The priests here pushed the donkey off the precipice, which proved to be
only about two feet high, the gulf below being an illusion arranged with
the aid of lights that shone through apertures in the wall.
These pleasing little diversions Pythagoras afterward introduced into
the college which he founded, so to teach the merry freshmen that
nothing, at the last, was as bad as it seemed, and that most dangers are
simply illusions.
The Egyptians grew to have such regard for Pythagoras that he was given
every opportunity to know the inmost secrets of the mysteries. He said
he encompassed them all, save those alone which were incomprehensible.
This was probably true.
The years spent in Egypt were not wasted--he learned astronomy,
mathematics, and psychology, a thing then not named, but pretty well
understood--the management of men.
It was twenty years before Pythagoras returned to Samos. His mother was
dead, so she passed away in ignorance of the secrets of the gods--which
perhaps was just as well.
Samos now treated Pythagoras with great honor.
Crowds flocked to his lectures, presents were given him, royalty paid
him profound obeisance.
But Samos soon tired of Pythagoras. He was too austere, too severe; and
when he began to rebuke the officials for their sloth and indifference,
he was invited to go elsewhere and teach his science of life. And so he
journeyed into Southern Italy, and at Crotona built his Temple to the
Muses and founded the Pythagorean School. He was the wisest as well as
the most learned man of his time.
* * * * *
Some unkind person has said that Pythagoras was the original charter
member of the Jesuits Society. The maxim that the end justifies the
means was the cornerstone of Egyptian theology. When Pythagoras left
Egypt he took with him this cornerstone as a souvenir. That the priests
could hold their power over the masses only through magic and miracle
was fully believed, and as a good police system the value of organized
religion was highly appreciated. In fact, no ruler could hold his place,
unsupported by the priest. Both were divine propositions. One searches
in vain for simple truth among the sages, solons, philosophers, poets
and prophets that existed down to the time of Socrates. Truth for
truth's sake was absolutely unimagined; freethought was unguessed.
Expediency was always placed before truth.
Truth was furnished with frills--the people otherwise would not be
impressed. Chants, robes, ritual, processions, banging of bells, burning
of incense, strange sounds, sights and smells: these were considered
necessary factors in teaching divine truth.
To worship with a noise seems to us a little like making love with a
brass band.
Pythagoras was a very great man, but for him to eliminate theological
chaff entirely was impossible. So we find that when he was about to
speak, red fire filled the building as soon as he arose. It was all a
little like the alleged plan of the late Reverend T. DeWitt Talmage,
who used to have an Irishman let loose a white pigeon from the
organ-loft at an opportune time.
When Pythagoras burned the red fire, of course the audience thought a
miracle was taking place, unable to understand a simple stage-trick
which all the boys in the gallery who delight in "Faust" now understand.
However, the Pythagorean School had much virtue on its side, and made a
sincere and earnest effort to solve certain problems that yet are vexing
us.
The Temple of the Muses, built by Pythagoras at Crotona, is described by
Iamblichus as a stone structure with walls twenty feet thick, the light
being admitted only from the top. It was evidently constructed after the
Egyptian pattern, and the intent was to teach there the esoteric
doctrine. But Pythagoras improved upon the Egyptian methods and opened
his temple on certain days to all and any who desired to come. Then at
times he gave lectures to women only, and then to men only, and also to
children, thus showing that modern revival methods are not wholly
modern.
These lectures contain the very essence of Pythagorean philosophy, and
include so much practical commonsense that they are still quoted. These
are some of the sayings that impressed Socrates, Pericles, Aristotle and
Pliny. What the Egyptians actually taught we really do not know--it was
too gaseous to last. Only the good endures. Says Pythagoras:
Cut not into the grape. Exaltation coming from wine is not good.
You hope too much in this condition, so are afterwards depressed.
Wise men are neither cast down in defeat nor exalted by success.
Eat moderately, bathe plentifully, exercise much in the open air,
walk far, and climb the hills alone.
Above all things, learn to keep silence--hear all and speak little.
If you are defamed, answer not back. Talk convinces no one. Your
life and character proclaim you more than any argument you can put
forth. Lies return to plague those who repeat them.
The secret of power is to keep an even temper, and remember that no
one thing that can happen is of much moment. The course of justice,
industry, courage, moderation, silence, means that you shall
receive your due of every good thing. The gods may be slow, but
they never forget.
It is not for us to punish men nor avenge ourselves for slights,
wrongs and insults--wait, and you will see that Nemesis unhorses
the man intent on calumny.
A woman's ornaments should be modesty, simplicity, truth,
obedience. If a woman would hold a man captive she can only do it
by obeying him. Violent women are even more displeasing to the gods
than violent men--both are destroying themselves. Strife is always
defeat.
