Timaeus

“ This will be sufficient defence of Aristotle, Theophrastus, Callisthenes, Ephorus, and Demochares against the attacks of Timaeus: and it is addressed to those who believe that this historian is impartial and truthful....
24. We may fairly judge Timaeus on the principles which he has himself laid down. According to him,The incapacity of Timaeus for forming a judgment. “poets and historians betray their own tastes by the incidents which they repeatedly record in their writings. ”

“ TIMAEUS (c. 345-c. 250 B.C.) , [1] Greek historian, was born at Tauromenium in Sicily. Driven out by Agathocles, he migrated to Athens, where he studied rhetoric under a pupil of Isocrates and lived for fifty years. ”

“ These thoughts, in sparkles of light, had appeared often to pious and to poetic souls; but this well-bred, all-knowing Greek geometer comes with command, gathers them all up into rank and gradation, the Euclid of holiness, and marries the two parts of nature. Before all men, he saw the intellectual values of the moral sentiment. He describes his own ideal, when he paints in Timaeus a god leading things from disorder into order. He kindled a fire so truly in the center, that we see the sphere illuminated, and can distinguish poles, equator, and lines of latitude, every arc and node ”

“ Hence, as it appears to me, Timaeus with great propriety thinks it fit that we should produce the divine genera, following the inventors of fables as sons of the gods, and subscribe to their always generating secondary natures from such as are first, though they should speak without demonstration. For this kind of discourse is not demonstrative, but entheastic, or the progeny of divine inspiration; and was invented by the ancients, not through necessity, but for the sake of persuasion, not regarding naked discipline, but sympathy with things themselves. ”

“ Just these I think which Timaeus represents Hermocrates as using.
(a) Again, in the same book, Timoleon is exhorting the Greeks to engage the Carthaginians;47Timoleon’s victory over the Carthaginians, B.C. 344. and when they are on the very point of coming to close quarters with the enemy, who are many times superior to them in number, Timaeus represents him as saying, “Do not look to the numbers of the foe, but to their cowardice. ”

“ And thus people of your class are the only ones remaining who are fitted by nature and education to take part at once both in politics and philosophy. Here is Timaeus, of Locris in Italy, a city which has admirable laws, and who is himself in wealth and rank the equal of any of his fellow-citizens; he has held the most important and honourable offices in his own state, and, as I believe, has scaled the heights of all philosophy; and here is Critias, whom every Athenian knows to be no novice in the matters of which we are speaking ”

“ Timæus the Sicilian historian (writing about 320-290 B.C.) represented the subsequent defeat of the Athenians as a divine punishment for the desecration of the Hermæ, inflicted chiefly by the Syracusan Hermokratês, son of Hermon and descendant of the god Hermes (Timæi Fragm. 103-104, ed. Didot; Longinus, de Sublim. iv, 3) . ”

“ On the same principle he judges Dionysius the tyrant because he “was always very particular in the ornamentation of his dining-couches, and had hangings of exquisite make and variegated colours.” If we apply this principle to Timaeus, we shall have abundant reason to think badly of him. In attacking others he shows great acuteness and boldness; when he comes to independent narrative he is full of dreams, miracles, incredible myths,—in a word, of miserable superstition and old wives’ tales. ”

“ Polybius’ comments upon Timaeus reach the dignity of a treatise upon history. He protests against its use for controversial pamphlets which distort the truth. “Directly a man assumes the moral attitude of an historian he ought to forget all considerations, such as love of one’s friends, hatred of one’s enemies . ”

“ Hence, though he does not admit this mode of mythologizing, yet, as is evident from what he says in the Timaeus, bethinks we ought to be persuaded by those antients who were the offspring of the gods, and to investigate their occult conceptions. Hence too, though he rejects the Saturnian bonds, and the castrations of Heaven, when discouraging with Euthyphro and the auditors of his Republic, yet in his Cratylus, when he investigates names philosophically, he admits other secondary bonds about the mighty Saturn and Pluto. ”

