93 The same charge is leveled at 2.60. The dialogue Crito survives intact.
94 The passages referred to are Phaedo 59b and Apology 34a and 38b.
95 This remark is not found in the surviving works of Aristotle.
96 Wax tablets were used for notes and impermanent writing in the ancient Greek world, and perhaps, as Diogenes implies here, for early drafts of works intended for revision. But the Laws is far too long a work to have been recorded in this medium.
97 The dialogue Epinomis, a continuation of the discussion in the Laws, is included in the traditional Platonic corpus but is generally regarded as spurious today.
98 Protagoras (c. 490–420 BC) was one of the most successful of the sophists in Athens; Diogenes discusses his life and views at 9.50–56. The charge here attributed to Aristoxenus is repeated at 3.57 but assigned to Favorinus.
99 Xenocrates of Chalcedon was a disciple of Plato and head of the Academy from 339 to 314 BC. Diogenes discusses his life and views at 4.6–15.
100 The quip evokes the literal meaning of the word hippotaphia, derived from hippos (horse) and taphos (pride or vanity) but used more generally of high self-regard.
101 Laws VII, 807e–808c.
102 Ibid., II, 663e.
103 Philip II of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great. The thirteenth year of his reign fell in 348–347 BC.
104 There are many ancient writers by this name, and it’s not clear which one is meant here.
105 Not Plato’s younger brother, but probably that man’s grandson, Plato’s grandnephew. Plato had no children of his own.
106 Presumably one of Plato’s household slaves, named for the goddess.
107 Speusippus was the son of Plato’s sister Potone; Eurymedon was Speusippus’ father. The other executors are unknown, although Callimachus and Demetrius of Amphipolis are mentioned previously in the will.
108 Plato’s given name, Aristocles, was taken from his paternal grandfather (see 3.4).
109 Another name for Apollo, god of light, music, and healing.
110 Theophrastus (c. 370–288/85 BC) was a follower of Aristotle and became head of the Lyceum after Aristotle’s death. His life and views are discussed at 5.36–57.
111 Hyperides and Lycurgus were both prominent in Athenian politics in the second half of the fourth century BC.
112 The most famous orator of his age (384–322 BC) and a prominent Athenian statesman.
113 A rare form of direct address, used only one other time by Diogenes in Lives (see 10.29).
114 Owls were the symbol of the goddess Athena, and therefore of her patron city, Athens. Both Athena and her owl were prominently stamped on the Athenian silver tetradrachms (coins equal in value to four drachmas), which were widely used in the ancient Greek world and informally known as “owls.”
115 A member of the Eleatic school founded by Parmenides, Zeno (fl. early fifth century BC) is best known for his paradoxes. Diogenes discusses his life and views at 9.25–29.
116 Otherwise unknown.
117 The Greek word maieusis means “midwifery.” Socrates claimed that his proper role was as a midwife of knowledge, meaning that though he was barren of doctrines, he could help others give birth to their own views and then examine their soundness.
118 The Greek word peirasis means a “trial” or “attempt.” Thus peirastic dialogues are those concerned with trying out an opinion or putting it to the test.
119 Generally considered spurious by modern scholars, as are the Rivals in Love, Minos, Epinomis, and Theages.
120 Apparently an alternative title of Plato’s Critias.
121 Euthydemus 297e–298c.
122 Ibid., 298c–299a.
123 Phaedo 70d–72a.
124 Each of these were major Athenian festivals. The first, the Dionysia (also known as the City Dionysia), was celebrated at the end of March in honor of the god Dionysus. Along with parades and sacrifices, the main event was a dramatic competition for both tragic and comic playwrights. The Lenaea, celebrated in late January–early February, also in honor of Dionysus, had similar, though smaller, theatrical contests. The Panathenaea was an important summer festival held in honor of the city’s patron goddess, Athena, sometimes featuring athletic and musical contests. The Pot-Feast (Chytri), in late February, celebrated the maturation of the previous year’s wine. Earthen pots were offered to the dead and to the god Hermes in his capacity as guide of souls to the underworld.
125 The dramatic tetralogies consisted of three linked tragedies and a satyr play that often spoofed the tragic material. We have no tetralogy intact and only one of the tragic trilogies, Aeschylus’ Oresteia; the satyr play that accompanied it (Proteus) is lost except for a single fragment.
