helmet and spear, and 
 the Senate are met to discuss the portent." And he 
 smiled and said to himself, " You are quick, wife, for the 
 tale to get before me to the Forum ! " Then meeting some 
 of the Senators he disabused them of their panic. But to 
 punish his wife, he said when he got home, " You have 
 undone me, wife : for the secret has got abroad from my 
 house, so that I must be an exile from my country for your 
 inability to keep a secret." And on her trying to deny it, 
 and saying, " Were there not three hundred Senators that 
 heard of it as well as you ? Might not one of them have 
 divulged it ? " he replied, " Stuff o' your three hundred ! 
 It was at your importunity that I invented the story, to put 
 you to the test ! " This fellow tested his wife warily and 
 cunningly, as one pours water, and not wine or oil, into a 
 leaky vessel. And Fabius,^ the friend of Augustus, hearing 
 
 ^ Fabius Maximus. So Tacitus, "Annals," i. 5, who relates this 
 story somewhat differently. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 225 
 
 the Emperor in his old age monrning over the extinction 
 of his family, how two of his daughter Julia's sons were 
 dead, and how Posthumus Agrippa, the only remaining 
 one, was in exile through false accusation/ and how he was 
 compelled to put his wife's son '^ into the succession to the 
 Empire, though he pitied Agrippa and had half a mind to 
 recall him from banishment, repeated the Emperor's words 
 to his wife, and she to Livia.^ And Livia bitterly up- 
 braided Augustus, if he meant recalling his grandson, for 
 not having done so long ago, instead of bringing her into 
 hatred and hostihty with the heir to the Empire. When 
 Fabius came in the morning as usual into the Emperor's 
 presence, and said, " Hail, Csesar ! " the Emperor replied, 
 " Farewell,* Fabius." And he understanding the mean- 
 ing of this straightway went home, and sent for his 
 wife, and said, " The Emperor knows that I have not kept 
 his secret, so I shall kill myself." And his wife replied,. 
 *' You have deserved your fate, since having been mai'ried 
 to me so long you did not remember and guard against my 
 incontinence of speech, but suffer me to kill myself first. '^ 
 So saying she took his sword, and slew herself first. 
 
 § XII. That was a good answer therefore that the comic 
 poet Philippides made to king Lysimachus, who greeted 
 him kindly, and said to him,' " What shall I give you of 
 all my possessions ? " "Whatever you like, O king, ex- 
 cept your secrets." And talkativeness has another plague 
 attached to it, even curiosity : for praters wish to hear 
 much that they may have much to say, and most of all do 
 they gad about to investigate and pry into secrets and hidden 
 things, providing as it were an antiquated stock of rubbish " 
 for their twaddle, in fine like children who cannot '^ hold ice 
 in their hands, and yet are unwilling to let it go,^ or rather 
 taking secrets to their bosoms and embracing them as if 
 
 ^ See Tacitus, '• Annals,"' i. 3. As to his fate, see " Annals," i. 6. 
 - Tiberius Nero, who actually did succeed Augustus. 
 ^ The Emperor's wife. 
 
 * So it is in § xii. But perhajos hei*e it means, " I wish you had more 
 sense, Fabius! " 
 
 ■' Adopting the reading of Reiske. 
 ° Reading cpopvTov or (pofjvTMv, as Wyttenbach. 
 '' Reading KaAx^iv dvvavTai with Reiske. 
 ^ See Sophocles, Fragm. 162. 
 
 Q 
 
226 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 they were so many serpents, that they cannot control, but 
 are sure to be gnawed to death by. They say that garfish 
 and vipers burst in giving life to their young, so secrets by 
 coming out ruin and destroy those who cannot keep them. 
 Seleucus Callinicus having lost his army and all his forces 
 in a battle against the Galati, threw off his diadem, and 
 fled on a swift horse with an escort of three or four of his 
 men a long day's journey by bypaths and out-of-the-way 
 tracks, till faint and famishing for want of food he drew 
 rein at a small farmhouse, where by chance he found the 
 master at home, and asked for some bread and water. 
 And he supplied him liberally and courteously not only 
 with what he asked for but with whatever else was on the 
 farm, and recognized the king, and being very joyful at 
 this opportunity of ministering to the king's necessities, he 
 could not contain himself, nor dissemble like the king who 
 wished to be incognito, but he accompanied him to the 
 road, and on parting from him, said, " Farewell, king 
 Seleucus." And he stretching out his right hand, and 
 drawing the man to him as if he was going to kiss him, 
 gave a sign to one of his escort to draw his sword and cut 
 the man's head off ; 
 
 "And at his woi'd the head roll'd in the dust." ' 
 
 Whereas if he had been silent then, and kept his counsel 
 for a time, as the king afterwards became prosperous and 
 great, he would have received, I take it, greater favour for 
 his silence than for his hospitality. And yet he had I admit 
 some excuse for his want of reticence, namely hope and joy. 
 § XIII. But most talkative peojDle have no excuse for 
 ruining themselves. As for example in a barber's shop one 
 day there was some conversation about the tyranny of 
 Dionysius, that it was as hard as adamant and invincible, 
 and the barber laughed and said, " Fancy your saying this 
 to me, who have my razor at his throat most days ! " And 
 Dionysius hearing this had him crucified. Barbers indeed 
 are generally a talkative race, for people fond of prating 
 flock to them and sit in their shops, so that they pick up 
 the habit from their customers. It was a witty answer 
 
 ' Homer, " Iliad," x. 457. 
 
ON TALKATIYENESS. 227 
 
 therefore of king Archelaus/ when a talkative barber put 
 the towel round his neck, and asked him, " How shall I 
 shave you, king?" "Silently," said the monarch. It 
 was a barber that first spread the news of the great reverse 
 of the Athenians in Sicily, having heard of it at the Piraeus 
 from a slave that had escaped from the island. He at 
 once left his shop, and ran into the city at full speed, 
 " that no one else should reap the fame, and he come in 
 the second,"^ of carrying the news into the town. And an 
 uproar arising, as was only to be expected, the people 
 assembled in the ecclesia, and began to investigate the 
 origin of the rumour. So the barber was dragged up and 
 questioned, but knew not the person's name who had told 
 him, so was obliged to refer its origin to an anonymous and 
 unknown person. Then anger filled the theatre, and the 
 multitude cried out, " Torture the cursed fellow, put him 
 to the rack : he has fabricated and concocted this news : 
 who else heard it ? who credits it ? " The wheel was brought, 
 the poor fellow stretched on it. Meantime those came 
 up who had brought the news, who had escaped from the 
 carnage in Sicily. Then all the multitude dispersed to 
 weep over their private sorrows, and abandoned the poor 
 barber, who remained fastened to the wheel. And when 
 released late in the evening he actually asked the execu- 
 tioner, if they had heard how Nicias the General was slain. 
 So invincible and incorrigible a vice does habit make 
 talkativeness to be. 
 
 § XIV. And yet, as those that drink bitter and strong- 
 smelling physic are disgusted even with the cups they 
 drink it out of, so those that bring evil tidings are dis- 
 liked and hated by their hearers. Wittily therefore has 
 Sophocles described the conversation between Creon and 
 the guard. 
 
 " Gr. Is't in your ears or in your mind you're grieved ? 
 C. Why do you thus define the seat of grief ? 
 Cr. The doer pains your mind, but I your ears."^ 
 
 However those that tell the tale grieve us as well as those 
 
 ^ Compare " Moralia," p. 177 A; Horace, " Satires," i. 7. 3 : " Omni- 
 bus et lippis notum et tonsoribus." 
 
 2 Homer, "Iliad," xxii. 207. ^ Sophocles, "Antigone," 317-319. 
 
228 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 that did the deed : and yet there is no means of checking 
 or controlling the running tongue. At Lacedaemon the 
 temple of Athene Chalcioecus ^ was broken into, and an 
 empty flagon was observed lying on the ground inside, and 
 a great concourse of people came up and discussed the 
 matter. And one of the company said, " If you will allow 
 me, I will tell you what I think about this flagon. I can- 
 not help being of opinion that these sacrilegious wretches 
 drank hemlock, and brought wine with them, before com- 
 mencing their nefarious and dangerous work : that so, if 
 they should fail to be detected, they might depart in safety, 
 drinking the wine neat as an antidote to the hemlock : 
 •whereas should they be caught in the act, before they were 
 put to the torture they would die of the poison easily and 
 painlessly." When he had uttered these words, the idea 
 seemed so ingenious and farfetched that it looked as if it 
 could not emanate from fancy, but only from knowledge of 
 the real facts. So the crowd surrounded this man, and asked 
 him one after the other, " Who are you ? Who knows you? 
 How come you to know all this?" And at last he was 
 convicted in this way, and confessed that he was one of 
 those that had committed the sacrilege. And were not the 
 murderers of Ibycus similarly captured ? They were 
 sitting in the theatre, and some cranes flew over their heads, 
 and they laughed and whispered to one another, " Behold 
 the avengers of Ibycus." And this being overheard by 
 some who sat near, as Ibycus had now been some time 
 missing and inquired after, they laid hold of this remark, 
 and reported it to the magistrates. And so they were con- 
 victed and dragged off to punishment, being brought to 
 justice not by the cranes but by their own inability to hold 
 their tongues, being compelled by some Fury or Vengeance 
 as it were to divulge the murder.^ For as in the body 
 there is an attraction to sore and suffering parts from 
 neighbouring parts, so the tongue of talkative persons, ever 
 suffering from inflammation and a throbbing pulse, attracts 
 and draws to it secret and hidden things. And so the 
 tongue ought to be fenced in, and have reason ever before 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, iii. 17 ; iv, 15 ; x. 5. 
 
 ^ Compare the idea of the people of Melita, Acts xxviii. 4. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 229 
 
 it, as a bulwark, to prevent its tripping : that we may not 
 seem to be more sillj than geese, of whom it is said that, 
 when they fly from Cilicia over Mt. Taurus which swarms 
 with eagles, they carry in their mouths a large stone, which 
 they employ as a gag or bridle for their scream, and so 
 they cross over by night unobserved. 
 
 § XV. Now if anyone were to ask who is the worst and 
 most abandoned man, no one would pass over the traitor, 
 or mention anyone else. It was as the reward of treason 
 that Euthy crates roofed his house with Macedonian wood, 
 as Demosthenes tells us ; and that Philocrates got a large 
 sum of money, and spent it on women and fish ; and it was 
 for betraying Eretria that Euphorbus and Philagrus got an 
 estate from king Philip. But the talkative man is an 
 unhired and officious traitor, not of horses^ or walls, but of 
 secrets which he divulges in the law courts, in factions, in 
 party-strife, no one thanking him for his pains ; but should 
 anyone listen to him he thinks he is the obliged party. 
 So that what was said to a man who rashly and indiscrimi- 
 nately squandered away all his means and bestowed them 
 on others, 
 
 '' It is not kindness in you but disease, 
 
 This itch for giving,"^ 
 
 is appropriate also to the prater, " You don't communicate to 
 "US all this out of friendship or goodwill, but it is a disease 
 in you, this itch for talking and prating." 
 
 § XVI. But all this must not be looked upon merely as 
 an indictment against talkativeness, but an attempt to cure 
 it: for we overcome the passions by judgement and practice, 
 but judgement is the first step. For no one is wont to shun, 
 and eradicate from his soul, what he does not dislike. 
 And we dislike the passions only when we discern by 
 reason the harm and shame that results to us by indulging 
 them. As we see every day in the case of talkative people : 
 if they wish to be loved, they are hated ; if they desire to 
 please, they bore ; when they think they are admired, they 
 are really laughed at ; they spend, and get no gain from so 
 
 ^ An Allusion to Dolon in Homer, " Iliad," x., 374, sq. according to 
 Xylander. 
 
 - Quoted again by our author in his " Publicola," p. 105 B. , and 
 assigned to Epicharmus. 
 
230 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 doing ; they injure their friends, benefit their enemies, and 
 rnin themselves. So that the first cure and remedy of this 
 disorder will be to reckon up the shame and trouble that 
 results from it. 
 
 § XVII. In the next place we must consider the opposite 
 virtue to talkativeness, always listening to and having on 
 our lips the encomiums passed upon reserve, and remember- 
 ing the decorum sanctity and mysterious power of silence, 
 and ever bearing in mind that terse and brief speakers, who 
 put the maximum of matter into the minimum of words, 
 are more admired and esteemed and thought wiser ^ than 
 unbridled windbags. And so Plato ^ praises, and compares 
 to clever javelin-men, such as speak tersely, compressedly, 
 and concisely. And Lycurgus by using his citizens from 
 boyhood to silence taught them to perfection their brevity 
 and terseness. For as the Celtiberians make steel of iron 
 only after digging down deep in the soil, and carefully 
 separating the iron ore, so Laconian oratory has no rind,^ 
 but by the removal of all superfluous matter goes home 
 straight to the point like steel. For its sententiousness,^ 
 and pointed suppleness in repartee, comes from the habit 
 of silence. And we ought to quote such pointed sayings 
 especially to talkative people, such neatness and vigour 
 have they, as, for example, what the Lacedaemonians said 
 to Philip, " [Remember] Dionysius at Corinth."' And 
 again, when Philip wrote to them, " If I invade Laconia, I 
 will drive you all out of house and home," they only wrote 
 back, "If." And when king Demetrius was indignant and 
 cried out, " The Lacedaemonians have only sent me one 
 ambassador," the ambassador was not frightened but said, 
 " Yes, one to one man." Certainly among the ancients men 
 of few words were admired. So the Amphictyones did not 
 write extracts from the Iliad or Odyssey, or the Paeans of 
 
 ^ So Shakspere lias taught us, " Brevity is the soul of wit." — Hamlet, 
 Act ii. Sc. 2. 
 
 2 "In Frotagora." — Xylander. 
 
 3 That is, is all kernel. See passim our author's " Apophthegmata 
 Laconica." 
 
 * Or, apophtheg'matic nature. 
 
 ^ Dionysius the younger, tyrant of Syracuse, was expelled, and 
 aftei'wards kept a school at Corinth. That is the allusion. It would 
 be like saying " Remember Napoleon at St. Helena." 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 281 
 
 Pindar, in the temple of Pythian Apollo at Delphi, but 
 " Know thyself," " Not too much of anything,"^ and " Be 
 a surety, trouble is near;"^ so much did they admire com- 
 pactness and simplicity of speech, combining brevity with 
 shrewdness of mind. And is not the god himself short and 
 concise in his oracles ? Is he not called Loxias,' because 
 he prefers ambiguity to longwindedness ? And are not 
 those who express their meaning by signs without words 
 wonderfully praised and admired ? As Heraclitus, when 
 some of the citizens asked him to give them his opinion 
 about concord, got on the platform, and took a cup of cold 
 water, and put some barley-meal in it, and stirred it up 
 with penny-royal, thus showing them that it is being 
 content with anything, and not needing costly dainties, 
 that keeps cities in peace and concord. Scilurus, the king 
 of the Scythians, left eighty sons, and on his deathbed asked 
 for a bundle of sticks, and bade his sons break it when it 
 was tied together, and when they could not, he took the 
 sticks one by one and easily broke them all up : thus showing 
 them that their harmony and concord would make them 
 strong and hard to overthrow, while dissension would make 
 them feeble and insecure. 
 
 § XVIII. If then anyone were continually to recollect and 
 repeat these or similar terse sayings, he would probably 
 cease to be pleased with idle talk. As for myself, when I 
 consider of what importance it is to attend to reason, and 
 to keep to one's purpose, I confess I am quite put out of 
 countenance by the example of the slave of Pupius Piso 
 the orator. He, not wishing to be annoyed by their prating, 
 ordered his slaves merely to answer his questions, and not 
 say a word more. On one occasion wishing to pay honour 
 to Clodius who was then in power, he ordered him to be 
 invited to his house, and provided for him no doubt a 
 sumptuous entertainment. At the time fixed all the guests 
 were present except Clodius, for whom they waited, and 
 the host frequently sent the slave who used to invite guests 
 to see if he was coming, but when evening came, and he 
 was now quite despaired of, he said to his slave, " Did you 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, x. 24. - See Plato, " Charmides," 165 A. 
 
 ^ A title applied to Apollo first by Herodotus, i. 91, from his 
 ambiguous {Xo^d) oracles. 
 
232 plutaech's morals. 
 
 not invite bim ? " "Certainly," said the slave. "Why 
 then has he not come ? " said the master. " Because he 
 declined," said the slave. *' Why then did you. not tell me 
 of it at once?" said the master. "Because you never 
 asked me," said the slave. This was a Roman slave. But 
 an Athenian slave " while digging will tell his master on 
 what terms peace was made." So great is the force of 
 habit in all matters. And of it we will now speak. 
 
 § XIX. For it is not by applying bit or bridle that we can 
 restrain the talkative person, we must master the disease 
 by habit. In the first place then, when you are in company 
 and questions are going round, accustom yourself not to 
 speak till all the rest have declined giving an answer. For 
 as Sophocles says, "counsel is not like a race;" no more 
 are question and answer. For in a race the victory belongs 
 to him who gets in first, but in company, if anyone has 
 given a satisfactory answer, it is sufiicient by assenting and 
 agreeing to his view to get the reputation of being a plea- 
 sant fellow ; and if no satisfactory answer is given, then to 
 enlighten ignorance and supply the necessary information 
 is well-timed and does not excite envy. But let us be espe- 
 cially on our guard that, if anyone else is asked a question, 
 we do not ourselves anticipate and intercept him in giving 
 an answer. It is indeed perhaps nowhere good form, if 
 another is asked a favour, to push him aside and undertake 
 to grant it ourselves ; for we shall seem so to upbraid two 
 people at once, the one who was asked as not able to grant 
 the favour, and the other as not knowing how to ask in 
 the right quarter. But especially insulting is such forward- 
 ness and impetuosity in answering questions. For he that 
 anticipates by his own answer the person that was asked 
 the question seems to say, " What is the good of asking 
 him ? What does he know about it ? In my presence 
 nobody else ought to be asked about these matters." And 
 yet we often put questions to people, not so much because 
 we want an answer, as to elicit from them conversation and 
 friendly feeling, and from a wish to fit them for company, 
 as Socrates drew out Thegetetus and Charmides. For it is 
 all one to run up and kiss one who wishes to be kissed by 
 another, or to divert to oneself the attention that he was 
 bestowing on another, as to intercept another person's 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 233 
 
 answers, and to transfer people's ears, and force their 
 attention, and fix them on oneself ; when, even if he that 
 was asked declines to give an answer, it will be well to hold 
 oneself in reserve, and only to meet the question modestly 
 when one's turn comes, so framing one's answer as to seem 
 to oblige the person who asked the question, and as if one 
 had been appealed to for an answer by the other. For if 
 people are asked questions and cannot give a satisfactory 
 answer they are with justice excused ; but he who without 
 being asked undertakes to answer a question, and antici- 
 pates another, is disagreeable even if he succeeds, while, if 
 his answer is unsatisfactory, he is ridiculed by all the com- 
 pany, and his failure is a source of the liveliest satisfaction 
 to them, 
 
 § XX. The next thing to practise oneself to in answering 
 the questions put to one, — a point to which the talkative 
 person ought to pay the greatest attention, — is not through 
 inadvertence to give serious answers to people who only 
 challenge you to talk in fun and sport. For some people 
 concoct questions not for real information, but simply for 
 amusement and to pass the time away, and propound them 
 to talkative people, just to have them on. Against this 
 we must be on our guard, and not rush into conversation 
 too hastily, or as if we were obliged for the chance, but we 
 must consider the character of the inquirer and his purpose. 
 When it seems that he really desires information, we should 
 accustom ourselves to pause, and interpose some interval 
 between the question and answer ; during which time the 
 questioner can add anything if he chooses, and the other 
 can reflect on his answer, and not be in too great a hurry 
 about it, nor bury it in obscurity, nor, as is frequently the 
 case in too great haste, answer some other question than that 
 which was asked. The Pythian Priestess indeed was accus- 
 tomed to utter some of her oracles at the very moment 
 before the question was put : for the god whom she serves 
 "understands the dumb, and hears the mute."^ But he 
 that wishes to give an appropriate answer must carefully 
 consider both the question and the mind of the questioner, 
 lest it be as the proverb expresses it, 
 
 ^ Part of the words of an oracle of the Pythian Priestess, slightly 
 changed. The whole oracle may be seen in Herodotus, i. 47. 
 
234 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 " I asked for shovels, they denied me pails." ^ 
 
 Besides we ought to check this greediness and hunger for 
 words, that it may not seem as if we had a flood on our 
 tongue which was dammed up, but which we were only too 
 glad to discharge^ on a question being put. Socrates 
 indeed so repressed his thirst, that he would not allow 
 himself to drink after exercise in the gymnasium, till he 
 had first drawn from the well one bucket of water and 
 poured it on to the ground, that he might accustom his 
 irrational part to wait upon reason. 
 
 § XXI. There are moreover three kinds of answers to 
 questions, the necessary, the polite, and the superfluous. 
 For instance, if anyone asked, "Is Socrates at home?" 
 one, as if backward and disinclined to answer, might say, 
 " ITot at home ; " or, if he wished to speak with Laconic 
 brevity, might cut off "at home," and simply say " N^o ; " 
 as, when Philip wrote to the Lacedaemonians to ask if they 
 would receive him in their city, they sent him back merely 
 a large "No." But another would answer more politely, 
 " He is not at home, but with the bankers," and if he 
 wished to add a little more, " he expects to see some 
 strangers there." But the superfluous prater, if he has 
 read Antimachus of Colophon,^ says, " He is not at home, 
 but with the bankers, waiting for some Ionian strangers, 
 about whom he has had a letter from Alcibiades who is in 
 the neighbourhood of Miletus, staying with Tissaphernes 
 the satrap of the great king, who used long ago to favour 
 the Lacedaemonian party, but now attaches himself to the 
 Athenians for Alcibiades' sake, for Alcibiades desires to 
 return to his country, and so has succeeded in changing 
 the views of Tissaphernes." And then he will go over 
 the whole of the Eighth Book of Thucydides, and deluge 
 the man, till before he is aware Miletus is captured, and 
 Alcibiades is in exile the second time. In such a case 
 most of all ought we to curtail talkativeness, by following 
 
 ^ Proverb of cross purposes. 
 
 ^ Reading llipaadai with Diibner. 
 
 ^ Catullus calls him " tumidus," i.e. long-winded, 95, 10. See also 
 Propertius, iii. 34-32. He was a Greek poet, a contemporary of Socrates 
 and Plato, and author of a Thebaid. Pausanias mentions him, viii. 25 ; 
 ix. 35. 
 
ON TALKATITENESS. 235 
 
 the track of a qnestion closely, and tracing oat our answer 
 according to the need of the questioner with the same 
 accuracy as we describe a circle. When Carneades was 
 disputing in the gymnasium before the days of his great 
 fame, the superintendent of the gymnasium sent to him a 
 message to bid him modulate his voice (for it was of the 
 loudest), and when he asked him to fix a standard, the 
 superintendent replied not amiss, " The standard of the 
 person talking with you." So the meaning of the ques- 
 tioner ought to be the standard for the answer. 
 
 § XXII. Moreover as Socrates urged his disciples to abstain 
 from such food as tempted them to eat when they were not 
 hungry, and from such drinks as tempted them to drink 
 when they were not thirsty, so the talkative person ought to 
 be afraid most of such subjects of conversation as he most 
 delights in and repeats ad nauseam, and to try and resist 
 their influence. For example, soldiers are fond of descrip- 
 tions about war, and thus Homer introduces N^estor fre- 
 quently narrating his prowess and glorious deeds. And 
 generally speaking those who have been successful in the 
 law courts, or beyond their hopes been favourites of kings 
 and princes, are possessed, as it were by some disease, with 
 the itch for frequently recalling and narrating, how they 
 got on and were advanced, what struggles they underwent, 
 how they argued on some famous occasion, how they won 
 the day either as plaintiffs or defendants, what panegyrics 
 were showered upon them. For joy is much more in- 
 clined to prate than the well-known sleeplessness repre- 
 sented in comedies, frequently rousing itself, and finding 
 something fresh to relate. And so at any excuse they slip 
 into such narratives. For not only, 
 
 "Where anyone does itch, there goes his hand,"^ 
 
 but also delight has a voice of its own, and leads about the 
 tongue in its train, ever wishing to fortify it with memory. 
 Thus lovers spend most of their time in conversations 
 that revive the memory of their loves ; and if they cannot 
 talk to human beings about them, they talk about them to 
 inanimate objects, as, " dearest bed," and, 
 
 ' The mediaeval proverb, Ubi dolor ibi digitus. 
 
236 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 " O happy lamp, Bacchis deems you a god, 
 And if she thinks so, then you are indeed 
 The greatest of the gods." 
 
 The talkative person therefore is merely as regards words a 
 white line/ but he that is especially inclined to certain sub- 
 jects should be especially on his guard against talking about 
 them, and should avoid such topics, since from the pleasure 
 they give him they may entice him to be very prolix and 
 tedious. The same is the case with people in regard to 
 such subjects as they think they are more experienced in 
 and acquainted with than others. For such a one, being 
 self-appreciative and fond of fame, " spends most of the 
 day in that particular branch of study in which he chances 
 to be proficient."^ Thus he that is fond of reading will 
 give his time to research ; the grammarian his to syntax ; 
 and the traveller, who has wandered over many countries, 
 his to geography. We must therefore be on our guard 
 against our favourite topics, for they are an enticement to 
 talkativeness, as its wonted haunts are to an animal. Ad- 
 mirable therefore was the behaviour of Cyrus in chal- 
 lenging his companions, not to those contests in which he 
 was superior to them, but to those in which he was inferior, 
 partly that he might not give them pain through his supe- 
 riority, partly for his own benefit by learning from them. 
 But the talkative person acts just contrary, for if any sub- 
 ject is introduced from which he might learn something 
 he did not know, this he rejects and refuses, not being 
 able to earn a good deal by a short silence,^ but he rambles 
 round the subject and babbles out stale and commonplace 
 rhapsodies. As one amongst us, who by chance had read 
 two or three of the books of Ephorus,^ bored everybody, 
 and dispersed every social party, by always narrating the 
 
 ^ A proverbial expression for having no judgment. See Sophocles, 
 Fragm. 307 5 Plato, " Charmides," 154 B ; Erasmus, " Adagia." So 
 we say a person's mind is a blank sheet on a subject he knows nothing 
 about. 
 
 ^ Euripides, Fragm. 202. Quoted also by Plato, " Gorgias," 484 E. 
 
 ^ Reading with Reiske, fiiffObv ahrtp dovi'm rqi [xiicpbv cnuiTrriaai 
 
 jiTJ ^VVajXtVOQ. 
 
 * A celebrated Greek historian, and pupil of Isocrates. See Cicero, 
 " De Oraiore," ii. 13. 
 
ON TALKATIVENESS. 237 
 
 particulars of the battle of Leuctra and its consequences, 
 so that he got nicknamed Epaminondas. 
 
 § XXIII. Nevertheless this is one of the least of the evils 
 of talkativeness, and we ought even to try and divert it 
 into such channels as these, for prating is less of a nuisance 
 when it is on some literary subject. We ought also to try 
 and get some persons to write on some topic, and so discuss 
 it by themselves. For Antipater the Stoic philosopher,^ 
 not being able or willing it seems to dispute with Carneades, 
 who inveighed vehemently against the Stoic philosophy, 
 writing and filling many books of controversy against him, 
 got the nickname of Noisy -ivith-the-pe7i ; and perhaps the 
 exercise and excitement of writing, keeping him very much 
 apart from the community, might make the talkative man 
 by degrees better company to those he associated with ; 
 as dogs, bestowing their rage on sticks and stones, are less 
 savage to men. It will also be very advantageous for such 
 to mix with people better and older than themselves, for 
 they will accustom themselves to be silent by standing in 
 awe of their reputation. And withal it will be well, when 
 we are going to say something, and the words are on our 
 lips, to reflect and consider, " What is this word that is so 
 eager for utterance ? To what is this tongue marching ? 
 What good will come of speaking now, or what harm of 
 silence?" For we ought not to drop words as we should 
 a burden that pressed upon us, for the word remains still 
 after it has been spoken just the same ; but men speak 
 either on their own behalf if they want something, or to 
 benefit those that hear them, or, to gratify one another, 
 they season everyday life with speech, as one seasons food 
 with salt. But if words are neither useful to the speaker, 
 nor necessary for the hearer, nor contain any pleasure or 
 charm, why are they spoken ? For words may be idle 
 and useless as well as deeds. And besides all this we must 
 ever remember as most important the dictum of Simonides, 
 that he had often repented he had spoken, but never that 
 he had been silent : while as to the power and strength of 
 practice consider how men by much toil and painstaking 
 will get rid even of a cough or hiccough. And silence is 
 
 ^ Of Tarsus. See Cicero, " De Officiis," iii. 12. 
 
238 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 not only never thirsty, as Hippocrates says, but also never 
 brings pain or sorrow. 
 
 ON CURIOSITY.' 
 
 § I. If a house is dark, or has little air, is in an exposed 
 position, or unhealthy, the best thing will probably be to 
 leave it ; but if one is attached to it from long residence 
 in it, one can improve it and make it more light and airy 
 and healthy by altering the position of the windows and 
 stairs, and by throwing open new doors and shutting up 
 old ones. So some towns have been altered for the better, 
 as my native place,^ which did lie to the west and received 
 the rays of the setting sun from Parnassus, was they say 
 turned to the east by Chajron. And Empedocles the 
 naturalist is supposed to have driven away the pestilence 
 from that district, by having closed up a mountain gorge 
 that was prejudicial to health by admitting the south 
 wind to the plains. Similarly, as there are certain diseases 
 of the soul that are injurious and harmful and bring storm 
 and darkness to it, the best thing will be to eject them and 
 lay them low by giving them open sky, pure air and light, or, 
 if that cannot be, to change and improve them some way 
 or other. One such mental disease, that immediately 
 suggests itself to one, is curiosity, the desire to know other 
 people's troubles, a disease that seems neither free from 
 envy nor malignity. 
 
 " Malignant wretch, why art so keen to mark 
 Thy neighbour's fault, and seest not thine own ? " ^ 
 
 Shift your view, and turn your curiosity so as to look in- 
 wards : if you delight to study the history of evils, you have 
 copious material at home, " as much as there is water in 
 the Alizon, or leaves on the oak," such a quantity of faults 
 will you find in your own life, and passions in your soul, 
 
 ' Jeremy Taylor has largely borrowed from this Treatise in his 
 " Holy Living," chap. ii. § v. Of Modesty. 
 2 Chsei'onea in Boeotia. 
 ^ Lines from some comic poet, no doubt. 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 239 
 
 and shortcomings in your dutj. For as Xenophon says ^ 
 good managers have one place for the vessels they use in 
 sacrificing, and another for those they use at meals, one 
 place for their farm instruments, and another for their 
 weapons of war, so your faults arise from different causes, 
 some from envy, some from jealousy, some from cowardice, 
 some from meanness. Review these, consider these ; bar 
 up the curiosity that pries into your neighbours' windows 
 and passages, and open it on the men's apartments, and 
 women's apartments, and servant's attics, in your own 
 house. There this inquisitiveness and curiosity will find 
 full vent, in inquiries that will not be useless or malicious, 
 but advantageous and serviceable, each one saying to 
 himself, 
 
 " What have I done amiss ? What have I done ? 
 What that I ought to have done left undone ? " 
 
 § II. And now, as they say of Lamia that she is blind 
 when she sleeps at home, for she puts her eyes on her 
 dressing-table, but when she goes out she pats her eyes on 
 again, and has good sight, so each of us turns, like an 
 eye, our malicious curiosity out of doors and on others, 
 while we are frequently blind and ignorant about our own 
 faults and vices, not applying to them our eyes and light. 
 So that the curious man is more use to his enemies than to 
 himself, for he finds fault with and exposes their short- 
 comings, and shows them what they ought to avoid and 
 correct, while he neglects most of his affairs at home, 
 owing to his excitement about things abroad. Odysseus 
 indeed would not converse with his mother till he had 
 learnt from the seer Tiresias what he went to Hades to 
 learn ; and after receiving that information, then he turned 
 to her, and asked questions about the other women, who 
 Tyro was, and who the fair Chloris, and why Epicaste^ 
 had died, " having fastened a noose with a long drop to 
 the lofty beam." ^ But we, while very remiss and ignorant 
 and careless about ourselves, know all about the pedigrees 
 
 ^ " CEconomicus," cap. viii. 
 
 2 The mother of CEdipus, better knovk^n as " Jocasta." 
 
 ^ Homer, " Odyssey," xi. 278. Epicaste hung herself. 
 
240 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 of other people, that our neighbour's grandfather was a 
 Syrian, and his grandmother a Thracian woman, and that 
 such a one owes three talents, and has not paid the interest. 
 We even inquire into such trifling matters as where some- 
 body's wife has been, and what those two are talking in 
 the corner about. But Socrates used to busy himself in 
 examining the secret of Pythagoras' persuasive oratory, 
 and Aristippus, meeting Ischomachus at the Olympian 
 games, asked him how Socrates conversed so as to have so 
 much influence over the young men, and having received 
 from him a few scraps and samples of his style, was so 
 enthusiastic about it that he wasted away, and became 
 quite pale and lean, thirsty and parched, till he sailed to 
 Athens and drew from the fountain-head, and knew the 
 wonderful man himself and his speeches and philosophy, the 
 object of which was that men should recognize their faults 
 and so get rid of them. 
 
 § iiL But some men cannot bear to look upon their own 
 life, so unlovely a spectacle is it, nor to throw and flash on 
 themselves, like a lantern, the reflection of reason ; but 
 their soul being burdened with all manner of vices, and 
 dreading and shuddering at its own interior, sallies forth and 
 wanders abroad, feeding and fattening its malignity there. 
 For as a hen, when its food stands near its coop,^ will fre- 
 quently slip off into a corner and scratch up, 
 
 " Where I ween some poor little grain appears on the dunghill," 
 
 so curious people neglecting conversation or inquiry abont 
 common matters, such as no one would try and prevent or 
 be indignant at their prying into, pick out the secret and 
 hidden troubles of every family. And yet that was a witty 
 answer of the Egyptian, to the person who asked him, 
 " What he was carrying wrapped up ; " "It was wrapped 
 up on purpose that you should not know." And you too, 
 Sir, I would say to a curious person, why do you pry into 
 what is hidden ? If it were not something bad it would 
 not be hidden. Indeed it is not usual to go into a strange 
 house without knocking at the door, and nowadays there 
 are porters, but in old times there were knockers on doors 
 
 ^ "otK^c7/c^ corrigit Valckenarius ad Herodot. p. 557." — Wyttenbach. 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 241 
 
 to let the people inside know when anyone called, that a 
 stranger might not find the mistress or daughter of the 
 house en deshabille, or one of the slaves being corrected, or 
 the maids bawling out. But the curious person intrudes 
 on all such occasions as these, although he would be unwill- 
 ing to be a spectator, even if invited, of a well-ordered 
 family : but the things for which bars and bolts and doors 
 are required, these he reveals and divulges openly to others. 
 Those are the most troublesome winds, as Aristo says, that 
 blow up our clothes : but the curious person not only strips 
 off the garments and clothes of his neighbours, but breaks 
 through their walls, opens their doors, and like the wanton 
 wind, that insinuates itself into maidenly reserve, he pries 
 into and calumniates dances and routs and revels. 
 
 § IV. And as Cleon is satirized in the play ^ as having 
 " his hands among the ^tolians, but his soul in Peculation- 
 town," so the soul of the curious man is at once in the 
 mansions of the rich, and the cottages of the poor, and the 
 courts of kings, and the bridal chambers of the newly 
 married ; he pries into everything, the affairs of foreigners, 
 the affairs of princes, and sometimes not without danger. 
 For just as if one were to taste aconite to investigate its 
 properties, and kill oneself before one had discovered them, 
 so those that pry into the troubles of great people ruin 
 themselves before they get the knowledge they desire; 
 even as those become blind who, neglecting the wide and 
 general diffusion all over the earth of the sun's rays, im- 
 pudently attempt to gaze at its orb and penetrate to its light. 
 And so that was a wise answer of Philippides the Comic 
 Poet, when King Lysimachus asked him on one occasion, 
 "What would you like to have of mine? " "Anything, O 
 king, but your secrets." For the pleasantest and finest 
 things to be got from kings are public, as banquets, and 
 riches, and festivities, and favours : but come not near any 
 secret of theirs, pry not into it. There is no concealment 
 of the joy of a prosperous monarch, or of his laugh when 
 he is in a playful mood, or of any tokens of his goodwill 
 and favour ; but dreadful is what he conceals, his gloomi- 
 ness, his sternness, his reserve, his store of latent wrath, his 
 
 ^ Aristophanes, " Equites," 79. 
 B 
 
242 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 meditation on stern revenge, his jealousy of his wife, or 
 suspicion of his son, or doubt about the fidelity of a friend. 
 Flee from this cloud that is so black and threatening, for 
 when its hidden fury bursts forth, you will not fail to hear 
 its thunder and see its lightning. 
 
 § V. How shall you flee from it ? Why, by dissipating 
 and distracting your curiosity, by turning your soul to 
 better and pleasanter objects : examine the phenomena of 
 sky, and earth, and air, and sea. Are you by nature fond 
 of gazing at little or great things ? If at great, turn your 
 attention to the sun, consider its rising and setting : view 
 the changes of the moon, like the changes of our mortal 
 life, see how it waxes and wanes, 
 
 " How at the first it peers out small and dim 
 Till it unfolds its full and glorious Orb, 
 And when its zenith it has once attained, 
 Again it wanes, grows small, and disappears."^ 
 
 These are indeed Nature's secrets, but they bring no trouble 
 on those that study them. But if you decline the study of 
 great things, inspect with curiosity smaller matters, see 
 how some plants flourish, are green and gay, and exhibit 
 their beauty, all the year round, while others are sometimes 
 gay like them, at other times, like some unthrift, run 
 through their resources entirely, and are left bare and 
 naked. Consider again their various shapes, how some 
 produce oblong fruits, others angular, others smooth and 
 round. But perhaps you will not care to pry into all this, 
 since you will find nothing bad. If you must then ever 
 bestow your time and attention on what is bad, as the 
 serpent lives but in deadly matter, go to history, and turn 
 your eye on the sum total of human misery. For there 
 you will find " the falls of men, and murders of their lives," ^ 
 rapes of women, attacks of slaves, treachery of friends, 
 mixing of poisons, envyings, jealousies, " shipwrecks of 
 families," and dethroning of princes. Sate and cloy your- 
 
 ^ Sophocles, Fragm. 713. The lines are quoted more fully by our 
 author in his " Lives," p. 911. There are there four preceding lines that 
 compare human life to the moon's changes. 
 
 2 JEschylus, " Supplices," 937. 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 243 
 
 self on these, you will by so doing vex and enrage none of 
 your associates. 
 
 § VI. But it seems curiosity does not rejoice in stale 
 evils, but only in fresh and recent ones, gladly viewing the 
 spectacle of tragedies of yesterday, but backward in taking 
 part in comic and festive scenes. And so the curious per- 
 son is a languid and listless hearer to the narrator of a 
 marriage, or sacrifice, or solemn procession, he says he has 
 heard most of all that before, bids the narrator cut it short 
 and come to the point ; but if his visitor tell him of the 
 violation of some girl, or the adultery of some married 
 woman, or the disputes and intended litigation of brothers, 
 he doesn't go to sleep then, nor pretend want of leisure, 
 
 " But he pricks up his ears, and asks for more." 
 
 And indeed those lines, 
 
 " Alas ! how quicker far to mortals' ears 
 Do ill news travel than the news of good ! " 
 
 are truly said of curious people. For as cupping-glasses 
 take away the worst blood, so the ears of curious people 
 attract only the worst reports ; or rather, as cities have 
 certain ominous and gloomy gates, through which they 
 conduct only condemned criminals, or convey filth and 
 night soil, for nothing pure or holy has either ingress into 
 or egress from them, so into the ears of curious people goes 
 nothing good or elegant, but tales of murders travel and 
 lodge there, wafting a whiif of unholy and obscene narra- 
 tions. 
 
 " And ever in my house is heard alone 
 The sound of wailing ; " 
 
 this is to the curious their one Muse and Siren, this the 
 sweetest note they can hear. For curiosity desires to know 
 what is hidden and secret; but no one conceals his good 
 fortune, nay sometimes people even pretend to have such 
 advantages as they do not really possess. So the curious 
 man, eager to hear a history of what is bad, is possessed 
 by the passion of malignity, which is brother to envy and 
 jealousy. For envy is pain at another's blessings, and 
 malignity is joy at another's misfortunes : and both pro- 
 >ceed from the same savage and brutish vice, ill-nature. 
 
244 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 § Yii. But so unpleasant is it to everybody to have his 
 private ills brought to light, that many have died rather 
 than acquaint the doctors with their secret ailments. For 
 suppose Herophilus, or Erasistratus, or even ^sculapius 
 himself during his sojourn on earth, had gone with their 
 drugs and surgical instruments from house to house, to 
 inquire what man had a fistula in ano, or what woman had 
 a cancer in her womb ; — and yet their curiosity would have 
 been professional ^ — who would not have driven them away 
 from their house, for not waiting till they were sent for, and 
 for coming without being asked to spy out their neighbours' 
 ailments ? But curious people pry into these and even 
 worse matters, not from a desire to heal them, but only 
 to expose them to others, which makes them deservedly 
 hated. For we are not vexed and mortified with custom- 
 house officers when they levy toll on goods hona fide im- 
 ported, but only when they seek for contraband articles, 
 and rip up bags and packages : and yet the law allows them 
 to do even this, and sometimes it is injurious to them not 
 to do so. But curious people abandon and neglect their 
 own affairs, and are busy about their neighbours' concerns. 
 Seldom do they go into the country, for they do not care 
 for its quiet and stillness and solitude, but if once in a way 
 they do go there, they look more at their neighbours' vines 
 than their own, and inquire how many cows of their 
 neighbour have died, or how much of his wine has turned 
 sour, and when they are satisfied on these points they soon 
 return to town again. But the genuine countryman does 
 not willingly listen to any rumour that chances to come 
 from the town, for he quotes the following lines, 
 
 " Even with spade in hand he'll tell the terms 
 On which peace was concluded : all these things 
 The cursed fellow walks about and pries into." 
 
 § Till. But curious people shun the country as stale and 
 dull and too quiet, and push into warehouses and markets 
 and harbours, asking, " Any news ? Were you not in the 
 market in the forenoon?" and sometimes leceiving for 
 answer, " What then ? Do you think things in the town 
 change every three hours ? " Notwithstanding if any- 
 
 ^ All three being eminent doctors. 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 246 
 
 one brings any news, he'll get off his horse, and embrace 
 him, and kiss him, and stand to listen. If however the 
 person who meets him says he has no news, he will say 
 somewhat peevishly, " No news, Sir ? Have you not been 
 in the market ? Did yon not pass by the oflBcers' quarters ? 
 Did you exchange no words with those that have just 
 arrived from Italy?" To stop such people the Locrian 
 authorities had an excellent rule ; they fined everyone coming 
 from abroad who asked what the news was. For as cooks 
 pray for plenty of meat, and fishmongers for shoals of fish, 
 so curious people pray for shoals of trouble, and plenty of 
 business, and innovations and changes, that they may have 
 something to hunt after and tittle-tattle about. Well also 
 was it in Charondas, the legislator of the people of Thurii,^ 
 to forbid any of the citizens but adulterers and curious 
 persons to be ridiculed on the stage. Adultery itself 
 indeed seems to be only the fmit of curiosity about another 
 man's pleasures, and an inquiring and prying into things 
 kept close and hidden from the world ; while curiosity is a 
 tampering with and seduction of and revealing the naked- 
 ness of secrets.^ 
 
 § IX. As it is likely that much learning will produce 
 wordiness, and so Pythagoras enjoined five years' silence 
 on his scholars, calling it a truce from words,^ so defama- 
 tion of character is sure to go with curiosity. For what 
 people are glad to hear they are glad to talk about, and 
 what they eagerly pick up from others they joyfully retail 
 to others. And so, amongst the other mischiefs of 
 curiosity, the disease runs counter to their desires ; for all 
 people fight shy of them, and conceal their affairs from 
 them, and neither care to do or say anything in their pre- 
 sence, but defer consultations, and put off investigations, 
 till such people are out of the way ; and if, when some secret 
 is just about to be uttered, or some important business is 
 
 ^ " Intelligo Charondam." — Xylander. 
 
 2 Plutarch wants to show that curiosity and adultery are really the 
 same vice in principle. Hence his imagery here. Jeremy Taylor has 
 very beautifully dealt with this passage, " Holy Living," chap. ii. § v. 
 I cannot pretend to his felicity of language. Thus Plutarch makes 
 adultery mere curiosity, and curiosity a sort of adultery in regard to 
 secrets. A profoundly ethical and moral view. Compare § ix. 
 
 ^ Compare Lucian's kx^^yXtDTTia, after ixtxiip'ia {armistice), Lexiph. 9. 
 
246 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 just about to be arranged, some curious man happen to 
 pop in, they are mum at once and reserved, as one puts 
 away fish if the cat is aboat ; and so frequently things 
 seen and talked about by all the rest of the world are 
 unknown only to them. For the same reason the curious 
 person never gets the confidence of anybody. For we 
 would rather entrust our letters and papers and seals to 
 slaves and strangers than to curious friends and intimates. 
 The famous Bellerophon,^ though he carried letters against 
 his life, opened them not, but abstained from reading 
 the letter to the king, as he had refused to sell his honour 
 to Proetus' wife, so great was his continence.^ For curiosity 
 and adultery both come from incontinence, and to the 
 latter is added monstrous folly and insanity. For to pass 
 by so many common and public women, and to intrude 
 oneself on some married woman, ^ who is sure to be more 
 costly, and possibly less pretty to boot, is the acme of 
 madness. Yet such is the conduct of curious people. 
 They neglect many gay sights, fail to hear much that 
 would be well worth hearing, lose much fine sport and 
 pastime, to break open private letters, to put their ears to 
 their neighbour's walls, and to whisper to their slaves and 
 women-servants, practices always low, and frequently dan- 
 gerous. 
 
 § X. It will be exceedingly useful, therefore, to deter the 
 curious from these propensities, for them to remember 
 their past experience. Simonides used to say that he 
 occasionally opened two chests for rewards and thanks 
 that he had by him, and found the one full for rewards, 
 but the one for thanks always empty ."* So if anyone were 
 to open occasionally the stores that curiosity had amassed, 
 and observe what a cargo there was of useless and idle 
 and unlovely things, perhaps the sight of all this poor 
 stuff would inspire him with disgust. Suppose someone, 
 in studying the writings of the ancients, were to pick out 
 only their worst passages, and compile them into a volume, 
 
 ^ See the story in Homer, " Iliad," vi. 155 sq. 
 ^ Or self-control. 
 
 ^ Literally, some woman shut wp, or enclosed. 
 
 ^ See also our author's " On those who are punished by the Deity 
 late," § xi. 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 247 
 
 as Homer's imperfect lines, and the solecisms of the trage- 
 dians, and Archilochus' indecent and bitter railings against 
 women, by which he so exposed himself, would he not be 
 worthy of the curse of the tragedian, 
 
 " Perish, compiler of thy neighbours' ills ? " 
 
 And independently of such a curse, the piling up of other 
 people's misdoings is indecent and useless, and like the 
 town which Philip founded and filled with the vilest and 
 most dissolute wretches, and called Rogue Town. Curious 
 persons, indeed, making a collection of the faults and 
 errors and solecisms, not of lines or poems but of people's 
 lives, render their memory a most inelegant and unlovely 
 register of dark deeds. Just as there are in Rome some 
 people who care nothing for pictures and statues, or even 
 handsome boys or women exposed for sale, but haunt the 
 monster-market, and make eager inquiries about people 
 who have no calves, or three eyes, or arms like weasels, or 
 heads like ostriches, and look about for some 
 
 " Unnatural monster like the Minotaur," ' 
 
 and for a time are greatly captivated with them, but if 
 anyone continually gazes at such sights, they will soon 
 give him satiety and disgust ; so let those who curiously 
 inquire into the errors and faults of life, and disgraces of 
 families, and disorders in other people's houses, first 
 remember what little favour or advantage such prying 
 has brought them on previous occasions. 
 
 § XI. Habit will be of the utmost importance in stopping 
 this propensity, if we begin early to practise self-control in 
 respect to it, for as the disease increases by habit and 
 degrees, so will its cure, as we shall see when we discuss 
 the necessary discipline. In the first place, let us begin 
 with the most trifling and unimportant matters. What 
 hardship will it be when we walk abroad not to read the 
 epitaphs on graves, or what detriment shall we suffer by 
 not glancing at the inscriptions on walls in the public 
 walks ? Let us reflect that there is nothing useful or plea- 
 sant for us in these notices, which only record that so-and- 
 
 ^ See Euripides, Fragm., 389. Also Plutarch's " Theseus," cap. xv. 
 
