BOOK XII

CRITICISM OF TIMAEUS

+1.+ Byzacia is near the Syrtes; it has a circumference of two thousand

stades, and is circular in shape....

Hippo, Singa, Tabraca, are cities in Libya. Chalkeia, however, is not,

as Demosthenes ignorantly states, the name of a city, but means only a

“bronze-factory.” ...

[Sidenote: The lotus. See Herodotus, 2, 92.]

+2.+ The lotus is not a large tree; but it is rough and thorny, and has

a green leaf, like the rhamnus (black or white thorn), a little longer

and broader. The fruit is like white myrtle-berries when they are come

to perfection; but, as it grows, it becomes purple in colour, and in

size about equal to round olives, and has a very small stone. When it

is ripe they gather it: and some of it they pound up with groats of

spelt, and store in vessels for their slaves; and the rest they also

preserve for the free inhabitants, after taking out the stones, and use

it for food. It tastes like a fig or a date, but is superior to them in

aroma. A wine is made of it also by steeping it in water and crushing

it, sweet and pleasant to the taste, like good mead; and they drink it

without mixing it with water. It will not keep, however, more than ten

days, and they therefore only make it in small quantities as they want

it. Vinegar also is made out of it....

[Sidenote: Misstatements of Timaeus about Libya,]

+3.+ The excellence of the soil of Libya must excite our admiration.

But one would feel inclined to say of Timaeus, not merely that he

had never studied the country, but that he was childish and entirely

unintelligent in his notions; completely enslaved to those old

traditional stories of Libya being wholly sandy, parched, and barren.

The same too holds good about its animals. The supply of horses, oxen,

sheep, and goats in it is beyond anything to be found in any other part

of the world; because many of the tribes in Libya do not use cultivated

crops, but live on and with their flocks and herds. Again what writer

has failed to mention the vast number and strength of its elephants,

lions, and panthers, or the beauty of its buffalos, or the size of its

ostriches? Of these not one is to be found in Europe, while Libya is

full of them. But Timaeus, by passing them over without a word, gives,

as though purposely, an impression exactly the reverse of the truth.

[Sidenote: and Corsica,]

And just in the same random way in which he has spoken about Libya, he

has also done about the island called Cyrnus. For, when mentioning it

in his second book, he says that wild goats, sheep, wild oxen, stags,

hares, wolves, and some other animals are plentiful in it; and that the

inhabitants employ themselves in hunting them, and in fact spend most

of their time in that pursuit. Whereas in this island there are not

only no wild goats or wild oxen, but not even hare, wolf, or stag, or

any animal of the sort, except some foxes, rabbits, and wild sheep. The

rabbit indeed at a distance looks like a small hare; but when taken in

the hand, it is found to be widely different both in appearance and in

the taste of its flesh; and it also lives generally underground.

[Sidenote: the reason of his mistake.]

+4.+ The idea, however, of all the animals in the island being wild,

has arisen in the following way: The caretakers cannot keep up with

their animals, owing to the thick woods and rocky broken nature of

the country; but, whenever they wish to collect them, they stand on

some convenient spots and call the beasts together by the sound of a

trumpet; and all of them flock without fail to their own trumpets. Now,

when ships arrive at the coast, and the sailors see goats or cattle

grazing without any one with them, and thereupon try to catch them,

the animals will not let them come near them, because they are not

used to them, but will scamper off. But as soon as the keeper sees the

men disembarking and sounds his trumpet, they all set off running at

full speed and collect round the trumpet. This gives the appearance

of wildness; and Timaeus, who made only careless and perfunctory

inquiries, committed himself to a random statement.

[Sidenote: Swine-keeping in Italy.]

Now this obedience to the sound of a trumpet is nothing astonishing.

For in Italy the swineherds manage the feeding of their pigs in the

same way. They do not follow close behind the beasts, as in Greece,

but keep some distance in front of them, sounding their horn every

now and then; and the animals follow behind and run together at the

sound. Indeed, the complete familiarity which the animals show with

the particular horn to which they belong seems at first astonishing

and almost incredible. For owing to the populousness and wealth of the

country, the droves of swine in Italy are exceedingly large, especially

along the sea coast of the Tuscans and Gauls: for one sow will bring

up a thousand pigs, or sometimes even more. They therefore drive them

out from their night styes to feed, according to their litters and

ages. Whence, if several droves are taken to the same place, they

cannot preserve these distinction of litters; but they of course get

mixed up with each other, both as they are being driven out, and as

they feed, and as they are being brought home. Accordingly the device

of the horn-blowing has been invented to separate them, when they have

got mixed up together, without labour or trouble. For as they feed,

one swineherd goes in one direction sounding his horn, and another in

another: and thus the animals sort themselves of their own accord, and

follow their own horns with such eagerness that it is impossible by any

means to stop or hinder them. But in Greece, when the swine get mixed

up in the oak forests in their search for the mast, the swineherd who

has most assistants and the best help at his disposal, when collecting

his own animals, drives off his neighbour’s also. Sometimes too a thief

lies in wait, and drives them off without the swineherd knowing how he

lost them; because the beasts straggle a long way from their drivers,

in their eagerness to find acorns, when they are just beginning to

fall....