126 It seems that Plato himself used only the interlocutor’s name when assigning titles to his dialogues.
127 Commonly referred to as the First or Greater Alcibiades.
128 Generally considered spurious by modern scholars.
129 Commonly known as the Hippias Major.
130 Known as the Hippias Minor.
131 Scholars disagree about the authenticity of these letters.
132 Presumably Cleon the Pythagorean, whose spurious letters circulated in antiquity.
133 No such letter exists, though Diogenes may have in mind the Tenth Letter, which is addressed to an otherwise unknown Aristodorus.
134 Aristophanes of Byzantium was a grammarian and head of the Library of Alexandria (c. 257–180 BC). A versatile scholar and researcher, he was best known for his editions of the works of the great poets, including Homer, Hesiod, and Pindar.
135 The Greek word phaulos means “poor” or “common.” It generally has a pejorative sense, but can be used to denote simplicity in a positive sense, as in the lines quoted below.
136 Haplous means “simple.”
137 The Greek letter Χ, in this context short for chrēsthai, “customary usage.”
138 The Greek word keraunion means “lightning bolt.”
139 See Timaeus 42b and 90e.
140 Ibid., 54a.
141 Ibid., 69c and 89e.
142 Ibid., 36d–37c.
143 Ibid., 50d–e and 51a.
144 Ibid., 30a and 69b.
145 Ibid., 58a–c.
146 Ibid., 31a–b, 33a, 55c–d, and 92c.
147 Ibid., 30b.
148 Ibid., 30a–b and 55c–d.
149 Ibid., an adaptation of 33b.
150 Ibid., 33a–d, 34b, 32c, and 63a.
151 Ibid., 32c, 33a, 38b, 41a, and 43d.
152 Ibid., 29e–30a and 42e.
153 Ibid., 31b–33a.
154 Ibid., 37d–38b.
155 Ibid., 38c–39d.
156 Ibid., 30c–31b, 39c–40a, and 41b–c.
157 Ibid., 40b–c.
158 Ibid., 46d–e, 47e, 48a, 68e, and 69a.
159 Ibid., 49a, 50b–51b, and 52a–b.
160 Ibid., 53c–55c.
161 Ibid., 52d, 53b, 57c, and 69b–c.
162 See Thaeatetus 176a ff.; Phaedrus 248a and 253a; Republic X 612a–b and 613a; Timaeus 90d; and Gorgias 470e and 506b.
163 Philebus 63d ff.; Euthydemus 281d; Menexenus 246e–f; and Republic VI, 491c.
164 See Laws VI, 772d–e.
165 See Apology 31e, and Crito 49a–54d.
166 See Sophist 265c–d; Philebus 28d ff.; Timaeus 30b, 44c; and Laws V, 709b, and X, 899d ff.
167 See Apology 27c ff.; Cratylus 397e ff.; Symposium 202e; Republic III, 392a; Timaeus 40d; and Laws IV, 713a and 717b.
168 The subtitle of Cratylus.
169 See Gorgias 523a; Republic II, 364b, and X, 613a; Timaeus 42b; and Laws IV, 716a, and X, 904b.
170 For Plato’s use of myths regarding the afterlife, see Phaedo 107d–e and 113d; Thaeatetus 177a; Phaedrus 249a–b; Gorgias 523a ff.; Republic X, 614a ff.; and Laws X, 903–5d.
171 See Phaedrus 245c–56c; Phaedo 107c–8c; Republic X, 614b–21d; and Gorgias 523a–27c.
172 Starting here and
continuing through ch. 109, Diogenes relies heavily on a work not actually by Aristotle—the so-called Divisiones Aristoteleae (Aristotelian Divisions). (The earliest sources sometimes credit the “Divisions” to Plato himself or to Xenocrates. It may be the text was a teaching tool, perhaps used even in the Academy, to help aspiring students of philosophy master various techniques of classification.) Large parts of Divisiones Aristoteleae survive in three different manuscripts, suggesting that it was relatively well-known in the ancient world. Although some of the classificatory schemes reported by Diogenes can be identified in Plato’s corpus, others cannot. The notes do not attempt to trace all the possible allusions to specific passages in Plato.
