by Plautus
MEGARONIDES
What say you as to the young man, who you see to be thus profligate, and who has been entrusted to your care and confidence? Why do you not reform him? Why do you not train him to frugal habits? It would have been somewhat more just for you to give attention to that matter, if you could have somehow made him a better man, and not for you yourself to be a party to the same disreputable conduct, and share your dishonour with his disgrace?
CALLICLES
What have I done?
MEGARONIDES
That which a bad man would do.
CALLICLES
That is no name of mine.
MEGARONIDES
Have you not bought this house from that young man? A pause. Why are you silent? This, where you yourself are now living. He points to the house of CHARMIDES.
CALLICLES
I did buy it, and I gave the money for it, — forty minæ, to the young man himself, into his own hand.
MEGARONIDES
You gave the money, do you say?
CALLICLES
’Twas done; and I am not sorry ’twas done.
MEGARONIDES
I’ faith — a young man committed to untrusty keeping. Have you not by these means given him a sword with which to slay himself? For, prithee, what else is it, your giving ready money to a young man who loves women, and weak in intellect, with which to complete his edifice of folly which he had already commenced?
CALLICLES
Ought I not to have paid him the money?
MEGARONIDES
You ought not to have paid him; nor ought you either to have bought anything of or sold anything to him; nor should you have provided him with the means of becoming worse. Have you not taken in the person who was entrusted to you? Have you not driven out of his house the man who entrusted him to you? By my faith, a pretty trust, and a faithful guardianship! Leave him to take care of himself; he would manage his own affairs much better.
CALLICLES
You overpower me, Megaronides, with your accusations, in a manner so strange, that what was privately entrusted to my secrecy, fidelity, and constancy, for me to tell it to no one, nor make it public, the same I am now compelled to entrust to you.
MEGARONIDES
Whatever you shall entrust to me, you shall take up the same where you have laid it down.
CALLICLES
Look round you, then, that no overlooker may be near us MEGARONIDES looks on every side ; and look around every now and then, I beg of you.
MEGARONIDES
I am listening if you have aught to say.
CALLICLES
If you will be silent, I will speak. At the time when Charmides set out hence for foreign parts, he showed me a treasure in this house, here in a certain closet —— He starts as if he hears a noise. But do look around.
MEGARONIDES
There is no one.
CALLICLES
Of Philippean pieces to the number of three thousand. Alone with myself, in tears, he entreated me, by our friendship and by my honour, not to entrust this to his son, nor yet to any one, from whom that might come to his knowledge. Now, if he comes back hither safe, I will restore to him his own. But if anything should happen to him, at all events I have a stock from which to give a marriage-portion to his daughter, who has been entrusted to me, that I may settle her in a condition of life that befits her.
MEGARONIDES
O ye immortal gods! how soon, in a few words, you have made another man of me; I came to you quite a different person. But, as you have begun, proceed further to inform me.
CALLICLES
What shall I tell you? How that this worthless fellow had almost utterly ruined his caution and my own trustiness and all the secret.
MEGARONIDES
How so?
CALLICLES
Because, while I was in the country for only six days, in my absence and without my knowledge, without consulting me, he advertised with bills this house for sale.
MEGARONIDES
The wolf hungered the more, and opened his mouth the wider; he watched till the dog went to sleep; and intended to carry off the whole entire flock.
CALLICLES
I’ faith, he would have done it, if the dogs had not perceived this in time. But now, in my turn, I wish to ask you this: let me know what it was my duty for me to do. Whether was it right for me to discover the treasure to him, against which very thing his father had cautioned me, or should I have permitted another person to become the owner of this house? Ought that money to have belonged to him who bought the house? In preference, I myself bought the house; I gave the money for the sake of the treasure, that I might deliver it safe to my friend. I have not, then, bought this house either for myself or for my own use; for Charmides have I bought it back again; from my own store have I paid the money. This, whether it has been done rightfully or wrongfully, I own, Megaronides, that I have done. Here, then, are my misdeeds; here, then, is my avarice. Is it for these things that they spread false reports against me?
MEGARONIDES
Stay — you have overcome your corrector. You have tied my tongue; there is nothing for me to say in answer.
CALLICLES
Now I entreat you to aid me with your assistance and counsel, and to share this duty of mine in common with me.
MEGARONIDES
I promise you my assistance.
CALLICLES
Where, then, will you be a short time hence?
MEGARONIDES
At home.
CALLICLES
Do you wish anything else?
MEGARONIDES
Attend to the trust reposed in you.
CALLICLES
That is being carefully done.
MEGARONIDES
But how say you —— ?
CALLICLES
What do you want?
MEGARONIDES
Where is the young man living now?
CALLICLES
This back part of the building he retained when he sold the house.
MEGARONIDES
That I wanted to know. Now, then, go at once. But what say you, where is the damsel now? She is at your house, I suppose?
