Complete Works of Plutarch Part 68

Then Niloxenus delivered the paper to Bias, who broke up the seal and commanded it to be read in all their hearing. The contents were these:

Amasis the king of Egypt, to Bias, the wisest of the Grecians, greeting.

There is a contest between my brother of Ethiopia and myself about wisdom; and being baffled in divers other particulars, he now demands of me a thing absurd and impracticable; for he requires me to drink up the ocean dry. If I be able to read this his riddle, divers cities and towns now in his possession are to be annexed to my kingdom; but if I cannot resolve this hard sentence, and give him the right meaning thereof, he requires of me my right to all the towns bordering upon Elephantina.

Consider with speed the premises, and let me receive your thoughts by Niloxenus. Pray lose no time. If in anything I can be serviceable to your city or friends, you may command me. Farewell.

Bias, having perused and for a little time meditated upon the letter, and whispering Cleobulus in the ear (he sat by him), exclaimed: What a narration is here, O Niloxenus! Will Amasis, who governs so many men and is seized of so many flouris.h.i.+ng territories, drink up the ocean for the gain of a few paltry, beggarly villages? Niloxenus replied with a smile: Consider, good sir, what is to be done, if he will obey. Why then, said Bias, let Amasis require the Ethopian king to stop the stream which from all parts flow and empty themselves in the ocean, until he have drunk out the whole remainder; for I conceive he means the present waters, not those which shall flow into it hereafter. Niloxenus was so overjoyed at this answer, that he could not contain himself. He hugged and kissed the author, and the whole company liked his opinion admirably well; and Chilo laughing desired Niloxenus to get aboard immediately before the sea was consumed, and tell his master he should mind more how to render his government sweet and potable to his people, than how to swallow such a quant.i.ty of salt water. For Bias, he told him, understands these things very well, and knows how to oblige your lord with very useful instructions, which if he vouchsafe to attend, he shall no more need a golden basin to wash his feet, to gain respect from his subjects; all will love and honor him for his virtue, though he were ten thousand times more hateful to them than he is. It were well and worthily done, quoth Periander, if all of us did pay him our first-fruits in this kind by the poll (as Homer said). Such a course would bring him an accession of profit greater than the whole proceeds of the voyage, besides being of great use to ourselves.

To this point it is fit that Solon should first speak, quoth Chilo, not only because he is the eldest in the company and therefore sits uppermost at table, but because he governs and gives laws to the amplest and most complete and flouris.h.i.+ng republic in the world, that of Athens.

Here Niloxenus whispered me in the ear: O Diocles, saith he, how many reports fly about and are believed, and how some men delight in lies which they either feign of their own heads or most greedily swallow from the mouths of others. In Egypt I heard it reported how Chilo had renounced all friends.h.i.+p and correspondence with Solon, because he maintained the mutability of laws. A ridiculous fiction, quoth I, for then he and we must have renounced Lycurgus, who changed the laws and indeed the whole government of Sparta.

Solon, pausing awhile, gave his opinion in these words. I conceive that monarch, whether king or tyrant, were infinitely to be commanded, who would exchange his monarchy for a commonwealth. Bias subjoined, And who would be first and foremost in conforming to the laws of his country.

Thales added, I reckon that prince happy, who, being old, dies in his bed a natural death. Fourthly, Anacharsis, If he alone be a wise man.

Fifthly, Cleobulus said, If he trust none of his courtiers. Sixthly, Pittacus spake thus, If he could so treat his subjects that they feared not him but for him. Lastly, Chilo concluded thus, A magistrate ought to meditate no mortal thing but everything immortal.

When all had given in their judgments upon this point, we requested Periander to let us know his thoughts. Disorder and discontent appearing in his countenance, he said, These opinions are enough to scare any wise man from affecting, empire. These things, saith Aesop after his reproving way, ought rather to have been discussed privately among ourselves, lest we be accounted antimonarchical while we desire to be esteemed friends and loyal counsellors. Solon, gently touching him on the head and smiling, answered: Do you not perceive that any one would make a king more moderate and a tyrant more favorable, who should persuade him that it is better not to reign than to reign? Who would believe you before the oracle delivered unto you, quoth Aesop which p.r.o.nounced that city happy that heard but one crier. Yes, quoth Solon, and Athens, now a commonwealth, hath but one crier and one magistrate, the law, though the government be democratical; but you, my friend, have been so accustomed to the croaking of ravens and the prating of jays, that you do not hear clearly your own voice. For you maintain it to be the happiness of a city to be under the command of one man, and yet account it the merit of a feast if liberty is allowed every man to speak his mind freely upon what subject he pleases. But you have not prohibited your servants' drunkenness at Athens, Aesop said, as you have forbidden them to love or to use dry ointments. Solon laughed at this; but Cleodorus the physician said: To use dry ointment is like talking when a man is soaked with wine; both are very pleasant. Therefore, saith Chilo, men ought the more carefully to avoid it. Aesop proceeds, Thales seemed to imply that he should soon grow old.

