Epistulae

THEOPHYLACTUS SIMOCATTA THE SCHOLASTIC: MORAL, RUSTIC, AND COMPANIONABLE LETTERS Critias to Plotinus The musical cicada, when spring appears, begins his melody; and at the hour of midday he is known to be more tuneful in his songs and by nature more talkative, as though drunk with the sun's rays. So the melodious creature trills, making the tree his stage and the field his theatre, and displays his music to passers-by. Therefore we too are eager to sing your virtues; for they somehow warm and kindle our own toward praise. For you have revived us, who had long been dead in this squalid life, from your letters unto virtue. So may I become Critias to your Plotinus; for Plotinus either philosophizes on earth apart from the body, or philosophy, having been embodied, walks among men as a man. 2. Dorcon to Moschon The leader of the sheep, that wondrous ram of mine, has perished, and the flock is widowed of its pastoral leadership. We have suffered a very great evil, and it seems to me that Pan is angry with me; for we no longer honored him with the first-fruits of our hives. Therefore I am going to the city to plead as ambassador to the angry god, and I shall recount his harshness to the citizens, saying: "Because of a honey-cake, Pan has destroyed for me the leader of my flock.

Theano to Eurydice: The natural order has passed you by, and your comeliness is near to wrinkles; yet you attempt to counterfeit the truth, deceiving your lovers with artificial adornment. Submit to time, little old woman; for meadows are not comely with flowers in autumn. Remember death too—for you have come near to it—and endeavor of necessity to practice temperance. For you wrong both old age and youth: old age, since by your claims you have belied it; youth, since what you possessed you have adulterated. Euagoras to Antipater: The craftsman set bounds even for the sea's surge, and the ocean's stream is curbed at the shorelines, and there is a little sand that is a boundary between land and sea; for the sea has not been permitted to wrong the neighboring land; but the stream, raging and having threatened the dry land with a great assault, runs back upon itself. Set bounds, then, O Antipater, upon your angry spirit, not making your hand the servant of your wrath. To philosophize with both hands and tongue alike is indeed the highest limit of perfect virtue; but if you are not able to master this, soothe your temper with gentle indulgences, if you wish to resemble barking dogs. For thus the sea too, when it rages, displays its anger no further than its foam and swell.

Aigeiros to Platanos: We have bad neighbors, my friend, in the cranes. They wage an immortal war over our little plot. For they neither made a treaty with our fathers, nor have they dissolved the war with us who came after them. And yet we have often honored them with the first-fruits of the harvest; indeed, we have even given them a portion of the plot, like a sacred field to a god, though they are ungrateful. But their gifts, it seems, are not respected by them. Therefore we are all departing from here; for it is more profitable for us to farm rocks than to dwell in plains and hills with such troublesome neighbors. Erato to Terpsithea: They say that golden Callicrates has painted your portrait; but I think the painting does not represent Terpsithea, but the Laconian Helen—yes, by the truthful tablets of Parrhasius. Therefore you have wronged both art and nature, insulting the one and falsifying the other; for you have compelled the art of Parrhasius to lie and to embellish the panels with what does not belong to you, as if you were adorning the defects of nature and displaying her great lack of skill. But I am a praiser both of the painter—for he did not consent to be a painter of your ugliness—and I have marveled at the wisdom of nature, which did not entrust the comeliness of the body to a most wicked soul.

Sosipatros to Terpandros: There is a law among horses, as it seems to me, and a very wise one; for I praise exceedingly their affectionate care for one another. But what is this law of theirs? Whenever they see a mare still under the teat lacking a nurse, and the mother who bore it far away from the offspring, as sometimes happens, they do something noble; for they do not forget their own nature, and they cherish the one left alone, feeling no resentment at all, as though it were a child near and true-born. And nature makes them think thus; for it was not Solon's law that compelled them. I shall divert my argument to you. You neglect your nephew as he goes from door to door, clad in a most wretched cloak; truly your disposition is more senseless than that of irrational beasts. You feed other men's dogs; for thus it is more fitting to call the flatterers about you. For they will seem to be most well-disposed toward you, until they have reveled in your goods, wretched man; but they will certainly bark at you too, still belching from yesterday's drunkenness. For the nature of flatterers is both mindful of evil and quick to forget good things. Cherish your nephew at last, Terpandros; otherwise you will have Providence as an invincible enemy, sharpening its own sword against the tears of nature. Daphnon to Myron: How long will you keep hollowing out the little field and swallow down the water that has flooded it, wretched man? Or perhaps you are contriving that my children go hungry because of the drought? For your little field is turned into a marsh, while ours has not even known the nature of water. Let the clouds be asked, by the gods, whether they release their water for Myron alone. An enviable man is a great evil.

But if it has also been allotted to be a neighbor, the misfortune is unavoidable and will scarcely be stopped even by death. Euripe to Dexikrates: You promised to return to us on the ninth of the waning month Anthesterion, and you have belied the agreement, Dexikrates. And my mind has been scorched by love, and my breast has blazed like a torch. I kept tossing my tears about every day and dreaming of your return, and the sound of the doors was always to me a vision of your presence. But you, Dexikrates, are diverting your love to others, and what is strange is always more precious to you; for the souls of the idle are accustomed to be enslaved by the swiftest satiety. Desire and loves are a thing of no trust, and you too will one day be struck; for the misfortunes of those who are wronged pass over to those who have done the wrong. Hermagoras to Sosipatros: I have heard you lament your poverty very ignobly and abuse wealth as being uneven among men, offering its own possession as attainable to some and hard to attain to others, as if nature were envious of men in this matter. For if the beams of the sun are equally available to men and the abundance of fire is most ready to all, and the streams of rivers, both torrents and ever-flowing, are easily procured by all, why then—you said—did nature dispose gold so exactly for men and assign a contentious gift to those beneath the moon, through which the greatest evils come upon men? But I pour broad laughter over your opinions; for the very praise of nature is a basis