248 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 BO remembered so-and-so out of gratitude, and, " Here lies 
 the best of friends," and much poor stuff of that kind ; ^ 
 which indeed do not seem to do much harm, except indi- 
 rectly, to those that read them, by engendering the prac- 
 tice of curiosity about things immaterial. And as hunts- 
 men do not allow the hounds to follow any scent and run 
 where they please, but check and restrain them in leashes, 
 keeping their sense of smell pure and fresh for the ob- 
 ject of their chase, that they may the keener dart on their 
 tracks, " following up the traces of the unfortunate beasts 
 by their scent," so we must check and repress the sallies 
 and excursions of the curious man to every object of 
 interest, whether of sight or hearing, and confine him to 
 what is useful. For as eagles and lions on the prowl keep 
 their claws sheathed that they may not lose their edge and 
 sharpness, so, when we remember that curiosity for learning 
 has also its edge and keenness, let us not entirely expend 
 or blunt it on inferior objects. 
 
 § xiT. Next let us accustom ourselves when we pass a 
 strange house not to look inside at the door, or curiously 
 inspect the interior, as if we were going to pilfer something, 
 remembering always that saying of Xenocrates, that it is 
 all one whether one puts one's feet or eyes in another 
 person's house. For such prying is neither honourable, nor 
 comely, nor even agreeable. 
 
 " Stranger, thou'lt see within untoward sights." 
 For such is generally the condition inside houses, utensils 
 kicking about, maids lolling about, no work going on, 
 nothing to please the eye ; and moreover such side glances, 
 and stray shots as it were, distort the soul, and are unhand- 
 some, and the practice is a pernicious one. When Diogenes 
 saw Dioxippus, a victor at Olympia, driving up in his 
 chariot and unable to take his eyes off a handsome 
 woman who was watching the procession, but still turning 
 round and casting sheep's eyes at her, he said, " See you 
 yon athlete straining his neck to look at a girl ? " And 
 similarly you may see curious people twisting and straining 
 
 ^ Plutarch rather reminds one, in his evident contempt for Epitaphs, 
 of the cynic who asked, *' Where are all the bad people buried ? " 
 Where indeed ? 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 249 
 
 their necks at every spectacle alike, from the habit and 
 practice of turning their eyes in all directions. And I 
 think the senses ought not to rove about, like an ill-trained 
 maid, when sent on an errand by the soul, but to do their 
 business, and then return quickly with the answer, and 
 afterwards to keep within the bounds of reason, and obey 
 her behests. But it is like those lines of Sophocles, 
 
 " Then did the jEnianian's horses bolt, 
 Unmanageable quite ; " 
 
 for so the senses not having, as we said, right training and 
 practice, often run away, and drag reason along with them, 
 and plunge her into unlawful excesses. And so, though 
 that story about Democritus is false, that he purposely 
 destroyed his eyesight by the reflection from burning- 
 glasses (as people sometimes shut up windows that look 
 into the street), that they might not disturb him by fre- 
 quently calling off his attention to external things, but allow 
 him to confine himself to purely intellectual matters, yet it 
 is very true in every case that those who use the mind 
 most are least acted upon by the senses. And so the phi- 
 losophers erected their places for study as far as possible 
 from towns, and called Night the time propitious to 
 thought,^ thinking quiet and withdrawal from worldly dis- 
 tractions a great help towards meditating upon and solving 
 the problems of life. 
 
 § XIII. Moreover, when men are abusing and reviling 
 one another in the market-place, it is not very difficult or 
 tiresome not to go near them ; or if a tumultuous con- 
 course of people crowd together, to remain seated ; or to 
 get up and go away, if you are not master of yourself. 
 For you will gain no advantage by mixing yourself up 
 with curious people: but you will derive the greatest 
 benefit from putting a force upon your inclinations, and 
 bridling your curiosity, and accustoming it to obey reason. 
 Afterwards it will be well to extend the practice still fur- 
 ther, and not to go to the theatre when some fine piece is 
 performing, and if your friends invite you to see some 
 dancer or actor to decline, and, if there is some shouting 
 
 > Sophocles, " Electra," 724, 725. 
 
 ^ tixppovt], a stock phrase for night, is here defined. 
 
250 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 in the stadium and hippodrome, not even to turn your 
 head to look what is up. For as Socrates advised people 
 to abstain from food that made them eat when they were 
 not hungry, and from drinks that made them drink when 
 they were not thirsty, so ought we also to shun and flee 
 from those objects of interest, whether to eye or ear, that 
 master us and attract us when we stand in no need of 
 them. Thus Cyrus would not look at Panthea, but when 
 Araspes told him that her beauty was well worth inspec- 
 tion, he replied, " For that very reason must I the more 
 abstain from seeing her, for if at your persuasion I were to 
 pay her a visit, perhaps she would persuade me to visit her 
 again when I could ill spare the time, so that I might 
 neglect important business to sit with her and gaze on her 
 charms."^ Similarly Alexander would not see the wife of 
 Darius, who was reputed to be very beautiful, but visited 
 her mother who was old, aud would not venture to look 
 upon the young and handsome queen. We on the contrary 
 peep into women's litters, and hang about their windows, 
 and think we do no harm, though we thus make our 
 curiosity a loop-hole ^ for all manner of vice. 
 
 § xiY. Moreover, as it is of great help to fair dealing 
 sometimes not to seize some honest gain, that yon 
 may accustom yourself as far as possible to flee from 
 unjust gains, and as it makes greatly for virtue to abstain 
 sometimes from your own wife, that you may not ever be 
 tempted by another woman, so, applying the habit to 
 curiosity, try not to see and hear at times all that goes on 
 in your own house even, and if anyone wishes to tell you 
 anything about it give him the go-by, and decline to hear 
 him. For it was nothing but his curiosity that involved 
 CEdipus in his extreme calamities : for it was to try and find 
 out his extraction that he left Corinth and met Laius, and 
 killed him, and got his kingdom, and married his own 
 mother, and when he then seemed at the acme of felicity, 
 he must needs make further inquiries about himself ; and 
 though his wife tried to prevent him, he none the less com- 
 
 • " Historia exstat initio libri quinti Cyropsedise." — BeisJce. 
 
 3 Literally, " slippery and prone to." For the metaphor of 
 "slippery" compare Horace, "Odes," i. 19-8, " Et vultus nimium 
 lubricus adspici." 
 
ON CURIOSITY. 251 
 
 pelled the old man that had been an eje-wftness of the 
 deed to tell him all the circumstances of it, and though he 
 long suspected how the story would end, yet when the old 
 man cried out, 
 
 " Alas ! the dreadful tale I must then tell," 
 
 SO inflamed was he with curiosity and trembling with im- 
 patience, that he replied, 
 
 " I too must hear, for hear it now I will." ^ 
 
 So bitter-sweet and' uncontrollable is the itch of curiosity, 
 like a sore, shedding its blood when lanced. But he that 
 is free from this disease, and calm by nature, being igno- 
 rant of many unpleasant things, may say, 
 
 " Holy oblivion of all human ills. 
 What wisdom dost thou bring ! " '^ 
 
 § XY. We ought therefore also to accustom ourselves, 
 when we receive a letter, not to be in a tremendous hurry 
 about breaking the seal, as most people are, even tearing it 
 open with their teeth if their hands are slow ; nor to rise from 
 our seat and run up to meet him, if a messenger comes ; 
 and if a friend says, " I have some news to tell you," we 
 ought to say, " I had rather you had something useful or 
 advantageous to tell me." When I was on one occasion 
 lecturing at Rome, one of my audience was the well-known 
 Rusticus, whom the Emperor Domitian afterwards had put 
 to death through envy of his glory, and a soldier came in in 
 the middle and brought him a letter from the Emperor, and 
 silence ensuing, and I stopping that he might have time 
 to read his letter, he would not, and did not open it till I 
 had finished my lecture, and the audience had dispersed ; 
 so that everybody marvelled at his self-control. But when- 
 ever anyone who has power feeds his curiosity till it is 
 strong and vehement, he can no longer easily control it, 
 when it hurries him on to illicit acts, from force of habit ; 
 and such people open their friends' letters, thrust them- 
 selves in at private meetings, become spectators of rites 
 
 ^ This and the line above are in Sophocles, " CEdipus Tyrannus," 
 1169, 1170. 
 2 Euripides, " Orestes," 213. 
 
252 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 they ought not to witness, enter holy grounds they 
 ought not to, and pry into the lives and conversations of 
 kings. 
 
 § XVI. Indeed tyrants themselves, who must know all 
 things, are made unpopular by no class more than by their 
 spies ^ and talebearers. Darius in his youth, when he 
 mistrusted his own powers, and suspected and feared 
 everybody, was the first who employed spies ; and the 
 Dionysiuses introduced them at Syracuse : but in a revolu- 
 tion they were the first that the Syracusans took and tor- 
 tured to death. Indeed informers are of the same tribe and 
 family as curious people. However informers only inves- 
 tigate wicked acts or plots, but curious people pry into and 
 publish abroad the involuntary misfortunes of their neigh- 
 bours. And it is said that impious people first got their 
 name from curiosity, for it seems there was a mighty famine 
 at Athens, and those people that had wheat not producing it, 
 but grinding it stealthily by night in their houses, some 
 of their neighbours went about and noticed the noise of 
 the mills grinding, and so they got their name.^ This also is 
 the origin of the well-known Greek word for informer, 
 (Sycophant, quasi Fig-informer), for when the people were 
 forbidden to export figs, those who informed against those 
 who did were called Fig-informers. It is well worth the 
 while of curious people to give their attention to this, that 
 they may be ashamed of having any similarity or connec- 
 tion in habit with a class of people so universally hated 
 and disliked as informers. 
 
 ON SHYNESS.' 
 
 § I. Some of the things that grow on the earth are in 
 their nature wild and barren and injurious to the growth 
 
 ^ Literally, ears. 
 
 ^ The paronomasia is as follows. The word for impious people is 
 supposed to mean listeners to mills grinding. 
 
 ^ Or bashfulness, skamefacedness, what the French call mauvaise 
 honie. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 253 
 
 of seeds and plants, yet those who till the ground consider 
 them indications not of a bad soil but of a rich and fat 
 one ; ^ so also there are passions of the soul that are not 
 good, yet are as it were offshoots of a good disposition, and 
 one likely to improve with good advice. Among these I class 
 shyness, no bad sign in itself, though it affords occasion to 
 vice. For the modest oftentimes plunge into the same 
 excesses as the shameless, but then they are pained and 
 grieved at them, and not pleased like the others. For the 
 shameless person is quite apathetic at what is disgraceful, 
 while the modest person is easily affected even at the very 
 appearance of it. Shyness is in fact an excess of modesty. 
 And thus it is called shamefacedness, because the face 
 exhibits the changes of the mind. For as dejection is 
 defined to be the grief that makes people look on the 
 ground, so shamefacedness is that shyness that cannot look 
 people in the face. And so the orator said the shameless 
 person had not pupils '^ in his eyes but harlots. The bashful 
 person on the other hand shows his delicacy and effemi- 
 nacy of soul in his countenance, and palliates his weakness, 
 which exposes him to defeat at the hands of the impudent, 
 by the name of modesty. Cato used to say he was better 
 pleased with those lads that blushed than with those that 
 turned pale, rightly teaching us to fear censure more than 
 labour,^ and suspicion than danger. However we must 
 avoid too much timidity and fear of censure, since many 
 have played the coward, and abandoned noble ventures, 
 more from fear of a bad name than of the dangers to 
 be undergone, not being able to bear a bad reputation. 
 
 § II. As we must not disregard their weakness, so 
 neither again must we praise that rigid and stubborn 
 insensibility, " that recklessness and frantic energy to rush 
 anywhere, that seemed like a dog's courage in Anaxar- 
 chus."* But we must contrive a harmonious blending of 
 the two, that shall remove the shamelessness of pertinacity, 
 and the weakness of excessive modesty ; seeing its cure is 
 
 ^ Shakespeare puts all this into one line : " Most subject is the fattest 
 soil to weeds." — 2 Henrj/ IV., A. iv. Sc. iv. 
 
 ^ Or qirls. Koprj means both a girl, and the pupil of the eye. 
 
 3 So Wyttenbach. 
 
 * These lines are quoted again '* On Moral Virtue," § vi. 
 
254 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 difl&cult, and the correction of such excesses not without 
 danger. For as the husbandman, in rooting up some wild 
 and useless weed, at once plunges his spade vigorously into 
 the ground, and digs it up by the root, or burns it with 
 fire, but if he has to do with a vine that needs pruning, or 
 some apple-tree, or olive, he puts his hand to it very care- 
 fully, being afraid of injuring any sound part ; so the 
 philosopher, eradicating from the soul of the young man 
 that ignoble and untractable weed, envy, or unseasonable 
 avarice, or amputating the excessive love of pleasure, may 
 bandage and draw blood, make deep incision, and leave 
 scars : but if he has to apply reason as a corrective to a 
 tender and delicate part of the soul, such as shyness and 
 bashfulness, he is careful that he may not inadvertently 
 root up modesty as well. For nurses who are often rub- 
 bing the dirt off their infants sometimes tear their flesh 
 and put them to torture. We ought not therefore, by 
 rubbing off the shyness of youths too much, to make them 
 too careless and contemptuous; but as those that pull 
 down houses close to temples prop up the adjacent parts, 
 so in trying to get rid of shyness we must not eradicate 
 with it the virtues akin to it, as modesty and meekness 
 and mildness, by which it insinuates itself and becomes 
 part of a man's character, flattering the bashful man that 
 he liiis a nature courteous and civil and affable, and not 
 hard as flint or self-willed. And so the Stoics from the 
 outset verbally distinguished shame and shyness from mo- 
 desty, that they might not by identity of name give the 
 vice opportunity to inflict harm. But let it be granted to 
 us to use the words indiscriminately, following indeed the 
 example of Homer. For he said, 
 
 ' ' Modesty does both harm and good to men 5 " '^ 
 
 and he did well to mention the harm it does first. For it 
 becomes advantageous only through reason's curtailing its 
 excess, and reducing it to moderate proportions. 
 
 § III. In the first place, then, the person who is afflicted 
 with shyness ought to be persuaded that he suffers 
 from an injurious disease, and that nothing injurious 
 
 1 "Iliad," xxiv. 44,45. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 266 
 
 can be good : nor must lie be wheedled and tickled with 
 the praise of being called a nice and jollj fellow rather 
 than being styled loftj and dignified and just ; nor, like 
 Pegasus in Euripides, *' who stooped and crouched lower 
 than he wished"^ to take up his rider Bellerophon, must 
 he humble himself and grant whatever favours are asked 
 him, fearing to be called hard and ungentle. Thej say 
 that the Egyptian Bocchoris, who was by nature very 
 severe, had an asp sent him by Isis, which coiled round his 
 head, and shaded him from above, that he might judge 
 righteously. Bashfulness on the contrary, like a dead 
 weight on languid and effeminate persons, not daring tore- 
 fuse or contradict anybody, makes jurors deliver unjust ver- 
 dicts, and shuts the mouth of counsellors, and makes people 
 say and do many things against their wish ; and so the 
 most headstrong person is always master and lord of such, 
 through his own impudence prevailing against their mo- 
 desty. So bashfulness, like soft and sloping ground, being 
 unable to repel or avert any attack, lies open to the most 
 shameful acts and passions. It is a bad guardian of youth, 
 as Brutus said he didn't think that person had spent his 
 youth well who had not learnt how to say No. It is a bad 
 duenna of the bridal bed and of women's apartments, as the 
 penitent adultress in Sophocles said to her seducer, 
 
 " You did persuade, and coax me into sin." ^ 
 
 Thus shyness, being first seduced by vice,^ leaves its citadel 
 unbarred, unfortified, and open to attack. By gifts people 
 ensnare the worse natures, but by persuasion and playing 
 upon their bashfulness people often seduce even go"od 
 women. I pass over the injury done to worldly affairs by 
 bashfulness causing people to lend to those whose credit is 
 doubtful, and to go security against their wish, for though 
 they commend that saying, " Be a surety, trouble is at 
 hand," ^ they cannot apply it when business is on hand. 
 
 § lY, It would not be easy to enumerate how many this 
 vice has ruined. When Creon said to Medea, 
 
 ' Euripides, " Bellerophon," Fragm., 313. 
 
 ^ Soph., Fragm., 736. 
 
 ' Surely it is necessary to read 7rpodia(p9aph<ra roJ ccKoXdaTut. 
 
 * See Plato, « Charmides," 165 A. 
 
256 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 '* Lady, 'tis better now to earn yoiu* hate, 
 
 1'han through my softness afterwards to groan," ' 
 
 he uttered a pregnant maxim for others ; for ho himself 
 was overcome by his bashful ness, and granted her one day 
 more, and so was the undoing of his family. And some, 
 when they suspected murder or poison, have failed through it 
 to take precautions for their safety. Thus perished 13ion, 
 not ignorant that Callippus was plotting against him, but 
 ashamed to be on his guard against a friend and host. So 
 Antipater, the son of Cassander, having invited Demetrius 
 to supper, and being invited back by him for the next day, 
 was ashamed to doubt another as he had been trusted himself, 
 and went, and got his throat cut after supper. And Poly- 
 sperchon promised Cassander for a hundred talents to 
 murder Hercules, tho son of Alexander by Barsine, and 
 invited him to supper, and, as tho stripling suspected and 
 feared the invitation, and pleaded as an excuse that he was 
 not very well, Polysperchon called on him, and addressed 
 him as follows, " Imitate, my lad, your father's good- 
 nature and kindness to his friends, unless indeed you fear 
 us as plotting against you." The young man was ashamed 
 to refuse any longer, so he went with him,'and some of those 
 at tho supper-party strangled him. And so that line of 
 Hesiod,'' 
 
 ** Invite your friend to supper, not your enemy," 
 
 is not ridiculous, as some say, or stupid advice, but wise. 
 Show no bashfulness in regard to an enemj, and do not 
 suppose him trustworthy, though he may seem so.^ For if 
 you invite you will be invited back, and if you entertain 
 others you will be entertained back to your hurt, if you let 
 the temper as it were of your caution be weakened by 
 shame. 
 
 § Y. As then this disease is the cause of much mischief, 
 we must try and exterminate it by assiduous effort, begin- 
 ning first, as people are wont to do in other matters, with 
 small and easy things. For example, if anyone pledge 
 you to drink with him at a dinner when you have had 
 enough, do not be bashful, or do violence to nature, but 
 
 1 Euripides, " Medea," 290, 291. » " Works and Days," 342. 
 
 ' lieading with Wyttenbach, firjd' v-KoXafie. niaTtveiv, Sokovvtu. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 257 
 
 put tlie iMip down without drinking'. Atrain, if somebody 
 else cliallen^o you to ])lHy at dico with liini in your cups, 
 be not bashful or aim id of ridicule, but imitate Xonophanes, 
 who, when Ijtisus of Hermiono called him coward because 
 he would not play at dice with hira, admitted that lie was 
 a great coward and had no couraj^o for what was ignoble. 
 Again, if you meet with some prating fellow who attacks 
 you and sticks to you, do not bo bashful, but get rid of 
 him, and hasten on and pursue your undertaking. For 
 such flights and repulses, keeping you in practice in trying 
 to overcome your bashfulness in small matters, will pre- 
 pare you for greater occasions. And here it is well to 
 record a remark of Demosthenes. When the Athenians 
 were going to help Harpalus, and to war against Alex- 
 ander, all of a sudden I'hiloxenus, who was Alexander's 
 admiral, was sighted in the ofUng. And the populace 
 being greatly alarmed, and speecjdess for fear, Demos- 
 thenes said, " What will they do when they see the sun, if 
 they cannot lift their eyes to face a lamp ? " And what will 
 you do in important matters, if the king desires anything, 
 or the peo[)le importune you, if you cannot decline to drink 
 when your friend asks you, or evade the onset of some 
 prating fellow, but allow the trifler to waste all your time, 
 from not having nerve to say, " I will see you some other 
 time, I have no leisure now." ' 
 
 § vi. Moreover, the use and practice of restraining one's 
 bashfulness in small and unimportant matters is advan- 
 tageous also in regard to praise. For example, if a friend's 
 harper sings badly at a drinking party, or an actor hired at 
 great cost murders '^ Menandcr, and most of the party clap 
 and applaud, I find it by no means hard, or bad manners, 
 to listen silently, and not to be so illiberal as to praise con- 
 trary to one's convictions. For if in such matters you are 
 not master of yourself, what will you do if your friend 
 reads a poor poem, or parades a speech stupidly and ridicu- 
 lously written?^ You will praise it of course, and join 
 the flatterers in loud applause. But how then will you 
 
 ^ See Iloracio's very amusing '* Satire," i. ix., on such tirosonne fellows, 
 ' lmTpil3iD is used in the same sense by Demostiw >i">j !« •'->-: 
 ' On such social pests see Juvenal, i. 1-14. 
 
258 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 find fault with your friend if lie makes mistakes in busi- 
 ness ? How will you be able to correct him, if he acts 
 improperly in reference to some office, or marriage, or the 
 state ? For I cannot indeed assent to the remark of 
 Pericles to his friend, who asked him to bear false witness 
 in his favour even to the extent of perjury, " I am your 
 friend as far as the altar." He went too far. But he that 
 has long accustomed himself never to go against his con- 
 victions in praising a speaker, or clapping a singer, or 
 laughing at a dull buffoon, will never go to this length, 
 nor say to some impudent fellow in such matters, " Swear 
 on my behalf, bear false witness, pronounce an unjust 
 verdict." 
 
 § VII. So also we ought to refuse people that want to 
 borrow money of us, from being accustomed to say ]^o in 
 small and easily refused matters. Thus Archelaus, king of 
 the Macedonians, being asked at supper for a gold cup by 
 a man who thought Receive the finest word in the lan- 
 guage, bade a boy give it to Euripides,^ and gazing intently 
 on the man said to him, " You are fit to ask, and not to 
 receive, and he is fit to receive without asking." Thus did 
 he make judgement and not bashful ness the arbiter of his 
 gifts and favours. Yet we oftentimes pass over our friends 
 who are both deserving and in need, and give to others 
 who continually and impudently importune us, not from 
 the wish to give but from the inability to say Xo. So the 
 older Antigonus, being frequently annoyed by Bion, said, 
 " Grive a talent to Bion and necessity." Yet he was of 
 all the kings most clever and ingenious at getting rid 
 of such importunity. For on one occasion, when a Cynic 
 asked him for a drachma, he replied, " That would be too 
 little for a king to give; "^ and when the Cynic rejoined, 
 " Give me then a talent," he met him with, " That would 
 be too much for a Cynic to receive."^ Diogenes indeed 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, i. 2. Euripides left Athens about 409 B.C., and took 
 up his abode for good in Macedonia at the court of Archelaus, where he 
 died 406 B.C. 
 
 2 For a drachma was on\y worth 6 obols, or 9|fZ. of our money, nearly 
 = Roman denarius. 
 
 ^ A talent was 6,000 drachmse, or 36,000 obols, about £243 15s. 
 of our money. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 259 
 
 used to go round begging to the statues in the Ceramicus, 
 and when people expressed their astonishment said he was 
 practising how to bear refusals. And we must practise 
 ourselves in small matters, and exercise ourselves in little 
 things, with a view to refusing people who importune 
 us, or would receive from us when inconvenient, that 
 we may be able to avoid great miscarriages. For no one, 
 as Demosthenes says,^ if he expends his resources on unne- 
 cessary things, will have means for necessary ones. And 
 our disgrace is greatly increased, if we are deficient in 
 what is noble, and abound in what is trivial. 
 
 § VIII. But bashfulness is not only a bad and inconsi- 
 derate manager of money, but also in more important 
 matters makes us reject expediency and reason. For when 
 we are ill we do not call in the experienced doctor, because 
 we stand in awe of the family one ; and instead of the best 
 teachers for our boys we select those that importune us ; ^ 
 and in our suits at law we frequently refuse the aid of 
 some skilled advocate, to oblige the son of some friend or 
 relative, and give him a chance to make a forensic display ; 
 and lastly, you will find many so-called philosophers Epi- 
 cureans or Stoics, not from deliberate choice or conviction, 
 but simply from bashfulness, to have the same views as 
 their friends and acquaintances. Since this is the case, let 
 us accustom ourselves betimes in small and everyday 
 matters to employ no barber or fuller merely from bash- 
 fulness, nor to put up at a sorry inn, when a better is at 
 hand, merely because the innkeeper has on several occa- 
 sions been extra civil to us, but for the benefit of the habit 
 to select the best even in a small matter ; as the Pytha- 
 goreans were careful never to put their left leg across the 
 right, nor to take an even number instead of an odd, all 
 other matters being indifferent. We must accustom our- 
 selves also, at a sacrifice or marriage or any entertainment 
 of that kind, not to invite the person who greets us and 
 runs up to meet us, but the friend who is serviceable to us. 
 For he that has thus practised and trained himself will be 
 difficult to catch tripping, nay even unassailable, in greater 
 xaatters. 
 
 ' " Olynth." iii. p. 33, § 19. ^ Compare « On Education," § vii. 
 
260 plutaech's moeals. 
 
 § IX. Let so mucli suffice for practice. And of useful 
 considerations the first is that which teaches and reminds 
 us, that all passions and maladies of the soul are accom- 
 panied by the very things which we think we avoid 
 through them. Thus infamy comes through too great love 
 of fame, and pain comes from love of pleasure, and plenty of 
 work to the idle, and to the contentious defeats and losses of 
 lawsuits. And so too it is the fate of bashfulness, in fleeing 
 from the smoke of ill- repute, to throw itself into the fire of 
 it.^ For the bashful, not venturing to say ]N"o to those that 
 press them hard, afterwards feel shame at just rebuke, 
 and, through standing in awe of slight blame, frequently 
 in the end incur open disgrace. For if a friend asks some 
 money of them, and through bashfulness they cannot 
 refuse, a little time after they are disgraced by the 
 facts becoming known ; ^ or if they have promised to help 
 friends in a lawsuit, they turn round and hide their 
 diminished heads, and run away from fear of the other 
 side. Many also, who have accepted on behalf of a 
 daughter or sister an unprofitable offer of marriage at the 
 bidding of bashfulness, have afterwards been compelled to 
 break their word, and break off the match. 
 
 § X. He that said all the dwellers in Asia were slaves 
 to one man because they could not say the one syllable 
 No, spoke in jest and not in earnest ; but bashful persons, 
 even if they say nothing, can by raising or dropping 
 their eyebrows decline many disagreeable and unplea- 
 sant acts of compliance. For Euripides says, " Silence is 
 an answer to wise men,"^ but we stand more in need of it 
 to inconsiderate persons, for we can talk over the sensible. 
 And indeed it is well to have at hand and frequently on 
 our lips the sayings* of good and famous men to quote to 
 those who importune us, as that of Phocion to Antipater, 
 " You cannot have me both as a friend and flatterer ; " or 
 his remark to the Athenians, when they applauded him 
 
 ' Our " Out of the frying-pan into the fire." Cf. "Incidit in Scyllam 
 cupiens vitare Charybdim." 
 
 '^ By their having to borrow themselves. 
 
 3 Fragra. 947. 
 
 '^ Or apophthegms, of which Plutarch and Lord Verulam have both 
 left us collections. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 261 _ 
 
 and bade liim contribute to the expenses of a festival, " I 
 am ashamed to contribute anything to you, till I have paid 
 yonder person my debts to him," pointing out his creditor 
 Callicles. For, as Thucydides says, " It is not disgraceful 
 to admit one's poverty, but it is very much so not to try 
 to mend it." ^ But he who through stupidity or softness is 
 too bashful to say to anyone that importunes him, 
 
 " Stranger, no silver white is in my caves," 
 
 but goes bail for him as it were through his promises, 
 
 " Is bound by fetters not of brass but shame." ^ 
 
 But PerssDus,^ when he lent a sum of money to one of his 
 friends, had the fact duly attested by a banker in the 
 market-place, remembering belike that line in Hesiod,* 
 
 " E'en to a brother, smiling, bring you witness." 
 
 And he wondering and saying, "Why all these legal 
 forms, Pers83us ? " he replied, " Ay, verily, that my money 
 may be paid back in a friendly way, and that I may not 
 have to use legal forms to get it back." For many, at 
 first too bashful to see to security, have afterwards had to 
 go to law, and lost their friend.^ 
 
 § XI. Plato again, giving Helicon of Cyzicus a letter for 
 Dionysius, praised the bearer as a man of goodness and 
 moderation, but added at the end of the letter, " I write 
 you this about a man, an animal by nature apt to change." 
 But Xenocrates, though a man of austere character, was 
 prevailed upon through his bashfulness to recommend to 
 Polysperchon by letter, one who was no good man as the 
 event showed ; for when the Macedonian welcomed him, 
 and inquired if he wanted any money, he asked for a 
 talent, and Polysperchon gave it him, but wrote to Xeno- 
 crates advising him for the future to be more careful in 
 the choice of people he recommended. But Xenocrates 
 knew not the fellow's true character; we on the other 
 
 ^ Thucydides, ii. 40. Pericles is the speaker. 
 
 2 A slightly -changed line from Euripides' "Pirithous," Fragra. 591. 
 Quoted correctly " Un Abundance of Fi-iends," § vii. 
 
 ^ " Zenonis discipulus." — Eeiske. * " Works and Days," 371. 
 
 5 Cf. Shakspere, " Hamlet," i. iii. 76. 
 
262 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 liand verj often when we know that such and such 
 men are bad, jet give them testimonials and money, doing 
 ourselves injury, and not getting any pleasure for it, as 
 people do get in the company of whores and flatterers, but 
 being vexed and disgusted at the importunity that has upset 
 and forced our reason. For the line 
 
 " I know that what I'm going to do is bad,"^ 
 
 is especially applicable to people that importune us, when 
 one is going to perjure oneself, or deliver an unjust verdict, 
 or vote for a measure that is inexpedient, or borrow money 
 for someone who will never pay it back. 
 
 § XII. And so repentance follows more closely upon bash- 
 fulness than upon any emotion, and that not afterwards 
 but in the very act. For we are vexed with ourselves when 
 we give, and ashamed when we perjure ourselves, and get 
 ill-fame from our advocacies, and are put to the blush 
 when we cannot fulfil our promises. For frequently, from 
 inability to say No, we promise impossibilities to perse- 
 vering applicants, as introductions at court, and audiences 
 with princes, from reluctance or want of nerve to say, 
 " The king does not know us, others have his regard far 
 more." But Lysander, when he was out of favour with 
 Agesilaus, though he was thought to have very great 
 influence with him owing to his great reputation, was not 
 ashamed to dismiss suitors, and bid them go and pay their 
 court to others who had more influence with the king. For 
 not to be able to do everything carries no disgrace with it, 
 but to undertake and try and force your way to what you 
 are unable to do, or unqualified by nature for, is in addition 
 to the disgrace incurred a task full of trouble. 
 
 § XIII. To take another element into consideration, all 
 seemly and modest requests we ought readily to comply 
 with, not bashfully but heartily, whereas in injurious or 
 unreasonable requests we ought ever to remember the con- 
 duct of Zeno, who, meeting a young man he knew walking 
 very quietly near a wall, and learning from him that he was 
 trying to get out of the way of a friend who wanted him to 
 perjure himself on his behalf, said to him, " stupid fellow, 
 what do you tell me? Is he not afraid or ashamed to 
 
 1 Euripides, " Medea," 1078. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 263 
 
 press you to what is not right ? And dare not you stand 
 np boldly against him for what is right ? " For he that 
 said " villainy is no bad weapon against villainy " ' taught 
 people the bad practice of standing on one's defence against 
 vice by imitating it ; but to get rid of those who shame- 
 lessly and unblushingly importune us by their own effron- 
 tery, and not to gratify the immodest in their disgrace- 
 ful desires through false modesty, is the right and proper 
 conduct of sensible people. 
 
 § xiY. Moreover it is no great task to resist disrej)utable 
 and low and worthless fellows who importune you, but 
 some send such off with a laugh or a, jest, as Theocritus 
 did, who, when two fellows in the public baths, one a 
 stranger, the other a well-known thief, wanted to borrow 
 his scraper,^ put them both off with a playful answer, 
 "You, sir, I don't know, and you I know too well." And 
 Lysimache,^ the priestess of Athene Polias at Athens, when 
 some muleteers that bore the sacred vessels asked her to 
 give them a drink, answered, " I hesitate to do so from fear 
 that you would make a practice of it." ^ And when a cer- 
 tain young man, the son of a distinguished officer, but 
 himself effeminate and far from bold, asked Antigonus for 
 promotion, he replied, " With me, young man, honours are 
 given for personal prowess, not for the prowess of an- 
 cestors." 
 
 § XV. But if the person that importunes us be famous or 
 a man of power, for such persons are very hard to move 
 by entreaty or to get rid of when they come to sue for your 
 vote and interest, it will not perhaps be easy or even ne- 
 cessary to behave as Cato, when quite a young man, did to 
 Catulus. Catulus was in the highest repute at Rome, and 
 at that time held the office of censor, and went to Cato, who 
 then held the office of quEestor, and tried to beg off some- 
 one whom he had fined, and was urgent and even violent 
 in his petitions, till Cato at last lost all patience, and said, 
 " To have you, the censor, removed by my officers against 
 your will, Catulus, would not be a seemly thing for you." 
 So Catulus felt ashamed, and went off in a rage. But see 
 
 ' Our " Set a thief to catch a thief." 
 
 ^ Or strigil. See Otto Jahn's note on Persius. v. 126. 
 
 ^ " Forsitan ilia quam nominat Pausanias, i. 27." — Beiske. 
 
264 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 whether the answers of Agesilaus and Themistocles are 
 not more modest and in better form. Agesilans, when he 
 was asked by his father to pronounce sentence contrary to 
 the law, said, " Father, I was taught by you even from my 
 earliest years to obey the laws, so now I shall obey you and 
 do nothing contrary to law." And Themistocles, when 
 Simonides asked him to do something unjust, replied, 
 " Neither would you be a good poet if your lines violated 
 the laws of metre, nor should I be a good magistrate if I 
 gave decisions contrary to law." 
 
 § XYi. And yet it is not on account of want of metrical 
 harmony in respect to the lyre, to borrow the words of 
 Plato, that cities quarrel with cities and friends with 
 friends, and do and suffer the worst woes, but on account 
 of deviations ^ from law and justice. And yet some, who 
 themselves pay great attention to melody a,nd letters and 
 measures, do not think it wrong for others to neglect what 
 is right in magistracies and judicial sentences and business 
 generally. One must therefore deal with them in the fol- 
 lowing manner. I^oes an orator ask a favour of you when 
 you are acting as juryman, or a demagogue when you are 
 sitting in council ? Say you will grant his request if he 
 first utter a solecism, or introduce a barbarism into his 
 speech ; he will refuse because of the shame that would 
 attach itself to him ; at any rate we see some that will 
 not in a speech let two vowels come together. If again 
 some illustrious and distinguished person importune you 
 to something bad, bid him come into the market-place 
 dancing or making wry faces, and if he refuse you will 
 have an opportunity to speak, and ask him which is more 
 disgraceful, to utter a solecism and make wry faces, or to 
 violate the law and one's oath, and contrary to justice to 
 do more for a bad than for a good man. ISTicostratus the 
 Argive, when Archidamus offered him a large sum of 
 money and any Lacedemonian bride he chose if he would 
 deliver up Cromnum, said Archidamus could not be a 
 descendant of Hercules, for he travelled about and killed 
 evil-doers, whereas Archidamus tried to make evil-doers of 
 
 ' Literally '' want of tune in." We cannot well keep up the metaphor. 
 Compare with this passage, " That virtue may be taught," § ii. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 265 
 
 the good. In like manner, if a man of good repute tries to 
 force and importune us to something bad, let us tell him 
 that he is acting in an ignoble way, and not as his birth and 
 virtue would warrant. 
 
 § XVII. But in the case of people of no repute you must 
 see whether you can persuade the miser by your impor- 
 tunity to lend you money without a bond, or the proud 
 man to yield you the better place, or the ambitious man 
 to surrender some office to you when he might take it him- 
 self. For truly it would seem monstrous that, while such 
 remain firm and inflexible and unmoveable in their vicious 
 propensities, we who wish to be, and profess to be, men of 
 honour and justice should be so little masters of ourselves 
 as to abandon and betray virtue. For indeed, if those who 
 importune us do it for glory and power, it is absurd that 
 we should adorn and aggrandize others only to get infamy 
 and a bad name ourselves ; like unfair umpires in the 
 public games, or like people voting only to ingratiate 
 themselves, and so bestowing improperly offices and prizes^ 
 and glory on others, while they rob themselves of respect 
 and fair fame. And if we see that the person who impor- 
 tunes us only does so for money, does it not occur to one 
 that it is monstrous to be prodigal of one's own fame and 
 reputation merely to make somebody else's purse heavier ? 
 Why the idea must occur to most people, they sin with 
 their eyes open ; like people who are urged hard to toss off 
 big bumpers, and grunt and groan and make wry faces, 
 but at last do as they are told. 
 
 § XVIII. Such weakness of mind is like a temperament 
 of body equally susceptible to heat and cold : for if such 
 people are praised by those that importune them they are 
 overcome and yield at once, whereas they are mortally 
 afraid of the blame and suspicions of those whose desires 
 they do not comply with. But we ought to be stout and 
 resolute in either case, neither yielding to bullying nor 
 cajolery. Thucydides indeed tells us, since envy necessarily 
 follows ability, that "he is well advised who incurs envy in 
 matters of the highest importance." ^ But we, thinking it 
 
 ^ Literally " crowns." 
 
 ^ Thucydides, ii. 64. Pericles is the speaker. Quoted again in 
 " How one may discern a flatterer from a friend," § xxxv. 
 
266 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 difficult to escape envy, and seeing that it is altogether 
 impossible not to incur blame or give offence to those we 
 live with, shall be well advised if we prefer the hatred of 
 the perverse to that of those who might justly find fault 
 with us for having iniquitously served their turn. And 
 indeed we ought to be on our guard against praise from 
 those who importune us, which is sure to be altogether in- 
 sincere, and not to resemble swine, readily allowing anyone 
 that presses to make use of us from our pleasure at itching 
 and tickling, and submitting ourselves to their will. For 
 those that give their ears to flatterers differ not a whit 
 from such as let themselves be tripped up at wrestling, only 
 their overthrow and fall is more disgraceful ; some for- 
 bearing hostility and reproof in the case of bad men, that 
 they may be called merciful and humane and compas- 
 sionate ; and others on the contrary persuaded to take up 
 unnecessary and dangerous animosities and charges by 
 those who praise them as the only men, the only people 
 that never flatter, and go so far as to entitle them their 
 mouthpieces and voices. Accordingly Bio^ compared such 
 people to jars, that you could easily take by the ears and 
 turn about at your will. Thus it is recorded that the 
 sophist Alexinus in one of his lectures said a good many 
 bad things about Stilpo the Megarian, but when one of 
 those that were present said, " Why, he was speaking in 
 your praise only the other day," he replied, " I don't doubt 
 it ; for he is the best and noblest of men." Menedemus 
 on the contrary, having heard that Alexinus^ frequently 
 praised him, replied, "But I always censure him, for that 
 man is bad who either praises a bad man or is blamed by 
 a good." So inflexible and proof was he against such 
 flattery, and master of that advice which Hercules in 
 Antisthenes^ gave, when he ordered his sons to be grateful 
 to no one that praised them ; which meant nothing else 
 than that they should not be dumbfoundered at it, nor 
 flatter again those who praised them. Very apt, I take it, 
 
 ^ "Est Bio Borysthenita, dequo vide Diog. Laert," — Rciske. 
 
 2 " De Alexino Eleo vide Diog. Laert., ii. 109. Nostri p. 1063, 3."— 
 Reiske. 
 
 3 Antisthenes wrote a book called " Hercules." See Diogenes 
 Laertius, vi. 16. 
 
ON SHYNESS. 267 
 
 was the remark of Pindar to one who told him. that he 
 praised him everywhere and to all persons, " I am greatly 
 obliged to you, and will make your account true by my 
 actions." 
 
 § XIX. A useful precept in reference to all passions is 
 especially valuable in the case of the bashful. When they 
 have been overcome by this infirmity, and against their 
 judgement have erred and been confounded, let them fix it 
 in their memories, and, remembering the pain and grief it 
 gave them, let them recall it to their mind and be on their 
 guard for a very long time. For as travellers that have 
 stumbled against a stone, or pilots that have been wrecked 
 off a headland, if they remember these occurrences, not 
 only dread and are on their guard continually on those 
 spots, but also on all similar ones ; so those that frequently 
 remember the disgrace and injury that bashfulness brought 
 them, and its sorrow and anguish, will in similar cases be 
 on their guard against their weakness, and will not readily 
 allow themselves to be subjugated by it again. 
 
 ON RESTRAINma ANGER. 
 
 A DIALOGUE BETWEEN STLLA AND FUNDANUS. 
 
 § I. Sylla. Those painters, Fundanus, seem to me to 
 do well who, before giving the finishing touches to their 
 paintings, lay them by for a time and then revise them ; 
 because by taking their eyes off them for a time they gain 
 by frequent inspection a new insight, and are more apt to 
 detect minute differences, that continuous familiarity would 
 have hidden. Now since a human being cannot so separate 
 himself from himself for a time, and make a break in his 
 continuity, and then approach himself again — and that is 
 perhaps the chief reason why a man is a worse judge of 
 himself than of others — the next best thing will be for a 
 man to inspect his friends after an interval, and likewise 
 offer himself to their scrutiny, not to see whether he has 
 aged quickly, or whether his bodily condition is better or 
 
268 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 worse, iDut to examine his moral character, and see whether 
 time has added any good quality, or removed any bad one. 
 On my return then to Rome after an absence of two years, 
 and having been with you now five months, I am not at all 
 surprised that there has been a great increase and growth 
 in those good points which you formerly had owing to your 
 admirable nature ; but when I see how gentle and obedient 
 to reason your former excessive impetuosity and hot temper 
 has become, it cannot but occur to me to quote the line, 
 
 " Ye gods, how much more mild is he become ! " ''■ 
 
 And this mildness has not wrought in you sloth or weakness, 
 but like cultivation of the soil it has produced a smoothness 
 and depth fit for action, instead of the former impetuosity 
 and vehemence. And so it is clear that your propensity 
 to anger has not been effaced by any declining vigour or 
 through some chance, but has been cured by good precepts. 
 And indeed, for I will tell you the truth, when our friend 
 Eros^ reported this change in you to me, I suspected 
 that owing to goodwill he bare witness not of the 
 actual state of the case, but of what was becoming to all 
 good and virtuous men, although, as you know, he can 
 never be persuaded to depart from his real opinion to in- 
 gratiate himself with anyone. But now he is acquitted 
 of false witness, and do you, as your journey gives you 
 leisure, narrate to me the mode of cure you employed to 
 make your temper so under control, so natural, gentle and 
 obedient to reason. 
 
 Fundanus. Most friendly Sylla, take care that you do 
 not in your goodwill and affection to me rest under any 
 misconception of my real condition. For it is possible that 
 Eros, not being able always himself to keep his temper in 
 its place in the obedience that Homer speaks of,^ but some- 
 times carried away by his hatred of what is bad, may think 
 me grown milder than I really am, as in changes of the 
 scale in music the lowest notes become the highest. 
 
 Sylla. Neither of these is the case, Fundanus, but oblige 
 me by doing as I ask. 
 
 1 Homer, "Iliad," xxii. 373. 
 
 ' Alluded to again " On the tranquillity of the mind," § i. 
 
 ' The allusion is to Homer's " Odyssey," xx. 23. 
 
ON KESTRAINING ANGER. 269 
 
 § II. Ftmdanus. One of the excellent precepts then of 
 Musonias that I remember, Sylla, is this, that those who 
 wish to be well should diet themselves all their life long. 
 For I do not think we must employ reason as a cure, as 
 we do hellebore, by purging it out with the disease, but we 
 must retain it in the soul, to restrain and govern the judge- 
 ment. For the power of reason is not like physic, but 
 wholesome food, which co-operates with good health in 
 producing a good habit of body in those by whom it is 
 taken. But admonition and reproof, when passion is at 
 its height and swelling, does little or no good, but resem- 
 bles very closely those strong-smelling substances, that are 
 able to set on their legs again those that have fallen in 
 epileptic fits, but cannot rid them of their disease. For 
 although all other passions, even at the moment of their 
 acme, do in some sort listen to reason and admit it into the 
 soul, yet anger does not, for, as Melanthius says, 
 
 " Fell things it does when it the mind unsettles," 
 
 for it absolutely turns reason out of doors, and bolts it out, 
 and, like those persons who burn themselves and houses 
 together, it makes all the interior full of confusion and 
 smoke and noise, so that what would be advantageous can 
 neither be seen nor heard. And so an empty ship in a 
 storm at open sea would sooner admit on board a pilot from 
 without, than a man in a tempest of rage and anger would 
 listen to another's advice, unless his own reason was first 
 prepared to hearken. But as those who expect a siege get 
 together and store up supplies, when they despair of relief 
 from without, so ought we by all means to scour the 
 country far and wide to derive aids against anger from 
 philosophy, and store them up in the soul : for, w^hen the 
 time of need comes, we shall find it no easy task to import 
 them. For either the soul doesn't hear what is said with- 
 out because of the uproar, if it have not within its own 
 reason (like a boatswain as it were) to receive at once and 
 understand every exhortation ; or if it does hear, it despises 
 what is uttered mildly and gently, while it is exasperated 
 by harsh censure. For anger being haughty and self- 
 willed and hard to be worked upon by another, like a 
 
270 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 fortified tyranny, must liave someone born and bred 
 within it ^ to overthrow it. 
 
 § III. IS'ow long- continued anger, and frequent giving 
 way to it, produces an evil disposition of soul, which people 
 call irascibility, and which ends in passionateness, bitter- 
 ness, and peevishness, whenever the mind becomes sore and 
 vexed at trifles and querulous at everyday occurrences, 
 like iron thin and beaten out too fine. But when the 
 judgement checks and suppresses at once the rising anger, 
 it not only cures the soul for the moment, but restores its 
 tone and balance for the future. It has happened to myself 
 indeed twice or thrice, when I strongly fought against anger, 
 that I was in the same plight as the Thebans, who after 
 they had once defeated the Lacedeemonians, whom they 
 had hitherto thought invincible, never lost a battle against 
 them again. I then felt confident that reason can win the 
 victory. I saw also that anger is not only appeased by the 
 sprinkling of cold water, as Aristotle attested, but is also 
 extinguished by the action of fear ; aye, and, as Homer tells 
 us, anger has been cured and has melted away in the case 
 of many by some sudden joy. So that I came to the con- 
 clusion that this passion is not incurable for those who 
 wish to be cured. For it does not arise from great and 
 important causes, but banter and joking, a laugh or a nod, 
 and similar trifles make many angry, as Helen by addressing 
 her niece, 
 
 " Electra, maiden now for no short time," ^ 
 provoked her to reply, 
 
 " Your wisdom blossoms late, since formerly 
 You left your house in shame ; " ' 
 
 and Callisthenes incensed Alexander, by saying, when a 
 huge cup was brought to him, " I will not drink to Alex- 
 ander till I shall require the help of -(:Esculapius." 
 
 § IV. As then it is easy to put out a flame kindled in 
 the hair of hares and in wicks and rubbish, but if it once 
 gets hold of things solid and thick, it quickly destroys and 
 consumes them, " raging amidst the lofty work of the 
 
 Reading s? tavrou with Reiske. ^ Euripides, " Orestes," 72. 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Orestes," 99. 
 
ON EE STRAINING ANGER. 271 
 
 carpenters," as -ZEschjlus^ says ; so he that observes anger 
 in its rise, and sees it gradually smoking and bursting forth 
 into fire from some chatter or rubbishy scurrility, need 
 have no great trouble with it, but can frequently smother 
 it merely by silence and contemjDt. For as a person puts 
 out a fire by bringing no fuel to it, so with respect to 
 anger, he that does not in the beginning fan it, and 
 stir up its rage in himself, keeps it off and destroys it. 
 And so, though Hieronymus has given us many useful 
 sayings and precepts, I am not pleased with his remark 
 that there is no perception of anger in its birth, but 
 only in its actual developement, so quick is it. For 
 none of the passions when stirred up and set in motion 
 has so palpable a birth and growth as anger. As indeed 
 Homer skilfully shows us, where he represents Achilles as 
 seized at once with grief, when word was brought him of 
 Patroclus' death, in the line, 
 
 " Thus spake he, and grief's dark cloud covered him ;" ^ 
 
 whereas he represents him as waxing angry with Agamem- 
 non slowly, and as inflamed by his many words, which if 
 either of them^ had abstained from, their quarrel would 
 not have attained such growth and magnitude. And so 
 Socrates, as often as he perceived any anger rising in him 
 against any of his friends, " setting himself like some ocean 
 promontory to break the violence of the waves," would 
 lower his voice, and put on a smiling countenance, and 
 give his eye a gentler expression, by inclining in the other 
 direction and running counter to his passion, thus keeping 
 himself from fall and defeat. 
 