Debauchery, riot, splendor, luxury, are attempts to get a pleasure
out of life that is not our due, and so Nemesis provides her
penalty for the idle and gluttonous.
Fear and honor the gods. They guide our ways and watch over us in
our sleep. After the gods, a man's first thought should be of his
father and mother. Next to these his wife, then his children.
So great was this power of Pythagoras over the people that many of the
women who came, hearing his discourse on the folly of pride and
splendor, threw off their cloaks, and left them with their rings,
anklets and necklaces on the altar.
With these and other offerings Pythagoras built another temple, this
time to Apollo, and the Temple to the Muses was left open all the time
for the people.
His power over the multitude alarmed the magistrates, so they sent for
him to examine him as to his influence and intents. He explained to them
that as the Muses were never at variance among themselves, always living
in subjection to Apollo, so should magistrates agree among themselves
and think only of being loyal to the king. All royal edicts and laws are
reflections of divine law, and therefore must be obeyed without
question. And as the Muses never interrupt the harmony of Heaven, but in
fact add to it, so should men ever keep harmony among themselves.
All officers of the government should consider themselves as runners in
the Olympian games, and never seek to trip, jostle, harass or annoy a
rival, but run the race squarely and fairly, satisfied to be beaten if
the other is the stronger and better man. An unfair victory gains only
the anger of the gods.
All disorders in the State come from ill education of the young.
Children not brought up to be patient, to endure, to work, to be
considerate of their elders and respectful to all, grow diseased minds
that find relief at last in anarchy and rebellion. So to take great care
of children in their infancy, and then leave them at puberty to follow
their own inclinations, is to sow disorder. Children well loved and kept
close to their parents grow up into men and women who are an ornament to
the State and a joy to the gods. Lawless, complaining, restless, idle
children grieve the gods and bring trouble upon their parents and
society.
The magistrates were here so pleased, and satisfied in their own minds
that Pythagoras meant the State no harm, that they issued an order that
all citizens should attend upon his lectures at least once a week, and
take their wives and children with them.
They also offered to pay Pythagoras--that is, put him on the payroll as
a public teacher--but he declined to accept money for his services. In
this, Iamblichus says, he was very wise, since by declining a fixed fee,
ten times as much was laid upon the altar of the Temple of the Muses,
and not knowing to whom to return it, Pythagoras was obliged to keep it
for himself and the poor.
* * * * *
Churchmen of the Middle Ages worked the memory of Pythagoras great
injustice by quoting him literally in order to prove how much they were
beyond him. Symbols and epigrams require a sympathetic hearer, otherwise
they are as naught.
For instance, Pythagoras remarks, "Sit thou not down upon a bushel
measure." What he probably meant was, get busy and fill the measure with
grain rather than use it for a seat.
"Eat not the heart"--do not act so as to harrow the feelings of your
friends, and do not be morbid.
"Never stir the fire with a sword"--do not inflame people who are
wrathful.
"Wear not the image of God upon your jewelry"--do not make religion a
proud or boastful thing.
"Help men to a burden, but never unburden them." This saying was used by
Saint Francis to prove that the pagan philosophers had no tenderness,
and that the humanities came at a later date. We can now easily
understand that to relieve men of responsibilities is no help; rather do
we grow strong by carrying burdens.
"Leave not the mark of the pot upon the ashes"--wipe out the past,
forget it, look to the future.
"Feed no animal that has crooked claws"--do not encourage rogues by
supplying them a living.
"Eat no fish whose fins are black"--have nothing to do with men whose
deeds are dark.
"Always have salt upon your table"--this seems the original of "cum
grano salis" of the Romans.
"Leave the vinegar at a distance"--keep sweet.
"Speak not in the face of the sun"--even Erasmus thought this referred
to magic. To us it is quite reasonable to suppose that it meant, "do not
talk too much in public places."
"Pick not up what falls from the table"--Plutarch calls this
superstition, but we can just as easily suppose it was out of
consideration for cats, dogs or hungry men. The Bible has a command
against gleaning too closely, and leaving nothing for the traveler.
"When making sacrifice, never pare your nails"--that is to say, do one
thing at a time: wind not the clock at an inopportune time.
"Eat not in the chariot"--when you travel, travel.
"Feed not yourself with your left hand"--get your living openly and
avoid all left-handed dealings.
And so there are hundreds of these Pythagorean sayings that have vexed
our classic friends for over two thousand years. All Greek scholars who
really pride themselves on their scholarship have taken a hand at them,
and agitated the ether just as the members of the Kokomo Woman's Club
discuss obscure passages in Bliss Carman or Ella Wheeler Wilcox. Learned
people are apt to comprehend anything but the obvious.