CALLICLES
She is so; I take care of her almost as much as of my own daughter.
MEGARONIDES
You act properly.
CALLICLES
Before I go away, are you going to ask me anything else?
MEGARONIDES
Farewell. Exit CALLICLES. Really, there is nothing more foolish or more stupid, nothing more lying or indeed more tattling, more self-conceited or more forsworn, than those men of this city everlastingly gossiping about, whom they call Busybodies. And thus have I enlisted myself in their ranks together with them; who have been the swallower of the false tales of those who pretend that they know everything, and yet know nothing. They know, forsooth, what each person either has in his mind, or is likely to have; they know what the king whispered in the ear of the queen; they know what Juno talked about in conversation with Jupiter; that which neither is nor is likely to be, do these fellows know. Whether they praise or dispraise any one they please, falsely or truly, they care not a straw, so they know that which they choose to know. All people were in the habit of saying that this Callicles was unworthy of this state, and, himself, to exist, who had despoiled this young man of his property. From the reports of these tale-bearers, in my ignorance I rushed forward to rebuke my guiltless friend. But if the authority was always required from the foundation, upon which they speak of anything they have heard, unless that clearly appeared, the matter ought to be to the peril and loss of the tale-bearer. If this were so, it would be for the public benefit. I would cause those to be but few, who now that which they do not know, and I would make them have their silly chattering more restricted. (Exit.)
ACT II.
Enter LYSITELES.
LYSITELES
I am revolving many things in my mind at once, and much uneasiness d
o I find in thinking upon them. I tease, and fret, and wear myself out; a mind that enjoins a hard task is now my master. But this thing is not clear to me, nor has it been enough studied by me, which pursuit of these two I should rather follow for myself; which of the two I should think of the greater stability for passing my life therein: whether it were preferable for me to devote myself to love or to aggrandisement; in which alternative there is more enjoyment of life in passing one’s days. On this point I am not fully satisfied. But this I think I’ll do, that I may weigh both the points together, I must be both judge and culprit in this trial: I’ll do so — I like it much. First of all, I will enlarge upon the pursuits of love, how they conduce to one’s welfare. Love never expects any but the willing man to throw himself in his toils; these he seeks for, these he follows up, and craftily counsels against their interests. He is a fawning flatterer, a rapacious grappler, a deceiver, a sweet-tooth, a spoiler, a corrupter of men who court retirement, a pryer into secrets. For he that is in love, soon as ever he has been smitten with the kisses of the object that he loves, forthwith his substance vanishes out of doors and melts away. “Give me this thing, my honey, if you love me, if you possibly can.” And then this gudgeon says: “O apple of my eye, be it so: both that shall be given you, and still more, if you wish it to be given.” Then does she strike while he is wavering; and now she begs for more. Not enough is this evil, unless there is still something more — what to eat, what to drink. A thing that creates a further expense, the favour of a night is granted; a whole family is then introduced for her — a wardrobe-woman a perfume-keeper, a cofferer, fan-bearers, sandal-bearers, singing-girls, casket-keepers, messengers, news-carriers, so many wasters of his bread and substance. The lover himself, while to them he is complaisant, becomes a beggar. When I revolve these things in my mind, and when I reflect how little one is valued when he is in need; away with you, Love — I like you not — no converse do I hold with you. Although ’tis sweet to feast and to carouse, Love still gives bitters enough to be distasteful. He avoids the Courts of justice, he drives away your relations, and drives yourself away from your own contemplation. Nor do men wish that he should be called their friend. In a thousand ways is Love to be held a stranger, to be kept at a distance, and to be wholly abstained from. For he who plunges into love, perishes more dreadfully than if he leapt from a rock. Away with you, Love, if you please; keep your owns property to yourself. Love, never be you a friend of mine; some there are, however, whom, in their misery, you may keep miserable and wretched — those whom you have easily rendered submissive to yourself. My fixed determination is to apply my mind to my advancement in life, although, in that, great labour is undergone by the mind. Good men wish these things for themselves, gain, credit, and honour, glory, and esteem; these are the rewards of the upright. It delights me, then, the more, to live together with the upright rather than with the deceitful promulgators of lies.
Enter PHILTO.
PHILTO
looking about . Where has this man betaken himself out of doors from the house?
LYSITELES
coming up to him . I am here, father; command me what you will, and I shall cause no delay to you, nor will I hide myself in any skulking-place out of your sight.