You have made a reproach and suffered the same thing as the owl; for that bird seems to be the cause of blindness by the bright flashes of the sun. Mankind hungers for gold with profit, Sosipatrus; for from this source both arts were introduced into life and cities were founded and ease of commerce. And if one must speak summarily, this earthly habitation would have been deprived of all good order, if gold had not fashioned men to be in need of one another; for neither would a sailor have sailed, nor a traveler have traded, nor would farmers have possessed an ox for plowing, nor would the scepters of royal rule have been honored, nor would the subject have been adorned with offices and tributes, nor would a general have led the army. And if you wish to learn a secret account, gold has been entrusted with the reins of virtue and vice, and the soul's impulse is tested through it, and it is comparable to the Celtic river; for it is the truest test of counterfeit virtue and of vice. 11 Callistachus to Cyparisson: Simichidas yesterday, I suppose, set fire to the nature of the unfruitful and savage trees; for such was the condemnation he voted against the trees that bear no fruit. And the nature of the all-devouring fire had an unrestrained impulse, and suddenly destroyed the property of the neighboring farmer. And he, leaving his leather cloak and his mattock, goes to the city to get a rhetorician as an ally, and a court has been convened against Simichidas. This I too, Cyparisson, will contrive against you, if you do not order your bees to keep away from my meadows, and you will learn not to acquire an unjust income from the labors of others.

Melpomene to Praximilla: The flute-girl Chrysogone has made her haunts at the Leocorium, and perhaps she thinks she is even delighting my lovers. And she says that we, the little harlot, are excessively vexed at the matter. But I have not made the affair of much account; for what sort of lovers they actually are toward us, the character of Chrysogone will put to the test. But, by the gods, become for me the clearest messenger of a truthful answer and tell the Laconian woman: we owe you the greatest thanks, at any rate, Chrysogone; for by your ugliness our own charms will be shown the more august, since even when the jackdaw has not appeared, the crow too will be reckoned among the comely birds. Ariston to Nicias: They say the elephant is the most learning-loving of animals and a clever pupil of human teachings; for the bulk of its body is not so wonderful in it as the adornment of its education is honored. And these things the children of the Indians bandy about; but I have marveled at Nicias, who has the reasoning of irrational animals more irrational than they. For being the son of a sophist, you have licked up your father's virtues, and you have spent the leisure of your life on dice and wrestling-schools, and you have become the end of nobility for your family. If, then, you wish to be called a son of Hermagoras, return at last to that man's life; for it is a good thing for a man to have wisdom and prudence even in old age, as it seems also to Plato. But if you are vexed at changing from your old evils and proclaim yourself a son of Hermagoras, know that you are becoming a tomb-robber of your father's grave; for by your wickedness you insult his virtues. Myronides to Damalus: Your son has ravaged the whole flock.

The thief, having always filled his milk-pail, goes off to the plane trees, and having made a bed of leaves he lies down without a care and embraces the luxurious life. Then, taking up his pipe, he offers up merriment as though it were a song after dinner, and he counterfeits the rustic customs. But the flocks have been scattered here and there and are easy to catch for an attack. Indeed, the wretch even sells off his dung cheaply, and he is not ashamed to wrong Myronides. Yesterday we feasted Trygias splendidly, for my dishes were figs and locusts. But this wondrous youth has devoured most of the figs and has gulped down the locusts I know not how—and Trygias was gaping—and he carries off some portion home with him after his fill. Let Cleinias be gone from my fields henceforth; for it is preferable to endure evils from afar than to keep an enemy at home in hiding. Atalante to Corinna: In the wrestling school I have seen Augeias, Corinna; and neither could speech express the sight nor could a painter's hands imitate it. For the youth was sturdy, upright, shaggy about the chest, and his eyes were those of a gazelle. And his glance was neither reddened with anger nor too soft in its moistness, but manly and gentle at once. And the color of his body was neither whitened toward the effeminate nor darkened toward the swarthier. And his hair gently rippled with its curl and was likened to the sea growing dark-blue at the season of calm, when it embraces the neighboring land with a soft stream, letting go the mad and barbarous surge.

Her cheeks were neither flushed—for that is womanish—nor again did they darken their comeliness with pallor. Her nose was very gracefully shaped and gave much proof of the skill of the creating nature. The oil, poured on, shone round about like sunlight, and with the flashing of its gleams it brightened the wrestling-ground like rays. I have suffered in my soul, Corinna, and I feel the pain more sharply; for the female sex is ashamed to recount a tale of erotic suffering. Gorgias to Aristeides: You rejoice when you borrow, you are vexed when the debt is exacted, and when you meet your creditors you are struck with terror, as though you thought you were encountering certain fearsome and savage beasts; and you look around at the crossroads and gaze toward the colonnades, eager to run away from your creditors, just as those who sail the sea in a great swell long to reach a harbor. But you even add evil to evil; for borrowing from others you pay your debt to others, doing the same as those who hurl themselves down through fear of death. Since, then, borrowing is a many-branched evil for men and more troublesome than the mythical Hydra with its self-grown offspring, even in your dreams beware of borrowing; for thus you may look freely upon the sun's rays and breathe the air above the earth very pleasantly.

17 May Leucippus not come to the Plain of the Hills; for that place was rearing a savage beast against us. A court was convened between me and Sostratus over the boundaries of the little hill. But Leucippus was wholly corrupted in his mind and longed to see the court golden; such a gold-loving passion possessed the wretch. Sostratus, perceiving this, bought the victory with gold and stuffed the throat of Leucippus with gifts. The maiden Justice has been corrupted, and gold weighs out victory for men. For the balanced judgment has perished; since gifts, rather than what is just, are held trustworthy. 18 Erotylus to Hypsipyle: Even the palm trees yearn with natural love, and the male desires the female, and the male is bent round with love and twines about the hair of his beloved. And if the female is far from the male, taking the spathes from the female they attach them to the male and by a device charm away his love. If, then, you are not able to return to us quickly, console my love for you through a painter, and let the painting, in pictures, give me a vision of the sight of you; for even a semblance is enough to beguile those who love exceedingly.

