Plutarch Quomodo adolescens poetas audire debeat 12

[12] Now the bee, in accordance with nature’s laws, discovers amid the most pungent flowers and the roughest thorns the smoothest and most palatable honey; so children, if they be rightly nurtured amid poetry, will in some way or other learn to draw some wholesome and profitable doctrine even from passages that are suspect of what is base and improper. For example, Agamemnon is suspected of having, for a bribe, released from service in the army the rich man who made him a present of the mare Aetha, But, as Aristotle ² observes, he did quite right in preferring a good mare to a man of that type. For a coward, and a weakling, made dissolute by wealth and soft living, is not, I swear, worth a dog or even an ass. Again, it appears most shameful in Thetis ³ when she incites her son to pleasures and reminds him of love. But even there we must contrast Achilles’ mastery of himself, that although he is in love with Briseis, who has come back to him, and although he knows that the end of his life is near, yet he does not make haste to enjoy love’s pleasures, nor, like most men, mourn for his friend by inactivity and omission of his duties, but as he refrains from such pleasures because of his grief, so he bestirs himself in the business of his command. Again, Archilochus cannot be commended, because while grieving over his sister’s husband, who was lost at sea, he is minded to fight against his grief by means of wine and amusement; he has, however, alleged a cause that has some appearance of reason, For if he thought that he should not make matters worse by pursuing joys, yea, and festivities, how shall our present condition be any the worse if we engage in the study of philosophy or take part in public life, if we go out to the market-place or down to the Academy, or if we pursue our farming? Wherefore the corrected versions which Cleanthes and Antisthenes employed are themselves not without value. Antisthenes, observing that the Athenians had raised an uproar in the theatre at the line, at once interpolated, and Cleanthes, taking the lines about riches, Give to your friends, and when your body’s ill, Save it by spending, ⁶ rewrote them in this manner, And Zeno in amending the lines of Sophocles, rewrote it thus: by the word free as he now uses it designating the man who is fearless, high-minded, and unhumbled. What, then, is to hinder us also from encouraging the young to take the better course by means of similar rejoinders, dealing with the citations something like this: Not so, will be our retort, but

The shaft of whose desire hits what is good.

For to gain and achieve one’s wish, if what one wishes is not right, is pitiable and unenviable. Again, No, indeed, we shall say, but you must find joy and not grief if your lot be but moderate, since

Not for good and no ill came thy life from thy sire, Agamemnon;

and: No, rather is it bestial, we reply, and irrational and pitiable that a man who knows the better should be led astray by the worse as a result of a weak will and soft living.

And again: No, rather it is both character and speech, or character by means of speech, just as a horseman uses a bridle, or a helmsman uses a rudder, since virtue has no instrument so humane or so akin to itself as speech. And: But it were better to say

Where there is virtue, either suits him best,

of a truth, and there is no difference in his inclination; but the man who is influenced by pleasure or outward beauty to shift his course hither and thither is incompetent and inconstant. Again: Not so by any means, but

God’s doings make the wise to feel assured,

but they do make the silly and foolish and ungrateful to feel afraid, because such persons suspect and fear the power which is the cause and beginning of every good thing, as though it did harm. Such then is the system of amendment.

[12] Again, boys may be instructed, by reading the poets as they ought, to draw something that is useful and profitable even from those passages that are most suspected as wicked and absurd; as the bee is taught by Nature to gather the sweetest and most pleasant honey from the harshest flowers and sharpest thorns. It does indeed at the first blush cast a shrewd suspicion on Agamemnon of taking a bribe, when Homer tells us that he discharged that rich man from the wars who presented him with his fleet mare Aethe:— Yet, as saith Aristotle, it was well done of him to prefer a good beast before such a man. For, the truth is, a dog or ass is of more value than a timorous and cowardly man that wallows in wealth and luxury. Again, Thetis seems to do indecently, when she exhorts her son to follow his pleasures and minds him of companying with women. But even here, on the other side, the continency of Achilles is worthy to be considered; who, though he dearly loved Briseis—newly returned to him too,—yet, when he knew his life to be near its end, does not hasten to the fruition of pleasures, nor, when he mourns for his friend Patroclus, does he (as most men are wont) shut himself up from all business and neglect his duty, but only bars himself from recreations for his sorrow’s sake, while yet he gives himself up to action and military employments. And Archilochus is not praiseworthy either, who, in the midst of his mourning for his sister’s husband drowned in the sea, contrives to dispel his grief by drinking and merriment. And yet he gives this plausible reason to justify that practice of his, For, if he judged himself to do nothing amiss when he followed sports and banquets, sure, we shall not do worse, if in whatever circumstances we follow the study of philosophy, or manage public affairs, or go to the market or to the Academy, or follow our husbandry. Wherefore those corrections also are not to be rejected which Cleanthes and Antisthenes have made use of. For Antisthenes, seeing the Athenians all in a tumult in the theatre, and justly, upon the pronunciation of this verse,— presently subjoined this corrective, And Cleanthes, hearing this passage concerning wealth: presently altered it thus: And Zeno corrected that of Sophocles, after this manner: meaning by a free man one that is undaunted and magnanimous, and one of a spirit too great to stoop beneath itself. And why may not we also, by some such acclamations as those, call off young men to the better side, by using some things spoken by poets after the same manner? For example, it is said, To which we may reply thus: For it is an unhappy thing and not to be wished, for a man to obtain and be master of what he desires if it be inexpedient. Again this saying, we may thus invert: Again it is said, Yea, rather, say we, it is a brutish and irrational and wretched fault of ours, that when we understand better things, we are carried away to the pursuit of those which are worse, through our intemperance and effeminacy. Again, one says, Yea, rather, say we, both the speech and practice,—or the practice by the means of speech,—as the horse is managed with the bridle, and the ship with the helm. For virtue hath no instrument so suitable and agreeable to human nature to work on men withal, as that of rational discourse. Again, we meet with this character of some person: But it had been better said thus: For it is no commendation of a man’s dexterity to be tossed up and down as pleasure and beauty move him, but an argument rather of a weak and unstable disposition. Once more, this speech, is by no means to be allowed; but rather the contrary, and gives not occasion of fear to any but weak and foolish persons and such as are ungrateful to the Deity, who are apt to look on that divine power and principle which is the cause of all good with suspicion and jealousy, as being hurtful unto them. And so much for that which I call correction of poets’ sayings.