The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers Diogenes LaĆ«rtius (first ebook reader .TXT) š
- Author: Diogenes Laƫrtius
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On one occasion he was working with his hands in the marketplace, and said: āI wish I could rub my stomach in the same way, and so avoid hunger.ā When he saw a young man going with some satraps to supper, he dragged him away and led him off to his relations, and bade them take care of him. He was once addressed by a youth beautifully adorned, who asked him some question; and he refused to give him any answer till he satisfied him whether he was a man or a woman. And on one occasion, when a youth was playing the cottabus in the bath, he said to him: āThe better you do it, the worse you do it.ā Once at a banquet, some of the guests threw him bones, as if he had been a dog; so he, as he went away, put up his leg against them as if he had been a dog in reality. He used to call the orators, and all those who speak for fame ĻĻĪ¹ĻĪ¬Ī½ĪøĻĻĻĪæĪ¹ (thrice men), instead of ĻĻĪ¹ĻĪ¬ĪøĪ»Ī¹ĪæĪ¹ (thrice miserable). He said that a rich but ignorant man was like a sheep with a golden fleece. When he saw a notice on the house of a profligate man: āTo be sold.āā āāI knew,ā said he, āthat you who are so incessantly drunk, would soon vomit up your owner.ā To a young man, who was complaining of the number of people who sought his acquaintance, he said: āDo not make such a parade of your vanity.ā
Having been in a very dirty bath, he said: āI wonder where the people who bathe here clean themselves.ā When all the company was blaming an indifferent harp-player, he alone praised him, and being asked why he did so, he said: āBecause, though he is such as he is, he plays the harp and does not steal.ā He saluted a harp player who was always left alone by his hearers, with: āGood morning, cock;ā and when the man asked him: āWhy so?ā he said: āBecause you, when you sing, make everyone get up.ā When a young man was one day making a display of himself, he, having filled the bosom of his robe with lupins, began to eat them; and when the multitude looked at him, he said: āthat he marvelled at their leaving the young man to look at him.ā And when a man, who was very superstitious, said to him: āWith one blow I will break your head;āā āāAnd I,ā he replied, āwith one sneeze will make you tremble.ā When Hegesias entreated him to lend him one of his books, he said: āYou are a silly fellow, Hegesias, for you will not take painted figs, but real ones; and yet you overlook the genuine practice of virtue, and seek for what is merely written.ā A man once reproached him with his banishment, and his answer was: āYou wretched man, that is what made me a philosopher.ā And when, on another occasion, someone said to him: āThe people of Sinope condemned you to banishment,ā he replied: āAnd I condemned them to remain where they were.ā Once he saw a man who had been victor at the Olympic games, feeding (Ī½ĪĪ¼ĪæĪ½ĻĪ±) sheep, and he said to him: āYou have soon come across my friend from the Olympic games, to the Nemean.ā When he was asked why athletes are insensible to pain, he said: āBecause they are built up of pork and beef.ā
He once asked for a statue; and being questioned as to his reason for doing so, he said: āI am practising disappointment.ā Once he was begging of someone (for he did this at first out of actual want), he said: āIf you have given to anyone else, give also to me; and if you have never given to anyone, then begin with me.ā On one occasion, he was asked by the tyrant: āWhat sort of brass was the best for a statue?ā and he replied: āThat of which the statues of Harmodius and Aristogiton are made.ā When he was asked how Dionysius treats his friends, he said: āLike bags; those which are full he hangs up, and those which are empty he throws away.ā A man who was lately married put an inscription on his house: āHercules Callinicus, the son of Jupiter, lives here; let no evil enter.ā And so Diogenes wrote in addition: āAn alliance is made after the war is over.ā He used to say that covetousness was the metropolis of all evils. Seeing on one occasion a profligate man in an inn eating olives, he said: āIf you had dined thus, you would not have supped thus.ā One of his apothegms was that good men were the images of the Gods; another, that love was the business of those who had nothing to do. When he was asked what was miserable in life, he answered: āAn indigent old man.ā And when the question was put to him, what beast
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