Periander said laughing: We suffer deservedly, for, before we have perfected any remarks upon the letter, we are fallen upon disputes foreign to the matter under consideration; and therefore I pray, Niloxenus, read out the remainder of your lord's letter, and slip not this opportunity to receive what satisfaction all that are present shall be able to give you. The command of the king of Ethiopia, says Niloxenus, is no more and no less than (to use Archilochus's phrase) a broken scytale; that is, the meaning is inscrutable and cannot be found out. But your master Amasis was more mild and polite in his queries; for he commanded him only to resolve him what was most ancient, most beautiful, greatest, wisest, most common, and withal, what was most profitable, most pernicious, most strong, and most easy. Did he resolve and answer every one of these questions? He did, quoth Niloxenus, and do you judge of his answers and the soundness thereof: and it is my Prince's purpose not to misrepresent his responses and condemn unjustly what he saith well, so, where he finds him under a mistake, not to suffer that to pa.s.s without correction. His answers to the foresaid questions I will read to you.--What is most ancient? Time. What is greatest? The World. What is wisest? Truth. What is most beautiful? The light. What is most common? Death. What is most profitable? G.o.d. What is most Pernicious? An evil genius. What is strongest? Fortune. What is most easy? That which is pleasant.

When Niloxenus had read out these answers, there was a short silence among them; by and by Thales desires Niloxenus to inform him if Amasis approved of these answers. Niloxenus said, he liked some and disliked others. There is not one of them right and sound, quoth Thales, but all are full of wretched folly and ignorance. As for instance, how can that be most ancient whereof part is past, part is now present, and part is yet to come; every man knows it is younger than ourselves and our actions. As to his answer that truth is the most wise thing, it is as incongruous as if he had affirmed the light to be an eye if he judged the light to be the most beautiful how could he omit the sun; as to his solutions concerning the G.o.ds and evil genuises, they are full of presumption and peril. What he saith of Fortune is void of sense, for her inconstancy and fickleness proceed from want of strength and power.

Nor is death the most common thing; the living are still at liberty, it hath not arrested them. But lest we be blamed as having a faculty to find fault only, we will lay down our opinions of these things, and compare them with those of the Ethiopian; I offer my self first, if Niloxenus pleases, to deliver my opinion on every one singly and I will relate both questions and answers in that method and order in which they were sent to Ethiopia and read to us. What is most ancient Thales answered, G.o.d, for he had no beginning. What is greatest? Place; the World contains all other things, this surrounds and contains the world.

What is most beautiful? The world; for whatever is framed artificially and methodically is a part of it. What is most wise? Time; for it has found out some things already, it will find out the rest in due time.

What is most common Hope; for they that want other things are masters of this. What is most profitable? Virtue; for by a right managery of other things she makes them all beneficial and advantageous. What is most pernicious? Vice; for it depraves the best things we enjoy. What is most strong? Necessity; for this alone is insuperable. What is most easy?

That which is most agreeable to nature; for pleasures themselves are sometimes tedious and nauseating.

All the consult approved of Thale's solutions. Cleodemus said: My friend Niloxenus, it becomes kings to propound and resolve such questions; but the insolence of that barbarian who would have Amasis drink the sea would have been better fitted by such a smart reprimand as Pittacus gave Alyattes, who sent an imperious letter to the Lesbians. He made him no other answer, but to bid him spend his time in eating his hot bread and onions.

Periander, here a.s.sumed the discourse, and said: It was the manner of the ancient Grecians heretofore, O Cleodemus, to propound doubts to one another; and it hath been told us, that the most famous and eminent poets used to meet at the grave of Amphidamas in Chalcis. This Amphidamas was a leading commander, one that had perpetual wars with the Eretrians, and at last lost his life in one of the battles fought for the possession of the Lelantine plain. Now, because the writings of those poets were set to verse and so made the argument more knotty and the decision more arduous, and the great names of the antagonists, Homer and Hesiod, whose excellence was so well known, made the umpires timorous and shy to determine; they therefore betook themselves to these sorts of questions, and Homer, says Lesches, propounded this riddle:--

Tell me, O Muse, what never was And never yet shall be.

Hesiod answered readily and extempore in this wise:--

When steeds with echoing hoof, to win The prize, shall run amain; And on the tomb of lofty Jove Their chariots break in twain.

For this reply he was infinitely commended and got the tripod. Pray tell me, quoth Cleodemus, what difference there is between these riddles and those of Eumetis, which she frames and invents to recreate herself with as much pleasure as other virgins make nets and girdles? They may be fit to offer and puzzle women withal; but for men to beat their brains to find out their mystery would be mighty ridiculous. Eumetis looked like one that had a great mind to reply; but her modesty would not permit her, for her face was filled with blushes. But Aesop in her vindication asked: Is it not much more ridiculous that all present cannot resolve the riddle she propounded to us before supper? This was as follows:--

A man I saw, who by his fire Did set a piece of bra.s.s Fast to a man, so that it seemed To him it welded was.

