Vitae philosophorum

Diogenes Laertius

Diogenes Laertius. Hicks, R. D., editor. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1925.

Of his songs the most popular is the following: By the whetstone gold is tried, giving manifest proof; and by gold is the mind of good and evil men brought to the test. He is reported to have said in his old age that he was not aware of having ever broken the law throughout his life; but on one point he was not quite clear. In a suit in which a friend of his was concerned he himself pronounced sentence according to the law, but he persuaded his colleague who was his friend to acquit the accused, in order at once to maintain the law and yet not to lose his friend.

He became very famous in Greece by his warning about the island of Cythera off the Laconian coast. For, becoming acquainted with the nature of the island, he exclaimed: Would it had never been placed there, or else had been sunk in the depths of the sea.

And this was a wise warning; for Demaratus, when an exile from Sparta, advised Xerxes to anchor his fleet off the island; and if Xerxes had taken the advice Greece would have been conquered. Later, in the Peloponnesian war, Nicias reduced the island and placed an Athenian garrison there, and did the Lacedaemonians much mischief.

He was a man of few words; hence Aristagoras of Miletus calls this style of speaking Chilonean. . . . is of Branchus, founder of the temple at Branchidae. Chilon was an old man about the 52nd Olympiad, when Aesop the fabulist was flourishing. According

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to Hermippus, his death took place at Pisa, just after he had congratulated his son on an Olympic victory in boxing. It was due to excess of joy coupled with the weakness of a man stricken in years. And all present joined in the funeral procession.

I have written an epitaph on him also, which runs as follows[*](Anth. Pal. vii. 88.):

    I praise thee, Pollux, for that Chilon’s son
  1. By boxing feats the olive chaplet won.
  2. Nor at the father’s fate should we repine;
  3. He died of joy; may such a death be mine.
The inscription on his statue runs thus[*](Anth. Pal. ix. 596.):
    Here Chilon stands, of Sparta’s warrior race,
  1. Who of the Sages Seven holds highest place.
His apophthegm is: Give a pledge, and suffer for it. A short letter is also ascribed to him.

Chilon to Periander

You tell me of an expedition against foreign enemies, in which you yourself will take the field. In my opinion affairs at home are not too safe for an absolute ruler; and I deem the tyrant happy who dies a natural death in his own house.