PHILTO
You will be doing what is consonant to the rest of your conduct if you reverence your father. By your duty to me, my son, I wish you, for my sake, not to hold any converse with profligate men, either in the street or in the Forum. I know this age — what its manners are. The bad man wishes the good man to be bad, that he may be like himself. The wicked, the rapacious, the covetous, and the envious, disorder and confound the morals of the age: a crew gaping for gain, they hold the sacred thing as profane — the public advantage as the private emolument. At these things do I grieve, these are the matters that torment me. These things am I constantly repeating both day and night, that you may use due precaution against them. They only deem it right to keep their hands off that which they cannot touch with their hands; as to the rest, seize it, carry it off, keep it, be off and go hide, that is the word with them. These things, when I behold them, draw tears from me, because I have survived to see such a race of men. Why have I not rather descended to the dead ere this? For these men praise the manners of our ancestors, and defile those same persons whom they commend. With regard, then, to these pursuits, I enjoin you not to taint your disposition with them. Live after my fashion, and according to the ancient manners; what I am prescribing to you, the same do you remember and practise. I have no patience with these fashionable manners, upsetting preconceived notions, with which good men are now disgracing themselves. If you follow these my injunctions to you, many a good maxim will take root in your breast.
LYSITELES
From my earliest youth, even up to this present age, I have always, father, paid all submission to the injunctions you have given. So far as my nature was concerned, I considered that I was free; so far as your injunctions were concerned, I deemed it proper that my mind should pay all submission to you.
PHILTO
The man who is struggling with his inclination from his earliest age, whether he ought to prefer to be so, as his inclination thinks it proper that he should be, or whether, rather so as his parents and his relations wish him to be — if his inclination conquers that man, it is all over with him; he is the slave of his inclination and not of himself. But if he conquers his inclination, he truly lives and shall be famed as a conqueror of conquerors. If you have conquered your inclination rather than your inclination you, you have reason to rejoice. ’Tis better by far that you should be such as you ought to be, than such as pleases your inclination. Those who conquer the inclination will ever be esteemed better men than those whom the inclination subdues.
LYSITELES
I have ever esteemed these maxims as the shield of my youthful age; never to betake myself to any place where vice was the order of the day, never to go to stroll about at night, nor to take from another that which is his. I have taken all precautions, my father, that I might not cause you uneasiness; I have ever kept your precepts in due preservation by my own rule of conduct.
PHILTO
And do you reproach me, because you have acted aright? For yourself have you done so, not for me: my life, indeed, is nearly past; this matter principally concerns your own. Keep on overlaying good deeds with other good deeds, that the rain may not come through. He is the upright man who is not content with it, however upright and however honest he may chance to be. He who readily gives satisfaction to himself, is not the upright man, nor is he really honest: he who thinks but meanly of himself, in him is there a tendency to well-doing.
LYSITELES
For this reason, father, I have thought that since there is a certain thing that I wish for, I would request it of you.
PHILTO
What is it? I am already longing to give assent.
LYSITELES
A young man here, of noble family, my friend and years’ mate, who has managed his own affairs but heedlessly and unthinkingly — I wish, father, to do him a service, if you are not unwilling.
PHILTO
From your own means, I suppose?
LYSITELES
From my own means — for what is yours is mine, and all mine is yours.
PHILTO
What is he doing? Is he in want?
LYSITELES
He is in want.
PHILTO
Had he property?
LYSITELES
He had.
PHILTO
How did he lose it? Was he connected with public business, or with commercial matters? Had he merchandise or wares to sell, when he lost his property?
LYSITELES
None of these.
PHILTO
What then?
LYSITELES
I’ faith, my father, by his good-nature. Besides, to indulge his tastes, he wasted some part of it in luxury.
PHILTO
By my trot
h now! a fellow spoken of boldly, and as on familiar terms; — one, indeed, who has never dissipated his fortune by any good means, and is now in want. I cannot brook that, with qualities of that description, he should be your friend.
LYSITELES
’Tis because he is without any bad disposition that I wish to relieve his wants.
PHILTO
He deserves ill of a beggar who gives him what to eat or to drink; for he both loses that which he gives and prolongs for the other a life of misery. I do not say this because I am unwilling and would not readily do what you desire; but when I apply these expressions to that same person, I am warning you beforehand, so to have compassion on others, that others may not have to pity you.
LYSITELES
I am ashamed to desert him, and to deny him aid in his adversity.
PHILTO
I’ troth, shame is preferable to repentance by just as many letters as it consists of.
LYSITELES
In good sooth, father, by the care of the Gods, and of my forefathers, and your own, I may say that we possess much property, honestly obtained. If you do a service to a friend, it ought not to make you repent that you have done so; it ought rather to cause you shame if you do not do it.
PHILTO
If from great wealth you subtract something, does it become more or less?
LYSITELES
Less, father. But do you know what is wont to be repeated to the niggardly citizen? “That which thou hast mayst thou not have, and mayst thou have that misfortune which thou hast not; since thou canst neither endure it to be enjoyed by thyself nor by another.”
PHILTO
I know, indeed, that so it usually is: but, my son, he is the truly niggardly man that has nought with which to pay his dues.
LYSITELES
By the care of the Gods, we have, father, both enough for us to enjoy ourselves, and with which to do kind offices to kind-hearted men.