Can you tell me, said he, how to construe this, and what the sense of it may be? No, said Cleodemus, it is no profit to know what it means. And yet, quoth Aesop, no man understands this thing better and practises it more judiciously and successfully than yourself. If you deny it, I have my witnesses ready; for there are your cupping-gla.s.ses. Cleodemus laughed outright; for of all the physicians in his time, none used cupping-gla.s.ses like him, he being a person that by his frequent and fortunate application thereof brought them first into request in the world.

Mnesiphilus the Athenian, a friend and favorite of Solon's, said: O Periander, our discourse, as our wine, ought to be distributed not according to our power or priority, but freely and equally, as in a popular state; for what hath been already discoursed concerning kingdoms and empires signifies little to us who live in a democracy. Wherefore I judge it convenient that every one of you, commencing with Solon, should freely and impartially declare his sense of a popular state. The motion pleased all the company; then saith Solon: My friend Mnesiphilus, you heard, together with the rest of this good company, my opinion concerning republics; but since you are willing to hear it again, I hold that city or state happy and most likely to remain free, in which those that are not personally injured are yet as forward to try and punish wrongdoers as that person who is wronged. Bias added, Where all fear the law as they fear a tyrant. Thirdly, Thales said, Where the citizens are neither too rich nor too poor. Fourthly, Anacharsis said, Where, though in all other respects they are equal, yet virtuous men are advanced and vicious persons degraded. Fifthly, Cleobulus said, Where the rulers fear reproof and shame more than the law. Sixthly, Pittacus said, Where evil men are kept from ruling, and good men from not ruling. Chilo, pausing a little while, determined that the best and most enduring state was where the subject minded the law most and the lawyers least. Periander concluded with his opinion, that all of them would best approve that democracy which came next and was likest to an aristocracy.

After they had ended this discourse, I begged they would condescend to direct me how to govern a house; for they were few who had cities and kingdoms to govern, compared with those who had houses and families to manage. Aesop laughed and said: I hope you except Anacharsis out of your number; for having no house he glories because he can be contented with a chariot only, as they say the sun is whirled about from one end of the heavens to the other in his chariot. Therefore, saith Anacharsis, he alone, or he princ.i.p.ally, is most free among the G.o.ds, and ever at his own liberty and dispose. He governs all, and is governed and subject to none, but he rides and reigns; and you know not how magnificent and broad his chariot is; if you did, you would not thus floutingly depreciate our Scythian chariots. For you seem in my apprehension to call these coverings made of wood and mud houses, as if you should call the sh.e.l.l and not the living creature a snail. Therefore you laughed when Solon told you how, when he viewed Croesus's palace and found it richly and gloriously furnished, he yet could not yield he lived happily until he had tried the inward and invisible state of his mind; for a man's felicity consists not in the outward and visible favors and blessings of fortune, but in the inward and unseen perfections and riches of the mind. And you seem to have forgot your own fable of the fox, who, contending with the leopard as to which possessed more colors and spots, and having referred the matter in controversy to the arbitration of an umpire, desired him to consider not so much the outside as the inside; for, saith he, I have more various and different fetches and tricks in my mind than he has marks or spots in his body. You regard only the handiwork of carpenters and masons and stone-cutters, and call this a house; not what one hath within, his children, his wife, his friends and attendants, with whom if a man lived in an emmet's bed or a bird's nest, enjoying in common the ordinary comforts of life, this man may be affirmed to live a happy and a fortunate life.

This is the answer I purpose to return Aesop, quoth Anacharsis, and I tender it to Diocles as my share in this discourse; only let the rest give in their opinions, if they please. Solon thought that house most happy where the estate was got without injustice, kept without distrust, and spent without repentance. Bias said, That house is happy where the master does freely and voluntarily what the law would else compel him to do. Thales held that house most happy where the master had most leisure and respite from business. Cleobulus said, That in which the master is more beloved than feared. Pittacus said, most that is happy where superfluities are not required and necessaries are not wanting. Chilo added, that house is most happy where one rules as a monarch in his kingdom. And he proceeded, when a certain Lacedaemonian desired Lycurgus to establish a democracy in the city. Go you, friend, replied he, and try the experiment first in your own house.

When they had all given in their opinions upon this point, Eumetis and Melissa withdrew. Then Periander called for a large bowl full of wine, and drank to Chilo; and Chilo too drank to Bias. Ardalus then standing up called to Aesop, and said: Will you not hand the cup to your friends at this end of the table, when you behold those persons there swilling up all that good liquor, and imparting none to us here as if the cup were that of Bathycles. But this cup, quoth Aesop, is no public cup, it hath stood so long by Solon's trenchard. Then Pittacus called to Mnesiphilus: Why, saith he, does not Solon drink, but act in contradiction to his own verses?--

I love that ruby G.o.d, whose blessings flow In tides, to recreate my thirsty maw; Venus I court, the Muses I adore, Who give us wine and pleasures evermore.

