Chapter 17. MENEDEMUS
Menedemus belonged to Phaedo's school; he was
the son of Clisthenes, a member of the clan called
the Theopropidae, of good family, though a builder
and a poor man; others say that he was a scenepainter and that Menedemus learnt both trades.
Hence, when he had proposed a decree, a certain
Alexinius attacked him, declaring that the philosopher
was not a proper person to design either a scene or
a decree. When Menedemus was dispatched by
the Eretrians to Megara on garrison duty, he paid
a visit to Plato at the Academy and was so captivated
that he abandoned the service of arms.
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Asclepiades
of Phlius drew him away, and he lived at Megara
with Stilpo, whose lectures they both attended.
Thence they sailed to Elis, where they joined
Anchipylus and Moschus of the school of Phaedo.
Down to their time, as was stated in the Life of
Phaedo, the school was called the Elian school.
Afterwards it was called the Eretrian school, from
the city to which my subject belonged.
It would appear that Menedemus was somewhat
pompous. Hence Crates burlesques him thus
1:
Asclepiades the sage of Phlius and the Eretrian bull;
and Timon as follows
2:
A puffing, supercilious purveyor of
humbug.
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He was a man of such dignity that, when Eurylochus of Casandrea was invited by Antigonus to
court along with Cleïppides, a youth of Cyzicus, he
declined the invitation, being afraid that Menedemus
would hear of it, so caustic and outspoken was he.
When a young gallant would have taken liberties
with him, he said not a word but picked up a twig
and drew an insulting picture on the ground, until
all eyes were attracted and the young man, perceiving the insult, made off. When Hierocles, who
was in command of the Piraeus, walked up and
down along with him in the shrine of Amphiaraus,
and talked much of the capture of Eretria, he made
no other reply beyond asking him what Antigonus's
object was in treating him as he did.
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To an adulterer who was giving himself airs he
said, "Do you not know that, if cabbage has a good
flavour, so for that matter has radish?" Hearing
a youth who was very noisy, he said, "See what
there is behind you." When Antigonus consulted
him as to whether he should go to a rout, he sent
a message to say no more than this, that he was the
son of a king. When a stupid fellow related something to him with no apparent object, he inquired
if he had a farm. And hearing that he had, and
that there was a large stock of cattle on it, he said,
"Then go and look after them, lest it should happen
that they are ruined and a clever farmer thrown
away." To one who inquired if the good man ever
married, he replied, "Do you think me good or
not?" The reply being in the affirmative, he said,
"Well, I am married."
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Of one who affirmed that
there were many good things, he inquired how many,
and whether he thought there were more than a
hundred. Not being able to curb the extravagance
of some one who had invited him to dinner, he said
nothing when he was invited, but rebuked his host
tacitly by confining himself to olives. However, on
account of this freedom of speech he was in great
peril in Cyprus with his friend Asclepiades when
staying at the court of Nicocreon. For when the
king held the usual monthly feast and invited these
two along with the other philosophers, we are told
that Menedemus said that, if the gathering of such
men was a good thing, the feast ought to have been
held every day; if not, then it was superfluous even
on the present occasion.
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The tyrant having replied
to this by saying that on this day he had the
leisure to hear philosophers, he pressed the point
still more stubbornly, declaring, while the feast was
going on, that any and every occasion should be
employed in listening to philosophers. The consequence was that, if a certain flute-player had not
got them away, they would have been put to death.
Hence when they were in a storm in the boat
Asclepiades is reported to have said that the fluteplayer through good playing had proved their salvation when the free speech of Menedemus had been
their undoing.
He shirked work, it is said, and was indifferent to
the fortunes of his school. At least no order could be
seen in his classes, and no circle of benches; but each
man would listen where he happened to be, walking or
sitting, Menedemus himself behaving in the same way.
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In other respects he is said to have been nervous and
careful of his reputation; so much so that, when
Menedemus himself and Asclepiades were helping
a man who had formerly been a builder to build a
house, whereas Asclepiades appeared stripped on the
roof passing the mortar, Menedemus would try to
hide himself as often as he saw anyone coming.
After he took part in public affairs, he was so nervous
that, when offering the frankincense, he would
actually miss the censer. And once, when Crates
stood about him and attacked him for meddling in
politics, he ordered certain men to have Crates
locked up. But Crates none the less watched him
as he went by and, standing on tiptoe, called him a
pocket Agamemnon and Hegesipolis.