[Sidenote: False criticisms of Timaeus on Theopompus and Ephorus.]

(_a_) It is difficult to pardon such errors in Timaeus, considering how

severe he is in criticising the slips of others. For instance he finds

fault with Theopompus for stating that Dionysius sailed from Sicily to

Corinth in a merchant vessel, whereas he really arrived in a ship of

war. And again he falsely charges Ephorus with contradicting himself,

on the ground that he asserts that Dionysius the Elder ascended the

throne at the age of twenty-three, reigned forty-two years, and died at

sixty-three. Now no one would say, I think, that this was a blunder of

the historian, but clearly one of the transcriber. For either Ephorus

must be more foolish than Coroebus and Margites, if he were unable to

calculate that forty-two added to twenty-three make sixty-five; or, if

that is incredible in the case of a man like Ephorus, it must be a mere

mistake of the transcriber, and the carping and malevolent criticism of

Timaeus must be rejected.

[Sidenote: His false account of the October horse.]

(_b_) Again, in his history of Pyrrhus, he says that the Romans still

keep up the memory of the fall of Troy by shooting to death with

javelins a war-horse on a certain fixed day, because the capture of

Troy was accomplished by means of the “Wooden Horse.” This is quite

childish. On this principle, all non-Hellenic nations must be put down

as descendants of the Trojans; for nearly all of them, or at any rate

the majority, when about to commence a war or a serious battle with

an enemy, first kill and sacrifice a horse. In making this sort of

ill-founded deduction, Timaeus seems to me to show not only want of

knowledge, but, what is worse, a trick of misapplying knowledge. For,

because the Romans sacrifice a horse, he immediately concludes that

they do it because Troy was taken by means of a horse.

[Sidenote: The reason of his mistakes a want of care in making

inquiries.]

(_c_) These instances clearly show how worthless his account of Libya,

Sardinia, and, above all, of Italy is; and that, speaking generally,

he has entirely neglected the most important element in historical

investigation, namely, the making personal inquiries. For as historical

events take place in many different localities, and as it is impossible

for the same man to be in several places at the same time, and also

impossible for him to see with his own eyes all places in the world and

observe their peculiarities, the only resource left is to ask questions

of as many people as possible; and to believe those who are worthy of

credit; and to show critical sagacity in judging of their reports.

[Sidenote: Nor is he to be trusted even in matters that fell under his

own observation.]

[Sidenote: Arethusa.]

(_d_) And though Timaeus makes great professions on this head, he

appears to me to be very far from arriving at the truth. Indeed, so far

from making accurate investigations of the truth through other people,

he does not tell us anything trustworthy even of events of which he has

been an eye-witness, or of places he has personally visited. This will

be made evident, if we can convict him of being ignorant, even in his

account of Sicily, of the facts which he brings forward. For it will

require very little further proof of his inaccuracy, if he can be shown

to be ill-informed and misled about the localities in which he was born

and bred, and that too the most famous of them. Now he asserts that

the fountain Arethusa at Syracuse has its source in the Peloponnese,

from the river Alpheus, which flows through Arcadia and Olympia. For

that this river sinks into the earth, and, after being carried for four

thousand stades under the Sicilian Sea, comes to the surface again in

Syracuse; and that this was proved from the fact that on a certain

occasion a storm of rain having come on during the Olympic festival,

and the river having flooded the sacred enclosure, a quantity of dung

from the animals used for sacrifice at the festival was thrown up by

the fountain Arethusa; as well as a certain gold cup, which was picked

up and recognised as being one of the ornaments used at the festival....

[Sidenote: The traditions of the colonisation of Locri Epizephyrii

agree with the account in Aristotle, rather than with that of Timaeus.]

+5.+ I happened to have visited the city of the Locrians on several

occasions, and to have been the means of doing them important services.

For it was I that secured their exemption from the service in Iberia

and Dalmatia, which, in accordance with the treaty, they were bound

to supply to the Romans. And being released thereby from considerable

hardship, danger, and expense, they rewarded me with every mark

of honour and kindness. I have therefore reason to speak well of

the Locrians rather than the reverse. Still I do not shrink from

saying and writing that the account of their colonisation given by

Aristotle is truer than that of Timaeus. For I know for certain that

the inhabitants themselves acknowledge that the report of Aristotle,

and not of Timaeus, is the one which they have received from their

ancestors. And they give the following proofs of this. In the first

place, they stated that every ancestral distinction existing among them

is traced by the female not the male side.[27] For instance, those

are reckoned noble among them who belong to “the hundred families”;

and these “hundred families” are those which were marked out by the

Locrians, before embarking upon their colonisation, as those from

which they were in accordance with the oracle to select the virgins

to be sent to Ilium. Further, that some of these women joined the

colony: and that it is their descendants who are now reckoned noble,

and called “the men of the hundred families.” Again, the following

account of the “cup-bearing” priestess had been received traditionally

by them. When they ejected the Sicels who occupied this part of Italy,

finding that it was a custom among them for the processions at their

sacrifices to be led by a boy of the most illustrious and high-born

family obtainable, and not having any ancestral custom of their own

on the subject, they adopted this one, with no other improvement than

that of substituting a girl for one of their boys as cupbearer, because

nobility with them went by the female line.

