The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers Diogenes Laërtius (first ebook reader .TXT) 📖

And ever after that they became very intimate, so that they say Theophrastus was much annoyed, and said: “That a most ingenious and well-disposed young man had deserted his school.”

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

Pergamus is not famed for arms alone,
But often hears its praise resound
For its fine horses, at the holy Pisa.
Yet, if a mortal may declare,
Its fate as hidden in the breast of Jove,
It will be famous for its woes.

There is another addressed to Menodorus the son of Eudamus, who was attached to one of his fellow pupils:

Phrygia is a distant land, and so
Is sacred Thyatira, and Cadanade,
Your country Menodorus. But from all,
As the unvaried song of bards relates,
An equal road does lie to Acheron,
That dark unmentioned river; so you lie
Here far from home; and here Eudamus raises
This tomb above your bones, for he did love you,
Though you were poor, with an undying love.

But he admired Homer above all poets, and always used to read a portion of his works before going to sleep; and in the morning he would say that he was going to the object of his love, when he was going to read him. He said, too, that Pindar was a wonderful man for filling the voice, and pouring forth an abundant variety of words and expressions. He also, when he was a young man, wrote a criticism on Ion.

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

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

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

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

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

First Plato comes, and Pyrrho last,
And in the middle Diodorus.

And Timon speaks thus of him:

For having on this side the heavy load
Of Menedemus plac’d beneath his breast,
He’ll to stout Pyrrho run, or Diodorus.

And presently afterwards he represents him as saying:

I’ll swim to Pyrrho, or that crooked sophist
Called Diodorus.

He was exceedingly fond of employing axioms, very concise in his diction, and when speaking he laid an emphasis on each separate word.

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

You’ll not escape all notice while you thus
Attack the young man with your biting sarcasm.

Once, when a young man was arguing against him with more boldness than usual, he said: “Will no one stop his mouth with the knout?”36 And to a man who lay under the general imputation of low debauchery, and who argued with him that one thing was not greater than another, he asked him whether a cup holding two pints was not larger than one which held only one. There was a certain Chian named Hemon, exceedingly ugly but who fancied himself good looking and always went about in fine clothes; this man asked him one day: “If he thought that a wise man could feel attachment to him.”⁠—“Why should he not,” said he, “when they love even those who are less handsome than you, and not so well-dressed either?” and when the man, though one of the vilest characters possible, said to Arcesilaus as if he were addressing a very rigid man:

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

Arcesilaus replied:

O wretched woman, why do you thus roughen
Your voice, not speaking in your usual manner?

And once, when he was plagued by a chattering fellow of low extraction, he said:

The sons of slaves are always talking vilely.37

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

For often times the passing winds do fill
The female bird, except when big with young.38

And the lines come out of the Oenomaus of Sophocles. He once reminded a certain dialectician, a pupil of Alexinus, who was unable to explain correctly some saying of his master, of what had been done by Philoxenus to some brick-makers. For when they were singing some of his songs very badly he came upon them, and trampled their bricks under foot, saying: “As you spoil my works so will I spoil yours.”

And he used to be very indignant with those who neglected proper opportunities of applying themselves to learning; and he had a peculiar habit, while conversing, of using the expression, “I think,” and “So-and-so,” naming the person, “will not agree to this.” And this was imitated by several of his pupils, who copied also his style of expression and everything