“ Of course he [33] can't do me any good; but it is one of the penalties that has to be paid for greatness, that one must die according to rule. No one of any repute is allowed to die in these parts without having Timæus to help him off. Yes, I will see him. And mind, Cleanor, when he has examined me have a talk with him, and make him tell you the absolute truth."
That afternoon, soon after the physician had departed, the king summoned the young Greek to his chamber. ”

“ In the first place he misrepresents Ephorus. For in truth, admirable as Ephorus is throughout his whole work, in style, treatment, and argumentative acuteness, he is never more brilliant than in his digressions and statements of his personal views: in fact, whenever he is adding anything in the shape of a commentary or a 115note. And it so happens that his most elegant and convincing digression is on this very subject of a comparison between historians and speech-writers. But Timaeus is anxious not to be thought to follow Ephorus. ”

“ Nor is it necessary to mention any names: but after Alexander’s death, in their mutual rivalries for the possession of various parts of nearly all the world, they filled a very large number of histories with the record of their glorious deeds. We may admit then that the bitter invective of the historian Timaeus against Agathocles, despot of Sicily, though it seems unmeasured, has yet some reason in it,-—for it is directed against a personal enemy, a bad man, and a tyrant ”

“ And for my part, I look upon this difference in writers as strictly analogous to the facts of everyday life. In this too it is easy to criticise our neighbours, but to be faultless ourselves is hard. One might almost say that those who are most ready at finding fault with others are most prone to errors in their own life.
(d) Besides these I may mention another error of Timaeus. Having stayed quietly at Athens for about fifty years, during which he devoted himself to the study of written history, he imagined that he was in possession of the most important means of writing it. ”

“ For science is not the summit of knowledge, but beyond it is intellect; not that intellect only which is separated from soul, but the illustration infused from thence into the soul, which Aristotle affirms to be the intellect by which we acknowledge the principles of science; and Timæus says, that this exists in no place but the soul. Ascending, therefore, to this intellect, we must contemplate together with it intelligible essence, by indivisible and simple perceptions, speculating the simple genera of beings. ”

“ But writers who have introduced into their books a good deal of such foolish talk, so far from running down others, should think themselves fortunate if they escape attack themselves. And this is just the position in which Timaeus stands.Callisthenes. He remarks that “Callisthenes was a mere sycophant for writing stuff of this sort; and acted in a manner utterly unworthy of his philosophy in giving heed to ravens and inspired women; and that he richly deserved the punishment which he met with at the hands of Alexander, for having corrupted the mind of that monarch as far as he could.” ”

“ He divides man's life into four quarters thus: "Twenty years a boy, twenty years a youth, twenty years a young man, twenty years an old man; and these four periods correspond to the four seasons, the boy to spring, the youth to summer, the young man to autumn, and the old man to winter," meaning by youth one not yet grown up and by a young man a man of mature age. According to Timaeus, he was the first to say, "Friends have all things in common" and "Friendship is equality"; indeed, his disciples did put all their possessions into one common stock. ”

“ These points being agreed upon—the wide difference between the ignorant and intentional lie, and the kindly correction due to the one and the unbending denunciation to the other—it will be found that it is to the latter charge that Timaeus more than any one lays himself open. ”

“ Timon, a lord of Athens, in the enjoyment of a princely fortune, affected a humour of liberality which knew no limits. His almost infinite wealth could not flow in so fast, but he poured it out faster upon all sorts and degrees of people. Not the poor only tasted of his bounty, but great lords did not disdain to rank themselves among his dependants and followers. His table was resorted to by all the luxurious feasters, and his house was open to all comers and goers at Athens. His large wealth combined with his free and prodigal nature to subdue all hearts to his love ”

“ Messenger All happiness to your honour!
Exit
Enter an old Athenian
Old Athenian Lord Timon, hear me speak.
TIMON Freely, good father.
Old Athenian Thou hast a servant named Lucilius.
TIMON I have so: what of him?
Old Athenian Most noble Timon, call the man before thee.
TIMON Attends he here, or no? Lucilius!
LUCILIUS Here, at your lordship's service.
Old Athenian This fellow here, Lord Timon, this thy creature,
By night frequents my house. I am a man
That from my first have been inclined to thrift;
And my estate deserves an heir more raised
Than one which holds a trencher. ”