 § V. For the first way, my friend, to overcome anger, 
 like the putting down of some tyrant, is not to obey or 
 listen to it when it bids you speak loud, and look fierce, 
 and beat yourself, but to remain quiet, and not to make 
 the passion more intense, as one would a disease, by tossing 
 about and crying out. In love affairs indeed, such things 
 as revellings, and serenadings, and crowning the loved 
 
 1 Fragment 3G1. 2 Homer, " Iliad," xvii. 591. 
 
 3 The reading of the MSS. is avToJv. 
 
272 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 one's door with garlands, may indeed bring some pleasant 
 and elegant relief. 
 
 " I went, but asked not who or whose she was, 
 I merely kissed her door-post. If that be 
 A crime, I do plead guilty to the same." ^ 
 
 In. the case of monrners also giving np to weeping and 
 wailing takes away with the tears much of the grief. But 
 anger on the contrary is much more fanned by what angry 
 persons do and say. It is best therefore to be calm, or 
 to flee and hide ourselves and go to a haven of quiet, when 
 we feel the fit of temper coming upon us as an epileptic 
 fit, that we fall not, or rather fall not on others, for it is 
 our friends that we fall upon most and most frequently. 
 For we do not love all, nor envy all, nor fear all men ; but 
 nothing is untouched or unassailed by anger ; for we are 
 angry with friends and enemies, parents and children, aye, 
 and with the gods, and beasts, and even things inanimate, 
 as was Thamyris, 
 
 " Breaking his gold-bound horn, breaking the music 
 Of well-compacted lyre ;" ^ 
 
 and Pandarus, who called down a curse upon himself, if 
 he did not burn his bow "after breaking it with his 
 hands. "^ And Xerxes inflicted stripes and blows on the 
 sea, and sent letters to Mount Athos, " Divine Athos, 
 whose top reaches heaven, put not in the way of my works 
 stones large and difficult to deal with, or else I will hew 
 thee down, and throw thee into the sea." For anger has 
 many formidable aspects, and many ridiculous ones, so that 
 of all the passions it is the most hated and despised. It 
 will be well to consider both aspects. 
 
 § VI. To begin then, whether my process was wrong or 
 right I know not, but I began my cure of anger by noticing 
 its effects in others, as the Lacedssmonians study the 
 nature of drunkenness in the Helots. And in the first 
 place, as Hippocrates tells us that disease is most dangerous 
 in which the face of the patient is most unlike himself, 
 so observing that people beside themselves with anger 
 
 ^ Lines of Callimachus. <p\it]v is the admirable emendation of Sal- 
 masius. 
 
 2 Sophocles, " Thamyras," Fragm. 232. * " Iliad," v. 214-216. 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 273 
 
 change their face, colour, walk, and voice, I formed 
 an impression as it were of that aspect of passion, and was 
 very disgusted with myself if ever I should appear so 
 frightful and like one out of his mind to my friends and 
 wife and daughters, not only wild and unlike oneself in 
 appearance, but also with a voice savage and harsh, as I 
 had noticed in some ^ of my acquaintance, who could neither 
 preserve for anger their ordinary behaviour, or demea- 
 nour, or grace of language, or persuasiveness and gentle- 
 ness in conversation. Caius Gracchus, indeed, the orator, 
 whose character was harsh and style of oratory impassioned, 
 had a pitch-pipe made for him, such as musicians use to 
 heighten or lower their voices by degrees, and this, when 
 he was making a speech, a slave stood behind him and held, 
 and used to give him a mild and gentle note on it, whereby 
 he lowered his key, and removed from his voice the harsh 
 and passionate element, charming and laying the heat of 
 the orator, 
 
 " As shepherds' wax -joined reed sounds musically 
 With sleep provoking strain." ^ 
 
 For myself if I had some elegant and sprightly companion, 
 I should not be vexed at his showing me a looking-glass 
 in my fits of anger, as they offer one to some after a bath 
 to little useful end. For to behold oneself unnaturally 
 distorted in countenance will condemn anger in no small 
 degree. The poets playfully tell us that Athene when play- 
 ing on the pipe was rebuked thus by a Satyr, 
 
 " That look no way becomes you, take your armour, 
 Lay down your pipes, and do compose your cheeks," 
 
 and though she paid no attention to him, yet afterwards 
 when she saw her face in a river, she felt vexed and threw 
 her pipes away, although art had made melody a compen- 
 sation for her unsightliness. And Marsyas, it seems, by a 
 sort of mouthpiece forcibly repressed the violence of his 
 breath, and tricked up and hid the contortion of his face, 
 
 " Around his shaggy temples put bright gold, 
 And o'er his open mouth thongs tied behind." 
 
 ^ Reading kvioiQ, as Wyttenbach suggests. 
 2 Aeschylus, " Prometheus," 574, 575. 
 T 
 
274 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Now anger, that puffs np and distends the face so as to 
 look ugly, utters a voice still more harsh and unpleasant, 
 " Moving the mind's chords undisturbed before," 
 
 They say that the sea is cleansed when agitated by the 
 winds it throws up tangle and seaweed ; but the intem- 
 perate and bitter and vain words, which the mind throws 
 up when the soul is agitated, defile the speakers of them 
 first of all and fill them with infamy, as always having 
 those thoughts within their bosom and being defiled with 
 them, but only giving vent to them in anger. And so for 
 a word which is, as Plato styles it, "a very small matter," 
 they incur a most heavy punishment, for they get reputed 
 to be enemies, and evil speakers, and malignant in dis- 
 position. 
 
 § VII. Seeing and observing all this, it occurs to me to 
 take it as a matter of fact, and record it for my own 
 general use, that if it is good to keep the tongue soft and 
 smooth in a fever, it is better to keep it so in anger. For 
 if the tongue of people in a fever be unnatural, it is a bad 
 sign, but not the cause of their malady ; but the tongue of 
 angry people, being rough and foul, and breaking out into 
 unseemly speeches, produces insults that work irremediable 
 mischief, and argue deep-rooted malevolence within. For 
 wine drunk neat does not exhibit the soul in so ungovern- 
 able and hateful a condition as temper does : for the 
 outbreaks of the one smack of laughter and fun, while 
 those of the other are compounded with gall : and at a 
 drinking-bout he that is silent is burdensome to the 
 company and tiresome, whereas in anger nothing is more 
 highly thought of than silence, as Sappho advises, 
 
 " When anger's busy in the brain 
 Thy idly-barking tongue restrain." 
 
 § VIII. And not only does the consideration of all this 
 naturally arise from observing ourselves in the moments of 
 anger, but we cannot help seeing also the other properties 
 of rage, how ignoble it is, how unmanly, how devoid of 
 dignity and greatness of mind ! And yet to most people 
 its noise seems vigour, its threatening confidence, and its 
 obstinacy force of character ; some even not wisely entitle 
 its savageness magnanimity, and its implacability firmness, 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 275 
 
 and its morositj hatred of what is bad. For their actions 
 and motions and whole demeanour argue great littleness 
 and meanness, not only when they are fierce with little 
 boys, and peevish with women, and think it right to treat 
 dogs and horses and mules with harshness, as Ctesiphon 
 the pancratiast thought fit to kick back a mule that had 
 kicked him, but even in the butcheries that tyrants commit 
 their littleness of soul is apparent in their savageness, and 
 their suffering in their action, so that they are like the 
 bites of serpents, that, when they are burnt and smart with 
 pain, violently thrust their venom on those that have hurt 
 them. For as a swelling is produced in the flesh by a 
 heavy blow, so in softest souls the inclination to hurt 
 others gets its greater strength from greater weakness. 
 Thus women are more prone to anger than men, and people 
 ill than people well, and old men than men in their prime, 
 and the unfortunate than the prosperous ; the miser is 
 most prone to anger with his steward, the glutton with his 
 cook, the jealous man with his wife, the vain man when he 
 is spoken ill of ; and worst of all are those " men who are 
 too eager in states for office, or to head a faction, a manifest 
 sorrow," to borrow Pindar's words. So from the very 
 great pain and suffering of the soul there arises mainly from 
 weakness anger, which is not like the nerves of the soul, 
 as some one defined it, but like its strainings and convul- 
 sions when it is excessively vehement in its thirst for 
 revenge. 
 
 § IX. Such bad examples as these were not pleasant to 
 look at but necessary, but I shall now proceed to describe 
 people who have been mild and easy in dealing with anger, 
 conduct gratifying either to see or hear about, being utterly 
 disgusted ^ with people who use such language as, 
 
 " You have a man wi'onged : shall a man stand this ? " 
 and, 
 " Put your heel upon his neck, and dash his head against the ground," 
 
 and other provoking expressions such as these, by which 
 some not well have transferred anger from the woman's 
 
 ' It will be seen I adopt the reading and punctuation of Xylander. 
 
276 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 side of the house to the man's. For manliness in all other 
 respects seems to resemble justice, and to differ from it 
 only in respect to gentleness, with which it has more 
 affinities. For it sometimes happens to worse men to 
 govern better ones, but to erect a trophy in the soul against 
 anger (which Heraclitus says it is difficult to contend 
 against, for whatever it wishes is bought at the price of the 
 soul), is a proof of power so great and victorious as to be 
 able to apply the judgement as if it were nerves and sinews 
 to the passions. So I always try to collect and peruse the 
 remarks on this subject not only of the philosophers, who 
 foolish ^ people say had no gall in their composition, but 
 still more of kings and tyrants. Such was the remark of 
 Antigonus to his soldiers, when they were abusing him 
 near his tent as if he were not listening, so he put his staff 
 out, and said, " What's to do ? can you not go rather 
 farther off to run me down ? " And when Arcadio the 
 Achsean, who was always railing against Philip, and ad- 
 vising people to flee 
 
 " Unto a country wliere they knew not Philip," 
 
 visited Macedonia afterwards on some chance or other, 
 the king's friends thought he ought to be punished and the 
 matter not looked over ; but Philip treated him kindly, 
 snd sent him presents and gifts, and afterwards bade inquiry 
 to be made as to what sort of account of him Arcadio now 
 gave to the Greeks ; and when all testified that the fellow 
 had become a wonderful praiser of the king, Philip said, 
 " You see I knew how to cure him better than all of you." 
 And at the Olympian games when there was defamation, 
 of Philip, and some of his suite said to him, that the 
 Greeks ought to smart for it, because they railed against 
 him when they were treated well by him, he replied, 
 " What will they do then if they are treated badly by me ?" 
 Excellent also was the behaviour of Pisistratus to Thrasy- 
 bulus, and of Porsena to Mucins, and of Magas to Philemon. 
 As to Magas, after he had been publicly jeered at by 
 Philemon in one of his comedies at the theatre in the 
 following words, 
 
 ^ This is the reading of Keiske and Diibner. 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 277 
 
 " Magas, the king hath written thee a letter, 
 Unhappy Magas, since thou can'st not read," 
 
 after having taken Philemon, who had been cast on shore 
 by a storm at Parsetonium, he commanded one of his 
 soldiers only to touch his neck with the naked sword and 
 then to go away quietly, and dismissed him, after sending 
 him a ball and some dice as if he were a silly boy. And 
 Ptolemy on one occasion, flouting a grammarian for his 
 ignorance, asked him who was the father of Peleus, and he 
 answered, " I will tell you, if you tell me first who was the 
 father of Lagus." This was a jeer at the obscure birth of 
 the king, and all his courtiers were indignant at it as an 
 unpardonable liberty ; but Ptolemy said, " If it is not 
 kingly to take a flout, neither is it kingly to give one." And 
 Alexander was more savage than usual in his behaviour to 
 Callisthenes and Clitus. So Porus, when he was taken 
 captive, begged Alexander to use him as a king. And on 
 his inquiring, " What, nothing more ? " he replied " No. 
 For everything is included in being used as a king." So 
 they call the king of the gods Milichius,^ while they call 
 Ares Maimactes ; ''^ and punishment and torture they assign 
 to the Erinnyes and to demons, not to the gods or Olympus. 
 § X. As then a certain person passed the following re- 
 mark on Philip when he had razed Olynthus to the ground, 
 " He certainly could not build such another city," so we 
 may say to anger, " You can root up, and destroy, and 
 throw down, but to raise up and save and spare and tolerate 
 is the work of mildness and moderation, the work of a 
 Camillus, a Metellus, an Aristides, a Socrates ; but to 
 sting and bite is to resemble the ant and horse-fly. For, 
 indeed, when I consider revenge, I find its angry method 
 to be for the most part ineffectual, since it spends itself in 
 biting the lips and gnashing the teeth, and in vain attacks, 
 and in railings coupled with foolish threats, and eventually 
 resembles children running races, who from feebleness 
 ridiculously tumble down before they reach the goal they 
 are hastening to. So that speech of the Rhodian to a 
 
 ^ That is mild. Zeus is so called, Pausanias, i. 37 ; ii. 9, 20. 
 ^ That is, fierce, furious. It will be seen I adopt the suggestion of 
 Reiske. 
 
278 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 lictor of the Roman preetor who was shouting and talking 
 insolently was not inapt, " It is no matter to me what you 
 say, but what your master thinks." ^ And Sophocles, when 
 he had introduced Neoptolemus and Eurypylus as armed 
 for the battle, gives them this high commendation,^ 
 
 " They rushed into the midst of armed warriors." 
 Some barbarians indeed poison their steel, but bravery has 
 no need of gall, being dipped in reason, but rage and fury 
 are not invincible but rotten. And so the Lacedemonians 
 by their pipes turn away the anger of their warriors, and 
 sacrifice to the Muses before commencing battle, that 
 reason may abide with them, and when they have routed 
 a foe do not follow up the victory,^ but relax their rage, 
 which like small daggers they can easily take back. But 
 anger kills myriads before it is glutted with revenge, as 
 happened in the case of Cyrus and Pelopidas the Theban. 
 But Agathocles bore mildly the revilings of those he was 
 besieging, and when one of them cried out, " Potter, how 
 are you going to get money to pay your mercenaries?" 
 he replied laughingly, " Out of your town if I take it." 
 And when some of those on the wall threw his ugliness 
 into the teeth of Antigonus, he said to them, " I thought I 
 was rather a handsome fellow." But after he had taken 
 the town, he sold for slaves those that had flouted him, pro- 
 testing that, if they insulted him again, he would bring 
 the matter before their masters. I have noticed also that 
 hunters and orators are very unsuccessful when they give 
 way to anger."* And Aristotle tells us that the friends of 
 Satyrus stopped up his ears with wax when he was to plead 
 a cause, that he might not make any confusion in the case 
 through rage at the abuse of his enemies. And does 
 it not frequently happen with ourselves that a slave who 
 has offended escapes punishment, because they abscond in 
 fear of our threats and harsh words ? What nurses then 
 say to children, " Give up crying, and you shall have it," 
 may usefully be applied to anger, thus, " Do not be in a 
 hurry, or bawl out, or be vehement, and you will sooner 
 
 ^ Literally " is silent about." It is like the saying about Von Moltke 
 that he can be silent in six or seven languages. 
 
 ^ Adopting Eeiske's reading. ^ Compare Pausanias, iv. 8. 
 
 * Diibner puts this sentence in brackets. 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 279 
 
 and better get what you. want." For a father, seeing his 
 boj trying to cut or cleave something with a knife, takes 
 the knife from him and does it himself : and similarly a 
 person, taking revenge out of the hand of passion, does 
 himself safely and usefully and without harm punish the 
 person who deserves punishment, and not himself instead, 
 as anger often does. 
 
 § XI. Now though all the passions need such discipline 
 as by exercise shall tame and subdue their unreasoning 
 and disobedient elements, yet there is none which we ought 
 to keep under by such discipline so much as the exhibition 
 of anger to our servants. For neither envy, nor fear, nor 
 rivalry come into play between them and us ; but our fre- 
 quent displays of anger to them, creating many offences 
 and faults, make us to slip as if on slippery ground owing 
 to our autocracy with our servants, which no one resists or 
 prevents. For it is impossible to check irresponsible power 
 so as never to break out under the influence of passion, 
 unless one wields power with much meekness, and refuses 
 to listen to the frequent complaints of one's wife and 
 friends charging one with being too easy and lax with one's 
 servants. And by nothing have I been more exasperated 
 against them, as if they were being ruined for want of 
 correction . At last, though late, I got to see that in the first 
 place it is better to make them worse by forbearance, than by 
 bitterness and anger to distort oneself for the correction 
 of others. In the next place I observed that many for the 
 very reason that they were not corrected were frequently 
 ashamed to be bad, and made pardon rather than punish- 
 ment the commencement of their reformation, aye, and 
 made better slaves to some merely at their nod silently 
 and cheerfully than to others with all their beatings and 
 brandings, and so I came to the conclusion that reason 
 gets better obeyed than temper, for it is not as the poet said, 
 
 " Where there is fear, there too is self-respect," 
 
 but it is just the other way about, for self-respect begets that 
 kind of fear that corrects the behaviour. But perpetual 
 and pitiless beating produces not so much repentance for 
 wrong-doing as contrivances to continue in it without 
 detection. In the third place, ever remembering and re- 
 
280 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 fleeting within myself that, just as he that teaches us the 
 use of the bow does not forbid us to shoot but only to miss 
 the mark, so it will not prevent punishment altogether to 
 teach people to do it in season, and with moderation, 
 utility, and decorum, I strive to remove anger most espe- 
 cially by not forbidding those who are to be corrected to 
 speak in their defence, but by listening to them. For 
 the interval of time gives a pause to passion, and a delay 
 that mitigates it, and so judgement finds out both the fit 
 manner and adequate amount of punishment. Moreover 
 he that is punished has nothing to allege against his cor- 
 rection, if he is punished not in anger but only after his 
 guilt is brought home to him. And the greatest disgrace 
 will not be incurred, which is when the servant seems to 
 speak more justly than the master. As then Phocion, after 
 the death of Alexander, to stop the Athenians from revolt- 
 ing and believing the news too soon, said to them, " Men 
 of Athens, if he is dead to-day, he will certainly also be 
 dead to-morrow and the next day," so I think the man 
 who is in a hurry to punish anyone in his rage ought to 
 consider with himself, " If this person has wronged you 
 to-day, he will also have wronged you to-morrow and the 
 next day ; and there will be no harm done if he shall 
 be punished somewhat late ; whereas if he shall be pun- 
 ished at once, he will always seem to you to have been 
 innocent, as has often happened before now." For which 
 of us is so savage as to chastise and scourge a slave 
 because five or ten days before he over-roasted the meat, 
 or upset the table, or was somewhat tardy on some errand ? 
 And yet these are the very things for which we put ourselves 
 out and are harsh and implacable, immediately after they 
 have happened and are recent. For as bodies seem greater in 
 a mist, so do little matters in a rage. We ought therefore 
 to consider such arguments as these at once, and if, when 
 there is no trace of passion left, the matter appear bad to 
 calm and clear reason, then it ought to be taken in hand, and 
 the punishment ought not to be neglected or abandoned, as 
 we leave food when we have lost our appetites. For 
 nothing causes people to punish so much when their anger 
 is fierce, as that when it is appeased they do not punish at 
 all, but forget the matter entirely, and resemble lazy rowers. 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 281 
 
 who lie in harbour when the sea is calm, and then sail ont 
 to their peril when the wind gets up. So we, condemning 
 reason for slackness and mildness in punishing, are in a 
 hurry to punish, borne along bj passion as by a dangerous 
 gale. He that is hungry takes his food as nature dictates, 
 but he that punishes should have no hunger or thirst for 
 it, nor require anger as a sauce to stimulate him to it, but 
 should punish when he is as far as possible from having 
 any desire for it, and has to compel his reason to it. For 
 we ought not, as Aristotle tells us slaves in his time were 
 scourged in Etruria to the music of the flute, to go head- 
 long into punishing with a desire and zest for it, and to 
 delight in punishing, and then afterwards to be sorry at it 
 — for the first is savage, and the last womanish — but we 
 should without either sorrow or pleasure chastise at the 
 dictates of reason, giving anger no opportunity to interfere. 
 § XII. But this perhaps will not appear a cure of anger 
 so much as a patting away and avoiding such faults as men 
 commit in anger. And yet, though the swelling of the 
 spleen is only a symptom of fever, the fever is assuaged by 
 its abating, as Hieronymus tells us. Now when I contem- 
 plated the origin of anger itself, I observed that, though 
 different persons fell into it for different reasons, yet in 
 nearly all of them was the idea of their being despised and 
 neglected to be found. So we ought to help those who try 
 to get rid of anger, by removing as far as possible from 
 them any action savouring of contempt or contumely, and 
 by looking upon their anger as folly or necessity, or emotion, 
 or mischance, as Sophocles says, 
 
 •' In those that are unfoi-tunate, O king, 
 
 No mind stays firna, but all their balance lose." ^ 
 
 And so Agamemnon, ascribing to Ate his carrying off 
 Briseis, yet says to Achilles, 
 
 " I wish to please you in return, and give 
 Completest satisfaction."' ^ 
 
 For suing is not the action of one who shews his contempt, 
 and when he that has done an injury is humble he removes 
 
 ' Sophocles, " Antigone," 563, 564, ^ Homer, " Iliad," xix. 138. 
 
282 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 all idea of slighting one. But the angry person must not 
 expect this, but rather take to himself the answer of 
 Diogenes, who, when it was said to him, " These people 
 laugh at you," replied, " But I am not one to be laughed 
 at," and not think himself despised, but rather despise the 
 person who gave the offence, as acting from weakness, or 
 error, or rashness, or heedlessness, or illiberality, or old 
 age, or youth. Nor must we entertain such notions with 
 regard to our servants and friends. For they do not 
 despise us as void of ability or energy, but owing to our 
 evenness and good-nature, some because we are mild, and 
 others presuming on our affection for them. But as it is 
 we not only fly into rages with wife and slaves and friends, 
 as if we were slighted by them, but we also frequently, 
 from forming the same idea of being slighted, fall foul of 
 innkeepers and sailors and muleteers, and are vexed at 
 dogs that bark and asses that are in our way : like the 
 man who was going to beat an ass- driver, but when he 
 cried out he was an Athenian, he said to the ass, "You are 
 not an Athenian anyway," and beat it with many stripes. 
 
 § XIII. Moreover those continuous and frequent fits of 
 anger that gather together in the soul by degrees, like a 
 swarm of bees or wasps, are generated within us by selfish- 
 ness and peevishness, luxury and softness. And so nothing 
 causes us to be mild to our servants and wife and friends 
 so much as easiness and simplicity, and the learning to be 
 content with what we have, and not to require a quantity 
 of superfluities. 
 
 " He who likes not his meat if over-roast 
 
 Or over-boiled, or undex'-roast or under-boiled, 
 
 And never praises it however dressed," 
 
 but will not drink unless he have snow to cool his drink, 
 nor eat bread purchased in the market, nor touch food 
 served on cheap or earthenware plates, nor sleep upon any 
 but a feather bed that rises and falls like the sea stirred 
 up from its depths, and with rods and blows hastens his 
 servants at table, so that they run about and cry out and 
 sweat as if they were bringing poultices to sores, he is 
 slave to a weak querulous and discontented mode of life, 
 and, like one who has a continual cough or various 
 ailments, whether he is aware of it or not, he is in an 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 283 
 
 ulcerous aud catarrh-like condition as regards liis prone- 
 ness to anger. We must therefore train the bodj to con- 
 tentment by plain living, that it may be easily satisfied : 
 for they that require little do not miss much ; and it is no 
 great hardship to begin with our food, and take it silently 
 whatever it is, and not by being choleric and peevish to 
 thrust upon ourselves and friends the worst sauce to meat, 
 anger. 
 
 " No more unpleasant supper could there be " ^ 
 
 than that wherein the servants are beaten, and the wife 
 scolded, because something is burnt or smoked or not salt 
 enough, or because the bread is too cold. Arcesilaus was 
 once entertaining some friends and strangers, and when 
 dinner was served, there was no bread, through the ser- 
 vants having neglected to buy any. In such a case as this 
 which of us would not have broken the walls with vocife- 
 ration ? But he only smiled and said, " How unfit a sage 
 is to give an entertainment ! " And when Socrates once 
 took Euthydemus home with him from the wrestling- 
 school, Xanthippe was in a towering rage, and scolded, 
 and at last upset the table, and Euthydemus rose and went 
 away full of sorrow. But Socrates said to him, " Did not 
 a hen at your house the other day fly in and act in the 
 very same way ? And we did not put ourselves out about 
 it." We ought to receive our friends with gaiety and 
 smiles and welcome, not knitting our brows, or inspiring 
 fear and trembling in the attendants. We ought also to 
 accustom ourselves to the use of any kind of ware at 
 table, and not to stint ourselves to one kind rather than 
 another, as some pick out a particular tankard or horn, as 
 they say Marius did, out of many, and will not drink out 
 of anything else; and some act in the same way with 
 regard to oil-flasks and scrapers,^ being content with only 
 one out of all, and so, if such an article is broken or lost, 
 they are very much put out about it, and punish with 
 severity. He then that is prone to anger should not use 
 rare and dainty things, such as choice cups and seals and 
 precious stones : for if they are lost they put a man beside 
 
 ^ Homer, " Odyssey," xx. 392. ^ Or strigils. 
 
284 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 himself much more than the loss of ordinary and easily got 
 things would do. And so when Nero had got an eight-cor- 
 nered tent constructed, a wonderful object both for its 
 beauty and costliness, Seneca said to him, " You have now 
 shown yourself to be poor, for if you should lose this, you will 
 not be able to procure such another." And indeed it did so 
 happen that the tent was lost by shipwreck, but Nero bore 
 its loss patiently, remembering what Seneca had said. 
 Now this easiness about things generally makes a man also 
 easy and gentle to his servants, and if to them, then it is 
 clear he will be so to his friends also, and to all that serve 
 under him in any capacity. So we observe that newly- 
 purchased slaves do not inquire about the master who has 
 laought them, whether he is superstitious or envious, but 
 only whether he is a bad-tempered man : and generally 
 speaking we see that neither can men put up with chaste 
 wives, nor wives with loving husbands, nor friends with 
 one another, if they be ill-tempered to boot. So neither 
 marriage nor friendship is bearable with anger, though 
 without anger even drunkenness is a small matter. For 
 the wand of Dionysus punishes sufficiently the drunken 
 man, but if anger be added it turns wine from being the 
 dispeller of care and inspirer of the dance into a savage 
 and fury. And simple madness can be cured by Anticyra,^ 
 but madness mixed with anger is the producer of tragedies 
 and dreadful narratives. 
 
 § XIV. So we ought to give anger no vent, either in jest, 
 for that draws hatred to friendliness ; or in discussion, for 
 that turns love of learning into strife ; or on the judge- 
 ment-seat, for that adds insolence to power ; or in teach- 
 ing, for that produces dejection and hatred of learning : or 
 in prosperity, for that increases envy ; or in adversity, for 
 that deprives people of compassion, when they are peevish 
 and run counter to those who condole with them, like 
 Priam, 
 
 " A murrain on you, worthless wretches all, 
 Have you no griefs at home, that here you come 
 To sympathize with me ? " ^ 
 
 ' Anticyra was famous for its hellebore, which was prescribed in cases 
 of madness. See Horace, " Satires," ii. 3. 82, 83. 
 « Homer, " Iliad," xxiv. 239, 240, 
 
ON RESTKAINING ANGER. 285 
 
 Good temper on the other hand is useful in some circum- 
 stances, adorns and sweetens others, and gets the better of all 
 peevishness and anger by its gentleness. Thus Euclides,^ 
 when his brother said to him in a dispute between them, 
 *' May I perish, if I don't have mj revenge on you ! " re- 
 plied, " May I perish, if I don't persuade you ! " and so at 
 once turned and changed him. And Polemo, when a man 
 reviled him who was fond of precious stones and quite 
 crazy for costly seal-rings, made no answer, bub bestowed 
 all his attention on one of his seal-rings, and eyed it 
 closely ; and he being delighted said, " Do not look at it 
 so, Polemo, but in the light of the sun, and it will appear 
 to you more beautiful." And Aristippus, when there was 
 anger between him and -^schines, and somebody said, " O 
 Aristippus, where is now your friendship ? " replied, " It is 
 asleep, but I will wake it up," and went to ^schines, and 
 said to him, " Do I seem to you so utterly unfortunate and 
 incurable as to be unworthy of any consideration? " And 
 ^schines replied, " It is not at all wonderful that you, 
 being naturally superior to me in all things, should have 
 been first to detect in this matter too what was needful." 
 
 " For not a woman only, but young child 
 Tickling the bristly boar with tender hand, 
 Will lay him prostrate sooner than an athlete." 
 
 But we that tame wild beasts and make them gentle, and 
 carry in our arms young wolves and lions' whelps, incon- 
 sistently repel our children and friends and acquaintances in 
 our rage, and let loose our temper like some wild beast on 
 our servants and fellow-citizens, speciously trying to dis- 
 guise it not rightly under the name of hatred of evil, but 
 it is, I suppose, as with the other passions and diseases of 
 the soul, we cannot get rid of any of them by calling one 
 prudence, and another liberality, and another piety. 
 
 § XV. And yet, as Zeno said the seed was a mixture and 
 compound drawn from all the faculties of the soul, so 
 anger seems a universal seed from all the passions. For it 
 it is drawn from pain and pleasure and haughtiness, and 
 from envy it gets its property of malignity — and it is even 
 
 ^ A philosopher of Megara, and disciple of Socrates. Compare our 
 author, " De Fraterno Amore," § xviii. 
 
286 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 worse than envy/ for it does not mind its own suffering if 
 it can only implicate another in misery — and the most 
 unlovely kind of desire is innate in it, namely the appetite 
 for injuring another. So when we go to the houses of 
 spendthrifts we hear a flute-playing girl early in the 
 morning, and see " the dregs of wine," as one said, and frag- 
 ments of garlands, and the servants at the doors reeking of 
 yesterday's debauch ; but for tokens of savage and peevish, 
 masters these yon will see by the faces, and marks, and 
 manacles of their servants : for in the house of an angry man 
 
 " The only music ever heard is wailing," 
 stewards being beaten within, and maids tortured, so that 
 the spectators even in their jollity and pleasure pity these 
 victims of passion. 
 
 § XVI. Moreover those to whom it happens through their 
 genuine hatred of what is bad to be frequently overtaken 
 by anger, can abate its excess and acerbity by giving up 
 their excessive confidence in their intimates. For nothing 
 swells the anger more, than when a good man is detected 
 of villainy, or one who we thought loved us falls out and 
 jangles with us. As for my own disposition, you know of 
 course how mightily it inclines to goodwill and belief in 
 mankind. As then people walking on empty space,^ the 
 more confidently I believe in anybody's affection, the more 
 sorrow and distress do I feel if my estimate is a mistaken 
 one. And indeed I could never divest myself of my ardour 
 and zeal in affection, but as to trusting people I could 
 perhaps use Plato's caution as a curb. For he said lie so 
 praised Helicon the mathematician, because he was by 
 nature a changeable animal, but that he was afraid of 
 those that were well educated in the city, lest, being human 
 beings and the seed of human beings, they should reveal 
 by some trait or other the weakness of human nature. But 
 Sophocles' line, 
 
 " Trace out most human acts, you'll find them base," 
 seems to trample on human nature and lower its merits too 
 
 ^ So Reiske. Diibner reads 06/3oy. The MSS. have (pSvov, which 
 Wyttenbach retains, but is evidently not quite satisfied with the text. 
 Can (pOovov — arepov be an account oi' t7nxaif>eicaKia? 
 
 ^ Up in the clouds. Cf. dtpofSaTeio. 
 
ON RESTRAINING ANGER. 287 
 
 much. Still such a peevish and condemnatory verdict as 
 this has a tendency to make people milder in their rage, 
 for it is the sudden and unexpected that makes people go 
 distracted. And we ought, as Paneetius somewhere said, 
 to imitate Anaxagoras, and as he said at the death of his 
 son, "I knew that I had begotten a mortal," so ought 
 every one of us to use the following kind of language in 
 those contretemps that stir up our anger, " I knew that 
 the slave I bought was not a philosopher," " I knew that 
 the friend I had was not perfect," " I knew that my wife 
 was but a woman." And if anyone would also constantly 
 put to himself that question of Plato, " Am I myself all 
 I should be ? " and look at home instead of abroad, and 
 curb his propensity to censoriousness, he would not be so 
 keen to detect evil in others, for he would see that he stood 
 in need of much allowance himself. But now each of us, 
 when angry and punishing, quote the words of Aristides 
 and Cato, " Do not steal. Do not tell lies," and " Why are 
 you lazy?" And, what is most disgraceful of all, we 
 blame angry people when we are angry ourselves, and 
 chastise in temper faults that were committed in temper, 
 unlike the doctors who 
 
 " With bitter physic purge the bitter bile," 
 
 for we rather increase and aggravate the disease. When- 
 ever then I busy myself with such considerations as these, 
 I try also to curtail my curiosity. For to scrutinize and 
 pry into everything too minutely, and to overhaul every 
 business of a servant, or action of a friend, or pastime of a 
 son, or whisper of a wife, produces frequent, indeed daily, 
 fits of anger, caused entirely by peevishness and harshness 
 of character. Euripides says that the Deity 
 
 " In great things intervenes, but small things leaves 
 To fortune ; " '■ 
 
 but I am of opinion that a prudent man should commit 
 nothing to fortune, nor neglect anything, but should put 
 some things in his wife's hands to manage, others in the 
 
 ' Horace, remembering these lines no doubt, says " JDe Arte Poetica," 
 191, 192, 
 
 "Nee deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus 
 Incident." 
 
288 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 hands of his servants, others in the hands of his friends^ 
 (as a governor has his stewards, and financiers, and con- 
 trollers), while he himself superintends the most important 
 and weighty matters. For as small writing strains the 
 eyes, so small matters even more strain and bother people, 
 and stir np their anger, which carries this evil habit to 
 greater matters. Above all I thought that saying of 
 Empedocles, "Fast from evil," ^ a great and divine one, 
 and I approved of those promises and vows as not un- 
 graceful or unphilosophical, to abstain for a year from wine 
 and Venus, honouring the deity by continence, or for a 
 stated time to give up lying, taking great heed to ourselves 
 to be truthful always whether in play or earnest. With 
 these I compared my own vow, as no less pleasing to the 
 gods and holy, first to abstain from anger for a few days, like 
 spending days without drunkenness or even without wine 
 at all, offering as it were wineless offerings of honey .'^ Then 
 I tried for a month or two, and so in time made some pro- 
 gress in forbearance by earnest resolve, and by keeping 
 myself courteous and without anger and using fair lan- 
 guage, purifying myself from evil words and absurd 
 actions, and from passion which for a little unlovely plea- 
 sure pays us with great mental disturbance and the bit- 
 terest repentance. In consequence of all this my expe- 
 rience, and the assistance of the deity, has made me form 
 the view, that courtesy and gentleness and kindliness are 
 not so agreeable, and pleasant, and delightful, to any of 
 those we live with as to ourselves, that have those qualities.^ 
 
 ^ It is quite likely that the delicious poet Eobert Hcrrick borrowed 
 hence his " To starve thy sin not bin, That is to keep thy Lent." For 
 we know he was a student of the " JMoralia" when at the University of 
 Cambridge. 
 
 2 See^schylus, "Eumenides," 107. Sophocles, " CEdipus Colonseus," 
 481. See also our author's " De Sanitate Praecepta," § xix. 
 
 ^ Jeremy Taylor has closely imitated parts of this Dialogue in his 
 " Holy Living," chapter iv. sect, viii., " Twelve remedies against anger, 
 by way of exercise," " Thirteen remedies against anger, by way of con- 
 sideration." Such a storehouse did he make of the " Moralia." 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 289 
 
 ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND.^ 
 
 PLUTARCH SENDS GREETING TO PACCIUS. 
 
 § I. It was late when I received jour letter, askmg me 
 to write to you something on contentedness of mind, and 
 on those things in the Timaeus that require an accurate 
 explanation. And it so fell out that at that very time our 
 friend Eros was obliged to set sail at once for Rome, 
 having received a letter from the excellent Fundanus, 
 urging haste according to his wont. And not having as 
 much time as I could have vrished to meet your request, 
 and yet not thinking for one moment of letting my messen- 
 ger go to you entirely empty-handed, I copied out the notes 
 that I had chanced to make on contentedness of mind. For 
 I thought that you did not desire this discourse merely to 
 be treated to a subject handled in fine style, but for the 
 real business of life. And I congratulate you that, though 
 you have friendships with princes, and have as much 
 forensic reputation as anybody, yet you are not in the 
 same plight as the tragic Merops, nor have you like him 
 by the felicitations of the multitude been induced to forget 
 the sufferings of humanity ; but you remember, what you 
 have often heard, that a patrician's slipper ^ is no cure for 
 the gout, nor a costly ring for a whitlow, nor a diadem for 
 the headache. For how can riches, or fame, or power at 
 court help us to ease of mind or a calm life, unless we enjoy 
 them when present, but are not for ever pining after them 
 when absent ? And what else causes this but the long exer- 
 cise and practice of reason, which, when the unreasoning and 
 emotional part of the soul breaks out of bounds, curbs it 
 quickly, and does not allow it to be carried away headlong 
 from its actual position ? And as Xenophon ^ advised that 
 we should remember and honour the gods most especially 
 in prosperity, that so, when we should be in any strait, we 
 might confidently call upon them as already our well- 
 
 '■ Or cheerfulness, or tranquillity of mind, Jeremy Taylor has 
 largely borrowed again from this treatise in his " Holy Living," ch. ii. 
 § 6, " Of Contentedness in all Estates and Accidents." 
 
 ^ Reading with Salmasius koXtioq iraTpiKiog. 
 
 ^ " Locus Xenophontis est Cyropaed.," 1. i. p. 52. — Reiske. 
 U 
 
290 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 wishers and friends ; so sensible men wonld do well before 
 trouble comes to meditate on remedies how to bear it, 
 that thej may be the more eflBcacious from being ready for 
 nse long before. For as savage dogs are excited at every 
 sound, and are only soothed by a familiar vpice, so also it 
 is not easy to quiet the wild passions of the soul, unless 
 familiar and well-known arguments be at hand to check its 
 excitement, 
 
 § II. He then that said, that the man that wished to have 
 an easy mind ought to have little to do either public or 
 private, first of all makes ease of mind a very costly article 
 for us, if it is to be bought at the price of doing nothing, as 
 if he should advise every sick person, 
 
 " Lie still, poor wretch, in bed." ^ 
 And indeed stupor is a bad remedy for the body against 
 despair,^ nor is he any better physician of the soul who 
 removes its trouble and anxiety by recommending a lazy 
 and soft life and a leaving our friends and relations and 
 country in the lurch. In the next place, it is false that 
 those that have little to do are easy in mind. For then 
 women would be easier in mind than men, since they 
 mostly stay at home in inactivity, and even now-a-days it 
 is as Hesiod says,^ 
 
 " The North Wind comes not near a soft-skinned maiden;" 
 yet griefs and troubles and unrest, proceeding from jealousy 
 or superstition or ambition or vanity, inundate the women's 
 part of the house with unceasing flow. And Laertes, 
 though he lived for twenty years a solitary life in the 
 country, 
 
 " With an old woman to attend on him, 
 Who duly set on board his meat and drink," * 
 
 and fled from his country and house and kingdom, yet had 
 
 sorrow and dejection^ as a perpetual companion with leisure. 
 
 And some have been often thrown into sad unrest merely 
 
 from inaction, as the following, 
 
 " But fleet Achilles, Zeus-sprung, son of Peleus, 
 Sat by the swiftly-sailing ships and fumed, 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Orestes," 258. 
 
 '■^ So Wyttenbach, Diibner. Vulgo dvai(T9r]<yiag — ciTrovia. 
 
 3 « Works and Days," 519. '' " Odyssey," i. 191, 192. 
 
 ^ I read KarrifEiav. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND, 291 
 
 Nor ever did frequent th' ennobling council, 
 Nor ever join the war, but pined in heart, 
 Though in his tent abiding, for the fray." ' 
 
 And full of emotion and distress at this state of things he 
 himself says, 
 
 " A useless burden to the earth I sit 
 
 Beside the ships." ^ 
 
 So even Epicurus thinks that those who are desirous of 
 honour and glory should not rust in inglorious ease, but 
 use their natural talents in public life for the benefit of the 
 community at large, seeing that they are by nature so con- 
 stituted that they would be more likely to be troubled and 
 afflicted at inaction, if they did not get what they desired. 
 But he is absurd in that he does not urge men of ability to 
 take part in public life, but only the restless. But we 
 ought not to estimate ease or unrest of mind by our many 
 or few actions, but by their fairness or foulness. For the 
 omission of fair actions troubles and distresses us, as I have 
 said before, quite as much as the actual doing of foul 
 actions. 
 
 § III. As for those who think that one kind of life is 
 especially free from trouble, as some think that of farmers, 
 others that of bachelors, others that of kings, Menander 
 sufficiently exposes their error in the following lines : 
 
 " Phania, I thought those rich who need not borrow, 
 Nor groan at nights, nor cry out ' Woe is me,' 
 Kicked up and down in this untoward world, 
 But sweet and gentle sleep they may enjoy." 
 
 He then goes on to remark that he saw the rich suffering 
 the same as the poor, 
 
 " Trouble and life are truly near akin. 
 With the luxurious or the glorious life 
 Trouble consorts, and in the life of poverty 
 Lasts with it to the end." 
 
 But just as people on the sea, timid and prone to sea-sickness, 
 think they will suffer from it less on board a merchantman 
 than on a boat, and for the same reason shift their quarters 
 to a trireme, but do not attain anything by these changes, 
 for they take with them their timidity and qualmishness, 
 so changes of life do not remove the sorrows and troubles 
 
 1 " Iliad," i. 488-492. ^ « Hiad," xviii. 104, 
 
292 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 of the soul ; which proceed from want of experience and 
 reflection, and from inability or ignorance rightly to enjoy 
 the present. These afflict the rich as well as the poor ; 
 these trouble the married as well as the unmarried ; these 
 m.ake people shun the forum, but find no happiness in 
 retirement ; these make people eagerly desire introductions 
 at court, though when got they straightway care no more 
 about them. 
 
 " The sick are peevish in their straits and needs." ^ 
 
 For the wife bothers them, and they grumble at the doctor, 
 and they find the bed uneasy, and, as Ion says, 
 
 " The friend that visits them tires their patience, 
 And yet they do not like him to depart." 
 
 But afterwards, when the illness is over, and a sounder 
 condition supervenes, health returns and makes all things 
 pleasant and acceptable. He that yesterday loathed eggs 
 and cakes of finest meal and purest bread will to-day eat 
 eagerly and with appetite coarsest bread with a few olives 
 and cress. 
 
 § IV. Such contentedness and change of view in regard 
 to every kind of life does the infusion of reason bring about. 
 When Alexander heard from Anaxarchus of the infinite 
 number of worlds, he wept, and when his friends asked him 
 what was the matter, he replied, " Is it not a matter for 
 tears that, when the number of worlds is infinite, I have 
 not conquered one ?" But Crates, who had only a wallet 
 and threadbare cloak, passed all his life jesting and laugh- 
 ing as if at a festival. Agamemnon was troubled with his 
 rule over so many subjects, 
 
 *' You look on Agamemnon, Atreus' son, 
 Whom Zeus has plunged for ever in a mass 
 Of never-ending cares." ^ 
 
 But Diogenes when he was being sold sat down and kept 
 jeering at the auctioneer, and would not stand up when he 
 bade him, but said joking and laughing, "Would you tell 
 a fish you were Selling to stand up?" And Socrates in 
 prison played the philosopher and discoursed with his 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Orestes," 232. ^ Homer, " Iliad," x. 88, 89. 
 
ON OONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 293 
 
 friends. But Phaethon,' when he got up to heaven, wept 
 because nobody gave to him his father's horses and chariot. 
 As therefore the shoe is shaped by the foot, and not the 
 foot by the shoe, so does the disposition make the life 
 similar to itself. For it is not, as one said, custom that 
 makes the best life seem sweet to those that choose it, but 
 it is sense that makes that very life at once the best and 
 sweetest. Let us cleanse therefore the fountain of con- 
 tentedness, which is within us, that so external things may 
 turn out for our good, through our putting the best face on 
 them. 
 
 " Events will take their course, it is no good 
 Our being angry at them, he is happiest 
 Who wisely turns them to the best account." ^ 
 
 § V. Plato compared human life to a game at dice, 
 wherein we ought to throw according to our requirements, 
 and, having thrown, to make the best use of whatever 
 turns up. It is not in our power indeed to determine what 
 the throw will be, but it is our part, if we are wise, to 
 accept in a right spirit whatever fortune sends, and so to con- 
 trive matters that what we wish should do us most good, 
 and what we do not wish should do us least harm. For 
 those who live at random and without judgement, like 
 those sickly people who can stand neither heat nor cold, are 
 unduly elated by prosperity, and cast down by adversity ; 
 and in either case suffer from unrest, but 'tis their own 
 fault, and perhaps they suffer most in what are called 
 good circumstances. Theodorus, who was surnamed the 
 Atheist, used to say that he held out arguments with his 
 right hand, but his hearers received them with their left ; 
 so awkward people frequently take in a clumsy manner the 
 favours of fortune; but men of sense, as bees extract 
 honey from thyme which is the strongest and driest of 
 herbs, ^ so from the least auspicious circumstances fre- 
 quently derive advantage and profit. 
 
 § VI. We ought then to cultivate such a habit as this, 
 
 ^ The story of Phiiethon is a very well-known one, and is recorded 
 very fully by Ovid in the " Metamorphoses," Book ii. 
 ^ Euripides, "Bellerophon.'' Fragm. 298. 
 ^ Supplying (pvToJv with Keiske. 
 
294 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 like the man who threw a stone at his dog, and missed it, 
 but hit his step-mother, and cried out, " Not so bad." 
 Thus we may often turn the edge of fortune when things 
 turn not out as we wish. Diogenes was driven into exile ; 
 "not so bad;" for his exile made him turn philosopher. 
 And Zeno of Cittium,^ when he heard that the only mer- 
 chantman he had was wrecked, cargo and all, said, " For- 
 tune, you treat me handsomely, since you reduce me to my 
 threadbare cloak and piazza."^ What prevents our imitating 
 such men as these ? Have you failed to get some office ? 
 You will be able to live in the country henceforth, and 
 manage your own affairs. Did you court the friendship of 
 some great man, and meet with a rebuff ? You will live 
 free from danger and cares. Have you again had matters to 
 deal with that required labour and thought ? " Warm water 
 will not so much make the limbs soft by soaking," to quote 
 Pindar,^ as glory and honour and power make "labour sweet, 
 and toil to be no toil."'* Or has any bad luck or con- 
 tumely fallen on you in consequence of some calumny or 
 from envy ? The breeze is favourable that will waft you 
 to the Muses and the Academy, as it did Plato when his 
 friendship with Dionysius came to an end. It does indeed 
 greatly conduce to contentedness of mind to see how 
 famous men have borne the same troubles with an unruffled 
 mind. For example, does childlessness trouble you ? Con- 
 sider those kings of the Romans, none of whom left his 
 kingdom to a son. Are you distressed at the pinch of 
 poverty ? Who of the Boeotians would you rather prefer 
 to be than Epaminondas, or of the Romans than Fabri- 
 cius? Has your wife been seduced? Have you never 
 read that inscription at Delphi, 
 
 " Agis the king of land and sea erected me ; " 
 
 and have you not heard that his wife Timaea was seduced 
 by Alcibiades, and in her whispers to her handmaidens 
 called the child that was born Alcibiades ? Yet this did 
 not prevent Agis from being the most famous and greatest 
 
 ^ • In Cyprus. Zeno was the founder of the Stoics. 
 ■^ Zeno and his successors taught in the Piazza at Athens called the 
 Painted Piazza. See Pausanias, i. 15. 
 ^ Pindar, Nem. iv. 6. ^ Euripides, " Bacchae," 66. 
 
ON CONTENTBDNESS OF MIND. 295 
 
 of the Greeks. Neither again did the licentiousness of his 
 daughter prevent Stilpo from leading the merriest life of 
 all the philosophers that were his contemporaries. And 
 when Metrocles reproached him with her life, he said, " Is it 
 my fault or hers ? " And when Metrocles answered, " Her 
 fault, but your misfortune," he rejoined, " How say you ? 
 Are not faults also slips ? " " Certainly," said he, " And 
 are not slips mischances in those matters wherein we 
 slip ? " Metrocles assented. " And are not mischances 
 misfortunes in those matters wherein we mischance ? " By 
 this gentle and philosophical argument he demonstrated 
 the Cynic's reproach to be an idle bark. 
 
