Lives of the Eminent Philosophers

by Pamela Mensch

  Diogenes, by Norbert Schwontkowski, 2013. Oil on canvas, 150 x 130 cm.

  31,32 Xeniades’ sons memorized many passages from the works of poets and writers, including Diogenes’ own treatises, and he trained them in every shortcut for committing words to memory. At home he taught them to attend to their own needs, to live on plain food and water, to wear their hair short and unadorned, to go barefoot and without a tunic, and to be silent and keep their eyes lowered when walking in the streets. He also took them hunting. They paid close attention to Diogenes and often asked their parents to let him attend to them. He himself says that he grew old in the house of Xeniades, and that he asked to be buried with his sons. When Xeniades asked how he should bury him, Diogenes replied, “Face down.” And when Xeniades asked why, he replied, “Because before long up and down are going to be reversed.” (Here he was referring to the recent victory of the Macedonians,47 who, formerly humble, were now omnipotent.)

  When someone brought him to a sumptuous house and warned him not to spit, he cleared his throat and spat in the man’s face, saying he couldn’t find a worse place to leave his spittle. (Others tell this story of Aristippus.) On one occasion, after shouting, “Come this way, fellows,” and people had gathered, he attacked them with his staff, saying, “It was men I was calling for, not trash,” as Hecaton48 reports in the first book of his Anecdotes. Alexander is reported to have remarked, “Had I not been Alexander, I would like to have been Diogenes.”

  33 He used to say that it is not the deaf and blind who are impaired (anaperous), but those who have no knapsack (pera).49 One day, when he had entered a young men’s drinking party half-shaven (as Metrocles relates in his Anecdotes), he was given a beating; but later, after writing the names of his attackers on a gypsum tablet, he walked about with it around his neck until he had brought discredit upon them, making them objects of public scorn and disgrace. He used to say that though he was a dog of the kind that men admire, none of his admirers dared to take him along on a hunt. To a man who said, “I defeat other men at the Pythian games,”50 he replied, “On the contrary, it is I who defeat men; you defeat slaves.”

  34 To those who said, “You’re an old man. Take it easy from now on,” he would reply, “Whatever for? If I were running a distance race, would I slow down when approaching the finish line? Wouldn’t I do better to speed up?” Invited to a dinner, he said he would not go, since the last time around he had not been thanked.

  35 He used to go barefoot in winter, and endured all the other hardships mentioned earlier; he even tried to eat meat raw, but found he could not digest it. One day he approached Demosthenes the orator,51 who was having lunch at a tavern; and when the man drew back, Diogenes said, “You’ll only be that much further in the tavern.” When foreigners wanted to get a glimpse of Demosthenes, Diogenes pointed him out with his middle finger52 and said, “There you have the demagogue of Athens.” When someone dropped a loaf of bread and was ashamed to pick it up, Diogenes admonished the man by tying a rope to the neck of a wine-jar and dragging it through the Cerameicus.53

  He used to say he was imitating the chorus trainers; for they would set their pitch a little sharp so that everyone else would hit the right note. He maintained that most people fell short of being insane by a finger’s breadth; for anyone who walked about with his middle finger extended would be regarded as insane, but would not be so regarded if he were extending his index finger. He would say that valuable things were exchanged for what was worthless, and vice versa: for a statue was sold for three thousand drachmas, but a quart of barley for two coppers.

  36 To Xeniades, the man who purchased him, he said, “Be sure to do as I tell you.” And when Xeniades replied, “Springs flow back to their sources,”54 he said, “If you had been ill and purchased a doctor, would you not obey him, but instead say to him ‘Springs flow back to their sources’?”

