Oration 2

It is said that Alexander, while still a youth, once held a conversation with his father Philip about Homer, in a manner most spirited and high-minded; and this discourse of theirs was very nearly a discussion about kingship as well. For Alexander happened already to be campaigning together with his father, though Philip tried to prevent it; but the boy could not contain himself, just as well-bred hounds cannot bear to be left behind when their masters go out to the hunt, but break their leashes and follow along.

Now sometimes these young dogs throw the work into confusion, giving tongue before the moment and rousing the quarry too soon, out of their youth and eagerness; yet sometimes by springing ahead they make the kill themselves. So it was with Alexander at first, so that they say he was the cause of the battle and the victory at Chaeronea, when his father shrank from the danger. At the time in question, then, having returned from a campaign, they were sacrificing to the Muses at Dium in Pieria and holding the contest of the Olympia, which they say is an ancient festival among them.

So Philip asked him, in the course of their gathering, "Why is it, my boy, that you are so utterly struck with admiration for Homer that you occupy yourself with him alone among the poets? Yet you ought not to neglect the others either, for they are wise men." And Alexander said, "Because it seems to me, father, that not every kind of poetry befits a king, any more than every kind of dress does.

The other poems I for my part regard as some of them suited to drinking-parties, others as love-poems; some are encomia of athletes and victorious horses, others are dirges for the dead, and others are composed for the sake of laughter or of abuse, like the works of the comic poets and of the poet of Paros.

Perhaps some of them might be called popular pieces, since they offer counsel and exhortation to the common crowd and to private men—such, I suppose, as the verses of Phocylides and Theognis. From these what profit could a man like ourselves draw, one who wishes 'to be master over all, and to rule over all'?

But the poetry of Homer alone do I truly see to be noble, magnificent, and kingly, the poetry to which a man ought to give his mind—above all a man who is to rule over whatever men there may be anywhere, or, failing that, over the most numerous and most renowned; one who is to be, in Homer's very phrase, a 'shepherd of the people.' Or how is it not absurd that a king should refuse to use any but the best horse, yet should consort even with the inferior poets, as though he had time on his hands?

Be assured, father," he said, "that I cannot bear even to hear of another poet, nor even of any meter other than Homer's heroic verse." At this Philip greatly admired him for his high-mindedness, since it was plain that he conceived nothing mean or low, but rather measured himself against the heroes and the demigods.

Wishing nonetheless to draw him out, "And Hesiod, Alexander," he said, "do you judge him to be a poet worth little?" "Not I," he replied, "but worth everything—yet not for kings, perhaps, nor for generals." "For whom, then?" And Alexander, laughing, said, "For shepherds and carpenters and farmers. For he says that shepherds are beloved of the Muses, and to carpenters he gives most expert advice on how large to cut the axle, and to farmers, when they should broach the wine-jar."

"What then? Are these things not useful to men?" said Philip. "Not to us, at any rate, father," he replied, "nor to the Macedonians of today, but to those of an earlier time, when, herding and farming, they were in slavery to the Illyrians and the Triballi." "And the precepts about sowing and reaping," said Philip, "given so magnificently by Hesiod, do they not please you?— 'When the Atlas-born Pleiades are rising, begin the harvest, and the plowing when they set.'"

"Far more," said Alexander, "do the agricultural passages in Homer please me." "And where has Homer spoken of farming?" Philip asked. "Or do you mean the representations on the shield, of the men plowing and reaping and gathering the vintage?" "Not in the least," said Alexander, "but these far rather: 'As reapers facing one another drive their swathes through a rich man's field of wheat or barley, and the handfuls fall thick: so the Trojans and Achaeans, leaping upon one another, kept slaying, and neither side took thought of ruinous flight.'"

"Yet for all such verses," said Philip, "Homer was defeated by Hesiod. Or have you not heard the inscription on Helicon, upon the tripod: 'Hesiod dedicated this to the Heliconian Muses, having conquered divine Homer in a contest of song at Chalcis'?"

