Plutarch's Morals
pains, while the diseases of the mind, bad as they are, escape the
notice of most people, the latter are worse because they deprive the
sufferer of the perception of them. For reason if it be sound perceives
the diseases of the body, but he that is diseased in his mind cannot
judge of his sufferings, for he suffers in the very seat of judgement.
We ought to account therefore the first and greatest of the diseases of
the mind that ignorance,[315] whereby vice is incurable for most people,
dwelling with them and living and dying with them. For the beginning of
getting rid of disease is the perception of it, which leads the sufferer
to the necessary relief, but he who through not believing he is ill
knows not what he requires refuses the remedy even when it is close at
hand. For amongst the diseases of the body those are the worst which are
accompanied by stupor, as lethargies, headaches, epilepsies, apoplexies,
and those fevers which raise inflammation to the pitch of madness, and
disturb the brain as in the case of a musical instrument,
"And move the mind's strings hitherto untouched."[316]
Sec. III. And so doctors wish a man not to be ill, or if he is ill to be
ignorant of it, as is the case with all diseases of the soul. For
neither those who are out of their minds, nor the licentious, nor the
unjust think themselves faulty--some even think themselves perfect. For
no one ever yet called a fever health, or consumption a good condition
of body, or gout swift-footedness, or paleness a good colour; but many
call anger manliness, and love friendship, and envy competition, and
cowardice prudence. Then again those that are ill in body send for
doctors, for they are conscious of what they need to counteract their
ailments; but those who are ill in mind avoid philosophers, for they
think themselves excellent in the very matters in which they come short.
And it is on this account that we maintain that ophthalmia is a lesser
evil than madness, and gout than frenzy. For the person ill in body is
aware of it and calls loudly for the doctor, and when he comes allows
him to anoint his eye, to open a vein, or to plaster up his head; but
you hear mad Agave in her frenzy not knowing her dearest ones, but
crying out, "We bring from the mountain to the halls a young stag
recently torn limb from limb, a fortunate capture."[317] Again he who is
ill in body straightway gives up and goes to bed and remains there
quietly till he is well, and if he toss and tumble about a little when
the fit is on him, any of the people who are by saying to him,
"Gently,
Stay in the bed, poor wretch, and take your ease,"[318]
restrain him and check him. But those who suffer from a diseased brain
are then most active and least at rest, for impulses bring about action,
and the passions are vehement impulses. And so they do not let the mind
rest, but when the man most requires quiet and silence and retirement,
then is he dragged into the open air, and becomes the victim of anger,
contentiousness, lust, and grief, and is compelled to do and say many
lawless things unsuitable to the occasion.
Sec. IV. As therefore the storm which prevents one's putting into harbour
is more dangerous than the storm which will not let one sail, so those
storms of the soul are more formidable which do not allow a man to take
in sail, or to calm his reason when it is disturbed, but without a pilot
and without ballast, in perplexity and uncertainty through contrary and
confusing courses, he rushes headlong and falls into woeful shipwreck,
and shatters his life. So that from these points of view it is worse to
be diseased in mind than body, for the latter only suffer, but the
former do ill as well as suffer ill. But why need I speak of our various
passions? The very times bring them to our mind. Do you see yon great
and promiscuous crowd jostling against one another and surging round the
rostrum and forum? They have not assembled here to sacrifice to their
country's gods, nor to share in one another's rites; they are not
bringing to Ascraean Zeus the firstfruits of Lydian produce,[319] nor are
they celebrating in honour of Dionysus the Bacchic orgies on festival
nights with common revellings; but a mighty plague stirring up Asia in
annual cycles drives them here for litigation and suits at law at stated
times: and the mass of business, like the confluence of mighty rivers,
has inundated one forum, and festers and teems with ruiners and ruined.
What fevers, what agues, do not these things cause? What obstructions,
what irruptions of blood into the air-vessels, what distemperature of
heat, what overflow of humours, do not result? If you examine every suit
at law, as if it were a person, as to where it originated, where it came
from, you will find that one was produced by obstinate temper, another
by frantic love of strife, a third by some sordid desire.[320]
[312] Homer, "Iliad," xvii. 446, 447.
[313] See the Fable [Greek: Alopex kai Pardalis]. No.
42, Ed. Halme.
[314] Reading with Wyttenbach, [Greek: ochriasesi kai
erythemasi].
[315] Forte [Greek: agnoian]."--_Wyttenbach._ The
ordinary reading is [Greek: anoian]. "E coelo descendit
[Greek: gnothi seauton]," says Juvenal truly, xi. 27.
[316] Compare the image in Shakspere, "Hamlet," A. iii.
Sc. I. 165, 166.
"Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh."
[317] Euripides, "Bacchae," 1170-1172. Agave's treatment
of her son Pentheus was a stock philosophical
comparison. See for example Horace, ii. "Sat." iii. 303,
304, and context.
[318] Euripides, "Orestes," 258.
