Vitae philosophorum

Diogenes Laertius

Diogenes Laertius. Hicks, R. D., editor. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1925.

When mice crept on to the table he addressed them thus, See now even Diogenes keeps parasites. When Plato styled him a dog, Quite true, he said, for I come back again and again to those who have sold me. As he was leaving the public

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baths, somebody inquired if many men were bathing. He said, No. But to another who asked if there was a great crowd of bathers, he said, Yes. Plato had defined Man as an animal, biped and featherless, and was applauded. Diogenes plucked a fowl and brought it into the lecture-room with the words, Here is Plato’s man. In consequence of which there was added to the definition, having broad nails. To one who asked what was the proper time for lunch, he said, If a rich man, when you will; if a poor man, when you can.

At Megara he saw the sheep protected by leather jackets, while the children went bare. It’s better, said he, to be a Megarian’s ram than his son.[*](Where the wool was of fine quality, as near Tarentum (Hor. Carm. ii. 6. 10 pellitis ovibus), the fleeces were protected by coverings of skin, partly against damage from brambles and partly to preserve the colour (Varro, R.R. ii. 2). We are reminded of what Augustus said when he heard of the execution of Antipater, It is better to be Herod’s pig than his son.) To one who had brandished a beam at him and then cried, Look out, he replied, What, are you intending to strike me again? He used to call the demagogues the lackeys of the people and the crowns awarded to them the efflorescence of fame. He lit a lamp in broad daylight and said, as he went about, I am looking for a man. One day he got a thorough drenching where he stood, and, when the bystanders pitied him, Plato said, if they really pitied him, they should move away, alluding to his vanity. When some one hit him a blow with his fist, Heracles, said he, how came I to forget to put on a helmet when I walked out?

Further, when Meidias assaulted him and went on to say, There are 3000 drachmas to your credit, the next day he took a pair of boxing-gauntlets, gave him a thrashing and said, There are 3000 blows to your credit.

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When Lysias the druggist asked him if he believed in the gods, How can I help believing in them, said he, when I see a god-forsaken wretch like you? Others give this retort to Theodorus. Seeing some one perform religious purification, he said, Unhappy man, don’t you know that you can no more get rid of errors of conduct by sprinklings than you can of mistakes in grammar? He would rebuke men in general with regard to their prayers, declaring that they asked for those things which seemed to them to be good, not for such as are truly good.

As for those who were excited over their dreams he would say that they cared nothing for what they did in their waking hours, but kept their curiosity for the visions called up in their sleep. At Olympia, when the herald proclaimed Dioxippus to be victor over the men, Diogenes protested, Nay, he is victorious over slaves, I over men.

Still he was loved by the Athenians. At all events, when a youngster broke up his tub, they gave the boy a flogging and presented Diogenes with another. Dionysius the Stoic says that after Chaeronea he was seized and dragged off to Philip, and being asked who he was, replied, A spy upon your insatiable greed. For this he was admired and set free.

Alexander having on one occasion sent a letter to Antipater at Athens by a certain Athlios, Diogenes, who was present, said:

Graceless son of graceless sire to graceless wight by graceless squire.

Perdiccas having threatened to put him to death unless he came to him, That’s nothing wonderful, quoth he, for a beetle or a tarantula would

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do the same. Instead of that he would have expected the threat to be that Perdiccas would be quite happy to do without his company. He would often insist loudly that the gods had given to men the means of living easily, but this had been put out of sight, because we require honeyed cakes, unguents and the like. Hence to a man whose shoes were being put on by his servant, he said, You have not attained to full felicity, unless he wipes your nose as well; and that will come, when you have lost the use of your hands.

Once he saw the officials of a temple leading away some one who had stolen a bowl belonging to the treasurers, and said, The great thieves are leading away the little thief. Noticing a lad one day throwing stones at a cross (gibbet), Well done, he said, you will hit your mark.[*](i.e.some day you’ll come to the gallows.) When some boys clustered round him and said, Take care he doesn’t bite us, he answered, Never fear, boys, a dog does not eat beetroot. To one who was proud of wearing a lion’s skin his words were, Leave off dishonouring the habiliments of courage. When some one was extolling the good fortune of Callisthenes and saying what splendour he shared in the suite of Alexander, Not so, said Diogenes, but rather ill fortune; for he breakfasts and dines when Alexander thinks fit.

Being short of money, he told his friends that he applied to them not for alms, but for repayment of his due. When behaving indecently in the marketplace, he wished it were as easy to relieve hunger by rubbing an empty stomach. Seeing a youth starting off to dine with satraps, he dragged him off, took him to his friends and bade them keep

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strict watch over him. When a youth effeminately attired put a question to him, he declined to answer unless he pulled up his robe and showed whether he was man or woman. A youth was playing cottabos in the baths. Diogenes said to him, The better you play, the worse it is for you. At a feast certain people kept throwing all the bones to him as they would have done to a dog.[*](You would not see so many bones if I were the dog, was Dante’s retort when annoyed by similar attentions at the table of Can Grande.) Thereupon he played a dog’s trick and drenched them.

