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

brought forth,
Used to deny that there were Gods at all.
Now, if he’d persevered in this opinion,
One would have said he speaks just as he thinks;
Though certainly his thoughts are quite mistaken.
But when a lengthened sickness overtook him,
And he began to fear lest he should die;
This man who heretofore denied the Gods,
And would not even look upon a temple,
And mocked all those who e’er approached the Gods
With prayer or sacrifice; who ne’er, not even
For his own hearth, and home, and household table,
Regaled the Gods with savoury fat and incense,
Who never once said, “I have sinned, but spare me.”
Then did this atheist shrink, and give his neck
To an old woman to hang charms upon,
And bound his arms with magic amulets,
With laurel branches blocked his doors and windows,
Ready to do and venture anything
Rather than die. Fool that he was, who thought
To win the Gods to come into existence,
Whenever he might think he wanted them.
So wise too late, when now mere dust and ashes,
He put his hand forth, Hail, great Pluto, Hail!

There were ten people of the name of Bion. First of all, the one who flourished at the same time with Pherecydes of Syros, and who has left two books behind him, which are still extant; he was a native of Proconnesus. The second was a Syracusan, the author of a system of rhetoric. The third was the man of whom we have been speaking. The fourth was a pupil of Democritus, and a mathematician, a native of Abdera, who wrote in both the Attic and Ionic dialect. He was the person who first asserted that there were countries where there was night for six months, and day for six months. The fifth was a native of Soli who wrote a history of Aethiopia. The sixth was a rhetorician who has left behind him nine books, inscribed with the names of the Muses, which are still extant. The eighth was a Milesian statuary who is mentioned by Polemo. The ninth was a tragic poet of the number of those who are called Tarsicans. The tenth was a statuary, a native of Clazomenae or Chios, who is mentioned by Hipponax.

Lacydes

Lacydes, the son of Alexander, was a native of Cyrene. He it is who was the founder of the New Academy, having succeeded Arcesilaus; and he was a man of great gravity of character and demeanour, and one who had many imitators.

He was industrious from his very childhood, and poor, but very pleasing and sociable in his manners.

They say that he had a pleasant way of managing his housekeeping affairs. For when he had taken anything out of his store-chest, he would seal it up again, and throw in his seal through the hole, so that it should be impossible for anything of what he had laid up there to be stolen from him or carried off. But his servants, learning this contrivance of his, broke the seal and carried off as much as they pleased, and then they put the ring back through the hole in the same manner as before; and though they did this repeatedly, they were never detected.

Lacydes now used to hold his school in the Academy in the garden which had been laid out by Attalus the king, and it was called the Lacydeum after him. And he was the only man who, while alive, resigned his school to a successor; but he resigned this to Telicles and Evander, of Phocis; and Hegesinus of Pergamus succeeded Evander; and he himself was in his turn succeeded by Carneades.

There is a witty saying which is attributed to Lacydes. For they say that when Attalus sent for him, he answered that statues ought to be seen at a distance. On another occasion, as it is reported, he was studying geometry very late in life, and some said to him: “Is it then a time for you to be learning now?”⁠—“If it is not,” he replied, “when will it be?”

And he died in the fourth year of the hundred and thirty-fourth Olympiad, when he had presided over his school twenty-six years. And his death was caused by paralysis, which was brought on by drinking. And we ourselves have jested upon him in the following language.

’Tis an odd story that I heard of you⁠—
Lacydes, that you went with hasty steps,
Spurred on by Bacchus, to the shades below.
How then, if this be true, can it be said,
That Bacchus e’er trips up his votaries’ feet
’Tis a mistake his being named Lyaeus.43

Carneades

Carneades was the son of Epicomus⁠—or Philocomus, as Alexander states in his Successions⁠—and a native of Cyrene.

He read all the books of the Stoics with great care, and especially those of Chrysippus; and then he wrote replies to them, but did it at the same time with such modesty that he used to say: “If Chrysippus had not lived, I should never have existed.”

He was a man of as great industry as ever existed; not, however, very much devoted to the investigation of subjects of natural philosophy, but more fond of the discussion of ethical topics, on which account he used to let his hair and his nails grow, from his entire devotion of all his time to philosophical discussion. And he was so eminent as a philosopher that the orators would quit their own schools and come and listen to his lectures.

He was also a man of a very powerful voice, so that the president of the Gymnasium sent to him once, to desire he would not shout so loudly. And he replied: “Give me then, measure for my voice.” And the gymnasiarch again rejoined with great wit, for he said: “You have a measure in your pupils.”

He was a very vehement speaker, and one difficult to contend with in the investigation of a point. And he used to decline all invitations to entertainments, for the reasons I have already mentioned.

On one occasion, when Mentor the Bithynian, one of his pupils, came to him to attend his