"And most justly," said Alexander, "was he defeated; for he was not competing among kings, but among farmers and private men—or rather among pleasure-loving and soft men. And so it was that Homer took his revenge upon the Euboeans through his poetry." "How so?" asked Philip in astonishment. "Because of all the Greeks he shore them alone in the most shameful fashion, leaving the hair to grow long behind, just as people nowadays do with their delicate boys."

And Philip, laughing, said, "You see, Alexander, that one must not vex good poets nor formidable prose-writers, since they are lords of whatever they choose to say about us." "Not lords at all," he replied. "Stesichorus, at least, did not profit by his lie against Helen. Hesiod, however, father, seems to me himself to be not unaware of his own powers, and how far he fell short of Homer.

"How do you mean?" "Because, when Homer had made poetry about the heroes, Hesiod made a Catalogue of Women, and in truth he sang the women's quarters, yielding to Homer the praise of the men." Upon this Philip asked, "But you, Alexander—would you choose to have been Agamemnon, or Achilles, or one of those heroes, rather than Homer?"

"By no means," said Alexander, "but rather to surpass Achilles and the rest by far. For I do not consider you inferior to Peleus, nor would I call Macedonia weaker than Phthia, nor Olympus less renowned than Mount Pelion; nor, again, have I obtained a meaner education under Aristotle than he did under Phoenix son of Amyntor, a man who was an exile and at variance with his father. And besides all this, Achilles was subject to others, and was sent out with a small force, not as a commander but to campaign under another's orders; whereas I would never be made a subject king by any man."

And Philip, almost provoked, said, "But by me, at least, you are ruled, Alexander." "Not I," he replied; "for it is not as a king but as a father that I obey you." "Surely you will not also claim to have been born of a goddess mother, like Achilles?" said Philip. "Or do you think it fitting to compare Olympias with Thetis?" And Alexander, smiling quietly, said, "To me, father, she seems braver than all the Nereids."

At this Philip laughed and said, "Not only braver, my boy, but more warlike too. At any rate, she never ceases waging war on me." Thus far, then, did the two of them sport together, yet with a serious purpose. Then Philip asked him again, "But, Alexander, admiring Homer so intensely as you do, how is it that you despise his wisdom?" "Because," he said, "I would most gladly listen to the herald at Olympia as he proclaims in a great and clear voice—yet I should not myself wish to be the herald proclaiming the victory of others; far rather to have my own victory proclaimed."

In saying this he made it plain that he held Homer to be in truth a divine and heaven-sent herald of virtue, while he regarded himself and those heroes as the athletes and contenders in deeds of nobility. "Yet there is nothing absurd, father," he said, "in my being also a good poet, should nature grant it; for indeed a king has need of rhetoric too. You yourself are often compelled to write replies and to argue against Demosthenes, that most formidable orator and sorcerer, and against the others who play their part in the politics of Athens."

"And I should have been glad," said Philip in jest, "to cede Amphipolis to the Athenians in exchange for Demosthenes' formidable power. But how do you suppose Homer was minded about rhetoric?" "It seems to me, father," he said, "that he held the thing in admiration. For otherwise he would not have brought in Phoenix as a teacher of speech for Achilles—he says, at any rate, that Phoenix was sent by Achilles' father 'to be a speaker of words and a doer of deeds.'

"And the others, the best and most kingly of his heroes, he represented as having no less earnest concern for such ability—Diomedes and Odysseus and Nestor, this last surpassing all in understanding and persuasiveness. At the beginning of the poem he says of him, 'From whose tongue a voice flowed sweeter than honey.'

So that Agamemnon prayed for ten such old men to be his counselors, rather than young warriors like Ajax and Achilles, since thus Troy would the sooner be taken. And the greatness of the use of speech he showed in another passage as well.