Rhetoricians and all who talked for reputation he used to call thrice human, meaning thereby thrice wretched. An ignorant rich man he used to call the sheep with the golden fleece. Seeing a notice on the house of a profligate, To be sold, he said, I knew well that after such surfeiting you would throw up the owner. To a young man who complained of the number of people who annoyed him by their attentions he said, Cease to hang out a sign of invitation. Of a public bath which was dirty he said, When people have bathed here, where are they to go to get clean? There was a stout musician whom everybody depreciated and Diogenes alone praised. When asked why, he said, Because being so big, he yet sings to his lute and does not turn brigand.

The musician who was always deserted by his audience he greeted with a Hail chanticleer, and when asked why he so addressed him, replied, Because your song makes every one get up. A young man was delivering a set speech, when Diogenes, having filled the front fold of his dress with lupins, began to eat them, standing right opposite to him. Having thus drawn off the attention of the assemblage, he said he was greatly surprised

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that they should desert the orator to look at himself. A very superstitious person addressed him thus, With one blow I will break your head. And I, said Diogenes, by a sneeze from the left will make you tremble. Hegesias having asked him to lend him one of his writings, he said, You are a simpleton, Hegesias; you do not choose painted figs, but real ones; and yet you pass over the true training and would apply yourself to written rules.

When some one reproached him with his exile, his reply was, Nay, it was through that, you miserable fellow, that I came to be a philosopher. Again, when some one reminded him that the people of Sinope had sentenced him to exile, And I them, said he, to home-staying. Once he saw an Olympic victor tending sheep and thus accosted him: Too quickly, my good friend, have you left Olympia for Nemea.[*](Shepherd’s Bush.) Being asked why athletes are so stupid, his answer was, Because they are built up of pork and beef. He once begged alms of a statue, and, when asked why he did so, replied, To get practice in being refused. In asking alms —as he did at first by reason of his poverty— he used this form: If you have already given to anyone else, give to me also; if not, begin with me.

On being asked by a tyrant what bronze is best for a statue, he replied, That of which Harmodius and Aristogiton were moulded. Asked how Dionysius treated his friends, Like purses, he replied; so long as they are full, he hangs them up, and, when they are empty, he throws them away. Some one lately wed had set up on his door the notice:

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    The son of Zeus, victorious Heracles,
  1. Dwells here; let nothing evil enter in.
To which Diogenes added After war, alliance. The love of money he declared to be mother-city of all evils. [*](Cf. inf. vii. § 111; 1 Tim. vi. 10, The love of money is the root of all evil.) Seeing a spendthrift eating olives in a tavern, he said, If you had breakfasted in this fashion, you would not so be dining.

Good men he called images of the gods, and love the business of the idle. To the question what is wretched in life he replied, An old man destitute. Being asked what creature’s bite is the worst, he said, Of those that are wild a sycophant’s; of those that are tame a flatterer’s. Upon seeing two centaurs very badly painted, he asked, Which of these is Chiron? (worse man). Ingratiating speech he compared to honey used to choke you. The stomach he called livelihood’s Charybdis.[*](i.e. a whirlpool engulfing a man’s livelihood.) Hearing a report that Didymon the flute-player had been caught in adultery, his comment was, His name alone is sufficient to hang him. To the question why gold is pale, his reply was, Because it has so many thieves plotting against it. On seeing a woman carried in a litter, he remarked that the cage was not in keeping with the quarry.

One day seeing a runaway slave sitting on the brink of a well, he said, Take care, my lad, you don’t fall in. Seeing a boy taking clothes at the baths, he asked, Is it for a little unguent (ἀλειμμάτιον) or is it for a new cloak (ἄλλʼ ἱμάτιον)? Seeing some women hanged from an olive-tree, he said, Would that every tree bore similar fruit. On seeing a footpad he accosted him thus:

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    What mak’st thou here, my gallant?
  1. Com’st thou perchance for plunder of the dead?[*](Hom. Il. x. 343, 387.)
Being asked whether he had any maid or boy to wait on him, he said No. If you should die, then, who will carry you out to burial? Whoever wants the house, he replied.

Noticing a good-looking youth lying in an exposed position, he nudged him and cried, Up, man, up, lest some foe thrust a dart into thy back! To one who was feasting lavishly he said:

Short-liv’d thou’lt be, my son, by what thou—buy’st.[*](Cf. Hom. Il. v. 40, xviii. 95.)
As Plato was conversing about Ideas and using the nouns tablehood and cuphood, he said, Table and cup I see; but your tablehood and cuphood, Plato, I can nowise see. That’s readily accounted for, said Plato, for you have the eyes to see the visible table and cup; but not the understanding by which ideal tablehood and cuphood are discerned.

