Plutarch's essays and miscellanies, Vol. 3 (of 5) : $b Comprising all his works collected under the title of "Morals" — John Shaqi
Plutarch's essays and miscellanies, Vol. 3 (of 5) : $b Comprising all his works collected under the title of "Morals"Plutarch
Philosophy
Plutarch's essays and miscellanies, Vol. 3 (of 5) : $b Comprising all his works collected under the title of "Morals"
Plutarch
Classical literature; Essays; Ethics; Philosophy
For both he and Simonides before him went into Sicily. And whereas we
meet with this title, “This publication of the History of Herodotus
of Halicarnassus,” many have changed it into Herodotus of Thurii, for
he dwelt at Thurii, and was a member of that colony. And that sacred
and divine poet Homer, that adorned the Trojan war,—why was he a
controversy to so many cities (every one pleading he was theirs) but
because he did not cry up any one of them to the disparagement of the
rest? Many also and great are the honors that are paid to Jupiter
Hospitalis.
14. If any one object, that these men hunted ambitiously after glory
and honor, let him go to the philosophers and the schools and nurseries
of wisdom at Athens, those in the Lyceum, the Academy, the Stoa,
the Palladium, the Odeum. If he admires and prefers the Peripatetic
philosophy before the rest, Aristotle was a native of Stagira,
Theophrastus of Ephesus, Straton of Lampsacus, Glycon of Troas, Ariston
of Ceus, Critolaus of Phaselis. If thou art for the Stoic philosophy,
Zeno was of Citium, Cleanthes of Assus, Chrysippus of Soli, Diogenes
of Babylon, Antipater of Tarsus, and Archedemus who was of Athens went
over to the Parthians, and left a succession of Stoic philosophers in
Babylon. And who, I pray, persecuted and chased these men out of their
country? Nobody at all; but they pursued their own quiet, which men
cannot easily enjoy at home that are in any reputation or have any
power; other things they taught us by what they said, but this by what
they did. For even now the most approved and excellent persons live
abroad out of their own country, not being transported, but departing
voluntarily, not being driven thence, but flying from business and from
the disquiets and molestations which they are sure to meet with at home.
It seems to me that the Muses helped the ancient writers to finish
their choicest and most approved compositions, by calling in, as it
were, banishment to their assistance. Thucydides the Athenian wrote
the Peloponnesian and Athenian War in Thrace, hard by the forest of
Scapte; Xenophon wrote his history in Scillus belonging to Elis;
Philistus in Epirus, Timaeus of Tauromenum at Athens, Androtion the
Athenian in Megara, Bacchylides the poet in Peloponnesus. These and
many more, after they had lost their country, did not lose all hope nor
were dejected in their minds, but took occasion thereupon to express
the vivacity of their spirit and the dexterity of their wit, receiving
their banishment at the hands of Fortune as a viaticum that she had
sent them; whereby they became renowned everywhere after death, whereas
there is no remaining mention of those factious persons that expelled
them.
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