Delphi Complete Works of Dio Chrysostom

by Dio Chrysostom

  Moreover, let us take the case of the Ephesians: Leaving aside scruples having to do with the goddess, one would say that they commit a misdeed if they take from the deposits to which I have referred, so far as the act itself is concerned; but that people who treat the statues in this way do an injustice, not merely, to be sure, for the reasons already given — that they would be wronging persons in no wise related to themselves, the majority of whom they did not even know — but also on account of the ill repute which arises from their act. For to those who have not taken good care of a deposit entrusted to them nobody would thereafter entrust any of his own property; but those who insult their benefactors will by nobody be esteemed to deserve a favour. Consequently, the danger for you is that you will no longer receive benefactions at the hands of anybody at all, while the danger to the Ephesians is merely that they will no longer have other persons’ property to take care of.

  [66] I wish, moreover, to mention a deed of yours which took place not very long ago, and yet is commended by everyone no less than are the deeds of the men of old, in order that you may know by making comparison whether on principle it is seemly for people like you to be guilty of such behaviour as this. After that continuous and protracted civil war among the Romans, during which it was your misfortune to suffer a reverse on account of your sympathy with the democracy, when, finally, the terrible scenes came to an end, and all felt they were safe at last, just as in a severe illness there is often need of some heroic remedy, so then, too, the situation seemed to require a similar corrective measure. Consequently all the provinces were granted a remission of their debts. [67] Now the others accepted it gladly, and saw in the measure a welcome gift; but you Rhodians alone of all rejected it, although the capture of your city had recently occurred, as I have said, and the enemy had spared nothing in the city except your dwellings. But nevertheless, you thought it would be a shame to violate any principle of justice in any crisis whatsoever and on account of the disasters that had befallen you to destroy your credit to boot; and while deferring to the Romans in everything else, you did not think it right to yield to them in this one respect — of choosing a dishonourable course for the sake of gain. [68] For the things, methinks, which you saw that Rome did not lack because of its high character at once and of its good fortune, these you demonstrated that your city did not lack, because of its high character alone. Certainly you will not say, men of Rhodes, that gratitude is owing less to those who have done a service than to those who were ready to contribute the amount of your debt.

  After that, though you thought it a scandal not to pay your debts willingly, yet is it an equitable act, having discharged an obligation, then to rob the recipient of his requital? For surely you have not supposed that it is more shameful to act dishonourably in common with all the world than to be alone in so doing! And yet when that great revolution occurred at the time I have mentioned and there was repudiation of every kind, the gifts which had been made remained undisturbed in the possession of those who had received them previously, and no one was so bold as to try to exact a return from those who already had anything. You, however, are at this present time not leaving undisturbed even what you were so prompt to pay to your benefactors, but although at that time you would not consent to follow in any respect the same course as all the others took, and that too, in spite of the reverses you had suffered, now when you are prosperous you do what not a single one of the peoples in that crisis did!

  [69] And yet the action taken in regard to the debts you will find was taken at other times as well; Solon, for instance, is said to have taken it once at Athens. For apart from the fact that this measure often becomes necessary in view of the insolvency of those who have contracted loans, there are times also when it is even justifiable on account of the high rate of interest, on occasions when lenders have got back in interest their principal many times over. But to deprive the recipients of the tokens of gratitude which they have received in return for their benefactions can find no plausible excuse, nor has anyone ever yet formally proposed the adoption of this procedure; no, this is almost the only thing in the world for which there has never yet been found any occasion.

  [70] Furthermore, the following two practices have alike been considered worthy of being most carefully guarded against in our laws and as deserving of execration and the most extreme penalties, namely, a proposal that debts be cancelled, or that the land ought to be redistributed. Well, of these two measures, the former has never been adopted in your city; the latter, however, of which we have not the slightest knowledge that it ever has been taken, please consider by comparing it with the practice under examination. If the land were being parcelled out anew, the very worst consequence would be that the original holder should be put on an equality with the man who possessed no land at all; but where a man’s statue has been given to another, the one who has been robbed is by no means on an equality with the man who received it. For the latter has gained the honour, if you can really call it such, whereas the other has nothing left.

  [71] Come, then, if any one were to question the magistrate who is set over you, who commands that the inscription be erased and another man’s name engraved in its place, asking: “What does this mean? Ye gods, has this man been found guilty of having done the city some terrible wrong so many years after the deed?” In heaven’s name, do you not think that he would be deterred, surely if he is a man of common decency? For my part I think that even the mason will blush for shame. And then if children or kinsmen of the great man should happen to appear, what floods of tears do you think they will shed when some one begins to obliterate the name? [72] No, not they merely, but everybody will protest, coming before you, in your assembly, creating an uproar. Let me ask you, then: Even if such a demonstration does occur, will you refrain from trying to prevent the deed, and take no notice at all? I for my part cannot conceive of your taking such a course, but rather maintain that even now you do not know that this is going on, but that you will not permit it, now that you have learned of it; anyhow you know it all now at any rate, I imagine, so that it is your duty to put a stop to the practice once for all.