Diogenes to Chryse: I say that you are a steward of wealth, not a master of money; for such is the condemnation that your own ways have pronounced against you. For it is not lawful for unholy souls to partake of any good thing. Bury your land, then, and guard your gold, thrice-wretched man; for the wealth is not yours, but is believed to be stored with you. For having emulated the wickedness of Midas the Phrygian, you are rich while starving, hanged as it were with golden nooses. Blooming Achradas to Meken: Yesterday, Meken, I sent gifts to my beloved; but she flung away the woof and straightway rose from her weaving, and taking the gifts she distributed them to the pigs, and sent the messenger away as an ill-omened herald. And I weep; for love is a fearful thing, wronging us and forcing us to love an unseemly girl. Blind are Fortune and the Loves—the one bestowing pains, the other happiness, at random and as it happens. Perdicia to Rhodope: You sing unmusically and grieve, not delight, your lovers; for you are murmuring a tragedy, not a charming song, to your hearers. And your lovers weep in distress; for your songs teach them to be temperate instead of lustful; for you have not made your melody alluring. Spare us, then, by the gods, while we are in distress; for you seem to your audience to be not a flute-girl but a mourner. And we would all stop our ears with wax, if you should practice melody; for we would rather hear Sirens wailing than the Muses.

Antisthenes to Pericles: Alexander, the son of Philip, was in no way puffed up by his successes, but he philosophized; he was not accustomed to being enticed by the greatest praises of the blasts of fortune. For this reason, in the turning point of the war, having seen Darius fallen, he looked over the enemy in his cloak, displaying the nobility of virtue and fortune. From this, his subjects reviled Alexander, and his piety was an accusation against the king. Therefore Alexander, being a philosopher, had feared the uncertainty of fortune, as it seems; therefore, when very many successes were announced to him at once, he said: "O Zeus, mix some misfortune in with the good things." Thus Alexander most prudently was cautious of the extremes of prosperity. If, then, you were ignorant of the nature that is near to defeats, you will soon see experience as a teacher, and you will have lessons older than knowledge; but if you are willingly blind, you will obtain a harsher penalty for your offenses and will be exacted the penalties of knowledge. Astachyon to Mylon: Clear out the field of hemlock; for you have damaged my bees. Do not, by the gods, give trouble to a farmer. You differ in no way from drones. Why then do you rage unreasonably at your neighbor? If you do not desist from wickedness, you most wicked one, I would inscribe your licentiousness on my doors, and I would show the injustice to the neighboring farmers, so that all might flee from you as from some evil thing hard to meet.

Telesilla to Laïs: Neither miners tracking the vein of gold nor well-diggers searching out the secrets of the earth in darkness, seeking to behold the eyes of waters, have been so earnest about their own craft as I was combing through the whole city, in case I might somewhere behold Agesilaus. For I have heard that the maenad Leucippe has made a drinking-party of him, and a rushing thunderbolt has descended upon us, and the suffering blazes up in me with tears beyond all comfort. Therefore I shall be a fellow-worker of tragedy; for we shall no longer behold the rising sun. Thus I shall become more terrible even than Medea and Phaedra. Sosipatrus to Axiochus: They say that you recently buried your brother, and that you are exceedingly and inconsolably distressed by the suffering. And how could I admire you as a philosopher when you are so far conquered by passion? There is a certain sleep among us that is much talked of, namely death—longer than this customary sleep, but very brief in comparison with the day to come. The dead have been sent on a long journey abroad; our separation from them is not for long; endure the parting, awaiting the union again. Do not suffer anything of a body-loving soul, since even Plotinus seemed ashamed that he was in a body; so much did this mortal tent distress the philosopher. Stop for me up to this point

Tears: set a limit to your grief; heal your passion with prudence; become your own physician. You have reason as your remedy, grief-assuaging, free from anger, making one forget all evils. The Creator never leads his works from the better to the worse. Let us leave mortal things to mortals; for here the royal part of the soul is stained with great blemishes. I would rather weep over birth or over death; for the one is the beginning of tears, the other the release from sorrows. Ignorance makes us exceedingly fearful, and we shrink from death not because it is evil, but because it is unknown to men; for whatever a person has been deprived of knowledge of, that he accuses most readily. Do not then become like Niobe, lest you seem yourself to be changing human nature into stone. Cecropis to Dexicrates: They say that the Magnesian stone loves iron, and they report that the stone lives for as long as it is together with the object of its love. For whenever the stone is separated from its mate, it immediately dies and lays aside its own activity. Such attachments, Dexicrates, arise even in inanimate things. But what should I suffer, dearest, being left so far behind by your presence? I think that to describe it is harder than to endure it. Thus may I grieve those who have grieved me, and may I become a dart to lovers; for the spark of Aphrodite is more fiery than soot and flame. Theristron to Speiron: We are setting out for Etna, the Sicilian mountain, having bidden farewell to Attica. For never have we seen a land more unfortunate for the increase of crops; instead of wheat it bore us myrtles, instead of barley ivy.

The sieve is empty, and my threshing floor is filled with famine. For this reason, since my first seeds did not sprout, I would not again cast them upon the ungrateful ground. A farmer cannot have both famine and a soldier as enemies, nor are sailors able to fight against winds and thunderbolts at the same time. 28 Heraclides to Antisthenes: You have not yet released your anger, Antisthenes, but you are still harsh toward us, and you conceal your grief under the pretext of gentle words, like those who store up a spark of fire in soot. Henceforth, cleanse the sorrow from your heart; for this is what our words advocate. Otherwise, you will be harsher than the sea; for the sea calms its wildness and presents a kindly face to sailors, whenever they appease with oil the waves that rage exceedingly. To Piganon of the Vegetables: Come to me tomorrow for the oil; for I shall depart from the city and shall be a guest at the feast, dearest friend. For I shall dedicate the firstfruits of the flock to the Nymphs and to Pan. For the gods are favorably disposed to us at last; my milk-bowls are filled with milk, the ewes have given birth fruitfully, the goats leap about over their good fortune as if rejoicing. We have ceased fighting with poverty, a beast hard to admonish and difficult; it clings to its possessors like a sore and is a habitual evil, making one lazy, downcast, leading to inconsolable grief, quick to flow toward distress, sleepless, fond of cares, laborious, inventive of evils, inglorious, easily despised, unenvied. For no one wishes to encounter so great an evil, not even if he were condemned to suffer the madness of Orestes.