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He was also in a way rather superstitious. At all
events once, when he was at an inn with Asclepiades
and had inadvertently eaten some meat which had
been thrown away, he turned sick and pale when he
learnt the fact, until Asclepiades rebuked him, saying
that it was not the meat which disturbed him but
merely his suspicion of it. In all other respects he
was magnanimous and liberal. In his habit of body,
even in old age, he was as firm and sunburnt in
appearance as any athlete, being stout and always
in the pink of condition; in stature he was wellproportioned, as may be seen from the statuette in
the ancient Stadium at Eretria. For it represents
him, intentionally no doubt, almost naked, and displays the greater part of his body.
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He was fond of entertaining and used to collect
numerous parties about him because Eretria was
unhealthy; amongst these there would be parties of
poets and musicians. He welcomed Aratus also and
Lycophron the tragic poet, and Antagoras of Rhodes,
but, above all, he applied himself to the study of
Homer and, next, the Lyric poets; then to Sophocles,
and also to Achaeus, to whom he assigned the second
place as a writer of satiric dramas, giving Aeschylus
the first. Hence he quoted against his political
opponents the following lines
3:
Ere long the swift is overtaken by the feeble,
And the eagle by the tortoise,
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which are from the
Omphale, a satiric drama of
Achaeus. Therefore it is a mistake to say that he
had read nothing except the
Medea of Euripides,
which some have asserted to be the work of Neophron
of Sicyon.
He despised the teachers of the school of Plato
and Xenocrates as well as the Cyrenaic philosopher
Paraebates. He had a great admiration for Stilpo;
and on one occasion, when he was questioned about
him, he made no other answer than that he was a
gentleman. Menedemus was difficult to see through,
and in making a bargain it was difficult to get the
better of him. He would twist and turn in every
direction, and he excelled in inventing objections.
He was a great controversialist, according to Anti-
sthenes in his
Successions of Philosophers. In
particular he was fond of using the following argument:
"Is the one of two things different from the other?"
"Yes." "And is conferring benefits different from
the good?" "Yes." "Then to confer benefits is
not good."
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It is said that he disallowed negative propositions,
converting them into affirmatives, and of these he
admitted simple propositions only, rejecting those
which are not simple, I mean hypothetical and
complex propositions. Heraclides declares that,
although in his doctrines he was a Platonist, yet he
made sport of dialectic. So that, when Alexinus
once inquired if he had left off beating his father, his
answer was, "Why, I was not beating him and have
not left off"; and upon Alexinus insisting that he
ought to have cleared up the ambiguity by a plain
"Yes" or "No," "It would be absurd," he said,
"for me to conform to your rules when I can stop
you on the threshold." And when Bion persistently
ran down the soothsayers, Menedemus said he was
slaying the slain.
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On hearing some one say that the greatest good
was to get all you want, he rejoined, "To want the
right things is a far greater good." Antigonus of
Carystus asserts that he never wrote or composed
anything, and so never held firmly by any doctrine.
He adds that in discussing questions he was so
pugnacious that he would only retire after he had
been badly mauled. And yet, though he was so
violent in debate, he was as mild as possible in his
conduct. For instance, though he made sport of
Alexinus and bantered him cruelly, he was nevertheless very kind to him, for, when his wife was afraid
that on her journey she might be set upon and
robbed, he gave her an escort from Delphi to Chalcis.
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He was a very warm friend, as is shown by his
affection for Asclepiades, which was hardly inferior
to the devotion shown by Pylades. But, Asclepiades
being the elder, it was said that he was the playwright and Menedemus the actor. They say that
once, when Archipolis had given them a cheque for
half a talent, they stickled so long over the point as
to whose claim came second that neither of them
got the money. It is said that they married a
mother and her daughter; Asclepiades married the
daughter and Menedemus the mother. But after
the death of his own wife, Asclepiades took the wife
of Menedemus; and afterwards the latter, when he
became head of the state, married a rich woman as
his second wife. Nevertheless, as they kept one
household, Menedemus entrusted his former wife
with the care of his establishment.