 § VII. But most people are troubled and exasperated not 
 only at the bad in their friends and intimates, but also in 
 their enemies. For railing and anger and envy and malig- 
 nity and jealousy and ill-will are the bane of those that 
 suffer from those infirmities, and trouble and exasperate 
 the foolish : as for example the quarrels of neighbours, and 
 peevishness of acquaintances, and the want of ability in 
 those that manage state affairs. By these things you your- 
 self seem to me to be put out not a little, as the doctors in 
 Sophocles, who 
 
 " With bitter physic purge the bitter bile," ^ 
 
 so vexed and bitter are you at people's weaknesses and 
 infirmities, which is not reasonable in you. Even your 
 own private affairs are not always managed by simple and 
 good and suitable instruments, so to speak, but very fre- 
 quently by sharp and crooked ones. Do not think it then 
 either your business, or an easy matter either, to set all 
 these things to rights. But if you take people as they are, 
 as the surgeon uses his bandages and instruments for draw- 
 ing teeth, and with cheerfulness and serenity welcome all 
 that happens, as you would look upon barking dogs as only 
 following their nature, you will be happier in the disposi- 
 tion you will then have than you will be distressed at other 
 people's disagreeableness and shortcomings. For you will 
 forget to make a collection of disagreeable things,'^ which 
 
 ' Quoted again by our author " On Restraining Anger," § xvi. 
 ^ As will be seen, I follow Wyttenbach's guidance in this vexy corrupt 
 passage, which is a true crux. 
 
296 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 now inundate, as some hollow and low-lying ground, your 
 littleness of mind and weakness, which fills itself with 
 other people's bad points. For seeing that some of the 
 philosophers censure compassion to the unfortunate (on 
 the ground that it is good to help our neighbours, and not 
 to give way to sentimental sympathy in connection with 
 them), and, what is of more importance, do not allow those 
 that are conscious of their errors and bad moral disposition 
 to be dejected and grieved at them, but bid tbem cure their 
 defects without grief at once, is it not altogether unrea- 
 sonable, look you, to allow ourselves to be peevish and 
 vexed, because all those who have dealings with us and 
 come near us are not good and clever ? Let us see to it, 
 dear Paccius, that we do not, whether we are aware of it 
 or not, play a part, really looking^ not at the universal 
 defects of those that approach us, but at our own interests 
 through our selfishness, and not through our hatred of evil. 
 For excessive excitement about things, and an undue appe- 
 tite and desire for them, or on the other hand aversion and 
 dislike to them, engender suspiciousness and peevishness 
 against persons, who were, we think, the cause of our being 
 deprived of some things, and of being troubled with others. 
 But he that is accustomed to adapt himself to things easily 
 and calmly is most cheerful and gentle in his dealings with 
 people. 
 
 § VIII. Wherefore let us resume our argument. As in a 
 fever everything seems bitter and unpleasant to the taste, 
 but when we see others not loathing but fancying the very 
 same eatables and drinkables, we no longer find the fault 
 to be in them but in ourselves and our disease, so we shall 
 cease to blame and be discontented with the state of affairs, 
 if we see others cheerfully and without grief enduring the 
 same. It also makes for contentedness, when things 
 happen against our wish, not to overlook our many advan- 
 tages and comforts, but by looking at both good and bad 
 to feel that the good preponderate. When our eyes are 
 dazzled with things too bright we turn them away, and ease 
 them by looking at flowers or grass, while we keep the eyes 
 of our mind strained on disagreeable things, and force 
 
 ^ Reading SeSopKOTsg. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 297 
 
 them to dwell on bitter ideas, well-nigh tearing them away 
 by force from the consideration of pleasanter things. And 
 yet one might apply here, not unaptly, what was said to 
 the man of curiosity,^ 
 
 " Malignant wretch, why art so keen to mark 
 Thy neiglibour's fault, and seest not thme own ? " 
 
 Why on earth, my good sir, do you confine your view to 
 your troubles, making them so vivid and acute, while you 
 do not let your mind dwell at all on your present com- 
 forts ? But as cupping-glasses draw the worst blood from 
 the flesh, so you force upon your attention the worst things 
 in your lot : acting not a whit more wisely than that 
 Chian, who, selling much choice wine to others, asked for 
 some sour wine for his own supper ; and one of his slaves 
 being asked by another, what he had left his master doing, 
 replied, "Asking for bad when good was by." For most 
 people overlook the advantages and pleasures of their 
 individual lives, and run to their difficulties and grievances. 
 Aristippus, however, was not such a one, for he cleverly 
 knew as in a scale to make the better preponderate over 
 the worse. So having lost a good farm, he asked one of 
 those who made a great show of condolence and sympathy, 
 " Have you not only one little piece of ground, while I 
 have three fields left ?" And when he admitted that it was 
 so, he went on to say, " Ought I not then to condole with 
 you rather than you with me?" For it is the act of a 
 madman to distress oneself over what is lost, and not to 
 rejoice at what is left ; but like little children, if one of 
 their many playthings be taken away by anyone, throw the 
 rest away and weep and cry out, so we, if we are assailed 
 by fortune in some one point, wail and mourn and make all 
 other things seem unprofitable in our eyes. 
 
 § IX. Suppose someone should say. What blessings have 
 we ? I would reply, What have we not ? One has reputa- 
 tion, another a house, another a wife, another a good 
 friend. When Antipater of Tarsus was reckoning up on 
 his death-bed his various pieces of good fortune, he did not 
 
 1 See "On Curiosity," § i. 
 
298 
 
 PLUTAKCH S MORALS. 
 
 even pass over his favourable voyage from Cilicia to Athens. 
 So we should not overlook, but take account of every- 
 day blessings, and rejoice that we live, and are well, and 
 see the sun, and that no war or sedition plagues our coun- 
 try, but that the earth is open to cultivation, the sea secure 
 to mariners, and that we can speak or be silent, lead a 
 busy or an idle life, as we choose. We shall get more con- 
 tentedness from the presence of all these blessings, if we 
 fancy them as absent, and remember from time to time 
 how people ill yearn for health, and people in war for 
 peace, and strangers and unknown in a great city for repu- 
 tation and friends, and how painful it is to be deprived of 
 all these when one has once had them. For then each of 
 these blessings will not appear to us only great and 
 valuable when it is lost, and of no value while we have it. 
 For not having it cannot add value to anything. Nor 
 ought we to amass things we regard as valuable, and 
 always be on the tremble and afraid of losing them as 
 valuable things, and yet, when we have them, ignore them 
 and think little of them ; but we ought to use them for 
 our pleasure and enjoyment, that we may bear their loss, 
 if that should happen, with more equanimity. But most 
 people, as Arcesilaus said, think it right to inspect 
 minutely and in every detail, perusing them alike with the 
 eyes of the body and mind, other people's poems and 
 paintings and statues, while they neglect to study their 
 own lives, which have often many not unpleasing subjects 
 for contemplation, looking abroad and ever admiring other 
 people's reputations and fortunes, as adulterers admire 
 other men's wives, and think cheap of their own. 
 
 § X. And yet it makes much for contentedness of mind 
 to look for the most part at home and to our own condi- 
 tion, or if not, to look at the case of people worse oft" than 
 ourselves, and not, as most people do, to compare ourselves 
 with those who are better off. For example, those who are 
 in chains think those happy who are freed from their chains, 
 and they again freemen, and freemen citizens, and they 
 again the rich, and the rich satraps, and satraps kings, and 
 kings the gods, content with hardly anything short of 
 hurling thunderbolts and lightning. And so they ever 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OP MIND. 299 
 
 want something above them, and are never thankful for 
 what they have. 
 
 " I care not for the wealth of golden Gyges," 
 
 and, 
 
 " I never had or envy or desire 
 
 To be a god, or love for mighty empire, 
 
 Far distant from my eyes are all such things." 
 
 But this, you will say, was the language of a Thasian. 
 But you will find others, Chians or Galatians or Bithy- 
 nians, not content with the share of glory or power they 
 have among their fellow-citizens, but weeping because 
 they do not wear senators' shoes ; or, if they have them, 
 that they cannot be praetors at Rome ; or, if they get that 
 office, that they are not consuls ; or, if they are consuls, 
 that they are only proclaimed second and not first. What 
 is all this but seeking out excuses for being unthankful to 
 fortune, only to torment and punish oneself ? But he that 
 has a mind in sound condition, does not sit down in 
 sorrow and dejection if he is less renowned or rich than 
 some of the countless myriads of mankind that the sun 
 looks upon, " who feed on the produce of the wide world," ^ 
 but goes on his way rejoicing at his fortune and life, 
 as far fairer and happier than that of myriads of others. 
 In the Olympian games it is not possible to be the victor 
 by choosing one's competitors. But in the race of life 
 circumstances allow us to plume ourselves on surpassing 
 many, and to be objects of envy rather than to have to 
 envy others, unless we pit ourselves against a Briareus or 
 a Hercules. Whenever then you admire anyone carried 
 by in his litter as a greater man than yourself, lower your 
 eyes and look at those that bear the litter. And when you 
 think the famous Xerxes happy for his passage over the 
 Hellespont, as a native of those parts ^ did, look too at 
 those who dug through Mount Athos under the lash, and 
 at those whose ears and noses were cut ofP because the 
 bridge was broken by the waves, consider their state of 
 mind also, for they think your life and fortunes happy. 
 Socrates, when he heard one of his friends saying, " How 
 
 ^ Simonides. ^ See Herodotus, vii. 56. 
 
300 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 dear this city is ! Chian wine costs one mina,^ a purple 
 robe three, and half a pint of honey five drachmae," took 
 him to the meal market, and showed him half a peck of 
 meal for an obol, then took him to the olive market, and 
 showed him a peck of olives for two coppers, and lastly 
 showed him that a sleeveless vest^ was only ten drachmse. 
 At each place Socrates' friend exclaimed, " How cheap this 
 city is ! " So also we, when we hear anyone saying that 
 onr affairs are bad and in a wofnl plight, because we are 
 not consuls or governors, may reply, " Our affairs are in 
 an admirable condition, and our life an enviable one, seeing 
 that we do not beg, nor carry burdens, nor live by flattery." 
 § XI. But since through our folly we are accustomed to 
 live more with an eye to others than ourselves, and since 
 nature is so jealous and envious that it rejoices not so 
 much in its own blessings as it is pained by those of others, 
 do not look only at the much-cried-up splendour of those 
 whom you envy and admire, but open and draw, as it were, 
 the gaudy curtain of their pomp and show, and peep 
 within, you will see that they have much to trouble them, 
 and many things to annoy them. The well-known Pit- 
 tacus,^ whose fame was so great for fortitude and wisdom 
 and uprightness, was once entertaining some guests, and 
 his wife came in in a rage and upset the table, and as the 
 guests were dismayed he said. Every one of you has some 
 trouble, and he who has mine only is not so bad off. 
 " Happy is he accounted at the forum, 
 But wiien he opes the door of his own house 
 Thrice miserable ; for his wife rules all, 
 Still lords it over him, and is ever quarrelling. 
 Many griefs has he that I wot not of." 
 
 Many such cases are there, unknown to the public, for 
 family pride casts a veil over them, to be found in wealth 
 and glory and even in royalty. 
 
 *' O happy son of Atreus, child of destiny, 
 
 Blessed thy lot ; " * 
 
 congratulation like this comes from an external view, from 
 a halo of arms and horses and the pomp of war, but the 
 inward voice of emotion testifies against all this vain glory ; 
 
 ^ A mina was 100 drachmae {i.e. £4. Is. 3d.), and 600 obols. 
 
 ^ A slave's ordinary dress. ^ One of the Seven Wise Men. 
 
 * Homer, " Iliad," iii. 182. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 301 
 
 " A heavy fate is laid on me by Zeus 
 The son of Cronos." ^ 
 And, 
 
 " Old man, I think your lot one to be envied, 
 As that of any man who free from danger 
 Passes his life unknown and in obscurity." * 
 
 By such reflections as these one may wean oneself from 
 that discontent with one's fortune, which makes one's own 
 condition look low and mean from too much admiring one's 
 neighbour's. 
 
 § XII. Another thing, which is a great hindrance to peace 
 of mind, is not to proportion our desires to our means, but 
 to carry too much sail, as it were, in our hopes of great 
 things and then, if unsuccessful, to blame destiny and for- 
 tune, and not our own folly. For he is not unfortunate 
 who wishes to shoot with a plough, or hunt the hare with 
 an ox ; nor has he an evil genius opposed to him, who does 
 not catch deer with fishing nets, but merely is the dupe 
 of his own stupidity and folly in attempting impossi- 
 bilities. Self-love is mainly to blame, making people fond 
 of being first and aspiring in all matters, and insatiably 
 desirous to engage in everything. For people not only 
 wish at one and the same time to be rich, and learned, and 
 strong, and boon-companions, and agreeable, and friends of 
 kings, and governors of cities, but they are also discon- 
 tented if they have not dogs and horses and quails and 
 cocks of the first quality. Dionysius the elder was not 
 content with being the most powerful monarch of his times, 
 but because he could not beat Philoxenus the poet in singing, 
 or surpass Plato in dialectics, was so angry and exasperated 
 that he put the one to work in his stone quarries, and sent 
 the other to JEgina and sold him there. Alexander was of 
 a different spirit, for when Crisso the famous runner ran 
 a race with him, and seemed to let the king outrun him 
 on purpose, he was greatly displeased. Good also was 
 the spirit of Achilles in Homer, who, when he said, 
 
 " None of the Achsean warriors is a match 
 For me in war," 
 
 ^ Homer, "Iliad," ii. 111. 
 
 ^ Words of Agamemnon to the House Porter. Euripides, " Iphigenia 
 in Aidis," 17-19. 
 
302 PLUTARCH'S MORALS. 
 
 added, 
 
 " Yet in'the council hall 
 Others there are who better are than me." ^ 
 
 And when Megabyzus the Persian visited the studio of 
 Apelles, and began to chatter about art, Apelles stopped 
 him and said, " While you kept silence you seemed to be 
 somebody from your gold and purple, but now these lads 
 that are grinding colours are laughing at your nonsense." 
 But some who think the Stoics only talk idly, in styling 
 their wise man not only prudent and just and brave but also 
 orator and general and poet and rich man and king, yet claim 
 for themselves all those titles, and are indignant if they do 
 not get them. And yet even among the gods different func- 
 tions are assigned to different personages ; thus one is called 
 the god of war, another the god of oracles, another the god 
 of gain, and Aphrodite, as she has nothing to do with war- 
 like affairs, is despatched by Zeus to marriages and bridals. 
 § XIII, And indeed there are some pursuits which cannot 
 exist together, but are by their very nature opposed. For 
 example oratory and the study of the mathematics require 
 ease and leisure ; whereas political ability and the friend- 
 ship of kings cannot be attained without mixing in affairs 
 and in public life. Moreover wine and indulgence in meat 
 make the body indeed strong and vigorous, but blunt the 
 intellect ; and though unremitting attention to making and 
 saving money will heap up wealth, yet despising and con- 
 temning riches is a great help to philosophy. So that all 
 things are not within any one's power, and we must obey 
 that saying inscribed in the temple of Apollo at Delphi, 
 Know thyself,'^ and adapt ourselves to our natural bent, and 
 not drag and force nature to some other kind of life or 
 pursuit. *' The horse to the chariot, and the ox to the 
 plough, and swiftly alongside the ship scuds the dolphin, 
 while he that meditates destruction for the boar must find 
 a staunch hound." ^ But he that chafes and is grieved that 
 he is not at one and the same time " a lion reared on the 
 mountains, exulting in his strength,"* and a little Maltese 
 
 ^ " Iliad," xviii. 105, 106. 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, x. 24. 
 
 3 Pindar, Fragm., 258. Quoted " On Moral Virtue," § xii. 
 
 * Homer, " Iliad," xvii. 61 ; " Odyssey," vi. 130. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 303 
 
 lap-dog ^ reared in the lap of a rich widow, is out of his 
 senses. And not a whit wiser is he who wishes to be an 
 Empedocles, or Plato, or Democritus, and write about the 
 world and the real nature of things, and at the same time 
 to be married like Enphorion to a rich wife, or to revel 
 and drink with Alexander like Medius ; and is grieved 
 and vexed if he is not also admired for his wealth like 
 Ismenias, and for his virtue like Epaminondas. But runners 
 are not discontented because they do not carry off the 
 crowns of wrestlers, but rejoice and delight in their own 
 crowns. " You are a citizen of Sparta : see you make the 
 most of her." So too said Solon : 
 
 " We will not change our virtue for their wealth, 
 For virtue never dies, but wealth has wings, 
 And Hies about from one man to another." 
 
 And Strato the natural philosopher, when he heard that 
 Menedemus had many more pupils than he had, said, " Is 
 it wonderful at all that more wish to wash than to be 
 anointed ? " And Aristotle, writing to Antipater, said, 
 " Not only has Alexander a right to phime himself on his 
 rule over many subjects, but no less legitimate is satisfac- 
 tion at entertaining right opinions about the gods." For 
 those that think so highly of their own walk in life will 
 not be so envious about their neighbours'. We do not 
 expect a vine to bear figs, nor an olive grapes, yet now-a- 
 days, with regard to ourselves, if we have not at one and 
 the same time the privilege of being accounted rich and 
 learned, generals and philosophers, flatterers and outspoken, 
 stingy and extravagant, we slander ourselves and are dis- 
 satisfied, and despise ourselves as living a maimed and 
 imperfect life. Furthermore, we see that nature teaches 
 us the same lesson.^ For as she provides different kinds 
 of beasts with different kinds of food, and has not made all 
 carnivorous, or seed-pickers, or root- diggers, so she has 
 given to mankind various means of getting a livelihood, 
 " one by keeping sheep, another by ploughing, another by 
 fowling," ^ and another by catching the fish of the sea. 
 
 ' A famous breed of dogs from the island Molita, near Dalmatia. 
 See Pliny, " Hist Nat.," iii. 26, extr. § 30 ; xxx. 5, extr. § 14. 
 ^ That Non omnia possumus omnes. 
 ^ Pindar, " Isthm.," i. 65-70. 
 
304 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 We ought each therefore to select the calling appropriate 
 for ourselves and labour energetically in it, and leave other 
 people to theirs, and not demonstrate Hesiod as coming 
 short of the real state of things when he said, 
 
 " Potter is wroth with potter, smith with smith." ^ 
 For not only do people envy those of the same trade and 
 manner of life, but the rich envy the learned, and the 
 famous the rich, and advocates sophists, aye, and freemen 
 and patricians admire and think happy comedians starring 
 it at the theatres, and dancers, and the attendants at kings' 
 courts, and by all this envy give themselves no small 
 trouble and annoyance. 
 
 § XIV. But that every man has in himself the magazines 
 of content or discontent, and that the jars containing 
 blessings and evils are not on the threshold of Zeus,^ but 
 lie stored in the mind, is plain from the differences of 
 men's passions. For the foolish overlook and neglect 
 present blessings, through their thoughts being ever intent 
 on the future ; but the wise make the past clearly present 
 to them through memory. For the present giving only a 
 moment of time to the touch, and then evading our grasp, 
 does not seem to the foolish to be ours or to belong to us 
 at all. And like that person^ painted as rope-making in 
 Hades and permitting an ass feeding by to eat up the rope 
 as fast as he makes it, so the stupid and thankless forget- 
 fulness of most people comes upon them and takes posses- 
 sion of them, and obliterates from their mind every past 
 action, whether success, or pleasant leisure, or society, or 
 enjoyment, and breaks the unity of life which arises from 
 the past being blended with the present ; for detaching to- 
 day from both yesterday and to-morrow, it soon makes 
 every event as if it had never happened from lack of memory. 
 For as those in the schools, who deny the growth of our 
 bodies by reason of the continual flux of substance, make 
 each of us in theory different from himself and another 
 man, so those vs^ho do not keep or recall to their memory 
 former things, but let them drift, actually empty them- 
 
 ^ Hesiod, " Works and Days," 25. Our " two of a trade seldom agree." 
 2 An allusion to " Iliad,"' xxiv. 527-533. 
 ^ Ocnus. See Pausanias, x. 29. 
 
0\ CONTEXTEDNESS OF MIND. 305 
 
 selves daily, and hang upon the morrow, as if what hap- 
 pened a year ago, or even yesterday and the day before 
 yesterday, h id nothing to do with them, and had hardly 
 occui red at all. 
 
 § XV. This is one great hindrance to contentedness of mind, 
 and another still greater is whenever, like flies that slide 
 down smooth places in mirrors, but stick fast in rough places 
 or where there are cracks, men let pleasant and agreeable 
 things glide from their memory, and pin themselves down 
 to the remembrance of unpleasant things ; or rather, as at 
 Olynthus they say beetles, when they get into a certain 
 place called Destruction-to-beetles, cannot get out, but fly 
 round and round till they die, so men will glide into the 
 remembrance of their woes, and will not give themselves a 
 respite from sorrow. But, as we use our brightest colours 
 in a picture, so in the mind we ought to look at the cheerful 
 and bright side of things, and hide and keep down the 
 gloomy, for we cannot altogether obliterate or get rid of it. 
 For, as the strings of the bow and lyre are alternately 
 tightened and relaxed, so is it with the order of the world ; 
 in human affairs there is nothing pure and without alloy. 
 But as in music there are high and low notes, and in gram- 
 mar vowels and mutes, but neither the musician nor gram- 
 marian decline to use either kinds, but know how to blend 
 and employ them both for their purpose, so in human 
 affairs which are balanced one against another, — for, as 
 Euripides says, 
 
 " There is no good without ill in the world, 
 But everything is mixed in due proportion," — 
 
 we ought not to be disheartened or despondent ; but as 
 musicians drown their worst music with the best, so 
 should we take good and bad together, and make our 
 chequered life one of convenience and harmony. For it is 
 not, as Menander says, 
 
 ''Directly any man is born, a genius 
 Befriends him, a good guide to him for life," 
 
 but it is rather, as Empedocles states, two fates or genii 
 take hold of each of us when we are born and govern us. 
 " There were Chthonia and far-seeing Heliope, and cruel 
 Deris, and grave Harmonia, and Callisto, and ^schra, and 
 
 X 
 
306 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Thoosa, and Denaea, and charming Nemertes, and Asaphea 
 with the black fruit," 
 
 § XYI. And as^ at our birth we received the mingled 
 seeds of each of these passions, which is the cause of much 
 irregularity, the sensible person hopes for better things, 
 but expects worse, and makes the most of either, remem- 
 bering that wise maxim, Not too much of anything. For not 
 only will he who is least solicitous about to-morrow best 
 enjoy it when it comes, as Epicurus says, but also wealth, 
 and renown, and power and rule, gladden most of all the 
 hearts of those who are least afraid of the contrary. For 
 the immoderate desire for each, implanting a most im- 
 moderate fear of losing them, makes the enjoyment of 
 them weak and wavering, like a flame under the influence 
 of a wind. But he whom reason enables to say to fortune 
 without fear or trembling, 
 
 '' If you bring any good I gladly welcome it, 
 But if 3^ou fail me little does it trouble me," 
 
 he can enjoy the present with most zest through his confi- 
 dence, and absence of fear of the loss of what he has, 
 which would be unbearable. For we may not only admire 
 but also imitate the behaviour of Anaxagoras, which made 
 him cry out at the death of his son, " I knew I had begot 
 a mortal," and apply it to every contingency. For example, 
 "I know that wealth is ephemeral and insecure; I know 
 that those who gave power can take it away again ; I know 
 that my wife is good, but still a woman ; and that my 
 friend, since a human being, is by nature a changeable 
 animal, to use Plato's expression." For such a prepared 
 frame of mind, if anything happens unwished for but not 
 unexpected, not admitting of such phrases as " I shouldn't 
 have dreamed of it," or " I expected quite a different lot," 
 or " I didn't look for this," abates the violent^ beatings 
 and palpitations of the heart, and quickly causes wild un- 
 rest to subside. Carneades indeed reminds us that in 
 great matters the unexpected makes the sum total of grief 
 and dejection. Certainly the kingdom of Macedonia was 
 many times smaller than the Roman Empire, but when 
 
 ^ So Wyttenbach, who reads 'Qg dk tovtojv. 
 2 Reading ola with Reiske. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 307 
 
 Perseus lost Macedonia, he not only himself bewailed his 
 wretched fate, but seemed to all men the most unfortunate 
 and unlucky of mankind ; yet ^milius who conquered 
 him, though he had to give up to another the command 
 both by land and sea, yet was crowned, and offered sacri- 
 fice, and was justly esteemed happy. For he knew that he 
 had taken a command which he would have to give up, 
 but Perseus lost his kingdom without expecting it. Well 
 also has the poet ^ shown the power of anything that hap- 
 pens unexpectedly. For Odysseus wept bitterly at the death 
 of his dog, but was not so moved when he sat by his wife who 
 wept, for in the latter case he had come fully determined 
 to keep his emotion under the control of reason, whereas 
 in the former it was against his expectation, and therefore 
 fell upon him as a sudden blow. 
 
 § XVII. And since generally speaking some things which 
 happen against our will pain and trouble us by their very 
 nature, while in the case of most we accustom ourselves 
 and learn to be disgusted with them from fancy, it is not 
 unprofitable to counteract this to have ever ready that line 
 of Menander, 
 
 " You suffer no dread thing but in your fancy." 
 
 For what, if they touch you neither in soul nor body, are 
 such things to you as the low birth of your father, or the 
 adultery of your wife, or the loss of some prize or prece- 
 dence, since even by their absence a man is not prevented 
 from being in excellent condition both of body and soul. 
 And with respect to the things that seem to pain us by 
 their very nature, as sickness, and anxieties, and the deaths 
 of friends and children, we should remember, that line of 
 Euripides, 
 
 " Alas ! and wh}'^ alas ? we only suffer 
 What mortals must expect." 
 
 For no argument has so much weight with emotion when 
 it is borne down with grief, as tliat which reminds it of the 
 common and natural necessity to which man is exposed 
 owing to the body, the only handle which he gives to for- 
 tune, for in his most important and influential part ^ he is 
 
 ^ Homer to wit. ^ The soul. 
 
308 PLUTARCH'S MORALS. 
 
 secure against external things. When Demetrius captured 
 Megara, he asked Stilpo if any of his things had been 
 plundered, and Stilpo answered, " I saw nobody carrying 
 off anything of mine." ^ And so when fortune has plun- 
 dered us and stripped us of everything else, we have that 
 within ourselves 
 
 ^' Which the Achseans ne'er could rob us of." ^ 
 So that we ought not altogether to abase and lower nature, 
 as if she had no strength or stability against fortune ; but 
 on the contrary, knowing that the rotten and perishable 
 part of man, wherein alone he lies open to fortune, is small, 
 while we ourselves are masters of the better part, wherein 
 are situated our greatest blessings, as good opinions and 
 teaching and virtuous precepts, all which things cannot be 
 abstracted from us or perish, we ought to look on. the 
 future with invincible courage, and say to fortune, as 
 Socrates is supposed to have said to his accusers Anytus 
 and Melitus before the jury, " Anytus and Melitus can kill 
 me, but they cannot hurt me." For fortune can afflict 
 us with disease, take away our money, calumniate us to 
 the people or king, but cannot make a good and brave and 
 high-souled man bad and cowardly and low and ignoble 
 and envious, nor take away that disposition of mind, whose 
 constant presence is of more use for the conduct of life 
 than the presence of a pilot at sea. For the pilot cannot 
 make calm the wild wave or wind, nor can he find a haven 
 at his need wherever he wishes, nor can he await his fate 
 with confidence and without trembling, but as long as he 
 has not despaired, but uses his skill, he scuds before the 
 gale, " lowering his big sail, till his lower mast is only just 
 above the sea dark as Erebus," and sits at the helm trem- 
 bling and quaking. But the disposition of a wise man 
 gives calm even to the body, mostly cutting off the causes 
 of diseases by temperance and plain living and moderate 
 exercise ; but if some beginning of trouble arise from with- 
 out, as we avoid a sunken rock, so he passes by it with 
 furled sail, as Asclepiades puts it ; but if some unexpected 
 
 ^ The reading here is rather doubtful. That 1 have adopted is 
 Eeiske's and Wyttenbach's. 
 •^ " Iliad," V. 484. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND. 309 
 
 and tremendous gale come upon him and prove too much 
 for him, the harbour is at hand, and he can swim away 
 from the body, as from a leaky boat. 
 
 § XVIII. For it is the fear of death, and not the desire of 
 life, that makes the foolish person to hang to the body, 
 clinging to it, as Odysseus did to the fig-tree from fear of 
 Charybdis that lay below, 
 
 " Where the wind neither let him stay, or sail," 
 SO that he was displeased at this, and afraid of that. But 
 he who understands somehow or other the nature of the 
 soul, and reflects that the change it will undergo at death 
 will be either to something better or at least not worse, he 
 has in his fearlessness of death no small help to ease of 
 mind in life. For to one who can enjoy life when virtue 
 and what is congenial to him have the upper hand, and 
 that can fearlessly depart from life, when uncongenial and 
 unnatural things are in the ascendant, with the words on 
 his lips, 
 
 " The deity shall free me, when I will," ^ 
 
 what can we imagine could befall such a man as this that 
 would vex him and wear him and harass him ? For he 
 who said, " I have anticipated you, fortune, and cut off 
 all your loopholes to get at me," did not trust to bolts 
 or keys or walls, but to determination and reason, which 
 are within the power of all persons that choose. And we 
 ought not to despair or disbelieve any of these sayings, but 
 admiring them and emulating them and being enthusi- 
 astic about them, we ought to try and test ourselves in 
 smaller matters with a view to greater, not avoiding or 
 rejecting that self-examination, nor sheltering ourselves 
 under the remark, " Perhaps nothing will be more difficult." 
 For inertia ^ and softness are generated by that self- 
 indulgence which ever occupies itself only with the easiest 
 tasks, and flees from the disagreeable to what is most 
 pleasant. But the soul that accustoms itself to face 
 steadily sickness and grief and exile, and calls in reason to 
 its help in each case, will find in what appears so sore and 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Bacchae," 498, Compare Hoi*ace, " Epistles," i. xvi. 
 78, 79. 
 
 ^ Reading with Diibner dpyiar. Reiske has arovlai'. 
 
310 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 dreadful much that is false, empty, and rotten, as reason 
 will show in each case. 
 
 § XIX. And yet many shudder at that line of Menander, 
 
 " No one can say, I shall not suffer this or that," 
 being ignorant how much it helps us to freedom from grief 
 to practise to be able to look fortune in the face with our 
 eyes open, and not to entertain fine and soft fancies, like 
 one reared in the shade on many hopes that always yield 
 and never resist. We can, however, answer Menander's line, 
 
 " No one can say, I shall not suffer this or that," 
 for a man can say, " I will not do this or that, I will not lie, 
 I will not play the rogue, I will not cheat, I will not 
 scheme." For this is in our power, and is no small but 
 great help to ease of mind. As on the contrary 
 
 " The consciousness of having done ill deeds," ^ 
 like a sore in the flesh, leaves in the mind a regret which 
 ever wounds it and pricks it. For reason banishes all other 
 griefs, but itself creates regret when the soul is vexed with 
 shame and self-tormented. For as those who shudder in 
 ague-fits or burn in fevers feel more trouble and distress 
 than tliose who externally suffer the same from cold or heat, 
 so the grief is lighter which comes externally from chance, 
 but that lament, 
 
 " None is to blame for this but 1 myself," 
 coming from within on one's own misdeeds, intensifies one's 
 bitterness by the shame felt. And so neither costly house, 
 nor quantity of gold, nor pride of race, nor weighty office, 
 nor grace of language, nor eloquence, impart so much calm 
 and serenity to life, as a soul pure from evil acts and desires, 
 having an imperturbable and undefiled character as the 
 source of its life ; whence good actions flow, producing 
 an enthusiastic and cheerful energy accompanied by lofti- 
 ness of thought, and a memory sweeter and more lasting 
 than that hope which Pindar says is the support of old age. 
 Censers do not, as Carneades said, after they are emptied, 
 long retain their sweet smell ; but in the mind of the wise 
 man good actions always leave a fresh and fragrant 
 memory, by which joy is watered and flourishes, and 
 ^ Euripides, " Orestes," 396. 
 
ON CONTENTEDNKSS OF MIND. 311 
 
 despises those who wail over life and abuse it as a region 
 of ills, or as a place of exile for sonls in this world. 
 
 § XX. I am very taken with Diogenes' remark to a 
 stranger at Lacedaemon, who was dressing with much dis- 
 play for a feast, " Does not a good man consider every day 
 a feast ? " And a very great feast too, if we live soberly. 
 For the world is a most holy and divine temple, into which 
 man is introduced at his birth, not to behold motionless 
 images made by hands, but those things (to use the lan- 
 guage of Plato) which the divine mind has exhibited 
 as the visible representations of invisible things, having 
 innate in them the principle of life and motion, as the sun 
 moon and stars, and rivers ever flowing with fresh water, 
 and the earth affording maintenance to plants and animals. 
 Seeing then that life is the most complete initiation into 
 all these things, it ought to be full of ease of mind and 
 joy ; not as most people wait for the festivals of Cronos ^ 
 and Dionysus and the Panathenaea and other similar days, 
 that they may joy and refresh themselves with bought 
 laughter, paying actors and dancers for the same. On 
 such occasions indeed we sit silently and decorously, 
 for no one wails when he is initiated, or groans when he 
 beholds the Pythian games, or when he is drinking at the 
 festival of Cronos : ^ but men shame the festivals which 
 the deity supplies us with and initiates us in, passing most 
 of their time in lamentation and heaviness of heart and dis- 
 tressing anxiety. And though men delight in the pleasing 
 notes of musical instruments, and in the songs of birds, 
 and behold with joy the animals playing and frisking, and 
 on the contrary are distressed when they roar and howl 
 and look savage ; yet in regard to their own life, when they 
 see it without smiles and dejected, and ever oppressed and 
 afllicted by the most wretched sorrows and toils and un- 
 ending cares, they do not think of trying to procure allevia- 
 tion and ease. How is this ? Nay, they will not even 
 listen to others' exhortation, which would enable them to 
 acquiesce in the present without repining, and to remember 
 the past with thankfulness, and to meet the future hope- 
 fully and cheerfully without fear or suspicion. 
 
 ^ The Saturnalia (as the Romans called this feast) was well known as 
 a festival of merriment and license. 
 
312 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 OX ENVY AND HATRED. 
 
 § I. Outwardly there seems no difference between hatred 
 and envy, but they seem identical. For generally speaking, 
 as vice has many hooks, and is swayed hither and thither by 
 the passions that hang on it, there are many points of con- 
 tact and entanglement between them, for as in the case of 
 illnesses there is a sympathy between the various passions. 
 Thus the prosperous man is equally a source of pain to hate 
 and envy. And so we think benevolence the opposite of 
 both these passions, being as it is a wish for our neigh- 
 bour's good, and we think hate and envy identical, for the 
 desire of both, is the very opposite of benevolence. But 
 since their similarities are not so great as their dissimilari- 
 ties, let us investigate and trace out these two passions 
 from their origin. 
 
 § II. Hatred then is generated by the fancy that the per- 
 son hated is either bad generally or bad to oneself. For 
 those who think they are wronged naturally hate those who 
 they think wrong them, and dislike and are on their 
 guard against those who are injurious or bad to others ; ^ but 
 people envy merely those they think prosperous. So envy 
 seems illimitable, being, like ophthalmia, troubled at every- 
 thing bright, whereas hatred is limited, since it settles only 
 on what seems hostile. 
 
 § III. In the second place people feel hatred even against 
 the brutes ; for some hate cats and beetles and toads and 
 serpents. Thus Germanicus could not bear the crowing or 
 sight of a cock, and the Persian magicians kill their mice, 
 not only hating them themselves but thinking them hateful 
 to their god, and the Arabians and Ethiopians abominate 
 them as much. Whereas we envy only human beings. 
 
 § IV. Indeed among the brutes it is not likely that there 
 should be any envy, for they have no conception of pros- 
 perity or adversity, nor have they any idea of reputation or 
 
 ^ dXXwg MSS. Wyttenbach dWwv. Malo dXXoLg. 
 
ON ENVY AND HATRED. 313 
 
 want of reputation, which are the things that mainlj 
 excite envy ; but they hate one another, and are hostile to 
 one another, and fight with one another to the death, as 
 eagles and dragons, crows and owls, titmice and finches, 
 insomuch that they say that even the blood of these crea- 
 tures will not mix, and if you try to mix it it will imme- 
 diately separate again. It is likely also that there is strong 
 hatred between the cock and the lion, and the pig and 
 the elephant, owing to fear. For what people fear they 
 naturally hate. We see also from this that envy differs 
 from hatred, for the animals are capable of the one, but 
 not of the other. 
 
 § V. Moreover envy against anyone is never just, for no 
 one wrongs another by his prosperity, though that is what 
 he is envied for ; but many are hated with justice, for we 
 even think others ^ worthy of hatred, if they do not flee 
 from such, and are not disgusted and vexed at them. A 
 great indication of this is that some people admit they hate 
 many, but declare they envy nobody. Indeed hatred of 
 evil is reckoned among praiseworthy things ; and when 
 some were praising Charillus, the nephew of Lycurgus and 
 king of Sparta, for his mildness and gentleness, his col- 
 league said, " How can Charillus be good, who is not even 
 harsh to the bad ? " And so the poet described the bodily 
 defects of Thersites at much length, whereas he expressed 
 his vile moral character most shortly and by one remark, 
 " He was most hateful both to Achilles and Odysseus." " 
 For to be hated by the most excellent is the height of 
 worthlessness. But people deny that they are envious, and, 
 if they are charged with being so, they put forward ten 
 thousand pleas, saying they are angry with the man or 
 fear him or hate him, suggesting any other passion than 
 envy, and concealing it as the only disorder of the soul 
 which is abominable. 
 
 § VI. Of necessity then these two passions cannot, like 
 plants, be fed and nourished and grow on the same roots ; 
 for they are by nature different.^ For we hate people 
 more as they grow worse, but they are envied only the 
 
 ' So Wyttenbach. 
 
 2 Homer, " Iliad," ii. 220. 
 
 ^ So Wyttenbach. The reading in this passage is very doubtful. 
 
314 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 more the more they advance in virtue. And so Themistocles, 
 vrhen quite a lad, said he had done nothing remarkable, for 
 he was not yet envied. For as insects attack most ripe corn 
 and roses in their bloom, so envy fastens most on the good 
 and on those who are growing in virtue and good repute 
 for moral character. Again extreme badness intensifies 
 hatred. So hated indeed and loathed were the accusers of 
 Socrates, as guilty of extreme vileness, by their fellow- 
 citizens, that they would neither supply them with fire, nor 
 answer their questions, nor touch the water they had 
 bathed in, but ordered the servants to pour it away as 
 polluted, till they could bear this hatred no longer and 
 hung themselves. But splendid and exceptional success 
 often extinguishes envy. For it is not likely that anyone 
 envied Alexander or Cyrus, after their conquests made 
 them lords of the world. But as the sun, when it is 
 high over our heads and sends down its rays, makes next 
 to no shadow, so at those successes that attain such a height 
 as to be over its head envy is humbled, and retires com- 
 pletely dazzled. So Alexander had none to envy him, 
 but many to hate him, by whom he was plotted against 
 till he died. So too misfortunes stop envy, but they do not 
 remove hatred. For people hate their enemies even when 
 they lie prostrate at their feet, but no one envies the un- 
 fortunate. But the remark of one of the sophists of our day 
 is true, that the envions are very prone to pity ; so here too 
 there is a great difference between these two passions, for 
 hatred abandons neither the fortunate nor unfortunate, 
 whereas envy is mitigated in the extreme of either fortune. 
 § viL Let us look at the same again from opposite points 
 of view. Men put an end to their enmity and hatred, 
 either if persuaded they have not been wronged, or if they 
 come round to the view that those they hated are good men 
 and not bad, or thirdly if they receive a kindness. For, as 
 Thucydides says, the last favour conferred, even though a 
 smaller one, if it be seasonable, outweighs a greater offence.^ 
 Yet the persuasion that they have not been wronged does 
 not put an end to envy, for people envy although absolutely 
 persuaded that they have not been wronged ; and the two 
 
 ^ Thucydides, i. 42. 
 
ON ENYY AND HATRED. 315 
 
 other cases actually increase envy ; for people look with an 
 evil eye even more on those they think good, as having vir- 
 tue, which is the greatest blessing ; and if they are treated 
 kindly by the prosperous it grieves them, for they enyj both 
 their will and power to do kindnesses, the former proceeding 
 from their goodness, the latter from their prosperity, but 
 both being blessings. Thus envy is a passion altogether 
 different from hatred, seeing that what abates the one pains 
 and exasperates the other. 
 
 § VIII. Let us now look at the intent of each of these 
 passions. The intent of the person who hates is to do 
 as much harm as he can, so they define hatred to be a dispo- 
 sition and intent on the watch for an opportunity to do 
 harm. But this is altogether foreign to envy.^ For those 
 who envy their relations and friends would not wish them 
 to come to ruin, or fall into calamity, but are only annoyed 
 at their prosperity ; and would hinder, if they could, their 
 glory and renown, but they would not bring upon them 
 irremediable misfortunes : they are content to remove, as 
 in the case of a lofty house, what stands in their light. 
 
 HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT 
 
 EXCITING ENVY. 
 
 § I. To speak to other people about one's own impor- 
 tance or ability, Herculanus, is universally declared to be 
 tiresome and illiberal, but in fact not many even of those 
 who censure it avoid its unpleasantness. Thus Euripides, 
 though he says, 
 
 " If words had to be bought by human beings, 
 No one would wish to trumpet his own praises. 
 But since one can get words sa?i,s any payment 
 From lofty ether, everyone delights 
 In speaking truth or falsehood of himself, 
 For he can do it with impunity ; " 
 
 yet uses much tiresome boasting, intermixing with the 
 passion and action of his plays irrelevant matter about 
 himself. Similarly Pindar says, that " to boast unseason- 
 
 ^ Reading aTrttrnv oXw^. O'l yap (pQovovvrtQ. What can be made of 
 TToWovQ here ? 
 
316 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 ably is to play an accompaniment to madness,"^ yet he 
 does not cease to talk big about his own merit, which 
 indeed is well worthy of encomium, who would deny it ? 
 But those who are crowned in the games leave it to others 
 to celebrate their victories, to avoid the unpleasantness of 
 singing their own praises. So we are with justice dis- 
 gusted at Timotheus" for trumpeting his own glory inele- 
 gantly and contrary to custom in the inscription for his 
 victory over Phrynis, " A proud day for you, Timotheus, 
 was it when the herald cried out, ' The Milesian Timotheus 
 is victorious over the son of Carbo and his Ionic notes.' " 
 As Xenophon says, " Praise from others is the pleasantest 
 thing a man can hear," ^ but to others a man's self-praise is 
 most nauseous. For first we think those impudent who 
 praise themselves, since modesty would be becoming even 
 if they were praised by others ; secondly, we think them 
 unjust in giving themselves what they ought to receive 
 from others ; thirdly, if we are silent we seem to be vexed 
 and to envy them, and if we are afraid of this imputation, 
 we are obliged to heap praise upon them contrary to our 
 real opinion, and to bear them out, undertaking a task 
 more befitting gross flattery than honour. 
 
 § II. And yet, in spite of all this, there are occasions 
 when a statesman may venture to speak in his own praise, 
 not to cry up his own glory and merit, but when the time 
 and matter demand that he should speak the truth about 
 himself, as he would about another ; especially when it is 
 mentioned that another has done good and excellent 
 things,^ there is no need for him to suppress the fact that 
 he has done as well. For such self-praise bears excellent 
 fruit, since much more and better praise springs from it as 
 from seed. For the statesman does not ask for reputation 
 as a reward or consolation, nor is he merely pleased at its 
 attending upon his actions, but he values it because credit 
 and character give him opportunities to do good on a larger 
 scale. For it is both easy and pleasant to benefit those who 
 
 1 Pindar, " Olymp." ix. 57, 58. 
 ^ Mentioned by Paiisanias, iii. 12 ; viii. 50. 
 "' " Memorabilia," ii. 1.31. 
 
 ^ Reading as Wyttenbach suggests, juaXtora dt orav XkyTjrai rd a\\y 
 TTiTrpayfisva sq. 
 
HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENVY. 317 
 
 believe in us and are friendly to ns, but it is not easy to 
 act virtuously against suspicion and calumny, and to force 
 one's benefits on those that reject them. Let us now con- 
 sider, if there are any other reasons warranting self-praise 
 in a statesman, what they are, that, while we avoid vain 
 glory and disgusting other people, we may not omit any 
 useful kind of self-praise. 
 
 § III, That is vain glory then when men seem to praise 
 themselves that they may call forth the laudation of 
 others ; and it is especially despised because it seems to 
 proceed from ambition and an unseasonable opinion of 
 oneself. For as those who cannot obtain food are forced 
 to feed on their own flesh against nature, and that is the 
 end of famine, so those that hunger after praise, if they get 
 no one else to praise them, disgrace themselves by their 
 anxiety to feed their own vanity. But when, not merely 
 content with praising themselves, they vie with the praise 
 of others, and pit their own deeds and actions against 
 theirs, with the intent of outshining them, they add 
 envy and malignity to their vanity. The proverb teaches 
 us that to put our foot into another's dance is meddlesome 
 and ridiculous; we ought equally to be on our guard 
 against intruding our own panegyric into others' praises 
 out of envy and spite, nor should we allow others either to 
 praise us then, but we should make way for those that are 
 being honoured, if they are worthy of honour, and even if 
 they seem to us undeserving of honour and worthless, we 
 ought not to strip them of their praise by self -laudation, 
 but by direct argument and proof that they are not worthy 
 of all these encomiums. It is plain then that we ought to 
 avoid all such conduct as this. 
 
 § IV. But self-praise cannot be blamed, if it is an answer 
 to some charge or calumny, as those words of Pericles, 
 " And yet you are angry with such a man as me, a man I 
 take it inferior to no one either in knowledge of what 
 should be done, or in ability to point out the same, and a 
 lover of my country to boot, and superior to bribes." ^ For 
 not only did he avoid all swagger and vainglory and ambi- 
 tion in talking thus loftily about himself, but he also exhi- 
 
 ^ Thucydides, ii. 60. 
 
318 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 bited the spirit and greatness of his virtue, which could 
 abase and crush envy because it could not be abased itself. 
 For people will hardly condemn such men, for they are 
 elevated and cheered and inspired by noble self -laudation 
 such as this, if it have a true basis, as all history testifies. 
 Thus the Thebans, when their generals were charged with 
 not returning home, and laying down their office of 
 Bceotarchs when their time had expired, but instead of 
 that making inroads into Laconia, and helping Messene, 
 hardly acquitted Pelopidas, who was submissive and sup- 
 pliant, but for Epaminondas,^ who gloried in what he had 
 done, and at last said that he was ready to die, if they 
 would confess that he had ravaged Laconia, and restored 
 Messene, and made Arcadia one state, against the will of 
 the Thebans, they would not pass sentence upon him, but 
 admired his heroism, and with rejoicing and smiles set him 
 free. So too we must not altogether find fault with 
 Sthenelus in Homer saying, 
 
 " We boast ourselves fai- better than our fathers,"^ 
 when we remember the words of Agamemnon, 
 
 " How now ? thou son of brave horse-taming Tydeus, 
 Why dost thou crouch for fear, and watch far off 
 The lines of battle ? How unlike thy father ! " ^ 
 
 For it was not because he was defamed himself, but he 
 stood up for his friend* that was abused, the occasion 
 giving him a reasonable excuse for self-commendation. 
 So too the Romans were far from pleased at Cicero's 
 frequently passing encomiums upon himself in the affair 
 of Catiline, yet when Scipio said they ought not to try him 
 (Scipio), since he had given them the power to try anybody, 
 they put on garlands, and accompanied him to the Capitol, 
 and sacrificed with him. For Cicero was not compelled to 
 praise himself, but only did so for glory, whereas the 
 danger in which Scipio stood removed envy from him. 
 
 § V. And not only on one's trial and in danger, but also 
 in misfortune, is tall talk and boasting more suitable than 
 in prosperity. For in prosperity people seem to clutch as 
 it were at glory and enjoy it, and so gratify their ambition ; 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, ix. 14, 15. ^ Homer, "Iliad," iv. 405. 
 
 3 Homer, '' Iliad," iv. 370, 371. * Diomede. 
 
HOW ONE CA.N PRMSE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENVT. 319 
 
 bnt in adversity, being far from ambition owing- to circum- 
 stances, such self-commendation seems to be a bearing up 
 and fortifying the spirit against fortune, and an avoidance 
 altogether of that desire for pity and condolence, and that 
 humility, which we often find in adversity. As then we 
 esteem those persons vain and without sense who in walking 
 hold themselves very erect and with a stiff neck, yet in 
 boxing or fighting we commend such as hold themselves up 
 and alert, so the man struggling with adversity, who 
 stands up straight against his fate, " in fighting posture 
 like some boxer," ^ and instead of being humble and abject 
 becomes through his boasting lofty and dignified, seems to 
 be not offensive and impudent, but great and invincible. 
 This is why, I suppose, Homer has represented Patroclus 
 modest and without reproach in prosperity, yet at the 
 moment of death saying grandiloquently, 
 
 " Had twenty warriors fought me such as thou, 
 All had .succumbed to my victorious spear." ^ 
 
 And Phocion, though in other respects he was gentle, yet 
 after his sentence exhibited his greatness of soul to many 
 others, and notably to one of those that were to die with 
 him, who was weeping and wailing, to whom he said, 
 " What ! are you not content to die with Phocion ? " 
 
 § Yi. Not less, but still more, lawful is it for a public 
 man who is wronged to speak on his own behalf to those 
 who treat him with ingratitude. Thus Achilles generally 
 conceded glory to the gods, and modestly used such lan- 
 guage as, 
 
 " If ever Zeus 
 Shall grant to me to sack Troy's well-built town ; " ^ 
 
 but when insulted and outraged contrary to his deserts, he 
 utters in his rage boastful words, 
 
 "Alighting from my ships twelve towns I sacked,"'* 
 and, 
 
 " For they will never dare to face my helmet 
 
 When it gleams near."^ 
 
 ^ Sophocles. '• Trachinise," 442. 
 