Anacharsis subjoined: He fears your severe law, my friend Pittacus, wherein you decreed the drunkard a double punishment. You seem, said Pittacus, a little to fear the penalty, who have adventured heretofore, and now again before my face, to break that law and to demand a crown for the reward of your debauch. Why not, quoth Anacharsis, when there is a reward promised to the hardest drinker? Why should I not demand my reward, having drunk down all my fellows?--or inform me of any other end men drive at in drinking much wine, but to be drunk. Pittacus laughed at this reply, and Aesop told them this fable: The wolf seeing a parcel of shepherds in their booth feeding upon a lamb, approaching near them,--What a bustle and noise and uproar would there have been, saith he, if I had but done what you do! Chilo said: Aesop hath very justly revenged himself upon us, who awhile ago stopped his mouth; now he observes how we prevented Mnesiphilus's discourse, when the question was put why Solon did not drink up his wine.

Mnesiphilus then spake to this effect: I know this to be the opinion of Solon, that in every art and faculty, divine and human, the work which is done is more desired than the instrument wherewith it is done, and the end than the means conducing to that end; as, for instance, a weaver thinks a cloak or coat more properly his work than the ordering of his shuttles or the divers motions of his beams. A smith minds the soldering of his irons and the sharpening of the axe more than those little things accessory to these main matters, as the kindling of the coals and preparing the stone-dust. Yet farther, a carpenter would justly blame us, if we should affirm it is not his work to build houses or s.h.i.+ps but to bore holes or to make mortar; and the Muses would be implacably incensed with him that should say their business is only to make harps, pipes and such musical instruments, not the inst.i.tution and correcting of manners and the government of those men's pa.s.sions who are lovers of singing and masters of music. And agreeably copulation is not the work of Venus, nor is drunkenness that of Bacchus; but love and friends.h.i.+p, affection and familiarity, which are begot and improved by and the means of these. Solon terms these works divine, and he professes he loves and now prosecutes them in his declining years as vigorously as ever in his youthful days. That mutual love between man and wife is the work of Venus, the greatness of the pleasure affecting their bodies mixes and melts their very souls; divers others, having little or no acquaintance before, have yet contracted a firm and lasting friends.h.i.+p over a gla.s.s of wine, which like fire softened and melted their tempers, and disposed them for a happy union. But in such a company, and of such men as Periander hath invited, there is no need of can and chalice, but the Muses themselves throwing a subject of discourse among you, as it were a sober cup, wherein is contained much of delight and drollery and seriousness too, do hereby provoke, nourish, and increase friends.h.i.+p among you, allowing the cup to rest quietly upon the bowl, contrary to the rule which Hesiod (Hesiod, "Works and Days," 744.) gives for those who have more skill for carousing than for discoursing.

Though all the rest with stated rules we bound Unmix'd, unmeasured are thy goblets crown'd ("Iliad" iv. 261.)

for it was the old Greek way, as Homer here tells us, to drink one to another in course and order. So Ajax gave a share of his meat to his next neighbor.

When Mnesiphilus had discoursed after this manner, in comes Chersias the poet, whom Periander had lately pardoned and received into favor upon Chilo's mediation. Saith Cherias: Does not Jupiter distribute to the G.o.ds their proportion and share sparingly and severally, as Agamemnon did to his commanders when his guests pledged one another? If, O Chersias, quoth Cleodemus, as you narrate, certain pigeons bring him ambrosia every meal, winging with a world of hards.h.i.+p through the rocks called PLANCTAE (or WANDERING), can you blame him for his sparingness and frugality and dealing out to his guests by measure?

I am satisfied, quoth Chersias, and since we are fallen upon our old discourse of housekeeping, which of the company can remember what remains to be said thereof? There remains, if I mistake not, to show what that measure is which may content any man. Cleobulus answered: The law has prescribed a measure for wise men; but as touching foolish ones I will tell you a story I once heard my father relate to my brother. On a certain time the moon begged of her mother a coat that would fit her. How can that be done, quoth the mother, for sometime you are full, sometimes the one half of you seems lost and perished, sometimes only a pair of horns appear. So, my Chersias, to the desires of a foolish immoderate man no certain measure can be fitted; for according to the ebbing and flowing of his l.u.s.t and appet.i.te, and the frequent or seldom casualties that befall him, accordingly his necessities ebb and flow, not unlike Aesop's dog, who, being pinched and ready to starve with the cold winter, was a mind to build himself a house; but when summer came on, he lay all along upon the ground, and stretching himself in the sun thought himself monstrous big, and thought it unnecessary and besides no small labor to build him a house portionable to that bulk and bigness.

And do you not observe, O Chersias, continues he, many poor men,--how one while they pinch their bellies, upon what short commons they live, how sparing and n.i.g.g.ardly and miserable they are; and another while you may observe the same men as distrustful and covetous withal, as if the plenty of the city and county, the riches of king and kingdom were not sufficient to preserve them from want and beggary.

When Chersias had concluded this discourse, Cleodemus began thus: We see you that are wise men possessing these outward goods after an unequal manner. Good sweet sir, answered Cleobulus, the law weaver-like hath distributed to every man a fitting, decent, adequate portion, and in your profession your reason does what the law does here,--when you feed, or diet, or physic your patient, you give not the quant.i.ty he desires, but what you judge to be convenient for each in his circ.u.mstances.

