Bis accusatus sive tribunalia

Lucian of Samosata

Lucian, Vol. 3. Harmon, A. M., editor. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1921.

ZEUS The people were still unfamiliar with the teachings of philosophy at that time, and there were few that pursued it, so it was natural that the juries inclined towards Anytus and Meletus. But at present, do not you see how many short cloaks and staves and wallets there are? On all sides there are long beards, and books in the left hand, and everybody preaches in favour of you; the public walks are full of people assembling in companies and in battalions, and there is nobody who does not want to be thought a scion of Virtue. In fact, many, giving up the trades that they had before, rush after the wallet and the cloak, tan their bodies in the sun to Ethiopian hue, make themselves extemporaneous philosophers out of cobblers or carpenters, and go about praising you and your virtue. Consequently, in the words of the proverb, it would be easier for a man to fall in a boat without hitting a plank than for your eye to miss a philosopher wherever it looks.

JUSTICE Yes, but those very men frighten me, Zeus, by quarrelling with each other and showing unfairness even in their discussions of me. It is rumoured, too, that while most of them claim kinship with me in words, when it comes to facts they do not even open their house to me at all, but make it plain that they will lock me out if ever I come to their door ; for they made Injustice their bosom friend long ago.

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ZEUS They are not all bad, my daughter, and it is enough if you find some that are good. But go now, so that a few cases, at least, may be heard to-day.

HERMES Let us set out in this direction, Justice, straight for Sunium, not far from the foot of Hymettus, to the left of Parnes, where you see those two heights[*](Lycabettus and the Acropolis. The promontory of Sunium is the most conspicuous landmark because Hermes and Justice are coming down from above, and from seaward (cf. below, ἐν δεξιᾷ). Lucian’s gods live in Heaven, not on Olympus or Ida. ); you have probably forgotten the way long since. But why are you crying and taking it hard? Don't be afraid: things are no longer the same in life. All those Scirons and Pinebenders and Busirises and Phalarises whom you used to fear in former days are dead, and now Wisdom and the Academy and the Porch are in full sway, seek for you everywhere, and hold conversations about you, in open-mouthed expectation that, from some quarter or other, you may perhaps come flying down to them once more.

JUSTICE Well, Hermes, you are the only person who can tell me the truth, inasmuch as you associate with them a great deal, passing your days with them in the athletic clubs and in the market-place; for you are the god of the market, as well as being crier in the meetings of the assembly. What sort’of people are they, and is it possible for me to abide among them?

HERMES To be sure; I should not be treating you fairly if I did not tell you, since you are my sister. Most of

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them have been helped not a little by philosophy: for if it goes no further, at least regard for their cloth makes them more circumspect in sinning. However, you will come upon a few rascals among them—I must tell the truth, I suppose—and some who are partly wise and partly foolish. You see, when Wisdom took them in hand and dyed them over, all those who thoroughly absorbed the dye were made entirely serviceable, without any intermixture of other hues, and they are quite ready to receive you ; while those who because of their ingrained filth were not deeply penetrated by the colouring matter of the dyestuff are better than the rest, to be sure, but unfinished products, half-white, blemished, and spotted like the pard. And there are some who have only touched the kettle on the outside with a finger-tip and smeared on some of the soot, yet think that they too are well enough dyed over. You, however, will of course pass your time with the best of them.

But in the course of our talk we are already drawing near to Attica, so let us leave Sunium on our right, and now let us glide down to the Acropolis. Now that we have alighted, you sit down here on the Areopagus somewhere, facing the Pnyx, and wait until I give out the proclamation from Zeus. If I climb the Acropolis it will be easier for me to summon everybody from that point of vantage for the voice.

JUSTICE Don’t go, Hermes, until you have told me who comes here, the person with the horns and the shepherd’s pipe and the hairy legs.

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HERMES What! Don’t you know Pan, the most bacchanalian of the servants of Dionysus? He formerly lived on Parthenion,[*](A mountain in Arcadia. ) but at the time of the approach of Datis by sea and the landing of the barbarians at Marathon, he came unasked to fight on the side of the Athenians ; and since then, accepting this cavern under the Acropolis, a little above the Pelasgicon,[*](The cave of Pan, being in the N.W. corner of the Acropolis, can be pointed out (ταύτην) trom the Areopagus, which is close by (ἐκ γειτόνων). For the bit of the prehistoric wall below it (Pelasgicon), see p. 63, note 1, and p. 71. ) he lives in it, paying the usual tax as a resident alien. Very likely he has seen us near and is coming up to greet us.

PAN Good day to you, Hermes and Justice.

HERMES The same to you, Pan, most musical and most frolicsome of all satyrs, and at Athens the most bellicose !

PAN What business brought you two here, Hermes ?