[Sidenote: The trick of the Locrians.]

+6.+ And as to a treaty, none ever existed, or was said to have

existed, between them and the Locrians in Greece; but they all knew

by tradition of one with the Sicels: of which they give the following

account. When they first appeared, and found the Sicels occupying the

district in which they are themselves now dwelling, these natives were

in terror of them, and admitted them through fear into the country; and

the new-comers made a sworn agreement with them that “they would be

friendly and share the country with them, as long as they stood upon

the ground they then stood upon, and kept heads upon their shoulders.”

But, while the oaths were being taken, they say that the Locrians put

earth inside the soles of their shoes, and heads of garlic concealed on

their shoulders, before they swore; and that then they shook the earth

out of their shoes, and threw the heads of garlic off their shoulders,

and soon afterwards expelled the Sicels from the country. This is the

story current at Locri....

By an extraordinary oversight Timaeus of Tauromenium commits himself

to the statement that it was not customary with the Greeks to possess

slaves.[28]...

[Sidenote: Locri Epizephyrii colonised by certain slaves who had

obtained their freedom, and by some free born women.]

These considerations would lead us to trust Aristotle rather than

Timaeus. His next statement is still more strange. For to suppose, with

Timaeus, that it was unlikely that men, who had been the slaves of the

allies of the Lacedaemonians, would continue the kindly feelings and

adopt the friendships of their late masters is foolish. For when they

had the good fortune to recover their freedom, and a certain time has

elapsed, men, who have been slaves, not only endeavour to adopt the

friendships of their late masters, but also their ties of hospitality

and blood: in fact, their aim is to keep them up even more than the

ties of nature, for the express purpose of thereby wiping out the

remembrance of their former degradation and humble position; because

they wish to pose as the descendants of their masters rather than as

their freedmen. And this is what in all probability happened in the

case of the Locrians. They had removed to a great distance from all who

knew their secret; the lapse of time favoured their pretensions; and

they were not therefore so foolish as to maintain any customs likely

to revive the memory of their own degradation, rather than such as

would contribute to conceal it. Therefore they very naturally called

their city by the name of that from which the women came; and claimed a

relationship with those women: and, moreover, renewed the friendships

which were ancestral to the families of the women.

[Sidenote: The Locrians then were naturally friends of Sparta and

enemies of Athens.]

And this also indicates that there is no sign of Aristotle being wrong

in saying that the Athenians ravaged their territory. For it being

quite natural, as I have shown, that the men who started from Locri

and landed in Italy, if they were slaves ten times over, should adopt

friendly relations with Sparta, it becomes also natural that the

Athenians should be rendered hostile to them, not so much from regard

to their origin as to their policy.

[Sidenote: The reason of the women of Locris (in Greece) leaving their

homes with the slaves.]

It is not, again, likely that the Lacedaemonians should themselves

send their young men home from the camp for the sake of begetting

children, and should refuse to allow the Locrians to do the same. Two

things in such a statement are not only improbable but untrue. In

the first place, they were not likely to have prevented the Locrians

doing so, when they did the same themselves, for that would be wholly

inconsistent: nor were the Locrians, in obedience to orders from them,

likely to have adopted a custom like theirs. (For in Sparta it is a

traditional law, and a matter of common custom, for three or four men

to have one wife, and even more if they are brothers; and when a man

has begotten enough children, it is quite proper and usual for him to

sell his wife to one of his friends.) The fact is, that though the

Locrians, not being bound by the same oath as the Lacedaemonians, that

they would not return home till they had taken Messene, had a fair

pretext for not taking part in the common expedition; yet, by returning

home only one by one, and at rare intervals, they gave their wives

an opportunity of becoming familiar with the slaves instead of their

original husbands, and still more so the unmarried women. And this was

the reason of the migration....

[Sidenote: Timaeus and Aristotle.]

+7.+ Timaeus makes many untrue statements; and he appears to have

done so, not from ignorance, but because his view was distorted by

party spirit. When once he has made up his mind to blame or praise, he

forgets everything else and outsteps all bounds of propriety. So much

for the nature of Aristotle’s account of Locri, and the grounds on

which it rested. But this naturally leads me to speak of Timaeus and

his work as a whole, and generally of what is the duty of a man who

undertakes to write history. Now I think that I have made it clear from

what I have said, first, that both of them were writing conjecturally;

and, secondly, that the balance of probability was on the side of

Aristotle. It is in fact impossible in such matters to be positive and

definite. But let us even admit that Timaeus gives the more probable

account. Are the maintainers of the less probable theory, therefore,

to be called by every possible term of abuse and obloquy, and all but

be put on trial for their lives? Certainly not. Those who make untrue

statements in their books from ignorance ought, I maintain, to be

forgiven and corrected in a kindly spirit: it is only those who do so

from deliberate intention that ought to be attacked without mercy.

