Demonax

Lucian of Samosata

Lucian, Vol. 1. Harmon, A. M., editor. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1913.

Finding a bit of jewelry one day while he was out walking, he posted a notice in the public square asking the one who owned it and had lost it to come and get it by describing the weight of the setting, the stone, and the engravings on it. Well, a pretty girl came to him saying that she had lost it; but as there was nothing right in her description, Demonax said: “Be off, girl, and don’t lose your own jewel : this is none of yours !”

A Roman senator in Athens introduced his son to him, a handsome boy, but girlish and neurasthenic, saying: “My son here pays his respects to you.” “A dear boy,’ said Demonax, “worthy of you and like his mother!”

The Cynic who pursued his philosophical studies clad in a bearskin he would not call Honoratus, which was his name, but Ursinus. When a man asked him what he thought was the definition of happiness, he replied that none but a free man is happy; and when the other said that free men were numerous, he rejoined:

“But I have

v.1.p.157

in mind the man who neither hopes nor fears anything.” But how can one achieve this? For the most part we are all slaves of hope and fear.” «Why, if you observe human affairs you will find that they do not afford justification either for hope or for fear, since, whatever you may say, pains and pleasures are alike destined to end.”