HERMES She will tell you the whole story; I am going to the Acropolis, to make my proclamation.

JUSTICE Zeus sent me down, Pan, to empanel juries for the lawsuits. But how do you find things in Athens?

PAN On the whole, I do not get on as well as I ought here—much worse than I expected; and yet I dis-

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pelled the mighty hue and cry of the barbarians. In spite of that, they come up only two or three times a year, pick out and sacrifice in my honour a he-goat with a powerful goatish smell, and then feast on the meat, making me a mere witness of their good cheer and paying their respects to me only with their noise. However, their laughter and fun afford me some amusement.

JUSTICE In general, Pan, have they been improved in virtue by the philosophers ?

PAN What do you mean by philosophers? Those gloomy fellows, flocking together, with beards like mine, who talk so much?

JUSTICE To be sure.

PAN I do not know at all what they mean and_I do not understand their wisdom, for I am a mountaineer and I have not studied those clever, citified, technical terms, Justice. How could a literary man or a philosopher possibly come from Arcadia? My wisdom does not go beyond the flute and the pipes ; for the rest I am a goatherd, a dancer, and if need bea fighter. However, I hear them bawling continually and talking about “virtue” (whatever that means) and “ideas” and “nature” and “things incorporeal,” terms that are to me unknown and outlandish. They begin their discussions peaceably, but as the conference proceeds they raise their voices to a high falsetto, so that, what with their excessive straining and their endeavour to talk at the same time, their

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faces get red, their necks get swollen, and their veins stand out like those of flute-players when they try to blow into a closed flute. In fact, they spoil their arguments, confuse the original subject of inquiry, and then, after abusing one another, most of them, they go away wiping the sweat off their foreheads with their bent fingers; and the man that is most loud-mouthed and impudent and leaves last when they break up is considered to have the best of it. However, the common people admire them, especially those who have nothing more pressing to do, and stand there enchanted by their impudence and their shouting. For my part, I considered them impostors in consequence of all this, and was annoyed at the resemblance in beard. But perhaps there was something beneficial to the common weal in their shouting and some good sprang from those technical terms of theirs—I can’t say. However, if I am to tell the truth without any reserve—for I dwell on a look-out, as you see—I have often seen many of them in the dark of the evening—

JUSTICE Hush, Pan ; didn’t it seem to you that Hermes is making a proclamation ?

PAN Why, yes.

HERMES Oyez, oyez! Under the blessing of Heaven, we shall hold a session of court to-day, the seventh of Elaphebolion.[*](The seventh of Elaphebolion was not far from the first of April. ) All who have entered suits are to come to the Areopagus, where Justice will empanel the juries

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and be present in person at the trials. The jurors will be drawn from the entire body of Athenians ; the pay will be three obols a case, and the number of jurors will be in accordance with the charge. All those who have entered suits but have died before they came to trial are to be sent back to earth by Aeacus. If anyone thinks he has had an unjust hearing, he is to appeal the case, and the appeal will be to Zeus.

PAN Heavens, what a hubbub! What a shout they raised, Justice, and how eagerly they are gathering at a run, dragging each other up the hill, straight for the Areopagus ! Hermes, too, is here already, so busy yourselves with the cases, empanel your juries and give your verdicts as usual; I am going back to the cave to pipe one of the passionate melodies with © which I am in the habit of provoking Echo. I am sick of trials and speeches, for I hear the pleaders on the Areopagus every day.

HERMES Come, Justice, let’s call them to the bar.

JUSTICE Quite right. Indeed they are approaching incrowds, as you see, with a great noise, buzzing about the hilltop like wasps.

ATHENIAN I’ve got you, curse you !

SECOND ATHENIAN You are a blackmailer !

THIRD ATHENIAN At last you are going to pay the penalty !

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FOURTH ATHENIAN I will prove that you have committed horrible crimes !

FIFTH ATHENIAN Empanel my jury first!

SIXTH ATHENIAN Come to court with me, scoundrel !

SEVENTH ATHENIAN Stop choking me!

JUSTICE Do you know what we ought to do, Hermes? Let us put off the rest of. the cases until to-morrow, and to-day let us provide only for those entered by professions or pursuits or sciences against men. Pass me up the writs of that description.[*](As Hermes gives each writ to Justice, he reads the heading and she tells him how many jurors are to be drawn. Her orders are carried out in silence, and the juries are all in readiness when the first case is called, which is not until she has filled the docket for the day (§ 15). ) HERMES Intemperance v. the Academy in re Polemo: kidnapping.[*](Polemo, intemperate in his youth, went to a lecture by Xenocrates to create a disturbance, but was converted to philosophy by what he heard. He succeeded Xenocrates as ead of the Academy (Diog. L. iv. 1 ff.). ) JUSTICE Draw seven jurors.