+8.+ It must then either be shown that Aristotle’s account of Locri

was prompted by partiality, corruption, or personal enmity; or, if no

one ventures to say that, then it must be acknowledged that those who

display such personal animosity and bitterness to others, as Timaeus

does to Aristotle, are wrong and ill advised.

[Sidenote: The vulgar abuse of Timaeus.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 333.]

The epithets which he applies to him are “audacious,” “unprincipled,”

“rash”; and besides, he says that he “has audaciously slandered Locri

by affirming that the colony was formed by runaway slaves, adulterers,

and man-catchers.” Further, he asserts that Aristotle made this

statement, “in order that men might believe him to have been one of

Alexander’s generals, and to have lately conquered the Persians at the

Cilician Gates in a pitched battle by his own ability; and not to be

a mere pedantic sophist, universally unpopular, who had a short time

before shut up that admirable doctor’s shop.” Again, he says that

he “pushed his way into every palace and tent:” and that he was “a

glutton and a gourmand, who thought only of gratifying his appetite.”

Now it seems to me that such language as this would be intolerable in

an impudent vagabond bandying abuse in a law court; but an impartial

recorder of public affairs, and a genuine historian, would not think

such things to himself, much less venture to put them in writing.

[Sidenote: Timaeus’s account of his investigations in the history of

the colony of Locri.]

+9.+ Let us now, then, examine the method of Timaeus, and compare his

account of this colony, that we may learn which of the two better

deserves such vituperation. He says in the same book: “I am not now

proceeding on conjecture, but have investigated the truth in the course

of a personal visit to the Locrians in Greece. The Locrians first of

all showed me a written treaty which began with the words, ‘as parents

to children.’ There are also existing decrees securing mutual rights

of citizenship to both. In fine, when they were told of Aristotle’s

account of the colony, they were astonished at the audacity of that

writer. I then crossed to the Italian Locri and found that the laws and

customs there accorded with the theory of a colony of free men, not

with the licentiousness of slaves. For among them there are penalties

assigned to man-catchers, adulterers, and runaway slaves. And this

would not have been the case if they were conscious of having been such

themselves.”

[Sidenote: Criticism of the above statement of Timaeus.]

+10.+ Now the first point one would be inclined to raise is, as to

what Locrians he visited and questioned on these subjects. If it had

been the case that the Locrians in Greece all lived in one city, as

those in Italy do, this question would perhaps have been unnecessary,

and everything would have been plain. But as there are two clans of

Locrians, we may ask, Which of the two did he visit? What cities of

the one or the other? In whose hands did he find the treaty? Yet we

all know, I suppose, that this is a speciality of Timaeus’s, and that

it is in this that he has surpassed all other historians, and rests

his chief claim to credit,—I mean his parade of accuracy in studying

chronology and ancient monuments, and his care in that department of

research. Therefore we may well wonder how he came to omit telling us

the name of the city in which he found the treaty, the place in which

it was inscribed, or the magistrates who showed him the inscription,

and with whom he conversed: to prevent all cavil, and, by defining the

place and city, to enable those who doubted to ascertain the truth. By

omitting these details he shows that he was conscious of having told

a deliberate falsehood. For that Timaeus, if he really had obtained

such proofs, would not have let them slip, but would have fastened upon

them with both hands, as the saying is, is proved by the following

considerations. Would a writer who tried to establish his credit on

that of Echecrates,—he mentioning him by name as the person with whom

he had conversed, and from whom he had obtained his facts about the

Italian Locri—taking the trouble to add, by way of showing that he

had been told them by no ordinary person, that this man’s father had

formerly been entrusted with an embassy by Dionysius,—would such a

writer have remained silent about it if he had really got hold of a

public record or an ancient tablet?

[Sidenote: Timaeus and the Olympic registers.]

+11.+ This is the man forsooth who drew out a comparative list of the

Ephors and the kings of Sparta from the earliest times; as well as

one comparing the Archons at Athens and priestesses in Argos with the

list of Olympic victors, and thereby convicted those cities of being

in error about those records, because there was a discrepancy of three

months between them! This again is the man who discovered the engraved

tablets in the inner shrines, and the records of the guest-friendships

on the door-posts of the temples. And we cannot believe that such a

man could have been ignorant of anything of this sort that existed, or

would have omitted to mention it if he had found it. Nor can he on any

ground expect pardon, if he has told an untruth about it: for, as he

has shown himself a bitter and uncompromising critic of others, he must

naturally look for equally uncompromising attacks from them.

Being then clearly convicted of falsehood in these points, he goes

to the Italian Locri: and, first of all, says that the two Locrian

peoples had a similar constitution and the same ties of amity, and that

Aristotle and Theophrastus have maligned the city. Now I am fully aware

that in going into minute particulars and proofs on this point I shall

be forced to digress from the course of my history. It was for that

reason however that I postponed my criticism of Timaeus to a single

section of my work, that I might not be forced again and again to omit

other necessary matter....

[Sidenote: Timaeus condemned out of his own mouth.]

+12.+ Timaeus says that the greatest fault in history is want of truth;

and he accordingly advises all, whom he may have convicted of making

false statements in their writings, to find some other name for their

books, and to call them anything they like except history....

[Sidenote: See 1, 14.]

For example, in the case of a carpenter’s rule, though it may be too

short or too narrow for your purpose, yet if it have the essential

feature of a rule, that of straightness, you may still call it a

rule; but if it has not this quality, and deviates from the straight

line, you may call it anything you like except a rule. “On the same

principle,” says he, “historical writings may fail in style or

treatment or other details; yet if they hold fast to truth, such books

may claim the title of history, but if they swerve from that, they

ought no longer to be called history.” Well, I quite agree that in

such writings truth should be the first consideration: and, in fact,

somewhere in the course of my work I have said “that as in a living

body, when the eyes are out, the whole is rendered useless, so if you

take truth from history what is left is but an idle tale.” I said

again, however, that “there were two sorts of falsehoods, the ignorant

and the intentional; and the former deserved indulgence, the latter

uncompromising severity.” ... These points being agreed upon—the wide

difference between the ignorant and intentional lie, and the kindly

correction due to the one and the unbending denunciation to the

other—it will be found that it is to the latter charge that Timaeus

more than any one lays himself open. And the proof of his character in

this respect is clear....

[Sidenote: The proverb Λοκροὶ τὰς συνθήκας.]

There is a proverbial expression for the breakers of an agreement,

“Locrians and a treaty.” An explanation given of this, equally

accepted by historians and the rest of the world, is that, at the

time of the invasion of the Heracleidae, the Locrians agreed with

the Peloponnesians that, if the Heracleidae did not enter by way of

the isthmus, but crossed at Rhium, they would raise a war beacon,

that they might have early intelligence and make provisions to oppose

their entrance. The Locrians, however, did not do this, but, on the

contrary, raised a beacon of peace; and therefore, when the Heracleidae

arrived opposite Rhium, they crossed without resistance; while the

Peloponnesians, having taken no precautions, found that they had

allowed their enemies to enter their country, because they had been

betrayed by the Locrians....

[Sidenote: Callisthenes.]

[Sidenote: Timaeus’s attitude towards the art of divination.]

Many remarks depreciatory of divination and dream interpretation may

be found in his writings.[29] But writers who have introduced into

their books a good deal of such foolish talk, so far from running

down others, should think themselves fortunate if they escape attack

themselves. And this is just the position in which Timaeus stands. He

remarks that “Callisthenes was a mere sycophant for writing stuff of

this sort; and acted in a manner utterly unworthy of his philosophy in

giving heed to ravens and inspired women; and that he richly deserved

the punishment which he met with at the hands of Alexander, for having

corrupted the mind of that monarch as far as he could.” On the other

hand, he commends Demosthenes, and the other orators who flourished

at that time, and says that “they were worthy of Greece for speaking

against the divine honours given to Alexander; while this philosopher,

for investing a mere mortal with the aegis and thunderbolt, justly met

the fate which befel him from the hands of providence....”

[Sidenote: Demochares.]

+13.+ Timaeus asserts that Demochares was guilty of unnatural lust,

and that his lips therefore were unfit to blow the sacred fire; and

that in morals he went beyond any stories told by Botrys and Philaenis

and all other writers of indecent tales. Foul abuse and shameless

accusations of this sort are not only what no man of cultivation would

have uttered, they go beyond what you might expect from the lowest

brothels. It is, however, to get credit for the foul and shameless

accusations, which he is always bringing, that he has maligned this

man: supporting his charge by dragging in an obscure comic poet. Now

on what grounds do I conjecture the falsity of the accusation? Well,

first, from the fact of the good birth and education of Demochares; for

he was a nephew of Demosthenes. And in the second place, from the fact

that he was thought worthy at Athens, not only of being a general, but

of the other offices also; which he certainly would not have obtained,

if he had got into such troubles as these. Therefore it seems to me

that Timaeus is accusing the people of Athens more than Demochares, if

it is the fact that they committed the interests of the country and

their own lives to such a man. For if it had been true, the comic poet

Archedicus would not have been the only one to have made this statement

concerning Demochares, as Timaeus alleges: it would have been repeated

by many of the partisans of Antipater, against whom he has spoken with

great freedom, and said many things calculated to annoy, not only

Antipater himself, but also his successors and friends. It would have

been repeated also by many of his political opponents: and among them,

by Demetrius of Phalerum, against whom Demochares has inveighed with

extraordinary bitterness in his History, alleging that “his conduct as

a prince, and the political measures on which he prided himself, were

such as a petty tax-gatherer might be proud of; for he boasted that in

his city things were abundant and cheap, and every one had plenty to

live upon.” And he tells another story of Demetrius, that “He was not

ashamed to have a procession in the theatre led by an artificial snail,

worked by some internal contrivance, and emitting slime as it crawled,

and behind it a string of asses; meaning by this to indicate the

slowness and stupidity of the Athenians, who had yielded to others the

honour of defending Greece, and were tamely submissive to Cassander.”

Still, in spite of these taunts, neither Demetrius nor any one else has

ever brought such a charge against Demochares.

