“I never had honest man about me, I; all I kept were knaves, to serve in meat to villains.” Act iv. sc. 3, l. 475 And so his ungoverned passion of hatred goes on until it culminates in the epitaph placed on his tomb, which he names his “everlasting mansion,”— “Upon the beached verge of the salt flood.” That epitaph as given by Shakespeare, from North’s _Plutarch_ (edition 1579, p. 1003), is almost a literal rendering from the real epitaph recorded in the Greek Anthology (Jacobs, vol. i. p. 86),— “Ἐνθάδ’ ἀποῤῥηξας ψυχὴν βαρυδαίμονα κεῖμαι, Τοὔνομα δ’ οὐ πεύσεσθε, κακοὶ δὲ κακῶς ἀπόλοισθε.” Of which a very close translation will be,— “Here, having rent asunder a dæmon oppressed soul, I lie; The name ye shall not inquire, but ye bad ones badly shall perish.” The epitaph of the drama (_Timon of Athens_, act v. sc. 4, l. 69, vol. vii. p. 305) is thus read by Alcibiades from the wax impression taken at the tomb,— “Here lies a wretched corse, of wretched soul bereft: Seek not my name: a plague consume you wicked caitiffs left! Here lie I, Timon; who, alive, all living men did hate: Pass by and curse thy fill: but pass and stay not here thy gait.” Plutarch[175] introduces a mention of Timon into the life of Marc Antony, whom he compares in some respects to the misanthrope of Athens. He gives the same epitaph as that of the Anthology above quoted, except a letter or two,— “Ἐνθαδ’ ἀποῤῥήξας ψυχὴν βαρυδαίμονα κεῖμαι, Τοὔνομα δ’ οὐ πευσοισθε, κακοὶ δὲ κακῶς ἀπόλοισθε.” Plutarch avers, “καὶ τοὺτο μὲν αὐτὸν ἔτιζῶντα πεποιηκέναι λέγουσι,”—“And people say that during his life he himself made this epitaph.” The narrator then adds, “τοὺτο δε περιφερόμενον, Καλλιμάχου εστι,”—“But this round the margin is by Callimachus,”— “Τίμων μισάνθρωπος ἐσοικέω· ἀλλα πάρελθε Οἰμώζειν εἴπας πολλὰ, πάρελθε μόνον.” “I, Timon the manhater dwell within: but pass by, To bewail _me_ thou hast spoken many things;—only pass by.“ The two epitaphs Shakespeare has combined into one, showing indeed his acquaintance with the above passage through North’s _Plutarch_, but not discriminating the authorship of the two parts. North’s translation of the epitaphs is simple and expressive, but the Langhornes, in 1770, vulgarise the lines into,— “At last I’ve bid the knaves farewell Ask not my name, but go to hell.” “My name is Timon: knaves begone, Curse me, but come not near my stone.” How Wrangham, in his edition of the Langhornes, 1826, could without notice let this pass for a translation, is altogether unaccountable!