Dion

And it is related that Dion once went to pay a visit to Ptoeodorus the Megarian, upon his invitation. Now Ptoeodorus, it would seem, was one of the wealthy and influential men of the city;

and when, therefore, Dion saw a crowd of people at his door, and a press of business, which made him difficult of access and hard to come at, he turned to his friends, who were vexed and indignant at it, and said: Why should we blame this man? For we ourselves used to do just so in Syracuse.

But as time went on, Dionysius became jealous of Dion and afraid of his popularity among the Greeks. He therefore stopped sending him his revenues, and handed his estate over to his own private stewards.

However, with a desire to make head against the bad repute which he had also won among the philosophers on Plato’s account, he assembled at his court many men with a reputation for learning.

But he was ambitious to surpass them all in discussion, and was therefore driven to use inaptly what he had imperfectly learned from Plato.

So he yearned once more for that philosopher, and reproached himself for not having utilized his presence to learn all that he should have learned.

And since, like a tyrant, he was always extravagant in his desires and headstrong in all that he undertook, he set out at once to secure Plato, and, leaving no stone unturned, persuaded Archytas and his fellow Pythagoreans to become sureties for his agreements, and to summon Plato; for it was through Plato, in the first place, that he had entered into friendly relations with these philosophers.