Ardalus inquires: Epimenides, to abstain from all other victuals, and to content himself with a little composition of his own, which the Greeks call [Greek omitted] (HUNGER-RELIEVING)? This he takes into his mouth and chews, and eats neither dinner nor supper. This instance obliged the whole company to be a little while silent, until Thales in a jesting way replied, that Epimenides did very wisely, for hereby he saved the trouble and charge of grinding and boiling his meat, as Pittacus did. I myself sojourning as Lesbos overheard my landlady, as she was very busy at her hand-mill, singing as she used to do her work, "Grind mill; grind mill; for even Pittacus the prince of great Mitylene, grinds" [Greek footnote ommitted]. Quoth Solon: Ardalus, I wonder you have not read the law of Epimenides's frugality in Hesiod's writings, who prescribes him and others this spare diet; for he was the person that gratified Epimenides with the seeds of this nutriment, when he directed him to inquire how great benefit a man might receive by mallows and asphodel (Hesiod, "Works and Days," 41.) Do you believe, said Periander, that Hesiod meant this literally; or rather that, being himself a great admirer of parsimony, he hereby intended to exhort men to use mean and spare diet, as most healthful and pleasant? For the chewing of mallows is very wholesome, and the stalk of asphodel is very luscious; but this "expeller of hunger and thirst" I take to be rather physic than natural food, consisting of honey and I know not what barbarian cheese, and of many and costly drugs fetched from foreign parts. If to make up this composition so many ingredients were requisite, and so difficult to come by and so expensive, Hesiod might have kept his breath to cool his pottage, and never blessed the world with the discovery. And yet I admire how your landlord, when he went to perform the great purification for the Delians not long since, could overlook the monuments and patterns of the first aliment which the people brought into the temple,--and, among other cheap fruits such as grow of themselves, the mallows and the asphodel; the usefulness and innocency whereof Hesiod seemed in his work to magnify. Moreover, quoth Anacharsis, he affirms both plants to be great restoratives. You are in the right, quoth Cleodemus; for it is evident Hesiod was no ordinary physician, who could discourse so learnedly and judiciously of diet, of the nature of wines, and of the virtue of waters and baths, and of women, the proper times for procreation, and the site and position of infants in the womb; insomuch, that (as I take it) Aesop deserves much more the name of Hesiod's scholar and disciple than Epimenides, whose great and excellent wisdom the fable of the nightingale and hawk demonstrates. But I would gladly hear Solon's opinion in this matter; for having sojourned long at Athens and being familiarly acquainted with Epimenides, it is more than probable he might learn of him the grounds upon which he accustomed himself to so spare a diet.

To what purpose, said Solon, should I trouble him or myself to make inquiry in a matter so plain? For if it be a blessing next to the greatest to need little victuals, then it is the greatest felicity to need none at all. If I may have leave to deliver my opinion, quoth Cleodemus, I must profess myself of a different judgment, especially now we sit at table; for as soon as the meat is taken away, what belongs to those G.o.ds that are the patrons of friends.h.i.+p and hospitality has been removed. As upon the removal of the earth, quoth Thales, there must needs follow an universal confusion of all things, so in forbidding men meat, there must needs follow the dispersion and dissolution of the family, the sacred fire, the cups, the feasts and entertainment's, which are the princ.i.p.al and most innocent diversions of mankind; and so all the comforts of society are at end. For to men of business some recreation is necessary, and the preparation and use of victuals conduces much thereunto. Again, to be without victuals would tend to the destruction of husbandry, for want whereof the earth would soon be overgrown with weeds, and through the sloth of men overflowed with waters. And together with this, all arts would fail which are supported and encouraged hereby; nay, more, take away hospitality and the use of victuals and the wors.h.i.+p and honor of the G.o.ds will sink and perish; the sun will have but small and the moon yet smaller reverence if thy afford men only light and heat. And who will build an altar or offer sacrifices to Jupiter Pluvius, or to Ceres the patroness of husbandmen, or to Neptune the preserver of plants and trees? Or how can Bacchus be any longer termed the donor of all good things, if men make no further use of the good things he gives? What shall men sacrifice? What first-fruits shall they offer? In short, the subversion and confusion of the greatest blessings attend this opinion. Promiscuously and indefatigable to pursue all sorts of pleasures I own to be brutish, and to avoid all with a suitable aversion equally blockish, let the mind then freely enjoy such pleasures as are agreeable to its nature and temper. But for the body, there is certainly no pleasure more harmless and commendable and fitting than that which springs from a plentiful table,--which is granted by all men, for, placing this in the middle, men converse with one another and share in the provision. As to the pleasures of the bed, men use these in the dark, reputing the use thereof shameful and beastly as well as the total disuse of the pleasures of the table.

Cleodemus having finished this long harangue, I began to this effect.

