Epaminondas

Epaminondas, son of Polymnis, a Theban. Before we write of him, these things seem worth pointing out to our readers: that they should not refer the customs of others to their own, nor think that things which to themselves are of slight account were held in the same way among other peoples. For we know that music is, by our customs, foreign to a leading man's character, and that dancing is even reckoned among vices: all of which among the Greeks are held both pleasing and worthy of praise. But since we wish to portray the likeness of the habits and life of Epaminondas, we think we ought to pass over nothing that bears upon setting them forth. Wherefore we shall speak first of his birth, then by what studies and by whom he was educated, then of his character and the powers of his mind, and if there be aught else worthy of memory; lastly of his exploits, which by very many are set before the virtues of the soul.

Born then of the father whom we have named, of an honourable family, he was left poor, the poverty being already inherited from his ancestors; but he was educated as no Theban better. For he was taught both to play the lyre and to sing to the sound of the strings by Dionysius, who was of no less renown in music than Damon or Lamprus, whose names are widely known; to play the flute by Olympiodorus, and to dance by Calliphron. As his teacher in philosophy he had Lysis of Tarentum, a Pythagorean, to whom indeed he was so devoted that as a youth he preferred the company of a grave and austere old man to that of all his contemporaries; nor did he part from him before he so far surpassed his fellow-pupils in learning that it could easily be understood that he would in like manner surpass all in the other arts. Now these things, by our standard, are slight and rather to be despised; but in Greece, at least in former times, they were held in great esteem. After he became a youth and began to give attention to the wrestling-school, he attended not so much to strength of body as to swiftness: for he judged that the former pertained to the use of athletes, the latter to the advantage of war. And so he exercised himself most in running and in wrestling up to that point at which, standing, he could grapple with and contend against his opponent. But in arms he spent the most pains.

To this firmness of body still more gifts of the mind had been added. For he was modest, prudent, dignified, wisely using occasions, skilled in war, stout of hand, of the greatest spirit, and so devoted to truth that not even in jest would he lie. He was likewise temperate, merciful, and patient to an admirable degree, bearing the wrongs not only of the people but even of his friends; above all, keeping secret what was entrusted to him; and — what is sometimes of no less profit than to speak eloquently — eager to listen: for from this he thought one most easily learned. And so, when he came into a company in which there was either debate about public affairs or discourse about philosophy, he never departed before the conversation had been brought to its end. Poverty he bore so easily that from public life he took nothing but glory. He lacked means for the support of his friends, but he so often used the good faith of others to relieve still others that it could be judged that all things were in common between him and his friends. For when either some one of his fellow-citizens had been taken captive by the enemy, or a maiden of marriageable age could not, on account of poverty, be settled in marriage, he held a council of his friends, and assessed what each should give according to his means. And when he had made up that sum, rather than receive the money himself, he brought the man who was seeking it to those who were contributing, and made them pay it over in person, so that he to whom the matter came might know how much he owed to each.

His freedom from bribery, too, was tested by Diomedon of Cyzicus: for he, at the request of King Artaxerxes, had undertaken to corrupt Epaminondas with money. He came to Thebes with a great weight of gold and won over the youth Micythus, whom Epaminondas then loved most, with five talents to his purpose. Micythus met Epaminondas and made known the cause of Diomedon's coming. But he, in Diomedon's presence, said: 'There is no need of money: for if the king wishes what is to the advantage of the Thebans, I am ready to do it for nothing; but if the contrary, he has not enough gold and silver. For I would not take the riches of the whole world in place of my love of country. As for you, that you have tried me, whom you did not know, and have judged me like yourself, I do not wonder, and I forgive you; but depart quickly, lest you corrupt others, since you could not corrupt me. And you, Micythus, give back the silver to this man, or, unless you do it at once, I shall hand you over to the magistrate.' When Diomedon begged that he might be allowed to depart in safety and to carry off what he had brought, 'That indeed,' said he, 'I will do, and not for your sake, but my own, lest, if the money were taken from you, anyone should say that what I had refused to accept when offered had come to me by seizure.' When he had asked of him whither he wished to be conducted, and the other had said Athens, he gave him an escort, that he might reach it safely. Nor indeed did he hold this enough, but even brought it about, through Chabrias the Athenian, of whom we made mention above, that he should embark unharmed. Of his freedom from bribery this will be testimony enough. Very many instances indeed we could bring forward, but a limit must be set, since we have resolved to comprise in this one volume the lives of several distinguished men, whose deeds earlier writers before us have set forth separately in many thousands of lines.

He was eloquent too, so that no Theban was his equal in speaking, and no less neat in brevity of reply than ornate in continuous discourse. He had a detractor, a certain Meneclides, likewise of Thebes, and his adversary in the management of the state, fairly practised in speaking — for a Theban, that is: for that race has more of strength than of wit. He, because he saw Epaminondas flourishing in military matters, was wont to urge the Thebans to prefer peace to war, lest the services of that commander be missed. To him Epaminondas said: 'You deceive your fellow-citizens with a word, in that you call them away from war: for under the name of leisure you procure slavery. For peace is born of war. And so those who wish to enjoy it lastingly ought to be trained in war. Wherefore, if you wish to be the leaders of Greece, you must use the camp, not the wrestling-school.' That same Meneclides, when he reproached him with having no children and not having taken a wife, and above all with his presumption, in that he seemed to himself to have won the war-glory of Agamemnon, Epaminondas said: 'Cease, Meneclides, to reproach me about a wife: for of no one's counsel in that matter do I less wish to make use.' (For Meneclides was suspected of adultery.) 'But that you think I rival Agamemnon, you are mistaken. For he, with all Greece, in scarcely ten years took a single city; I, on the contrary, with our one city, and in a single day, by routing the Lacedaemonians, set all Greece free.'