"For when the Greeks, on account of the length of the war and the hardship of the siege—and also, I suppose, on account of the plague that fell upon them and the quarrel of the kings, Agamemnon and Achilles—had now grown weary of the campaign, and when, besides, a certain demagogue had risen against them and thrown the assembly into uproar, the multitude rushed for the ships, and embarking at once wished to flee, no one being able to restrain them, and not even Agamemnon knowing how to deal with the situation before him—

then it was that Odysseus alone was able to call them back and turn them about, and at last by his speech, together with Nestor, persuaded them to remain. So this work was plainly the achievement of the orators. And one might point to many other instances as well.

"And it appears that not Homer only, but Hesiod too, was of this mind, that both philosophy and true rhetoric befit the king; as in the passage where he says of Calliope: 'For she attends upon revered kings as well; whomever the daughters of great Zeus honor and behold at his birth among the kings nurtured by Zeus.'

"To make epic verses, then, father, or to compose speeches in prose, such as those letters of yours by which they say you win such high repute, is not at all necessary for kings—unless perhaps for those still young and at leisure, as they say of you, that at Thebes you labored at the art of speech;

nor again to take up philosophy in its most exact form; rather to display, without artifice and simply, in his very deeds, a character humane and gentle and just, and besides lofty and brave, and most of all delighting in acts of benevolence, which is nearest to the nature of the gods; and to listen gladly to discourses drawn from philosophy, when there is occasion, since these appear not contrary but in harmony with his own ways;

and to take pleasure in poetry and give his mind to it—not to all poetry, but to the finest and most magnificent—this I would counsel the man noble and kingly in soul, the only poetry of that kind we know being Homer's, and such of Hesiod's as is of this sort, and whatever else any poet has said that is wholesome.

"Nor would I wish to learn all music," he said, "but only to use the cithara or the lyre for hymns and worship of the gods, and besides, I suppose, for the praises of good men; nor would it be fitting for kings to sing the love-songs of Sappho or of Anacreon, but, if any at all, the songs of Stesichorus or of Pindar, should there be any necessity.

"And perhaps for this purpose too Homer is sufficient." "Indeed," said Philip, "do any of Homer's verses seem to you fit to be sung to the cithara or lyre?" And Alexander, with a fierce look like a lion's, said, "For my part, father, I think that many of Homer's lines befit being sung to the trumpet—not, by Zeus, the call to retreat, but the one that urges and exhorts—and not by a chorus of women or maidens, but by an armed phalanx; far more so than the verses of Tyrtaeus among the Spartans."

At this Philip praised him for speaking well and worthily of the poet. "And so," said Alexander, "this very point of which we have just spoken Homer also demonstrates. He has represented Achilles, lingering in the camp of the Achaeans, singing no slack or amorous songs—though he says that Achilles was in love with Briseis—but using the cithara; not, by Zeus, one he had bought, nor brought from home from his father, but one he had chosen out of the spoils when he took Thebe and slew Eetion, Hector's father-in-law.

" 'With it,' he says, 'he delighted his heart, and sang of the glorious deeds of men'—as though the noble and kingly man must never, whether drinking or singing, forget virtue and renowned actions, but must continually be either himself performing some great and wonderful deed, or recalling the like in others."

These things he said to his father, displaying his own cast of mind. For indeed he happened to love Homer, while toward Achilles he felt not only admiration but also a kind of jealous emulation, on account of Homer's poetry—just as handsome boys are sometimes jealous of handsome companions who have obtained the better lovers.

Agamemnon, however, he did not count blessed, for he hoped himself to rule over far more peoples than that king ruled. For the other poets he had little regard. But Stesichorus and Pindar he did mention—the one because he is held to be an imitator of Homer and made the capture of Troy not unworthily; and Pindar both for the brilliance of his nature and because he praised Alexander's own ancestor and namesake, the one surnamed the Philhellene, having composed for him the line, 'O you who bear the name of the blessed sons of Dardanus.' For this reason, too, when later he was sacking Thebes, he left standing only that man's house, ordering it to be inscribed: 'Do not burn the roof of Pindar the maker of song.' Doubtless he knew much gratitude was owed to those who praised him not meanly, being so exceedingly ambitious of honor.