Having cast off the things of poverty to poverty, let us remove ourselves to another portion, changing our mind along with our fortune. Rodine to Calliope. In the matter of lovers you mock and jeer at us this and that, ridiculing the tautness and the swelling vigor of my body as grown slack. But you think your own villainy is hidden; for you, all-polluted woman, tread out the things conceived in you without bringing them to fulfillment, and you have made abortions preferable to births, stifling with sharper drugs the living things in your womb, and you render your murders more cruel than those of Medea of Colchis. Her husband, in his folly, taught that child-killer to be the slayer of his bedfellow and his ally in his contests; but you, because of the comeliness of your beauty, bring about countless calamities, you little whore. Cease now both covering over your own inhumanity and mocking our piety. For in our eyes childbirth is more humane than abortion. Know also that Justice is angry against you and is not negligent in exacting the penalties for child-murder. Hephaestion to Thales. The Persian bird, the peacock, has also inherited the arrogance of the Persians, thinking great and exceeding lofty thoughts about its beauty. Its female too seems to be inferior to it. Its feather, then, raises itself up like a lock of hair and provides a most conspicuous beauty to those who see it, and it produces a circular shape, and it images the heavenly order, and in the eyes of the feather it molds anew the arrangement of the stars. And this is the beauty-loving character of Persian birds; for they do not begrudge their own good order by teaching painters.

But you sit brooding over your own writings and conceal your virtues and leave your labors undisplayed, overlooking us as we are bereft of such great benefit. If, then, it is some envy that grieves us, the undertaking is unphilosophical and alien to your promise; but if it is hesitation that husbanding the delay, you have suffered the same as a farmer who has lent many sweats to the earth and at the height of summer does not reap the ears of grain. 32 Poa to Ampelius: Come, old man, let us weep a joint lament. The river has leapt up and danced an evil dance for us; it has flooded the whole field and the terrible one has sunk the young shoots of the vines. But the greater misfortune is that the foul one does not wish to depart from here; for he lingers in the little plot and has made our field his bed. And it is worth tears to see: for instead of vines we wretched ones farm fish. When the river wishes, we hunt; when it wishes, we starve; and it seems to me a great gift to pride oneself on. Would that in summer we never beseech the clouds to grant us rain when we are parched; for thus we would not have been deprived of what we possessed. For a river is burdensome in itself; but if it also grows rich with rains, it is more ungovernable than fire and does not bridle its prancings with measures. Galatea to Thetis: I praise your prudence, and I admire your great experience. For as if from some Pythian tripod you have told me the future, and you have looked into the deeper and unseen things of affairs more sharply than Lynceus. Callimachus has left us; he has flown away, soaring on the sharpest wing of satiety.

That utterly accursed man has run away from us, and his surfeit of desire has grown older than the desire itself. But you kept advising me at length: do not be persuaded by oaths, Galatea; for lovers there is nothing more ready to hand than oaths. For young men, drunk on erotic pleasures, are deprived of the ability to deliberate well, and they do and say whatever the Erotes legislate; for they do not have a self-moving impulse toward things. Distrust seems safer than trust, and an oath is a sufficiently credible sophist for deception. Themistocles to Chrysippus: Since moderation is honored even in myth, come then, Chrysippus, I shall tell you a tale that is not unseemly. Once the birds came to Zeus and sent an embassy asking him to hand over to them a leader; for anarchy was what troubled the birds, and they were bereft of the greatest good, leadership, and for this reason had acquired great disorder. Zeus therefore nodded assent, and his will became deed, and he grants the suppliants a wondrous gift; for what was being given was the dignity of a king. He then ordered the birds to go to lakes and springs and wash off their own filth, and he entrusted to the waters the test of leadership; for in Zeus's eyes it was comeliness that was honored. So the birds bathed, and then they ran straight back to Zeus, and each displayed his own comeliness. But the jackdaw, fearing his own ugliness, falsified the workmanship of nature, adorning his own comeliness with another's ornament. But

The owl exposed the ugliness and revealed the counterfeit adornment; for recognizing its own feather, it took it back as its own and gave the other birds an example, that each should take back what is its own. And the jackdaw became a jackdaw again. This fable, Chrysippus, speaks the truth like a waking vision, recounting to us great self-control. For thus we humans possess nothing here as our own, but while living we pride ourselves for a little while on counterfeit adornment, and when dead we are stripped of what is not ours. Therefore look down on both money and body, and take care for an immortal thing, the soul; for the one is everlasting and immortal, while the mortal things are ours only for a little while. Myronides to Moschon: I have lent the plow ox to Tycanias; for he did not have the other of the yoke. And Tycanias promised to provide me with his own bull. For I too was lacking an ox; for my wonderful bull has perished, when that harsh plague settled among the livestock. But the fine Tycanias dissolved the agreement, and as long as his aim was being accomplished he seemed to welcome what had been decided. But I lament the tyrannical †antle†; for we do not possess plow oxen, and the season of plowing has already, I suppose, passed by. Therefore I will arm myself with a court against Tycanias, and I will set the whole district as judges. And he will pay the penalty for his deceit, and we will persuade the licentious to keep away from wickedness, having the destruction of one man as a teacher of self-control.

Antigonus to Lysistratus: The Loves make sport of men and enslave the children of the moon, the winged ones, so that we may believe the painters too. Would that it were possible to see the enemy; for thus the Loves, in shooting, would be shot at. But in this very thing we have been wronged the more, that we have remained ignorant even of our enemies, what their nature happens to be. For with what irrational passion I am entangled: I long for Melanippe, descendant of Diodorus, beyond measure, though I have never once seen the woman even in a dream, but only heard from someone that she sings wonderfully. And I have been struck in the soul, though wronged by nothing from my eyes, which is what I am accustomed to suffer, Lysistratus; but now my ears have become eyes to me. So great is the power of the nature of the Loves. Whether then she is a toad in appearance, I do not know, or whether what was said is some fantasy, I do not understand; for one witness is not sufficient for the truth. Yet I grieve in my soul, and I love one not seen, and I think I have partaken of Panic madness; for that one too, the object of his longing was unseen, and only a fancy had the substance of the things he sought. Eurybiades to Cimon: You promise many things and do few, and you have a tongue loftier than your action. But if cleverness of words is admired by you, the painters are more powerful than your tongue, fashioning on their panels as many things as nature cannot do. But if you also seem to delight your hearers with promises, you gladden them for a little while, but you grieve them not long after more grievously. Since even the fairest of dreams do not so much gladden us while sleeping as they pained us when awake; for hopes fly up together with sleep straightway.

