The Works of Lucian of Samosata — Volume 01Lucian, of Samosata
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The Works of Lucian of Samosata — Volume 01
Lucian, of Samosata
Lucian, of Samosata -- Translations into English
_Her_. I like your spirit.—However, here we are in port. Away with you
all to the judgement-seat; it is straight ahead. The ferryman and I
must go back for a fresh load.
_Men_. Good voyage to you, Hermes.—Let us be getting on; what are you
all waiting for? We have got to face the judge, sooner or later; and by
all accounts his sentences are no joke; wheels, rocks, vultures are
mentioned. Every detail of our lives will now come to light!
F.
XI
_Crates. Diogenes_
_Cra_. Did you know Moerichus of Corinth, Diogenes? A shipowner,
rolling in money, with a cousin called Aristeas, nearly as rich. He had
a Homeric quotation:—Wilt thou heave me? shall I heave thee?
[Footnote: Homer, Il. xxiii. 724. When Ajax and Odysseus have wrestled
for some time without either's producing any impression, and the
spectators are getting tired of it, the former proposes a change in
tactics. "Let us hoist—try you with me or I with you." The idea
evidently is that each in turn is to offer only a passive resistance,
and let his adversary try to fling him thus.' _Leaf_.]
_Diog_. What was the point of it?
_Cra_. Why, the cousins were of equal age, expected to succeed to each
other's wealth, and behaved accordingly. They published their wills,
each naming the other sole heir in case of his own prior decease. So it
stood in black and white, and they vied with each other in showing that
deference which the relation demands. All the prophets, astrologers,
and Chaldean dream-interpreters alike, and Apollo himself for that
matter, held different views at different times about the winner; the
thousands seemed to incline now to Aristeas's side, now to Moerichus's.
_Diog_. And how did it end? I am quite curious.
_Cra_. They both died on the same day, and the properties passed to
Eunomius and Thrasycles, two relations who had never had a presentiment
of it. They had been crossing from Sicyon to Cirrha, when they were
taken aback by a squall from the north-west, and capsized in
mid-channel.
_Diog_. Cleverly done. Now, when we were alive, we never had such
designs on one another. I never prayed for Antisthenes's death, with a
view to inheriting his staff—though it was an extremely serviceable
one, which he had cut himself from a wild olive; and I do not credit
you, Crates, with ever having had an eye to my succession; it included
the tub, and a wallet with two pints of lupines in it.
_Cra_. Why, no; these things were superfluities to me—and to yourself,
indeed. The real necessities you inherited from Antisthenes, and I from
you; and in those necessities was more grandeur and majesty than in the
Persian Empire.
_Diog_. You allude to—-
_Cra_. Wisdom, independence, truth, frankness, freedom.
_Diog_. To be sure; now I think of it, I did inherit all this from
Antisthenes, and left it to you with some addition.
_Cra_. Others, however, were not interested in such property; no one
paid us the attentions of an expectant heir; they all had their eyes on
gold, instead.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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