Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata

When, at the beginning of his rule, he was being besieged as the result of a conspiracy against him among the citizens, his friends advised him to abdicate unless he wished to be overpowered and put to death. But, on seeing that an ox slaughtered by a cook fell instantly, he said, Is it not then distasteful that we, for fear of death which is so momentary, should forsake such a mighty sovereignty ? [*](Cf. Moralia, 783 C-D; Diodorus, xiv. 8; Aelian, Varia Historia, iv. 8; Polyaenus, v. 7.)

Learning that his son, to whom he was intending to bequeath his empire, had debauched the wife of a free citizen, he asked the young man, with some heat, what act of his father’s he knew of like that! And when the youth answered, None, for you did not have a despot for a father. Nor will you have a son, was the reply, unless you stop doing this sort of thing.