On being asked by somebody, What sort of a man do you consider Diogenes to be? A Socrates gone mad, said he.[*](i.e. Plato. This anecdote is found in Aelian, Var. Hist. xiv. 33 εἰώθει δέ, φασίν, ὁ Πλάτων περὶ Διογένους λέγειν ὅτι μαινόμενος οὗτος Σωκράτης ἐστίν.) Being asked what was the right time to marry, Diogenes replied, For a young man not yet: for an old man never at all. Being asked what he would take to be soundly cuffed, he replied, A helmet. Seeing a youth dressing with elaborate care, he said, If it’s for men, you’re a fool; if for women, a knave. One day he detected a youth blushing. Courage, quoth he, that is the hue

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of virtue. One day after listening to a couple of lawyers disputing, he condemned them both, saying that the one had no doubt stolen, but the other had not lost anything. To the question what wine he found pleasant to drink, he replied, That for which other people pay. When he was told that many people laughed at him, he made answer, But I am not laughed down.

When some one declared that life is an evil, he corrected him: Not life itself, but living ill. When he was advised to go in pursuit of his runaway slave, he replied, It would be absurd, if Manes can live without Diogenes, but Diogenes cannot get on without Manes. When breakfasting on olives amongst which a cake had been inserted, he flung it away and addressed it thus:

Stranger, betake thee from the princes’ path.[*](Eur. Phoen. 40.)
And on another occasion thus:
He lashed an olive.[*](Hom. Il. v. 366, viii. 45. In the Homeric lines, however, ἐλάαν is a verb in the infinitive mood: he lashed the steeds to make them run.)
Being asked what kind of hound he was, he replied, When hungry, a Maltese; when full, a Molossian —two breeds which most people praise, though for fear of fatigue they do not venture out hunting with them. So neither can you live with me, because you are afraid of the discomforts.

Being asked if the wise eat cakes, Yes, he said, cakes of all kinds, just like other men. Being asked why people give to beggars but not to philosophers, he said, Because they think they may one day be lame or blind, but never expect that they will turn to philosophy. He was begging of a miserly man who was slow to respond; so he

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said, My friend, it’s for food that I’m asking, not for funeral expenses. Being reproached one day for having falsified the currency, he said, That was the time when I was such as you are now; but such as I am now, you will never be. To another who reproached him for the same offence he made a more scurrilous repartee.

On coming to Myndus and finding the gates large, though the city itself was very small, he cried, Men of Myndus, bar your gates, lest the city should run away. Seeing a man who had been caught stealing purple, he said:

Fast gripped by purple death and forceful fate.[*](Il. v. 83.)
When Craterus wanted him to come and visit him, No, he replied, I would rather live on a few grains of salt at Athens than enjoy sumptuous fare at Craterus’s table. He went up to Anaximenes the rhetorician, who was fat, and said, Let us beggars have something of your paunch; it will be a relief to you, and we shall get advantage. And when the same man was discoursing, Diogenes distracted his audience by producing some salt fish. This annoyed the lecturer, and Diogenes said, An obol’s worth of salt fish has broken up Anaximenes’ lecture-class.

Being reproached for eating in the market-place, Well, it was in the market-place, he said, that I felt hungry. Some authors affirm that the following also belongs to him: that Plato saw him washing lettuces, came up to him and quietly said to him, Had you paid court to Dionysius, you wouldn’t now be washing lettuces, and that he with equal calmness made answer, If you had washed lettuces,

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you wouldn’t have paid court to Dionysius. When some one said, Most people laugh at you, his reply was, And so very likely do the asses at them; but as they don’t care for the asses, so neither do I care for them. One day observing a youth studying philosophy, he said, Well done, Philosophy, that thou divertest admirers of bodily charms to the real beauty of the soul.

When some one expressed astonishment at the votive offerings in Samothrace, his comment was, There would have been far more, if those who were not saved had set up offerings. But others attribute this remark to Diagoras of Melos. To a handsome youth, who was going out to dinner, he said, You will come back a worse man. When he came back and said next day, I went and am none the worse for it, Diogenes said, Not Worse-man (Chiron), but Lax-man (Eurytion).[*](As Chiron was the wisest and best, so Eurytion was the most intemperate, of the Centaurs: Eurytion, ebriosus ille Centaurus (Menagius).) He was asking alms of a bad-tempered man, who said, Yes, if you can persuade me. If I could have persuaded you, said Diogenes, I would have persuaded you to hang yourself. He was returning from Lacedaemon to Athens; and on some one asking, Whither and whence? he replied, From the men’s apartments to the women’s.