Plutarch's Morals
news into the town. And an uproar arising, as was only to be expected,
the people assembled in the ecclesia, and began to investigate the
origin of the rumour. So the barber was dragged up and questioned, but
knew not the person's name who had told him, so was obliged to refer its
origin to an anonymous and unknown person. Then anger filled the
theatre, and the multitude cried out, "Torture the cursed fellow, put
him to the rack: he has fabricated and concocted this news: who else
heard it? who credits it?" The wheel was brought, the poor fellow
stretched on it. Meantime those came up who had brought the news, who
had escaped from the carnage in Sicily. Then all the multitude dispersed
to weep over their private sorrows, and abandoned the poor barber, who
remained fastened to the wheel. And when released late in the evening he
actually asked the executioner, if they had heard how Nicias the General
was slain. So invincible and incorrigible a vice does habit make
talkativeness to be.
Sec. XIV. And yet, as those that drink bitter and strong-smelling physic
are disgusted even with the cups they drink it out of, so those that
bring evil tidings are disliked and hated by their hearers. Wittily
therefore has Sophocles described the conversation between Creon and the
guard.
"_G._ Is't in your ears or in your mind you're grieved?
_C._ Why do you thus define the seat of grief?
_G._ The doer pains your mind, but I your ears."[585]
However those that tell the tale grieve us as well as those that did the
deed: and yet there is no means of checking or controlling the running
tongue. At Lacedaemon the temple of Athene Chalcioecus[586] was broken
into, and an empty flagon was observed lying on the ground inside, and a
great concourse of people came up and discussed the matter. And one of
the company said, "If you will allow me, I will tell you what I think
about this flagon. I cannot help being of opinion that these
sacrilegious wretches drank hemlock, and brought wine with them, before
commencing their nefarious and dangerous work: that so, if they should
fail to be detected, they might depart in safety, drinking the wine neat
as an antidote to the hemlock: whereas should they be caught in the act,
before they were put to the torture they would die of the poison easily
and painlessly." When he had uttered these words, the idea seemed so
ingenious and farfetched that it looked as if it could not emanate from
fancy, but only from knowledge of the real facts. So the crowd
surrounded this man, and asked him one after the other, "Who are you?
Who knows you? How come you to know all this?" And at last he was
convicted in this way, and confessed that he was one of those that had
committed the sacrilege. And were not the murderers of Ibycus similarly
captured? They were sitting in the theatre, and some cranes flew over
their heads, and they laughed and whispered to one another, "Behold the
avengers of Ibycus." And this being overheard by some who sat near, as
Ibycus had now been some time missing and inquired after, they laid hold
of this remark, and reported it to the magistrates. And so they were
convicted and dragged off to punishment, being brought to justice not by
the cranes but by their own inability to hold their tongues, being
compelled by some Fury or Vengeance as it were to divulge the
murder.[587] For as in the body there is an attraction to sore and
suffering parts from neighbouring parts, so the tongue of talkative
persons, ever suffering from inflammation and a throbbing pulse,
attracts and draws to it secret and hidden things. And so the tongue
ought to be fenced in, and have reason ever before it, as a bulwark, to
prevent its tripping: that we may not seem to be more silly than geese,
of whom it is said that, when they fly from Cilicia over Mt. Taurus
which swarms with eagles, they carry in their mouths a large stone,
which they employ as a gag or bridle for their scream, and so they cross
over by night unobserved.
Sec. XV. Now if anyone were to ask who is the worst and most abandoned man,
no one would pass over the traitor, or mention anyone else. It was as
the reward of treason that Euthycrates roofed his house with Macedonian
wood, as Demosthenes tells us; and that Philocrates got a large sum of
money, and spent it on women and fish; and it was for betraying Eretria
that Euphorbus and Philagrus got an estate from king Philip. But the
talkative man is an unhired and officious traitor, not of horses[588] or
walls, but of secrets which he divulges in the law courts, in factions,
in party-strife, no one thanking him for his pains; but should anyone
listen to him he thinks he is the obliged party. So that what was said
to a man who rashly and indiscriminately squandered away all his means
and bestowed them on others,
"It is not kindness in you but disease,
This itch for giving,"[589]
is appropriate also to the prater, "You don't communicate to us all this
out of friendship or goodwill, but it is a disease in you, this itch for
talking and prating."
Sec. XVI. But all this must not be looked upon merely as an indictment
against talkativeness, but an attempt to cure it: for we overcome the
passions by judgement and practice, but judgement is the first step. For
no one is wont to shun, and eradicate from his soul, what he does not
dislike. And we dislike the passions only when we discern by reason the
harm and shame that results to us by indulging them. As we see every day
in the case of talkative people: if they wish to be loved, they are
hated; if they desire to please, they bore; when they think they are
admired, they are really laughed at; they spend, and get no gain from so
doing; they injure their friends, benefit their enemies, and ruin
themselves. So that the first cure and remedy of this disorder will be
to reckon up the shame and trouble that results from it.