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However,
Asclepiades died first at a great age at Eretria,
having lived with Menedemus economically, though
they had ample means. Some time afterwards a
favourite of Asclepiades, having come to a party
and being refused admittance by the pupils,
Menedemus ordered them to admit him, saying
that even now, when under the earth, Asclepiades
opened the door for him. It was Hipponicus the
Macedonian and Agetor of Lamia who were their
chief supporters; the one gave each of the two
thirty minae, while Hipponicus furnished Menedemus
with two thousand drachmae with which to portion
his daughters. There were three of them according
to Heraclides, his children by a wife who was a
native of Oropus.
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He used to give his parties in this fashion: he
would breakfast beforehand with two or three friends
and stay until it was late in the day. And in the
next place some one would summon the guests who
had arrived and who had themselves already dined,
so that, if anyone came too soon, he would walk up
and down and inquire from those who came out of
the house what was on the table and what o'clock
it was. If then it was only vegetables or salt fish,
they would depart; but if there was meat, they
would enter the house. In the summer time a rush
mat was put upon each couch, in winter time a sheepskin. The guest brought his own cushion. The
loving-cup which was passed round was no larger
than a pint cup. The dessert consisted of lupins or
beans, sometimes of ripe fruit such as pears, pomegranates, a kind of pulse, or even dried figs.
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All of
these facts are mentioned by Lycophron in his
satiric drama entitled
Menedemus, which was composed as a tribute to him. Here is a specimen of it
4:
And after a temperate feast the modest cup was passed
round with discretion, and their dessert was temperate discourse for such as cared to listen.
At first he was despised, being called a cynic and
a humbug by the Eretrians. But afterwards he was
greatly admired, so much so that they entrusted him
with the government of the state. He was sent as
envoy to Ptolemy and to Lysimachus, being honoured
wherever he went. He was, moreover, envoy to
Demetrius, and he caused the yearly tribute of
two hundred talents which the city used to pay
Demetrius to be reduced by fifty talents. And
when he was accused to Demetrius of intriguing
to hand over the city to Ptolemy, he defended
himself in a letter which commences thus:
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"Menedemus to King Demetrius, greeting. I hear that
a report has reached you concerning me." There
is a tradition that one Aeschylus who belonged
to the opposite party had made these charges against
him. He seems to have behaved with the utmost
dignity in the embassy to Demetrius on the subject
of Oropus, as Euphantus relates in his
Histories.
Antigonus too was much attached to him and used to
proclaim himself his pupil. And when he vanquished
the barbarians near the town of Lysimachia, Menedemus moved a decree in his honour in simple terms
and free from flattery, beginning thus:
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"On the
motion of the generals and the councillors--Whereas
King Antigonus is returning to his own country after
vanquishing the barbarians in battle, and whereas
in all his undertakings he prospers according to his
will, the senate and the people have decreed . . ."
On these grounds, then, and from his friendship for
him in other matters, he was suspected of betraying
the city to Antigonus, and, being denounced by
Aristodemus, withdrew from Eretria and stayed
awhile in Oropus in the temple of Amphiaraus.
And, because some golden goblets were missing
from the temple, he was ordered to depart by a
general vote of the Boeotians, as is stated by
Hermippus; and thereupon in despair, after a secret
visit to his native city, he took with him his wife
and daughters and came to the court of Antigonus,
where he died of a broken heart.
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Heraclides tells quite another story, that he was
made councillor of the Eretrians and more than once
saved the city from a tyranny by calling in Demetrius
--so then he would not be likely to betray the city
to Antigonus, but was made the victim of a false
charge; that he betook himself to Antigonus and
was anxious to regain freedom for his country;
that, as Antigonus would not give way, in despair
he put an end to his life by abstaining from food for
seven days. The account of Antigonus of Carystus
is similar.
5 With
Persaeus alone he carried on open
warfare, for it was thought that, when Antigonus
was willing for Menedemus's sake to restore to the
Eretrians their democracy, Persaeus prevented him.
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Hence on one occasion over the wine Menedemus
refuted Persaeus in argument and said, amongst
other things, "Such he is as a philosopher but, as
a man, the worst of all that are alive or to be born
hereafter."
According to the statement of Heraclides he died
in his seventy-fourth year. I have written the
following epigram upon him
6:
I heard of your fate, Menedemus, how, of your own free
will, you expired by starving yourself for seven days, a
deed right worthy of an Eretrian, but unworthy of a man;
but despair was your leader and urged you on.
These then are the disciples of Socrates or their
immediate successors. We must now pass to Plato,
the founder of the Academy, and his successors, so
far as they were men of reputation.