The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, Diogenes Laërtius [the gingerbread man read aloud TXT] 📗

And they say that once, when he was being borne in a carriage into the Academy, he met Diogenes, and said: “Hail;” and Diogenes replied: “I will not say hail to you, who, though in such a state as you are, endure to live.”

And at last in despair he put an end to his life, being a man of a great age. And we have written this epigram on him:

Had I not known Speusippus thus had died,
No one would have persuaded me that he
Was e’er akin to Plato; who would never
Have died desponding for so slight a grief.

But Plutarch, in his Life of Lysander, and again in his Life of Sylla, says that he was kept in a state of constant inflammation by lice. For he was of a weak habit of body, as Timotheus relates in his treatise on Lives.

Speusippus said to a rich man who was in love with an ugly woman: “What do you want with her? I will find you a much prettier woman for ten talents.”

He left behind him a great number of commentaries, and many dialogues, among which was one on Aristippus; one on Riches; one on Pleasure; one on Justice; one on Philosophy; one on Friendship; one on the Gods; one called The Philosopher; one addressed to Cephalus; one called Cephalus; one called Clinomachus, or Lysias; one called The Citizen; one on the Soul; one addressed to Gryllus; one called Aristippus; one called The Test of Art. There were also Commentaries by way of dialogues; one on Art; and ten about those things which are alike in their treatment. There are also books of divisions and arguments directed to similar things; Essays on the Genera and Species of Examples; an Essay addressed to Amartyrus; a Panegyric on Plato; Letters to Dion, and Dionysius, and Philip; an Essay on Legislation. There is also, the Mathematician; the Mandrobulus; the Lysias; Definitions; and a series of Commentaries. There are in all, forty-three thousand four hundred and seventy-five lines.

Simonides dedicated to him the Histories, in which he had related the actions of Dion and Bion. And in the second book of his Commentaries, Phavorinus states that Aristotle purchased his books for three talents.

There was also another person of the name of Speusippus, a physician of the school of Herophilus,34 a native of Alexandria.

Xenocrates was the son of Agathenor, and a native of Chalcedon. From his early youth he was a pupil of Plato, and also accompanied him in his voyages to Sicily.

He was by nature of a lazy disposition, so that they say that Plato said once, when comparing him to Aristotle: “The one requires the spur, and the other the bridle.” And on another occasion, he said: “What a horse and what an ass am I dressing opposite to one another!”

In other respects Xenocrates was always of a solemn and grave character, so that Plato was continually saying to him: “Xenocrates, sacrifice to the Graces.” And he spent the greater part of his time in the Academy, and whenever he was about to go into the city, they say all the turbulent and quarrelsome rabble in the city used to make way for him to pass by. And once, Phryne the courtesan wished to try him and pretending that she was pursued by some people, she fled and took refuge in his house; and he admitted her indeed, because of what was due to humanity; and as there was but one bed in the room, he, at her entreaty, allowed her to share it with him; but at last, in spite of all her entreaties, she got up and went away, without having been able to succeed in her purpose; and told those who asked her that she had quitted a statue and not a man. But some say that the real story is that his pupils put Lais into his bed, and that he was so continent that he submitted to some severe operations of excision and cautery.

And he was a very trustworthy man; so that, though it was not lawful for men to give evidence except on oath, the Athenians made an exception in his favor alone.

He was also a man of the most contented disposition; accordingly they say that when Alexander sent him a large sum of money, he took three thousand Attic drachmas and sent back the rest, saying that Alexander wanted most, as he had the greatest number of mouths to feed. And when some was sent him by Antipater, he would not accept any of it, as Myronianus tells us in his Similitudes. And once, when he gained a golden crown in a contest as to who could drink most, which was offered in the yearly festival of the Choes by Dionysius, he went out and placed the crown at the feet of the statue of Mercury, which was at the gate, where he was also accustomed to deposit his garlands of flowers. It is said also that he was once sent with some colleagues as an ambassador to Philip; and that they were won over by gifts, and went to his banquets and conversed with Philip; but that he would do none of these things, nor could Philip propitiate him by these means; on which account, when the other ambassadors arrived in Athens, they said that Xenocrates had gone with them to no purpose; and the people were ready to punish him, but when they had learnt from him that they had now more need than ever to look to the welfare of their city, for that Philip had already bribed all their counsellors, but that he had been unable to win him over by any means, then they say that the people honored him with redoubled honor. They add also that Philip said afterwards that Xenocrates was the only