Keep your deeds in agreement with your tongue, so that you may not be hated by friends for lying and may not give your enemies a pretext for blame, as one who has no share in the truth. 38 Tettix to Ortyx: Why then, thrice-wretched man, have you changed your clothing and spread out your partridges? Wine has become your ruin; they say that with wine Odysseus also bought the Cyclops' eye. Therefore, Ortyx, if you do not gather the birds together, I will hurl myself down along with you. For it is hard for a licentious son to live, and for a son to appropriate a tomb before his father is exceedingly grievous. 39 Thetis to Anaxarchus: You cannot love both Thetis and Galateia; desire is not cut in pieces, for the Loves are not divided. But neither could you bear love doubled; for as the earth cannot be warmed by two suns, so one soul does not endure a pair of fiery loves. 40 Socrates to Plato: No one is wronged, yet all do wrong, each wronging himself of his own accord; for we are masters of virtue and vice. Leonides has taken away your little field; this is among external things, and it has harmed your soul not at all. Philip wrongs you and appropriates your ring; you yourself have suffered no wrong, for what is acquired is not our own. The barbarians have killed your son; you have suffered nothing terrible, for you did not possess the child forever; recently he came to you when you did not possess him, and again he is not, since he was not, but came to be. Therefore men do wrong, but are not wronged. And I have admired the Homeric Cyclops; for he said he was wronged by no one, and the shepherd's declaration was the affirmation of truth.

Marathon to Piganon: Having escaped the political surges and the inexorable uproars of the city, I have rented this field here, and I thought I had found a change of fortune. But I have been cast into greater evils; for at one time I have mildew as my enemy, at another the locusts, and at still another the hail; and the frost ravages the crops like an inexorable tyrant, and I, wretched man, give my sweat as a gift to the winds. Alas, miserable that I am, where shall I turn? Whenever I call to mind the toils of farming, I welcome the things of the city; whenever I reckon up the city's turmoil, I long for the countryside, and the present is less fortunate than the absent. There is one dissolution of griefs: death, whether natural or again self-chosen. Therefore hanging is my remedy; for it is foolish for the unfortunate to loathe death. Pericles to Aspasia: If you seek gifts, you do not desire; for the Erotes are without gifts, and they teach those who desire to be such. If then you are in love, giving is more fitting than receiving; but if you lust after money and have feigned desire for the sake of trade, the tongue has exposed the mind, selling pleasures for gold to whoever wishes.

Diogenes to Demonikos: The Lydian eunuch has insulted us—that artificial woman, that twofold-natured half-man, in no respect complete according to nature; for they proclaim that all the members of their body have shameful tongues. But I, like the Homeric Odysseus, do not perceive his shafts; for the female race strikes heroes without effect—to speak to you somewhat more grandly, imitating Diomedes. To bark and to rage is fitting for eunuchs; for since they are deprived of the power of their hands, they wish to accomplish everything through the tongue. But our friends accuse us of great folly, because we have not requited the insulter with punishments; for in this way, if even an ass should kick us, we would not convene a court for it. And this too has been well stated by Socrates the son of Sophroniskos. Priapides to Corydon: Be my guest at table tomorrow. Everything for the wedding has been prepared for me: lentil soup, chickpeas, many figs, and sweet new wine, and honey-cake, and flat cakes. But you yourself bring the artful syrinx, to sing melodies surpassing the swans; for you were skilled in pastoral music-making, Corydon. For I wish to stir the bridal chamber to Aphrodisian pleasure, charmed by the sounds from the pipe.

Leandros to Pylades: The Loves are exceedingly hateful to us. I love, but she who is longed for hates; and what should I do, thrice wretched as I am? The Loves do not hold an evenly balanced scale; they weigh out tears for humans unequally. If, then, they do wrong, let them not be called gods; but if they do not falsify their name, let them judge rightly and apportion my pains to me according to justice. Diogenes to Aristarchus: Alexander astounded Macedonia as he rode upon Bucephalus. They record that the horse would not obey the bit, nor be softened by hand-tamed flatteries; for the beast was untameable, and its spirit had stripped it of being a horse, and it was an unapproachable evil and exceedingly hard to encounter for those who met it. When, therefore, it obtained Alexander as its rider, it blended its savagery as if with gentleness, exchanging its prancing for dejection; and one could see the licentious one become temperate. For it was not lawful for it to fight against Alexander. Be you too, Aristarchus, obedient to fortune; for it was not to Alexander, but to fortune, that the horse Bucephalus was obedient.

Poimnion to Arnon: The udders of my sheep are about to burst with milk, and I do not know how it is that we have run short of milk-pails. Therefore do you yourself give the milk-pails, and I will supply you with milk, repaying small favors with great gifts. Chrysogone to Terpander: Do not blame me for reviling and insulting you; for those who feel longing also gladly offer insults, and often take delight in blows and bruises. But if you are vexed at being insulted, you will not even pluck a rose while you shrink from its thorn. Leonides to Periander: The son of Thetis felt shame even before Priam when he came as an envoy—for the son of Peleus was ashamed of an enemy's gray hairs—and he gave the father his son dead, honoring Priam with a most unfortunate gift. And I have marveled at the one's daring, and I have praised the other's humanity. Be an Aeacid to me as well, and accept the tears of gray hairs, giving me my son alive. For we too are unfortunate, just as Priam was; for we would not have come as envoys to you, an enemy, on behalf of a child, engraving the letters of the letter with tears, not with ink. But if you too desire to obtain equal humanity, let the gift precede the request; but if reason does not reign in you, but anger and grief have obtained the privilege of embassy, you will be gladdened for a little while, but you will be grieved more greatly, exacting great penalties from an unphilosophic anger.