The same man, when he had come into an assembly of the Arcadians, asking that they make alliance with the Thebans and Argives, and on the other side Callistratus, the envoy of the Athenians, who at that time excelled all in eloquence, demanded that they rather seek the friendship of the Athenians, and in his speech had inveighed much against the Thebans and Argives, and among these things had laid this down, that the Arcadians ought to mark what manner of citizens each state had brought forth, from whom they might judge of the rest — for the Argives had been Orestes and Alcmaeon, matricides, while at Thebes was born Oedipus, who, after he had slain his own father, begot children of his mother: to him in reply Epaminondas, when he had finished with the rest, after he came to those two reproaches, said that he marvelled at the folly of the Attic orator, who had not observed that those men were born innocent at home, but, after a crime had been committed, when they had been driven from their country, were received by the Athenians. But most of all his eloquence shone forth at Sparta, as envoy before the battle of Leuctra. When envoys of all the allies had assembled there, before a most crowded gathering of embassies, he so arraigned the tyranny of the Lacedaemonians that he shook their power no less by that speech than by the battle of Leuctra. For then he brought it about — as afterwards appeared — that the Lacedaemonians were deprived of the help of their allies.

That he was patient and bore the wrongs of his fellow-citizens, because he thought it sin to be angry with his country, these are the proofs. When his fellow-citizens, out of envy, had been unwilling to set him in command of the army, and a leader unskilled in war had been chosen, by whose error the matter had been brought to such a pass that all feared for their safety, because, shut in by the narrows of the ground, they were besieged by the enemy, the diligence of Epaminondas began to be missed: for he was there, a private man in the rank of a soldier. When they sought help of him, he kept no memory of the affront, and freed the army from the siege and brought it home unharmed. Nor indeed did he do this once, but more often. But it was most conspicuous when he had led an army into the Peloponnese against the Lacedaemonians and had two colleagues, of whom one was Pelopidas, a brave and vigorous man. When these had all fallen into ill favour through the slanders of their adversaries, and on that account their command had been taken from them, and others had succeeded as generals in their place, Epaminondas did not obey the decree of the people, and persuaded his colleagues to do the same, and carried on the war which he had undertaken. For he observed that, unless he did so, the whole army, through the imprudence of the generals and their unskilfulness in war, would perish. There was a law at Thebes which punished with death any who held command longer than was fixed by the law. This law, since Epaminondas saw that it had been passed for the preservation of the commonwealth, he would not let be turned to the ruin of the state, and held his command four months longer than the people had ordered.

After the return home, his colleagues were accused on this charge. To them he gave leave to transfer the whole case to himself, and to maintain that it was by his doing that they had not obeyed the law. By which defence, when they had been freed from peril, no one thought that Epaminondas would make answer, because he had nothing to say. But he came into court, denied none of those things which his adversaries laid to his charge, confessed all that his colleagues had said, and did not refuse to undergo the penalty of the law; but one thing he asked of them, that on his tomb they should inscribe: 'Epaminondas was condemned to death by the Thebans, because he forced them to conquer the Lacedaemonians at Leuctra, whom, before he was commander, no one of the Boeotians dared to look upon in the line of battle; and because by a single battle he not only drew Thebes back from ruin, but also set all Greece at liberty, and brought the affairs of both parties to such a pass that the Thebans assailed Sparta, the Lacedaemonians counted it enough if they could be safe; nor did he cease to make war before, Messene being restored, he shut up their city in a siege.' When he had said this, laughter arose among all amid merriment, nor did any judge dare to cast his vote against him. So from a trial for his life he came off with the greatest glory.

He, at the last, as commander at Mantinea, when, the line being drawn up, he was pressing the enemy too boldly, was recognized by the Lacedaemonians, who, because they thought the safety of their country lay in the destruction of this one man, all together made an onset upon him alone, nor withdrew before, with great slaughter dealt and many slain, they saw Epaminondas himself, fighting most bravely, struck from a distance by a javelin and fall. By his fall the Boeotians were somewhat checked, yet they did not leave the fight before they had routed those who resisted. But Epaminondas, when he perceived that he had received a mortal wound, and at the same time that, if he drew out the iron which remained in his body from the spear-shaft, he would at once give up the ghost, kept it in until it was reported to him that the Boeotians had conquered. When he heard this, 'I have lived enough,' said he, 'for I die unconquered.' Then, the iron being drawn out, he straightway breathed his last.

He never took a wife. When he was blamed for this by Pelopidas, who had a son of ill repute, and was told that he was ill counselling his country in this, because he was leaving no children, 'See,' said he, 'that you do not counsel worse, who will leave behind such a son as is born of you. Nor indeed can offspring be wanting to me: for I leave, born of me, the battle of Leuctra, which must not only survive me, but even be immortal.' At the time when, under the leadership of Pelopidas, the exiles seized Thebes and drove the garrison of the Lacedaemonians from the citadel, Epaminondas, as long as there was slaughter of citizens, kept at home, because he wished neither to defend the bad nor to assail them, lest he stain his hands with the blood of his own people: for he counted every victory over fellow-citizens a deadly thing. The same man, after the fighting with the Lacedaemonians began at the Cadmea, stood among the foremost. Of his virtues and his life it will be enough to have said this, if I add this one thing, which no one will deny: that Thebes, both before Epaminondas was born and after his death, was perpetually subject to the rule of others; whereas, so long as he was at the head of the commonwealth, it was the chief city of all Greece. From this it can be understood that one man was worth more than a state.