[319] "_Aurum_ puta. Pactolus enim aurum fert. Videtur
dictio e Pindaro desumta esse."--_Reiske._
[320] "Libellus hic fine carere videtur. Quare autem
opusculum hoc Plutarcho indignum atque suppositum visum
Xylandro fuerit, non intelligo."--_Reiske._
ON ABUNDANCE OF FRIENDS.
Sec. I. Menon the Thessalian, who thought he was a perfect adept in
discourse, and, to borrow the language of Empedocles, "had attained the
heights of wisdom," was asked by Socrates, what virtue was, and upon his
answering quickly and glibly, that virtue was a different thing in boy
and old man, and in man and woman, and in magistrate and private person,
and in master and servant, "Capital," said Socrates, "you were asked
about one virtue, but you have raised up a whole swarm of them,"[321]
conjecturing not amiss that the man named many because he knew not one.
Might not someone jeer at us in the same way, as being afraid, when we
have not yet one firm friendship, that we shall without knowing it fall
upon an abundance of friends? It is very much the same as if a man
maimed and blind should be afraid of becoming hundred-handed like
Briareus or all eyes like Argus. And yet we wonderfully praise the young
man in Menander, who said that he thought anyone wonderfully good, if he
had even the shadow of a friend.[322]
Sec. II. But among many other things what stands chiefly in the way of
getting a friend is the desire for many friends, like a licentious woman
who, through giving her favours indiscriminately, cannot retain her old
lovers, who are neglected and drop off;[323] or rather like the
foster-child of Hypsipyle, "sitting in the meadow and plucking flower
after flower, snatching at each prize with gladsome heart, insatiable in
its childish delight,"[324] so in the case of each of us, owing to our
love of novelty and fickleness, the recent flower ever attracts, and
makes us inconstant, frequently laying the foundations of many
friendships and intimacies that come to nothing, neglecting in love of
what we eagerly pursue what we have already possession of. To begin
therefore with the domestic hearth,[325] as the saying is, with the
traditions of life that time has handed down to us about constant
friends, let us take the witness and counsel of antiquity, according to
which friendships go in pairs, as in the cases of Theseus and Pirithous,
Achilles and Patroclus, Orestes and Pylades, Phintias and Damon,
Epaminondas and Pelopidas. For friendship is a creature that goes in
pairs, and is not gregarious, or crow-like,[326] and to think a friend
a second self, and to call him companion as it were second one,[327]
shows that friendship is a dual relation. For we can get neither many
slaves nor many friends at small expense. What then is the
purchase-money of friendship? Benevolence and complaisance conjoined
with virtue, and yet nature has nothing more rare than these. And so to
love or be loved very much cannot find place with many persons; for as
rivers that have many channels and cuttings have a weak and thin stream,
so excessive love in the soul if divided out among many is weakened.
Thus love for their young is most strongly implanted in those that bear
only one, as Homer calls a beloved son "the only one, the child of old
age,"[328] that is, when the parents neither have nor are likely to have
another child.
Sec. III. Not that we insist on only one friend, but among the rest there
should be one eminently so, like a child of old age, who according to
that well-known proverb has eaten a bushel of salt with one,[329] not as
nowadays many so-called friends contract friendship from drinking
together once, or playing at ball together, or playing together with
dice, or passing the night together at some inn, or meeting at the
wrestling-school or in the market. And in the houses of rich and leading
men people congratulate them on their many friends, when they see the
large and bustling crowd of visitors and handshakers and retainers: and
yet they see more flies in their kitchens, and as the flies only come
for the dainties, so they only dance attendance for what they can get.
And since true friendship has three main requirements, virtue, as a
thing good; and familiarity, as a thing pleasant; and use, as a thing
serviceable; for we ought to choose a friend with judgement, and rejoice
in his company, and make use of him in need; and all these things are
prejudicial to abundance of friends, especially judgement, which is the
most important point; we must first consider, if it is impossible in a
short time to test dancers who are to form a chorus, or rowers who are
to pull together, or slaves who are to act as stewards of estates, or
as tutors of one's sons, far more difficult is it to meet with many
friends who will take off their coats to aid you in every fortune, each
of whom "offers his services to you in prosperity, and does not object
to share your adversity." For neither does a ship encounter so many
storms at sea, nor do they fortify places with walls, or harbours with
defences and earthworks, in the expectation of so many and great
dangers, as friendship tested well and soundly promises defence and
refuge from. But if friends slip in without being tested, like money
proved to be bad,
"Those who shall lose such friends may well be glad,
And those who have such pray that they may lose them."[330]
Yet is it difficult and by no means easy to avoid and bring to a close
an unpleasant friendship: as in the case of food which is injurious and
harmful, we cannot retain it on the stomach without damage and hurt, nor
can we expel it as it was taken into the mouth, but only in a putrid
mixed up and changed form, so a bad friend is troublesome both to others
and himself if retained, and if he be got rid of forcibly it is with
hostility and hatred, and like the voiding of bile.
Sec. IV. We ought not, therefore, lightly to welcome or strike up an
intimate friendship with any chance comers, or love those who attach