Apophthegmata Laconica

In answer to those of the Argives who upbraided him as an impious perjurer, he said, You have the power to speak ill of me, but I have the power to do ill to you.

To the ambassadors from Samos who urged him to make war upon the despot Poly crates, and for this reason spoke at great length, he said, What you said at the beginning I do not remember; for that reason I do not comprehend the middle part; and the conclusion I do not approve. [*](Cf. Herodotus, iii. 46, and the note on 216 A (15), supra. The traditional date of the mission from Samos (525 B.C.) seems to early to fall within Cleomenes’s reign, but the chronology is uncertain.)

A certain pirate overran the country, and, when he was captured, said, I had not the means to provide subsistence for my soldiers; therefore, to

When a certain low fellow spoke ill of him, he said, So it is for this reason, is it, that you speak ill of everyone, that we, busied in defending ourselves, may not have time to speak of your baseness?

When one of the citizens said that the good king ought to be mild at all times and in every way, he remarked, Yes, but not to the extent of being despised.

When he was afflicted with a lingering illness, and began to give attention to mind-healers and seers, to whom formerly he had given no attention, someone expressed surprise. Why are you surprised? said he; for I am not now the same man that I was, and, not being the same man, I do not approve the same things. [*](For a similar change in the attitude of Pericles and of Bion Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Pericles, chap. xxxviii. (173 A) and Diogenes Laertius, iv. 54.)