Page:Masterpieces of Greek Literature (1902).djvu/475

445 TIMON OF ATHENS. ACT III 445

a lover of truth, a lover of beauty, and a lover of simplicity, and whatever else has to do with loving. Albeit, very few are Avorthy of this profession, while those ranged under the opposite head and better suited to be objects of one's hate, are legion. I am, therefore, in danger of soon for- getting the former art for want of practice, but am likely to attain a thorough understanding of this latter. . . . My practice, however, is of this sort — namely, to hate the bad, and praise and love the good."

This impartiality and ability to see all sides of a ques- tion made his work of real value in his own time and of real interest in ours. His works have been copied and imi- tated by satirists from Rabelais down to the present day, but he still stands unapproached in his own field, at the side of his great predecessor Aristophanes.

The following passages are quoted by the kind permission of their translator, TVinthrop Dudley Sheldon, Vice-Presi- dent of Girard Collecre.

TIMON OF ATHENS. 1 ACT m

Scene I. — A desert place. Timon digs up the treasure. The false friends of former days — Gnathonides, Philiades, Demeas, Thrasycles, Blepsias, Laches, and Gniphon, and a crowd of others — hear of his good fortune and hasten to greet him.

Timon (jalone). Come now, Ο mattock, take coiarage for the nonce, I pray you, and don't tire of calling Thesaurus forth from the depths into the light. (^The strokes of his mattock suddenly revealing the treasure.^ Ο Zeus, god of marvels, and ye beloved priests of Cybele, and Hermes, bestower of treasure trove — whence comes so much gold ? Can it be that it 's a dream? At any rate, I 'm afraid I shall

^ Timon the Misanthrope appears first in Aristophanes. He is best known to the modem world through Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.