You omit one thing, my friend, how they that decry food decry sleep too, and they that declaim against sleep declaim against dreams in the same breath, and so destroy the primitive and ancient way of divination. Add to this, that our whole life will be of one form and fas.h.i.+on, and our soul enclosed in a body to no purpose; many and those the princ.i.p.al parts thereof are naturally so formed and fas.h.i.+oned as to be organs of nutriment; so the tongue, the teeth, the stomach, and the liver, whereof none are idle, none framed for other use, so that whosoever hath no need of nutriment has no need of his body; that is, in other words, no man hath any need of himself, for every man hath a body of his own. This I have thought fit to offer in vindication of our bellies; if Solon or any other has anything to object to what I have said, I am willing to hear him.

Yea, doubtless, replies Solon, or we may be reputed more injudicious than the Egyptians. For when any person dies among them, they open him and show him so dissected to the sun; his guts they throw into the river, to the remaining parts they allow a decent burial, for they think the body now pure and clean; and to speak truly they are the foulest parts of the body, and like that lower h.e.l.l crammed with dead carca.s.ses and at the same time flowing with offensive rivers, such as flame with fire and are disturbed with tempests. No live creature feeds upon another living creature, but we first take away their lives, and in that action we do them great wrong. Now the very plants have life in them,--that is clear and manifest, for we perceive they grow and spread.

But to abstain from eating flesh (as they say Orpheus of old did) is more a pretence than a real avoiding of an injury proceeding from the just use of meat. One way there is, and but one way, whereby a man may avoid offence, namely by being contented with his own, not coveting what belongs to his neighbor. But if a man's circ.u.mstances be such and so hard that he cannot subsist without wronging another man, the fault is G.o.d's, not his. The case being such with some persons, I would fain learn if it be not advisable to destroy, at the same time with injustice, these instruments of injustice, the belly, stomach, and liver, which have no sense of justice or appet.i.te to honesty, and therefore may be fitly compared to your cook's implements, his knives and his caldrons, or to a baker's chimney and bins and kneading-tubs.

Verily one may observe the souls of some men confined to their bodies, as to a house of correction, barely to do the drudgery and to serve the necessities thereof. It was our own case but even now. While we minded our meat and our bellies, we had neither eyes to see nor ears to hear; but now the table is taken away, we are free to discourse among ourselves and to enjoy one another; and now our bellies are full, we have nothing else to do or care for. And if this condition and state wherein we at present are would last our whole life, we having no wants to fear nor riches to covet (for a desire of superfluities attends a desire of necessaries), would not our lives be much more comfortable and life itself much more desirable?

Yea, but Cleodemus stiffly maintains the necessity of eating and drinking, else we shall need tables and cups, and shall not be able to offer sacrifice to Ceres and Proserpina. By a parity of reason there is a necessity there should be contentions and wars, that men may have bulwarks and citadels and fortifications by land, fleets and navies abroad at sea, and that having slain hundreds, we may offer Hecatombs after the Messenian manner. By this reason we shall find men grudging their own health, for (they will say) there will be no need of down or feather beds unless they are sick; and so those healing G.o.ds, and particularly Esculapius, will be vast sufferers, for they will infallibly lose so many fat and rich sacrifices yearly. Nay, the art of chirurgery will perish, and all those ingenious instruments that have been invented for the cure of man will lie by useless and insignificant.

And what great difference is there between this and that? For meat is a medicine against hunger, and such as use a constant diet are said to cure themselves,--I mean such as use meat not for wantonness but of necessity. For it is plain, the prejudices we receive by feeding far surmount the pleasures. And the enjoyment of eating fills a very small place in our bodies and very little time. But why should I trouble you or myself with a catalogue of the many vexations which attend that man who is necessitated to provide for a family, and the many difficulties which distract him in his undertaking? For my part, I verily believe Homer had an eye to this very thing, when, to prove the immortality of the G.o.ds, he made use of this very argument, that they were such because they used no victuals;

For not the bread of man their life sustains, Nor wine's inflaming juice supplies their veins; ("Iliad," v. 341.)

intimating meat to be the cause of death as well as the means of sustaining and supporting life. From hence proceed divers fatal distempers caused much more by fulness than by fasting; and to digest what we have eaten proves frequently a harder matter than to provide and procure what we eat. And when we solicitously inquire beforehand what we should do or how we should employ ourselves if we had not such care and business to take up our time, this is as if Danaus's daughters should trouble their heads to know what they should do if they had no sieves to fill with water. We drudge and toil for necessaries, for want of better and n.o.bler occupation. As slaves then who have gained their freedom do now and then those drudgeries and discharge those servile employments and offices for their own benefit which they undertook heretofore for their masters' advantage, so the mind of man, which at present is enslaved to the body and the service thereof, when once it becomes free from this slavery, will take care of itself, and spend its time in contemplation of truth without distraction or disturbance. Such were our discourses upon this head, O Nicarchus.