"Tell me," said Philip, "my boy—for I take great pleasure in hearing you speak of such things—do you not think the king's dwelling ought to be furnished pleasurably, adorned with gold and amber and ivory and precious things?" "By no means, father," he said, "but far rather with the spoils and arms of enemy men; and the temples should be propitiated with such adornments, just as Hector thought fit, when challenging the best of the Achaeans, saying that if he prevailed he would give the body back to the man's allies, but the arms, he said, 'I will strip off, and hang them in the temple of Apollo the far-darter.'

"For altogether this is a better adornment for temples than emeralds and carnelians and onyx stones, such as Sardanapalus had about Ninus. For such objects of ambition are in no way fit for a king, but are the playthings of a foolish girl or a dissolute woman.

"Indeed, I do not so much envy the Athenians for the expenditure and extravagance lavished upon their city and temples as I admire the deeds their ancestors performed. For they possess as a far more august and excellent offering the scimitar of Mardonius and the shields of the Laconians once captured at Pylos, than the propylaea of the Acropolis and the Olympieum, built at a cost of more than ten thousand talents."

"And so," said Philip, "here at least you would not be able to praise Homer. For the palace of Alcinous, a Greek man and an islander, he adorned not only with gardens and plants and waters, so as to be most pleasant to dwell in, but with golden statues as well. And still more the dwelling of Menelaus, and that of a man returned from a campaign—does he not describe it as something Persian and Median, almost not far short of the palace of Semiramis, or of Darius and Xerxes?

"He says, at any rate: 'For as the radiance of the sun or of the moon was the high-roofed house of glorious Menelaus, with gold and amber and silver and ivory.'

"It ought rather, by your reasoning, to have gleamed with the spoils of Troy than with these." And Alexander, pausing, said, "I do not think I shall leave Homer without a defense; for perhaps he made the palace to suit the character of Menelaus, whom he calls the only 'soft warrior' among the Achaeans.

"For very nearly this poet seems to say nothing else idly either, but often likens dress and dwelling and manner of life to the character of the men.

"For this reason he adorned the palace among the Phaeacians with groves and fruits throughout the year and ever-flowing springs; and still more that of Calypso, as of a goddess in her prime and kindly, dwelling apart by herself on an island. For he says that the island was exceedingly fragrant with the sweetest perfumes burning within it, and shaded with flourishing trees, and that around the cave ran a vine in its prime, heavy with clusters, and before it soft meadows of parsley and other herbs intermingled, and in the midst four springs of bright and transparent water flowing in all directions, since the ground was neither sloping nor uneven. For all these things are surpassingly amorous and pleasant, after the manner, I suppose, of the goddess.

"But the hall of Menelaus he makes rich in treasure and rich in gold, like, I suppose, that of one of the Asiatic kings. For indeed Menelaus was not far removed from Tantalus and Pelops; whence, I think, Euripides too made the chorus hint at this in the king's entrance: 'Menelaus, conspicuous to behold in great luxury, being of the blood of the sons of Tantalus.'

"But the dwelling of Odysseus he made in no way like these, but, as belonging to a cautious man, equipped for this very purpose. For he speaks thus: 'One court leads from another, and the court is fenced with wall and coping; the doors are well-made and double-folding: no man could storm it.'

"And one must take some of the poet's words as those of one giving counsel and exhortation, others as those of one merely describing, and many as those of one reproaching and mocking. And indeed in matters of the couch and the daily way of life Homer seems competent to give an education truly heroic and kingly, so that Lycurgus, having learned the Laconian common meals from him, established them by law for the Spartans.

