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Moreover, in things confessed to have been done, but
for doing which the cause and intention is unknown, he
who casts his conjectures on the worst side is partial and
malicious. Thus do the comedians. who affirm the Peloponnesian war to have been kindled by Pericles for the
love of Aspasia or the sake of Phidias, and not through
any desire of honor, or ambition of pulling down the
Peloponnesian pride and giving place in nothing to the
Lacedaemonians. For those who suppose a bad cause for
laudable works and commendable actions, endeavoring by
calumnies to insinuate sinister suspicions of the actor when
they cannot openly discommend the act,—as they that
impute the killing of Alexander the tyrant by Theba not
to any magnanimity or hatred of vice, but to a certain
feminine jealousy and passion, and those that say Cato
slew himself for fear Caesar should put him to a more
[p. 334]
shameful death,—such as these are manifestly in the
highest degree envious and malicious.
Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. Translated from the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised by. William W. Goodwin, PH. D. Boston. Little, Brown, and Company. Cambridge. Press Of John Wilson and son. 1874. 4.
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