And before Solon had fully finished, in came Gorgias, Periander's brother, who was just returned from Taenarum, whither he had been sent by the advice of the oracle to sacrifice to Neptune and to conduct a deputation. Upon his entrance we welcomed him home; and Periander having among the rest saluted him, Gorgias sat by him upon a bed, and privately whispered something to his brother which we could not hear. Periander by his various gestures and motions discovered different affections; sometimes he seemed sad and melancholic, by and by disturbed and angry; frequently he looked as doubtful and distrustful men use to do; awhile after he lifts up his eyes, as is usual with men in a maze. At last recovering himself, saith he, I have a mind to impart to you the contents of this emba.s.sy; but I scarce dare do it, remembering Thales's aphorism, how things impossible or incredible are to be concealed and only things credible and probable are to be related. Bias answered, I crave leave to explain Thales's saying, We may distrust enemies, even though they speak things credible, and trust friends, even though they relate things incredible; and I suppose by enemies he meant vicious men and foolish, and by friends, wise and good men. Then, brother Gorgias, quoth Periander, I pray relate the whole story particularly.

Gorgias in obedience to his brother's command began his story thus:--

When we had fasted now for three days and offered sacrifice upon each of those days, we were all resolved to sit up the third night and spend it in pastime and dancing. The moon shone very bright upon the water, and the sea was exceeding calm and still; this we saw, for we sported ourselves upon the sh.o.r.e. Being thus taken up, all of a sudden we espied a wonderful spectacle off at sea, making with incredible expedition to the adjoining promontory. The violence of the motion made the sea foam again, and the noise was so loud, that the whole company forsook their sport and ran together toward the place, admiring what the matter should be. Before we could make a full discovery of the whole, the motion was so rapid, we perceived divers dolphins, some swimming in a ring or circle, others hastening amain to that part of the sh.o.r.e which was most shallow, and others following after and (as it were) bringing up the rear. In the middle there was a certain heap which we could perceive above the water; but we could not distinctly apprehend what it was, till drawing near the sh.o.r.e we saw all the dolphins flocking together, and having made near the land they safely surrendered their charge, and left out of danger a man breathing and shaking himself. They returned to the promontory, and there seemed to rejoice more than before for this their fortunate undertaking. Divers in the company were affrighted and ran away; myself and a few more took courage, and went on to see and satisfy ourselves what this unusual matter might be; there we found and instantly knew our old acquaintance Arion the musician, who told us his name. He wore that very garment he used when he strove for mastery. We brought him into our tent and found he had received no damage in his pa.s.sage, save only a little la.s.situde by the violence of the motion. He told us the whole story of his adventure,--a story incredible to all but such as saw it with their eyes. He told us how, when he had determined to leave Italy, being hastened away by Periander's letters, he went aboard a Corinthian merchantman then in port and ready to sail; being off at sea with the winds favorable, he observed the seamen bent to ruin him, and the master of the vessel told him as much, and that they purposed to execute their design upon him that very night. In this distress, the poor man (as if inspired by his good Genius) girds about him his heretofore victorious, now his mourning cloak, with a brave resolution to compose and sing his own epitaph, as the swans when they apprehend the approaches of death are reported to do. Being thus habited, he told the seamen he was minded to commit the protection of himself and his fellow-pa.s.sengers to the providence of the G.o.ds in a Pythian song; then standing upon the p.o.o.p near the side of the vessel, and having invoked the help and a.s.sistance of all the sea G.o.ds, he strikes up briskly and sings to his harp. Before he had half finished his carol, the sun set, and he could discern Peloponnesus before him.

The seamen thought it tedious to tarry for the night, wherefore they resolved to murder him immediately, to which purpose they unsheathed their swords. Seeing this, and observing the steersman covering his face, he leaped into the sea as far as he could; but before his body sunk he found himself supported by dolphins. At first he was surprised with care and trouble; but by and by, finding himself marching forward with much ease and security, and observing a whole shoal of dolphins flocking about him and joyfully contending which should appear most forward and serviceable in his preservation, and discerning the vessel at a considerable distance behind, he apprehended the nimbleness of his porters; then, and not till then, his fears forsook him, and he professed he was neither so fearful of death nor desirous of life as he was full of ambitious desire, that he might show to all men that he stood in the grace and favor of the G.o.ds, and that he might himself have a firm belief in them. In his pa.s.sage, as he lifted up his eyes toward heaven, and beheld the stars glittering and twinkling and the moon full and glorious, and the sea calm all about her as she seemed to rise out of it, and yielding him (as it were) a beaten track; he declared, he thought G.o.d's justice had more eyes than one, and that with these innumerable eyes the G.o.ds beheld what was acted here below both by sea and land. With such contemplations he performed his voyage less anxiously, which much abated the tediousness thereof and was a comfort and refreshment to him in his solitude and danger. At last, arriving near the promontory which was both steep and high, and fearing danger in a straight course and direct line, they unanimously veered about, and making to sh.o.r.e with a little compa.s.s for security they delivered Arion to us in safety, so that he plainly perceived and with thanks acknowledged a Providence.

When Arion had finished this narrative of his escape, I asked him (quoth Gorgias) whither the s.h.i.+p was bound; he told me for Corinth, but it would not be there very suddenly, for when he leaped out of the s.h.i.+p and was carried (as he conceived) about five hundred furlongs, he perceived a calm, which must needs much r.e.t.a.r.d their arrival who were aboard.