Kalamon to Speiron: If you wish to be a farmer, stand away from the tumults of the city. But if there are orators at your house and law-courts and platforms much busied over, put down the mattock, take up the reed-pen and sheets of paper, and go to the crows, old man. For the commonwealth of farmers does not more readily admit men who are sycophants and who utter "O men of the jury" more frequently. Rhodokleia to Hypsipyle: Last night I was walking about the Peiraeus; and I saw your lover with Chrysippe, and a young lad was carrying the torch, and the old woman Abrotonon, the friend of your union, was in the procession. But when I addressed the procuress, the boy put out the torch; for this your lover had commanded, so that what was being done might escape notice in the darkness. Therefore trust him neither when he swears nor when he flatters; for each of these is the most terrible trick of the tongue. Sokrates to Kleon: Whenever wolves light upon a great hunt and in their surfeit philosophize as though practicing self-control, they have the character of lambs, and they change their wildness to love of mankind, and surfeit teaches wolves a wondrous kind of justice: they graze together with the sheep, doing no harm at all to the flock, and they make libations with the shepherds and honor temperance, until their belly breathes again. But you have acquired a disposition more shameless even than that of wolves, and you hold your licentiousness more covetously, whenever gold bubbles up over your treasuries, like drunkards. For they thirst when they have been filled

...of wine, and they are made clever by drunkenness, an intensification of drunkenness; for through their extreme vigor they fall into the opposite disposition, since the wine makes the wine-bibbers sleek and sets them ablaze. Away with shameless drunkenness, you shameless one, lest you be carried over to the opposite inclination, when fortune takes away even what it has given; for by such punishments as these are the ungrateful chastened. 53 Minthēs to Rhizōn: The river Chrysaspis has plundered a portion of our little field and has annexed it to your land, doing something foolish and silly; for it makes its claim to honor with others' gifts. But if you are not able to bear the burden of law-courts on your shoulders, do not accept the gifts of rivers; but if you lust after others' property, before long you will weep, being deprived of your own and punished by the votes of an arbiter. Medea to Jason: Nothing is so eagerly sought by humans, nor yet so cloying, as a love relationship. Where are the streams of your tears, which you used to pour over our feet? Where have flown the countless kinds of those speeches of yours, and the subdued and lowly character of your words? I think that neither those who borrow on such terms have used such words to their lenders, nor a wounded man captured by the hands of enemies. The intense wakefulness has passed away, you have abandoned the morning songs; I shall pass over the countless embassies, the libations you poured to me through the women who served as go-betweens. You have suddenly slipped to another maiden, like those who sleep passing straight from one dream-subject to another. I praise the painters...

For they depict the Loves as winged and by art they shape their subject matter and by their fictions they make a marvel of the truth. 55 Parmenides to Chrysosthenes: To be awake at all times is proper to the immortal nature, but to sleep in moderation is, as it seems, among our own conditions and human; but to sleep beyond what is fitting is more suited to the dead than to the living. You have been deprived, Chrysosthenes, of the greatest portions of your life; for you are always sleeping, and you have passed over to the allotment here below, like some Odysseus, wandering outside our inhabited world, swimming in sleep as in some Ocean, and looking upon neither the rising nor the setting sun. 56 Daphnon to Aigeiros: Your fig trees have spread their roots toward my little plot, unwilling any longer to remain under your authority, and having taken away your right they pride themselves on their produce for me; for they have deserted to my boundaries. And this is law among farmers; and obey laws that have grown old, old man. But if you wish to speak against our customs, since you are a new and recent lawgiver, we cast you out of the farmers' assemblies and banish you from our boundaries as an alien.

57 Pyrrhias to Philonides: If you are in love, do not accuse your beloved of unseemliness. For a soul in love cannot but be blind; the passion of lovers is invincible. But if you are not in love, why do you weep and groan, and bring a self-chosen tempest upon yourself? You wrong both sides, then: at one moment as a lover pursuing, at another as an adversary loathing. 58 Damascius to Antigonus: Unless Socrates possesses the pledges of a life, let him not be appointed to be the tutor of your child. And let children be understood as the pledges of a life; for the man whom nature has taught to be a father is also trustworthy to be a tutor, having learned by experience both the bond of begetting and the pangs of affection. 59 Cepias to Coriannus: Be my fellow-worker at the hour of midday, Coriannus; for I would fence the field with a dry-stone wall. For we have bad wayfarers; I am not able to contend both with irrational creatures and with men. The hare destroys the vines, and the caterpillar the vegetables. Why then should I even speak of the moles? For the evil is fearful to the farmer and the enemy hard to fight against. Therefore stand by me and lend a hand with my labors; and I in turn will repay you with such works. For in this way even the ants, allying with one another, both devise their toil and lay hold of the greatest labors.

60 Antheia to Orion: Everything has been enslaved to the female sex. Diogenes is in love with Laïs, the Phrygian with Sostrate. The elegance of philosophy has perished; they have thrust aside their dignified character, abandoned their ethereal mind, and belied their lofty profession; all their former studies for discipline are gone. It seems to me a premature sport for an old man, possessing a venerable gray head and with brows raised high in dignity, to be in love with a young courtesan. And I laugh out loud and cannot contain my laughter whenever I meet these little old men; for they used to accuse Aphrodite of many things long ago and said that lovers were sick with a self-chosen madness, defining love as the desire of an licentious soul. To bear all things is wise; but to hope is far more prudent; for time and fortune have great power. 61 Sostratus to Lysistratus: Since, after giving you much wonderful advice, we seemed to be weaving the web of Penelope, come now, come, let us also begin with mythical tales; for perhaps what is said might reach your mind. In the newly budding trees the cicada, riding in the season of heat, sang shrilly, and perceiving its own harmony, it delighted itself. But the ant was present at the harvest and had made its haunts about the threshing floor and stored its food in the bosoms of the earth, since the ant is more provident than the cicada. The sun had then passed by from the north, autumn was gone, and winter was visiting the earth; and the sea had dissolved its calm treaties.