173 The Greek term philia has a broader meaning than the English word “friendship” and can refer to any form of relationship involving intimacy and affection.
174 In mythology, Pylades was the closest companion of Orestes, son of Agamemnon, and helped incite Orestes to murder his mother, Clytemnestra, in order to avenge his father’s death. Their bond was often cited in the ancient world as a model of perfect friendship.
175 The second-century BC historian Polybius refers to magistrates in Carthage “giving gifts” in order to attain office, though no other details of the practice are known.
176 Perhaps some historical episode in which the Spartans were betrayed by their allies is being referred to.
Book 4
SPEUSIPPUS
c. 407–339 bc
XENOCRATES
4th cent. bc
POLEMON
fl. 314–270 bc
CRATES
3rd cent. bc
CRANTOR
c. 335–275 bc
ARCESILAUS
316/15–242/41 bc
BION
c. 335–c. 245 bc
LACYDES
d. 206/05 bc
CARNEADES
214/13–129/28 bc
CLITOMACHUS
187/86–110/09 bc
Terra-cotta statuette of a girl, third century BC, Greek.
Speusippus
1 The preceding account of Plato is the best we were able to assemble after diligently examining what is reported about him. He was succeeded by Speusippus, son of Eurymedon, an Athenian who belonged to the deme of Myrrhinus and was the son of Plato’s sister Potone.1 He was head of the school for eight years beginning in the 108th Olympiad.2 He dedicated statues of the Graces in the shrine of the Muses that Plato built in the Academy. He adhered to the same doctrines as Plato but was unlike him in character. For he was irascible and liable to be dominated by pleasures. It is reported, at any rate, that in a fit of anger he threw a puppy into a well, and that merely for pleasure he traveled to Macedonia to attend Cassander’s wedding.3
2,3 It is said that two women, Lestheneia of Mantinea and Axiothea of Phlius, had also studied with Plato.4 It was then that Dionysius,5 in a letter to Speusippus, mockingly remarked, “From the Arcadian woman who is your student one can grasp your wisdom. Plato demanded no fees from those who came to him; but you subject them to tribute and collect it from the willing and unwilling alike.” Speusippus was the first, according to Diodorus in the first book of his Reminiscences, to discern the common element in studies and to relate them to one another as far as that was possible.6 He was also the first to divulge Isocrates’ so-called secret doctrines, as Caineus says.7 He was also the first to devise a way of making bundles of firewood portable.
Grave naiscus of Theogenis with her mother, Nicomache, and her brother Nicodemus, c. 360 BC. This Greek stele was found in the village of Grammatiko in Attica. Theogenis is the woman on the left shaking hands with her mother, labeled as Nicomache. The young man at center is labeled as Nicodemus, the son of Polyllus.
When crippled by paralysis, he sent word to Xenocrates8 inviting him to come and succeed him as head of the school. They say that when he was being conveyed in a little wagon to the Academy he encountered Diogenes,9 whom he hailed, wishing him well, to which Diogenes replied, “Well, I don’t wish the same to you, if you can bear to stay alive in your present condition.” At last, despondent in old age, he willingly ended his life. My own verses about him run as follows:
Had I not learned that Speusippus would die like this,
No one would have persuaded me to declare
That he was not related by blood to Plato. For otherwise
He would not have died in despair at something so trivial.
4 Plutarch, in his lives of Lysander and Sulla, says that Speusippus suffered from infestations of lice;10 and according to Timotheus, in his book On Lives, his body wasted away. Speusippus, he says, remarked to a wealthy man who was in love with a homely person, “What do you need this (situation) for? For ten talents I’ll find you someone prettier.”11
5 He left a great many commentaries and numerous dialogues, including
Aristippus the Cyrenaic
On Wealth, one book
On Pleasure, one book
On Justice, one book
On Philosophy, one book
On the Gods, one book
The Philosopher, one book
A Reply to Cephalus, one book
Cephalus, one book
Clinomachus or Lysias, one book
The Citizen, one book
On the Soul, one book
A Reply to Gryllus, one book
Aristippus, one book
Criticism of the Arts, one book
Reminiscences in the Form of a Dialogue
Treatise on Technique, one book
{…} of a Treatise on Resemblances, in ten books
Divisions and Hypotheses Related to the Resemblances
On Examples of Genera and Species
A Reply to the Anonymous Work
Encomium of Plato
Letters to Dion, Dionysius, and Philip
On Legislation
The Mathematician
Mandrobolus
Lysias
Definitions
Lists of Reminiscences
Together these works comprise 43,475 lines. It is to Speusippus that Timonides has dedicated his narratives, in which he relates the achievements of Dion {and Bion}.12 Favorinus, in the second book of his Reminiscences, says that Aristotle purchased the books of Speusippus for three talents.13
There was another Speusippus, from Alexandria, a doctor of the school of Herophilus.