“ ALCIBIADES. What is it, Timon?
TIMON. Promise me friendship, but perform none. If thou wilt
not
promise, the gods plague thee, for thou art man! If thou dost
perform, confound thee, for thou art a man!
ALCIBIADES. I have heard in some sort of thy miseries.
TIMON. Thou saw'st them when I had prosperity.
ALCIBIADES. I see them now; then was a blessed time.
TIMON. As thine is now, held with a brace of harlots.
TIMANDRA. Is this th' Athenian minion whom the world
Voic'd so regardfully?
TIMON. Art thou Timandra?
TIMANDRA. Yes.
TIMON. Be a whore still; they love thee not that use thee. ”

“ To speak with Timon.
Second Senator At all times alike
Men are not still the same: 'twas time and griefs
That framed him thus: time, with his fairer hand,
Offering the fortunes of his former days,
The former man may make him. Bring us to him,
And chance it as it may.
FLAVIUS Here is his cave.
Peace and content be here! Lord Timon! Timon!
Look out, and speak to friends: the Athenians,
By two of their most reverend senate, greet thee:
Speak to them, noble Timon.
TIMON comes from his cave
TIMON Thou sun, that comfort'st, burn! ”

“ Timokles prayed long and fervently. His heart went back to his beloved Alexandrian home. Heaven would be sweet, but would his dear ones ever know the only way there? Would they ever accept Jesus Christ as their Savior?
"O Lord, help Heraklas to know thee!" prayed Timokles with dropping tears.
Nothing did Timokles know of the roll of the Book of the Christians, the papyrus that had swung from the palm tree in the court at home! ”

“ Nothing I'll bear from thee,
But nakedness, thou detestable town!
Take thou that too, with multiplying bans!
Timon will to the woods; where he shall find
The unkindest beast more kinder than mankind.
The gods confound--hear me, you good gods all--
The Athenians both within and out that wall!
And grant, as Timon grows, his hate may grow
To the whole race of mankind, high and low! Amen.
Exit
SCENE II. Athens. A room in Timon's house.
Enter FLAVIUS, with two or three Servants First Servant Hear you, master steward, where's our master?
Are we undone? cast off? nothing remaining? ”

“ Accordingly, say they, we avoid some things, and we seek others, following custom in that; and we obey the laws.
Some authors have asserted, that the chief good of the Stoics is impassibility; others say that it is mildness and tranquillity.
LIFE OF TIMON.
I. Apollonides, of Nicæa, a philosopher of our school, in the first book of his Commentaries on the Silli, which he dedicated to Tiberius Cæsar, says that Timon was the son of [421] Timarchus, and a Phliasian by birth. And then, when he was young, he studied dancing, and afterwards he renounced that study, and went to Megara to Stilpo. ”

“ This was the last feast which ever Timon made, and in it he took farewell of Athens and the society of men; for, after that, he betook himself to the woods, turning his back upon the hated city and upon all mankind, wishing the walls of that detestable city might sink, and the houses fall upon their owners, wishing all plagues which infest humanity, war, outrage, poverty, diseases, might fasten upon its inhabitants, praying the just gods to confound all Athenians, both young and old, high and low ”

“ And Timotheus, who was general of the Athenians, with a very high reputation, was the son of a courtesan, a Thracian by birth, but, except that she was a courtesan, of very excellent character; for when women of this class do behave modestly, they are superior to those who give themselves airs on account of their virtue. But Timotheus being on one occasion reproached as being the son of a mother of that character, said,—"But I am much obliged to her, because it is owing to her that I am the son of Conon." ”

“ Great men should drink with harness on their throats.
TIMON.
My lord, in heart, and let the health go round.
SECOND LORD.
Let it flow this way, my good lord.
APEMANTUS.
Flow this way? A brave fellow! He keeps his tides well. Those healths will make thee and thy state look ill, Timon.
Here’s that which is too weak to be a sinner,
Honest water, which ne’er left man i’ the mire.
This and my food are equals, there’s no odds.
Feasts are too proud to give thanks to the gods.
Apemantus’ grace
Immortal gods, I crave no pelf,
I pray for no man but myself. ”