 2 Homer, " Iliad," xvi. 847, 848. Plutarch only quotes the first line. 
 I have added the second for the English reader, as necessary for the 
 sense. 
 
 3 Homer, "' Iliad," i. 128, 129. * " Iliad," ix. 328. 
 5 "Iliad;' xvi. 70, 71. 
 
320 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 For frank outspokenness, when it is part of one's defence, 
 admits of boasting. It was in this spirit no doubt that 
 Themistocles, who neither in word nor deed had given any 
 offence, when he saw the Athenians were tired of him and 
 treating him with neglect, did not abstain from saying, 
 " My good sirs, why do you tire of receiving benefits so 
 frequently at the same hands ? " and^ "When the storm is 
 on you fly to me for shelter as to a tree, but when fine 
 weather comes again, then you pass by and strip me of my 
 leaves." 
 
 § Tii. They then that are wronged generally mention 
 what they have done well to those who are ungrateful. 
 And the person who is blamed for what he has done well is 
 altogether to be pardoned, and not censured, if he passes 
 encomiums on his own actions : for he is in the position of 
 one not scolding but making his defence. This it was 
 that made Demosthenes' freedom of speech splendid, and 
 prevented people being wearied out by the praise which in 
 all his speech On the Crovm he lavished on himself, pluming 
 himself on those embassies and decrees in connection with 
 the war with which fault had been found. 
 
 § Yiii. Not very unlike this is the grace of antithesis, 
 when a person shows that the opposite of what he is 
 charged with is base and low. Thus Lycurgus when he was 
 charged at Athens with having bribed an informer to 
 silence, replied, " What kind of a citizen do you think me, 
 who, having had so long time the fingering of your public 
 money, am detected in giving rather than taking unjustly ?" 
 And Cicero, when Metellus told him that he had destroyed 
 more as a witness than he had got acquitted as an advo- 
 cate, answered, " Who denies that my honesty is greater 
 than my eloquence ? " Compare such sayings of Demos- 
 thenes as, " Who would not have been justified in killing 
 me, had I tried in word only to impair the ancient glory of 
 our city ? " ^ And, " What think you these wretches would 
 have said, if the states had departed, when I was curiously 
 discussing these points ? " '^ And indeed the whole of that 
 speech On the Croivn most ingeniously introduces his own 
 
 ' So Wyttenbach. » Demosthenes, " De Corona," p. 260. 
 
 2 " De Corona," p. 307. 
 
HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING EN^T. 321 
 
 praises in his antitheses, and answers to the charges brought 
 against him. 
 
 § IX. However it is worth while to notice in his speech 
 that he most artistically inserts praise of his audience in 
 the remarks abont himself, and so makes his speech less 
 egotistical and less likely to raise envy. Thus he shows 
 how the Athenians behaved to the Euboeans and to the 
 Thebans, and what benefits they conferred on the people of 
 Byzantium and on the Chersonese, claiming for himself 
 only a subordinate part in the matter. Thus he cunningly 
 insinuates into the audience with his own praises what they 
 will gladly hear, for they rejoice at the enumeration of 
 their successes, ' and their joy is succeeded by admiration 
 and esteem for the person to whom the success was due. 
 So also Epaminondas, when Meneclidas once jeered at him 
 as thinking more of himself than Agamemnon ever did, 
 replied, "It is your fault then, men of Thebes, by whose 
 help alone I put down the power of the Lacedaemonians in 
 one day." 
 
 § X. But since most people very much dislike and object to 
 a man's praising himself, Ijut if he praises some one else are 
 on the contrary often glad and readily bear him out, some are 
 in the habit of praising in season those that have the same 
 pursuits business and characters as themselves, and so con- 
 ciliate and move the audience in their own favour ; for the 
 audience know at the moment such a one is speaking 
 that, though he is speaking about another, j-et his own 
 similar virtue is worthy of their praise." For as one who 
 throws in another's teeth things of which he is guilty him- 
 self must know that he upbraids himself most, so the good 
 in paying honour to the good remind those who know their 
 character of themselves, so that their hearers cry out at 
 once, "Are not you such a one yourself?" Thus Alex- 
 ander honouring Hercules, and Androcottus again honour- 
 ing Alexander, got themselves honoured on the same 
 grounds. Dionysius on the contrary pulling Gelon to 
 pieces, and calling him the Gelos^ of Sicily, was not aware 
 that through his envy he was weakening the importance 
 and dignity of his own authority. 
 
 ' After Wyttenbach. 2 .^f^er Wyttenbach. 
 
 * That is, laughing-stock. A play on the word Gelon. 
 
322 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 § XI. These things then a pablic man must generally 
 know and observe. But those that are compelled to praise 
 themselves do so less offensively if they do not ascribe all 
 the honour to themselves, but, being aware that their glory 
 will be tiresome to others, set it down partly to foi-tune, 
 partly to the deity. So Achilles said well, 
 
 " Since the gods granted us to kill this hero/' ^ 
 
 Well also did Timoleon, who erected a temple at Syracuse 
 to the goddess of Fortune after his success, and dedicated 
 his house to the Good Genius. Excellently again did 
 Pytho of ^nos, (when he came to Athens after killing 
 Cotys, and when the demagogues vied with one another in 
 praising him to the people, and he observed that some were 
 jealous and displeased,) in coming forward and saying, 
 " Men of Athens, this is the doing of one of the gods, I 
 only put my hands to the work." Sulla also forestalled 
 envy by ever praising fortune, and eventually he pro- 
 claimed himself as under the protection of Aphrodite.^ For 
 men would rather ascribe their defeat to fortune than the 
 enemy's valour, for in the former case they consider it an ac- 
 cident, whereas in the latter case they would have to blame 
 themselves and set it down to their own shortcomings. So 
 they say the legislation of Zaleucus pleased the Locrians not 
 least, because he said that Athene visited him from time to 
 time, and suggested to him and taught him his laws, and 
 that none of those he promulgated were his own idea and 
 plan. 
 
 § XII. Perhaps this kind of remedy by talking people 
 over must be contrived for those who are altogether 
 crabbed or envious ; but for people of moderation it is not 
 amiss to qualify excessive praise. Thus if anyone should 
 praise you as learned, or rich, or influential, it would be 
 well to bid him not talk about you in that strain, but say 
 that you were good and harmless and useful. For the person 
 that acts so does not introduce his own praise but transfers 
 it, nor does he seem to rejoice in people passing encomiums 
 upon him, but rather to be vexed at their praising him 
 inappropriately and on wrong grounds, and he seems to 
 
 ^ Homer, " Iliad," xxii. 379. He speaks of Hector. 
 2 Others take it ' * as fortune's favourite." 
 
HOW 03^ CAS PBAISB OanSBLF WSBOVT KXCITDTG KSTT. 323 
 
 kide bad tnite by better odbb^ not wiafamg to be {R^iaed, 
 bat showing how he ou^t to be praised. Such, seems 
 the intent of sash. wcKda as the f cdlowing, ^ I have not 
 fortified the city with stones or bricks, but if jaa wish to 
 see how I haTe fortified it, joa will find arms and horses 
 and alhes.'*^ Still m<nre in point are the last words of 
 Pericles, far as he was dying, and his friends reiy nata- 
 rally were weeding ai^ wailing;, and reminded him of his 
 iiiilit a r y services and his power, and the to>phies and vic- 
 tories and towns he had won iar Athens, ainl was karing 
 as a lega^, he raised himself np a little and blamed them 
 as praising him for things common to many, and some of 
 them the results of fortune rather than merit, while they 
 had passed orer the best and greatest of his deeds and one 
 pecnliariy his own, that he had never been the cause of 
 any Athenian's wearing mooming'. This gives the oratcv 
 an ezam|^ if he be a good man, when praised for his 
 eloquence, to transfer the praise to his Hfe and character, 
 and the general who is admired for his skill and good 
 fortune in war to speak with confidence about his gentle- 
 ness and uprightness. And again, if any tctj extravagant 
 praise is ottered, sndh as many people use in flattery whidi 
 provokes envy, one can r^y, 
 
 ''I warn no god: why do ^cNi ftca ae 
 TotfaenMrtali?-> 
 
 If you really know me, praise my integrity, or my sobriety, 
 or my kindheartedness, or my philanthropy. For even envy 
 is not rehictuit to give moderate -pnaae to one that depre- 
 cates excessive praise, and true pan^fyric is not lost by 
 people refusing to accept idle and false praise. So those 
 kings who would not be called gods or tiie sons of goda, 
 but only fond of their brothers or mother, or benefactors,' 
 or dear to the gods, did not excite tiie enry of tiiose ihak 
 honoured them by those tities, tiiat were noUe bnt still 
 such as men might daim. Again, people dislike Aoee w riter s 
 ^or qieakers ndto entitle tiaanacl fe s wise, bat they w^ 
 
 ! 
 
 * WoHb of DfeMitkeMa, " De ConiM,* fL 3t5. 
 
 them. 
 
 - Homer, • Oipmey^ x»L 187. 
 ritks of the'Ptokwn, FhiliddpfaB 
 
324 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 come those who content themselves with saying that they 
 are lovers of philosophy, and have made some progress, or 
 use some such moderate language about themselves as that, 
 which does not excite envy. But rhetorical sophists, who 
 expect to hear " Divine, wonderful, grand," at their decla- 
 mations, are not even welcomed with " Pretty fair, so so." 
 
 § XIII. Moreover, as people anxious not to injure those 
 who have weak eyes, draw a shade over too much light, 
 so some people make their praise of themselves less glaring 
 and absolute, by pointing out some of their small defects, 
 or miscarriages, or errors, and so remove all risk of making 
 people offended or envious. Thus Epeus, who boasts very 
 much of his skill in boxing, and says very confidently, 
 
 " I can your bod}' crush, and break your bones," ^ 
 yet says, 
 
 " Is't not enough that I'm in fight deficient ? " ^ 
 
 But Epeus is perhaps a ridiculous instance, excusing his 
 bragging as an athlete by his confession of timidity and 
 want of manliness. But agreeable and graceful is that 
 man who mentions his own forgetfulness, or ignorance, or 
 ambition, or eager desire for knowledge and conversation. 
 Thus Odysseus of the Sirens, 
 
 " My heart to listen to them did incline, 
 
 I bade my comi'ades by a nod to unloose me."* 
 
 And again of the Cyclops, 
 
 " I did not hearken (it had been far better), 
 I wished to see the Cyclops, and to taste 
 His hospitality."* 
 
 And generally speaking the admixture with praise of such 
 faults as are not altogether base and ignoble stops envy. 
 Thus many have blunted the point of envy by admitting 
 and introducing, when they have been praised, their past 
 poverty and straits, aye, and their low origin. So Aga- 
 thocles pledging his young men in golden cups beautifully 
 chased, ordered some earthenware pots to be brought in, and 
 said, " See the fruits of perseverance, labour, and bravery ! 
 Once I produced pots like these, but now golden cups." 
 
 1 Homer, " Iliad," xxiii. 673. ^ ibj^j 570. 
 
 3 Homer, " Odyssey," xii. 192-194. * Ibid. ix. 228, 229. 
 
HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENVY. 325 
 
 For Agatliocles it seems was so low-born and poor that he 
 was brought up in a potter's shop, though afterwards he 
 was king of almost all Sicilj. 
 
 § XIV. These are external remedies against self-praise. 
 There are other internal ones as it were, such as Cato 
 applied, when he said " he was envied, because he had 
 to neglect his own affairs, and lie awake every night for 
 the interests of his country." Compare also the following 
 lines, 
 
 " How should I boast ? who could with ease have been 
 Enrolled among the many in the army, 
 And had a fortune equal to the wisest; " ' 
 
 and, 
 
 " I shrink from squandering past labours' grace, 
 Nor do 1 now reject all present toil." ' 
 
 For as it is with house and farm, so also is it with glory 
 and reputation, people for the most part envy those who 
 have got them easily or for nothing, not those who have 
 bought them at the cost of much toil and danger. 
 
 § XV. Since then we can praise ourselves not only with- 
 out causing pain or envy but even usefully and advan- 
 tageously, let us consider, that we may not seem to have 
 only that end in view but some other also, if we might 
 praise ourselves to excite in our hearers emulation and 
 ambition. For Nestor, by reciting his battles and acts of 
 prowess, stirred up Patroclus and nine others to single 
 combat with Hector. For the exhortation that adds deed 
 to word and example and proper emulation is animating 
 and moving and stimulating, and with its impulse and 
 resolution inspires hope that the things we aim at are 
 attainable and not impossible. That is why in the choruses 
 at Lacedaemon the old men sing, 
 
 " We once were young and vigorous and strong," 
 and then the boys, 
 
 " We shall be stronger far than now we are," 
 and then the youths, 
 
 " We now are strong, look at us if you like." 
 ^ Fragments from the " Philoctetes " of Euripides. 
 
326 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 In this wise and statesmanlike manner did the legislator 
 exhibit to the young men the nearest and dearest examples 
 of what they should do in the persons of those who had 
 done so. 
 
 § XVI. Moreover it is not amiss sometimes, to awe and 
 repress and take down and tame the impudent and bold, to 
 boast and talk a little big about oneself. A.s Nestor did, to 
 mention him again, 
 
 ' ' For I have mixed ere now with better men 
 Than both of you, and ne'er did they despise me." ' 
 
 So also Aristotle told Alexander that not only had they 
 that were rulers over many subjects a right to think highly 
 of themselves, but also those that had right views about 
 the gods. Useful too against our enemies and foes is the 
 following line, 
 
 " Ill-starred are they whose sons encounter me." ^ 
 
 Compare also the remark of Agesilaus about the king of 
 the Persians, who was called great, " How is he greater 
 than me, if he is not also more upright ? " And that also 
 of Epaminondas to the Lacedaemonians who were inveigh- 
 ing against the Thebans, " Anyhow we have made yott 
 talk at greater length than usual." But these kind of 
 remarks are fitting for enemies and foes ; but onr boasting 
 is also good on occasion for friends and fellow-citizens, 
 not only to abate their pride and make them more humble, 
 but also when they are in fear and dejection to raise them 
 up again and give them confidence. Thus Cyrus talked 
 big in perils and on battle-fields, though at other times he 
 was no boaster. And the second Antigonns, though he 
 was on all other occasions modest and far from vanity, 
 yet in the sea-fight off Cos, when one of his friends said to 
 him, " See you not how many more ships the enemy have 
 got than we have ? " answered, " How many do you make 
 me equal to then ? " This Homer also seems to have 
 noticed. For he has represented Odysseus, when his com- 
 rades were dreadfully afraid of the noise and whirlpool of 
 Charybdis, reminding them of his former cleverness and 
 valour ; 
 
 1 Homer, " Iliad," i. 260, 261. ^ Homer, « Iliad,'^ vi. 127. 
 
HOW ONE CAN PEAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENYY. 327 
 
 " We are in no worse plight than when the Cyclops 
 By force detained us in his hollow cave ; 
 But even then, thanks to my valour, judgement, 
 And sense, we did escape." ^ 
 
 For such is not the self-praise of a demagogue or sophist, 
 or of one that asks for clapping or applause, but of one 
 who makes his valour and experience a pledge of confi- 
 dence to his friends. For in critical conjunctures the repu- 
 tation and credit of one who has experience and capacity in 
 command plays a great part in insuring safety. 
 
 § XYii. As I have said before, to pit oneself against 
 another's praise and reputation is by no means fitting for a 
 public man : however, in important matters, where mis- 
 taken praise is injurious and detrimental, it is not amiss to 
 confute it, or rather to divert the hearer to what is better 
 by showing him the difiierence between true and false 
 merit. Anyone would be glad, I suppose, when vice was 
 abused and censured, to see most people voluntarily keep 
 aloof from it ; but if vice should be well thought of, and 
 honour and reputation come to the person who promoted 
 its pleasures or desires, no nature is so well constituted or 
 strong that it would not be mastered by it. So the public 
 man must oppose the praise not of men but of bad actions, 
 for such praise is corrupting, and causes people to imitate 
 and emulate what is base as if it were noble. But it is best 
 refuted by putting it side by side with the truth: as 
 Theodorus the tragic actor is reported to have said once to 
 Satyrus the comic actor, " It is not so wonderful to make 
 an audience laugh as to make them weep and cry." But 
 what if some philosopher had answered him, " To make an 
 audience weep and cry is not so noble a thing as to make 
 them forget their sorrows." This kind of self- laudation 
 benefits the hearer, and changes his opinion. Compare the 
 remark of Zeno in reference to the number of Theophrastus' 
 scholars, " His is a larger body, but mine are better 
 taught." And Phocion, when Leosthenes was still in pros- 
 perity, being asked by the orators what benefit he had 
 conferred on the city, replied, " Only this, that during my 
 period of office there has been no funeral oration, but all 
 
 ' Homer, " Odyssey," xii. 209-212. 
 
328 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 the dead have been buried in their fathers' sepulchres." 
 Wittily also did Crates parody the Hnes, 
 
 " Eating and wantonness and love's delights 
 Are all I value," 
 
 with 
 
 " Learning and those grand things the Muses teach one 
 Are all 1 value. " 
 
 Such self-praise is good and useful and teaches people to 
 admire and love what is valuable and expedient instead of 
 vrhat is vain and superfluous. Let so much suffice on the 
 question proposed. 
 
 § XVIII. It remaius to me now to point out, what our 
 subject next demands and calls for, how everyone may avoid 
 unseasonable self-praise. For there is a wonderful incen- 
 tive to talking about oneself in self-love, which is frequently 
 strongly implanted in those who seem to have only mode- 
 rate aspirations for fame. For as it is one of the rules to 
 preserve good health to avoid altogether places where sick- 
 ness is, or to exercise the greatest precaution if one must 
 go there, so talking about oneself has its slippery times and 
 places that draw it on on any pretext. For first, when others 
 are praised, as I said before, ambition makes people talk 
 about themselves, and a certain desire and impulse for fame 
 which is hard to check bites and tickles that ambition, 
 especially if the other person is praised for the same things 
 or less important things than the hearer thinks he is a pro- 
 ficient in. For as hungry people have their appetite more 
 inflamed and sharpened by seeing others eat, so the praise 
 of one's neighbours makes those who eagerly desire fame 
 to blaze out into jealousy. 
 
 § XIX. In the second place the narration of things done 
 successfully and to people's mind entices many unawares 
 to boasting and bragging in their joy ; for falling into con- 
 versation about their victories, or success in state affairs, 
 or their words or deeds commended by great men, they 
 cannot keep themselves within bounds. With this kind of 
 self- laudation you may see that soldiers and sailors are 
 most taken. To be in this state of mind also frequently 
 happens to those who have returned from important posts 
 and responsible duties, for in their mention of illustrious 
 
HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENVY. 329 
 
 men and men of royal rank they insert the encomiums they 
 have passed on themselves, and do not so much think 
 they are praising themselves as merely repeating the praises 
 of others about themselves. Others think their hearers do 
 not detect them at all of self-praise, when they recount the 
 greeting and welcome and kindness they have received 
 from kings and emperors, but only imagine them to be 
 enumerating the courtesy and kindliness of those great 
 personages. So we must be very much on our guard in 
 praising others to free ourselves from all suspicion of self- 
 love and self-recommendation, and not to seem to be really 
 praising ourselves "under pretext of Patroclus." ^ 
 
 § XX. Moreover that kind of conversation that mainly 
 consists of censuring and running down others is dangerous 
 as giving opportunity for self- laudation to those who pine 
 for fame. A fault into which old men especially fall, 
 when they are led to scold others and censure their bad 
 ways and faulty actions, and so extol themselves as being 
 remarkably the opposite. In old men we must allow all 
 this, especially if to age they add reputation and merit, for 
 such fault-finding is not without use, and inspires those who 
 are rebuked with both emulation and love of honour.^ 
 But all other persons must especially avoid and fear that 
 roundabout kind of self-praise. For since generally speak- 
 ing censuring one's neighbours is disagreeable and barely 
 tolerable and requires great wariness, he that mixes up his 
 own praise with blame of another, and hunts for fame by 
 defaming another, is altogether tiresome and inspires dis- 
 gust, for he seems to wish to get credit through trying to 
 prove others unworthy of credit. 
 
 § XXI. Furthermore, as those that are naturally prone 
 and inclined to laughter must be especially on their guard 
 against tickling and touching, such as excites that propen- 
 sity by contact with the smoothest parts of the body, so 
 those that have a great passion for reputation ought to be 
 especially advised to abstain from praising themselves 
 when they are praised by others. For a person ought to 
 blush when praised, and not to be past blushing from 
 
 ^ An allusion to Homer, " Iliad," xix. 302. 
 ' Adopting the reading of Diibner. 
 
330 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 impudence, and ought to check those who extol him too 
 highly, and not to rebuke them for praising him too little ; 
 though very many people do so, themselves prompting and 
 reminding their praisers of others of their own acts and 
 virtues, till by their own praise they spoil the effect of 
 the praise that others give them. For some tickle and 
 puff themselves up by self-praise, while others, malignantly 
 holding out the small bait of eulogy, provoke others to 
 talk about themselves, while others again ask questions 
 and put inquiries, as was done to the soldier in Menander, 
 merely to poke fun at him ; 
 
 " ' How did you get this wound ? ' '' Sir, by a javelin.' 
 
 ' How in the name of Heaven ? ' 'I was on 
 
 A scaling ladder fastened to a wall.' 
 
 I show my wound to them in serious earnest, 
 
 But they for their part only mock at me." 
 
 § XXII. As regards all these points then we must be on 
 our guard as much as possible not to launch out into praise 
 of ourselves, or yield to it in consequence of questions put 
 to us to draw us. And the best caution and security 
 against this is to pay attention to others who praise them- 
 selves, and to consider how disagreeable and objectionable 
 the practice is to everybody, and that no other conversation 
 is so offensive and tiring. For though we cannot say that 
 we suffer any other evil at the hands of those who praise 
 themselves, yet being naturally bored by the practice, and 
 avoiding it, we are anxious to get rid of them and breathe 
 again ; insomuch that even the flatterer and parasite and 
 needy person in his distress finds the rich man or satrap or 
 king praising himself hard to bear and wellnigh intolerable ; 
 and they say that having to listen to all this is paying a 
 very large shot to their entertainment, like the fellow in 
 Menander ; 
 
 " To hear their foolish ' saws, and soldier talk. 
 Such as this cursed braggart bellows forth, 
 Kills me ; I get lean even at their feasts." 
 
 For as we may use this language not only about soldiers or 
 men who have newly become rich,^ who spin us a long 
 
 ^ Adopting the reading of Salmasius. 
 ^ Nouveaxuc riches, novi homines. 
 
HOW ONE CAN PRAISE ONESELF WITHOUT EXCITING ENVY. 331 
 
 yarn of their great and grand doings, being puffed up witli 
 pride and talking big about themselves ; if we remember 
 that the censure of others always follovrs our self-praise, 
 and that the end of this vain-glory is a bad repute, and 
 that, as Demosthenes says,^ the result will be that we shall 
 only tire our hearers, and not be thought what we profess 
 ourselves to be, we shall cease talking about ourselves, 
 unless by so doing we can bestow great benefit on ourselves 
 or our hearers. 
 
 ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE 
 DEITY LATE. 
 
 A discussion between Patrocleas, Plutarch, Timon, and 
 Olympicus. 
 
 § I. When Epicurus had made these remarks, Quintus,. 
 and before any of us who were at the end of the porch ^ 
 could reply, he went off abruptly. And we, marvelling 
 somewhat at his rudeness, stood still silently but looked ai 
 one another, and then turned and pursued our walk as 
 before. And Patrocleas was the first to speak. " Are we," 
 said he, " to leave the question unanswered, or are we to 
 reply to his argument in his absence as if he were present ? " 
 Then said Timon, " Because he went off the moment he 
 had thrown his missile at us, it would not be good surely 
 to leave it sticking in us ; for we are told that Brasidas 
 plucked the javelin that had been thrown at him out of 
 his body, and with it killed the hurler of it ; but there is 
 of course no need for us to avenge ourselves so on those 
 that have launched on us an absurd or false argument, it 
 will be enough to dislodge the notion before it gets fixed in 
 us." Then said I, " Which of his words has moved you 
 
 ^ Demosthenes, " De Corona," p. 270. 
 
 ^ In the temple at Delphi, the scene of the discussion, as we see- 
 later on, §§ vii. xii. 
 
332 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 most ? For the fellow seemed to rampage about, in his 
 anger and abusive language, with a long disconnected and 
 rambling rhapsody drawn from all sources, and at the same 
 time inveighed against Providence." 
 
 § II. Then said Patrocleas, " The slowness and delay of 
 the deity in punishing the wicked used to seem ^ to me a 
 very dreadful thing, but now in consequence of his speech 
 I come as it were new and fresh to the notion. Yet long 
 ago I was vexed when I heard that line of Euripides, 
 
 " He does delay, such is the Deity 
 In nature." ^ 
 
 For indeed it is not fitting that the deity should be slow in 
 anything, and least of all in the punishment of the wicked, 
 seeing that they are not slow or sluggish in doing evil, but 
 :are hurried by their passions into crime at headlong speed. 
 Moreover, as Thucydides^ says, when punishment follows 
 as closely as possible upon wrong-doing, it blocks up the 
 road at once for those who would follow up their villainy 
 if it were successful. For no debt so much as that of 
 justice paid behind time damps the hopes and dejects the 
 mind of the wronged person, and aggravates the audacity 
 and daring of the wrong-doer ; whereas the punishment 
 that follows crime immediately not only checks future out- 
 breaks but is also the greatest possible comfort to the 
 injured. And so I am often troubled when I consider that 
 remark of Bias, who told, it seems, a bad man that he was 
 not afraid that he would escape punishment, but that he 
 would not live to see it. For how did the Messenians who 
 were killed long before derive any benefit from the punish- 
 ment of Aristocrates ? For he had been guilty of treason 
 at the battle of The Great Trench, but had reigned over the 
 Arcadians for more than twenty years without being found 
 out, but afterwards was detected and paid the penalty, but 
 they were no longer alive.^ Or what consolation was 
 brought to the people of Orchomenus, who lost their sons 
 and friends and relatives in consequence of the treason of 
 
 ' Reading ISokh with Reiske. 
 
 •' Euripides, "Orestes," 420. Cf. "Ion," 1615. 
 
 ' Thucydides, iii. 38. 
 
 * Seethe circumstances in Pausanias, iv. 17 and 22. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 333- 
 
 Lyciscns, by the disease whicli settled upon him long after- 
 wards and spread all over his body ? For he used to go and 
 dip and soak his feet in the river, and nttered imprecations 
 and prayed that they might rot off if he was guilty of 
 treason or crime. Nor was it permitted to the children's 
 children of those that were slain to see at Athens the tear- 
 ing out of their graves the bodies of those atrocious crimi- 
 nals that had killed them, and the carrying them beyond 
 their borders. And so it seems strange in Euripides using 
 the following argument to deter people from vice : 
 
 " Fear not, for vengeance will not strike at once 
 
 Your heart, or that of any guilty wretch. 
 
 But silently and with slow foot it moves, ^ 
 
 And when their time's come will the wicked reach." 
 
 This is no doubt the very reason why the wicked incite' 
 and cheer themselves on to commit lawless acts, for crime 
 shows them a fruit visible and ripe at once, but a punish- 
 ment late, and long subsequent to the enjoyment." 
 
 § III. When Patrocleas had said thus much, Olympicus 
 interfered, " There is another consideration, Patrocleas, the 
 great absurdity involved in these delays and longsuffering 
 of the deity. For the slowness of punishment takes away 
 belief in providence, and the wicked, observing that no 
 evil follows each crime except long afterwards, attri- 
 bute it vrhen it comes to mischance, and look upon it 
 in the light more of accident than punishment, and so 
 receive no benefit from it, being grieved indeed when the 
 misfortune comes, but feeling no remorse for what they 
 have done amiss. For, as in the case of a horse, the whip- 
 ping or spurring that immediately follows upon a stumble 
 or some other fault is a corrective and brings him to his 
 duty, but pulling and backing him with the bit and shouting 
 at him long afterwards seems to come from some other 
 motive than a desire to teach him, for he is put to pain 
 without being shown his fault ; so the vice which each time 
 it stumbles or offends is at once punished and checked by 
 correction is most likely^ to come to itself and be humble 
 
 ^ Compare Petronius, " Satyricon," 44: " Dii pedes lanatos habent."" 
 Compare aI.-,o '• Tibullus," i. 9.4: " Sera tamen (acitis Poena venit 
 pedibus." 
 
 ^ Keading ^oXtora (for iioXtg) with Wyttenbach. 
 
334 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and stand in awe of the deity, as one that beholds men's 
 acts and passions and does not punish behind time ; whereas 
 that justice that, according to Euripides, " steals on silently 
 and with slow foot," and falls upon the wicked some time 
 or other, seems to resemble more chance than providence 
 by reason of its uncertainty, delay, and irregularity. So 
 that I do not see what benefit there is in those mills of the 
 gods that are said to grind late,^ since they obscure the 
 punishment, and obliterate the fear, of evil-doing." 
 
 § IT. When Olympicus had done speaking, and I was 
 musing with myself on the matter, Tim on said, " Am I to 
 put the finishing touch of difficulty on our subject, or am I 
 to let him first contend earnestly against these views ? " 
 Then said I, " Why should we bring up the third wave ^ 
 and drown the argument, if he is not able to refute or 
 evade the charges already brought ? To begin then with the 
 domestic hearth, as the saying is,^ let us imitate that 
 cautious manner of speaking about the deity in vogue 
 among the Academic philosophers, and decline to speak 
 about these things as if we thoroughly understood them. 
 For it is worse in us mortals than for people ignorant of 
 music to discuss music, or for people ignorant of military 
 matters to discuss the art of war, to examine too closely into 
 the nature of the gods and demons, like people with no 
 knowledge of art trying to get at the intention of artists 
 from opinion and fancy and probabilities. For if* it is 
 no easy matter for anyone not a professional to conjecture 
 why the surgeon performed an operation later rather 
 than sooner, or why he ordered his patient to take a 
 bath to-day rather than yesterday, how is it easy or safe 
 for a mortal to say anything else about the deity than that 
 he knows best the time to cure vice, and applies to each 
 his punishment as the doctor administers a drug, and that 
 a punishment not of the same magnitude, or applied at the 
 same time, in all cases. For that the cure of the soul, 
 which is called justice, is the greatest of all arts is testified 
 
 ' An allusion to the proverb 'O^/c QeCJv aXsovm fivXoi, dXeovm de XgTrra. 
 See Erasmus, " Adagia," p. 1864. 
 2 Cf. Plato, ♦' Kepublic," 472 A. 
 ^ See Note, " On Abundance of Friends," § ii. 
 * Reading d yap. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 335 
 
 by Pindar as well as by ten thousand others, for he calls 
 God, the ruler and lord of all things, the greatest artificer 
 as the creator of justice, whose function it is to determine 
 when, and how, and how far, each bad man is to be 
 punished. And Plato says that Minos, the son of Zeus, 
 was his father's pupil in this art, not thinking it possible 
 that any one could succeed in justice, or understand how 
 to succeed in it, without he had learned or somehow got 
 that science. For the laws which men make are not always 
 merely reasonable, nor is their meaning always apparent, 
 but some injunctions seem quite ridiculous, for example, 
 the Ephors at Lacedaemon make proclamation, directly 
 they take office, that no one is to let his moustache grow, 
 but that all are to obey the laws, that they be not grievous 
 to them. And the Romans lay a light rod on the bodies 
 of those they make freemen, and when they make their 
 wills, they nominate some as their heirs, while to others 
 they sell the property, which seems strange. But strangest 
 of all is that ordinance of Solon, that the citizen who, when 
 his city is in faction, will not side with either party is to 
 lose his civic rights. And generally one might mention 
 many absurdities in laws, if one did not know the mind of 
 the legislator, or understand the reason for each particular 
 piece of legislation. How is it wonderful then, if human 
 affairs are so difficult to comprehend, that it is no easy 
 task to say in connection with the gods, why they punish 
 some offenders early, and others late ? 
 
 § Y. This is not a pretext for evading the subject, but 
 merely a request for lenient judgement, that our discourse, 
 looking as it were for a haven and place of refuge, may rise 
 to the difficulty with greater confidence basing itself on 
 probability. Consider then first that, according to Plato, 
 god, making himself openly a pattern of all things good, 
 concedes human virtue, which is in some sort a resem- 
 blance to himself, to those who are able to follow him. 
 For all nature, being in disorder, got the principle of change 
 and became order ^ by a resemblance to an d participation 
 in the nature and virtue of the deity. The same Plato 
 also tells us that nature put eyesight into us, in order that 
 
 ^ Or a world. 
 
336 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the soul by beholding and admiring the heavenly bodies 
 might accustom itself to welcome and love harmony and 
 order, and might hate disorderly and roving propensities, 
 and avoid aimless reliance on chance, as the parent of all 
 vice and error. For man can enjoy no greater blessing 
 from god than to attain to virtue by the earnest imitation 
 of the noblest qualities of the divine nature. And so he 
 punishes the wicked leisurely and long after, not being 
 afraid of error or after repentance through punishing too 
 hastily, but to take away from us that eager and brutish 
 thirst for revenge, and to teach us that we are not to reta- 
 liate on those that have offended us in anger, and when the 
 soul is most inflamed and distorted with passion and almost 
 beside itself for rage, like people satisfying fierce thirst or 
 hunger, but to imitate the mildness and long-suffering of 
 the deity, and to avenge ourselves in an orderly and decent 
 manner, only when we have taken counsel with time long 
 enough to give us the least possible likelihood of after 
 repentance. For it is a smaller evil, as Socrates said, to 
 drink dirty water when excessively thirsty, than, when 
 one's mind is disturbed and full of rage and fury, before it 
 is settled and becomes pure, to glut our revenge on the 
 person of a relation and kinsman. For it is not the punish- 
 ment that follows as closely as possible upon wrong-doing, 
 as Thucj'dides said,^ but that which is more remote, that 
 observes decorum. For as Melanthius says of anger, 
 
 " Fell things it does when it the mind unsettles," ^ 
 
 so also reason acts with justice and moderation, when it 
 banishes rage and passion. So also people are made milder 
 by the example of other men, as when they hear that Plato, 
 when he held his stick over his slave to correct him, waited 
 some time, as he himself has told us, to compose his anger; 
 and that Ai'chytas, having learned of some wrong or dis- 
 orderly action on the part of some of his farm labourers, 
 knowing that at the time he was in a very great rage and 
 highly incensed at them, did nothing to them, but merely 
 departed, saying, " You may thank your stars that I am in 
 
 ' See above, § ii. 
 
 ^ Quoted also in *' On restraining Anger," § ii. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 337 
 
 a rage with you." If then the remembrance of the words 
 and recorded acts of men abates the fierceness and intensity 
 of onr rage, much more likely is it that we (observing that 
 the deity, though without either fear or repentance in any 
 case, yet puts off his punishments and defers them for some 
 time) shall be reserved in our views about such matters, 
 and shall think that mildness and long-suffering which the 
 god exhibits a divine part of virtue, reforming a few by 
 speedy punishment, but benefiting and correcting many 
 by a tardy one. 
 
 § Yi. Let us consider in the second place that punish- 
 ments inflicted by men for offences regard only retaliation, 
 and, when the offender is punished, stop and go no further ; 
 so that they seem to follow offences yelping at them like a 
 dog, and closely pursuing at their heels as it were. But it 
 is likely that the deity would look at the state of any guilty 
 soul that he intended to punish, if haply it might turn and 
 repent, and would give ^ time for reformation to all whose 
 vice was not absolute and incurable. For knowing how 
 great a share of virtue souls come into the world with, 
 deriving it from him, and how strong and lasting is their 
 nobility of nature, and how it breaks out into vice against 
 its natural disposition through the corruption of bad habits 
 and companions, and afterwards in some cases reforms itself, 
 and recovers its proper position, he does not inflict punish- 
 ment on all persons alike ; but the incorrigible he at once 
 removes from life and cuts off, since it is altogether in- 
 jurious to others, but most of all to a man's own self, to 
 live in perpetual vice, whereas to those who seem to have 
 fallen into wrong-doing, rather from ignorance of what was 
 good than from deliberate choice of what was bad, he gives 
 time to repent. But if they persist in vice he punishes them 
 too, for he has no fear that they will escape him. Consider 
 also how many changes take place in the life and character 
 of men, so that the Greeks give the names rpoiroQ and 7]doQ 
 to the character, the first word meaning cha7ige, and the 
 latter the immense force and power of habit. I think also 
 that the ancients called Cecrops half man and half dragon '^ 
 
 ^ It seems necessary to read either Tcopilav with Mez, or opi^eir with 
 Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ Compare Aristophanes, " Vespse," 438. 
 
338 Plutarch's morals, 
 
 not because, as some saj, he became from a good king wild 
 and dragon-like, but contrariwise because he was originally 
 perverse and terrible, and afterwards became a mild and 
 humane king. And if this is uncertain, at any rate we know 
 that Grelon and Hiero, both Sicilians, and Pisistratus the 
 son of Hippocrates, though they got their supreme power by 
 bad means, yet used it for virtuous ends, and though they 
 mounted the throne in an irregular way, yet became good and 
 useful princes. For by good legislation and by encouraging 
 agriculture they made the citizens earnest and industrious 
 instead of scoffers and chatterers. As for Gelon, after 
 fighting valiantly and defeating the Carthaginians in a great 
 battle, he would not conclude with them the peace they 
 asked for until they inserted an article promising to cease 
 sacrificing their sons to Cronos. And Lydiades was tyrant 
 in Megalopolis, yet in the very height of his power chang- 
 ing his ideas and being disgusted with injustice, he re- 
 stored their old constitution to the citizens,^ and fell glo- 
 riously, fighting against the enemy in behalf of his country. 
 And if any one had slain prematurely Miltiades the tyrant 
 of the Chersonese, or had prosecuted and got a conviction 
 against Cimon for incest with his sister, or had deprived 
 Athens of Themistocles for his wantonness and revellings 
 and outrages in the market, as in later days Athens lost Alci- 
 biades, by an indictment, should we not have had to go 
 without the glory of Marathon, and Eurymedon, and 
 beautiful Artemisium, *' where the Athenian youth laid the 
 bright base of liberty ? " ^ For great natures produce 
 nothing little, nor can their energy and activity rust owing 
 to their keen intellect, but they toss to and fro as at sea 
 till they come to a settled and durable character. As then 
 one inexperienced in farming, seeing a spot full of thick 
 bushes and rank growth, full of wild beasts and streams 
 and mud, would not think much of it, while to one who 
 has learnt how to discriminate and discern between different 
 kind of soils all these are various tokens of the richness and 
 goodness of the land, so great natures break out into many 
 strange excesses, which exasperate us at first beyond bear- 
 ing, so that we think it right to cut off such offenders and 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, viii. 27. ^ Pindar. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 339 
 
 stop their career at once, whereas a better judge, seeing 
 the good and noble even in these, waits for age and the 
 season which nature appoints for gathering fruit to bring 
 sense and virtue. 
 
 § VII. So much for this point. Do you not think also 
 that some of the Greeks did well to adopt that Egyptian 
 law which orders a pregnant woman condemned to death 
 not to suffer the penalty till after she has given birth ? " 
 " Certainly," said all the company. I continued, " Put the 
 case not of a woman pregnant, but of a man who can in 
 process of time bring to light and reveal some secret act 
 or plan, point out some unknown evil, or devise some 
 scheme of safety, or invent something useful and necessary, 
 would it not be better to defer his execution, and wait the 
 result of his meditation ? That is my opinion, at least." 
 " So we all think," said Patrocleas. " Quite right," said I. 
 " For do but consider, had Dionysius had vengeance taken 
 on him at the beginning of his tyranny, none of the Greeks 
 would have dwelt in Sicily, which was laid waste by the 
 Carthaginians. Nor would the Greeks have dwelt in 
 Apollonia, or Anactorium, or the peninsula of the Leuca- 
 dians, had not Periander's chastisement been postponed for 
 a long time. I think also that Cassander's punishment 
 was deferred that Thebes might be repeopled. And of the 
 mercenaries that plundered this very temple most crossed 
 over into Sicily with Timoleon, and after they had con- 
 quered the Carthaginians and put down their authority, 
 perished miserably, miserable wretches that they were. For 
 no doubt the deity makes use of some wicked men, as exe- 
 cutioners, to punish others, and so I think he crushes as it 
 were most tyrants. For as the gall of the hyena and 
 rennet of the seal, both nasty beasts in all other respects, 
 are useful in certain diseases, so when some need sharp 
 correction, the deity casts upon them the implacable fury 
 of some tyrant, or the savage ferocity of some prince, and 
 does not remove the bane and trouble till their fault be got 
 rid of and purged. Such a potion was Phalaris to the 
 Agrigentines, and Marius to the Romans. And to the 
 people of Sicyon the god distinctly foretold that their city 
 needed a scourge, when they took away from the Cleonceans 
 (as if he was a Sicyonian) the lad Teletias, who was crowned 
 
340 Plutarch's morals, 
 
 in the Pythian games, and tore him to pieces. As for the 
 Sicyonians, Orthagoras became their tyrant, and subse- 
 quently Myro and Clisthenes, and these three checked their 
 wanton outbreaks ; but the Cleoneeans, not getting such a 
 cure, went to ruin. You have of course heard Homer's 
 lines, 
 
 " ' From a bad father sprang a son far better, 
 
 Excelling in all virtue ; ' ' 
 
 and yet that son of Copreus never performed any brilliant 
 or notable action : but the descendants of Sisyphus and 
 Autolycus and Phlegyas flourished in the glory and virtues 
 of great kings. Pericles also sprang of a family under a 
 curse,' and Pompey the Great at Rome was the son of 
 Pompeius Strabo, whose dead body the Roman people cast 
 out and trampled upon, so great was their hatred of him. 
 How is it strange then, since the farmer does not cut down 
 the thorn till he has taken his asparagus, nor do the 
 Libyans burn the twigs till they have gathered the 
 ledanum, that god does not exterminate the wicked and 
 rugged root of an illustrious and royal race till it has 
 produced its fit fruit ? For it would have been better for 
 the Phocians to have lost ten thousand of the oxen and 
 horses of Iphitus, and for more gold and silver to have 
 gone from Delphi, than that Odysseus and -^sculapius 
 should not have been born, nor those others who from 
 bad and wicked men became good and useful." 
 
 § VIII. " And do you not all think that it is better that 
 punishment should take place at the fitting time and in 
 the fitting manner rather than quickly and on the spur of 
 the moment ? Consider the case of Callippus, who with the 
 very dagger with which he slew Dion, pretending to be his 
 friend, was afterwards slain by his own friends. And when 
 Mitius the Argive was killed in a tumult, a brazen statue 
 in the market-place fell on his murderer and killed him 
 during the public games. And of course, Patrocleas, 
 you know all about Bessus the Pseonian, and about Aristo 
 the QLtddsm. leader of mercenaries." " Not I, by Zeus," 
 said Patrocleas, "but I should like to hear." "Aristo," I 
 
 ^ Homer, "Iliad," xv. 641, 642. ' See Thueydides, i. 127. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BT THE DEITY LATE. 341 
 
 continued, " at the permission of the tyrants removed the 
 necklace of Eriphyle ^ which was hung up in this temple, 
 and took it to his wife as a present ; but his son being 
 angry with his mother for some reason or other, set the 
 house on fire, and burnt all that were in it. As for 
 Bessus, it seems he had killed his father, though his 
 crime was long undiscovered. But at last going to sup 
 with some strangers, he knocked down a nest of swallows, 
 pricking it with his lance, and killed all the young swal- 
 lows. And when the company said, as it was likely they 
 would, ' Whatever makes you act in such a strange man- 
 ner ? ' ' Have they not,' he replied, ' been long bearing 
 false witness against me, crying out that I had killed my 
 father ? ' And the company, astonished at his answer, laid 
 the matter before the king, and the affair was inquired into, 
 and Bessus punished." 
 
 § IX. " These cases," I continued, " we cite supposing, as 
 has been laid down, that there is a deferring of punish- 
 ment to the wicked ; and, for the rest, I think we ought 
 to listen to Hesiod, who tells us — not like Plato, who 
 asserts that punishment is a condition that follows crime — 
 that it is contemporaneous with it, and grows with it from 
 the same source and root. For Hesiod says, 
 
 " Evil advice is worst to the adviser ; " ^ 
 and, 
 
 '• He who plots mischief 'gainst another brings 
 It first on his own pate." ^ 
 
 The cantharis is said to have in itself the antidote to its own 
 sting, but wickedness, creating its own pain and torment, 
 pars the penalty of its misdeeds not afterwards but at the 
 time of its ill-doing. And as every malefactor about to 
 pay the penalty of his crime in his person bears his cross, 
 so vice fabricates for itself each of its own torments, being 
 the terrible author of its own misery in life, wherein in 
 addition to shame it has frequent fears and fierce passions 
 and endless remorse and anxiety. But some are just 
 
 ' See Pausanias, v. 17 ; viii. 24 ; ix. 41 j x. 29. 
 
 ^ Hesiod, " Works and Days,'' 266. 
 
 ■'' Ibid. 265. Compare Pausanias, ii. 9; Ovid, A. A, i. 655, 656. 
 
342 PLUTARCH'S MORALS. 
 
 like children, who, seeing malefactors in the theatres in 
 golden tunics and purple robes with crowns on and dancing, 
 admire them and marvel at them, thinking them happy, 
 till they see them goaded and lashed and issuing fire from 
 their gaudy but cheap garments.^ For most wicked people, 
 though they have great households and conspicuous offices 
 and great power, are yet being secretly punished before 
 they are seen to be murdered or hurled down rocks, which 
 is rather the climax and end of their punishment than the 
 punishment itself. For as Plato tells us that Herodicus the 
 Selymbrian having fallen into consumption, an incurable 
 disease, was the first of mankind to mix exercise with the 
 art of healing, and so prolonged his own life and that of 
 others suffering from the same disease, so those wicked 
 persons who seem to avoid immediate punishment, receive 
 a longer and not slower punishment, not later but extend- 
 ing over a wider period ; for they are not punished in their 
 old age, but rather grow old in perpetual punishment. I 
 speak of course of long time as a human being, for to the 
 gods all the period of man's life is as nothing, and so to 
 them ' now and not thirty years ago ' means no more than 
 with us torturing or hanging a malefactor in the evening 
 instead of the morning would mean ; especially as man is 
 shut up in life as in a prison from which there is no egress 
 or escape, and though doubtless during his life he has 
 much feasting and business and gifts and favours and 
 amusement, yet, just like people playing at dice or draughts 
 in a prison, the rope is all the time hanging over his 
 head."=^ 
 
 § X. " And indeed what prevents our asserting that people 
 in prison under sentence of death are not punished till their 
 heads are cut off, or that the person who has taken hemlock, 
 and walks about till he feels it is getting into his legs, suffers 
 not at all till he is deprived of sensation by the freezing 
 and curdling of his blood, if we consider the last moment, 
 of punishment all the punishment, and ignore all the inter- 
 mediate sufferings and fears and anxiety and remorse, the 
 
 ^ " Significat martyres Christianos, in tunica molesta fumantes.'" — 
 Rdske. 
 