+14.+ Relying therefore on the testimony of his own countrymen, as

safer ground than the virulence of Timaeus, I feel no hesitation in

declaring that the life of Demochares is not chargeable with such

enormities. But even supposing that Demochares had ever so disgraced

himself, what need was there for Timaeus to insert this passage in

his History? Men of sense, when resolved to retaliate upon a personal

enemy, think first, not of what he deserves, but of what it is

becoming in them to do. So in the case of abusive language: the first

consideration should be, not what our enemies deserve to be called,

but what our self respect will allow us to call them. But if men

measure everything by their own ill temper and jealousy, we are forced

to be always suspicious of them, and to be ever on our guard against

their exaggeration. Wherefore, in the present instance, we may fairly

reject the stories to the discredit of Philochares told by Timaeus;

for he has put himself out of the pale of indulgence or belief, by so

obviously allowing his native virulence to carry him beyond all bounds

of propriety in his invectives.

[Sidenote: Agathocles defended against the aspersions of Timaeus.]

+15.+ For my part I cannot feel satisfied with his abuse of Agathocles

either, even admitting him to have been the worst of men. I refer to

the passage at the end of his History in which he asserts that in his

youth Agathocles was “a common stale, extravagantly addicted to every

unnatural vice,” and that “when he died, his wife in the course of her

lamentations exclaimed ‘Ah, what have I not done for you! what have you

not done to me?’” To such language one can only repeat what has been

already said in the case of Demochares, and express one’s astonishment

at such extravagant virulence. For that Agathocles must have had fine

natural qualities is evident from the narrative of Timaeus itself. That

a man who came as a runaway slave to Syracuse, from the potter’s wheel

and smoke and clay, at the early age of eighteen, should have within

a short time advanced from that humble beginning to be master of all

Sicily, and after being a terror to the Carthaginians, should have

grown old in office and died in enjoyment of the royal title,—does not

this prove that Agathocles had some great and admirable qualities, and

many endowments and talents for administration? In view of these the

historian ought not to have recounted to posterity only what served to

discredit and defame this man, but those facts also which were to his

honour. For that is the proper function of history. Blinded, however,

by personal malignity, he has recorded for us with bitterness and

exaggeration all his defects; while his eminent achievements he has

passed over in entire silence: seeming not to be aware that in history

such silence is as mendacious as misstatement. The part of his history,

therefore, which was added by him for the gratification of his personal

spite I have passed over, but not what was really germane to his

subject....

[Sidenote: The laws of Zaleucus, and an incident in their working at

Locri (for which he legislated, see Arist. _Pol._ 2, 12).]

+16.+ Two young men had a dispute about the ownership of a slave. This

slave had been in the possession of one of them for a long time; but

two days before, as he was going to the farm without his master, the

other laid violent hands upon him and dragged him to his house. When

the first young man heard of this, he came to the house, seized the

slave, and taking him before the magistrate asserted his ownership and

offered sureties. For the law of Zaleucus ordained that the party from

whom the abduction was made should have possession of the property

in dispute, pending the decision of the suit. But the other man in

accordance with the same law, alleged that he was the party from whom

the abduction had been made, for the slave had been brought before the

magistrate from his house. The magistrates who were trying the case

were in doubt, and calling in the Cosmopolis[30] referred the point to

him. He interpreted the law as meaning that “the abduction was always

from that party in whose possession the property in dispute had last

been for a certain period unquestioned; but that if another abducted

this property from a holder, and then the original holder repossessed

himself of it from the abductor, this was not abduction in the sense of

the law.” The young man, who thus lost his case, was not satisfied, and

alleged that such was not the intention of the legislator. Thereupon

the Cosmopolis summoned him to discuss the interpretation in accordance

with the law of Zaleucus; that is, to argue on the interpretation of

the law with him before the court of the one thousand, and with a

halter round the neck of each: whichever should be shown to be wrong in

his interpretation was to lose his life in the sight of the thousand.

But the young man asserted that the compact was not a fair one, for the

Cosmopolis, who happened to be nearly ninety, had only two or three

years of life left, while in all reasonable probability he had not yet

lived half his life. By this adroit rejoinder the young man turned off

the affair as a jest: but the magistrates adjudged the question of

abduction in accordance with the interpretation of the Cosmopolis....

A CRITICISM ON EPHORUS AND CALLISTHENES

[Sidenote: Callisthenes and the battle of Issus, B.C. 333.]

+17.+ That I may not be thought to detract wantonly from the credit of

such great writers, I will mention one battle, which is at once one of

the most famous ever fought, and not too remote in point of time; and

at which, above everything else, Callisthenes was himself present. I

mean the battle between Alexander and Darius in Cilicia. He says that

“Alexander had already got through the pass called the Cilician Gates:

and that Darius, availing himself of that by the Amanid Gates, made

his way with his army into Cilicia; but on learning from the natives

that Alexander was on his way into Syria, he followed him; and having

arrived at the pass leading to the south, pitched his camp on the bank

of the river Pinarus. The width of the ground from the foot of the

mountain to the sea was not more than fourteen stades, through which

this river ran diagonally. On first issuing from the mountains its

banks were broken, but in its course through the level down to the

sea it ran between precipitous and steep hills.” Starting with this

description of the ground, he goes on to say that “When Alexander’s

army faced about, and, retracing its steps, was approaching to attack

them, Darius and his officers determined to draw up their whole phalanx

on the ground occupied by his encampment, as it then was, and to defend

his front by the river, which flowed right along his camp.” But he

afterwards says that Darius “stationed his cavalry close to the sea,

his mercenaries next along the river, and his peltasts next resting on

the mountains.”