  “Oh! but assuredly your illustration is not apposite,” someone may object, “since many of them are persons who have no surviving relative and the practice is not followed in the case of any person who is well known.”

  [73] Well, for my part, I will pass over the point that even if some are unaware, as is likely, that some of these honoured men are related to them, yet none the less on this account they suffer an injustice if their ancestors are dishonoured. But far more grievous at all events, it seems to me, is the wrong done to those honoured men who have not one single surviving relative. For in the case of the living it seems a greater indignity to wrong those who have not even one person left to help them. For on that principle you might as well say that it is not cruel to injure orphans either, children utterly alone in the world, who cannot protect themselves and have no one else to care for them. But you, on the contrary, look upon such conduct with even greater displeasure, and through the state appoint guardians to protect them from any possible wrong.

  [74] But, speaking in general terms, while none of the pleas that these people intend to urge has any equitable basis whatever, the most absurd plea of all is to say that after all they are not molesting any of the statues of well-known persons, nor those whose owners any one knows, but that they take liberties with sundry insignificant and very ancient ones. It is as if a person should say that he did not wrong any prominent citizen, but only those of the common crowd, persons whom nobody knows! And yet, by heavens, I maintain that the two cases are not alike. For in the case of the living one person is more prominent than another owing to his good birth or his good character, and it may also be on account of his wealth or for other good reasons; but in the case of the statues, on the contrary, one cannot point to one group and say ‘These are statues of better men.’ For it is not due to their humble birth or any baseness that we do not
know them, seeing that they have received the same honours as the most famous men, but our ignorance has come about through lapse of time.

  [75] Moreover, insofar as the men of the past were, as all believe, always superior by nature to those of the succeeding generations, and as in ancient times it was a rarer thing for any men to receive this honour, just in so far were those better men and the authors of greater blessings against whom it is acknowledged we are sinning. And that both these statements are true is clear, for we know that the exceedingly ancient men were demi-gods and that those who followed them were not much inferior to them; in the second place, we understand that their successors steadily deteriorated in the course of time, and finally, we know that the men of to-day are no better than ourselves. Indeed formerly even those who gave their lives for the state were not set up in bronze, but only the occasional man who performed extraordinary and wonderful exploits; but now we honour those that land at our ports, so that we should transfer to new owners, if transfer we must, rather the later statues and those which have been set up nearest the present time. [76] For you are not unaware, I presume, that all persons of good sense love their old friends more and esteem them more highly than those who have become their friends but recently, and that they honour their ancestral family friends altogether more than they do those whose acquaintance they themselves have made. For any who transgress the rights of these letter wrong them alone, but those who annul any of the rights of the former must also despise the men who accept their friendship. [77] And, to state a general principle, just as when any man now living whom you do not know very well personally or not at all is being subjected to a judicial examination in your courts, you listen to those who do know him and cast your vote according to what the witnesses say, especially if they are not knaves; so do the same thing now also. Since we too are speaking concerning men whom they say that no one now alive knows anything about, learn from those who did know them. Well then, those who lived in their time, who knew them perfectly, regarded them as benefactors of the city and considered them worthy of the highest honours. These are witnesses whom you have no right to disbelieve, being indeed your own forefathers — nor yet to declare that they were knaves.

  [78] Furthermore, you cannot advance any such argument, either, as to say that those who were honoured long ago have held their honours for a long time. For it will not be possible for you to prove that those men have been honoured for a longer time by the city than the city has been the recipient of their benefactions. Hence, just as a man who incurred a debt long ago and long ago repaid it has done not a whit more than the man who pays back now what he has just received, so does a similar statement apply if it was very long ago indeed that a man requited another for a benefit received from him at that time. [79] But the case would be different if you had given exemption from taxes, money, land, or some other such thing and were now taking it away — then perhaps those who would have received such an exemption afterwards would indeed suffer a greater wrong; for the man who has held such things for any length of time has received benefit and advantage therefrom already. But in the case of an honour conferred there is nothing like this. For whereas the former are better off for the future as well, since what they acquired then is the source of wealth which they enjoy now; the others, on the contrary, find that they have suffered an actual diminution of their honours. For in the one case the loss is less because the men have enjoyed the usufruct for a long time, but in the other case the dishonour is greater, since the victims are being deprived of a very ancient honour.

