Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/289

 DION. 281 tue boys tied him by his lame leg, and so drew him thiough the streets, while the S}Tacusans stood by laugh- ing and jesting at the sight of that very man thus tied and dragged about by the leg, who had told Dionysius, that, so far from flj'ing on horseback from Syracuse, he ought to wait tiU he should be dragged out by the heels. Philistus, however, has stated, that this was said to Dionysius by another, and not by himself. Timaeus avails himself of this advantage, which Phihs- tus truly enough afifoi'ds against himself in his zealous and constant adherence to the tyranny, to vent his o'ttii spleen and malice against him. They, indeed, who were injured by him at the time are perhaps excusable, if they carried their resentment to the length of indignities to his dead body; but they who write history afterwards, and were noway wi'onged by him in his lifetime, and have received assistance from his writings, in honor should not with opprobrious and scurrilous language upbraid him for those misfortunes, which may well enough befall even the best of men. On the other side, Ephorus is as much out of the way in his encomiums. For, however ingenious he is in supplying imjust acts and wicked con- duct with fair and worthy motives, and in selecting decorous and honorable terms, yet when he does his best, he does not himself stand clear of the charge of being the greatest lover of tj'rants, and the fondest admirer of luxury and power and rich estates and alliances of mar- riage with absolute princes. He that neither praises Philistus for his conduct, nor insults over his misfortunes, seems to me to take the fittest com'se. After Philistus's death, Dionysius sent to Dion, offering to surrender the castle, all the arms, provisions, and garrison-soldiers, with full pay for them for five months, demanding in return that he miu;ht have safe conduct to go unmolested into Italy, and there to continue, and alsc