Gorgias added that, having learned the names of the pilot and master and the colors of the s.h.i.+p, he immediately despatched out s.h.i.+ps and soldier to examine all the ports, all this while keeping Arion concealed, lest the criminals should upon notice of His deliverance escape the pursuit of justice. This action happened very luckily; for as soon as he arrived at Corinth, news was brought him that the same s.h.i.+p was in port, and that his party had seized it and secured all the men, merchants and others. Whereupon Periander commanded Gorgias's discretion and zeal, desiring him to proceed and lose no time, but immediately to clap them in close prison, and to suffer none to come at them to give the least notice of Arion's miraculous escape.

Gentlemen, quoth Aesop, I remember you derided my dialogue of the daws and rooks; and now you can admire and believe as improbable a story of dolphins. You are mightily out, said I, for this is no novel story which we believe, but it is recorded in the annals of Ino and Athamas above a thousand years ago. These pa.s.sages are supernatural, quoth Solon and much above our reason; what befell Hesiod is of a lower kind, and more proper for our discourse, and if you have not heard of it before, it is worth your hearing.

Hesiod once sojourned at the same house in Locris with a certain Milesian. In this his sojourning time it happened the gentleman's daughter was got with child by the Milesian which being discovered, the whole family concluded Hesiod, if not guilty, must be privy to the fact. His innocence was but a weak fence against their jealousy and aspersions; and therefore, rashly censuring him guilty, the brothers of the woman waylaid him in his return home, and slew him and his companion Troilus near the shrine of Nemean Jove in Locris. Their carca.s.ses they threw into the sea; that of Troilus was carried into the river Daphnus, and rested upon a certain rock compa.s.sed with waters, just above the surface of the sea, which rock bears his name to this day. The body of Hesiod was no sooner fallen upon the surface of the water, but a company of dolphins received it, and conveyed it to Rhium and Molyeria. It happened the Locrians were a.s.sembled at Rhium that day to feast and make merry according to the custom which continues still among them. As soon as they perceived a carca.s.s floating or rather swimming towards them, they hastened, not without admiration, to see what it was; and knowing the body to be Hesiod's, they instantly resolved to find out the murderers. It proved an easy discovery. After conviction they threw them headlong alive into the sea, and ordered their houses to be demolished to the very foundations. The body they buried in the grove of the temple of Jove, that no foreigner might find it out; the reason of this act was that the Orchomenians had searched far and near for it at the instigation of the oracle, who promised them the greatest felicity if they could get the bones of Hesiod and bury them in their city. Now if dolphins are so favorable to dead men, it is very probable they have a strong affection for the living, especially for such as delight in music, whether vocal or instrumental. And this we know undoubtedly, that these creatures delight infinitely in music; they love it, and if any man sings or plays, they will quietly come by the side of the s.h.i.+p, and listen till the music is ended. When children bathe in the water and sport themselves, you shall have a parcel of them flock together and sport and swim by them; and they may do it the more securely, since it is a breach of the law of Nature to hurt them. You never heard of any man that fishes for them purposely or hurts them wilfully, unless falling into the nets they spoil the sport, and so, like bad children, are corrected for their misdemeanors. I very well remember the Lesbians told me how a maid of their town was preserved from drowning by them.

It was a very true story, quoth Pittacus, and there are divers still alive who will attest it, if need be. The builders or founders of Lesbos were commanded by the oracle to sail till they came to a haven called Mesogaeum, there they should sacrifice a bull to Neptune, and for the honor of Amphitrite and the sea-nymphs they should offer a virgin. The princ.i.p.al persons in this colony were seven in number; the eighth was one Echelaus by name, and appointed head of the rest by the oracle himself; and he was a bachelor. A daughter of one of these seven was to be sacrificed, but who it should be was to be decided by lot, and the lot fell upon Smintheus's sister. Her they dressed most richly, and so apparelled they conveyed her in abundance of state to the water-side, and having composed a prayer for her, they were now ready to throw her overboard. There was in the company a certain ingenuous young gentleman whose name was Enalus; he was desperately in love with this young lady, and his love prompted him to endeavor all he could for her preservation, or at least to perish in the attempt. In the very moment she was to be cast away, he clasps her in his arms and throws himself and her together into the sea. Shortly after there was a flying report they were both conveyed safe to land. A while after Enalus was seen at Lesbos, who gave out they were preserved by dolphins. I could tell you stories more incredible than these, such as would amuse some and please others; but it is impossible to command men's faith. The sea was so tempestuous and rough, the people were afraid to come too near the waters, when Enalus arrived. A number of polypuses followed him even to Neptune's temple, the biggest and strongest of which carried a great stone. This Enalus dedicated, and this stone is therefore called Enalus to this day. To be short and to speak all in a few words,--he that knows how to distinguish between the impossible and the unusual, to make a difference between the unlikely and the absurd, to be neither too credulous nor too distrustful,--he hath learned your lesson, Do not overdo. ([Greek omitted], NE QUID NIMIS.)