"To avoid excess in all things." He used to say one should study geometry (surveying) just enough to be able to measure land in buying and selling it. When Euripides in the 'Auge' said of virtue: "These things were better left to lie untouched," he rose up and left the theatre, saying it was absurd to think it proper to seek for a slave if he was not to be found, but to let virtue perish unregarded. When his advice was asked whether to marry or not, he said, "Whichever you do, you will regret it!" He used to say that he marveled that those who made stone statues took pains to make the stone as like the man as possible, but took none with themselves, that they might not be like the stone. He thought it proper for the young to look constantly in the mirror, so that if they had beauty they might prove themselves worthy of it, and if they were ugly, that they might conceal their ugliness by their accomplishments. When he had invited rich friends to dinner, and Xanthippe was ashamed, he said, "Do not be troubled. If they are sensible, they will bear with us. If not, we shall care nothing for them." Most men, he said, lived to eat; but he ate to live. As to those who showed regard for the opinions of the ignoble multitude, he said it was as if a man should reject one tetradrachm [coin] as worthless, but accept a heap of such coins as good. When Æschines said, "I am poor and have nothing else, but I give you myself," he said, "Do you then not realize you are offering me the greatest of gifts?" To him who said, "The Athenians have. condemned you to death," he responded, "And nature has condemned them also thereto:" though some ascribe this to Anaxagoras. When his wife exclaimed, "You die innocent!" he answered, "Do you wish I were guilty?" When a vision in sleep seemed to say: "Three days hence thou'lt come to the fertile region of Phthia," he said to Æschines, "On the third day I shall die." When he was to drink the hemlock, Apollodorus gave him a fine garment to die in: "But why," quoth he, "is this garment of mine good enough to live in, but not to perish in?" To him who said, "So-and-so speaks ill of you," he answered, "Yes, he has not learned to speak well." When Antisthenes turned the ragged side of his cloak to the light, he remarked, "I see your vanity through your cloak." He declared we ought to put ourselves expressly at the service of the comedy writers: "For if they say anything about us that is true, they will correct us; and if what they say be untrue, it does not concern us at all." When Xanthippe had first reviled him, then drenched him with water, "Didn't I tell you," said he, "it was thundering and would soon rain?" To Alcibiades, who said Xanthippe's scolding was unbearable, he replied, "I am accustomed to it, as to a constantly creaking pulley. And you," he added, "endure the cackling of geese." Alcibiades said, "Yes, for they bring me eggs and goslings." "And Xanthippe," retorted Socrates, "bears me children." Once when she pulled off his cloak in the agora, his friends advised him to defend himself with force. "Yes," said he, "by Jove, so that as we fight, each of you may cry, 'Well done, Socrates!' 'Good for you, Xanthippe!" He used to say he practiced on Xanthippe just as trainers do with spirited horses. "Just as they if they master them are able to control any other horse, so I who am accustomed to Xanthippe shall get on easily with any one else." It was for such words and acts as this that the Delphic priestess bore witness in his honor, giving to Chairephon that famous response: "Wisest of all mankind is Socrates." He became extremely unpopular on account of this oracle; but also because he convicted of ignorance those who had a great opinion of themselves, particularly Anytus, as Plato also says in the 'Meno.' For Anytus, enraged at the ridicule Socrates brought upon him, first urged Aristophanes and the rest on to attack him, and then induced Meletus to join in indicting him for impiety and for corrupting the young men. Plato in the 'Apology' says there were three accusers,-Anytus, Lycon, and Meletus: Anytus being incensed at him in behalf of the artisans and politicians, Lycon for the orators, and Meletus for the poets, all of whom Socrates pulled to pieces. The sworn statement of the plaintiffs ran as follows; for it is still recorded, Favorinus says, in the State archives: -"Socrates is guilty, not honoring the gods whom the State honors, but introducing other strange divinities; and he is further guilty of corrupting the young. Penalty, death." When Lysias wrote a speech for his defense, he read it, and said, "A fine speech, Lysias, but not suited to me;" for indeed 4719 it was rather a lawyer's plea than a philosopher's. Lysias said, "But why, if the speech is a fine one, should it not be suitable for you?" Socrates replied, "Would not fine robes, then, and sandals, be unfitting for me?" While he was on trial, it is stated that Plato ascended the bema and began, "Being the youngest, O men of Athens, of all who ever came upon the