previous next
Now I here call those honors which the people,
Whose right it is, so name; with them I speak:

as Empedocles has it; since a wise statesman will not despise true honor and favor, consisting in the good-will and friendly disposition of those who gratefully remember his services; nor will he contemn glory by shunning to please his neighbors, as Democritus would have him. For neither the fawning of dogs nor the affection of horses is to be rejected by huntsmen and jockeys; nay, it is both profitable and pleasant to breed in those animals which are brought up in our houses and live with us, such a disposition towards one's self as Lysimachus's dog showed to his master, and as the poet relates Achilles's horses to have had towards Patroclus.1 And I am of opinion that bees would fare better if they would make much of those who breed them and look after them, and would admit them to come near them, than they do by stinging them and driving them away; for now their keepers punish them by smothering them with smoke; so they tame unruly horses with short bits; and dogs that are apt to run away, by collaring them and fastening them to clogs. But there is nothing which renders one man so obsequious and submissive to another, as the confidence of his good-will, and the opinion of his integrity and justice. Wherefore Demosthenes rightly affirmed, that the greatest preservative of states against tyrants is distrust. For the part of the soul by which we believe is most apt to be caught. As therefore [p. 147] Cassandra's gift of prophecy was of no advantage to the citizens of Troy, who would not believe her:

The God (says she) would have me to foretell
Things unbelieved; for when the people well
Have smarted, groaning under pressures sad,
They style me wise, till then they think me mad;

so the confidence the citizens had in Archytas, and their good-will towards Battus, were highly advantageous to those who would make use of them through the good opinion they had of them.

Now the first greatest benefit which is in the reputation of statesmen is the confidence that is had in them, giving them an entrance into affairs; and the second is, that the good-will of the multitude is an armor to the good against those that are envious and wicked; for,

As when the careful mother drives the flies
From her dear babe, which sweetly sleeping lies,
2

it chases away envy, and renders the plebeian equal in authority to the nobleman, the poor man to the rich, and the private man to the magistrates; and in a word, when truth and virtue are joined with it, it is a strange and favorable wind, directly carrying men into government. And on the other side behold and learn by examples the mischievous effects of the contrary disposition. For those of Italy slew the wife and children of Dionysius, having first violated and polluted them with their lusts; and afterwards burning their bodies, scattered the ashes out of the ship into the sea. But when one Menander, who had reigned graciously over the Bactrians, died afterwards in the camp, the cities indeed by common consent celebrated his funeral; but coming to a contest about his relics, they were difficultly at last brought to this agreement, that his ashes being distributed, every one of them should carry away an equal share, and they should all erect monuments [p. 148] to him. Again, the Agrigentines, being got rid of Phalaris, made a decree, that none should wear a blue garment; for the tyrant's attendants had blue liveries. But the Persians, because Cyrus was hawk-nosed, do to this day love such men and esteem them handsomest.

1 See Il. XIX. 404.

2 Il. IV. 130.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

load focus English (Harold North Fowler, 1936)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: