Plutarch's Lives Volume II Part 18

[Footnote 174: Ariobarzanes I. called Philoromaeus, or a lover of the Romans, was elected king of Cappadocia B.C. 93, but he was soon expelled by Tigranes, king of Armenia, the son-in-law of Mithridates.

Ariobarzanes applied for help to the Romans, and he was restored by Sulla B.C. 92. He was driven out several times after, and again restored by the Romans.]

[Footnote 175: The name is written Mithradates on the Greek coins. The word Mithradates occurs in various shapes in the Greek writers; and it was a common name among the Medes and Persians. The first part of the name (Mithra) is probably the Persian name Mitra or Mithra, the Sun.

This Mithridates is Mithradates the Sixth, king of Pontus in Asia, who succeeded his father Mithridates V. B.C. 120, when he was about eleven years of age. He was a man of ability, well instructed in the learning of the Greeks, and a great linguist: it is said that he could speak twenty-two languages. He had already got possession of Colchis on the Black Sea, and placed one of his sons on the throne of Cappadocia. He had also strengthened himself by marrying his daughter to Tigranes king of Armenia. Other events in his life are noticed in various parts of the Lives of Sulla, Lucullus, and Pompeius. (See _Penny Cyclopaedia_, "Mithridates VI.")]

[Footnote 176: This name was common to a series of Armenian, and to a series of Parthian kings. One Arsaces is considered to be the founder of the dynasty of the Parthian kings, which dynasty the Greeks and Romans call that of the Arsacidae. This Arsaces is reckoned the ninth in the series, and was the son and successor of Arsaces the Eighth. He is placed in the series of Parthian kings as Arsaces IX. Mithridates II. (On the series of Parthian Arsacidae, see "Arsaces," in _Biograph.

Dictionary_ of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.) From the time of this interview of Sulla to a late period under the Roman Empire, the Romans and Parthians were sometimes friends, oftener enemies. No name occurs so frequently among the Roman writers of the Augustan period as that of the Parthians, the most formidable enemy that the Romans encountered in Asia, and who stopped their victorious progress in the East.]

[Footnote 177: The MSS. have "a native of Chalkis" ([Greek: Chalkideus] ?a???de??), a manifest blunder, which has long since been corrected.]

[Footnote 178: Censorinus was a family name of the Marcii. This appears to be C. Censorinus, whom Cicero (_Brutus_, c. 67) speaks of as moderately versed in Greek Literature. He lost his life in the wars of Sulla B.C. 81.]

[Footnote 179: Timotheus distinguished himself during the period of the decline of the power of Athens. In the year B.C. 357 he and Iphicrates were sent with a fleet to reduce to obedience the Athenian subject states and especially the island of Samos. The expedition was unsuccessful, and Timotheus and other generals were brought to trial on their return home. Timotheus was convicted, and sentenced to pay a heavy fine, but as he was unable to pay it, he withdrew to Chalkis in Euba, where he died B.C. 354. (_Penny Cyclopaedia_, art. "Timotheus.") This story of the painting is told by aelia.n.u.s, _Var. Hist._ xiii. 43.]

[Footnote 180: The original has "the daemon" ([Greek: daimonion]

da??????), which is Fortune, as the context shows. It is not very easy to unravel all the ancient notions about Fortune, Nemesis, and the like personifications. The opinion that the deity, or the daemon, looks with an envious eye on a man's prosperity and in the end pays him off with some equivalent loss, is very common in the Greek writers. One instance of it occurs in the letter of Amasis, the cunning King of Egypt, to Polykrates the tyrant of Samos. (Herodotus, iii. 40.) The Egyptian King tells Polykrates plainly that his great good luck would certainly draw upon him some heavy calamity, for "the daemon ([Greek: to theion] t? ?e???) is envious;" and so it was, for Polykrates died a wretched death. Timotheus, according to Plutarch, provoked Fortune by his arrogance.]

[Footnote 181: This word ([Greek: daimon] da???) often occurs in Plutarch. In order to understand it, we must first banish from our minds the modern notions attached to the word Daemon. A little further, Sulla speaks of what the daemon ([Greek: to daimonion] t? da??????) enjoins during the night. People in ancient times attached great importance to dreams, because they were considered as a medium by which the G.o.ds communicated with men. There is great difficulty in translating an ancient writer on account of the terms used in speaking of superhuman powers.

Apuleius, who lived in the second century of our aera and was consequently nearly a contemporary of Plutarch, has explained this doctrine of daemons in his treatise _On the G.o.d of Sokrates_. "Moreover there are certain divine middle powers, situated in this interval between the highest ether and earth, which is in the lowest place, through whom our desires and deserts pa.s.s to the G.o.ds. These are called by a Greek name daemons, who being placed between the terrestrial and celestial inhabitants, transmit prayers from the one and gifts from the other. They likewise carry supplications from the one and auxiliaries from the other as certain interpreters and saluters of both. Through these same daemons, as Plato says in the _Banquet_, all denunciations, the various miracles of enchanters, and all the species of presages, are directed. Prefects, from among the number of these, providentially attend to everything, according to the province a.s.signed to each; either by the formation of dreams, or causing the fissures in entrails, or governing the flight of some birds, and instructing the song of others, or by inspiring prophets, or hurling thunder, or producing the coruscations of lightning in the clouds, or causing other things to take place from which we obtain a knowledge of future events. And it is requisite to think that all these particulars are effected by the will, the power, and authority of the celestial G.o.ds, but by the compliance, operations, and ministrant offices of daemons."--T. Taylor's Translation: he adds, "For a copious account of daemons, their nature, and different orders, see the notes on the First Alkibiades in vol. i. of my Plato, and also my translation of Iamblichus on the Mysteries." A little further on Apuleius says: "It is not fit that the supernal G.o.ds should descend to things of this kind. This is the province of the intermediate G.o.ds, who dwell in the regions of the air, which border on the earth, and yet are no less conversant with the confines of the heavens; just as in every part of the world there are animals adapted to the several parts, the volant being in the air and the gradient on the earth."

As to the expression "the G.o.d" ([Greek: ho theos] ? ?e??), which often occurs in Greek writers, Taylor observes (note _a_.) "According to Plato one thing is a G.o.d simply, another on account of union, another through partic.i.p.ation, another through contact, and another through similitude. For of super-essential natures, each is primarily a G.o.d; of intellectual natures, each is a G.o.d according to union; and of divine souls, each is a G.o.d according to contact with the G.o.ds; and the souls of men are allotted this appellation through similitude." He therefore concludes that Apuleius was justified in calling the daemon of Sokrates a G.o.d; and that this was the opinion of Sokrates appears, as he says, from the First Alkibiades, where Sokrates says, "I have long been of opinion that the G.o.d did not as yet direct me to hold any conversation with you."

Apuleius further says, "There is another species of daemons, more sublime and venerable, not less numerous, but far superior in dignity, who, being always liberated from the bonds and conjunction of the body, preside over certain powers. In the number of these are Sleep and Love, who possess powers of a different nature; Love, of exciting to wakefulness, but Sleep of lulling to rest. From this more sublime order of daemons, Plato a.s.serts that a peculiar daemon is allotted to every man who is a witness and a guardian of his conduct in life, who, without being visible to any one, is always present, and who is an arbitrator not only of his deeds, but also of his thoughts. But when, life being finished, the soul returns [to the judges of its conduct], then the daemon who presided over it, immediately seizes and leads it as his charge to judgment, and is there present with it while it pleads its cause. There, this daemon reprehends it, if it has acted on any false pretence; solemnly confirms what it says, if it a.s.serts anything that is true; and conformably to its testimony pa.s.ses sentence. All you therefore who hear this divine opinion of Plato, as interpreted by me, so form your minds to whatever you may do, or to whatever may be the subject of your meditation, that you may know there is nothing concealed from those guardians either within the mind or external to it; but that the daemon who presides over you inquisitively partic.i.p.ates of all that concerns you, sees all things, understands all things, and in the place of conscience dwells in the most profound recesses of the mind. For he of whom I speak is a perfect guardian, a singular prefect, a domestic speculator, a proper curator, an intimate inspector, an a.s.siduous observer, an inseparable arbiter, a reprobator of what is evil, an approver of what is good; and if he is legitimately attended to, sedulously known, and religiously worshipped, in the way in which he was reverenced by Sokrates with justice and innocence, will be a predicter of things uncertain, a premonitor in things dubious, a defender in things dangerous, and an a.s.sistant in want. He will also be able, by dreams, by tokens, and perhaps also manifestly, when the occasion demands it, to avert from you evil, increase your good, raise your depressed, support your falling, illuminate your obscure, govern your prosperous, and correct your adverse circ.u.mstances. It is not therefore wonderful, if Sokrates, who was a man exceedingly perfect, and also wise by the testimony of Apollo, should know and worship this his G.o.d; and that hence, this his keeper, and nearly, as I may say, his equal, his a.s.sociate and domestic, should repel from him everything which ought to be repelled, foresee what ought to be noticed, and pre-admonish him of what ought to be foreknown by him, in those cases in which, human wisdom being no longer of any use, he was in want not of counsel but of presage, in order that when he was vacillating through doubt, he might be rendered firm through divination. For there are many things, concerning the development of which even wise men betake themselves to diviners and oracles." I have adopted Taylor's translation of this eloquent pa.s.sage, because he was well acquainted with the theological systems of antiquity. The whole pa.s.sage is a useful comment on this chapter of Plutarch and many other pa.s.sages in him, and may help to rectify some erroneous notions which people maintain of the philosophical systems of antiquity, people who, as Bishop Butler expresses it, "take for granted that they are acquainted with everything." The pa.s.sage about conscience contains, as Taylor observes, a dogma which is only to be found implicitly maintained in the Scholia of Olympiodorus on the First Alkibiades of Plato.

Olympiodorus says that we shall not err if we call "the allotted daemon conscience;" on which subject he has some further remarks. This doctrine of the sameness of conscience and the internal daemon seems to be that of the Emperor Marcus Antoninus (ii. 13): "It is sufficient to attend only to the daemon within us and to reverence it duly," and he goes on to explain wherein this reverence consists. In another pa.s.sage (ii. 17) he says that philosophy consists "in keeping the daemon within us free from violence and harm, superior to pleasures and pains, doing nothing without a purpose, and yet without any falsehood or simulation, without caring whether another is doing so or not; further, taking what happens and what is our lot as coming from the same origin from which itself came; and finally, waiting for death with a tranquil mind, as nothing else than the separation of the elements of which every living being is composed. And if there is nothing to fear in the elemental parts constantly changing one into another, why should a man have any apprehension about the change and dissolution of the whole? for it is according to Nature, and nothing is bad that is according to Nature." Bishop Butler remarks (Preface to his _Sermons_): "The practical reason of insisting so much upon the natural authority of the principle of reflection or conscience is, that it seems in a great measure overlooked by many who are by no means the worst sort of men. It is thought sufficient to abstain from gross wickedness, and to be humane and kind to such as happen to come in their way. Whereas, in reality, the very const.i.tution of our nature requires, that we bring our whole conduct before this superior faculty; wait its determination; enforce upon ourselves its authority; and make it the business of our lives, as it is absolutely the whole business of a moral agent, to conform ourselves to it. This is the true meaning of that ancient precept, _reverence thyself_."

This note does not apply to any particular case, when daemons are mentioned by Plutarch, but to all cases where he speaks of daemons, divination, dreams, and other signs.]

[Footnote 182: Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius, the son of Metellus Numidicus, was consul with Sulla in his second consulship B.C. 80.]

[Footnote 183: The place is unknown, unless it be the place near the altar of Laverna, the G.o.ddess of thieves, which was near the Porta Lavernalis, as Varro says (_Ling. Lat._ v. 163). Horatius (1 _Ep._ xvi. 60) represents the rogue as putting up a prayer "to the Fair Laverna," that he may appear to be what he is not, an honest man, and that night and darkness may kindly cover his sins. The phaenomenon which Sulla describes appears to have been of a volcanic character; and if so, it is the most recent on record within the volcanic region of the Seven Hills.]

[Footnote 184: Apparently Aulus Postumius Albinus, who was consul with Marcus Antonius B.C. 99. Valerius Maximus tells the story (ix. 8, 3).]

[Footnote 185: This was Sulla'a first consulship, B.C. 88. If he was now fifty, he was born B.C. 138. His colleague was Quintus Pompeius Rufus, who was killed in this same year at the instigation or at least with the approbation of Cn. Pompeius Strabo, the father of Pompeius Magnus. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, i. 63.)]

[Footnote 186: Caecilia Metella was the fourth wife of Sulla. The other three are mentioned in this chapter. Ilia is perhaps a mistake for Julia. Sulla's fifth and last wife was Valeria, c. 35.]

[Footnote 187: Drumann (_Geschichte Roms_, Caecilii) has shown that Plutarch is mistaken in supposing Caecilia to be the daughter of Metellus Pius, who was consul with Sulla B.C. 80. She was the daughter of L. Metellus Dalmaticus, who was the brother of Metellus Numidicus and the uncle of Metellus Pius. Her first husband was M. Scaurus, consul B.C. 115, by whom she had several children, and among them the Scaurus whom Cicero defended. Metella had children by Sulla also. (See c. 36, notes.)]

[Footnote 188: The historian of Rome. These events belonged to the seventy-seventh book of Livius, which is lost. The Epitome shows what this book contained.]

[Footnote 189: This word occurs three times in this chapter. In the first instance, the word is _the daemonium_; in the second it is _the G.o.d_ ([Greek: ho theos] ? ?e??); in the third, it is _the daemonium_ again.]

[Footnote 190: The Senate often met in the temple of Duellona or Bellona, the G.o.ddess of War. Duellona and Bellona are the same.

Compare the Baccha.n.a.lian Inscription, and Livius (28, c. 9, &c.).

The last sentence of this chapter is corrupt, and the precise meaning is uncertain.]

[Footnote 191: See Marius, c. 35.]

[Footnote 192: A man might be manumitted so as either to have the complete citizenship or not. If Plutarch's account is true, the citizenship was sold to those libertini who were of the cla.s.s Dediticii or Latini. (Gaius, i. 12, &c.)]

[Footnote 193: See the note on the Sumptuary Laws, c. 1.]

[Footnote 194: Plutarch here uses the same word ([Greek: apraxiai]

?p????a?) which I have elsewhere translated by the Roman word Just.i.tium. (Marius, c. 35.)]

[Footnote 195: Appian (_Civil Wars_, i. 57) says that all Sulla's officers left him, when he was going to march to Rome, except one quaestor. They would not serve against their country.]

[Footnote 196: That is Moon, Athena (Minerva), and Enyo (Bellona). It is difficult to conjecture what Cappadocian G.o.ddess Plutarch means, if it be not the Great Mother. (Marius, c. 17.)]

[Footnote 197: The place is unknown. There are some discrepancies between the narrative of these transactions in Plutarch and Appian.

Appian's is probably the better (i. 58, &c.). The reading Pictae has been suggested. (Strabo, p. 237.)]

[Footnote 198: The Roman word is Tellus. (Livius, 2, c. 41.) The temple was built on the ground occupied by the house of Spurius Ca.s.sius, which was pulled down after his condemnation. (Livius, 2, c.

41.)]

[Footnote 199: Appian (_Civil Wars_, i. 60) mentions the names of twelve persons who were proscribed. The attempt to rouse the slaves to rebellion was one of the grounds of this condemnation, and a valid ground.]

[Footnote 200: L. Cornelius Cinna and Cn. Octavius were consuls B.C.

87. the year in which Sulla left Italy to fight with Mithridates.

Apuleius (_On the G.o.d of Sokrates_) thus alludes to the kind of oath which Cinna took--"Shall I swear by Jupiter, holding a stone in my hand, after the most ancient manner of the Romans? But if the opinion of Plato is true, that G.o.d never mingles himself with man, a stone will hear me more easily than Jupiter. This however is not true: for Plato will answer for his opinion by my voice. I do not, says he, a.s.sert that the G.o.ds are separated and alienated from us, so as to think that not even our prayers reach them; for I do not remove them from an attention to, but only from a contact with human affairs."]

[Footnote 201: Appian (_Civil Wars_, i. 63, 64) gives another reason.

Sulla was alarmed at the a.s.sa.s.sination of his colleague Quintus Pompeius Rufus, and left Rome by night for Capua, whence he set out for Greece.]

[Footnote 202: This was the country on the west coast of Asia Minor, of which the Romans had formed the province of Asia. Mithridates took advantage of the Romans being busied at home with domestic troubles to advance his interests in Asia, where he was well received by the people, who were disgusted with the conduct of the Roman governors. He had defeated the Roman generals L. Ca.s.sius, Manius Aquilius, and Q.

