Plutarch's essays and miscellanies, Vol. 2 (of 5) : $b Comprising all his works collected under the title of "Morals"Plutarch
Philosophy
Plutarch's essays and miscellanies, Vol. 2 (of 5) : $b Comprising all his works collected under the title of "Morals"
Plutarch
Classical literature; Essays; Ethics; Philosophy
3. In discourses of this kind we spent our time by the way, and were
now come to the house. Here Thales would not be washed, for he had but
a while before anointed himself; wherefore he took a round to view the
horse-race and the wrestling-place, and the grove upon the water-side,
which was neatly trimmed and beautified by Periander; this he did, not
so much to satisfy his own curiosity (for he seldom or never admired
any thing he saw), but that he might not disoblige Periander or seem
to overlook or despise the glory and magnificence of our host. Of the
rest every one, after he had anointed and washed himself, the servants
introduced into a particular room, purposely fitted and prepared for
the men; they were guided thither through a porch, in which Anacharsis
sat, and there was a certain young lady with him arranging his hair.
This lady stepping forward to welcome Thales, he saluted her most
courteously, and smiling said: Madam, make the stranger fair and
pleasant, so that, being (as he is) the mildest man in the world, he
may not be fearful and hideous for us to look on. When I was curious
to enquire who this lady was whom Thales thus complimented, he said,
Do you not yet know the wise and famous Eumetis?—for so her father
calls her, though others call her after her father’s name Cleobulina.
Doubtless, saith Niloxenus, they call her by this name to commend her
judgment and wit, and her reach into the more abstruse and recondite
part of learning; for I have myself in Egypt seen and read some
problems first started and discussed by her. Not so, saith Thales,
for she plays with these as men do with cockal-bones, and encounters
boldly all she meets, without study or premeditation; she is a person
of an admirable understanding, of a politic capacious mind, of a very
obliging conversation, and one that by her rhetoric and the sweetness
of her temper prevails upon her father to govern his subjects with
the greatest mildness in the world. How popular she is appears, saith
Niloxenus, plainly to any that observes her pleasant innocent garb. But
pray, continues he, wherefore is it that she shows such tenderness and
affection to Anacharsis? Because, replied Thales, he is a temperate and
learned man, who fully and freely makes known to her those mysterious
ways of dieting and physicing the sick which are now in use among the
Scythians; and I doubt not she now coaxes and courts the old gentleman
at the rate you see, taking this opportunity to discourse with him and
learn something of him.
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