Плутарх - Plutarch's Lives - Volume I

Indeed, neither Metellus, nor Aristeides, nor Epameinondas would stoop to court the favour of the people, and had a thorough contempt for all that the people can either give or take away; yet although they were often ostracised, convicted, and condemned to pay fines, they were not angry with their fellow countrymen for their folly, but came back and became reconciled to them as soon as they repented. The man who will not court the people, ought least of all to bear malice against them, reflecting that anger at not being elected to an office in the state, must spring from an excessive desire to obtain it.

V. Alkibiades made no secret of his delight in being honoured and his vexation when slighted, and in consequence endeavoured to make himself acceptable to all with whom he had to do. Marcius was prevented by his pride from courting those who could have bestowed honour and advancement upon him, while his ambition tortured him if these were withheld.

These are the points which we find to blame in his character, which in all other respects was a noble one. With regard to temperance, and contempt for money, he may be compared with the greatest and purest men of Greece, not merely with Alkibiades, who cared only too little for such things, and paid no regard to his reputation.

It was for the sake of others that I first undertook to write biographies, but I soon began to dwell upon and delight in them for myself, endeavouring to the best of my ability to regulate my own life, and to make it like that of those who were reflected in their history as it were in a mirror before me. By the study of their biographies, we receive each man as a guest into our minds, and we seem to understand their character as the result of a personal acquaintance, because we have obtained from their acts the best and most important means of forming an opinion about them. "What greater pleasure could'st thou gain than this?" What more valuable for the elevation of our own character? Demokritus says, that we ought to pray that we may meet with propitious phantasms, and that from the infinite space which surrounds us good and congenial phantasms, rather than base and sinister ones, may be brought into contact with us. He degrades philosophy by foisting into it a theory which is untrue, and which leads to unbounded superstition; whereas we, by our familiarity with history, and habit of writing it, so train ourselves by constantly receiving into our minds the memorials of the great and good, that should anything base or vicious be placed in our way by the society into which we are necessarily thrown, we reject it and expel it from our thoughts, by fixing them calmly and severely on some of these great examples. Of these, I have chosen for you in this present instance, the life of Timoleon the Corinthian, and that of Aemilius Paulus, men who both laid their plans with skill, and carried them out with good fortune, so as to raise a question whether it was more by good luck or by good sense that they succeeded in their most important achievements.

I. The state of affairs at Syracuse, before the mission of Timoleon to Sicily, was this. Dion had driven out the despot [28] [Greek: tyrannos], here and elsewhere translated despot , means a man who had obtained irresponsible power by unconstitutional means. Dionysius, but was immediately afterwards slain by treachery, and those who, under Dion, had freed the Syracusans, quarrelled amongst themselves. The city, which received a constant succession of despots, was almost forsaken because of its many troubles. Of the rest of Sicily, one part was rendered quite ruined and uninhabited by the wars, and most of the cities were held by barbarians of various nations, and soldiers who were under no paymaster. As these men willingly lent their aid to effect changes of dynasty, Dionysius, in the twelfth year of his exile, collected a body of foreign troops, drove out Nysaeus, the then ruler of Syracuse, again restored his empire, and was re–established as despot. He had strangely lost the greatest known empire at the hands of a few men, and more strangely still became again the lord of those who had driven him out, after having been an exile and a beggar. Those then of the Syracusans who remained in the city were the subjects of a despot not naturally humane, and whose heart now had been embittered by misfortune: [29] Compare Tacitus, "eo immitior quia toleraverat." but the better class of citizens and the men of note fled to Hiketes, the ruler of Leontini, swore allegiance to him, and chose him as their general for the war. This man was nowise better than the avowed despots, but they had no other resource, and they trusted him because he was a Syracusan by birth, and had a force capable of encountering that of their own despot.

II. Meanwhile the Carthaginians came to Sicily with a great fleet, and were hovering off the island watching their opportunity. The Sicilians in terror wished to send an embassy to Greece, and ask for help from the Corinthians, not merely on account of their kinship with them, and of the many kindnesses which they had received from them, but also because they saw that the whole city loved freedom, and hated despots, and that it had waged its greatest and most important wars, not for supremacy and greed of power, but on behalf of the liberty of Greece. But Hiketes who had obtained his post of commander–in–chief with a view, not to the liberation of Syracuse, but the establishment of himself as despot there, had already had secret negotiations with the Carthaginians, though in public he commended the Syracusans, and sent ambassadors of his own with the rest to Peloponnesus: not that he wished that any assistance should come thence, but, in case the Corinthians, as was probable, should refuse their help because of the disturbed state of Greece, he hoped that he should more easily be able to bring matters round to suit the Carthaginian interest, and to use them as allies either against the Syracusan citizens, or against their despot. Of this treacherous design he was shortly afterwards convicted.

III. When the ambassadors arrived, the Corinthians, who had always been in the habit of watching over the interests of their colonies, especially Syracuse, and who were not at war with any of the Greek States at that time, but living in peace and leisure, eagerly voted to help them. A General was now sought for, and while the government was nominating and proposing those who were eager for an opportunity of distinguishing themselves, a man of the people stood up and named Timoleon, the son of Timodemus, one who no longer took any part in politics, and who had no hope or thought of obtaining the post: but some god, it seems, put it into the man's mind to name him, such a kind fortune was at once shown at his election, and such success attended his actions, illustrating his noble character. He was of a good family, both his father Timodemus, and his mother Demariste being of rank in the city. He was a lover of his country, and of a mild temper, except only that he had a violent hatred for despotism and all that is base. His nature was so happily constituted, that in his campaigns he showed much judgment when young, and no less daring when old. He had an elder brother, Timophanes, who was in no respect like him, but rash, and inflamed with a passion for monarchy by worthless friends and foreign soldiers, with whom he spent all his time: he was reckless in a campaign, and loved danger for its own sake, and by this he won the hearts of his fellow–citizens, and was given commands, as being a man of courage and of action. Timoleon assisted him in obtaining these commands, by concealing his faults or making them appear small, and by magnifying the clever things which he did.

IV. Now in the battle which the Corinthians fought against the Argives and Kleoneans, Timoleon was ranked among the hoplites, [30] Heavy armed foot–soldiers, carrying a spear and shield. and his brother Timophanes, who was in command of the cavalry, fell into great danger. His horse received a wound, and threw him off among the enemy. Of his companions, some at once dispersed in panic, while those who remained by him, being a few against many, with difficulty held their own. When Timoleon saw what had happened, he ran to the rescue, and held his shield in front of Timophanes as he lay, and, after receiving many blows, both from missiles and in hand–to–hand fight, on his arms and body, with difficulty drove back the enemy and saved his brother.