Plutarch's Morals Part 25

[585] Sophocles, "Antigone," 317-319.

[586] See Pausanias, iii. 17; iv. 15; x. 5.

[587] Compare the idea of the people of Melita, Acts xxviii. 4.

[588] An Allusion to Dolon in Homer, "Iliad," x., 374, sq. according to Xylander.

[589] Quoted again by our author in his "Publicola," p.

105 B., and a.s.signed to Epicharmus.

[590] So Shakspere has taught us, "Brevity is the soul of wit."--_Hamlet_, Act ii Sc. 2.

[591] "In Protagora."--_Xylander._

[592] That is, is all kernel. See pa.s.sim our author's "Apophthegmata Laconica."

[593] Or, _apophthegmatic nature_.

[594] Dionysius the younger, tyrant of Syracuse, was expelled, and afterwards kept a school at Corinth. That is the allusion. It would be like saying "Remember Napoleon at St. Helena."

[595] See Pausanias, x. 24.

[596] See Plato, "Charmides," 165 A.

[597] A t.i.tle applied to Apollo first by Herodotus, i.

91, from his ambiguous ([Greek: loxa]) oracles.

[598] Part of the words of an oracle of the Pythian Priestess, slightly changed. The whole oracle may be seen in Herodotus, i. 47.

[599] Proverb of cross purposes.

[600] Reading [Greek: exerasthai] with Dubner.

[601] Catullus calls him "tumidus," _i.e._ long-winded, 95, 10. See also Propertius, iii. 34-32. He was a Greek poet, a contemporary of Socrates and Plato, and author of a Thebaid. Pausanias mentions him, viii. 25; ix. 35.

[602] The mediaeval proverb, _Ubi dolor ibi digitus_.

[603] A proverbial expression for having no judgment.

See Sophocles, Fragm. 307; Plato, "Charmides," 154 B; Erasmus, "Adagia." So we say a person's mind is a blank sheet on a subject he knows nothing about.

[604] Euripides, Fragm. 202. Quoted also by Plato, "Gorgias," 484 E.

[605] Reading with Reiske, [Greek: misthon auto dounai to mikron siopesai me dynamenos].

[606] A celebrated Greek historian, and pupil of Isocrates. See Cicero, "De Oratore," ii. 13.

[607] Of Tarsus. See Cicero, "De Officiis," iii. 12.

ON CURIOSITY.[608]

-- I. If a house is dark, or has little air, is in an exposed position, or unhealthy, the best thing will probably be to leave it; but if one is attached to it from long residence in it, one can improve it and make it more light and airy and healthy by altering the position of the windows and stairs, and by throwing open new doors and shutting up old ones. So some towns have been altered for the better, as my native place,[609]

which did lie to the west and received the rays of the setting sun from Parna.s.sus, was they say turned to the east by Chaeron. And Empedocles the naturalist is supposed to have driven away the pestilence from that district, by having closed up a mountain gorge that was prejudicial to health by admitting the south wind to the plains. Similarly, as there are certain diseases of the soul that are injurious and harmful and bring storm and darkness to it, the best thing will be to eject them and lay them low by giving them open sky, pure air and light, or, if that cannot be, to change and improve them some way or other. One such mental disease, that immediately suggests itself to one, is curiosity, the desire to know other people's troubles, a disease that seems neither free from envy nor malignity.

"Malignant wretch, why art so keen to mark Thy neighbour's fault, and seest not thine own?"[610]

Shift your view, and turn your curiosity so as to look inwards: if you delight to study the history of evils, you have copious material at home, "as much as there is water in the Alizon, or leaves on the oak,"

such a quant.i.ty of faults will you find in your own life, and pa.s.sions in your soul, and shortcomings in your duty. For as Xenophon says[611]

good managers have one place for the vessels they use in sacrificing, and another for those they use at meals, one place for their farm instruments, and another for their weapons of war, so your faults arise from different causes, some from envy, some from jealousy, some from cowardice, some from meanness. Review these, consider these; bar up the curiosity that pries into your neighbours' windows and pa.s.sages, and open it on the men's apartments, and women's apartments, and servant's attics, in your own house. There this inquisitiveness and curiosity will find full vent, in inquiries that will not be useless or malicious, but advantageous and serviceable, each one saying to himself,

"What have I done amiss? What have I done?

What that I ought to have done left undone?"

-- II. And now, as they say of Lamia that she is blind when she sleeps at home, for she puts her eyes on her dressing-table, but when she goes out she puts her eyes on again, and has good sight, so each of us turns, like an eye, our malicious curiosity out of doors and on others, while we are frequently blind and ignorant about our own faults and vices, not applying to them our eyes and light. So that the curious man is more use to his enemies than to himself, for he finds fault with and exposes their shortcomings, and shows them what they ought to avoid and correct, while he neglects most of his affairs at home, owing to his excitement about things abroad. Odysseus indeed would not converse with his mother till he had learnt from the seer Tiresias what he went to Hades to learn; and after receiving that information, then he turned to her, and asked questions about the other women, who Tyro was, and who the fair Chloris, and why Epicaste[612] had died, "having fastened a noose with a long drop to the lofty beam."[613] But we, while very remiss and ignorant and careless about ourselves, know all about the pedigrees of other people, that our neighbour's grandfather was a Syrian, and his grandmother a Thracian woman, and that such a one owes three talents, and has not paid the interest. We even inquire into such trifling matters as where somebody's wife has been, and what those two are talking in the corner about. But Socrates used to busy himself in examining the secret of Pythagoras' persuasive oratory, and Aristippus, meeting Ischomachus at the Olympian games, asked him how Socrates conversed so as to have so much influence over the young men, and having received from him a few sc.r.a.ps and samples of his style, was so enthusiastic about it that he wasted away, and became quite pale and lean, thirsty and parched, till he sailed to Athens and drew from the fountain-head, and knew the wonderful man himself and his speeches and philosophy, the object of which was that men should recognize their faults and so get rid of them.

-- III. But some men cannot bear to look upon their own life, so unlovely a spectacle is it, nor to throw and flash on themselves, like a lantern, the reflection of reason; but their soul being burdened with all manner of vices, and dreading and shuddering at its own interior, sallies forth and wanders abroad, feeding and fattening its malignity there. For as a hen, when its food stands near its coop,[614] will frequently slip off into a corner and scratch up,

"Where I ween some poor little grain appears on the dunghill,"

so curious people neglecting conversation or inquiry about common matters, such as no one would try and prevent or be indignant at their prying into, pick out the secret and hidden troubles of every family.

And yet that was a witty answer of the Egyptian, to the person who asked him, "What he was carrying wrapped up;" "It was wrapped up on purpose that you should not know." And you too, Sir, I would say to a curious person, why do you pry into what is hidden? If it were not something bad it would not be hidden. Indeed it is not usual to go into a strange house without knocking at the door, and nowadays there are porters, but in old times there were knockers on doors to let the people inside know when anyone called, that a stranger might not find the mistress or daughter of the house _en deshabille_, or one of the slaves being corrected, or the maids bawling out. But the curious person intrudes on all such occasions as these, although he would be unwilling to be a spectator, even if invited, of a well-ordered family: but the things for which bars and bolts and doors are required, these he reveals and divulges openly to others. Those are the most troublesome winds, as Aristo says, that blow up our clothes: but the curious person not only strips off the garments and clothes of his neighbours, but breaks through their walls, opens their doors, and like the wanton wind, that insinuates itself into maidenly reserve, he pries into and calumniates dances and routs and revels.

-- IV. And as Cleon is satirized in the play[615] as having "his hands among the aetolians, but his soul in Peculation-town," so the soul of the curious man is at once in the mansions of the rich, and the cottages of the poor, and the courts of kings, and the bridal chambers of the newly married; he pries into everything, the affairs of foreigners, the affairs of princes, and sometimes not without danger. For just as if one were to taste aconite to investigate its properties, and kill oneself before one had discovered them, so those that pry into the troubles of great people ruin themselves before they get the knowledge they desire; even as those become blind who, neglecting the wide and general diffusion all over the earth of the sun's rays, impudently attempt to gaze at its...o...b..and penetrate to its light. And so that was a wise answer of Philippides the Comic Poet, when King Lysimachus asked him on one occasion, "What would you like to have of mine?" "Anything, O king, but your secrets." For the pleasantest and finest things to be got from kings are public, as banquets, and riches, and festivities, and favours: but come not near any secret of theirs, pry not into it. There is no concealment of the joy of a prosperous monarch, or of his laugh when he is in a playful mood, or of any tokens of his goodwill and favour; but dreadful is what he conceals, his gloominess, his sternness, his reserve, his store of latent wrath, his meditation on stern revenge, his jealousy of his wife, or suspicion of his son, or doubt about the fidelity of a friend. Flee from this cloud that is so black and threatening, for when its hidden fury bursts forth, you will not fail to hear its thunder and see its lightning.