+18.+ Now it is difficult to understand how he could have drawn up

these troops in front of his phalanx, considering that the river ran

immediately under the camp:[31] especially as their numbers were so

great, amounting, on Callisthenes’s own showing, to thirty thousand

cavalry and thirty thousand mercenaries. Now it is easy to calculate

how much ground such a force would require. At the most cavalry in a

regular engagement is drawn up eight deep, and between each squadron

a clear space must be left in the line to enable them to turn or face

about. Therefore eight hundred will cover a stade of front; eight

thousand, ten stades;[32] three thousand two hundred, four stades;

and so eleven thousand two hundred would cover the whole of fourteen

stades. If therefore he were to put his whole thirty thousand on the

ground, he would have to mass his cavalry alone nearly three times

the usual depth; and then what room is left for his large force of

mercenaries? None, indeed, unless on the rear of the cavalry. But

Callisthenes says this was not the case, but that these latter engaged

the Macedonians first. We must therefore understand half the front,

that nearest the sea, to have been occupied by the cavalry; the other

half, that nearest the mountains, by the mercenaries. We may by these

data easily calculate the depth of the cavalry, and the distance the

river must have been from the camp to allow of it.

Again, he says that “on the approach of the enemy Darius himself, who

was on the centre, ordered up the mercenaries from the wing.” It is

difficult to see what he means by this: for the point of junction of

the mercenaries and the cavalry must have been at the centre. Where

and how then, and to what point could Darius, who was himself actually

among the mercenaries, be said to “order them up”?

Lastly, he says that “the cavalry on the right wing charged Alexander;

and that his men stood the charge gallantly, and, making a counter

charge, kept up an obstinate fight.” But he quite forgets that there

was a river between them, a river, too, of the nature that he had just

himself described.[33]

+19.+ His account of the movements of Alexander are equally vague. He

says that “he crossed into Asia with forty thousand infantry and four

thousand five hundred cavalry; but that when he was about to enter

Cilicia he was joined by a reinforcement of five thousand infantry and

eight hundred cavalry.” From these numbers, if one were to make the

liberal allowance of three thousand absentees from the infantry and

three hundred from the cavalry on various services, there would still

remain forty-two thousand infantry and five thousand cavalry. Starting

with these numbers, he goes on to say “that Alexander heard of the

entrance of Darius into Cilicia when he was a hundred stades away from

him, having already marched through the pass:[34] that he therefore

retraced his steps through the pass, his phalanx on the van, his

cavalry next, and his baggage on the rear. But that as soon as he had

debouched upon the open country, he gave general orders to form up into

a phalanx, at first thirty-two deep; then sixteen; and lastly, when

they were nearing the enemy, eight deep.” Now this is a worse blunder

than the last. A stade, allowing for the distances which must be kept

on a march, and reckoning the depth at sixteen, admits of one thousand

six hundred men, each man covering six feet. It is plain, therefore,

that ten stades will admit of only sixteen thousand men, and twenty

twice that number. Hence, when Alexander caused his men to form sixteen

deep, he would have wanted a width of ground of twenty stades; and even

then, the whole of the cavalry and ten thousand infantry would have

been unaccounted for.

+20.+ Again, he says that Alexander was marching in line when he was

about forty stades from the enemy. A greater blunder it is difficult to

conceive. For where could one find a ground; and especially in Cilicia,

twenty stades broad by forty deep, for a phalanx armed with sarissae to

march in line? It would not be easy to count all the impossibilities

in the way of such an arrangement and such a movement. One that is

mentioned by Callisthenes himself is sufficient to establish the point.

For he remarks that the winter torrents which descend from the hills

make so many gullies in the plain, that, in the course of the flight,

the chief part of the Persians are said to have lost their lives in

deep places of that kind. But, it may be urged, Alexander wished to be

ready for battle as soon as the enemy were in sight. But what could

be less ready than a phalanx in a disordered and straggling line?

Is it not much easier to form up a phalanx from a proper column of

route, than to bring a disordered and straggling line back into the

same alignment, and get it into order of battle on a broken and woody

ground? It was, therefore much better to march twice or four times the

ordinary depth of a phalanx[35] in good order, for which sufficient

ground could possibly be found. And it was easy to deploy his men

quickly into the line of the phalanx, because he was able by means of

scouts to ascertain the presence of the enemy in plenty of time. But

in this case, beside other absurdities, while bringing his men in line

across the level, he did not even (we are told) put the cavalry in

front, but marched with them in the same alignment.