 ^ Like the sword of Damocles. See Horace, " Odes," iii. 1. 17-21. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 343 
 
 destiny of every guilty wretcli ? That would be arguing 
 that the fish that has swallowed the hook is not caught, 
 till we see it boiled by the cook or sliced at table. For 
 every wrong-doer is liable to punishment, and soon 
 swallows the pleasantness of his wrong-doing like a bait, 
 while his conscience still vexes and troubles him, 
 
 '• As through the sea the impetuous tunny darts," 
 
 For the recklessness and audacity of vice is strong and ram- 
 pant till the crime is committed, but afterwards, when the 
 passion subsides like a storm, it becomes timid and dejected 
 and a prey to fears and superstitions. So that Stesichorus 
 in his account of Clytfemnestra's dream may have repre- 
 sented the facts and real state of the case, where he says, 
 " A dragon seemed to appear to her with its lofty head 
 smeared all over with blood, and out of it seemed to come 
 king Orestes the grandson of Plisthenes." For visions in 
 dreams, and apparitions during the day, and oracles, and 
 lightning, and whatever is thought to come from the deity, 
 bring tempests of apprehension to the guilty. So they 
 say that one time Apollodorus in a dream saw himself 
 flayed by the Scythians, and then boiled, and that his 
 heart out of the caldron spoke to him in a low voice and 
 said, "I am the cause of this;" and at another time he 
 dreamed that he saw his daughters running round him in 
 a circle all on fire and in flames. And Hipparchus the son 
 of Pisistratus, a little before his death, dreamt that Aphro- 
 dite threw some blood on his face out of a certain phial. 
 And the friends of Ptolemy Ceraunus dreamed that he was 
 summoned for trial by Seleucus, and that the judges were 
 vultures and wolves, who tore his flesh and distributed it 
 wholesale among his enemies. And Pausanias at Byzan- 
 tium, having sent for Cleonice a free-born maiden, intend- 
 ing to outrage her and pass the night with her, being 
 seized with some alarm or suspicion killed her, and fre- 
 quently saw her in his dreams saying to him, " Come near 
 for judgement, lust is most assuredly a grievous bane to 
 men," and as this apparition did not cease, he sailed, it 
 seems, to Heraclea to the place where the souls of the dead 
 could be summoned, and by propitiations and sacrifices 
 called up the soul of the maiden, and she appeared to him 
 
344 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and told him that this trouble would end when he got to 
 LacedaBmon, and directly he got there he died."^ 
 
 § XI. " And so, if nothing happens to the soul after death, 
 but that event is the end of all enjoyment or punishment, 
 one would be rather inclined to say that the deity was 
 lax and indulgent in quickly punishing the wicked and 
 depriving them of life. For even if we were to say that 
 the wicked had no other trouble in a long life, yet, when 
 their wrong- doing was proved to bring them no profit or 
 enjoyment, no good or adequate return for their many and 
 great anxieties, the consciousness of that would be quite 
 enough to throw ^ their mind off its balance. So they record 
 of Lysimachus that he was so overcome by thirst that he 
 surrendered himself and his forces to the Getee for some 
 drink, but after he had drunk and bethought him that he 
 was now a captive, he said, " Alas ! How guilty am I for 
 so brief a gratification to lose so great a kingdom ! " And 
 yet it is very difficult to resist a necessity of nature. But 
 when a man, either for the love of money, or for political 
 place or power, or carried away by some amorous propen- 
 sity, does some lawless and dreadful deed, and, after his 
 eager desire is satisfied, sees in process of time that only 
 the base and terrible elements of his crime remain, while 
 nothing useful, or necessary, or advantageous has flowed 
 from it, is it not likely that the idea would often present 
 itself to him that, moved by vain-glory, or for some illiberal 
 and unlovely pleasure, he had violated the greatest and 
 noblest rights of mankind, and had filled his life with 
 shame and trouble ? For as Simonides used to say play- 
 fully that he always found his money-chest full but his 
 gratitude-chest empty,^ so the wicked contemplating their 
 own vice soon find out that their gratification is joyless 
 and hopeless,* and ever attended by fears and griefs and 
 gloomy memories, and suspicions about the future, and dis- 
 trust about the present. Thus we hear Ino, repenting for 
 what she had done, saying on the stage, 
 
 ^ See also Paiisanias, iii. 17. 
 ^ Surely dv uvarp'tTroi must be read. 
 ^ Compare " On Curiosity," § x. 
 
 * The reading is very doubtful. I adopt ifdovtJQ jxev tv9v<; Ksvt)v 
 Xopiv, iXTTtSog ipi]}xov ivpiaKovai. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 345 
 
 " Dear women, would that I could now inhabit 
 For the first time the house of Athamas, 
 Guiltless of any of my awful deeds ! " ' 
 
 It is likely that the soul of every wicked person will medi- 
 tate in this way, and consider how it can escape the memory 
 of its ill-deeds, and lay its conscience to sleep, and become 
 pure, and live another life over again from the beginning. 
 For there is no confidence, or reality, or continuance, or 
 security, in what wickedness proposes to itself, unless by 
 Zeus we shall say that evil-doers are wise, but wherever the 
 greedy love of wealth or pleasure or violent envy dwells 
 with hatred and malignity, there will you also see and find 
 stationed superstition, and remissness for labour, and 
 cowardice in respect to death, and sudden caprice in the 
 passions, and vain-glory and boasting. Those that censure 
 them frighten them, and they even fear those that praise 
 them as wronged by their deceit, and as most hostile to the 
 bad because they readily praise those they think good. 
 For as in the case of ill-tempered steel the hardness of vice 
 is rotten, and its strength easily shattered. So that in 
 course of time, understanding their real selves, they are 
 vexed and disgusted with their past life and abhor it. For 
 if a bad man who restores property entrusted to his care, 
 or becomes surety for a friend, or contributes very gene- 
 rously and liberally to his country out of love of glory or 
 honour, at once repents and is sorry for what he has done 
 from the fickleness and changeableness of his mind ; and if 
 men applauded in the theatres directly afterwards groan, 
 their love of glory subsiding into love of money ; shall we 
 suppose that those who sacrificed men to tyrannies and con- 
 spiracies as Apollodorus did, or that those who robbed 
 their friends of money as Grlaucus the son of Epicydes did,^ 
 never repented, or loathed themselves, or regretted their 
 past misdeeds r For my part, if it is lawful to say so, I do 
 not think evil-doers need any god or man to punish them, 
 for the marring and troubling of all their life by vice is in 
 itself adequate punishment." 
 
 § XII. " But consider now whether I have not spoken too 
 long." Then Timon said, " Perhaps you have, considering 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Ino." ^ gge Herodotus, vi. 86 ; Juvenal, xiii. 199-207. 
 
346 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 what remains and the time it will take. For now I am 
 going to start the last question, as if it were a combatant 
 in reserve, since the other two questions have been debated 
 sufficiently. For as to the charge and bold accusation that 
 Euripides brings against the gods, for visiting the sins of 
 the parents upon the children, consider that even those of 
 us who are silent agree with Euripides. For if the guilty 
 were punished themselves there would be no further need 
 to punish the innocent, for it is not fair to punish even the 
 guilty twice for the same offence, whereas if the gods 
 through easiness remit the punishment of the wicked, 
 and exact it later on from the innocent, they do not well 
 to compensate for their tardiness by injustice. Such con- 
 duct resembles the story told of ^sop's coming to this 
 very spot,^ with money from Croesus, to offer a splendid 
 sacrifice to the god, and to give four minse to each of the 
 Delphians. And some quarrel or difference belike ensuing 
 between him and the Delphians here, he offered the sacri- 
 fice, but sent the money back to Sardis, as though the 
 Delphians were not worthy to receive that benefit, so they 
 fabricated against him a charge of sacrilege, and put him 
 to death by throwing him headlong down yonder rock 
 called Hyampia. And in consequence the god is said to 
 have been wroth with them, and to have brought dearth on 
 their land, and all kinds of strange diseases, so that they 
 went round at the public festivals of the Greeks, and in- 
 vited by proclamation whoever wished to take satisfaction 
 of them for ^ sop's death. And three generations after- 
 wards came Idmon" a Samian, no relation of ^sop's, but 
 a descendant of those who had purchased ^sop as a slave 
 at Samos, and by giving him satisfaction the Delphians got 
 rid of their trouble. And it was in consequence of this, 
 they say, that the punishment of those guilty of sacrilef^e 
 was transferred from Hyampia to Nauplia.^ And e^en 
 great lovers of Alexander, as we are, do not praise his 
 destroying the city of the Branchidae and putting everybody 
 in it to death because their great-grandfathers betrayed the 
 
 ' The company are in the temple at Delphi, be it remembered. 
 
 ^ Called ladmon in Herodotus, ii. 134, where this story is also told. 
 
 2 Wyttenbach suggests Daulis. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 347 
 
 temple at Miletus.' And Agathocles, the tyrant of Syra- 
 cnse, laughing and jeering at the Corcyraeans for asking 
 him why he wasted their island, replied, " Because, by 
 Zeus, your forefathers welcomed Odysseus." And when 
 the people of Ithaca likewise complained of his soldiers 
 carrying off their sheep, he said, " Your king came to us, 
 and actually put out the shepherd's eye to boot."^ And is 
 it not stranger still in Apollo punishing the present inha- 
 bitants of Pheneus, by damming up the channel dug to 
 carry off their water,^ and so flooding the whole of their 
 district, because a thousand years ago, they say, Hercules 
 carried off to Pheneus the oracular tripod ? and in telling 
 the Sybarites that the only end of their troubles would be 
 propitiating by their ruin on three occasions the wrath of 
 Leucadian Hera ? And indeed it is no long time since the 
 Locrians have ceased sending maidens^ to Troy, 
 
 " Who without upper garments and barefooted, 
 Like slave-girls, in the early morning swept 
 Around Athene's altar all unveiled, 
 Till old age came upon them with its burdens," 
 
 all because Ajax violated Cassandra. Where is the reason 
 or justice in all this? N^or do we praise the Thracians 
 who to this day, in honour of Orpheus, mark their 
 wives;" nor the barbarians on the banks of the Eridanus 
 who, they say, wear mourning for Phaethon. And I think 
 it would be still more ridiculous if the people living at the 
 time Phaethon perished had neglected him, and those who 
 lived five or ten generations after his tragic death had 
 begun the practice of wearing mourning and grieving for 
 him. And yet this would be only folly, there would be 
 nothing dreadful or fatal about it, but what should make 
 the anger of the gods subside at once and then afterwards, 
 like some rivers, burst out against others till they com- 
 pletely ruin them ?" 
 
 ' To Xerxes. 
 
 - The allusion is to the well-known story of Odysseus and the Cyclops 
 Polyphemus, who is supposed to have dwelt in the island of Sicily, 
 where Agathocles was tyrant. 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, viii. 14. 
 
 * Two were to be sent for 1,000 continuous years.. So the Oracle. 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, ix. 30; Herodotus, v. 6. 
 
348 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 § XIII. Directly he left off, fearing that if he began again 
 he would introduce more and greater absurdities, I asked 
 him, " Well, do you believe all this to be true ? " And he 
 replied, " If not all, but only some, of it is true, do you not 
 think that the subject presents the same difficulty?" 
 "Perhaps," said I, "it is as with those in a raging fever, 
 whether they have few or many clothes on the bed they are 
 equally hot or nearly so, yet to ease them we shall do well 
 to remove some of the clothes ; but let us waive this point, 
 if you don't like the line of argument, though a good deal 
 of what you have said seems myth and fable, and let us 
 recall to our minds the recent festival in honour of Apollo 
 called Theoxenia,^ and the noble share in it which the 
 heralds expressly reserve for the descendants of Pindar, 
 and how grand and pleasant it seemed to you," " Who 
 could help being pleased," said he, " with such a delightful 
 honour, so Greek and breathing the simple spirit of an- 
 tiquity, had he not, to use Pindar's own phrase, ' a black 
 heart forged when the flame was cold ?' " "I pass over 
 then," said I, " the similar proclamation at Sparta, ' After 
 the Lesbian singer,' in honour and memory of old Terpan- 
 der, for it is a similar case. But you yourselves certainly 
 lay claim to be better than other Boeotians as descended 
 from Opheltes," and than other Phocians because of your 
 ancestor Daiphantus,^ and you were the first to give me 
 help and assistance in preserving for the Lycormje and 
 Satilaei their hereditary privilege of wearing crowns as 
 descendants of Hercules, when I contended that we ought 
 to confirm the honours and favours of the descendants of 
 Hercules more especially because, though he was such a 
 benefactor to the Greeks, he had had himself no adequate 
 favour or return." "You remind me," he said, "of a 
 noble effort, and one well worthy of a philosopher." 
 "Dismiss then," said I, "my dear fellow, your vehement 
 accusation against the gods, and do not be so vexed that 
 some of a bad or evil stock are punished by them, or else 
 do not joy in and approve of the honour paid to descent 
 
 ^ See Pausanias, vii. 27 ; Athenaeus, 372 A. 
 
 ^ A former king of Thebes. See Pausanias, ix. 5. 
 
 ^ Called Daiphantes, Pausanias, x. 1. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 349 
 
 from a good stock. For it is unreasonable, if we continue 
 to show favour to a virtuous stock, to think punishment 
 wrong in the case of a criminal stock, or that it should not 
 correspond with the adequate reward of merit. And he 
 that is glad to see the descendants of Cimon honoured at 
 Athens, but is displeased and indignant that the descen- 
 dants of Lachares or Aristo are in exile, is too soft and 
 easy, or rather too fault-finding and peevish with the gods, 
 accusing them if the descendants of a bad and wicked man 
 are fortunate, and accusing them also if the progeny of the 
 bad are wiped off the face of the earth ; thus finding fault 
 with the deity alike, whether the descendants of the good 
 or bad father are unfortunate." 
 
 § XIV. '' Let these remarks," I continued, " be your bul- 
 warks as it were against those excessively bitter and 
 railing accusations. And taking up again as it were the 
 initial clue to our subject, which as it is about the deity is 
 dark and full of mazes and labyrinths, let us warily and 
 calmly follow the track to what is probable and plausible, 
 for certainty and truth are things very difficult to find even 
 in every-day life. For example, why are the children of 
 those that have died of consumption or dropsy bidden to 
 sit with their feet in water till the dead body is burnt ? 
 For that is thought to prevent the disease transferring 
 itself to them. Again, when a she-goat takes a bit of 
 eringo into her mouth, why do the whole herd stand still, 
 till the goatherd comes up and takes it out of her mouth ? 
 There are other properties that have connection and com- 
 munication, and that transfer themselves from one thing 
 to another with incredible^ quickness and over immense 
 distances. But we marvel more at intervals of time than 
 place. And yet is it more wonderful that Athens should 
 have been smitten with a plague^ that started in Arabia, 
 and of which Pericles died and Thucydides fell sick, than 
 that, when the Delphians and Sybarites became wicked, 
 vengeance should have fallen on their descendants.^ For 
 properties have relations and connections between ends and 
 
 "^ Reading aTriaToig with Xylander. 
 
 2 The famous plague. See Thucydides, ii. 47-54. 
 
 ' The allusion is to the circumstances mentioned in S xii. 
 
350 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 beginnings, and although the reason of them may not be 
 known by us, they silently perform their errand." 
 
 § XV. " Moreover the public punishments of cities by the 
 gods admits of a just defence. For a city is one continuous 
 entity, a sort of creature that never changes from age, or be- 
 comes different by time, but is ever sympathetic with and 
 conformable to itself, and is answerable for whatever it does 
 or has done for the public weal, as long as the community 
 by its union and federal bonds preserves its unity. For he 
 that would make several, or rather any quantity of, cities 
 out of one by process of time would be like a person who 
 made one human being several, by regarding him now as 
 an old man, now as a young man, now as a stripling. Or 
 rather this kind of reasoning resembles the arguments of 
 Epicharmus, from whom the sophists borrowed the piled- 
 up method of reasoning,^ for example, he incurred the debt 
 long ago, so he does not owe it now, being a different 
 person, or, he was invited to dinner yesterday, but he comes 
 uninvited to-day, for he is another person. And yet age 
 produces greater changes in any individual than it does 
 commonly in cities. For any one would recognize Athens 
 again if he had not seen it for thirty years, for the present 
 habits and feelings of the people there, their business, 
 amusements, likes and dislikes, are just what they were 
 long ago ; whereas a man's friend or acquaintance meeting 
 him after some time would hardly recognize his appear- 
 ance, for the change of character easily introduced by 
 every thought and deed, feeling and custom, produce a 
 wonderful strangeness and novelty in the same person. 
 And yet a man is reckoned to be the same person from 
 birth to death, and similarly we think it right for a city 
 always remaining the same to be liable to reproach for the 
 ill deeds of its former inhabitants, on the same principle as 
 it enjoys its ancient glory and power ; or shall we, without 
 being aware of it, throw everything into Heraclitus' river, 
 into which he says a person cannot step twice,^ since nature 
 is ever changing and altering everything ? " 
 
 ^ " Videtur idem cum sorita esse." — Reiske. 
 
 ^ Compare our author, "De EI apud Delphos," § xviii. See also 
 Seneca, " Epist.," Iviii. p. 483 ; and Plato. " Cratylus," 402 A. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 351 
 
 § XVI. " If then a city is one continuous entity, so of course 
 is a race that starts from one beginning, that can trace 
 back intimate union and similarity of faculties, for that 
 which is begot is not, like some production of art, unlike 
 the begetter, for it proceeds from him, and is not merely 
 produced by him, so that it appropriately receives his share, 
 whether that be honour or punishment. And if I should 
 not seem to be trifling, I should say that the bronze statue 
 of Cassander melted down by the Athenians, and the body 
 of Dionysius thrown out of their territory by the Syra- 
 cusans after his death, were treated more unjustly than 
 punishing their posterity would have been. For there was 
 none of the nature of Cassander in the statue, and the soul 
 of Dionysius had left his dead body before this outrage, 
 whereas Nyseeus and Apollocrates,^ Antipater and Philip, "^ 
 and similarly other sons of wicked parents had innate in 
 them a good deal of their fathers, and that no listless or 
 inactive element, but one by which they lived and were 
 nourished, and by which their ideas were controlled. Nor 
 is it at all strange or absurd that some should have their 
 fathers' characteristics. And to speak generally, as in 
 surgery whatever is useful is also just, and that person 
 would be ridiculous who should say it was unjust to 
 cauterize the thumb when the hip-joints were in pain, 
 and to lance the stomach when the liver was inflamed, or 
 when oxen were tender in their hoofs to anoint the tips of 
 their horns, so he that looks for any other justice in punish- 
 ment than curing vice, and is dissatisfied if surgery is em- 
 ployed to one part to benefit another, as surgeons open a 
 vein to relieve ophthalmia, can see nothing beyond the evi- 
 dence of the senses, and does not remember that even a 
 schoolmaster by correcting one lad admonishes others, and 
 that by decimation a general makes his whole army obey. 
 And so not only by one part to another comes benefit, but 
 also to the soul through the soul, even more often than to the 
 body through the body, come certain dispositions, and vices 
 or improvement of character. For just as it is likely in the 
 case of the body that the same feelings and changes will take 
 place, so the soul, being worked upon by fancies, naturally 
 
 ^ Sons of Dionysius. ^ Sons of Cassander. 
 
352 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 becomes better or worse according as it has more confidence 
 or fear." 
 
 § xviL While I was thus speaking, Olympicus interposed, 
 and said, " You seem in your argument to assume the im- 
 portant assumption of the permanence of the soul." I 
 replied, " You too concede it, or rather did concede it. For 
 that the deity deals with everyone according to his merit 
 has been the assumption of our argument from the begin- 
 ning." Then said he, " Do you think that it follows, 
 because the gods notice our actions and deal with us 
 accordingly, that souls are either altogether imperishable, 
 or for some time survive dissolution ? " Then said I, 
 " Not exactly so, my good sir, but is the deity so little 
 and so attached to trifles, if we have nothing divine in our- 
 selves, nothing resembling him, nothing lasting or sure, 
 but that we all do fade as a leaf, as Homer ^ says, and die 
 after a brief life, as to take the trouble — like women that 
 tend and cultivate their gardens of Adonis ' in pots — to 
 create souls to flourish in a delicate body having no stability 
 only for a day, and then to be annihilated at once ^ by any 
 occasion ? And if you please, leaving the other gods out 
 of the question, consider the case of our god here.* Does 
 it seem likely to you that, if he knew that the souls of the 
 dead perish immediately, and glide out of their bodies like 
 mist or smoke, he would enjoin many propitiatory offer- 
 ings for the departed and honours for the dead, merely 
 cheating and beguiling those that believed in him ? For 
 my own part, I shall never abandon my belief in the per- 
 manence of the soul, unless some second Hercules " shall 
 come and take away the tripod of the Pythian Priestess, 
 and abolish and destroy the oracle. For as long as many 
 such oracles are still given, as was said to be given to 
 Corax of Naxos formerly, it is impious to declare that the 
 soul dies." Then said Patrocleas, "What oracle do you 
 refer too ? Who was this Corax ? To me both the occur- 
 rence and name are quite strange." " That cannot be," said 
 
 1 "Iliad" vi. 146-149. 
 
 2 Compare Plato, " Phsedrus," 276 B. These gardens of Adonis were 
 what we might call flowerpot gardens. See Erasmus, " Adagia." 
 
 2 evOvQ seems the best reading, del is flat. 
 * Apollo. ° See § xii. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITT LATE, 363 
 
 I, " but I am to blame for using the surname instead of the 
 name. For he that killed Archilochus in battle was called 
 Calondes, it seems, but his surname was Corax. He was 
 first rejected by the Pythian Priestess, as having slain a 
 man sacred to the Muses, but after using many entreaties 
 and prayers, and urging pleas in defence of his act, he was 
 ordered to go to the dwelling of Tettix, and appease the 
 soul of Archilochus. Now this place was Tasnarum, for 
 there they say Tettix the Cretan had gone with a fleet and 
 founded a city, and dwelt near the place where departed 
 souls were conjured up. Similarly also, when the Spartans 
 were bidden by the oracle to appease the soul of Pausanias, 
 the necromancers were summoned from Italy, and, after 
 they had offered sacrifice, they got the ghost out of the 
 temple." 
 
 § XYiii. "It is one and the same argument," I continued, 
 " that confirms the providence of the deity and the perma- 
 nence of the soul of man, so that you cannot leave one if 
 you take away the other. And if the soul survives after 
 death, it makes the probability stronger that rewards or 
 punishments will be assigned to it. For during life the soul 
 struggles, like an athlete, and when the struggle is over, 
 then it gets its deserts. But what rewards or punishments 
 the soul gets when by itself in the unseen world for the deeds 
 done in the body has nothing to do with us that are alive, 
 and is perhaps not credited by us, and certainly unknown 
 to us; whereas those punishments that come on descen- 
 dants and on the race are evident to all that are alive, and 
 deter and keep back many from wickedness. For there is no 
 more disgraceful or bitter punishment than to see our chil- 
 dren in misfortune through our faults, and if the soul of 
 an impious or lawless man could see after death, not his 
 statues or honours taken from him, but his children or 
 friends or race in great adversity owing to him, and pay- 
 ing the penalty for his misdeeds, no one would ever persuade 
 him, could he come to life again, to be unjust and licen- 
 tious, even for the honours of Zeus. I could tell you a story 
 on this head, which I recently heard, but I hesitate to do 
 so, lest you should regard it only as a myth; I confine my- 
 self therefore to probability." " Pray don't," said Olym- 
 picus, "let us have your story." And as the others made 
 
 A A 
 
354 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 the same request, I said, " Permit me first to finish my 
 discourse according to probability, and then, if you like, I 
 will set my myth a going, if it is a myth. 
 
 § XIX. Bion says the deity in punishing the children of 
 the wicked for their fathers' crimes is more ridiculous than 
 a doctor administering a potion to a son or grandson for a 
 father's or grandfather's disease. But the cases, though in 
 some respects similar and like, are in others dissimilar. 
 For to cure one person of a disease does not cure another, 
 nor is one any better, when suffering from ophthalmia or 
 fever, by seeing another anointed or poulticed. But the 
 punishments of evil-doors are exhibited to everybody for 
 this reason, that it is the function of justice, when it is 
 carried out as reason dictates, to check some by the punish- 
 ment of others. So that Bion did not see in what respect 
 his comparison touched our subject. For sometimes, when a 
 man falls into a grievous but not incurable malady, which, 
 afterwards by intemperance and negligence ruins his consti- 
 tution and kills him, is not his son, who is not supposed to be 
 suffering from the same malady but only to have a predis- 
 position for it, enjoined to a careful manner of living by his 
 medical man, or friend, or intelligent trainer in gymnastics, 
 or honest guardian, and recommended to abstain from fish 
 and pastry, wine and women, and to take medicine fre- 
 quently, and to go in for training in the gymnasiums, and so 
 to dissipate and get rid of the small seeds of what might 
 be a serious malady, if he allowed it to come to a head ? Do 
 we not indeed give advice of this kind to the children of 
 diseased fathers or mothers, bidding them take care and be 
 cautious and not to neglect themselves, but at once to arrest 
 the first germ of the malady, nipping it in the bud while 
 removable, and before it has got a firm footing in the con- 
 stitution ? " " Certainly we do," said all the company. 
 " We are not then," I continued, "acting in a strange or 
 ridiculous but in a necessary and useful way, in arranging 
 their exercise and food and physic for the sons of epileptic or 
 atrabilious or gouty people, not when they are ill, but to pre- 
 vent their becoming so. For the offspring of a poor consti- 
 tution does not require punishment, but it does require 
 medical treatment and care, and if any one stigmatizes this, 
 because it curtails pleasure and involves some self-denial 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 355 
 
 and pain, as a punishment inflicted bj cowardice and 
 timidity, we care not for his opinion. Can it be right to tend 
 and care for the body that has an hereditary predisposition 
 to some malady, and are we to neglect the growth and 
 spread in the young character of hereditary taint of vice, 
 and to dally with it, and wait till it be plainly mixed up 
 with the feelings, and, to use the language of Pindar, 
 " produce malignant fruit in the heart ? " 
 
 § XX. Or is the deity in this respect no wiser than 
 Hesiod, who exhorts and advises, " not to beget children 
 on our return from a sad funeral, but after a banquet with 
 the gods," ^ as though not vice or virtue only, but sorrow 
 or joy and all other propensities, came from generation, to 
 which the poet bids us come gay and agreeable and sprightly. 
 But it is not Hesiod's function, or the work of human 
 wisdom, but it belongs to the deity, to discern and accurately 
 distinguish similarities and differences of character, before 
 they become obvious by resulting in crime through the 
 influence of the passions. For the young of bears and 
 wolves and apes manifest from their birth the nature 
 innate in them in all its naked simplicity ; whereas man- 
 kind, under the influence of customs and opinions and laws, 
 frequently conceal their bad qualities and imitate what is 
 good, so as altogether to obliterate and escape from the 
 innate taint of vice, or to be undetected for a long time, 
 throwing the veil of craft round their real nature, so that 
 we are scarce conscious of their villainy till we feel the 
 blow or smart of some unjust action, so that we are in fact 
 only aware that there is such a thing as injustice when men 
 act unjustly, or as vice when men act viciously, or as 
 cowardice when men run away, just as if one were to sup- 
 pose that scorpions had a sting only when they stung us, 
 or that vipers were venomous only when they bit us, which 
 would be a very silly idea. For every bad man is not bad 
 only when he breaks out into crime, but he has the seeds of 
 vice in his nature, and is only vicious in act when he has 
 opportunity and means, as opportunity makes the thief 
 steal,'^ and the tyrant violate the laws. But the deity is 
 
 ' Hesiod, " Works and Days," 735, 736. 
 
 ^ Compare the French Proverb, " L'occasion fait le larron." And 
 Juvenal's '• Nemo repente fuit turpissimus." 
 
356 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 not ignorant of the nature and disposition of every man, 
 inasmuch as by his very nature he can read the soul better 
 than the body, and does not wait to punish violence in the 
 act, or shamelessness in the tongue, or lasciviousness in the 
 members. For he does not retaliate upon the wrong-doer 
 as having been ill-treated by him, nor is he angry with the 
 robber as having been plundered by him, nor does he hate 
 the adulterer as having himself suffered from his licentious- 
 ness, but it is to cure him that he often punishes the adul- 
 terous or avaricious or unjust man in embryo, before he has 
 had time to work out all his villainy, as we try to stop 
 epileptic fits before they come on. 
 
 § XXI. Just now we were dissatisfied that the wicked 
 were punished late and tardily, whereas at present we 
 find fault with the deity for correcting the character and 
 disposition of some before they commit crime, from our 
 ignoring that the future deed may be worse and more 
 dreadful than the past, and the hidden intention than the 
 overt act ; for we are not able fully to understand the 
 reasons why it is better to leave some alone in their ill deeds, 
 and to arrest others in the intention ; just as no doubt 
 medicine is not appropriate in the case of some patients, 
 which would be beneficial to others not ill, but yet perhaps 
 in a more dangerous condition still. And so the gods do 
 not visit all the offences of parents on their children, but i£ 
 a good man is the son of a bad one, as the son of a sickly 
 parent is sometimes of a good constitution, he is exempt 
 from the punishment of his race, as not being a partici- 
 pator in its viciousness. But if a young man imitates his 
 vicious race it is only right that he should inherit the 
 punishment of their ill deeds, as he would their debts. For 
 Antigonus was not punished for Demetrius, nor, of the old 
 heroes,^ Phyleus for Augeas, or Nestor for Neleus, for 
 though their sires were bad they were good, but those 
 whose nature liked and approved the vices of their ances- 
 tors, these justice punished, taking vengeance on their simi- 
 larity in viciousness. For as the warts and moles and 
 freckles of parents often skip a generation, and reappear in 
 the grandsons and granddaughters, and as a Greek woman,, 
 
 ^ So Reiske very ingeniously. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 357 
 
 that had a black baby and so was accused of adultery, 
 found out that she was the great granddaughter of an 
 Ethiopian/ and as the son of Pytho the Nisibian who 
 recently died, and who was said to trace his descent to the 
 Sparti,^ had the birthmark on his body of the print of a 
 spear the token of his race, which though long dormant 
 had come up again as out of the deep, so frequently earlier 
 generations conceal and suppress the mental idiosyncrasies 
 and passions of their race, which afterwards nature causes 
 to break out in other members of the family, and so dis- 
 plays the family bent either to vice or virtue." 
 
 § XXII. When I had said thus much I was silent, but 
 Olympicus smiled and said, " We do not praise you, lest 
 we should seem to forget your promised story, as though 
 what you had advanced was adequate proof enough, but 
 we will give our opinion when we have heard it." Then I 
 began as follows. *' Thespesius of Soli, an intimate friend 
 of that Protogenes "^ who lived in this city with us for some 
 time, had been very profligate during the early part of 
 his life, and had quickly run through his property, and for 
 some time owing to his straits had given himself up to bad 
 practices, when repenting of his old ways, and following the 
 pursuit of riches, he resembled those profligate husbands 
 that pay no attention to their wives while they live with 
 them, but get rid of them, and then, after they have married 
 other men, do all they can wickedly to seduce them. Ab- 
 staining then from nothing dishonourable that could bring 
 either enjoyment or gain, in no long time he got together 
 no great amount of property, but a very great reputation 
 for villainy. But what most damaged his character was 
 the answer he received from the oracle of Amphilochus.* 
 For he sent it seems a messenger to consult the god whether 
 he would live the rest of his life better, and the answer was 
 he would do better after his death. And indeed this hap- 
 pened in a sense not long after. For he fell headlong down 
 from a great height, and though he had received no wound 
 
 ' A rather far-fetched pedigree. 
 
 ^ See Fausanias, viii, II; ix. 5, 10. See also Ovid, "Metamor- 
 phoses," Book iii. 100-130. 
 ^ Compare " On Love," § ii. 
 * At Malhis, in Cilicia. See Fausanias, i. 34. 
 
358 plutaech's morals. 
 
 nor even a blow, the fall did for him, bnt three days after 
 (just as he was about to be buried) he recovered. He soon 
 picked up his strength again, and went home, and so 
 changed his manner of life that jDeople would hardly credit 
 it. For the Cilicians say that they know nobody who was 
 in those days more fairdealing in business, or more devout 
 to the deity, or more disagreeable to his enemies, or more 
 faithful to his friends ; insomuch that all who had any 
 dealings with him desired to hear the reason of this change, 
 not thinking that so great a reformation of character could 
 have proceeded from chance, and their idea was correct, as 
 his narrative to Protogenes and others of his great friends 
 showed. For he told them that, when his soul left the 
 body, the change he first underwent was as if he were a 
 pilot thrown violently into the sea out of a ship. Then 
 raising himself up a little, he thought he recovered the 
 power of breathing again altogether, and looked round him 
 in every direction, as if one eye of the soul was open. But 
 he saw none of the things he had ever seen before, but stars 
 enormous in size and at immense distance from one another, 
 sending forth a wonderful and intense brightness of colour, 
 so that the soul was borne along and moved about every- 
 where quickly and easily, like a ship in fair weather. But 
 omitting most of the sights he saw, he said that the souls of 
 the dead mounted into the air, which yielded to them and 
 formed fiery bubbles, and then, when each bubble quietly 
 broke, they assumed human forms, light in weight but with 
 different kinds of motion, for some leapt about with wonder- 
 ful agility and darted straight upwards, while others like 
 spindles flitted round all together in a circle, some in an 
 upward direction, some in a downward, with mixed and 
 confused motion, hardly stopping at all, or only after a 
 very long time. As to most of these he was ignorant who 
 they were, but he saw two or three that he knew, and tried to 
 approach them and talk with them, but they would not 
 listen to him, and did not seem to be in their right minds, 
 but out of their senses and distraught, avoiding every sight 
 and touch, and at first turned round and round alone, but 
 afterwards meeting many other souls whirling round ard 
 in the same condition as themselves, they moved about pro- 
 miscuously with no particular object in view, and uttered 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 359 
 
 inarticulate sounds, like jells, mixed with wailing and 
 terror. Other souls in the upper part of the air seemed 
 joyful, and frequently approached one another in a friendly 
 way, and avoided those troubled souls, and seemed to mark 
 their displeasure by keeping themselves to themselves, and 
 their joy and delight by extension and expansion. At last 
 he said he saw the soul of a relation, that he thought he 
 knew but was not quite sure, as he died when he was a 
 boy, which came up to him and said to him, " Welcome, 
 Thespesius." And he wondering, and saying that his name 
 was not Thespesius but Aridaeus, the soul replied, "That 
 was your old name, but henceforth it will be Thespesius. 
 For assuredly you are not dead, but by the will of the gods 
 are come here with your intellect, for the rest of your soul 
 you have left in the body like an anchor ; and as a proof of 
 what I say both now and hereafter notice that the souls of 
 the dead have no shadow and do not move their eyelids." 
 Thespesius, on hearing these words, pulled himself some- 
 what more together again, and began to use his reason, 
 and looking more closely he noticed that an indistinct and 
 shadow-like line was suspended over him, while the others 
 shone all round and were transparent, but were not all 
 alike ; for some were like the full-moon at its brightest, 
 throwing out one smooth even and continuous colour, 
 others had spots or light marks here and there, while 
 others were quite variegated and strange to the sight, with 
 black spots like snakes, while others again had dim scratches. 
 Then the kinsman of Thespesius (for there is nothing to 
 prevent our calling the souls by the name of the persons), 
 pointed out everything, and told him that Adrastea, the 
 daughter of Necessity and Zeus, was placed in the highest 
 position to punish all crimes, and no criminal was either 
 so great or so small as to be able to escape her either by 
 fraud or violence. But, as there were three kinds of 
 punishment, each had its own oflftcer and administering 
 functionary. " For speedy Vengeance undertakes the punish- 
 ment of those that are to be corrected at once in the body 
 and through their bodies, and she mildly passes by many 
 offences that only need expiation ; but if the cure of vice 
 demands further pains, then the deity hands over such 
 criminals after death to Justice, and those whom Justice 
 
360 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 rejects as altogether incurable, Erinnys (the third and 
 fiercest of Adrastea's officers), pursues as they are fleeing 
 and wandering about in various directions, and with pitiless 
 severity utterly undoes them all, and thrusts them down 
 to a place not to be seen or spoken about. And, of all 
 these punishments, that which is administered in this life 
 by Vengeance is most like those in use among the barbarians. 
 For as among the Persians they pluck off and scourge the 
 garments and tiaras of those that are to be punished, while 
 the offenders weep and beg them to cease, so most punish- 
 ments by fine or bodily chastisement have no sharp touch, 
 nor do they reach vice itself, but are only for show and 
 sentiment. And whoever goes from this world to that 
 incorrigible and impure, Justice takes him aside, naked as 
 lie is in soul, and unable to veil or hide or conceal his 
 villainy, but descried all round and in all points by every- 
 body, and shows him first to his good parents, if such they 
 were, to let them see what a wretch he is and how unworthy 
 of his ancestors ; but if they were wicked too, seeing them 
 punished and himself being seen by them, he is chastised 
 for a long time till he is purged of each of his bad propen- 
 sities by sufferings and pains, which as much exceed in 
 magnitude and intensity all sufferings in the flesh, as what 
 is real is more vivid than a dream. But the scars and marks 
 of the stripes for each bad propensity are more visible in 
 some than in others. Observe also, he continued, the dif- 
 ferent and various colours of the souls. That dark dirty- 
 brown colour is the pigment of illiberality and covetous- 
 ness, and the blood-red the sign of cruelty and savageness, 
 and where the blue is there sensuality and love of pleasure 
 are not easily eradicated, and that violet and livid colour 
 marks malice and envy, like the dark liquid ejected by the 
 cuttle fish. For as during life vice produces these colours 
 by the soul being acted upon by passions and reacting upon 
 the body, so here it is the end of purification and correc- 
 tion when they are toned down, and the soul becomes alto- 
 gether bright and one colour. But as long as these colours 
 remain, there are relapses of the passions accompanied by 
 palpitation and throbbing of the heart, in some faint and 
 soon suppressed, in others more violent and lasting. And 
 some of these souls by being again and again corrected 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LA.TE. 361 
 
 recover their proper disposition and condition, while others 
 again by their violent ignorance and excessive love of plea- 
 sure ^ are carried into the bodies of animals ; for one by 
 weakness of reasoning power, and slowness of contempla- 
 tion, is impelled by the practical element in him to gene- 
 ration, while another, lacking an instrument to satisfy his 
 licentiousness, desires to gratify his passions immediately, 
 and to get that gratification through the medium of the 
 body ; for here there is no real fruition, but only an imper- 
 fect shadow and dream of incomplete pleasure." 
 
 After he had said this, Thespesius' kinsman hurried him 
 at great speed through immense space, as it seemed to him, 
 though he travelled as easily and straight as if he were 
 carried on the wings of the sun's rays. At last he got to 
 an extensive and bottomless abyss, where his strength left 
 him, as he found was the case with the other souls there : 
 for keeping together and making swoops, like birds, they 
 flitted all round the abyss, but did not venture to pass over 
 it. To internal view it resembled the caverns of Bacchus, 
 being beautiful throughout ^ with trees and green foliage 
 and flowers of all kinds, and it breathed a soft and gentle air, 
 laden with scents marvellously pleasant, and producing the 
 effect that wine does on those who are topers ; for the souls 
 were elevated by its fragrance, and gay and blithe with 
 one another: and the whole spot was full of mirth and 
 laughter, and such songs as emanate from gaiety and 
 enjoyment. And Thespesius' kinsman told him that this 
 was the way Dionysus went up to heaven by, and by which, 
 he afterwards took up Semele, and it was called the place of 
 Oblivion. But he would not let Thespesius stay there, 
 much as he wished, but forcibly dragged him away, 
 instructing and telling him that the intellect was melted and 
 moistened by pleasure, and that the irrational and corporeal 
 element being watered and made flesh stirs up the memory 
 of the body, from which comes a yearning and strong de- 
 sire for generation, so called from being an inclination to 
 the earth,^ when the soul is weighed down with moisture. 
 
 ^ Reading <})i\T]doviag tVxiit,' with Reiske. 
 ' Reading SiaTrsTroiKiXfispov op with Wyttenbach. 
 ^ A paronomasia on yivtatg as if tirl yriv vtvaig. We cannot Eng- 
 lish it. 
 
362 plutakch's morals. 
 
 Next Thespesius travelled as far in another direction, 
 and seemed to see a great crater into which several rivers 
 emptied themselves, one whiter than the foam of the sea 
 or snow, another like the purple of the rainbow, and others 
 of various hues whose brightness was apparent at some 
 distance, but when he got nearer the air became thinner 
 and the colours grew dim, and the crater lost all its gay 
 colours but white. And he saw three genii sitting together 
 in a triangular position, mixing the rivers together in certain 
 proportions. Then the guide of Thespesius' soul told him, 
 that Orpheus got as far as here, when he came in quest of 
 the soul of his wife,^ and from not exactly remembering what 
 he had seen spread a false report among mankind, that the 
 oracle at Delphi was common to Apollo and Night, though 
 Apollo had no communion with Night : but this, pursued the 
 guide, is an oracle common to Night and the Moon, that 
 utters forth its oracular knowledge in no particular part of 
 the world, nor has it any particular seat, but wanders about 
 everywhere in men's dreams and visions. Hence, as you see, 
 dreams receive and disseminate a mixture^ of simple truth 
 with deceit and error. But the oracle of Apollo you do not 
 know, nor can you see it, for the earthiness of the soul does 
 not suffer it to soar upwards, but keeps it down in depen- 
 dence on the body. And taking him nearer his guide tried to 
 show him the light from the tripod, which, as he said, shone 
 as far as Parnassus through the bosom of Themis, but 
 though he desired to see it he could not for its brightness, 
 but as he passed by he heard the shrill voice of a woman 
 speaking in verse several things, among others, he thought, 
 telling the time of his death. That, said the genius, was 
 the voice of the Sibyl, who sang about the future as she was 
 being borne about in the Orb of the moon. Though desirous 
 then to hear more, he was conveyed into another direction 
 by the violent motion of the moon, as if he had been in the 
 eddies of a whirlpool, so that he heard very little more, 
 only a prophecy about Mt. Vesuvius and that Dicaearchia* 
 would be destroyed by fire, and a short piece about the 
 
 ^ Eurydice. 
 
 ^ " fiiyvvntvov, Turn, et Bong.," Reiske. Surely the right reading. 
 
 ^ Latin Puteoli. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BY THE DEITY LATE. 363 
 
 Emperor then reigning,^ that "though he was good he 
 would lose his empire through sickness." 
 
 After this Thespesius and his guide turned to see those 
 that were undergoing punishment. And at first they saw 
 only distressing and pitiable sights, but after that, Thespe- 
 sius, little expecting it, found himself among his friends 
 and acquaintances and kinsfolk who were being punished, 
 and undergoing dreadful sufferings and hideous and bitter 
 tortures, and who wept and wailed to him. And at last 
 he descried his father coming up out of a certain gulf 
 covered with marks and scars, stretching out his hands, 
 and not allowed to keep silence, but compelled by those 
 that presided over his torture to confess that he had been 
 an accursed wretch and poisoned some strangers that had 
 gold, and during his lifetime had escaped the detection of 
 everybody ; but had been found out here, and his guilt 
 brought home to him, for which he had already suffered 
 much, and was being dragged on to suffer more. So 
 great was his consternation and fear that he did not dare 
 to intercede or beg for his father's release, but wishing to 
 turn and flee he could no longer see his gentle and kind 
 guide, but he was thrust forward by some persons horrible 
 to look at, as if some dire necessity compelled him to go 
 through with the business, and saw that the shades of 
 those that had been notorious criminals and punished in 
 their life-time were not so severely tortured here or like 
 the others, but had an incomplete" though toilsome punish- 
 ment for their irrational passions.'^ Whereas those who 
 under the mask and show of virtue had lived all their lives 
 in undetected vice were forced by their torturers with 
 labour and pain to turn their souls inside out, unnaturally 
 wriggling and writhing about, like the sea-scolopendras 
 who, when they have swallowed the hook, turn themselves 
 inside out; but some of them their torturers flayed and 
 crimped so as to show their various inward vices which 
 were only skinned over, which were deep in their soul the 
 
 ^ Vespasian. See Suetonius, " Vespasian,'' ch. 24, as to the particu- 
 lars of his death. 
 
 - The reading is very doubtful. I have followed Wyttenbach in 
 reading TpijSofisvrjv Tpifiyv arfXi}. 
 
 ' Such as that of the Danaides. So Wyttenbach. 
 
364 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 principal part of man. And he said he saw other souls, 
 like snakes two or three or even more twined together, 
 devouring one another in malignity and malevolence for 
 what they had suffered or done in life. He said also that 
 there were several lakes running parallel, one of boiling 
 gold, another most cold of lead, another hard of iron, and 
 several demons were standing by, like smiths, who lowered 
 down and drew up by turns with instruments the souls of 
 those whose criminality lay in insatiable cupidity. For 
 when they were red-hot and transparent through their 
 bath in the lake of gold, the demons thrust them into the 
 lake of lead and dipped them in that ; and when they got 
 congealed in it and hard as hail, they dipped them into the 
 lake of iron, and there they became wonderfully black, and 
 broken and crushed by the hardness of the iron, and 
 changed their appearance, and after that they were dipped 
 again in the lake of gold, after suffering, he said, dreadful 
 agony in all these changes of torment. But he said those 
 souls suffered most piteously of all that, when they seemed 
 to have escaped justice, were arrested again, and these were 
 those whose crimes had been visited on their children or 
 descendants. For whenever one of these latter happened 
 to come up, he fell into a rage and cried out, and showed 
 the marks of what he had suffered, and upbraided and pur- 
 sued the soul of the parent, that wished to fly and hide 
 himself but could not. For quickly did the ministers of 
 torture pursue them, and hurry them back again to Jus- 
 tice,^ wailing all the while on account of their fore-know- 
 ledge of what their punishment would be. And to some of 
 them he said many of their posterity clung at once, and 
 just like bees or bats stuck to them, and squeaked and gib- 
 bered '^ in their rage at the memory of what they had suf- 
 fered owing to them. Last of all he saw the souls of those 
 that were to come into the world a second time, forcibly 
 moulded and transformed into various kinds of animals by 
 artificers appointed for the very purpose with instruments 
 and blows, who broke off all the limbs of some, and only 
 wrenched off some of others, and polished others down or 
 
 ^ Adopting the arrangement of Wyttenbach. 
 ' Compare Homer, " Odyssey," xxiv. 5-10. 
 
ON THOSE WHO ARE PUNISHED BT THE DEITY LATE. 365 
 
 annihilated them, altogether, to fit them for other habits 
 and modes of life. Among them he saw the sonl of Nero 
 tortured in other ways, and pierced with red-hot nails. 
 And the artificers having taken it in hand and converted 
 it into the semblance of a Pindaric viper, which gets its 
 way to life by gnawing through its mother's womb, a great 
 light, he said, suddenly shone, and a voice came out of the 
 light, ordering them to change it into something milder, 
 so they devised of it the animal that croaks about lakes 
 and marshes, for he had been punished sufficiently for his 
 crimes, and now deserved some favour at the hands of the 
 gods, for he had freed Greece, the noblest nation of his sub- 
 jects and the best-beloved of the gods.^ So much did 
 Thespesius behold, but as he intended to return a horrible 
 dread came upon him. For a woman, marvellous in 
 appearance and size, took hold of him and said to him, 
 " Come here that you may the better remember everything 
 you have seen." And she was about to strike him with a 
 red-hot iron pin, such as the encaustic painters use,^ when 
 another woman prevented her ; and he was suddenly sucked 
 up, as through. ^ a pipe, by a strong and violent wind, and 
 lit upon his own body, and woke up and found that he was 
 close to his tomb. 
 
 AGAINST BORROWING MONEY. 
 
 § I. Plato in his Laws * does not permit neighbours to 
 use one another's water, unless they have first dug for 
 themselves as far as the clay, and reached ground that is 
 unsuitable for a well. For clay, having a rich and com- 
 pact nature, absorbs the water it receives, and does not let 
 it pass through. But he allows people that cannot make 
 a well of their own to use their neighbour's water, for the 
 law ought to relieve necessity. Ought there not also to 
 
 ' See Pausanius, vii. 17, for a sneaking kindness for Nero. 
 
 * See Athenseus, 687 B. ^ Reading did with lieiske. 
 
 * Page 844, A. B. C. 
 
366 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 be a law about monej, that people should not borrow of 
 others, nor go to other people's sources of income, until they 
 have first examined their own resources at home, and col- 
 lected, as by drops, what is necessary for their use ? But 
 nowadays from luxury and effeminacy and lavish expendi- 
 ture people do not use their own resources, though they 
 have them, but borrow from others at great interest with- 
 out necessity. And what proves this very clearly is the 
 fact that people do not lend money to the needy, but only 
 to those who, wanting an immediate supply, bring a wit- 
 ness and adequate security for their credit, so that they can 
 be in no actual necessity of borrowing.^ 
 
 § II. Why pay court to the banker or trader ? Borrow 
 from your own table. You have cups, silver dishes, pots 
 and pans. Use them in your need. Beautiful Aulis or 
 Tenedos will furnish you with earthenware instead, purer 
 than silver, for they will not smell strongly and unpleasantly 
 of interest, a kind of rust that daily soils your sumptuous- 
 ness, nor will they remind you of the calends and the new 
 moon, which, though the most holy of days, the money- 
 lenders make ill-omened and hateful. For those who 
 instead of selling them put their goods out at pawn cannot 
 be saved even by Zeus the Protector of Property : they are 
 ashamed to sell, they are not ashamed to pay interest on 
 their goods when out at pawn. And yet the famous Peri- 
 cles made the ornament of Athene, which weighed forty 
 talents of fine gold, removable at will, for "so," he said, "we 
 can use the gold in war, and at some other time restore as 
 costly a one." So should we too in our necessities, as in a 
 siege, not receive a garrison imposed on us by a hostile 
 money-lender, nor allow our goods to go into slavery ; but 
 stripping our table, our bed, our carriages, and our diet, of 
 superfluities, we should keep ourselves free, intending to 
 restore all those things again, if we have good luck. 
 
 § III. So the Roman matrons offered their gold and orna- 
 ments as first-fruits to Pythian Apollo, out of which a 
 golden cup was made and sent to Delphi ; ^ and the Car- 
 thaginian matrons had their heads shorn, and with the 
 
 ' Reading with Wyttenbach didoixn and txovai. 
 ^ See Livy, v. 25. 
 