-- V. How shall you flee from it? Why, by dissipating and distracting your curiosity, by turning your soul to better and pleasanter objects: examine the phenomena of sky, and earth, and air, and sea. Are you by nature fond of gazing at little or great things? If at great, turn your attention to the sun, consider its rising and setting: view the changes of the moon, like the changes of our mortal life, see how it waxes and wanes,

"How at the first it peers out small and dim Till it unfolds its full and glorious...o...b.. And when its zenith it has once attained, Again it wanes, grows small, and disappears."[616]

These are indeed Nature's secrets, but they bring no trouble on those that study them. But if you decline the study of great things, inspect with curiosity smaller matters, see how some plants flourish, are green and gay, and exhibit their beauty, all the year round, while others are sometimes gay like them, at other times, like some unthrift, run through their resources entirely, and are left bare and naked. Consider again their various shapes, how some produce oblong fruits, others angular, others smooth and round. But perhaps you will not care to pry into all this, since you will find nothing bad. If you must then ever bestow your time and attention on what is bad, as the serpent lives but in deadly matter, go to history, and turn your eye on the sum total of human misery. For there you will find "the falls of men, and murders of their lives,"[617] rapes of women, attacks of slaves, treachery of friends, mixing of poisons, envyings, jealousies, "shipwrecks of families," and dethroning of princes. Sate and cloy yourself on these, you will by so doing vex and enrage none of your a.s.sociates.

-- VI. But it seems curiosity does not rejoice in stale evils, but only in fresh and recent ones, gladly viewing the spectacle of tragedies of yesterday, but backward in taking part in comic and festive scenes. And so the curious person is a languid and listless hearer to the narrator of a marriage, or sacrifice, or solemn procession, he says he has heard most of all that before, bids the narrator cut it short and come to the point; but if his visitor tell him of the violation of some girl, or the adultery of some married woman, or the disputes and intended litigation of brothers, he doesn't go to sleep then, nor pretend want of leisure,

"But he p.r.i.c.ks up his ears, and asks for more."

And indeed those lines,

"Alas! how quicker far to mortals' ears Do ill news travel than the news of good!"

are truly said of curious people. For as cupping-gla.s.ses take away the worst blood, so the ears of curious people attract only the worst reports; or rather, as cities have certain ominous and gloomy gates, through which they conduct only condemned criminals, or convey filth and night soil, for nothing pure or holy has either ingress into or egress from them, so into the ears of curious people goes nothing good or elegant, but tales of murders travel and lodge there, wafting a whiff of unholy and obscene narrations.

"And ever in my house is heard alone The sound of wailing;"

this is to the curious their one Muse and Siren, this the sweetest note they can hear. For curiosity desires to know what is hidden and secret; but no one conceals his good fortune, nay sometimes people even pretend to have such advantages as they do not really possess. So the curious man, eager to hear a history of what is bad, is possessed by the pa.s.sion of malignity, which is brother to envy and jealousy. For envy is pain at another's blessings, and malignity is joy at another's misfortunes: and both proceed from the same savage and brutish vice, ill-nature.

-- VII. But so unpleasant is it to everybody to have his private ills brought to light, that many have died rather than acquaint the doctors with their secret ailments. For suppose Herophilus, or Erasistratus, or even aesculapius himself during his sojourn on earth, had gone with their drugs and surgical instruments from house to house, to inquire what man had a fistula in ano, or what woman had a cancer in her womb;--and yet their curiosity would have been professional[618]--who would not have driven them away from their house, for not waiting till they were sent for, and for coming without being asked to spy out their neighbours'