"For they say that Lycurgus was an admirer of Homer, and that he first brought the poetry from Crete or from Ionia into Greece. Diomedes, at least, he laid down to rest very hardily upon the hide of a field-ox, setting his spears around him upright on their butt-spikes—not for adornment, but ready to be seized. And he feasts the heroes upon meats, and these the meat of oxen—plainly for the sake of strength, not of pleasure.

"Agamemnon, at least, king of all and the wealthiest, he says always sacrificed an ox, and to it invited the best men. And Ajax, after his victory, he honors with the chine of the ox.

"He never represented them as tasting fish, and that though they were encamped beside the sea—calling the Hellespont, as it is, 'rich in fish' on each occasion; for Plato very rightly noted this very thing. Nor does he feast the suitors on fish, exceedingly wanton and luxurious as they were, and that though they were feasting in Ithaca.

"And that he does not relate these things at random, he himself plainly shows, declaring what sort of nourishment there ought to be and to what end it should be taken. For whatever meal he wishes to praise he calls 'a meal to the heart's content'—the kind able to furnish 'might,' that is, strength. And he says this teaching and exhorting that good men ought to take care also of the table, since he was not inexperienced in food of every kind and in extravagance, so that the Persians and Syrians who are now agog over such things, and among the Greeks the Italiote Greeks and the Ionians, do not even come close to the abundance and luxury found in Homer.

"Tell me," said Philip, "does he not give the heroes the finest clothing possible?" "By Zeus, yes," said Alexander, "yet not womanish nor embroidered; he adorned Agamemnon with purple only, and Odysseus with a single cloak from home. For Homer does not think the leader should appear mean or like the common crowd and private men, but should be distinguished from the rest in dress and arms toward what is greater and more august—yet without luxury or fussiness.

"The Carian, at least, who decked himself out in gold for the war, he reviled most insolently, saying: 'who came to war wearing gold like a girl, fool that he was; nor did it ward off grievous destruction, but he was vanquished beneath the hands of the swift-footed son of Aeacus in the river; and warlike Achilles carried off the gold.'

"He laughs at the man's luxury and at his folly together, that he all but carried prizes of his death to the enemy. So Homer is plainly no praiser of wearing gold, and that into battle—of bracelets and torques, and besides of golden frontlets and bits, such as they say the Persians affect; for in matters of war they have no censor like Homer.

"And out of these practices he made both the rulers good and the multitude well-disciplined. They advance for him in silence, 'fearing their commanders,' whereas the barbarians advance with much uproar and disorder, like cranes; since this above all is salutary and brings victory in dangers—that the soldiers should not be without fear of their leaders. For whoever are without fear of their own commanders, these would most quickly come to fear the enemy.

"And indeed he says that the Achaeans, when victorious, encamped in quiet, whereas among the Trojans, whenever they thought they had some advantage, at once there was all through the night 'the sound of flutes and pipes and the din of men'—as though this too were a sufficient sign of virtue or of baseness: which men bear their successes with self-control, or, on the contrary, with insolence.

"For me, then, father, Homer is the most sufficient corrector, and he who tries to give his mind to him is the most fortunate and best of kings. For he himself plainly lays down the two most kingly virtues, courage and justice, where he says: 'both things, a good king and a mighty warrior'—

as though the other virtues follow upon these. Yet I think the king ought not only to be distinguished in courage and dignity, but should not even listen to others playing the flute or the cithara or singing slack and luxurious songs, nor again should he admit the corrupt emulations of debased discourses, composed for the pleasure of the most ignorant;

but he should first and above all cast all such things as far away as possible and banish them from his own soul, and then from the ruling city—unbridled laughter and the makers of such laughter with their jests, in verse and in prose, and besides should put down wanton dances and the harlot-like postures of women in licentious dancing, and the shrill and lawless rhythms of flute-playing, and broken songs with unmusical modulations, and the variety of many-voiced instruments.

