“I am well skilled both to obey myself
And rule myself: well weighing all events
By virtue’s Standard.”{20}{this again is from the Syleus of Euripides.}
(153) Accordingly also Bias, of Priene, is said, when Croesus threatened him, to have threatened him in return, in a most contemptuous manner, bidding him eat onions, by which figurative expression he meant that he should weep, since the eating of onions excites tears. (154) Thus wise men, looking upon nothing as more royal than virtue, which is the regulator of the whole of their lives, do not fear the authority of other men, whom they look upon rather as subject to themselves; in reference to which idea, they are all accustomed to consider double-minded and treacherous people illiberal and slavish; (155) on which account also there is a good deal of propriety in the expression–
“Never was heard of slave uprightly held,
But stooping always with a downbent Neck.”{21}{from Theognis Carm. 41.}
For a crooked, and wily, and deceitful disposition, is a most ignoble thing; just as an upright, and straightforward, and undisguised, and unsuspicious soul, betokens a most noble character, its words harmonising with its intentions, and its intentions with its words. (156) We may fairly enough laugh at those men who, when once they have got released from the actual possession of an owner, think themselves free from that moment; for these men, when emancipated, are perhaps no longer servants, just as before, but they are all slaves, deeply branded slaves, obeying not indeed men (for this would not be so terrible), but even the most dishonoured of even inanimate things, strong wine, vegetables, cheesecakes, and all the other things which the superfluous labours of bakers and confectioners invent, as enemies of the miserable belly. (157) Accordingly Diogenes, when he on one occasion saw one of those who are called illiberal and slavish persons giving himself airs, and a great many others sympathising in his pleasures, marvelling at their want of reason and judgment said, “It is just as if any one were to proclaim, that some one of his servants was, from this day forth, to be accounted a good grammarian, or geometrician, or musician, without his having the very slightest idea of the art; for just as the proclamation would not make men learned, so also it would not make them free (for then it would be a blessed thing), but all that it could do would be to make them no longer slaves.
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