* * * * *
The School of Pythagoras grew until it became the chief attraction of
Crotona. The size of the town was doubled through the pilgrims who came
to study music, mathematics, medicine, ethics and the science of
government.
The Pythagorean plan of treating the sick by music was long considered
as mere incantation, but there is a suspicion now that it was actual
science. Once there was a man who rode a hobby all his life; and long
after he was dead, folks discovered it was a real live horse and had
carried the man long miles.
Pythagoras reduced the musical scale to a mathematical science. In
astronomy he anticipated Copernicus, and indeed, it was cited as the
chief offense of Copernicus that he had borrowed from a pagan.
Copernicus, it seems, set the merry churchmen digging into Greek
literature to find out just how bad Pythagoras was. This did the
churchmen good, but did not help the cause of Copernicus.
Pythagoras for a time sought to popularize his work, but he soon found
to his dismay that he was attracting cheap and unworthy people, who came
not so much out of a love of learning as to satisfy a morbid curiosity
and gain a short cut to wisdom. They wanted secrets, and knowing that
Pythagoras had spent twenty years in Egypt, they came to him, hoping to
get them.
Said Pythagoras, "He who digs, always finds." At another time, he put
the same idea reversely, thus, "He who digs not, never finds."
Pythagoras was well past forty when he married a daughter of one of the
chief citizens of Crotona. It seems that, inspired by his wife, who was
first one of his pupils and then a disciple, he conceived a new mode of
life, which he thought would soon overthrow the old manner of living.
Pythagoras himself wrote nothing, but all his pupils kept tablets, and
Athens in the century following Pythagoras was full of these Pythagorean
notebooks, and these supply us the scattered data from which his life
was written.
Pythagoras, like so many other great men, had his dream of Utopia: it
was a college or, literally, "a collection of people," where all were on
an equality. Everybody worked, everybody studied, everybody helped
everybody, and all refrained from disturbing or distressing any one. It
was the Oneida Community taken over by Brook Farm and fused into a
religious and scientific New Harmony by the Shakers.
One smiles to see the minute rules that were made for the guidance of
the members. They look like a transcript from a sermon by John Alexander
Dowie, revised by the shade of Robert Owen.
This Pythagorean Community was organized out of a necessity in order to
escape the blow-ins who sailed across from Greece intent on some new
thing, but principally to get knowledge and a living without work.
And so Pythagoras and his wife formed a close corporation. For each
member there was an initiation, strict and severe, the intent of which
was absolutely to bar the transient triflers. Each member was to turn
over to the Common Treasury all the money and goods he had of every kind
and quality. They started naked, just as did Pythagoras when he stood at
the door of the temple in Egypt.
Simplicity, truth, honesty and mutual service were to govern. It was an
outcrop of the monastic impulse, save that women were admitted, also.
Unlike the Egyptians, Pythagoras believed now in the equality of the
sexes, and his wife daily led the women's chorus, and she also gave
lectures. The children were especially cared for by women set apart as
nurses and teachers. By rearing perfect children, it was hoped and
expected to produce in turn a perfect race.
The whole idea was a phase of totemism and tabu.
That it flourished for about thirty years is very certain. Two sons and
a daughter of Pythagoras grew to maturity in the college, and this
daughter was tried by the Order on the criminal charge of selling the
secret doctrines of her father to outsiders.
One of the sons it seems made trouble, also, in an attempt to usurp his
father's place and take charge of affairs, as "next friend." One
generation is about the limit of a Utopian Community. When those who
have organized the community weaken and one by one pass away, and the
young assume authority, the old ideas of austerity are forgotten and
dissipation and disintegration enter. So do we move in circles.
The final blow to the Pythagorean College came through jealousy and
misunderstanding of the citizens outside. It was the old question of
Town versus Gown. The Pythagoreans numbered nearly three hundred people.
They held themselves aloof, and no doubt had an exasperating pride. No
strangers were ever allowed inside the walls--they were a law unto
themselves.
Internal strife and tales told by dissenters excited the curiosity, and
then the prejudice, of the townspeople.
Then the report got abroad that the Pythagoreans were collecting arms
and were about to overthrow the local government and enslave the
officials.
On a certain night, led by a band of drunken soldiers, a mob made an
assault upon the college. The buildings were fired, and the members were
either destroyed in the flames or killed as they rushed forth to escape.
Tradition has it that Pythagoras was later seen by a shepherd on the
mountains, but the probabilities are that he perished with his people.
But you can not dispose of a great man by killing him. Here we are
reading, writing and talking yet of Pythagoras.
[Illustration: PLATO]