"The only song he will sing and admit is the one befitting Enyalius, very strong and piercing, bringing to its hearers neither pleasure nor relaxation, but irresistible terror and confusion—such as Ares himself raised when 'he shouted shrill from the topmost citadel, urging on the Trojans,' and such as Achilles raised when, merely by his shout, before he was seen, he put the Trojans to flight, and was the cause of destruction to twelve men about their own chariots and arms;

and the song of victory composed after this by the Muses, such as Achilles bade the Achaeans sing—the paean—at the dragging of Hector to the ships, himself leading off: 'Now come, you youths of the Achaeans, singing the paean, let us return to our hollow ships, and let us bring this man along. We have won great glory; we have slain divine Hector, to whom the Trojans throughout their city prayed as to a god.'

"And besides, I think, the song of exhortation, such as that of the Laconian marching-songs, most befitting the polity of Lycurgus and those practices of theirs: 'Come, you sons of Sparta rich in men, sons of citizen fathers, with your left thrust forward the shield, and brandishing the spear boldly, sparing not your life; for that is not the way of the fathers in Sparta.'

"And dances and choruses corresponding to these—not staggering nor unrestrained, but as far as possible strong and temperate—to be brought in with steady rhythm; and the dance in armor, which is performed as a first-offering to the gods and at the same time as practice for war, of which the poet says that even Meriones was skilled. For he has represented one of the Trojans saying: 'Meriones, swiftly would my spear have stopped you, dancer though you are, had I but struck you.'

"Or do you suppose that the son of Molus, numbered among the best of the Achaeans, knew any other dance than the war-dance, the Curetic, which was native to the Cretans—the quick and nimble movement for easily swerving and guarding against the missile?

"And with these things it follows that the king should not even offer prayers like those of other men, nor should he call upon the gods praying as did Anacreon the Ionian poet: 'O lord, with whom Love the subduer and the dark-eyed Nymphs and rosy Aphrodite play, you who range over the high peaks of the mountains, I beseech you: come graciously to me, and listen kindly to my prayer. Be a good counselor to Cleobulus, O Dionysus, and grant that he accept my love.'

"Nor, by Zeus, with the prayers of the Attic drinking-songs and convivial verses, which befit not kings but cheerful and utterly unbuttoned commoners and clansmen: 'Would that I might become a fair lyre of ivory, and that fair boys might carry me to the chorus of Dionysus. Would that I might become a fair piece of unwrought gold, and that a fair woman might wear me.'

"But far rather as Homer made the king of all the Greeks pray: 'Zeus most glorious, most great, lord of the dark clouds, dwelling in the heaven, let not the sun set nor darkness come on, before I cast down headlong the smoke-blackened halls of Priam, and burn the gates with consuming fire, and tear about Hector's breast his tunic, cleft with the bronze; and may many of his comrades around him fall headlong in the dust and bite the earth with their teeth.'

"And many other lessons and teachings one might cite from Homer, courageous and kingly, to go through which now would perhaps take too long. Only this: that he shows his own whole judgment clearly, that he holds the king ought to be the best of all—and most of all in the case of Agamemnon, when first he arrays the army and recounts all the leaders and the multitude of the ships.

"For there he has left no contest with him to any other of the heroes, but, as much as a bull surpasses the herd in strength and size, so much, he says, does the king excel, speaking thus: 'As a bull is far the most conspicuous of all in the herd, for he stands out among the gathered cattle, such did Zeus make the son of Atreus on that day, preeminent among many and conspicuous among heroes.'

"And this, as it seems to me, he has not said simply, praising and wishing to show forth his strength only; for in that case he would have done well to liken him to a lion. Rather he is indicating the gentleness of his nature and his zeal on behalf of his subjects. For the bull is not only among the noble animals, nor does he use his strength for his own sake, as do the lion and the boar and the eagles, which pursue the other animals and overcome them for the sake of their own food; and for that reason one might rather call them a model of tyranny than of kingship.