bema" - but at this point the judges cried out, "Come down! come down!" So he was convicted by two hundred and eighty-one votes more than were cast for his acquittal. And when the judges considered what penalty or fine he should receive, he said he would pay five-and-twenty drachmæ. Euboulides says he agreed to pay a hundred, but when the judges expressed their indignation aloud, he said, "For what I have done, I consider the proper return to be support at the public expense in the town hall.» But they condemned him to death, the vote being larger than before by eighty. Not many days later he drank the hemlock in the prison, after uttering many noble words, recorded by Plato in the 'Phædo.' According to some, he wrote a poem beginning — "Greeting, Apollo of Delos, and Artemis, youthful and famous." He also versified, not very successfully, a fable of Æsop's which began "Esop once to the people who dwell in the city of Corinth So he passed from among men; but straightway the Athenians repented of their action, so that they closed the gymnasia, and exiling the other accusers, put Meletus to death. Socrates they honored with a statue of bronze, the work of Lysippus, which was set up in the Pompeion. Anytus in exile, entering Heraclea, was warned out of town that very day. The Athenians have had the same experience not only in Socrates's case, but with many others. Indeed, it is stated that they fined Homer as a madman, and adjudged Tyrtæus to be crazy. Euripides reproves them in the 'Palamedes,' saying: ་ "Ye have slain, ye have slain the all-wise, the harmless nightingale of the Muses." That is so. But Philochorus says Euripides died before Socrates. Socrates and Euripides were both disciples of Anaxagoras. It appears to me, too, that Socrates did talk on natural philosophy. In fact, Xenophon says so, though he states that Socrates held discourse only upon moral questions. Plato indeed, in the 'Apology,' mentioning Anaxagoras and other natural philosophers, himself says of them things whereof Socrates denies any knowledge; yet it is all ascribed to Socrates. to Aristotle states that a certain mage from Syria came Athens, and among other prophecies concerning Socrates foretold that his death would be a violent one. The following verses upon him are our own: Drink, in the palace of Zeus, O Socrates, seeing that truly O EXAMPLES OF GREEK WIT AND WISDOM BIAS NCE he was on a voyage with some impious men. The ves sel was overtaken by a storm, and they began to call upon the gods for aid. But Bias said, "Be silent, so they may not discover that you are aboard our ship!" He declared it was pleasanter to decide a dispute between his enemies than between friends. "For of two friends," he explained, one is sure to become my enemy; but of two enemies I make one friend." PLATO IT is said Socrates, in a dream, seemed to be holding on his knees a cygnet, which suddenly grew wings and flew aloft, singing sweetly. Next day Plato came to him; and Socrates said he was the bird. It is told that Plato, once seeing a man playing at dice, reproved him. "The stake is but a trifle," said the other. "Yes, but," responded Plato, "the habit is no trifle." Once when Xenocrates came into Plato's house, the latter bade him scourge his slave for him, explaining that he could not 4721 do it himself, because he was angry. Again, he said to one of his slaves, "You would have had a beating if I were not angry. ARISTIPPUS DIONYSIUS Once asked him why it is that the philosophers are seen at rich men's doors, not the rich men at the doors of the sages. Aristippus replied, Because the wise realize what they lack, but the rich do not." On a repetition of the taunt on another occasion he retorted, "Yes, and physicians are seen at sick men's doors; yet none would choose to be the patient rather than the leech!" Once when overtaken by a storm on a voyage to Corinth, he was badly frightened. Somebody said to him, "We ordinary folk are not afraid, but you philosophers play the coward." "Yes," was his reply, "we are not risking the loss of any such wretched life as yours. >> He Some one reproached him for his extravagance in food. answered, "If you could buy these same things for threepence, wouldn't you do it?"-"Oh yes." "Why then, 'tis not I who am too fond of the luxurious food, but you that are over-fond of your money!" a ARISTOTLE WHEN asked, "What is Hope?" he answered, "The dream of man awake." Asked what grows old quickest, he replied, "Gratitude." When told that some one had slandered him in his absence, he said, "He may beat me too-in my absence!" Being asked how much advantage the educated have over the ignorant, he replied, "As much as the living over the dead." Some one asked him why we spend much time in the society of the beautiful. "That," he said, "is a proper question for a blind man!" [Cf. Emerson's 'Rhodora.'] Once being asked how we should treat our friends, he said, "As we would wish them to treat us." Asked what a friend is, he answered, "One soul abiding in two bodies." VIII-296 |