HERMES Stoa v. Pleasure: alienation of affections— because Pleasure coaxed away her lover, Dionysius.[*](Dionyaius the Convert was a pupil of Zeno, but became a Cyrenaic, “being converted to pleasure ; for sore eyes gave him so much trouble that he could not bring himself to μaintain any longer that pain did not matter” (Diog. L. vii. 1, 31; cf. vii. 4). ) JUSTICE Five will do.

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HERMES High-living v. Virtue, re Aristippus.[*](Follower of Socrates; later, founder of the Cyrenaic School. ) JUSTICE Let five sit in this case too.

HERMES Banking v. Diogenes: absconding.[*](Diogenes the Cynic was son and partner of the banker Hicesias in Sinope. They were caught muking counterfeit coin ; the father was put to death, and the son fled to Athens (Diog. L. vii. 2, 1). ) JUSTICE Draw only three.

HERMES Painting v. Pyrrho: breach of contract.[*](Pyrrho the Sceptic began life as an artist (Diog. L. ix. 11). ) JUSTICE Let nine sit on jury.

HERMES Do you want us to provide juries for these two cases also, recorded yesterday against the public speaker ?[*](Lucian ; coming from Samosata on the Euphrates, he is presently called “the Syrian.” ) JUSTICE Let us first finish up the cases of long-standing ; these can go over until to-morrow for trial.

HERMES Why, these are of the same nature, and the complaint, although recent, is very like those for which we have already provided juries, so that it ought to be tried along with them.

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JUSTICE You appear to have been unduly influenced to make the request, Hermes. Let us make the drawing, however, since you wish ; but only for these two cases; we have enough on the docket. Give me the writs.

HERMES Oratory v. the Syrian: neglect. Dialogue v. the same: maltreatment.

JUSTICE Who is this man? His name is not recorded.

HERMES Empanel a jury for him as it stands in the writ— for the public speaker, the Syrian. There is nothing to hinder its being done anonymously.

JUSTICE Look here, are we really to try cases from over the border here in Athens, on the Areopagus? They ought to have been tried on the other side of the Euphrates. However, draw eleven jurors, the same to sit for both cases.

HERMES You are right, Justice, to avoid spending too much in jury-fees.

JUSTICE Let the first jury sit, in the“case of the Academy v. Intemperance. Fill the water-clock. Plead first, Intemperance . . . Why does she hold her tongue and shake her head? Go to her and find out, Hermes.

HERMES She says that she cannot plead her case because her tongue is tied with drink and she is afraid of getting

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laughed at in court. She can hardly stand, as you see.

JUSTICE Then let her have an advocate appear, one of these public pleaders. There are plenty of them ready to split their lungs for three obols !

HERMES But not one will care to espouse the cause of Intemperance, not openly, at any rate. However, this request of hers seems reasonable.

JUSTICE What request?

HERMES “The Academy,” she says, “is always ready to argue on both sides and trains herself to be able to speak eloquently both pro and con. Therefore let her plead first for me, and then after that she will plead for herself.”

JUSTICE That is unprecedented. Nevertheless, make both speeches, Academy, since it is easy for you.

ACADEMY Listen first, gentlemen of the jury, to the plea of Intemperance, as the water now runs for her. The poor creature has been treated with the greatest injustice by me, the Academy. She has been robbed of the only friendly and faithful slave she had, who thought none of her orders unbecoming, Polemo yonder, who used to go roistering through the middle of the square in broad day, who kept a music-girl’and had himself sung to from morning to night, who was always drunk and debauched and

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had garlands of flowers on his head. That this: is true, all the Athenians will testify ; for they never saw Polemosober. But when the unhappy man went rollicking to the Academy's door, as he used to go to everybody's, she claimed him as her slave, snatched him out of the hands of Intemperance by main strength, and took him into her house. Then she forced him to drink water, taught him to keep sober, stripped off his garlands: and when he ought to have been drinking at table, she made him study intricate, gloomy terms, full of profound thought. So, instead of the flush that formerly glowed upon him, the poor man has grown pale, and his body is shrivelled ; he has forgotten all his songs, and he sometimes sits without food or drink till the middle of the evening, talking the kind of balderdash that I, the Academy, teach people to talk unendingly. What is more, he even abuses Intemperance at my instigation and says any number of unpleasant things about her. I have said about all that there is to say for Intemperance. Now I will speak for myself, and from this point let the water run for me.

JUSTICE What in the world will she say in reply to that? Anyhow, pour in the same amount for her in turn.