  [80] And that the present practice is not free from impiety either, especially in view of the way these men describe it, I shall now prove, even if some will think that I speak with intent to exaggerate — not, as I said before, because offences committed with reference to the dead are all without exception acts of impiety, but also because it is generally believed that the men of very ancient times were semi-divine, even if they have no exceptional attribute, simply, I presume, on account of their remoteness in time. And those who are so highly revered and have been held worthy of the highest honours, some of whom actually enjoy the mystic rites given to heroes, men who have lain buried so many years that even the memory of them has disappeared — how can they possibly be designated in the same way as those who have died in our own time or only a little earlier, especially when these latter have not shown themselves worthy of any honour? [81] And assuredly, acts of impiety toward the heroes everyone would agree without demur should be put in the same class as impiety toward the gods. Well then, is it not a wrongful act to blot out their memory? To take away their honour? To chisel out their names? Yes, it is a shame and an outrage, by Zeus. [82] But if anyone removes a crown that will last perhaps one or two days, or if one puts a stain on the bronze, you will regard this man guilty of impiety; and yet will you think that the man who utterly blots out and changes and destroys another’s glory is doing nothing out of the way? Why, if anyone takes a spear out of a statue’s hand, or breaks the crest off his helmet, or the shield off his arm or a bridle off his horse, you will straightway hand this man over to the executioner, and he will suffer the same punishment as temple-robbers — just as many undoubtedly have already been put to death for such reasons — and they give them no more consideration because it is one of the nameless and very old statues they have mutilated. Then shall the city in its official capacity prove altogether worse and more contemptible in the treatment of its heroes?

  [83] Again, if a person comes in and says that some stranger or even citizen has stolen either a hand or a finger that he has taken from a statue, you will raise an outcry and bid him be put to the torture forthwith. Yet, even though the statue has been deprived of a hand or a spear, or a goblet if it happens to be holding one, the honour remains and the man who received the honour retains the symbol of his merits; it is the bronze alone that has suffered a loss. But when the inscription is destroyed, obviously its testimony has also been destroyed that the person in question is “considered to have shown himself worthy of approbation.”

  [84] And so I now wish to tell you of a practice which I know is followed at Athens, and here too, I imagine, in accordance with a most excellent law. In Athens, for instance, whenever any citizen has to suffer death at the hands of the state for a crime, his name is erased first. Why is this done? One reason is that he may no longer be considered a citizen when he undergoes such a punishment but, so far as that is possible, as having become an alien. [85] Then, too, I presume that it is looked upon as not the least part of the punishment itself, that even the appellation should no longer be seen of the man who had gone so far in wickedness, but should be utterly blotted out, just as, I believe, traitors are denied burial, so that in the future there may be no trace whatever of a wicked man. Come, therefore, if anyone says that in the case of benefactors the same course is followed in your city as is customary among many peoples in the case of evil-doers, will you not be exceedingly offended? Then do not be vexed at the man who seems to have given expression to this criticism on the present occasion, for you may find that he is to be thanked for its not being said again in the future or even always.

  [86] Again, if any one chisels out only one word from any official tablet, you will put him to death without stopping to investigate what the word was or to what it referred; and if anyone should go to the building where your public records are kept and erase one jot of any law, or one single syllable of a decree of the people, you will treat this man just as you would any person who should remove a part of the Chariot. Well then, does the man who erases the inscription on a statue commit a less serious offence than the man who chisels something off the official tablet? Indeed the fact is that he erases the entire decree by virtue of which that man received his honour, or rather he annuls the record of it. But if anyone who for any offence whatever is condemned to some punishment erases his own name secretly or by intrigue, he will be thought to be destroying the constitution. Accordingly, you think it a more ser
ious matter for a person to free himself from punishment than to deprive another man of his honour!

  [87] Neither can I, furthermore, pass over another thing, inasmuch as I have based my argument on the assumption of an act of impiety. For you Rhodians are perfectly aware that, while the whole city is sacred, yet you will find that many of the statues which stand within your very sanctuaries have been subjected to this indignity. For it so happened that these are very ancient; and whenever one of your chief magistrates wants to flatter any person, he is always eager, carrying out the idea that you are giving the honour, to have him set up in bronze in the finest possible place. What need is there of words? For I suppose that no one would deny that even of the statues so placed, even though the facts do not exactly accord with the statement I made a moment ago, the greater number have had the names on them changed, and some, I believe, that stand very close indeed to the statues of the gods. [88] What then? Is it not outrageous if we shall be found to be wronging our benefactors in the very place where it is not the custom to wrong even those who have committed some evil deed, if they flee there for refuge? And are such places to be unable, as seems to be the case, to afford to good men alone the sanctuary they afford to worthless men? Nay, if anyone merely shifts from its position a censer or a goblet belonging to the treasures dedicated inside a temple, he will be regarded as guilty of sacrilege just as much as those who filch those sacred things; [89] but if it is a statue and an honour that he shifts, does he do nothing out of the way? And yet any of us could say that the statues too are just as much votive offerings belonging to the gods, that is, the statues which stand in gods’ sanctuaries; and one may see many of them inscribed to that effect; for instance, “So-and-so set up a statue of himself (or of his father, or of his son) as dedicate to a god” (whatever god it might be). Hence, if one removes the name of the person so honoured from any of the other dedications and inscribes the name of a different person, are we to say that the person now in question is alone not guilty of impiety? Apollo would not allow, as you know, the man of Cymê to remove the nestlings from his precinct, saying that they were his suppliants.