"But the bull, plainly, as it seems to me, was made as an image of kingship and of the king. For he uses food ready at hand and a way of life of grazing, so that he need do no violence nor grasp for more on that account, but, as with prosperous kings, his necessary possessions are unstinted and abundant.

"And he is king and rules over his own kind with goodwill, as one might say, and with care—now leading the way to pasture, now, when a wild beast appears, not fleeing but fighting in defense of the whole herd and aiding the weak, eager to save the multitude from the harsh and savage beasts; just as the ruler and true king ought to be, not unworthy of the greatest honor among men.

"And sometimes, when another herd appears, he contends with that herd's leader for the sake of victory, that he himself may be judged the stronger, and his herd the stronger. And indeed not to make war on men, but, though naturally most fit to lead and the best of the irrational animals, nonetheless to admit the leadership of his superior—in strength and spirit and force yielding to none and giving way to none, but by reasoning and good sense willingly submitting—how could one not set down this too as a kingly lesson and teaching for temperate kings:

that he who appears superior to men like himself ought to rule, holding his leadership justly and according to nature, and to save the multitude of his subjects, taking counsel and fighting on their behalf when need is, and guarding them from savage and lawless tyrants, while toward the kings of others, if any there be, he should contend in virtue and seek, if it be possible, to gain the mastery for the benefit of whatever men there may be anywhere;

but to follow the gods, who are his betters, as good herdsmen, I suppose, and to honor above all the better and more blessed nature, accounting them his masters and rulers, and showing that the most precious possession of the greatest and first king, God, is first himself, and then the others marshaled under him.

"For indeed, just as temperate herdsmen, when a bull has become harsh and savage and rules wantonly against nature—despising and ravaging his own herd, while giving ground before those who plot against it from without and putting forward the helpless multitude as a shield, and, when no danger is present, behaving with insolence and recklessness, now bellowing shrilly and threateningly, now striking with his straight horns one who does not resist, displaying his strength among the weaker and the unwarlike, and not allowing the multitude of cattle to graze in peace through panic and fear—then the masters and herdsmen remove and make away with such a bull, holding him unfit and unprofitable to lead the herd;

but the one gentle to the cattle that follow him, yet stout-hearted and fearless against the beasts, august and magnificent and able to guard and lead the herd, and yet yielding to the herdsmen and obeying them, they suffer to live until extreme old age, even though his body has now grown heavier—

in like manner the gods too, and the great king of kings, who is the guardian and common father of men and gods, Zeus: whoever of men becomes a ruler violent and unjust and lawless, displaying his strength not against enemies but against subjects and friends, insatiable of pleasures, insatiable of wealth, quick to suspicion, implacable in anger, sharp to credit slanders, deaf to reason, knavish, treacherous, mean, self-willed, exalting the wicked, envious of his betters, witless of culture, accounting no man a friend and having none—him, as a possession of less worth than himself, He removes from the way and displaces,

as one unworthy to be king or to share His own honor and title, and that with shame and outrage—as, I suppose, Phalaris and Apollodorus and many others of like kind.

"But the brave and humane man, well-disposed to his subjects, honoring virtue and striving lest he be thought inferior in any of the good things, compelling the unjust to repent and aiding the weak—him God, admiring his virtue, for the most part brings on to old age, as we hear of Cyrus and of Deioces the Mede and Idanthyrsus the Scythian and Leucon, and of many of the Laconian kings, and of some of the earlier kings in Egypt;

and if the necessity of fate presses upon him before old age, yet He has at least deemed him worthy of good remembrance and of fair fame among all men for all time—as," said Alexander, "He did our own ancestor, the one held to be a son of Zeus on account of his virtue, Heracles."

Hearing this, Philip was pleased and said, "Not in vain, Alexander, do we hold Aristotle in such high esteem, and granted him the rebuilding of his native city, Stageira, which is in the territory of Olynthus. For the man is worthy of many great gifts, if he teaches you such things about rule and kingship, whether in expounding Homer or in some other way."