Oppius. (Appian, _Mithridatic War_, c. 17, &c.) He also ordered all the Romans and Italians who were in Asia, with their wives and children, to be murdered on one day; which was done.]

[Footnote 203: The kingdom of Bosporus was a long narrow slip on the south-east coast of the peninsula now called the Crimea or Taurida.

The name Bosporus was properly applied to the long narrow channel, now called the Straits of Kaffa or Yenikale, which unites the Black Sea and the Maeotis or Sea of Azoff. Bosporus was also a name of Pantikapaeum, one of the chief towns of the Bosporus. There was a series of Greek kings of the Bosporus, extending from B.C. 430 to B.C.

304, whose names are known; and there may have been others. In the time of Demosthenes, in the fourth century before the Christian aera, the Athenians imported annually a large quant.i.ty of corn from the Bosporus. This was the country that now belonged to Mithridates.

(_Penny Cyclopaedia_, article "Bosporus.")]

[Footnote 204: Kaltwa.s.ser conjectures that the son who is first mentioned was Mithridates, and he remarks that Appian (_Mithridatic War_, c. 64) calls him also Mithridates. But in place of the name Ariarathes, he reads Aciarathes, whom he makes to be the same as the Arcathias of Appian (c. 35). Ariarathes however was a son of Mithridates (_Mithridatic War_, 15); and according to Appian, it was a son Mithridates who held Pontus and the Bosporus. Ariarathes and Arcathias a.s.sisted their father in the war in Asia.]

[Footnote 205: This Archelaus was a native of Cappadocia, and probably of Greek stock. His name often occurs afterwards. (See "Archelaus,"

_Biograph. Dict._ of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.)]

[Footnote 206: The promontory of Malea, now Cape St. Angelo, is the most south-eastern point of the Peloponnesus. The expression of Plutarch is, "all the islands situated within Malea," by which he means all the islands of the Archipelago which are east of Malea, including the Cyclades, or the group which lies in somewhat of a circular form round the small rocky island of Delos.]

[Footnote 207: His name is Brettius in the MSS. of Plutarch. His Roman name is Bruttius, as Appian (_Mithridat. War_, i. 29) writes it. He took the island of Skiathus, where the enemy deposited their plunder; he hanged the slaves that he found there, and cut off the hands of the freemen. Caesar, when he was in Gaul, cut off the hands of all the persons who had a.s.sisted in the defence of Uxellodunum against the Romans, according to the author of the eighth book of the _Gallic War_ (viii. 44).]

[Footnote 208: See the Life of Lucullus.]

[Footnote 209: He is called Athenion by Athenaeus. His father was an Athenian citizen; his mother was an Egyptian woman. His political career began with his being sent by the Athenians on an emba.s.sy to Mithridates, and he ultimately persuaded the Athenians to join the king. This is the account of Posidonius as quoted by Athenaeus (v. 211, &c. ed. Casaub.) Appian (_Mithridatic War_, 28, &c.) gives an account of his making himself a tyrant in Athens, which is somewhat different.

He appears to have established himself in B.C. 88; and his power only lasted till B.C. 86. This Aristion was a philosopher, which gives occasion to some curious remarks by Appian (_Mithridatic War_, c. 28), who says, speaking of his enormities: "and all this he did though he was a follower of the Epicurean philosophy. But it was not Aristion only at Athens, nor yet Kritias before him, and all who were philosophers with Kritias and tyrants at the same time; but in Italy also, those who were Pythagoreans, and in Greece the Seven Sages as they are called, as many of them as engaged in public affairs,--all were chiefs and tyrants more cruel than tyrants who were not philosophers. So that one may doubt as to other philosophers, and have some suspicion, whether it was for virtue's sake, or merely to console them for their poverty and having nothing to do with political matters, that they adopted philosophy. There are now many philosophers in a private station and poor who consequently wrap themselves up in philosophy out of necessity, and bitterly abuse those who are rich or in power; and thereby do not so much get a reputation for despising wealth and power as being envious of them. But those whom they abuse act much more wisely in despising them." There was at least one exception to these philosophers, Marcus Antoninus, who was the head of the Roman State, and required in his exalted station all the comfort that philosophy could give.]