AGAINST BORROWING MONEY. 367 
 
 hair cut off made cords for the machines and engines to be 
 nsed in defence of their country.^ But we being ashamed 
 of independence enslave ourselves to covenants and con- 
 ditions, when we ought to restrict and confine ourselves to 
 what is useful, and dock or sell useless superfluities, to 
 build a temple of liberty for ourselves, our wives, and 
 children. The famous Artemis at Ephesus gives asylum 
 and security from their creditors to debtors, when they take 
 refuge in her temple ; but the asylum and sanctuary of 
 frugality is everywhere open to the sober-minded, afEording 
 them joyful and honourable and ample space for much ease. 
 For as the Pythian Priestess told the Athenians at the 
 time of the Median war that the god had given them wooden 
 walls,- and they left the region and city, their goods and 
 houses, and took refuge in their ships for liberty, so the 
 god gives us a wooden table, and earthenware plate, and 
 coarse garments, if we wish to live free. Care not for fine 
 horses or chariots with handsome harness, adorned with 
 gold ^ and silver, which swift interest will catch up and out- 
 run, but mounted on any chance donkey or nag flee from 
 the hostile and tyrannical money-lender, not demanding 
 like the Mede land and water,* but interfering with your 
 liberty, and lowering your status. If you pay him not, he 
 duns you ; if you offer the money, he won't have it ; if you 
 are selling anything, he cheapens the price ; if you don't 
 want to sell, he forces you ; if you sue him, he comes to 
 terms with you ; if you swear, he hectors ; if you go to 
 his house, he shuts the door in your face ; whereas if you 
 stay at home, he billets himself on you, and is ever rapping 
 at your door. 
 
 § IV. How did Solon benefit the Athenians by ordaining 
 that debtors should no longer have to pay in person ? For 
 they are slaves to all money-lenders,^ and not to them only, 
 what would there be so monstrous in that ? but to their 
 
 ^ See Appian, Iv. 26. 
 
 ^ See Herodotus, vii. 141-143; viii. 51. 
 
 ^ Reading with Reiske Kardxpyaa. 
 
 ^ The technical term for submission to an enemy. See Pausanias 
 iii. 12; x. 20. Herodotus, v. 17,18; vii. 133. 
 
 " Reading with Reiske SaveiaTaig. Perhaps dipaviaToig originally 
 came after dypioig, and got somehow displaced. 
 
368 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 slaves, wlio are insolent and savage barbarians, such as 
 Plato represents the fiery torturers and executioners in 
 Hades who preside over the punishment of the impious. 
 For they make the forum a hell for wretched debtors, and 
 like vultures devour and rend them limb from limb, 
 "piercing into their bowels," 1 and stand over others and 
 prevent their tasting their own grapes or crops, as if they 
 were so many Tantaluses. And as Darius sent Datis and 
 Artaphernes to Athens with manacles and chains in their 
 hands for their captives, so they bring into Greece boxes 
 full of bonds and agreements, like fetters, and visit the 
 towns and scour the country round, sowing not like Trip- 
 tolemus harmless corn, but planting the toilsome and pro- 
 lific and never-ending roots of debts, which grow and 
 spread all round, and ruin and choke cities. They say that 
 hares at once give birth and suckle and conceive again, but 
 the debts of these knaves and barbarians give birth before 
 they conceive ; for at the very moment of giving they ask 
 back, and take up what they laid down, and lend what they 
 take for lending. 
 
 § V. It is a saying among the Messenians, that " there is 
 a Pylos before Pylos, and another Pylos too." So it may be 
 said with respect to these money-lenders, " there is interest 
 before interest, and other interest too." Then of course they 
 laugh at those natural philosophers who say that nothing 
 can come of nothing, for they get interest on what neither 
 is nor was ; and they think it disgraceful to farm out the 
 taxes, though the law allows it, while they themselves 
 against the law exact tribute for what they lend, or rather, 
 if one is to say the truth, defraud as they lend, for he who 
 receives less than he signs his name for is defrauded. The 
 Persians indeed think lying a secondary crime, but debt a 
 principal one, for lying frequently follows upon debt, but 
 money-lenders tell more lies, for they make fraudulent 
 entries in their account-books, writing down that they 
 have given so-and-so so much, when they have really given 
 less. And the only excuse for their lying is covetousness, 
 not necessity, not utter poverty, but insatiable greediness, 
 the outcome of which is without enjoyment and useless to 
 
 ^ See Homer, " Odyssey," xi. 578, 579, and context. 
 
AGAINST BORROWING MONEY. 369 
 
 themselves, and fatal to their victims. For neither do 
 they farm the fields which they rob their debtors of, nor 
 do they inhabit their houses when they have thrust them 
 out, nor use their tables or apparel, but first one is ruined, 
 and then a second is hunted down, for whom the first one 
 serves as a decoy. For the bane spreads and grows like a 
 fire, to the destruction and ruin of all who fall into their 
 clutches, for it consumes one after another ; and the 
 money-lender, who fans and feeds this flame to ensnare 
 many, gets no more advantage from it but that some time 
 after he can take his account-book and read how many he 
 has sold up, how many turned out of house and home, and 
 track the sources of his wealth, which is ever growing into 
 a larger pile. 
 
 § VI. And do not think I say this as an enemy proclaim- 
 ing war against the money-lenders, 
 
 " For never did they lift my cows or horses," ^ 
 
 but merely to prove to those who too readily borrow money 
 what disgrace and servitude it brings with it, and what 
 extreme folly and weakness it is. Have you anything ? 
 do not borrow, for you are not in a necessitous condition. 
 Have you nothing ? do not borrow, for you will never be 
 able to pay back. Let us cpnsider either case separately. 
 Cato said to a certain old man who was a wicked fellow, 
 *' My good sir, why do you add the shame that comes from 
 wickedness to old age, that has so many troubles of its 
 own ? " So too do you, since poverty has so many troubles 
 of its own, not add the terrible distress that comes from 
 borrowing money and from debt ; and do not take away 
 from poverty its only advantage over wealth, its freedom 
 from corroding care. For the proverb that says, " I cannot 
 carry a goat, put an ox on my shoulder," has a ridiculous 
 ring. Unable to bear poverty, are you going to put on 
 your back a money-lender, a weight hard to carry even for 
 a rich man ? How then, will you say, am I to maintain 
 myself ? Do you ask this, having two hands, two legs, 
 and a tongue, in short, being a man, to love and be loved, 
 to give and receive benefits ? Can you not be a school- 
 
 ^ Homer, " Iliad," i. 154. 
 B B 
 
370 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 master or tutor, or porter, or sailor, or make coasting 
 voyages ? Any of these ways of getting a livelihood is less 
 disgraceful and difficult than to always have to hear, " Pay 
 m.e that thou owest." 
 
 § VII. The well-known Rutilius went up to Musonius at 
 Rome, and said to him, " Musonius, Zeus Soter, whom you 
 imitate and emulate, does not borrow money." And 
 Musonius smilingly answered, " Neither does he lend." 
 For you must know Rutilius, himself a lender, was ban- 
 tering Musonius for being a borrower. What Stoic in- 
 flatedness was all this ! What need was there to bring in 
 Zeus Soter ? For all nature teaches the same lesson. 
 Swallows do not borrow money, nor do ants, although 
 nature has given them no hands, or reason, or profession. 
 But men have intellect in excess, and so ingenious are they 
 that they keep near them horses, and dogs, and partridges, 
 and jackdaws. Why then do you despair, who are as 
 impressible as a jackdaw, have as much voice as a par- 
 tridge, and are as noble as a dog, of getting some person 
 to befriend you, by looking after him, winning his affec- 
 tions, guarding him, fighting his battles ? Do you not see 
 how many opportunities there are both on land and sea ? 
 As Crates says, 
 
 " Miccylus and his wife, to ward off famine 
 In these bad times, I saw both carding wool." 
 
 And King Antigonus asked Cleanthes, when he saw him 
 at Athens after a long interval, " Do you still grind, 
 Cleanthes ?" And he replied, " I do, king, but for my 
 living, yet so as not to desert philosophy." Such was the 
 admirable spirit of the man who, coming from the mill and 
 kneading-trough, wrote with the hand that had baked and 
 ground about the gods, and the moon, and stars, and the 
 sun. But those kinds of labour are in our view servile ! 
 And so that we may appear free we borrow money, and 
 flatter and dance attendance on slaves, and give them 
 dinners and presents, and pay taxes as it were to them, not 
 on account of our poverty (for no one lends money to a 
 poor man), but from our love of lavish expenditure. For if 
 we were content with things necessary for subsistence, the 
 race of money-lenders would be as extinct as Centaurs and 
 
AGAINST BORROWING MONEY. 371 
 
 Gorgons are ; ifc is luxury that has created them as much 
 as goldsmiths, and silversmiths, and perfumers, and dyers 
 in bright colours. For we do not owe money for bread 
 and wine, but for estates, and slaves, and mules, and 
 dining-rooms, and tables, and for our lavish public enter- 
 tainments, in our unprofitable and thankless ambition. 
 And he that is once involved in debt remains in it all his 
 time, like a horse bitted and bridled that takes one rider 
 after another, and there is no escape to green pastures and 
 meadows, but they wander about like those demons who 
 were driven out of heaven by the gods who are thus 
 described by Empedocles : — 
 
 " Into the sea the force of heaven thrusts them, 
 The sea rejects them back upon the land ; 
 To the sun's rays th' unresting earth remits them ; 
 The sun anon whirls them to heaven again." 
 
 So one after another usurer or trader gets hold of the 
 poor wretch, hailing either from Corinth, or Patree, or 
 Athens, till he gets set on to by them all, and torn to bits, 
 and cut into mince-meat as it were for his interest. For 
 as a person who is fallen into the mire must either get up 
 out of it or remain in it, and if he turns about in it, and 
 wallows in it, and bedabbles his body all over in it, he con- 
 tracts only the greater defilement, so by borrowing from 
 one person to pay another and changing their money- 
 lenders they contract and incur fresh interest, and get into 
 greater liabilities, and closely resemble sufferers from 
 cholera, whose case does not admit of cure because they 
 evacuate everything they are ordered to take, and so ever 
 add to the disease. So these will not get cleansed from 
 the disease of debt, but at regular times in the year pay 
 their interest with pain and agony, and then immediately 
 another creditor presents his little account, so again their 
 heads swim and ache, when they ought to have got rid of 
 their debts altogether, and regained their freedom. 
 
 § VIII. I now turn my attention to those who are rich 
 and luxurious, and use language like the following, " Am 
 I then to go without slaves and hearth and home ? " As if 
 any dropsical person, whose body was greatly swollen and 
 who was very weak, should say to his doctor, " Am I then 
 to become lean and empty ?" And why not, to get well ? 
 
372 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 And do you too go without a slave, not to be a slave 
 yourself ; and without chattels, not to be another man's 
 chattel. Listen to a story about two vultures ; one was 
 vomiting and saying it would bring its inside up, and 
 the other who was by said, " What harm if you do ? 
 For it won't be your inside you bring up, but that dead 
 body we devoured lately." And so any debtor does not 
 sell his own estate, or his own house, but his creditor's, 
 for he has made him by law master of them. ^S^ay, but by 
 Zeus, says one, my father left me this field. Yes, and 
 your father also left you liberty and a status in the com- 
 munity, which you ought to value more than you do. And 
 your father begot you with hand and foot, but should 
 either of them mortify, you pay the surgeon to cut it off. 
 Thus Calypso clad and "dressed" Odysseus "in raiment 
 smelling sweet," ^ like the body of an immortal, as a gift 
 and token of her affection for him ; but when his vessel 
 was upset and he himself immersed, and owing to this wet 
 and heavy raiment could hardly keep himself on the top 
 of the waves, he threw it off and stripped himself, and 
 covered his naked breast with Ino's veil,^ and " swam for 
 it gazing on the distant shore," ^ and so saved his life, 
 and lacked neither food nor raiment. What then ? have 
 not poor debtors storms, when the money-lender stands 
 over them and says, Pay ? 
 
 " Thus spoke Poseidon, and the clouds did gather, 
 And lashed the sea to fury, and at once 
 Eurus and Notus and the stormy Zephyr 
 Blew all together."* 
 
 Thus interest rolls on interest as wave upon wave, and he 
 that is involved in debt struggles against the load that 
 bears him down, but cannot swim away and escape, but 
 siiiks to the bottom, and carries with him to ruin his 
 friends that have gone security for him. But Crates the 
 Theban, though he had neither duns nor debts, and was 
 only disgusted at the distracting cai-es of housekeeping, 
 gave up a property worth eight talents, and assumed the 
 philosopher's threadbare cloak and wallet, and took refuge 
 
 ^ " Odyssey," v. 264. = " Odyssey," v. 333-375. 
 
 3 '< Odyssey," v. 439. * "Odyssey," v. 291-296. 
 
AGAINST BORROWING MONEY. 373 
 
 in philosophy and poverty. And Anaxagoras left his 
 sheep-farm. But why need I mention these? since the 
 lyric poet Philoxenus, obtaining by lot in a Sicilian colony 
 much substance and a house abounding in every kind of 
 comfort, but finding that luxury and pleasure and absence 
 of refinement was the fashion there, said, " By the gods 
 these comforts shall not undo me, I will give them up," 
 and he left his lot to others, and sailed home again. But 
 debtors have to put up with being dunned, subjected to 
 tribute, suffering slavery, passing debased coin, and like 
 Phineus, feeding certain winged Harpies, who carry off and 
 lay violent hands on their food, not at the proper season, 
 for they get possession of their debtors' corn before it is 
 sown, and thqy traffic for oil before the olives are ripe ; 
 and the money-lender says, " I have wine at such and such 
 a price," and takes a bond for it, when the grapes are yet 
 on the vine waiting for Arcturus to ripen them. - 
 
 WHETHER " LIVE UNKNOWN " BE A WISE 
 PRECEPT. 
 
 § I. He who uttered this precept ^ certainly did not wish 
 to live unknown, for he uttered it to let all the world know 
 he was a superior thinker, and to get to himself unjust 
 glory by exhorting others to shun glory. 
 
 " I hate the wise man for himself not wise." ^ 
 
 They say that Philoxenus the son of Eryxis and Gnatho 
 the Sicilian, being exceedingly greedy where good fare was 
 going, would blow their nose in the dishes, to disgust all 
 others at the table, that they alone might take their fill of 
 the choicest dishes. So those that are insatiable pursuers 
 of glory calumniate glory to others who are their rivals, 
 that they may get it without antagonists. In this they 
 
 ' Trobably Epicurus, as we infer from the very personal § iii. 
 - P^uripides, Fraj^m. 930. 
 
374 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 resemble rowers, who face the stern of the vessel but propel 
 it ahead, that by the recoil from the stroke of their oars 
 they may reach port, so those that give vent to precepts 
 like this pursue glory with their face turned in the opposite 
 direction. For otherwise what need was there to utter a 
 precept like this, or to write and hand it down to posterity, 
 if he wished to live unknown to his own generation, who 
 did not wish to live unknown to posterity ? 
 
 § II. Look at the matter in the following way.^ Has 
 not that " live unknown " a villainous ring, as though one 
 had broken open graves ? Is your life so disgraceful that 
 we must all be ignorant of it ? For my part I should say, 
 Even if your life be bad do not live unknown, but be 
 known, reform, repent ; if you have virtue, be not utterly 
 useless in life ; if you are vicious, do not continue unre- 
 formed. Point out then and define to whom you recom- 
 mend this precept. If to an ignorant or wicked or sense- 
 less person, you resemble one who should say to a person in 
 a fever or delirium, " Be unknown. Don't let the doctor 
 know your condition. Gro and throw yourself into some 
 dark place, that you and your ailments may be unknown." 
 So you say to a vicious man, " Go olf with your vice, and 
 hide your deadly and irremediable disease from your friends, 
 fearful to show your superstitious fears, palpitations as it 
 were, to those who could admonish you and cure you." Our 
 remote ancestors paid public attention to the sick, and if any 
 one had either had or cured a similar complaint, he com- 
 municated his experience to the patient, and so they say 
 medical art became great by these contributions from ex- 
 perience. We ought also in the same way to expose to 
 everyone diseased lives and the passions of the soul, and to 
 handle them, and to examine the condition of each," and 
 say. Are you a passionate man ? Be on your guard against 
 anger. Are you of a jealous turn ? Look to it. Are you 
 in love ? I myself was in love once, but I had to repent. 
 But nowadays people deny and conceal and cloak their 
 vices, and so fix them deeper in themselves. 
 
 § III. Moreover if you advise men of worth to live un- 
 
 ^ Keading with Wyttenbach, 'AXXa tovto niv ravry. 
 
 * Reading eKaarov for fica(TTOv. Keiske proposed eKaarwv. 
 
WHETHER "lite UNKNOWN" BE A WISE PRECEPT. 375 
 
 known and in obscurity, yoa say to Epaminondas, Do not 
 be a genei'al ; and to Lycurgus, Do not be a legislator ; and 
 to Thrasybulus, Do not be a tyrannicide ; and to Pytha- 
 goras, Do not teach ; and to Socrates, Do not discourse ; 
 and first and foremost you bid yourself, Epicurus, to re- 
 frain from writing letters to your friends in Asia, and from 
 enrolling Egyptian strangers among your disciples, and 
 from dancing attendance on the youths of Lampsacus, and 
 sending books to all quarters to display your wisdom to all 
 men and all women, and leaving directions in your will 
 about your funeral. What is the meaning of those com- 
 mon tables of yours ? what that crowd of friends and 
 handsome youths ? Why those many thousand lines written 
 and composed so laboriously on Metrodorus, and Aristo- 
 bulus, and Chseredemus, that they may not be unknown 
 even in death, if ^ you ordain for virtue oblivion, for art 
 inactivity, for philosophy silence, and for success that it 
 should be speedily forgotten ? 
 
 § IV. But if you exclude all knowledge about life, like 
 putting the lights out at a supper party, that you may go 
 from pleasure to pleasure undetected,^ then "live un- 
 known." Certainly if I am going to pass my life with the 
 harlot Hedeia, or my days with Leontium, and spurn at 
 virtue, and put my surtirtium bonum in sensual gratifica- 
 tions, these are ends that require darkness and night, on 
 these oblivion and ignorance are rightly cast. But if any 
 one in nature sings the praises of the deity and justice and 
 providence, and in morals upholds the law and society and 
 the constitution, and in the constitution what is honourable 
 and not expedient, why should he " live unknown " ? Is it 
 that he should instruct nobody, inspire in nobody an emu- 
 lation for virtue, and be to nobody a pattern in good ? ^ 
 Had Themistocles been unknown at Athens, Greece would 
 not have repelled Xerxes ; had Camillus been unknown at 
 Rome, Rome would not have remained a state ; had Plato 
 been unknown to Dion, Sicily would not have won its free- 
 dom. And as light, I take it, makes us not only visible 
 
 ^ Heading el (for 'Iva) with Xy lander and Wjttenbach. 
 
 ^ Reading with Wyttenbach. 
 
 ^ Adopting the snggestion of Wyttenbach, " Forte koXov, ut Amiot." 
 
376 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 bat useful to one another, so knowledge gives not only- 
 glory but impetus to virtue. Epaminondas in obscurity up 
 to his fortieth year was no use to the Thebans, but when 
 his merits became known and he was put into power, he 
 saved his state from ruin, and liberated Greece from slavery, 
 making his abilities efficacious in emergency through his 
 reputation like the bright shining of a light. For Sopho- 
 cles' words, 
 
 " Brightly shines brass in use, but when unused 
 It groweth dull in time, and mars the house," ^ 
 
 are also appropriate to the character of a man, which gets 
 rusty and senile by not mixing in affairs but living in 
 obscurity. For mute inglorious ease, and a sedentary life 
 devoted to leisure, not only injure the body but also the 
 soul : and as hidden waters overshadowed and stagnant get 
 foul because they have no outlet, so the innate powers of 
 unruffled lives, that neither imbibe nor pass on anything, 
 even if they had any useful element in them once, seem to 
 be effete and wasted. 
 
 § V. Have you never noticed how when night comes on 
 a tired languor seizes the body, and inactive torpor over- 
 powers the soul, and reason shrinks within itself like a fire 
 going out, and feeling quite worn out is gently agitated by 
 disordered fancies, only just indicating that the man is 
 alive ? Bat when the sun rises and scares away deceitful 
 dreams, and brings on as it were the everyday^ world '^ and 
 with its light rouses and stimulates the thoughts and 
 actions of everybody, then, as Democritus says, " men form 
 new ideas for the day," and betake themselves to their 
 various pursuits with mutual impetuosity, as ii drawn by 
 a strong impulse. 
 
 § VI. And I think that life itself, and the way we come 
 into the world, is so ordained by the deity that we should 
 know one another. For everyone comes into this great 
 universe obscure and unknown casually and by degrees, 
 but when he mixes with his fellows and grows to maturity 
 he shines forth, and becomes well-known instead of obscure, 
 
 ^ Frag. 742. 
 
 ^ " Dormiens quisque in peculiarem abest mundum, expergefactus in 
 communem redit." — Xylander. Compare Herrick's Poem, ^^Dreames." 
 
WHETHER " LITE UNKNOWN " BE A WISE PRECEPT. 377 
 
 and conspicuous instead of unknown. For knowledge is 
 not the road to being, as some say, but being to know- 
 ledge, for being does not create but only exhibits things, 
 as death is not the reducing of existence to non-existence, 
 but rather the result of dissolution is obscurity. So people 
 considering the Sun as Apollo according to hereditary 
 and ancient institutions, call him Delius ^ and Pythius ; 
 whereas the lord of the world of darkness, whether god or 
 demon, they call Hades ^ (for when we die we go into an 
 unseen and invisible place), and the lord of dark night and 
 idle sleep. And I think our ancestors called man himself 
 by a word meaning light,^ because by their relationship to 
 light all have implanted in them a strong and vehement 
 desire to know and to be known. And some philosophers 
 think that the soul itself is light in its essence, inferring so 
 on other grounds and because it can least endure igno- 
 rance about facts, and hates'* everything obscure, and is 
 disturbed at everything dark, which inspires fear and sus- 
 picion in it, whereas light is so dear and welcome to it 
 that it thinks nothing otherwise delightful bearable with- 
 out it, as indeed light makes every pleasure pastime and 
 enjoyment gay and cheerful, like the application of some 
 sweet and general flavour. But the man who thrusts him- 
 self into obscurity, and wraps himself up in darkness and 
 buries himself alive, is like one who is dissatisfied with his 
 birth, and renounces his being. 
 
 § VII. And yet Pindar tells us ^ that the abode of the 
 blest is a glorious existence, where the sun shines bright 
 through the entire night in meadows red with roses, an 
 extensive plain full of shady trees ever in bloom never in 
 fruit, watered by gentle purling streams, and there the 
 blest ones pass their time away in thinking and talking 
 about the past and present in social converse. . . .^ But 
 the third road is of those who have lived unholy and law- 
 less lives, that thrusts their souls to Erebus and the bottom- 
 less pit, where sluggish streams of murky night belch forth 
 endless darkness, which receive those that are to be punished 
 
 ' Bright. ^ Invisible, - ^wr. 
 
 * Reading with Wyttenbach txOaipei. 
 
 ' Reading (prjaiv for (pvrriv. ^ Hiatus hie valde deHendus. 
 
378 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 and conceal them in forgetfulness and oblivion. For vul- 
 tures do not always prey on the liver of wicked persons 
 lying on the ground/ for it is destroyed by fire or has rolled 
 away ; nor does the carrying of heavy burdens press upon 
 and tire out the bodies of those that undergo punishment, 
 
 " For their strength has no longer flesh and bones," '■^ 
 
 nor have the dead any vestige of body that can receive the 
 infliction of punishment that can make impression ; but in 
 reality the only punishment of those who have lived ill is 
 infamy and obscurity and utter annihilation, which hurries 
 them off to the dark river of oblivion,^ and plunges them 
 into the abyss of a fathomless sea, involving them in nse- 
 lessness and idleness, ignorance and obscurity. 
 
 ON EXILE. 
 
 § I. They say those discourses, like friends, are best and 
 surest that come to our refuge and aid in adversity, and 
 are useful. For many who come forward do more harm 
 than good in the remarks they make to the unfortunate, 
 as people unable to swim trying to rescue the drowning get 
 entangled with them and sink to the bottom together. 
 Now the discourse that ought to come from friends and 
 people disposed to be helpful should be consolation, and 
 not mere assent with a man's sad feelings. For we do 
 not in adverse circumstances need people to weep and wail 
 with us like choruses in a tragedy, but people to speak 
 plainly to us and instruct us, that grief and dejection of 
 mind are in all cases useless and idle and senseless ; and 
 that where the circumstances themselves, when examined 
 by the light of reason, enable a man to say to himself that 
 his trouble is greater in fancy than in reality, it is quite ridi- 
 culous not to inquire of the body what it has suffered, nor 
 of the mind if it is any the worse for what has happened, 
 
 ' As was fabled about Tityus, " Odyssey," xi. 576-579. 
 
 2 "Odyssey," xi. 219. * So Reiske, TroTajxuv Tqg XrjQrjg. 
 
ON EXILE. 379 
 
 bnt to employ external sympathizers to teach us what our 
 grief is. 
 
 § II. Therefore let us examine alone by ourselves the 
 weight of our misfortunes, as if they were burdens. For 
 the body is weighed down by the burden of what presses on 
 it, but the soul often adds to the real load a burden of its 
 own. A stone is naturally hard, and ice naturally cold, 
 Imt they do not receive these properties and impressions 
 from without ; whereas with regard to exile and loss of 
 reputation or honours, as also with regard to their oppo- 
 sites, as crowns and office and position, it is not their own 
 intrinsic nature but our opinion of them that is the gauge 
 of their real joy or sorrow, so that each person makes them 
 for himself light or heavy, easy to bear or hard to bear. 
 When Polynices was asked 
 
 " What is't to be an exile ? Is it grievous ? "' 
 
 he replied to the question, 
 
 " Most grievous, and in deed worse than in word." ' 
 
 Compare with this the language of Alcman, as the poet has 
 represented him in the following lines. " Sardis, my father's 
 ancient home, had I had the fortune to be reared in thee, 
 I should have been dressed in gold as a priest of Cybele,^ 
 and beaten the fine drums ; but as it is my name is Alcman, 
 and I am a citizen of Sparta, and I have learned to write 
 Greek poetry, which makes me greater than the tyrants 
 Dascyles or Gyges." Thus the very same thing one man's 
 opinion makes good, like current coin, and another's bad 
 and injurious. 
 
 § III. But let it be granted that exile is, as many say and 
 sing, a grievous thing. So some food is bitter, and sharp, 
 and biting to the taste, yet by an admixture with it of 
 sweet and agreeable food we take away its unpleasantness. 
 There are also some colours unpleasant to look at, that 
 quite confuse and dazzle us by their intensity and exces- 
 sive force. If then we can relieve this by a mixture of 
 shadow, or by diverting the eye to green or some agreeable 
 colour, so too can we deal with misfortunes, mixing up 
 
 ^ Euripides, "Phcenissae," 388, 389. 
 ^ Reading (SaKiXac Gallm in Latin. 
 
380 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 with them the advantages and pleasant things we still 
 enjoy, as wealth, or friends, or leisure, and no deficiency in 
 what is necessary for our subsistence. For I do not think 
 that there are many natives of Sardis who would not 
 choose your fortune even with exile, and be content to live 
 as you do in a strange land, rather than, like snails who 
 have no other home than their shells, enjoy no other bless- 
 ing but staying at home in ease. 
 
 § IV. As then he in the comedy that was exhorting an un- 
 fortunate friend to take courage and bear up against fortune, 
 when he asked him "how," answered "as a philosopher," 
 so may we also play the philosopher's part and bear up 
 against fortune manfully. How do we do when it rains, 
 or when the IS'orth Wind doth blow ? We go to the fire, 
 or the baths, or the house, or put on another coat : we don't 
 sit down in the rain and cry. So too can you more than 
 most revive and cheer yourself for the chill of adversity, 
 not standing in need of outward aid, but sensibly using 
 your actual advantages. The surgeon's cupping-glasses 
 extract the worst humours from the body to relieve and 
 preserve the rest of it, whereas the melancholy and 
 querulous by ever dwelling on their worst circumstances, 
 and thinking only of them, and being engrossed by their 
 troubles, make even useful things useless to them, at the 
 very time when the need is most urgent. For as to those 
 two jars, my friend, that Homer ' says are stored in Heaven, 
 one full of good fortunes, one of bad, it is not Zeus that 
 presides as the dispenser of them, giving to some a gentle 
 and even portion, and to others unmixed streams of evils, 
 but ourselves. For the sensible make their life pleasanter 
 and more endurable by mitigating their sorrows with the 
 consideration of their blessings, while most people, like 
 sieves, let the worst things stick to them while the best 
 pass through. 
 
 § V. And so, if we fall into any real trouble or evil, we 
 ought to get cheerfulness and ease of mind from the con- 
 sideration of the actual blessings that are still left to us, 
 mitigating outward trouble by private happiness. And as 
 to those things which are not really evil in their nature, 
 
 ^ " Iliad," xxiv. 527-533. 
 
ON EXILE. 381 
 
 but only so from imagination and empty fancy, we must act 
 as we do with children who are afraid of masks : by bring- 
 ing them near, and putting them in their hands, and turn- 
 ing them about, we accustom them never to heed them at 
 all : and so we by bringing reason to bear on it may dis- 
 cover the rottenness and emptiness and exaggeration of our 
 fancy. As a case in point let us take your present exile 
 from what you deem your country. For in nature no 
 country, or house, or field, or smithy, as Aristo said, or 
 surgery, is peculiarly ours, but all such things exist or 
 rather take their name in connection with the person who 
 dwells in them or possesses them. For man, as Plato says, 
 is not an earthly and immovable but heavenly plant, the 
 head making the body erect as from a root, and turned up 
 to heaven.^ And so Hercules said well, 
 
 " Argive or Theban am I, I vaunt not 
 To be of one town only, every tower 
 , That does to Greece belong, that is my counti*y." 
 
 But better still said Socrates, that he was not an Athenian 
 or Greek, but a citizen of the world (as a man might say 
 he was a Rhodian or Corinthian), for he did not confine 
 himself to Sunium, or Taenarum, or the Ceraunian moun- 
 tains. 
 
 " See you the boundless reach of sky above, 
 And how it holds the earth in its soft arms ? " 
 
 These are the boundaries of our country, nor is there 
 either exile or stranger or foreigner in these, where there is 
 the same fire, waiter and air, the same rulers controllers and 
 presidents, the sun the moon and the morning star, the 
 same laws to all, under one appointment and ordinance the 
 summer and winter solstices, the equinoxes, Pleias and 
 Arcturus, the seasons of sowing and planting ; where there 
 is one king and ruler, God, who has under his jurisdiction 
 the beginning and middle and end of everything, and 
 travels round and does everything in a regular way in 
 accordance with nature; and in his wake to punish all 
 transgressions of the divine law follows Justice, whom 
 
 ^ Plato, *' Timaeus," p. 90 A. Compare Ovid, " Metamorphoses,'' i. 
 84-86. 
 
382 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 all men naturally invoke in dealing with one another as 
 fellow citizens. 
 
 § Yi. As to jour not dwelling at Sardis, that is nothing. 
 Neither do all the Athenians dwell at Colyttus, nor all the 
 Corinthians at Craneum, nor all the Lacedsemonians at 
 Pitane. Do you consider all those Athenians strangers and 
 exiles who removed from Melita to Diomea, where they call 
 the month Metageitnion/ and keep the festival Metageitnia 
 to commemorate their migration, and gladly and gaily accept 
 and are content with their neighbourhood with other people ? 
 Surely you would not. What part of the inhabited world 
 or of the whole earth is very far distant from another 
 part, seeing that mathematicians teach us that the whole 
 earth is a mere point compared to heaven ? But we, like 
 ants or bees, if we get banished from one ant-hill or hive 
 are in sore distress and feel lost, not knowing or having 
 learnt to make and consider all things our own, as indeed 
 they are. And yet we laugh at the stupidity of one who 
 asserts that the moon shines brighter at Athens than at 
 Corinth, though in a sort we are in the same case ourselves, 
 when in a strange land we look on the earth, the sea, the 
 air, the sky, as if we doubted whether or not they were 
 different from those we had been accustomed to. For 
 nature makes us free and unrestrained, but we bind and 
 confine immure and force ourselves into small and scanty 
 space. Then too we laugh at the Persian kings, who, if 
 the story be true, drink only of the water of the Choaspes, 
 thus making the rest of the world waterless as far as they 
 are concerned, but when we migrate to other places, we 
 desire the water of the Cephisus, or we yearn for the 
 Eurotas, or Taygetus, or Parnassus, and so make the whole 
 world for ourselves houseless and homeless. 
 
 § Yii. Some Egyptians, who migrated to Ethiopia because 
 of the anger and wrath of their king, to those who begged 
 them to return to their wives and children very im- 
 modestly exposed their persons, saying that they would 
 never be in want of wives or children while so provided. 
 It is far more becoming and less low to say that whoever 
 
 '^ Derived from /iterd, yei'rwv, because then people flitted and clianged 
 their neighbours. 
 
ON EXILE. 383 
 
 has the good fortune to be provided with the few neces- 
 saries of life is nowhere a stranger, nowhere without home 
 and hearth, only he must have besides these prudence and 
 sense, as an anchor and helm, that he maj be able to moor 
 himself in any harbour. For a person indeed who has lost 
 his wealth it is not easy quickly to get another fortune, 
 but every city is at once his country to the man who knows 
 how to make it such, and has the roots by which he can 
 live and thrive and get acclimatized in every place, as was 
 the case with Themistocles and Demetrius of Phalerum. 
 The latter after his banishment became a great friend of 
 Ptolemy at Alexandria, and not only passed his days in 
 abundance, but also sent gifts to the Athenians. And 
 Themistocles, who was publicly entertained at the king's 
 expense, is stated to have said to his wife and children, 
 " We should have been ruined, if we had not been ruined." 
 And so Diogenes the Cynic to the person who said to him, 
 " The people of Sinope have condemned you to banishment 
 from Pontus," replied, "And I have condemned them to 
 stay in Pontus, ' by the high cliffs of the inhospitable 
 sea.' " ^ And Stratonicus asked his host at Seriphus, for 
 what offence exile was the appointed punishment, and being 
 told that they punished rogues by exile, said, " Why then 
 are not you a rogue, to escape from this hole of a place ? " 
 For the comic poet says they get their crop of figs down 
 there with slings, and that the island is very barely sup- 
 plied with the necessaries of life. 
 
 § VIII. For if you look at the real facts and shun idle 
 fancy, he that has one city is a stranger and foreigner in 
 all others. For it does not seem to such a one fair and 
 just to leave his own city and dwell in another. " It has 
 been your lot to be a citizen of Sparta, see that you adorn 
 your native city," whether it be inglorious, or unhealthy, or 
 disturbed with factions, or has its affairs in disorder. But 
 the person whom fortune has deprived of his own city, she 
 allows to make his home in any he fancies. That was an 
 excellent precept of Pythagoras, " Choose the best kind of 
 life, custom will make it easy." So too it is wise and 
 profitable to say here, " Choose the best and pleasantest 
 
 ^ Euripides, " Iphigenia in Tauris," 253. 
 
384 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 city, time will make it your country, and a country that 
 will not always distract you and trouble you and give you 
 various orders such as, ' Contribute so much money, Go on 
 an embassy to Rome, Entertain the prefect, Perform public 
 duties.' " If a person in his senses and not altogether silly 
 were to think of these things, he would prefer to live in 
 exile in some island, like Gryarus or Cinarns, 
 
 " Savage, and fruitless, ill repaying; tillage," 
 
 and that not in dejection and wailing, or using the lan- 
 guage of those women in Simonides, 
 
 *' I am shut in by the dark roaring sea 
 That foams all round," 
 
 but he will rather be of the mind of Philip, who when he 
 was thrown in wrestling, and turned round, and noticed 
 the mark his body made in the dust, said, " Hercules, 
 what a little part of the earth I have by nature, though 
 I desire all the world ! " 
 
 § IX. I think also you have seen Naxos, or at any rate 
 Hyria, which is close here. But the former was the home 
 of Ephialtes and Otus, and the latter was the dwelling- 
 place of Orion. And Alcm^eon, when fleeing from the 
 Furies, so the poets tell us, dwelt in a place recently formed 
 by the silting of the Achelous ; ^ but I think he chose that 
 little spot to dwell in ease and quiet, merely to avoid poli- 
 tical disturbances and factions, and those furies informers. 
 And the Emperor Tiberius lived the last seven years of his 
 life in the island of Capreas, and the sacred governing 
 power of the world enclosed in his breast during all that 
 time never changed its abode. But the incessant and con- 
 stant cares of empire, coming from all sides, made not that 
 island repose of his pure and complete. But he who can 
 disembark on a small island, and get rid of great troubles, 
 is a miserable man, if he cannot often say and sing to him- 
 self those lines of Pindar, " To love the slender cypress, 
 and to leave the Cretan pastures lying near Ida. I have 
 but little land, where I grow strong, and have nothing to 
 do with sorrow or faction," ^ or the ordinances of princes, 
 
 ^ See also Pausanias, viii. 24. ' Pindar, Fragm. 126. 
 
ON EXILE. 385 
 
 or public duties in political emergencies, or state functions 
 hard to get off. 
 
 § X. For if that seems a good saying of Callimachus, 
 "Do not measure wisdom by a Persian rope," much less 
 should we measure happiness by ropes and parasangs, and 
 if we inhabit an island containing 200 furlongs only, and not 
 (like Sicily) four days' sail round, ought we to wail and 
 lament as if we were very unfortunate ? For how does 
 plenty of room bring about an easy life ? Have you not 
 heard Tantalus saying in the play,^ 
 
 " I sow a field that takes twelve days to travel round, 
 The Berecyntian region," 
 
 but shortly after he says, 
 
 " My fortunes, that were once as high as heaven, 
 Now to the ground are fallen, and do say to me, 
 * Learn not to make too much of earthly things.'" 
 
 And Nausithous leaving the spacious Hyperia because of 
 the proximity of the Cyclopes, and migrating to an island 
 "far from all enterprising men," ^ and living an unsocial 
 life, 
 
 " Apart from men beside the stormy sea," ^ 
 
 yet contrived to make the life of his citizens very pleasant. 
 And the Cyclades were first inhabited by the sons of Minos, 
 and afterwards by the sons of Codrus and Neleus, though 
 foolish people now think they are punished if they are 
 exiled to them. And yet what island used as a place of 
 exile is not of larger extent than Scillus, where Xenophon 
 after his military service saw a comfortable old age ? '* 
 And the Academy, a small place bought for only 3,000 
 drachmae,^ was the domicile of Plato and Xenocrates and 
 Polemo, who taught and lived there all their lives, except 
 one day every year, when Xenocrates went to Athens to 
 grace the festival of Dionysus, so they said, and to see the 
 new plays exhibited. And Theocritus of Chios twitted 
 
 ^ ^schylus, "Niobe,"rragm. 146. 
 ^ " Odyssey," vi. 8, I read avdpCJv as Wyttenbach. 
 ^ " Odyssey," vi. 204. 
 * See Pausanias, v. 6. 
 5 In our money about £121 17^. 6d. 
 C C 
 
386 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 Aristotle with loving to live at the courts of Philip and 
 Alexander, and preferring to dwell at the mouth of the 
 Borborus to dwelling in the Academy. For there is a river 
 near Pella that the Macedonians call Borborus. As to 
 islands Homer seems to sing their praise, and recommend 
 them to us as if on purpose, as 
 
 " She came to Lemnos, town of sacred Thoas ; " ^ 
 and, 
 
 " What Lesbos has, the seat of the immortals ; " ^ 
 and, 
 
 " He captured lofty Scyros, citadel 
 
 Of Enyeus ; " ' 
 and, 
 
 " And those who from Dulichium came, and from 
 
 The sacred islands called th' Echinades, 
 
 That lie across the sea opposite Elis ; " * 
 
 and of the illustrious men that dwelt in islands he men- 
 tions -(^olus the favourite of the gods, and Odysseus most 
 wise, and Ajax most brave, and Alcinous most kind to 
 strangers. 
 
 § XI. When Zeno learned that the only ship he had left 
 was with all its freight lost at sea, he said, " Fortune, you 
 deal kindly with me, confining me to my threadbare cloak 
 and the life of a philosopher." And a man not altogether 
 silly, or madly in love with crowds, might, I think, not 
 blame fortune for confining him in an island, but might 
 even praise her for relieving him from weariness and 
 anxiety, and wanderings in foreign countries, and perils by 
 sea, and the uproar of the forum, and for giving him truly 
 a secure, quiet, undistracted and private life, putting him as 
 it were inside a circle in which everything necessary for 
 him was contained. For what island has not a house, a 
 promenade, a bath, and fish and hares for those who love 
 fishing and field-sports ? And the greatest blessing, quiet, 
 which others frequently pant for, you can freely enjoy.^ 
 And whereas in the world,'' when men are playing at dice 
 or otherwise enjoying the privacy of their homes, informers 
 and busybodies hunt them up and pursue them from their 
 
 1 " Iliad," xiv. 230. ^ u Hiad," xxiv. 544. 
 
 » " Iliad," ix. 668. * " Iliad," ii. 625, 626. 
 
 5 So Reiske. 
 
ON EXILE. 387 
 
 houses and gardens in the suburbs, and drag them by force 
 to the forum and court, in an island no one comes to bother 
 one or dun one or to borrow money, or to beg one to be surety 
 for him or canvass for him : only one's best friends and 
 intimates come to visit one out of good will and affection, 
 and the rest of one's life is a sort of holy retirement to 
 whoever wishes or has learnt to live the life of leisure. 
 But he who thinks those happy who are always scouring 
 the country, and pass most of their lives in inns and ferry- 
 boats, is like a person who thinks the planets happier than 
 fixed stars. And yet every planet keeps its order, rolling 
 in one sphere, as in an island. For, as Heraclitus says, the 
 sun will never deviate from its bounds, for if it did, the 
 Furies, who are the ministers of Justice, would find it out. 
 § xii. Let us use such and similar language, my friend, 
 and harp upon it, to those who are banished to an island, 
 and are debarred all access with others 
 
 " By the sea waves, which many keep apart." ^ 
 
 But you who are not tied down to one spot, but only for- 
 bidden to live in one, have by that prohibition liberty to 
 go to all others. Moreover to the considerations, I am not 
 in office, or a member of the senate, or an umpire in the 
 games, you may oppose these, I do not belong to any faction, 
 I have no large sums to spend, I have not to dance atten- 
 dance at the doors of the prefect, it is no odds to me who 
 has got by lot the province, whether he is hot-tempered or 
 an objectionable person. But just as Archilochus over- 
 looked the fruitful fields and vineyards of Thasos, and 
 abused that island as rocky and uneven, and said of it, 
 
 " It stands like donkey's chine crowned with wild forest," 
 
 SO we, fixing our eyes only on one aspect of exile, its in- 
 glorious state, overlook its freedom from cares, its leisure, 
 its liberty. And yet people thought the kings of Persia 
 happy, because they passed their winter in Babylon, their 
 summer in Media, and the pleasant season of spring at 
 Susa. So can the exile be present at the Eleusinian mys- 
 teries, at the festival of Dionysus at Athens, at the Nemean 
 
 ^ " Iliad," xxi. 59. 
 
388 Plutarch's morals. . 
 
 games at Argos, at tlie Pythian games at Delphi, and can 
 pass on and be a spectator of the Isthmian and Corinthian 
 games, if he is fond of sight-seeing ; and if not, he has 
 leisure, can walk about, read, sleep without being disturbed, 
 and can say like Diogenes, " Aristotle has to dine when 
 Philip thinks fit, Diogenes can dine at any time he himself 
 chooses," having no business, or magistrate, or prefect, to 
 put him out of his general habits of living. 
 
 § XIII. And so it is that you will find few of the wisest 
 and most intelligent men buried in their own countries, 
 but most (even without any compulsion) have themselves 
 weighed anchor, and transferred their course, and removed, 
 some to Athens, some from it. For who ever bestowed 
 such encomium upon his country as Euripides did in the 
 following lines ? 
 
 " First we are not a race brought in from other parts, 
 
 But are indigenous, when all other cities 
 
 Are, draughts-men like, transferred from place to place, 
 
 And are imported from elsewhere. And, lady. 
 
 If it is not beside the mark to boast, 
 
 We have above us a well-tempered sky, 
 
 A climate not too hot, nor yet too cold. 
 
 And all the finest things in Greece or Asia 
 
 We do procure as an attraction here." ^ 
 
 And yet the author of these lines went to Macedonia, and 
 lived all the latter part of his life at the court of Archelaus. 
 And of course you have heard the following epitaph ; 
 
 " Here lies Euphorion's son, Athenian JEschylus, 
 To whom death came in «orn-producing Gela." 
 
 For he, like Simonides before him, went to Sicily. And 
 many have changed the commencing words of Herodotus, 
 " This is the setting forth of the history of Herodotus 
 of Halicarnassus " into "Herodotus of Thurii." For he 
 migrated to Thurii, and participated in that colony. As to 
 the divine and sacred spirit of the Muses, the poet of the 
 Trojan war. Homer, did not many cities claim him as theirs, 
 because he did not cry up one city only ? And Hospitable 
 Zeus has many great honours. 
 
 ^ Euripides, Fragm. 960. 
 
ON EXILE. 389 
 
 § xiY. And if anyone shall say that these pursued glory 
 and honour, go to the philosophers, and their schools and 
 lectures, consider those at the Lyceum, the Academy, the 
 Porch, the Palladium, the Odeum. If you admire and 
 prefer the Peripatetic school, Aristotle was a native of 
 Stagira, Theophrastus of Eresus, Strato of Lampsacus, 
 Glyco of Troas, Aristo of Ceos, Critolaus of Phaselis. If 
 you prefer the Stoic school, Zeno was a native of Cittium, 
 Cleanthes of Assus, Chrysippus of Soli, Diogenes of Baby- 
 lon, Antipater of Tarsus ; and the Athenian Archidemus 
 migrated to the country of the Parthians, and left at 
 Babylon a succession of the Stoic school. Who exiled 
 these men ? Nobody ; it was their own pursuit of quiet, 
 of which no one who is famous or powerful can get much 
 at home, that made them teach us this by their practice, 
 while they taught us other things by their precepts. And 
 even nowadays most excellent and renowned persons live 
 in strange lands, not in consequence of being expelled or 
 banished, but at their own option, to avoid business and 
 distracting cares, and the want of leisure which their own 
 country would bring them. For it seems to me that the 
 Muses aided our old writers to complete their finest and 
 most esteemed works by calling in exile as a fellow-worker. 
 Thus Thucydides the Athenian wrote the history of the 
 war between the Peloponnesians and the Athenians in 
 Thrace near the forest of Scapte, Xenophon wrote at 
 Scillus in Elis, Philistus in Epirus, Timaeus of Taurome- 
 nium at Athens, Androtion of Athens at Megara, and 
 Bacchylides the poet ^ in Peloponnesus. All these and 
 many more, though exiled from their country, did not 
 despair or give themselves up to dejection, but so happy 
 was their disposition that they considered exile a resource 
 given them by fortune, whereby they obtained universal 
 fame after their deaths, whereas no memorial is left of those 
 who were factious against them and banished them. 
 
 § XY. He therefore is ridiculous who thinks that any 
 ignominy attaches itself to exile. What say you ? Was Dio- 
 genes without glory, whom Alexander saw basking in the 
 sun, and stopped to ask if he wanted anything, and when he 
 
 ^ Reiske suggests BaKxv\idr]g 6 Kelog. A very probable suggestion. 
 
390 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 answered, " Nothing, but that yon would get a little out 
 of my light," Alexander, astonished at his spirit, said to 
 his friends, " If I were not Alexander, I would be Dio- 
 genes." Was Camillus without glory when banished from 
 Rome, of which he is now accounted the second founder ? 
 And indeed Themistocles did not lose by his exile the glory 
 he had obtained among the Greeks, but he added to it 
 among the barbarians, and there is no one so without 
 honour, so ignoble, who would prefer to be Leobates who 
 indicted him rather than Themistocles the exile, or Clodius 
 who banished Cicero rather than the banished one, or 
 Aristophon the accuser rather than Timotheus who got 
 driven by him from his country. 
 
 § XYi. But since a good many are moved by the lines of 
 Euripides, who seems to bring a strong indictment against 
 exile, let us see what it is he says in each question and 
 answer about it. 
 
 Jocasta. What is't to be an exile ? Is it grievous ? 
 Polynices. Most grievous, and in deed worse than in vfoxA. 
 Jocasta. What is its aspect ? What is hard for exiles? 
 Polynices. This is the greatest, that they have no freedom. 
 Jocasta. This is a slave's life not to speak one's thoughts ! 
 Polynices. Then one must put up with one's masters' follies.^ 
 
 But this is not a right or true estimate.'-^ For first of all, 
 not to say out all one thinks is not the action of a slave 
 but of a sensible man, in times and matters that require 
 reticence and silence, as Euripides himself has said else- 
 where better, 
 
 *' Be silent where 'tis meet, speak where 'tis safe." 
 
