Hiero

And what if despotism brings all those troubles that you tell of, yet such men as you, it seems, rush headlong into it that you may have honour, that all men may carry out your behests in all things without question, that the eyes of all may wait on you, that all may rise from their seats and make way for you, that all in your presence may glorify you by deed and word alike. (Such, in fact, is the behaviour of subjects to despots and to anyone else who happens to be their hero at the moment.)

For indeed it seems to me, Hiero, that in this man differs from other animals—I mean, in this craving for honour. In meat and drink and sleep and sex all creatures alike seem to take pleasure; but love of honour is rooted neither in the brute beasts nor in every human being. But they in whom is implanted a passion for honour and praise, these are they who differ most from the beasts of the field, these are accounted men and not mere human beings.[*](Xen. Cyrop. 1.6.25.)

And so, in my opinion, you have good reason for bearing all those burdens that despotism lays on you, in that you are honoured above all other men. For no human joy seems to be more nearly akin to that of heaven than the gladness which attends upon honours. To this Hiero replied:

Ah, Simonides, I think even the honours enjoyed by despots bear a close resemblance to their courtships, as I have described them to you.

The services of the indifferent seemed to us not acts of grace, and favours extorted appeared to give no pleasure. And so it is with the services proffered by men in fear: they are not honours.

For how can we say that men who are forced to rise from their seats rise to honour their oppressors, or that men who make way for their superiors desire to honour their oppressors?

And as for presents, most men offer them to one whom they hate, and that too at the moment when they have cause to fear some evil at his hands. These acts, I suppose, may not unfairly be taken for acts of servility; but honours, I should say, express the very opposite feelings.