  Someone wanted to study philosophy with him, whereupon Diogenes handed the man a fish and told him to follow him. The man, thinking he’d been insulted, threw the fish away and departed. Later, on running into him, Diogenes laughed and said, “A fish has destroyed our friendship.” (Diocles, however, has reported the encounter as follows. When someone had said, “Give us your orders, Diogenes,” Diogenes took the man along and gave him a half obol’s worth of cheese to carry; and when the man refused, Diogenes said, “A half obol’s worth of cheese has destroyed our friendship.”55)

  37 One day, after seeing a boy drinking with his hands, Diogenes threw away the cup he kept in his knapsack, saying, “A child has outdone me in frugality.” He also threw away his bowl under similar circumstances, after seeing a boy with a broken bowl scooping up his lentils with a hollowed-out morsel of bread. He reasoned this way: all things belong to the gods; the wise are friends of the gods, and the possessions of friends are held in common; therefore all things belong to the wise.

  Diogenes Drinking, by Girolamo Forabosco, seventeenth century.

  38 Once he saw a woman bowing down to the gods in an indecent posture. Wanting to dispel her superstitiousness, according to Zoilus of Perga, he approached her and said, “Don’t you worry, ma’am, that to a god standing behind you—for all things are full of gods—you are assuming a shameful pose?” To Asclepius he offered a gamecock who dashed up to those who were prostrating themselves and mauled them.56

  He often said that he’d been visited by the tragic curses; at any rate, he was

  Without city, without home, robbed of his native land,

  A wanderer begging for his daily bread.57

  39 But he also used to say that he countered luck with courage, convention with nature, and emotion with reason. When he was lying in the sun at the Craneum,58 Alexander came up to him and said, “Ask whatever you desire,” to which Diogenes replied, “Stand out of my light.” When someone was reading aloud at great length and then pointed toward the end of the book where there was no writing, Diogenes said, “Courage, men. Land ho!” When someone proved by argument that he had horns,59 Diogenes touched his brow and said, “Well, I, for one, don’t see any.” Likewise when someone asserted that motion did not exist, Diogenes stood up and walked about.

  Alexander and Diogenes, by Jacques Gamelin, 1763.

  To someone who was discussing celestial phenomena he said, “How long have you been back from the sky?” When a wicked man60 had the motto “May nothing evil enter here” inscribed on his house, Diogenes said, “But then how is its master to get in?” After anointing his feet with myrrh, he said that the myrrh wafted from his head to the air, and from his feet to his nose. When the Athenians thought he should be initiated into the Mysteries,61 and said that initiates get special treatment in Hades, he said, “It would be laughable if Agesilaus and Epaminondas live in the mire, while nobodies inhabit the Isles of the Blessed because they’ve been initiated.”62

  40 To the mice who skittered across his table he said, “Lo and behold! Even Diogenes keeps parasites.” When Plato surnamed him “the Dog,” Diogenes said, “Very true, since I returned to those who sold me.” As he was leaving the baths, and someone asked him whether many men were bathing, he answered no; but to someone else who asked whether there was a large crowd, he answered yes. When Plato had defined man as an animal with two legs and no feathers, and was applauded, Diogenes plucked the feathers from a cock, brought it to Plato’s school, and said, “Here is Plato’s man.” (This was why “having broad nails” was added to the definition.)63 To someone who asked him at what hour one should take lunch, he said, “If you’re rich, whenever you like; if poor, whenever you can.”

  41 Noticing that in Megara the sheep were protected with leather skins, but the boys went without them, he said, “It’s better to be a Megarian’s ram (krion) than his son (huion).” To someone who hit him with a beam and then said, “Look out!” Diogenes said, “Why? Are you going to strike me again?” He used to say that the demagogues were lackeys of the mob, and their crowns the pustules of fame. On lighting a lamp in broad dayli
ght, he walked about saying, “I am looking for a man.” One day, when he was being drenched with water, and some bystanders were feeling sorry for him, Plato, who was among them, said, “If you want to spare him, stand somewhere else”—an allusion to Diogenes’ concern for his reputation.

