Anaxarchus

However, that eager yearning for philosophy which was imbedded in his nature and which ever grew with his growth, did not subside from his soul, as is testified by the honour in which he held Anaxarchus, by his gift of fifty talents to Xenocrates, and by the attentions which he so lavishly bestowed upon Dandamis and Calanus.

For, in fact, we are told that Anaxarchus, on seeing a present of small fish which the king had sent to Hephaestion, had uttered the speech above mentioned, as though he were disparaging and ridiculing those who undergo great toils and dangers in the pursuit of eminence and power, since in the way of enjoyments and pleasures they have little or nothing more than other men.

whereupon Anaxarchus the sophist who was present said to Alexander:

for Anaxarchus you do not pound," when he was being pounded by the tyrant with iron pestles.

Well, then, does Anaxarchus the Eudaemonic write in his work On Kingship:

Hearers of Democritus were Protagoras of Abdera and Metrodorus of Chios, whose pupil was Diogenes of Smyrna, whose pupil Anaxarchus, and of him Pyrrho, of whom Nausiphanes.

For this man, having fallen into a mortar and being struck with the pestles, himself said he was not being pounded, but that of his own which happened to be wrapped about him;

but a Greek man offered his body to be beaten as a kandys, as a cloak;

And I do not mention those brief Laconic matters—the Spartans enslaved to the Persians, and Dionysius at Corinth, and the condemnation of Socrates, and the exile of Xenophon, and the death of Pherecydes, and the wretchedness of Anaxarchus;

We have heard that Anaxarchus the Democritean was tortured to death by the tyrant of Cyprus, that Zeno of Elea was slain amid torments;

let one think of Anaxarchus the follower of Democritus, who, when in Cyprus he had fallen into the hands of King Timocreon, deprecated no kind of torture and refused none.

And once, when Anaxarchus fell into a slough, he passed by without giving him any help, and, while others blamed him, Anaxarchus himself praised his indifference and sang-froid.

Moreover, on another occasion, when Anaxarchus was drinking Alexander’s health, he held up his goblet and said:

This was a hit at Nicocreon, who never forgot it, and when after the king’s death Anaxarchus was forced against his will to land in Cyprus, he seized him and, putting him in a mortar, ordered him to be pounded to death with iron pestles.

This law admits of what Anaxarchus said, as Plutarch relates in the life of Alexander, though without sufficient accuracy, that God does not will a thing, because it is just, but that it is just, or binding, because God wills it.

He commanded his steward to give Anaxarchus the philosopher as much as he should ask for.

Anaxarchus, when he was being pounded with a pestle to the death, like barley-groats, kept saying, "Pound, pound the husk of Anaxarchus, for Anaxarchus you do not pound":