De Agricultura

For the indulgences of intemperance and gluttony, and whatever other vices the immoderate and insatiable pleasures, when completely filled with an abundance of all external things, produce and bring forth, do not allow the soul to proceed onwards by the plain and straight road, but compel it to fall into ravines and gulfs, until they utterly destroy it; but those practises which adhere to patience, and endurance, and moderation, and all other virtues, keep the soul in the straight road, leaving no stumbling block in the way, against which it can stumble and fall. Very naturally, therefore, has Moses declared that temperance clings to the right way, because it is plain that the contrary habit, intemperance, is always straying from the road.

And the expression, "Sitting in the path," suggests some such meaning as this, as I persuade myself: a path is a road calculated for riding horses and driving carriages on, well beaten by men and beasts.

This road they say is very like pleasures, for almost from their earliest birth to extreme old age men proceed and walk along it, and with great indolence and easiness of temper spend all their lives in it, and not men only, but every species of animal whatever; for there is no single thing which is not attracted by the allurements of pleasure, and which is not, at times, entangled in its multifarious nets, from which it is very difficult to escape.

But the paths of prudence, and temperance, and the other virtues, even though they may not be utterly untravelled, are, at all events, not beaten much; for the number of those who proceed by those roads, and who philosophise in a genuine spirit, and who form associations with virtue alone, disregarding, once for all, all other allurements, is very small.

Therefore he sits constantly in the road, and not once only, who has an eagerness for, and a care for, patient endurances, in order to watch from his ambush and attack pleasure, to which men in general are accustomed, that fountain of everlasting evils, and so to keep it off, and to eradicate it from the whole district of the soul.

Then, as Moses says, proceeding to the natural consequence of his position, he will of necessity bite the heel of the horse; for it is the especial attribute of patient endurance and temperance to shake and overturn the

Moses, therefore, represents the serpent that appeared to Eve as planning the death of man, for he records, that God says in his curses, "He shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." But he represents the serpent of Dan, which is the one which we are now discussing, as biting the heel of the horse and not of the man,

for the serpent of Eve, being the symbol of pleasure, as has been already shown, attacks man, that is to say, the reasoning power which is in every one of us; for the enjoyment and free use of excessive pleasure is the destruction of the mind;

and the serpent of Dan being a sort of image of vigorous virtue and of patient endurance, will bite the horse, who is the emblem of passion and wickedness, because temperance is occupied about the over throw and destruction of these things. Accordingly, when they are bitten and when they have fallen, "the horseman also," says Moses, "will fall;"

and the meaning which he conceals under this enigmatical expression is such as this, that we must think it an excellent thing and an object worthy of all labour, that our mind shall not be mounted upon any one of the passions or vices, but that whenever an attempt is made by force to put it upon one of them, we must endeavour to leap off and fall, for such falls produce the most glorious victories. On which account one of the ancients, when challenged to a contest of abuse, said, "I will never engage in such a contest as that in which he who wins is more dishonoured than he who is defeated."

Do you, therefore, my friend, never enter into a contest of evil, and never contend for the pre-eminence in such practises, but rather exert yourself with all your might to escape from them. And if ever, being under the compulsion of some power which is mightier than yourself, you are compelled to engage in such a strife, take care to be without delay defeated;

for then you, being defeated, will be a glorious conqueror, and those who have gained the victory will have got the worst. And do not ever entrust it to a herald to proclaim the victory of your rival or to the judge to crown; but do you go yourself and offer to him the acknowledgment of victory and the palm, and crown him, if he will, and bind him with wreaths of triumph, and proclaim him as conqueror

Therefore, in all these unholy contests, surrender the prizes to others; but, as for those which are really holy, study yourself to gain the crown in them. And think not those contests holy which the different cities propose in their triennial festivals, when they build theatres and receive many myriads of people; for in those he who has overthrown any one in wrestling, or who has cast him on his back or on his face upon the ground, or he who is very skilful in wrestling or in the pancratium, carries off the first prize, though he may be a man who has never abstained from any act of may violence or of injustice.

There are some men, again, who, having armed and strongly fortified both their hands in a most hard and terrible manner, like iron, attack their adversaries, and batter their heads and faces, and the other parts of their bodies, and whenever they are able to plant a blow, they inflict great fractures, and then claim the decision in their favour, and the crown of victory, by means of their merciless cruelty.

But what man in his senses would not laugh at the other competitions of runners, and candidates for the prize in the pentathlum, to see men studying with all their energies to leap the longest distance, and measuring spaces and distances, and contending with one another in swiftness of foot? men whom, not only those more active animals, an antelope, or a deer, but even the very smallest beasts, such as a dog, or a hare, without making any extraordinary haste, would outrun, though they were to exert themselves with all their speed, and to put themselves out of breath.

Of all these contests, then, there is not one which is truly sacred; no, not though all the men in the world should combine to bear witness in their favour, but they must be convicted by themselves of bearing false witness if they do so: for they who admire these things have established laws

How, then, is it natural for the same persons to be indignant at those who insult and assault others privately, and to establish in their cases punishments which cannot be avoided, but yet, in the case of those who commit these assaults publicly, and in assemblies of the people, and in theatres, to establish by law that they shall receive crowns, and that proclamations shall be made in their honour, and all sorts of other glorious circumstances?

For when two opposite opinions are established concerning any one thing, whether it be person or action, it follows of necessity that one or other of them must be wrong, and the other right, for it is impossible for them both to be right: which of the two, then, will you praise deservedly? Will you not say that that sentence is right which orders those who begin acts of violence to be punished? You would justly blame the contrary law, which commands such persons to be honoured; that nothing sacred may be blamed, every such thing must be altogether glorious.

Therefore the Olympian contest is the only one that justly deserves to be called sacred; meaning by this, not that which the inhabitants of Elis celebrate, but that which is instituted for the acquisition of the divine, and Olympian, and genuine virtues. Now, as competitors in this contest, all those have their names inscribed who are very weak in their bodies, but very vigorous in their souls; and then, having stripped off their clothes, and smeared themselves in the dust, they do all those actions which belong to skill and to power, omitting nothing which may conduce to their gaining the victory.

These men, therefore, get the better of their adversaries: and then, again, they have a competition with one another for the prize of pre-eminence, for they are not all victorious in the same manner, but all are worthy of honour, having routed and overthrown most grievous and formidable enemies;