  42 When someone punched him, he said, “Heracles! How could I have forgotten to walk out without my helmet?” But when Medias had assaulted him and said, “Here are three thousand drachmas to your credit,” Diogenes replied the next day, when he had donned boxing gloves and trounced Medias, “Here are three thousand to your credit.” When Lysias the apothecary asked if he believed in gods, Diogenes replied, “How could I not, when I see you are so much out of their favor?” (Some, however, attribute this retort to Theodorus.64) When he had seen someone performing a ritual purification, he said, “Don’t you realize that by sprinkling yourself you can no more correct your mistakes in life than your errors in grammar?” He faulted men for their prayers, saying that they asked for what they imagined was good, rather than for what was truly good.

  43 To those who were disturbed by their dreams he used to say that they paid no attention to what they did in a waking state, but were inquisitive about the visions they saw in their sleep. When a herald at the Olympic games announced, “Dioxippus has defeated the other men,” Diogenes retorted, “On the contrary! He defeats slaves, while I defeat men.”

  Still, he was admired by the Athenians. At any rate, when a young fellow had broken Diogenes’ tub they gave the boy a flogging and presented Diogenes with a new tub. Dionysius the Stoic says that after the Battle of Chaeronea Diogenes was arrested and brought to Philip; and when asked who he was, he replied, “A spy of your insatiable greed,” for which he was admired and set free.

  44 Once when Alexander had sent a letter to Antipater65 in Athens through one “Athlios” (Wretched), Diogenes, who was present, said

  Wretched message from a wretch to a wretch, carried by a wretch.66

  When Perdiccas67 threatened to have Diogenes killed unless he came to him, Diogenes said, “Small wonder, since a beetle or a poisonous spider might pose the same threat.” He thought Perdiccas would have threatened him more effectively by saying, “Without you in my life, I could be a happy man.” He often thundered that the gods had made it possible for men to live easily, but this had been lost sight of, because we demand honey cakes, perfumes, and the like. Hence he said to someone who was having his shoes put on by a servant, “You won’t be content until he wipes your nose for you; but that day will come, once you’ve lost the use of your hands.”

  45 One day, noticing the temple magistrates leading away a steward who had filched a votive bowl, he said, “The big thieves are leading away the little one.” Another day, observing a boy tossing stones at the cross of a gallows, he said, “Well done! You’ll get there yet!”68 To some boys standing nearby and saying, “Let’s take care he doesn’t bite us,” he said, “Fear not, boys; a dog won’t eat beets.”69 To a man preening in a lion’s skin he said, “Don’t disgrace the garments of courage.” To someone who said that Callisthenes70 was lucky, since he lived in luxury as a member of Alexander’s entourage, Diogenes said, “On the contrary, it’s an ill-starred man who breakfasts and dines whenever Alexander sees fit.”

  Diogenes Looking for an Honest Man (Portrait History of the Steyn Family), by Caesar van Everdingen, 1652.

  46 When short of money he would tell his friends he was not asking them to give him money, but to give it back.71 When masturbating in the marketplace,72 he said, “If only one could relieve hunger by rubbing one’s belly.” Noticing a young fellow going off to dine with satraps,73 Diogenes dragged him away, brought him to the boy’s friends, and told them to keep an eye on him. To an effeminately dressed youth who asked him a question, Diogenes said he would not reply unless the fellow pulled up his clothes and showed whether he was a woman or a man. To a young fellow playing cottabus at the baths, he said, “The better you play, the worse you are.”74 At a dinner some guests were throwing bones to him, as one would to a dog; accordingly, in the manner of a dog, he urinated on the guests as he was leaving.

  47 He called the orators and all who sought to win fame with their eloquence “thrice-human,” meaning “thrice-wretched.” He called an ignoramus who was rich “a sheep with a golden fleece.” Seeing a for sale sign on the house of a spendthrift, he said, “I knew that after your debauch you’d easily vomit forth the owner.” To a young man who complained that his crowd of admirers was annoying, Diogenes said, “Then stop flaunting your perverted desires.” At a filthy bathhouse he said, “Where are people who have bathed here supposed to wash themselves?” When a stout lyre player was universally maligned, only Diogenes sang his praises; when asked why, he said, “Because big though he is, he’s a lyre player and not a robber.”