 Then as for the follies of one's masters, one has to put up 
 with them just as much in one's own country as in exile. 
 Indeed, more frequently have the former reason to fear 
 that the powerful in cities will act unjustly to them either 
 through calumny or violence. But his greatest and ab- 
 surdest error is that he takes away from exiles freedom of 
 speech. It is wonderful, if Theodorus had no freedom of 
 speech, that when Lysimachus the king said to him, "Did 
 
 » Euripides, " Phoenissae," 388-393. 
 
 ^ Omitting Trpwrwf , which probably got in from irputrov following, and 
 for which Reiske conjectured up(^g w£. 
 
ON EXILE. 391 
 
 not your country cast you out because of your character ? " 
 replied, " Yes, as Semele cast out Dionysus, when unable 
 to bear him any longer." And when he showed him 
 Telesphorus in a cage,^ with his eyes scooped out, and his 
 nose and ears and tongue cut off, and said to him, " This is 
 how I treat those that act ill to me." * *^ And had not 
 Diogenes freedom of speech, who, when he visited Philip's 
 camp just as he was on the eve of offering battle to the 
 Greeks, and was taken before the king as a spy, told him 
 he had come to see his insatiable folly, who was going 
 shortly to stake his dominions and life on a mere die. 
 And did not Hannibal the Carthaginian use freedom of 
 speech to Antiochus, though he was an exile, and Antiochus 
 a king ? For as a favourable occasion presented itself he 
 urged the king to attack the enemy, and when after sacri- 
 fice he reported that the entrails forbade it, Hannibal 
 chided him and said, " You listen rather to what flesh tells 
 you than to the instruction of a man of experience." Nor 
 does exile deprive geometricians or grammarians of their 
 freedom of speech, or prevent their discussing what they 
 know and have learnt. Why should it then good and 
 worthy men ? It is meanness everywhere that stops a 
 man's speech, ties and gags his tongue, and forces him to 
 be silent. But what are the next lines of Euripides ? 
 
 Jocasta. Hopes feed the hearts of exiles, so they say. 
 Folynices. Hopes have a flattering smile, but still delay. ^ 
 
 But this is an accusation against folly rather than exile. 
 For it is not those who have learnt and know how to enjoy 
 the present, but those who ever hang on the future, and 
 hone after what they have not, that float as it were on 
 hope as on a raft, though they never get beyond the walls.* 
 
 Jocasta. But did your father's friends do nothing for you ? 
 Folynices. Be fortunate ! Friends are no use in trouble. 
 Jocasta. Did not your good birth better your condition ? 
 Folynices. 'Tis bad to want. Birth brought no bread to me.' 
 
 ^ Such as Cardinal Balue was shut up by Louis XI. in for fourteen 
 years. 
 
 ^ The answer of Theodoras is wanting, 
 3 Euripides, " Phoenissai," 396, 397. 
 * That is, they never get any further. 
 ^ Euripides, " Phoenissse," 402-405. 
 
392 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 But it was ungratefal in Polynices thus to rail against 
 exile as discrediting his good birth and robbing him of 
 friends, for it was on account of his good birth that he was 
 deemed worthy of a royal bride though an exile, and he 
 came to fight supported by a band of friends and alUes, a 
 great force, as he himself admits a little later, 
 
 " Many of the princes of the Danai 
 And from Mycenae are with me, bestowing 
 A sad but necessary kindness on me." ^ 
 
 Kor was there any more justice in the lament of his 
 
 mother : — 
 
 " I never lit for you the nuptial torch 
 In marriage customary, nor did Ismenus 
 Furnish you with the usual solemn bath." ^ 
 
 She ought to have been pleased and content to hear that 
 her son dwelt in such a palace as that at Argos, and in 
 lamenting that the nuptial torch was not lit, and that he 
 had not had the usual bath in the river Ismenus, as though 
 there was no water or fire at Argos for wedded people, she 
 lays on exile the evils really caused by pride and stupidity. 
 § XVII. But exile, you will say, is a matter of reproach. 
 It may he among fools, who also jeer at the beggar, the 
 bald man, the dwarf, aye, and even the stranger and resi- 
 dent alien. But those who are not carried away in that 
 manner admire good men, whether they are poor, or 
 strangers or exiles. Do we not see that all men adore the 
 temple of Theseus as well as the Parthenon and Eleusi- 
 nium ? And yet Theseus was an exile from Athens, though 
 it was owing to him that Athens is now inhabited, and he 
 was banished from a city which he did not merely dwell in, 
 but had himself built. And what glory is left to Eleusis, 
 if we are ashamed of Eumolpus, who migrated from 
 Thrace, and taught the Greeks (as he still teaches them) 
 the mysteries ? And who was the father of Codrus that 
 reigned at Athens ? Was it not Melanthus, an exile from 
 Messene ? And do you not praise the answer of Antis- 
 thenes to the person who told him that his mother was a 
 Phrygian, " So also is the mother of the gods." If you 
 
 ^ Euripides, " PhoenissPe," 43,0-432. ^ j^j^j^ 344-346. 
 
ON EXILE. 393 
 
 are twitted then with exile, why do you not answer, " The 
 father of the glorious victor Hercules was an exile." 
 And Cadmus, the grandfather of Dionysus, when he was 
 sent from home to find Europa, and never came back, 
 ''though aPhcenician born he changed his country," ^ and 
 migrated to Thebes, and became' the grandfather of 
 " Dionysus, who rejoices in the cry of Evoe, the exciter of 
 women, who delights in frantic honours." As for what 
 ^schylus obscurely hints at in the line, 
 
 "Apollo the chaste god, exile from heaven," 
 
 let me keep a religious silence, as Herodotus^ says. And 
 Empedocles commences his system of philosophy as fol- 
 lows, " It is an ordinance of necessity, an ancient decree of 
 the gods, when anyone stains his hands with crime and 
 murder, the long-lived demons get hold of him, so that he 
 wanders away from the gods for thirty thousand years. 
 Such is my condition now, that of an exile and wanderer 
 from the gods." In these words he not only speaks of 
 himself, but points out that all of us men similarly are 
 strangers and. foreigners and exiles in this world. For he 
 says, " men, it is not blood or a compounded spirit that 
 made the being or beginning of the soul, but it is your 
 earth-born and mortal body that is made up of these." 
 He calls speciously by the mildest of names the birth of 
 the soul that has come from elsewhere a living in a strange 
 country. But the truth is the soul is an exile and wan- 
 derer, being driven about by the divine decrees and laws, 
 and then, as in some sea-girt island, gets joined to the 
 body like an oyster to its shell, as Plato says, because it 
 cannot call to mind or remember from what honour and 
 greatness of happiness it migrated, not from Sardis to 
 Athens, nor from Corinth to Lemnos or Scyros, but ex- 
 changing heaven and the moon for earth and life upon 
 earth, if it shifts from place to place for ever so short 
 a time it is put out and feels strange, and fades away like 
 a dying plant. But although one soil is more suitable to a 
 
 ^ Reading xQovbg. " Sic mutandum censet Valckenarius."— Wytten- 
 hach. 
 
 2 Through his daughter Semele. ^ Herodotus, ii. 171. 
 
394 
 
 PLUTARCH S MORALS. 
 
 plant than another, and it thrives and grows better on 
 such a soil, yet no situation can rob a man of his happiness 
 or virtue or sense. It was in prison that Anaxagoras wrote 
 his squaring of the circle, and that Socrates, even after 
 drinking the hemlock, talked philosophically, and begged 
 his friends to be philosophers, and was esteemed happy by 
 them. On the other hand, Phaethon and Tantalus, though 
 they got up to heaven, fell into the greatest misfortunes 
 through their folly, as the poets tell us. 
 
 ON FORTUNE. 
 
 § I. " Fortune, not wisdom, rules the affairs of mortals."^ 
 And does not justice, and fairness, and sobriety, and 
 decorum rule the affairs of mortals ? Was it of fortune or 
 owing to fortune that Aristides persevered in his poverty, 
 when he might have been lord of much wealth ? And that 
 Scipio after taking Carthage neither saw nor received any 
 of the spoil ? Was it of fortune or owing to fortune that 
 Philocrates spent on harlots and fish the money he had 
 received from Philip ? And that Lasthenes and Euthy- 
 crates lostOlynthus, measuring happiness by their belly and 
 lusts ? Was it of fortune that Alexander the son of Philip 
 not only himself abstained from the captive women, but 
 punished others that outraged them ? Was it under the 
 influence of an evil genius and fortune that Alexander,^ the 
 son of Priam, intrigued with the wife of his host and ran 
 away with her, and filled two continents with war and 
 evils ? For if all these things are due to fortune, what 
 hinders our saying that cats and goats and apes are under 
 the influence of fortune in respect of greediness, and lust, 
 and ribaldry ? 
 
 § II. And if there are such things as sobriety and justice 
 and fortitude, with what reason can we deny the existence 
 of prudence, and if prudence exists, how can we deny the 
 existence of wisdom ? For sobriety is a kind of prudence, 
 
 ^ A line from Chaeremon. ^ Better known as Paris. 
 
ON FORTUNE. 395 
 
 as people say, and justice also needs the presence of pru- 
 dence. Nay more, we call the wisdom and prudence that 
 makes people good in regard to pleasure self-control and 
 sobriety, and in dangers and hardships endurance and for- 
 titude, and in dealings between man and man and in public 
 life equity and justice. And so, if we are to ascribe to for- 
 tune the acts of wisdom, let us ascribe justice and sobriety 
 to fortune also, aye, and let ns put down to fortune 
 stealing, and picking pockets, and lewdness, and let us bid 
 farewell to argument, and throw ourselves entirely on for- 
 tune, as if we were, like dust or refuse, borne along and 
 hurried away by a violent wind. For if there be no 
 wisdom, it is not likely that there is any deliberation or 
 investigation of matters, or search for expediency, but 
 Sophocles only talked nonsense when he said, 
 
 " Whate'er is sought is found, what is neglected 
 Escapes our notice ;"^ 
 
 and again in dividing human affairs, 
 
 " What can be taught I learn, what can be found out 
 
 Duly investigate, and of the gods 
 
 I ask for what is to be got by prayer." ^ 
 
 For what can be found out or learnt by men, if everything 
 is due to fortune ? And what deliberative assembly of a 
 state is not annulled, what council of a king is not abro- 
 gated, if all things are subject to fortune ? whom we abuse 
 as blind because we ourselves are blind in our dealings 
 with her. Indeed, how can it be otherwise, seeing that we 
 repudiate wisdom, which is like plucking out our eyes, and 
 take a blind guide of our lives ? 
 
 § iiT. Supposing any of us were to assert that seeing is a 
 matter of fortune, not of eyesight, nor of the eyes that give 
 light, as Plato says, and that hearing is a matter of for- 
 tune, and not the imbibing of a current of air through the 
 ear and brain, it would be well for us then to be on our 
 guard against the evidence of our senses. But indeed 
 
 ^ " (Edipus Tyrannus," 110, 111. Wyttenbach compares Terence, 
 " Heanton Timorumenos," 675. " Nil tam difficilest, quin quaerendo 
 investigari possiet." 
 
 2 Soph., Frag. 723. 
 
396 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 nature has given us sight and hearing and taste and smell, 
 and all other parts of the body and their functions, as 
 ministers of wisdom and prudence. For " it is the mind 
 that sees, and the mind that hears, everything else is deaf 
 a.nd blind." And just as, if there were no sun, we should 
 have perpetual night for all the stars, as Heraclitus says, 
 •so man for all his senses, if he had no mind or reason, 
 would be little better than the beasts. But as it is, it is 
 not by fortune or chance that we are superior to them and 
 masters of them, but Prometheus, that is reason, is the 
 •cause of this, 
 
 '* Presenting us with bulls, horses, and asses, 
 To ease us of our toil, and serve instead," 
 
 as ^schylus says.^ For as to fortune and natural condi- 
 tion, most of the beasts are better off than we are. For 
 some are armed with horns and tusks and stings, and as 
 for the hedgehog, as Empedocles says, it h?s its back all 
 rough with sharp bristles, and some are shod and pro- 
 tected by scales and fur and talons and hoofs worn smooth 
 by use, whereas man alone, as Plato says, is left by nature 
 naked, unarmed, unshod, and uncovered. But by one gift, 
 that of reason and painstaking and forethought, nature 
 compensates for all these deficiencies. " Small indeed is 
 the strength of man, but by the versatility of his intellect 
 he can tame the inhabitants of the sea, earth, and air.""^ 
 Nothing is more agile and swift than horses, yet they run 
 for man ; the dog is a courageous and high-spirited crea- 
 ture, yet it guards man ; fish is most pleasant to the taste, 
 the pig the fattest of all animals, yet both are food and 
 delicacies for man. What is huger or more formidable in 
 appearance than the elephant ? Yet it is man's plaything, 
 and a spectacle at public shows, and learns to dance and 
 kneel. And all these things are not idly introduced, but to 
 the end that they may teach ns to what heights reason 
 raises man, and what things it sets him above, and how it 
 makes him master of everything. 
 
 ' ^schylus, Fragm. 180. Reading dvTidovXa with Reiske and the 
 MSS. 
 
 ■■^ Euripides, " jEoIus," Fragm. 27. 
 
ON FORTUNE. 397 
 
 " For we are not good boxers, nor good wrestlers, 
 Nor yet swift runners," ^ 
 
 for in all these points we are less fortunate than the beasts. 
 But bj our experience and memory and wisdom and 
 cunning, as Anaxagoras says, we make use of them, and 
 get their honey and milk, and catch them, and drive and 
 lead them abont at our will. And there is nothing of 
 fortune in this, it is all the result of wisdom and fore- 
 thought. 
 
 § IV. Moreover the labours of carpenters and copper- 
 smiths and house-builders and statue-makers are affairs of 
 mortals, and we see that no success in such trades is got 
 by fortune or chance. For that fortune plays a very small 
 part in the life of a wise man, whether coppersmith or 
 house-builder, and that the greatest works are wrought by 
 art alone, is shown by the poet in the following lines : — 
 
 " All handicraftsmen go into the street, 
 
 Ye that with fan-shaped baskets worship Ergane, 
 
 Zeus' fierce-eyed daughter ; " ^ 
 
 for Ergane'^ and Athene, and not Fortune, do the trades 
 regard as their patrons. They do indeed say that Nealces,^ 
 on one occasion painting a borse, was quite satisfied with 
 his painting in all other respects, but that some foam on 
 the bridle from the horse's breath, did not please him, so 
 that he frequently tried to rub it out ; at last in his anger 
 he threw his sponge (just as it was, full of colours) at the 
 picture, and this very wonderfully produced exactly the 
 effect he desired. This is the only fortunate accident in art 
 that history records. Artificers everywhere use rules and 
 weights and measures, that none of their work may be done 
 at random and anyhow. And indeed the arts may be con- 
 sidered as wisdom on a small scale, or rather as emanations 
 from and fragments of wisdom scattered about among the 
 
 1 Homer, " Odyssey," viii. 246, 247. 
 
 2 Soph., Frag. 724. 
 
 3 " The Worker." Generally a title of Athene, as Pausanias, i. 24 ; 
 iii. 17 ; v. 14 ; vi, 26 ; viii. 32 ; ix. 26. Gataker thinks kuI tyjv should 
 be expunged. Hercher omits koi Tr)v 'AOrivdv altogether. 
 
 ^ So Hercher after Madvig. See Pliny, " Hist. Nat.," xxxv. 36, 20. 
 
398 Plutarch's morals. 
 
 necessities of life ; as the fire of Prometheus is riddled to 
 have been divided and scattered about in all quarters of 
 the world. For thus small particles and fragments of 
 wisdom, breaking up as it were and getting divided into 
 pieces, have formed into order. 
 
 § V. It is strange then that the arts do not require fortune 
 to attain to their ends, and yet that the most important 
 and complete of all the arts, the sum total of man's glory 
 and merit, should be so completely powerless. Why, there 
 is a kind of wisdom even in the tightening or slackening of 
 chords, which people call music, and in the dressing of 
 food, which we call the art of cooking, and in cleaning 
 clothes, which we call the art of the fuller, and we teach 
 boys how to put on their shoes and clothes generally, and 
 to take their meat in the right hand and their bread in the 
 left, since none of these things come by fortune, but require 
 attention and care. And are we to suppose that the most 
 important things which make so much for happiness do 
 not call for wisdom, and have nothing to do with reason 
 and forethought ? Why, no one ever yet wetted earth 
 with water and then left it, thinking it would become 
 bricks by fortune and spontaneously, or procured wool and 
 leather, and sat down and prayed Fortune that it might 
 become clothes and shoes ; nor does anyone getting toge- 
 ther much gold and silver and a quantity of slaves, and 
 living in a spacious hall with many doors, and making a 
 display of costly couches and tables, believe that these 
 things will constitute his happiness, and give him a pain- 
 less happy life secure from changes, unless he be wise also. 
 A certain person asked the general Iphicrates in a scolding 
 way who he was, as he seemed neither a heavy-armed 
 soldier, nor a bowman, nor a targeteer, and he replied, " I 
 am the person who rule and make use of all these." 
 
 § VI. So wisdom is neither gold, nor silver, nor fame, 
 nor wealth, nor health, nor strength, nor beauty. What is 
 it then ? It is what can use all these well, and that by 
 means of which each of these things becomes pleasant and 
 esteemed and useful, and without which they are useless 
 and unprofitable and injurious, and a burden and disgrace 
 to their possessor. So Hesiod's Prometheus gives very 
 good advice to Epimetheus, "not to receive gifts from 
 
ON FORTUNE. 399 
 
 Olympian Zens bnt to send them back," ' meaning external 
 things and things of fortune. For as if he urged one who 
 knew nothing of music not to play on the pipe, or one who 
 knew nothing of letters not to read, or one who was not 
 used to horses not to ride, so he advised him not to take 
 office if he were foolish, nor to grow rich if he were 
 illiberal, nor to marry if likely to be ruled by his wife. 
 For success beyond their merit is to foolish persons a cause 
 of folly, as Demosthenes said,^ and good fortune beyond 
 their merit is to those who are not sensible a cause of mis- 
 fortune.^ 
 
 ^ Hesiod, " Works and Days," 86, 87. * " Olynth.," i. 23. 
 
 ^ The whole of this essay reminds one of the well-known lines of 
 Juvenal, twice repeated — namely, x. 365, 366 ; and xiv. 315, 316 : — 
 " Nullum numen habes, si sit prudentia ; nos te, 
 Nos facimus, Fortuna, deaai caeloque locamus," 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abrotonus, 37. 
 
 Absence, the test of affection, 122. 
 
 Academy, the, 385. 
 
 Achilles, 5, 52, 102, 172, 187, 196, 
 
 200, 271, 290, 291, 301, 319. 
 Acropolis, statue of Lesena in the, 
 
 221. 
 Admetus, 52. 
 Adonis, 43, 852. 
 Adulter}', the fruit of curiosity, 
 
 245. Loveof change, 298. 
 ^schines, 17, 188, 285. 
 ^schylus, quoted or referred to, 
 
 33, 45, 47, 55, 61, 125, 126, 130, 
 
 176, 203, 205, 242, 271, 273, 
 
 385, 388, 393, 396. 
 ^sculapius, 244, 270. 
 -^sop, fables of alluded to, 72, 81, 
 
 88, 125, 142. 
 Agamemnon, 292, 300, 301. 
 Agathoclea, 37. 
 
 Agathocles, 278, 324, 325, 347. 
 Agave, 144. 
 Agesilaus, 129, 136, 161,166,262, 
 
 264,326. 
 Agis, 294. 
 Aglaonice, her knowledge of 
 
 eclipses, 83. 
 Ajax, 113, 347. 
 Alcaeus, 56, 59. 
 Alcestis, 53. 
 Alcibiades, 54, 128, 135, 160, 192, 
 
 294, 338. 
 Alcman, 379. 
 Alexander, the Great, 16, 50, 113, 
 
 124, 137, 151, 162, 172, 174, 
 
 184, 185, 195, 250, 270, 277, 
 
 280, 292, 301, 303, 314, 321, 
 
 389, 390, 394. 
 Alexinus, 266. 
 
 Ammonius, Plutarch's master, 1 94. 
 Amoebeiis, 102, 
 Amphictyones, 121, 230. 
 Anacharsis, 125, 219. 
 Anacreon, 33. 
 Anaxagoras, 136, 306, 373, 394, 
 
 397. 
 Anaxarchus, 107, 113, 253, 292. 
 Anger, how to restrain, 267-288. 
 A n i mals, appeal to,21-25. Useof, 
 
 202. 
 Answers, three different kinds of,, 
 
 234. 
 Anticyra, 284. 
 Antigonus, 16, 38, 222, 258, 263, 
 
 276, 278, 326, 370. 
 Antileon, 50. 
 Antimachus, poet, 234. 
 Antipater, 77, 124, 182, 237, 260, 
 
 297. 
 Antipatridas, 50. 
 Antiphanes, 125. 
 Antiphon, 189. 
 Antisthenes, 266. 
 Antony, 176. 
 Anytus, 54, 141. 
 Apelles, 10, 171,302. 
 Aphrodite, 34, 43, 44, 49, 76, 78, 
 
 80, 219. 
 Apollo, 154, 347, 377. 
 Araspes, 136. 
 Arcadio, 276. 
 Arcesilaus, 180, 283. 
 Archelaus, 258, 388. 
 
 D D 
 
402 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Arcbidamus, king, 2, 264. 
 
 Archilochus, 215, 247, 387. 
 
 Archytas,of Tarentum, 11,15, 336. 
 
 Ares, 44, 45, 47, 49. 
 
 Argus, 146. 
 
 Aristaeus (the Saint Hubert of the 
 
 Middle Ages), 45. 
 Aristides, 120, 136. 
 Aristippus, 6, 32, 93, 127, 128, 240, 
 
 285, 297. 
 Aristo, 98, 241. 
 Aristocrates, 322. 
 Aristogiton, 50, 67, 189, 220. 
 Aristomenes, the hero, 52. 
 Aristomenes, tutor of Ptolemy 
 
 Epiphanes, 195. 
 Aristonica, 37. 
 Aristophanes, 15, 27, 43, 93, 195, 
 
 241. 
 Aristotle, 100, 101, 110, 124, 162, 
 
 215, 270, 278, 281, 303, 326, 386. 
 Arisinoe, sisterand wife of Ptolemy 
 
 Philadelphus, 16. 
 Artemis, 367. 
 Asopicbus, 52. 
 
 Ass-driver, story of Athenian, 282. 
 Athene, ornament of, 366. Athene 
 
 and the Satyr, 273. Athene 
 
 Chalcioecus, 228. Called Er- 
 
 gane, 397. 
 Atnenians, oracle given to the, 367. 
 Attis, 43. 
 
 Augustus, 189, 224, 225. 
 Aulis, famous for earthenware, 
 
 366. 
 
 Bacehis, 37. 
 
 Barbers, a talkative race, 226, 227. 
 
 Baxter, Kichard, and Plutarch, 
 Preface, viii, note. 
 
 Belestiche, 38. 
 
 B«5llerophon, 246, 255. 
 
 Bessus, story about, 341. 
 
 Bias, 176, 217, 332. 
 
 Bion, 10, 67, 132, 172, 258, 354. 
 
 Bocehoris, 255. 
 
 Books, value of, 12. 
 
 Boys, not to be overworked, 13. 
 To be taught to speak the truth, 
 16. Love of, 17, 31, 33-35, 50, 
 51, 52, 54, 61, 64, 65, 67. 
 
 Brasidas, 120, 126, 331. 
 Briareus, 146, 150, 299. 
 Brides, custom of in Boeotia, 70, 71. 
 Custom of at Leptis in Libya, 79. 
 
 Caenous, his change of sex, 120. 
 
 Csesar, Julius, 210. 
 
 Callimachus, 272, 385. 
 
 Callisthenes, 270. 
 
 Callixenus, 141. 
 
 Camma, story about, 63, 64. 
 
 Carneades, 172, 235, 237, 306, 
 
 310. 
 Cassander, 256, 339, 351. 
 Cassandra, 347. 
 Cato, 48, 72, 211, 212, 263, .325, 
 
 369. 
 Cebes, 17. 
 Cephisocrates, 181. 
 Cephisodorus, 52. 
 Ceramicus, at Athens, 219, 259. 
 Cestus of Aphrodite, 76, 219. 
 Chseron, son of Plutarch, 87. 
 Chseron, and Chaeronea, 238. 
 Chseroiiea, Plutarch's native place, 
 
 238. 
 Chalcis, people of, 51. 
 Chameleon, 158, 162. 
 Character, moral, 102. 
 Childless, paid court to, 28. 
 Chilo, 151, 202. 
 Chrysippus, 44, 99, 110, 113, 114, 
 
 115. 
 Cicero, 210, 318, 320,390. 
 Cimon, father of Miltiades, 27, 52. 
 Claudia, 84. 
 Cleanthes, 370. 
 Clearchus, 191. 
 Cleomachus, 51. 
 Cleonice, 343, 344. 
 Clitus, 113, 195,277. 
 Clodius, 231,232. 
 Clytsemnestra, dream of, 343. 
 Conjugal constancy, 81. Conjugal 
 
 precepts, 70-84. 
 Contentedness of mind, on, 289- 
 
 311. 
 Contracts, 139. 
 Corax, 352. 
 
 Cornelia, sister of Scipio, 84. 
 Correction of servants, 279-281. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 403 
 
 Crassus, 207, 208. 
 
 Crates, 76, 141. 191, 203, 292, 
 
 328, 370, 372. 
 Creon, his daughter, 151, 
 Crete, 202. 
 Crisso, 172, 
 CrcEsns, 171, 192. 
 Ctesiphon, 275. 
 Curiosity, 238-252. 
 Cybele, 47, 55, 82, 379. 
 Cyclades, 385. 
 Cynic, story about, 258. 
 Cynosarges, 32, note, 
 Cyrus, 79, 236, 250, 314, 326. 
 
 Danaus, 27. 
 
 Darius, 157, 250. 
 
 Deity, on those who are punished 
 
 late by the, 331-365. 
 Demaratus, 193. 
 Demetrius, 8, 191, 230. 
 Democritus, 14, 110, 129, 142,249, 
 
 377. 
 Demosthenes, 9, 128, 192, 205, 
 
 257, 259, 320, 321, 323, 331, 
 
 399. 
 Diogenes, 2, 7, 93, 118, 123, 124, 
 
 127, 131, 140, 141, 193, 201, 
 
 203, 205, 248, 258, 259, 282, 
 
 292, 294, 301, 311, 383, 388, 
 
 389, 390,391. 
 Dion, 11, 151, 161, 162, 192, 256. 
 Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, 
 
 76, 151, 160, 161, 162, 163, 168, 
 
 187, 188, 189, 226, 230, 261, 
 
 294, 321, 339. 
 Dionysius, a Corinthian poet, 51. 
 Dionysus (the Latin Bacchm), 45, 
 
 47, 91, 145, 393. 
 Dioxippus, 248. 
 ])isease, the sacred, 41, note. 
 Disorders, of mind or body, which 
 
 worse? 142, 145. 
 Dolon, 113, 120. 
 Domitian, 251. 
 Domitius, 207, 211. 
 Dorian measure, 134. 
 Drink, 2, 216, 217, 284. 
 Dryads, 45. 
 
 Earthenware, 366. 
 
 Education, 1-21. 
 
 Egyptian, answer of an, 240. 
 
 Emerson, on Plutarch, see Title- 
 page, and Preface, p. ix. 
 
 Empedocles, 43, 145, l49, 180, 
 288, 305, 371, 393, 396. 
 
 Empone, her devotion to her hus- 
 band, 67-69. 
 
 Enemies, how a man may be bene- 
 fited by his, 201-213. 
 
 Enthusiasm, 47. 
 
 Envy, 212, 213, 243, 304. On 
 envy and hatred, 312-315, How- 
 one can praise oneself without 
 exciting envy, 315-331. 
 
 Epaminondas, 11, 52, 136, 161, 
 294, 318, 321, 326, 376. 
 
 Ephesus, 367. 
 
 Ephorus, 236. 
 
 Epicharmus, 188, 189, 350. 
 
 Epicureans, argued against, 21- 
 28, 373-378. 
 
 Epicurus, 24, 291, 306, 373, 375. 
 
 Epitaphs, 247, 248. 
 
 Erasistratus, 25, 244. 
 
 Ergane, name of Athene, 397. 
 
 Eumenes, 222. 
 
 Euphemism, 112, 143, 144, 167. 
 
 Euphorion, 303. 
 
 Eupolis, 163. 
 
 Euripides, quoted or referred to, 1, 
 8, 9, 14, 17, 27, 28, 40, 42, 43, 
 44,50,53,56,58, 60,67,79,80, 
 86, 89, 107, 112. 119, 136, 138, 
 144, 146, 150, 151, 152, 155, 
 160, 170, 178, 179, 182, 190, 
 191, 194, 196, 197, 199, 205, 
 206, 207, 209, 214, 216, 222, 
 223, 236, 247, 251, 255, 256, 
 260, 261, 262, 270, 287, 290, 
 292, 293, 301, 305, 307, 309, 
 310, 315, 325, 332, 333, 334, 
 345, 346, 373, 379, 383, 388, 
 390, 391, 392, 397. 
 
 Eurydice of Hierapolis, 21. 
 
 Eurydice, wife of Orpheus, 53. 
 
 Euthydemus, 283. 
 
 Eutropio, cook toKing Antigonus, 
 16. 
 
 Evenus, sayings of, 27, 155. 
 
 Exei-cise, value of, 12. 
 
404 
 
 Exile, 378-394. 
 
 Fabius Maximus, 224, 225. 
 
 Fabricius, 294. 
 
 Family, defects and idiosyncrasies 
 of, 356, 357. 
 
 Fancy, power of, 307. 
 
 Fathers, not to be too strict, 20, 
 To set a good example to their 
 sons, 20, 21. The Jics trium 
 liberorum, 22. Saying of Evenus 
 about fathers, 27. 
 
 Favour, the, 33, 34. Reminding of 
 favoui's unpleasant, 181. 
 
 Feast, every day a, 311. 
 
 Fickleness, 146. 
 
 Flatterers, 19. Saying of Phocion 
 about, 77, 182. How to be dis- 
 cerned from friends, 153-201. 
 
 Flute-girls at marriages, 40, 
 
 Fortune, not to be railed at, 89-91. 
 Fortune's rope-dance, 139. For- 
 tune and vice, 140, 141. Un 
 Fortune, 394-399. 
 
 Freedom of speech, 185-201. 
 
 Friends, on abundance of, 1 45-153. 
 Friendship going in pairs, 146, 
 147. Originated by similarity, 
 152, 158, 159. How friends are 
 to be distinguished from flat- 
 terers, 153-201, 
 
 Galba, story about, 49. 
 
 Geese, ingenuity of, 229. 
 
 Germanicus, idiosyncrasy of, 312. 
 
 Glaucus, son of Epicydes, 353. 
 
 Gobryas, 157. 
 
 Gods considered as forces, 44, 302. 
 Perform their benefits secretly, 
 181. 
 
 Gorgias, 81. 
 
 Gorgo, wife of Leonidas, 84, 
 
 Gracchus, 273. 
 
 Great, the, especially open to flat- 
 terers, 184, 185. 
 
 Grief, immoderate at death to be 
 avoided, 86, 87, 88. Unexpected 
 grief worst, 113, 306. 
 
 Gylippus, 15, 
 
 Habit, force of, 3, 4, 337. 
 
 Hannibal, remark of, 391. 
 
 Happiness, the mind the aeatof, 95. 
 
 Hares, 368. 
 i Harmodius, 67, 189, 220. 
 
 Hatred, and envy, 312-315. 
 j Hegesias, 28, 
 j Helicon, Mount, 29, 30. 
 i Helots, 272, 
 j Hemlock, how affected by wine,228. 
 
 Heraclea, 343, 
 
 Heraclitus, 41, 93, 231, 276, 350, 
 387, 396, 
 
 Hercules, 39, 52, 299, 321, 347. 
 348, 352. 
 
 Heredity, 1, 2,351, 355. 
 
 Hermes, his functions, 46, ]*ro- 
 verbial saying about, 215, 
 
 Herodotus, 72, 94, 141, 157, 171, 
 192, 299, 367,388, 393. 
 
 Herophilus, 244. 
 
 Herrick, and Plutarch, ,st^ Preface, 
 viii, 288, note, 
 
 Hesiod, quoted or alluded to, 14, 
 36, 44, 96, 121, 123, 155, 180, 
 212, 256, 261, 290, 304, 341, 
 355, 398, 399, 
 
 Hiero, 209, 338. 
 
 Hieronymus, 271, 281. 
 
 Hipparchus, dream of, 343. 
 
 Hippocrates, 132, 237, 238, 
 
 Hippothorus, a tune, 70, 
 
 Homer, alluded to or quoted, 16, 
 23,24,26,33,44,45,48,52,54, 
 55, 56, 61, 65, 66, 71, 75, 76, 
 80, 83, 91, 95, 101, 102, 108, 
 110, 113, 117, 118, 122, 127, 
 128, 130, 132, 138, 139, 142, 
 147, 149, 160, 161, 165, 170, 
 172, 176, 179, 187, 192, 195, 
 196, 197, 199, 200, 204, 209, 
 216, 217, 218, 219, 221, 222, 
 223, 226, 227, 235, 239, 246, 
 247, 254, 268, 270, 271, 272, 
 281, 283, 284, 290, 291, 292, 
 .300, 301, 302, 304, 307, 308, 
 309, 313, 318, 319, 322, 323, 
 324, 326, 327, 329, 340, 341, 
 347, 352, 368, 369, 372. 378, 
 385, 386, 387, 398, 397. 
 
 Hypei'ides, 187, 
 
 Hypsipyle, her foster-child, 146. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 405 
 
 Ibyciis, story about, 228. 
 Idfean Ditctyli, 136. 
 Ignorance of self, 143. 
 Imagination, power of, 101, 102. 
 Indian wives, 140. Indian sages, 
 
 140, 141. 
 Infants, death of, 92. 
 lolaus, nephew of Hercules, 39, 52. 
 Iphicrates, answer of, 94, 398. 
 
 Knowledge of self, 154, 185, 207, 
 302. 
 
 Labour, its power, 3. 
 
 Lacydes, friend of Arcesilaus, 181. 
 
 Lacydes, king of the Argives, 208. 
 
 Lais, famous courtesan, 32, 49, 
 63. 
 
 Law, martial, 21 1. 
 
 Leaena. her hei'oism, 220, 221. 
 
 Lemnos, the women of, 41. 
 
 Leo of Byzantium, saying of, 206. 
 
 Life, the three kinds of, 11. Like 
 a game at dice, 293. Chequered, 
 305. " Live unknown," whether 
 a wise precept, 373-378. 
 
 Litigation, evil effects of, 145. 
 
 Livia, wife of Augustus, 225. 
 
 Liver, the seat of desire, 1 15. 
 
 Locrians, custom of the, 347. 
 
 Locris, authorities of, 245. 
 
 Love, to one's offspring, 21-28. On 
 love generally, 29-69. God of 
 Love, his festival at Thespise, 
 29, 63. Pandemian and Celestial 
 love, 57. No strong love without 
 jealousy, 135. Lovers admire 
 even the defects of their loves, 
 136, 167, 168, 209, 213. Love 
 blind, 153. 
 
 Loxias, name of Apollo, meaning 
 of, 231. 
 
 Lyciscus,332, 333. 
 
 Lycurgus, 3, 136, 230, 320. 
 
 Lydiades, 238. 
 
 Lydian measure, 134. Lydian pro- 
 duce, 145. 
 
 Lynceus, 203. 
 
 Lysander, 76, 262. 
 
 Lysias, 218. 
 
 L}simache, 263. 
 
 Lysimachus, king, 225, 241, 344, 
 390, 391. 
 
 Maecenas, 49. 
 
 Magas, 113, 276, 27 7. 
 
 Man, his wretchedness, 26, 142. 
 Different views of men, 114. 
 Man's various idiosyncrasies and 
 fortunes, 149. 
 
 Marriage, 20,31-39, 63-69. Hesiod 
 on the proper age for marriage, 
 36. No Meum and Txmm to 
 exist in marriage, 62, 74, 75. 
 Mutual respect a vital necessity 
 in marriage, 62. Conjugal Pre- 
 cepts, 70-84. 
 
 Marsyas, 273. 
 
 Means, various kinds of, 104, 105. 
 
 Measures, Dorian and Lydian, 134. 
 
 Median war, 367. 
 
 Medius, 184, 303. 
 
 Megabyzus, 171,302. 
 
 Megara, wife of Hercules, 39. 
 
 Megarians, their sacritice to Posei- 
 don, 133. 
 
 Melanippus, 50. 
 
 Melanthius, 81, 336. 
 
 Meleager, 52. 
 
 Meletus, 120, 141. 
 
 Memory, the storehouse of learn- 
 ing, 14. 
 
 Menander, 55, 96, 114, 115, 146, 
 150, 164,173, 179,257,291,305, 
 307, 310, 330. 
 
 Menedemus, 98, 130, 165, 303. 
 
 Metageitnion, 382. 
 
 Metella, wife of Sulla, 219. 
 
 Metellus, 222, 277, 320. 
 
 Metrocles, 140,295. 
 
 Metrodorus, saying of, 77. 
 
 Mice, dislike to, 312. 
 
 Miltiades, the son of Cimon, 27, 
 135,338. 
 
 Mirrors of the ancients, 59, note. 
 Comparison of wives to miri'ors, 
 73. Proper use of the mirror, 
 76. Comparison of the flattei'er 
 to a mirror, 161. 
 
 Mithridates, 170, 219, 
 
 Money, against borrowing, 365- 
 373, 
 
406 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Montaigne, and Plutarch, Preface, 
 
 vii. 
 Mothers, to be carefully selected, 
 
 1 . To suckle their children, 4. i 
 Munychia, 38. I 
 
 Music, power of, 102. 
 Musonius, 370. 
 
 Nasica, saying of, 205. : 
 
 Nations, most warlike also most | 
 
 amorous, 52. 
 Natures, great, 338. j 
 
 Nealces, story about, 397. ! 
 
 Neglect, not liked, 150. j 
 
 Neocles, father of Themistocles, 
 
 27. 
 Nero, 151, 168, 175,220,284, 365. ! 
 Nicostratus, 49, 264. 
 Night, Greek word for, 249. 
 Ninus and Semiramis, 37, 38. 
 Niobe, 50, 
 No, saying, 255, 260, 262. 
 
 Ocnus, 304. 
 
 Odysseus, self-restraint of, 101, 
 
 2^,307. 
 (Edipus,28, 197, 250,251. 
 CEnanthe, 37. 
 Old age querulous, 329. 
 Olympia, remarkable portico at, 
 
 214. 
 Olympias, wife of King Philip, 75, 
 
 76. 
 Olynthus, 305. 
 
 Onomademus, wise advice of, 212. 
 Oratory, extempore and prepared, 
 
 9, 10, 128, Laconic oratory, 230. 
 Orpheus, 53. 
 
 Paley, F. A., on the Moralia, Pre- 
 face, vii. 
 Pan, 47. 
 Panthea, 136. 
 
 Parmenides, his Cosmogony, 44, 
 Parmenio, 151. 
 Parthian juice, 141. 
 Passions, difference in, 113, 114. 
 Patroclus, 172, 187, 319,325. 
 Pausanias and Cleonice, 343, 344. 
 Pederasty, see Boys, love of. 
 Perfection, not in mortals, 287. 
 
 Pericles, son of Xantbippus, 9, 1 1, 
 27, 258, 317, 323, 340, 349,366. 
 
 Perseus, 192, 193, 307. 
 
 Persia, kings of, 73, 124, 140, 382, 
 387, 
 
 Phaethon, 293, 347, 394. 
 
 Phalaris, 120,168,339. 
 
 Phayllus and his wife, 49, 50. 
 
 Phidias, 78. 
 
 Philip, King, 49, 50, 75, 80, 82, 
 188,193,230,247,276,277,384. 
 
 Philippides, comic poet, 32, 225, 
 241. 
 
 Philosophy, its importance, 1 1, 97, 
 98. Philosophers' dress, 129, 
 141, 160, 203. Birthplace of 
 various philosophers, 389. 
 
 Philotas, 151. 
 
 Phi lot im us, 198. 
 
 Philoxenus, 373. 
 
 Phocion, 77, 136, 182, 260, 280, 
 319, 327, 328. 
 
 Phocylides, 5. 
 
 Phcenix, tutor of Achilles, 5, 196. 
 
 Phryne, 38, 49. 
 
 Phrynis, 134. 
 
 Pindar, 33, 34, 45, 54, 116, 138, 
 183, 190, 205, 210, 212, 267, 
 275, 294, 302, 303, 310, 315, 
 316, 335, 339, 348, 355, 377, 
 384. 
 
 Pirithous, 151. 
 
 Piso, Pupius, story about, 231, 
 232. 
 
 Pittacus, 222, 300, 
 
 Plato, 2, 5, 7,8, 12, 15,17,27,29, 
 34, 47, 49, 62, 66, 74, 77, 82, 83, 
 93, 96, 99, 100, 106, 113, 114, 
 115, 118, 120, 125, 132, 135, 
 136, 153, 154, 157, 158, 160, 
 161, 162, 167, 187, 188, 192, 
 194, 196, 206, 209, 213, 220, 
 230, 255, 261, 264, 274, 286, 
 287, 293, 294, 306, 311, 334, 
 335, 336, 341, .342, 365, 385, 
 393, 395, 396. 
 
 Plutarch's wife, see Tiraoxena. 
 Polemo, 196, 285, 385. 
 Polycletus, 138. 
 Polypus, the, 152, 158, 161. 
 Polysperchon, 256, 261. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 407 
 
 Pompey, the Great, 208, 210, 340. 
 His fathei' Pompeius Strabo, 
 340. ■ 
 
 Portico, remarkable, 214. 
 
 Porus, 277. 
 
 Poseidon, 133. 
 
 Postumia, 208. 
 
 Praise of self, 315-331. 
 
 Proteus, 152. 
 
 Proverbs, 4, 5, 9, 14, 18, 19, 20, 
 49, 62, 75, 80,82, 121, 146, 147, 
 154, 157, 175, 183, 189, 212, 
 215, 217, 235, 260, 263, 306, 
 317, 333, 334, 341, 355, 369. 
 
 Ptolemy Auletes, 168. 
 
 Ptolemy Epiphanes, 195. 
 
 Ptolemy Philadelphus, 16. 
 
 Ptolemy Philopator, 168. 
 
 Ptolemy Physcon, 174. 
 
 Punishment, on those that receive 
 late punishment from the Deity, 
 331-365. 
 
 Puppies, differently trained, 3, 4. 
 
 Pydna, 192. 
 
 Pyrrho, saying of, 132. 
 
 Pythagoras, 2, 18, 19, 100, 151, 
 194,211, 240, 245, 383. 
 
 Pythian Priestess, 233, 367. 
 
 Season, power of, 101, 133,221, 
 
 289. 
 Kemorse, 344, 345. 
 Repartee, 206, 207. 
 liespites, 339. 
 Rusticus, 251. 
 Kutilius, 370. 
 
 Sabinus, story about, 67-69. 
 
 Sappho, 34, 55, 84, 130, 274. 
 
 Saturnalia, 311, note. 
 
 Satyr, story about the, 202, 203. 
 
 Scaurus, 211. 
 
 Scilurus, and the bundle of sticks, 
 231. 
 
 Scipio, 318. 
 
 Sejanus, 151. 
 
 Seleucus Callinicus, 226. 
 
 Self, love of, 153, 154, 301. Igno- 
 rance of, 143, Knowledge of, 
 154, 185, 207, 302. 
 
 Semiramis, 37, 38. 
 
 Senator, story about Roman, 223, 
 
 224. 
 Seneca, 284. 
 Sextius, 123. 
 Shyness, 252-267. 
 Silence, benefit of, 220-222, 230- 
 
 232, 237. 
 Siraonides, 23, 106, 108, 126, 135, 
 
 154, 183, 184, 212, 237, 246, 
 
 299, 344, 384. 
 Sinatus, 63, 64. 
 Sinorix, 63, 64. 
 
 Socrates, 2, 8, 15, 17, 54, 76, 136, 
 140, 145, 188, 192, 194, 196, 
 210, 232, 234, 235, 240, 250, 
 271, 277, 283, 292, 293, 299, 
 
 300, 308, 314, 336, 394. 
 Solon, 33, 34, 56, 124, 171, 192, 
 
 213,303,335,367. His legisla- 
 tion for husbands, 65. His direc- 
 j tion to brides, 70. 
 j Sophocles, quoted or referred to, 
 ' 3, 43, 44, 47, 49, 50, 53, 62,64, 
 76, 106, 122, 125, 134, 148, 
 150, 162, 197, 200, 207, 218, 
 ! 227, 232, 242. 249, 251, 255, 
 I 272, 278, 281, 286, 295, 319, 
 376, 395, 397. 
 Sotades, 16. 
 
 Speusippus, nephew of Plato, 15, 
 I 192, 196. 
 Step-ladders, 156. 
 Step-mothers, 79, note. 
 Stilpo, 8, 133, 266, 295, 308. 
 Stoics, 172, 254, 302. 
 Stratocles, 32. 
 
 Suicide, alwaj's possible, 309. 
 Sulla, 219, 322. 
 Sycophant, origin of word, 252. 
 
 Talkativeness, 214-238. 
 Tantalus, 49, 138, 385, 394. 
 Tavern-frequenting, 131, note. 
 Taylor, Jeremy, and Plutarch, 
 
 Preface, vii, viii, 84, note, 238, 
 
 note, 245, note, 288, note. 
 Telephus, 207. 
 Tenedos, famous for earthenware, 
 
 366. 
 Theano, wife of Pythagoras, 78, 
 
 84. 
 
408 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Thebans,and Lacedaemonians, 270. 
 
 Themistocles, and his son, 1, 2. 
 His father Neocles, 27. The- 
 mistocles and Miltiades, 135, 
 213, 338. Suspicion about, 208. 
 Sayings of, 264, 314, 320. 
 
 Theocritus, the Sophist, 16. 263. 
 
 Theodorus, 141,293, 327,390,391. 
 
 Thecignis, his advice, 152. 
 
 Theophrastus, 124, 327. 
 
 Thero, the Thessalian, 52. 
 
 Theseus, 151, 392. 
 
 Thespesius, of Soli, curious story 
 about, 357-365. 
 
 Thessalians very pugnacious, 3, 
 note. 
 
 Thessaly famous for enchantments, 
 75, note, 83. 
 
 Thucydides, 127, 152, 167, 195, 
 198, 208, 261, 265, 314, 317, 
 332, 336, 349, 389. 
 
 Tiberius, 151, 174, 175, 225, 384. 
 
 Tirasea, 294. 
 
 Timesias, oracle given to, 151. 
 
 Timoleon, 322. 
 
 Timon, 107. 
 
 Timotheus, 316. 
 
 Timoxena, wife of Plutarch, con- 
 solatory letter to, 85-92. 
 
 Timoxena, daughter of Plutarch, 
 85-92. 
 
 Tongue, government of the, 15, 16, 
 209, 210, 214-238, 274. Barri- 
 caded by nature, 216. 
 
 Training, power of, 5-7. 
 
 Triptolemus, 368. 
 
 Truth, a divine thing, 154, 
 
 Tutors, choice of, 5-7 ; Habits 
 they teach boys, 94. 
 
 Versatility, 152, 153. 
 Vespasian, 67, 69. 
 
 Vice, not got rid of as easily as a 
 wife, 96. Uneasiness of, 96, 97, 
 139. Whether it is sufficient 
 to cause unhappiness, 138-142. 
 Vice in embryo, 355, 356. 
 
 Virtue, its two elements, 18. Can 
 be taught, 92-95. On virtue and 
 vice, 95-98. On moral virtue, 
 98-118. On progress in virtue, 
 118-138. 
 
 Washing hands usual before din- 
 ner, 156. 
 
 Wealth, has wings, 124, 303. 
 
 Wives, to be carefully selected, 1. 
 Rich wives, 20, 138. Indian 
 wives, 140. 
 
 W^ords, winged, 223. 
 
 Wyttenbach, his criticism on 
 Keiske, Preface, viii, ix. 
 
 Xanthippe, wife of Socrates, 210, 
 
 283. 
 Xanthippus, father of Pericles, 27. 
 Xenocrates, 66,77, 118, 196, 248, 
 
 261, 385. 
 Xenophanes, 55, 108, 257. 
 Xenophon, 17, 83, 166, 191, 202, 
 
 239, 250, note, 289, 316, 335, 
 389. 
 Xerxes, 272, 299. 
 
 Youth, a ticklish period of life, 17, 
 18. 
 
 Zaleucus, 322. 
 
 Zeno, founder of the Stoics, 99, 
 102, 124, 132, 203, 217, 220, 
 
 262, 263, 285, 294, 327, 386. 
 Zeuxis, his remark on painting, 
 
 148. 
 
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