Xenocrates
6 Xenocrates, son of Agathanor, was a native of Chalcedon.14 From an early age he studied with Plato and even accompanied him to Sicily. He was naturally sluggish, and consequently Plato, comparing him with Aristotle, said, “The one needs a spur, the other a bridle,”15 and, “What an ass I am training, after what a horse his rival!” But in all else Xenocrates was dignified and grave of countenance, which often prompted Plato to say to him, “Xenocrates, offer a sacrifice to the Graces.” He spent most of his time in the Academy; and whenever he was about to venture into the city, they say that all the noisy crowd and hired porters made way for him.
7,8 One day, when Phryne16 the courtesan wished to seduce him, she fled, as if she were being pursued, to his little house. And he, out of kindness, took her in; and as there was only one small bed, he permitted her to share it with him. At last, despite her many entreaties, she departed without success and told those who inquired that she had left the bed not of a man (andros), but of a statue (andriantos). Others say that his students persuaded Lais to share his bed. But his self-command was such that he even endured frequent genital incisions and cauteries.17 And he was so trustworthy that though it was illegal to bear witness without swearing an oath, the Athenians permitted Xenocrates alone to do so. Furthermore, he was exceptionally self-sufficient. At any rate, when Alexander sent him a large sum of money, Xenocrates took three thousand Attic drachmas and sent the rest back, saying that Alexander’s need was greater, since more people depended on him.18 He likewise declined the present sent him by Antipater,19 as Myronianus says in his Parallels. And whe
n he was honored at Dionysius’ court20 with a golden crown as the prize for the champion drinker at the Feast of the Choes,21 he went out and placed it on the statue of Hermes, where he was in the habit of placing garlands of flowers.
Phryne Before the Areopagus, by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1861. Legend has it that Phryne was on trial for impiety, and when it appeared the verdict would be unfavorable, her employer and lover, Hypereides, disrobed her. The jurors, persuaded by Phryne’s divine beauty, acquitted her.
9 There is a story that he was sent with others on an embassy to Philip. Though his colleagues, softened by bribes, accepted Philip’s invitations and conversed with him, Xenocrates would do neither. This was why Philip did not receive him.22 Hence, when the ambassadors returned to Athens, they said that Xenocrates had accompanied them to no purpose, and the Athenians were ready to fine him.23 But when he told them that now more than ever they should consider their city’s interests—“For Philip knew that the others had accepted his bribes, but that he would never win me over”—it is said that the Athenians paid him double honors. And Philip later said that Xenocrates alone, of those who had come to him, was incorruptible. Furthermore, when Xenocrates went on an embassy to Antipater about the Athenians who had been taken prisoner in the Lamian War, and was invited to dine with Antipater, he quoted to him the following verses:
Standing Female Nude (Marie-Christine Leroux), by Nadar, 1860–1861. Nadar is known to have photographed only three female nudes, and this one was made at the behest of the painter Jean-Léon Gérôme to assist in the process of painting Phryne Before the Areopagus.
O Circe, what honorable man
Could bear to partake of food and drink
Before he had ransomed his men and set eyes on them?
And Antipater, appreciating that Xenocrates had hit the bull’s-eye, immediately released the prisoners.24
10 One day when a little sparrow, pursued by a hawk, took refuge in his cloak, Xenocrates stroked it and let it go, saying that one seeking sanctuary must not be betrayed. When mocked by Bion,25 Xenocrates said he would not respond, since tragedy, when mocked by comedy, does not stoop to reply. To someone who had not studied music or geometry or astronomy but wished to be his student, Xenocrates said, “Be on your way. For you have no footholds into philosophy.” According to others, he said, “One doesn’t come to me for wool carding.”26
Lives of the Eminent Philosophers Page 23
