Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/100

78 badly: For like as he gave commandment to his boy for to keep away natural and living cocks, indeed, far enough off from his pictures; so a flatterer will do what he can to chase away true friends, and not suffer them to approach near; or if he be not able so to do, then openly and in public place he will seem to curry favour with them, to honour and admire them, as far better than himself; but secretly, underhand, and behind their backs, he will not let to raise some privy calumniations, and sow slanderous reports tending to their discredit: but if he see that by such privy girds and pinches which will fret and gall the sore, he cannot at the first bring his purpose about: yet he remembreth full well and observeth the saying of Medius.

This Medius was the chief captain of the troupe, or the master rather of the quire (if I may so say) of all those flatterers that used the court of King Alexander the Great, and came about his person; the principal sophister also that opposed himself and banded against all good men, and never rested to slander and backbite them: This rule and lesson he taught his scholars and quiristers that were under his hand. To cast out slanders boldly, and not to spare, therewith to bite others: For (quoth he) although the sore may heal up again, yet the scar will remain and be ever seen. By these cicatrices and scars of false imputations, or (to speaic more properly and truly) by such gangrenes and cankerous ulcers as these, Alexander the king being corroded and eaten, did to death Callisthenes, Parmenion, and Philotas, his fast and faithful friends: but to such as Agnon, Bagoas, Agesias and Demetrius were, he abandoned and gave himself wholly to be supplanted and overthrown at their pleasure, whiles he was by them adored, adorned, arrayed gorgeously with rich robes, and set out like a barbarian image, statue or idol. Lo, what is the force and power of flattery to win grace and favour; and namely in those who would be reputed the mightiest monarches and greatest potentates of the world, it beareth most sway: For such are persuaded, and desirous also, that the best things should be in themselves; and this is it that giveth both credit and also boldness unto a flatterer. True it is, I must confess, that the highest places and forts situate upon the loftiest mounts, are least accessible and most hard to be gained by those who would surprise and force them; but where there is an high spirit and haughty mind by nature, not guided by sound judgment of reason, but lifted up with the favours of fortune, or nobility of birth, it is the easiest matter in the world even for most base and vile persons