The sailors greeted the harbors as saviors, the farmer took refuge in his own warmth, and the ant had its labors in the hollows of the earth as a suitable hearth. So the cicada begged the industrious ant to share in its treasures; but the ant sent the singer away from its doors, pouring much laughter upon him for his idleness, and reminded him of his summer songs. Therefore the one had hunger for his song, and the other had labors for food. The fable suits you, Lysistratus; for being idle you are more wretched than one with a fever, eating twice as much in vain. Away then with idleness, O best of men; for you have disgraced the gifts of nature, passing over such great strength and vigor of body unadorned, unwilling to practice the knowledge of labors. Corydon to Porphyrion of the Cicadas: a blessed man and a friend of fortune, as it seems. The vines are weighed down with clusters, the pear trees are heavy and reach out to those gathering them, the olives bend down to the earth and by their abundance force the branches that bore them, the meadows are luxuriant, the threshing floor is equal to the Nile's furrows. But the wife too, along with the rest, is fruitful for the man; for he has so many children that he surpasses even Danaus and Aegyptus in goodly offspring. For one is still at the breast, another has ceased from nursing, others crawl not yet having begun upright walking; some lisp and change their teeth, others step into their prime and have obtained the lot of being big children; and the order of their ages is arranged like pipes playing on a syrinx.

But you advised me not to betroth your little daughter to Corydon, and you reviled the marriage alliance, as though you were renouncing low birth. Alas, I have been played the fool, wretch that I am, and I held my mind lightly. Noble birth is of no profit to men; for nothing is more esteemed among all people than wealth. Chryse to Hephaestion: You no longer love Diodote. You have extinguished the torches of love; for you are not jealous over her, seeing her lingering with Lysistratus. Nothing is more contentious than the Erotes; and how, if you love, do you philosophize while enduring such great pain? 64 Socrates to Melanippides: Gymnasts and trainers are indispensable to children as teachers of self-control. For since children are not yet capable of understanding or of laws, they bridle their licentiousness with threats; for we disturb children more by words than by whips. But I admire your shamelessness; for neither are the punishments of courts fearful to you, nor is persuasive speech held in respect. In old age you have a mind more foolish than children. Go then, if you wish, to the pit. For the man whom speech and whips do not teach to be self-controlled, to persuade him to abstain from vice is exceedingly difficult and harder than to cleanse the dung of Augeas or to drain the whole Atlantic sea with a cup.

Boubalion to Kissybios: The son of Gorgias is wronging us. For the utterly accursed fellow drives a pair of horses as he rides about, and under the pretext of hunting the most wicked man keeps turning over his villainy. For neither does a hare visit us nor is a gazelle present among us, nor buffaloes, nor deer, nor any other of the things suitable for hunting. For the pens and snares drive away the hares, by which they too are caught when they step upon the clusters, and there is a scarcity of gazelle and buffalo because of the neighboring lions. And why then shall I enumerate to you the countless kinds of beasts, with which we too are afflicted with hunger? For waterlessness punishes us, and want of game punishes the hunters. Since, then, you have a kinship with the wrongdoer, Kissybios, suggest what is advantageous, and let these present words of yours teach him to be more temperate. For know that he will be torn apart by dogs, if he dwells in my fields for the rest of his time; for already the bitch, together with her pups, guards my little plot for me, eager to lay hold of human fat. Peitho to Hippolytos: Those who lust after outward comeliness, not a solemn character, embrace it more. For the Loves do not promise chastity, but with beauty of body they bait the licentious eye. If, then, you love Rhodokleia for her ways, the Loves do not rule over your pleasures; for the dart of Aphrodite does not touch a reasoning mind that philosophizes. Eratosthenes to Aischines: You eat your oaths like vegetables, and what is being done seems to you a clatter of teeth, and you talk back to those who accuse you, you utter villain: "the tongue has sworn, but the mind is unsworn," not knowing that an unbridled tongue exacts a greater punishment than the offense.

For whatever sins we commit with words, we shall pay the penalty with deeds. So keep your tongue disciplined, being cautious about swearing even in matters that are true; for an oath seems to be a light thing, yet it is more burdensome than any weight. It was for this reason that Tantalus was punished: for in matters concerning the divine he kept his tongue unrestrained. Seutlion to Koriannos: Late, at last, I have caught the most wicked fox, and having taken her I guard the utterly accursed creature with varied bonds. And I shall bring her to the highway, Koriannos, having summoned all the rustics together, and I shall triumph over my enemy; and publicly she shall pay the penalty, undergoing one punishment in place of many wrongs. Calliope to Lais: Gorgias prides himself on his locks and his cicada, not yet having shadowed his face with down, and he struts about in his beauty, and he sets before us his comeliness as a bait for folly. But I shall engrave old age and disease and grief on tablets, and I would hang them before the doors of the ungrateful man; for these shall one day stand as rivals to his comeliness. Plato to Axiochus: We guide horses with reins and whips, and when we sail we sometimes spread the ship's sails and sometimes curb it with anchors and bring it to rest. In this way, Axiochus, one must also steer the tongue, sometimes arming it with words and sometimes calming it with silence.