ACADEMY Heard casually, gentlemen of the jury, the plea which the advocate has made in behalf of Intemperance is quite plausible, but if you give an unprejudiced hearing to my plea also, you will find out that I have done her no wrong at all. This man Polemo, who, she « says, is her servant, was not naturally bad or inclined to Intemperance,

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but had a nature like mine. But while he was still young and impressionable she preémpted him, with the assistance of Pleasure, who usually helps her, and corrupted the poor fellow, surrendering him unconditionally to dissipation and to light women, so that he had not the slightest remnant of shame. In fact, what she thoughf€ was said on her behalf a moment ago, you should consider said on my behalf. The poor fellow went about from early to late with garlands on his head, flushed with wine, attended by music right through the public square, never sober, making roisterous calls upon everybody, a disgrace to his ancestors and to the whole city and a laughing-stock to strangers.

But when he came to my house, it chanced that, as usual, the doors were wide open and I was discoursing about virtue and temperance to such of my friends as were there. Coming in upon us with his flute and his garlands, first of all he began to shout and tried to break up our meeting by disturbing it with his noise. But we paid no attention to him, and as he was not entirely sodden with Intemperance, little by little he grew sober under the influence of our discourses, took off his garlands, silenced his flute-player, became ashamed of his purple mantle, and, awaking, as it were, from profound sleep, saw his own condition and condemned his past life. The flush that came from Intemperance faded and vanished, and he flushed for shame at what he was doing. At length he abandoned her then and there, and took up with me, not because I either invited or constrained him, as this person says, but voluntarily, because he believed the conditions here were better.

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Please summon him now, that you may see how he has fared at my hands.... Taking this man, gentlemen of the jury, when he was in a ridiculous plight, unable either to talk or to stand on account of his potations, I converted him and sobered him and made him from a slave into a well-behaved, temperate man, very valuable to the Greeks; and he himself is grateful to me for it, as are also his relatives on his account. I have done. It is for you now to consider which of us it was better for him to associate with.

JUSTICE Come, now, do not delay ; cast your ballots and get up; others must have their hearing.

HERMES The Academy wins by every vote but one.

JUSTICE It is not at all surprising that there should be one man to vote for Intemperance.

Take your seats, you who have been drawn to hear Stoa v. Pleasure in re a lover. The clock is filled. You with the paint upon you and the gaudy colours, make your plea now.[*](An allusion to the famous frescoes of the Painted Porch ; Polygnotus’ Taking of Troy, Theseus and the Amazons, and Battle of Marathon. Lucian brings in a bit of fun by deliberately using language which suggests a painted face and a gay dress and is in this sense so incongruous as to be comical. )

STOA I am not unaware, gentlemen of the jury, that I shall have to speak against an attractive opponent ; indeed, I see that most of you are gazing at her and smiling at her, contemptuous of me because my head is close-clipped, my glance is masculine, and I seem dour. Nevertheless, if you are willing to hear me

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speak, I am confident that my plea will be.far more just than hers.

As a matter of fact, the present charge is that by getting herself up in this courtesan style she beguiled my lover, Dionysius, a respectable man until then, by the seductiveness of her appearance, and drew him to herself. Furthermore, the suit which your predecessors decided between the Academy and Intemperance was the twin-sister of the present suit. For the point at issue now is whether we should live like swine with our noses to the ground in the enjoyment of pleasure, without a single noble thought, or whether, considering what is enjoyable — secondary to what is right, we should follow philosophy in a free spirit like free men, neither fearing pain as invincible nor giving preference to pleasure in a servile spirit and seeking happiness in honey and in figs. By holding out such bait to silly people and by making a bogey. out of pain,' my opponent wins over the greater part of them, and this poor man is one; she made him run away from me by keeping an eye upon him until he was ill, for while he was well he would never have accepted her arguments.

After all, why should I be indignant at her? Forsooth, she does not even let the gods alone, but _slanders their management of afffirs! If you are wise, then, you will give her a sentence for impiety also. I hear, too, that she is not even prepared to plead in person, but will have Epicurus appear as her illustrating the point that Cicero makes in the T'uscwlans (ii. 15): Haec duo (te. laborem et dolorem) Graeci illi, quorum copiosior est lingua quam’ nostra, uno nomine appellant . . . O verborum inops interdum, quibus abundare te semper putas, Graecia !

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advocate, such contempt does she show the court! ; But see here—ask her what kind of men she thinks Heracles and your own[*](Athenian. ) Theseus would have been if they had allied themselves to Pleasure and had shirked pain and toil. Nothing would hinder the earth from being full of wrong-doing if they had not toiled painfully.

This is all I have to say, for I am not at all fond of long speeches. But if she should consent to let me put questions and to give a brief reply to each, it would very soon be evident that she amounts to nothing. However, remember your oath and vote in accordance with it now, putting no faith in Epicurus, who says that the gods take no note of what happens among us.

JUSTICE Stand aside. Epicurus, speak for Pleasure.