Sec. XVII. In the next place we must consider the opposite virtue to
talkativeness, always listening to and having on our lips the encomiums
passed upon reserve, and remembering the decorum sanctity and mysterious
power of silence, and ever bearing in mind that terse and brief
speakers, who put the maximum of matter into the minimum of words, are
more admired and esteemed and thought wiser[590] than unbridled
windbags. And so Plato[591] praises, and compares to clever javelin-men,
such as speak tersely, compressedly, and concisely. And Lycurgus by
using his citizens from boyhood to silence taught them to perfection
their brevity and terseness. For as the Celtiberians make steel of iron
only after digging down deep in the soil, and carefully separating the
iron ore, so Laconian oratory has no rind,[592] but by the removal of
all superfluous matter goes home straight to the point like steel. For
its sententiousness,[593] and pointed suppleness in repartee, comes from
the habit of silence. And we ought to quote such pointed sayings
especially to talkative people, such neatness and vigour have they, as,
for example, what the Lacedaemonians said to Philip, "[Remember]
Dionysius at Corinth."[594] And again, when Philip wrote to them, "If I
invade Laconia, I will drive you all out of house and home," they only
wrote back, "If." And when king Demetrius was indignant and cried out,
"The Lacedaemonians have only sent me one ambassador," the ambassador was
not frightened but said, "Yes, one to one man." Certainly among the
ancients men of few words were admired. So the Amphictyones did not
write extracts from the Iliad or Odyssey, or the Paeans of Pindar, in the
temple of Pythian Apollo at Delphi, but "Know thyself," "Not too much of
anything,"[595] and "Be a surety, trouble is near;"[596] so much did
they admire compactness and simplicity of speech, combining brevity with
shrewdness of mind. And is not the god himself short and concise in his
oracles? Is he not called Loxias,[597] because he prefers ambiguity to
longwindedness? And are not those who express their meaning by signs
without words wonderfully praised and admired? As Heraclitus, when some
of the citizens asked him to give them his opinion about concord, got on
the platform, and took a cup of cold water, and put some barley-meal in
it, and stirred it up with penny-royal, thus showing them that it is
being content with anything, and not needing costly dainties, that keeps
cities in peace and concord. Scilurus, the king of the Scythians, left
eighty sons, and on his death-bed asked for a bundle of sticks, and bade
his sons break it when it was tied together, and when they could not, he
took the sticks one by one and easily broke them all up: thus showing
them that their harmony and concord would make them strong and hard to
overthrow, while dissension would make them feeble and insecure.
Sec. XVIII. If then anyone were continually to recollect and repeat these
or similar terse sayings, he would probably cease to be pleased with
idle talk. As for myself, when I consider of what importance it is to
attend to reason, and to keep to one's purpose, I confess I am quite put
out of countenance by the example of the slave of Pupius Piso the
orator. He, not wishing to be annoyed by their prating, ordered his
slaves merely to answer his questions, and not say a word more. On one
occasion wishing to pay honour to Clodius who was then in power, he
ordered him to be invited to his house, and provided for him no doubt a
sumptuous entertainment. At the time fixed all the guests were present
except Clodius, for whom they waited, and the host frequently sent the
slave who used to invite guests to see if he was coming, but when
evening came, and he was now quite despaired of, he said to his slave,
"Did you not invite him?" "Certainly," said the slave. "Why then has he
not come?" said the master. "Because he declined," said the slave. "Why
then did you not tell me of it at once?" said the master. "Because you
never asked me," said the slave. This was a Roman slave. But an Athenian
slave "while digging will tell his master on what terms peace was made."
So great is the force of habit in all matters. And of it we will now
speak.
Sec. XIX. For it is not by applying bit or bridle that we can restrain the
talkative person, we must master the disease by habit. In the first
place then, when you are in company and questions are going round,
accustom yourself not to speak till all the rest have declined giving an
answer. For as Sophocles says, "counsel is not like a race;" no more are
question and answer. For in a race the victory belongs to him who gets
in first, but in company, if anyone has given a satisfactory answer, it
is sufficient by assenting and agreeing to his view to get the
reputation of being a pleasant fellow; and if no satisfactory answer is
given, then to enlighten ignorance and supply the necessary information
is well-timed and does not excite envy. But let us be especially on our
guard that, if anyone else is asked a question, we do not ourselves
anticipate and intercept him in giving an answer. It is indeed perhaps
nowhere good form, if another is asked a favour, to push him aside and
undertake to grant it ourselves; for we shall seem so to upbraid two
people at once, the one who was asked as not able to grant the favour,
and the other as not knowing how to ask in the right quarter. But
especially insulting is such forwardness and impetuosity in answering
questions. For he that anticipates by his own answer the person that was
asked the question seems to say, "What is the good of asking him? What
does he know about it? In my presence nobody else ought to be asked
about these matters." And yet we often put questions to people, not so
much because we want an answer, as to elicit from them conversation and