Rhodon to Kyparisson: They say the Lucanians are attacking again, and I shall throw away the sickle and forge a spear and a spear-butt, and I shall practice the art of war. For the demon does not allow us to rest. For me the summer is colder than the winter; for what could be more chilling than war? When spring appeared, I wept. How the field luxuriates with flowers, how fragrant the little plot among the myrtles, how comely the plane tree in its foliage. The grain crop is green, everything hastens for me toward fair weather. But the enemy wrongs us; for the sword is more desirable to them than the plough. Sosipatros to Telesilla: If nature had not mingled unpleasant satiety with the pleasures of Aphrodite, the male would have been enslaved by the female sex, Telesilla. Do not, then, be proud, little harlot. The firebrand of Aphrodite has been quenched for me; for the arrows of the Erotes do not provide immortal pains. Proklos to Archimedes: They say that the octopuses, when they fail to catch prey, eat their own tentacles, making their own wretched limbs, as it were, a ready-prepared relish. At any rate, the wretches feast on the vital parts of their own bodies, and are revealed as banqueters on their own flesh. Surely, Archimedes, do you not seem to be an octopus in disposition in every respect? I certainly think so most clearly; for you wrong your own father altogether too inhumanely, neither reverencing nature nor fearing justice as a pitfall. But if you should repent, you will have Providence forgetful of past evils;

But if you have inherited the gold-loving Erinys as an unchangeable passion, the divine balance weighs the evenly poised scale for you, and you will have children as true images and likenesses of their father's wickedness. For thus also the offspring of the viper succeed to their mother's impiety, bursting the womb that conceived and nursed them. 74 Gonimos to Dorkon, on the deer: The dung of cattle is established for the earth unto fruitfulness. Therefore give me the dung of your cattle, and you yourself will receive wages of plenty—wild pears and vegetables—and I shall repay your generosity with more splendid favors. 75 Aristoxenos to Polyxene: Nothing is weaker than the pleasures of courtesans. The kisses of your lips are faithless; for a love unplanted withers sooner. I, for the rest, shall rather welcome chastity, which is joyless in the eyes of most—for it promises constancy—and I shall purchase marriage with dowries; for to buy the faith of a courtesan is most difficult. 76 Diogenes to Sotion: This little scrap of reputation seems to the wise to be a dream in waking life, and it is more monstrous and more worthless than the fabricated myths—unstable, light-making, a plaything of sounds and winds more phantom-like. It vexes even when absent, and when it has come it grieved more; for not long after it proved ungrateful to its lovers and, before it came to be, ran away into not-being. Let not the puffings of fortune strike you with amazement; for it mocks men just as it wishes; for the affairs of men have turned out to be images of images.

77 Boukolion to Myronides: Your offspring is exceedingly wanton, Myronides. With a red rag he threw the herds into confusion and hurled down the heifer you longed for; and his agemates made the disaster a joke. Do not give the boy more than two choinikes; for the young, being full of vigor, are unruly, and when they live in luxury they are more intemperate. 78 Perikles to Kalliope: To attain maidenly pleasures is exceedingly difficult; and I am slack in soul. And what am I to do? For Eros is implacable, sending his arrow. Do you yourself judge both me and Eros, and give me a humane verdict; for the Erotes are envious, granting the longing but taking away the attainment. 79 Isokrates to Dionysios: Forerunners and rod-bearers and heralds and the attainment of the loftiest thrones are a mist over philosophy, and the separation of the virtues is by nature most divisive. You have not exchanged your nature along with your fortune. You still have your leathern wallet; for from the outset you have a mortal constitution. Why, then, has this empty and light little opinion puffed up to such an extent the clay flask? You have been filled with great folly, wretched man, and the knowledge of your nature has been taken from you. Thus the lofty movements of fortune have compelled you to depart from your former contemplation, and have prepared you to withdraw from that temperate madness. Once your lowly state was lofty to you; but now the highest boundary of fortune is both low and earthbound. Therefore stand away from false happiness, and outrun runaway fortune; for by anticipating the senseless change, you will not bear it hard when it falls upon you. Korydon to Ampelon: There is nothing more wretched than farmers.

We are tyrannized even by the winds, we wretches; the south wind destroys us, it has made my ears of grain wither away, it has ravaged the vine and ruined the grapes. And I am not able to drag the one who has harmed me before a court. Therefore I shall thrust away the sickle and the winnowing fan, and taking up shield and helmet and sword, I shall become a soldier, and by changing my craft I shall outwit fortune. 81 Leandros to Kallikomos: If there is anything more precious to men than gold, teach it, and I shall repay the enjoyment with greater gifts; but if not, give me your favors more quickly. For you do not have a beauty more august than Danae's, nor am I richer than Zeus in gold when I buy maidenhood. 82 Sokrates to Alkibiades: Even the playthings of poetry are full of all wisdom. The son of Meletos says that the companions of Odysseus passed through their ears with wax, when their ships put out toward the licentious Sirens, but that the son of Laertes was held back by bonds as in some hard-to-escape prison. He tells in myth the secret things of philosophy. For I think that poetry fashions the Sirens as shameful pleasures. And I marvel greatly at Homer, who mingles truth with his fictions and mixes a draught sweeter to our ears than nectar, as though he had blended falsehood like water with truth as with some most potent wine. For in this way we are neither deceived by his fictions, nor are we intoxicated in mind by the hard-to-attain comprehension of realities. Therefore by the wax he indicated ignorance, and by the bond philosophy. Hence he tells the marvel that Odysseus alone heard the melodies surpassing those of swans, and that his desire was cut off by the bonds.

For the removal of evils is a virtue without philosophy, but the withdrawal from pleasures is the contested trophy of philosophy. Since, then, Alcibiades, the present life is an image of the wandering of Odysseus, and the wretched human being swims round about in the sea of tumults, and the sounds of Siren-like pleasures circle around us, and like winds they beat upon us now from this side and now from another with strange blasts, let us imitate the consort of Penelope, practicing philosophy as an unbreakable and divine bond of the virtues. 83 Anthinus to Ampelinus: The vintage has already come forth, and the grape is filled with must and is eager to be poured out into the winepress. Keep watch, then, over the highway most excellently, and keep the Cretan bitch as your companion. For the hands of travelers are unrestrained and most ready to do injustice to the sweats of farmers. Chrysippe to Sosipatrus: You have not been caught in the nets of love, Sosipatrus, in loving Anthusa. It is a proof of prudent eyes to love a comely maiden. Do not groan, overcome by beauty; for you will have a greater enjoyment than the labors. Erotic

A tear is pleasant; for the things of grief have been mingled with pleasure, and the Loves delight while they pain; for the embroidered girdle of Aphrodite has been engraved with manifold passions. Plato to Dionysius: If you wish to conquer grief, walk around the tombs, and you will have the remedy for the passion, and you will behold the greatest felicities of men possessing no swelling beyond dust.