The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laërtius (best free ebook reader txt) 📕

Dionysius, his reply was: “I went to Socrates because I wanted instruction (παιδεῖας), and I have come to Dionysius because I want diversion (παιδιᾶς).” As he had made money by having pupils, Socrates once said to him: “Where did you get so much?” and he answered: “Where you got a little.” When his mistress said to him: “I am in the family way by you,” he said: “You can no more tell that, than you could tell, after you had gone through a thicket, which thorn had scratched you.” And when someone blamed him for repudiating his son, as if he were not really his, he said: “I know that phlegm, and I know that lice, proceed from us, but still we cast them away as useless.” One day, when he had received some money from Dionysius, and Plato had received a book, he said to a man who jeered him: “The fact is, money is what I want, and books what Plato wants.” When he was asked what it was for which he was reproached by Dionysius: “The same thing,” said he, “for which others reproach me.” One day he asked Dionysius for some money, who said: “But you told me that a wise man would never be in want;”⁠—“Give me some,” Aristippus rejoined, “and then we will discuss that point;” Dionysius gave him some; “Now then,” said he, “you see that I do not want money.” When Dionysius said to him;⁠—

“For he who does frequent a tyrant’s court,25
Becomes his slave, though free when first he came:”

He took him up, and replied:

“That man is but a slave who comes as free.”

This story is told by Diocles, in his book on the Lives of the Philosophers; but others attribute the rejoinder to Plato. He once quarrelled with Aeschines, and presently afterwards said to him: “Shall we not make it up of our own accord, and cease this folly; but will you wait till some blockhead reconciles us over our cups?”⁠—“With all my heart,” said Aeschines.⁠—“Recollect, then,” said Aristippus, “that I, who am older than you, have made the first advances.” And Aeschines answered: “You say well, by Juno, since you are far better than I; for I began the quarrel, but you begin the friendship.” And these are the anecdotes which are told of him.

Now there were four people of the name of Aristippus; one, the man of whom we are now speaking; the second, the man who wrote the history of Arcadia; the third was one who, because he had been brought up by his mother, had the name of μητροδίδαντος given to him; and he was the grandson of the former, being his daughter’s son; the fourth was a philosopher of the New Academy.

There are three books extant written by the Cyrenaic philosopher, which are, a history of Africa, and which were sent by him to Dionysius; and there is another book containing twenty-five dialogues, some written in the Attic, and some in the Doric dialect. And these are the titles of the Dialogues⁠—Artabazus; To the Shipwrecked Sailors; To the Exiles; To a Beggar; To Lais; To Porus; To Lais About Her Looking-Glass; Mercury; The Dream; To the President of the Feast; Philomelus; To His Domestics; to those who reproached him for possessing old wine and mistresses; to those who reproached him for spending much money on his eating; a Letter to Arete his daughter; a letter to a man who was training himself for the Olympic games; a book of Questions; another book of Questions; a Dissertation addressed to Dionysius; an Essay on a Statue; an Essay on the daughter of Dionysius; a book addressed to one who thought himself neglected; another to one who attempted to give him advice. Some say, also, that he wrote six books of dissertations; but others, the chief of whom is Sosicrates of Rhodes, affirm that he never wrote a single thing. According to the assertions of Sotion in his second book; and of Panaetius, on the contrary, he composed the following books⁠—one concerning Education; one concerning Virtue; one called An Exhortation; Artabazus; the Shipwrecked Men; the Exiles; six books of Dissertations; three books of Apothegms; an essay addressed to Lais; one to Porus; one to Socrates; one on Fortune. And he used to define the chief good as a gentle motion tending to sensation.

But since we have written his life, let us now speak of the Cyrenaics who came after him; some of whom called themselves Hegesiaci, some Annicerei, others Theodorei. And let us also enumerate the disciples of Phaedo, the chief of whom were the Eretrians. Now the pupils of Aristippus were his own daughter Arete, and Aethiops of Ptolemais, and Antipater of Cyrene. Arete had for her pupil the Aristippus who was surnamed μητροδίδαντος, whose disciple was Theodorus the atheist, but who was afterwards called θεὸς. Antipater had for a pupil Epitimedes of Cyrene, who was the master of Paraebates, who was the master of Hegesias, who was surnamed πεισιθάνατος (persuading to die), and of Anniceris who ransomed Plato.

These men then who continued in the school of Aristippus, and were called Cyrenaics, adopted the following opinions: They said that there were two emotions of the mind, pleasure and pain; that the one, namely pleasure, was a moderate emotion; the other, namely pain, a rough one. And that no one pleasure was different from or more pleasant than another; and that pleasure was praised by all animals, but pain avoided. They said also that pleasure belonged to the body, and constituted its chief good, as Panaetius also tells us in his book on Sects; but the pleasure which they call the chief good, is not that pleasure as a state, which consists in the absence of all pain, and is