  48 Whenever he met the lyre player who was invariably abandoned by his audience, he hailed him with the phrase, “Greetings, rooster!” And when asked why he did so, he said, “Because when you sing you make everyone get up.” When a young man was displaying his oratory, Diogenes, who had filled the bosom of his robe with beans, was gulping them down right in front of him. And when he had attracted the crowd’s notice, he said he was surprised that they shifted their attention from the speaker to himself. When a highly superstitious man said to him, “With one blow I will break your head,” Diogenes replied, “While I, by sneezing to the left, will make you tremble.”75 When Hegesias had asked him for one of his treatises, Diogenes said, “What an ass you are, Hegesias! For you do not choose painted figs, but real ones; yet you neglect real training, and rush to read about it instead.”

  49 To someone who had reproached him for being an exile, he said, “But it’s thanks to that, you fool, that I became a philosopher.” And when, in the same vein, someone remarked, “The Sinopeans sentenced you to exile,” he replied, “And I sentenced them to stay at home.” One day, noticing an Olympic victor tending sheep, he said, “You were quick, my dear fellow, to migrate from Olympia to Nemea.”76 Asked why athletes are stupid, he said, “Because they are built up of mutton and beef.” He once begged alms from a statue, and when asked why he did so he said, “To get practice in being turned down.” Begging someone for alms—he did this originally because of his poverty—he said, “If you’ve given to another, give also to me; but if not, begin with me.”

  50 Asked by a tyrant what kind of bronze is good for a statue, he said, “The kind from which Harmodius and Aristogeiton77 were forged.” Asked how Dionysius78 treated his friends, he said, “Like sacks: when they’re full he hangs them up, when empty he discards them.” When a newly married man had his house inscribed with the words:

  Heracles, the gloriously triumphant son of Zeus,

  Dwells within. May nothing evil enter here.

  Diogenes added, “After the war, the alliance.”79 He said that avarice was the motherland of all vices. Seeing a spendthrift eating olives at an inn, he said, “If you’d had fare like this for breakfast, you wouldn’t be having it for supper.”

  51 Good men he called images of the gods, and love the occupation of the idle. Asked what in life was pitiable, he answered, “An old man who’s poor.” Asked which of the animals had the worst bite, he said, “Of the wild beasts, the sycophant; of the tame, the flatterer.” Seeing two very badly painted centaurs, he asked, “Which of them is Cheiron?”80 He likened ingratiating speech to honey you could choke on. He used to say that the belly was the Charybdis81 of one’s livelihood. On hearing that the flute player Didymon had been convicted of adultery, he said, “He deserves to be hanged by his name.”82 Asked why gold is pale, he said, “Because it’s the target of many plotters.” Seeing a woman being carried in a litter, he said, “It’s the wrong type of cage for the quarry.”

  52 One day, seeing a runaway slave sitting on the edge of a well, he said, “Take care you don’t fall in, lad.”83 Seeing a boy stealing clothes at the baths, he said, “Are you after unguent (aleimmation) or another
cloak (allo himation)?” Seeing women who had been hanged from an olive tree, he said, “Would that all trees bore such fruit.” Seeing a {trustworthy} clothes stealer, he said,

  Diogenes, by Jules Bastien-Lepage, nineteenth century.

  What are you up to, my fine fellow?

  Are you hoping to despoil a corpse?84

  Asked if he had a little girl or boy, he said, “No.” “So if you die, who will carry you out for burial?” “Whoever wants my house,” he replied.

  53 When he saw a handsome youth asleep in an unprotected spot, he nudged him and said, “Wake up!