Vitae philosophorum

He was the first to define statement (or assertion) by saying that a statement is that which sets forth what a thing was or is. He used repeatedly to say, I’d rather be mad than feel pleasure, and We ought to make love to such women as will feel a proper gratitude. When a lad from Pontus was about to attend his lectures, and asked him what he required, the answer was, Come with a new book, a new pen, and new tablets, if you have a mind to (implying the need of brains as well).[*](There is the same untranslateable pun upon καινοῦ = new and καὶ νοῦ = a mind too, as in ii. § 118.) When someone inquired what sort of wife he ought to marry, he said, If she’s beautiful, you’ll not have her to yourself; if she’s ugly, you’ll pay for it dearly. Being told that Plato was abusing him, he remarked, It is a royal privilege to do good and be ill spoken of.[*](Cf. M. Anton. vii. 36 Ἀντισθενικόν, βασιλικὸν μὲν εὐπράττειν, κακῶς δὲ ἀκούειν, and Plutarch, Alex. c. 41 (of Alexander).)

When he was being initiated into the Orphic mysteries, the priest said that those admitted into these rites would be partakers of many good things in Hades. Why then, said he, don’t you die?

Being reproached because his parents were not both free-born, Nor were they both wrestlers, quoth he, but yet I am a wrestler. To the question why he had but few disciples he replied, Because I use a silver rod to eject them. When he was asked why he was so bitter in reproving his pupils he replied, Physicians are just the same with their patients. One day upon seeing an adulterer running for his life he exclaimed, Poor wretch, what peril you might have escaped at the price of an obol. He used to say, as we learn from Hecato in his Anecdotes, that it is better to fall in with crows than with flatterers; for in the one case you are devoured when dead, in the other case while alive.

Being asked what was the height of human bliss, he replied, To die happy. When a friend complained to him that he had lost his notes, You should have inscribed them, said he, on your mind instead of on paper. As iron is eaten away by rust, so, said he, the envious are consumed by their own passion. Those who would fain be immortal must, he declared, live piously and justly. States, said he, are doomed when they are unable to distinguish good men from bad. Once, when he was applauded by rascals, he remarked, I am horribly afraid I have done something wrong.

When brothers agree, no fortress is so strong as their common life, he said. The right outfit for a voyage, he said, is such as, even if you are shipwrecked, will go through the water with you. One day when he was censured for keeping company with evil men, the reply he made was, Well, physicians are in attendance on their patients without getting

Being asked what learning is the most necessary, he replied, How to get rid of having anything to unlearn. And he advised that when men are slandered, they should endure it more courageously than if they were pelted with stones.

And he used to taunt Plato with being conceited. At all events when in a procession he spied a spirited charger he said, turning to Plato, It seems to me that you would have made just such a proud, showy steed. This because Plato was constantly praising horseflesh. And one day he visited Plato, who was ill, and seeing the basin into which Plato had vomited, remarked, The bile I see, but not the pride.

He used to recommend the Athenians to vote that asses are horses.[*](Cf. Plato, Phaedrus 260 c.) When they deemed this absurd, his reply was, But yet generals are found among you who had had no training, but were merely elected. Many men praise you, said one. Why, what wrong have I done? was his rejoinder. When he turned the torn part of his cloak so that it came into view, Socrates no sooner saw this than he said, I spy your love of fame peeping through your cloak.[*](Cf. Aelian, Var. Hist. ix. 35.) Phanias in his work on the Socratics tells us how some one asked him

what he must do to be good and noble, and he replied, You must learn from those who know that the faults you have are to be avoided. When some one extolled luxury his reply was, May the sons of your enemies live in luxury.

To the youth who was posing fantastically as an artist’s model he put this question, Tell me, if the bronze could speak, on what, think you, would it pride itself most? On its beauty, was the reply. Then, said he, are you not ashamed of delighting in the very same quality as an inanimate object? When a young man from Pontus promised to treat him with great consideration as soon as his boat with its freight of salt fish should arrive, he took him and an empty wallet to a flour-dealer’s, got it filled, and was going away. When the woman asked for the money, The young man will pay, said he, when his boatload of salt fish arrives.

Antisthenes is held responsible for the exile of Anytus and the execution of Meletus.

For he fell in with some youths from Pontus whom the fame of Socrates had brought to Athens, and he led them off to Anytus, whom he ironically declared to be wiser than Socrates; whereupon (it is said) those about him with much indignation drove Anytus out of the city. If he saw a woman anywhere decked out with ornaments, he would hasten to her house and bid her husband bring out his horse and arms, and then, if the man possessed them, let his extravagance alone, for (he said) the man could with these defend himself; but, if he had none, he would bid him strip off the finery.

Favourite themes[*](Here follow three extracts of Cynic maxims or rules of conduct; for, strictly speaking, they had no tenets proper ( δόξαι, δόγματα). The last ( § 13) seems to be derived from Diocles.) with him were the following. He would prove that virtue can be taught; that

And he held virtue to be sufficient in itself to ensure happiness, since it needed nothing else except the strength of a Socrates. And he maintained that virtue is an affair of deeds and does not need a store of words or learning; that the wise man is selfsufficing, for all the goods of others are his; that ill repute is a good thing and much the same as pain; that the wise man will be guided in his public acts not by the established laws but by the law of virtue; that he will also marry in order to have children from union with the handsomest women; furthermore that he will not disdain to love, for only the wise man knows who are worthy to be loved.

Diocles records the following sayings of his: To the wise man nothing is foreign or impracticable. A good man deserves to be loved. Men of worth are friends. Make allies of men who are at once brave and just. Virtue is a weapon that cannot be taken away. It is better to be with a handful of good men fighting against all the bad, than with hosts of bad men against a handful of good men. Pay attention to your enemies, for they are the first to discover your mistakes. Esteem an honest man above a kinsman. Virtue is the same for women as for men. Good actions are fair and evil actions foul. Count all wickedness foreign and alien.

Wisdom is a most sure stronghold which never crumbles away nor is betrayed. Walls of defence must be constructed in our own impregnable reasonings. He used to converse in the gymnasium of Cynosarges (White hound) at no great distance from the gates, and some think that the Cynic school derived its name from Cynosarges. Antisthenes

himself too was nicknamed a hound pure and simple. And he was the first, Diocles tells us, to double his cloak and be content with that one garment and to take up a staff and a wallet. Neanthes too asserts that he was the first to double his mantle. Sosicrates, however, in the third book of his Successions of Philosophers says this was first done by Diodorus of Aspendus, who also let his beard grow and used a staff and a wallet.