Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/424

 402 HISTORY OF GREECE. bodily temperament contributed materially to facilitate such u purpose, and assist him in the maintenance of that self-mastery, contented self-sufficiency, and independence of the favor 1 as well as of the enmity of others, which were essential to his plan of intellectual life. His friends, who communicate to us his great bodily strength and endurance, are at the same time full of jests upon his ugly physiognomy ; his flat nose, thick lips, and prom- inent eyes, like a satyr, or silenus. 9 Nor can we implicitly trust the evidence of such very admiring witnesses, as to the philosopher's exemption from infirmities of temper ; for there seems good proof that he was by natural temperament violently irascible ; a defect which he generally kept under severe control, but which occasionally betrayed him into great improprieties of language and demeanor. 3 Of those friends, the best known to us are Xenophon and Plato, though there existed in antiquity various dialogues com- nounced virtue to be self-sufficient for conferring happiness, was obliged to add that the strength and vigor of Sokrates were required as a farther condition : avrapKi] ryv upertjv Trpbf evdat/j.oviav, [iTjdevde Ttpoadeofievijv on pi T^f ZuKpaTiKJjc lax v f > Winckelman, Antisthen. Fragment, p. 47 ; Diog. Laert. vi, 11. 1 See his reply to the invitation of Archelaus, king of Macedonia, indi- cating the repugnance to accept favors which he could not return (Aristot. Rhetor, ii, 24). 2 Plato, Sympos. c. 32, p. 215, A; Xenoph. Sympos. c. 5 ; Plato. Thcaetet. p. 143, D. 3 This is one of the traditions which Aristoxenus, the disciple of Aris- totle, heard from his father Spintharus, who had been in personal commu- nication with Sokrates. See the Fragments of Aristoxenus, Fragm. 27, 28 ; ap. Frag. Hist. Graec. p. 280, ed. Didot. It appears to me that Frag. 28 contains the statement of what Aristox- enus really said about the irascibility of Sokrates ; while the expressions of Fragm. 27, ascribed to that author by Plutarch, are unmeasured. Fragm. 28 also substantially contradicts Fragm. 26, in which Diogenes asserts, on the authority of Aristoxenus, what is not to be believed, even if Aristoxenus had asserted it, that Sokrates made a regular trade of his teaching, and collected perpetual contributions : see Xenoph. Memor. i, 2, 6 ; i, 5, 6. I see no reason for the mistrust with which Preller (Hist. Philosophic, c r, p. 139) and Hitter (Geschich. d. Philos. vol. ii, ch. 2, p. 1! ) regard tha general testimony of Aristoxcims about Sokrates.