+21.+ But the greatest blunder is still to come. “As soon as

Alexander,” he says, “was within distance of the enemy he caused his

men to take up order eight deep,” which would have necessitated ground

forty stades wide for the length of the line; and even had they, to

use the poet’s expression, “laid shield to shield and on each other

leaned,” still ground twenty stades wide would have been wanted, while

he himself says that it was less than fourteen. [We have also to deduct

from these fourteen stades the space occupied by the two divisions of

the cavalry, one on the left next the sea, the other on the right];[36]

and to allow for the fact that the whole force was kept a considerable

distance from the hills, to avoid being exposed to the enemy occupying

the skirts of the mountains; for we know that Callisthenes represents

the wing to have been facing these, at an angle with the centre. We are

also leaving out of account the ten thousand foot, whom we showed to be

too many according to his own calculation.

The upshot is that eleven stades at most is left for the whole length

of the phalanx, even taking Callisthenes’s own account, in which

thirty-two thousand men standing shield to shield must necessarily be

drawn up thirty deep: while he asserts that they fought eight deep.

Such blunders admit of no defence: for the facts at once demonstrate

the impossibility of the assertion. We have only to compare the space

occupied by each man, the width of the whole ground, and the number of

the men, to prove its falsity.

+22.+ It would be tedious to mention all his other absurdities in

connexion with this battle. I must be content with a very few. He says,

for instance, that “Alexander took care in arranging his order of

battle to be himself personally opposed to Darius; and that at first

Darius was equally anxious to be opposite Alexander, but afterwards

altered his mind.” But he does not vouchsafe to tell us how these kings

learnt at what part of their respective forces they were each posted,

or to what point in his own line Darius re-transferred himself. Again,

how could a phalanx mount to the edge of the river bank, when it was

precipitous and covered with brushwood? Such a piece of bad generalship

must not be attributed to Alexander, because he is acknowledged by

all to have been a skilful strategist and to have studied the subject

from childhood: we must rather attribute it to the historian’s want

of ability to discern between what is or is not practicable in such

movements. So much for Ephorus and Callisthenes....

[Sidenote: Timaeus’s over-estimate of Timoleon.]

+23.+ Timaeus attacks Ephorus with great severity, though he is himself

liable to two grave charges—bitterness in attacking others for faults

of which he is himself guilty, and complete demoralisation, shown by

the opinions which he expresses in his memoirs, and which he endeavours

to implant in the minds of his readers. If we are to lay it down that

Callisthenes deserved his death, what ought to happen to Timaeus?

Surely there is much more reason for Providence to be wroth with him

than with Callisthenes. The latter wished to deify Alexander; but

Timaeus exalts Timoleon above the most venerable gods. The hero of

Callisthenes, again, was a man by universal consent of a superhuman

elevation of spirit; while Timoleon, far from having accomplished

any action of first-rate importance, never even undertook one. The

one expedition which he achieved in the course of his life took him

no farther than from Corinth to Syracuse; and how paltry is such a

distance when compared with the extent of the world! I presume that

Timaeus believed that if Timoleon, by gaining glory in such a mere

saucer of a place as Sicily, should be thought comparable to the most

illustrious heroes, he too himself, as the historian of only Italy

and Sicily, might properly be considered on a par with the writers

of universal history. This will be sufficient defence of Aristotle,

Theophrastus, Callisthenes, Ephorus, and Demochares against the

attacks of Timaeus: and it is addressed to those who believe that this

historian is impartial and truthful....

[Sidenote: The incapacity of Timaeus for forming a judgment.]

+24.+ We may fairly judge Timaeus on the principles which he has

himself laid down. According to him, “poets and historians betray their

own tastes by the incidents which they repeatedly record in their

writings. Thus the poet[37] by his fondness for banqueting scenes shows

that he is a glutton; and in the same way Aristotle, by frequently

describing rich food in his writings, betrays his love of dainty living

and his greediness.” On the same principle he judges Dionysius the

tyrant because he “was always very particular in the ornamentation of

his dining-couches, and had hangings of exquisite make and variegated

colours.” If we apply this principle to Timaeus, we shall have abundant

reason to think badly of him. In attacking others he shows great

acuteness and boldness; when he comes to independent narrative he is

full of dreams, miracles, incredible myths,—in a word, of miserable

superstition and old wives’ tales. The truth is that Timaeus is a proof

of the fact, that at times, and in the case of many men, want of skill

and want of judgment so completely destroy the value of their evidence,

that though present at and eye-witnesses of the facts which they

record, they might just as well have been absent or had no eyes....

[Sidenote: The brazen bull of Phalaris.]

+25.+ The story of the brazen bull is this. It was made by Phalaris at

Agrigentum; and he used to force men to get into it, and then by way of

punishment light a fire underneath. The metal becoming thus red hot,

the man inside was roasted and scorched to death; and when he screamed

in his agony, the sound from the machine was very like the bellowing of

a bull. When the Carthaginians conquered Sicily this bull was removed

from Agrigentum to Carthage. The trap door between the shoulders,

through which the victims used to be let down, still remains; and no

other reason for the construction of such a bull in Carthage can be

discovered at all: yet Timaeus has undertaken to upset the common

story, and to refute the declarations of poets and historians, by

alleging that the bull at Carthage did not come from Agrigentum, and

that no such figure ever existed there; and he has composed a lengthy

treatise to prove this....

GENERAL REMARKS ON TIMAEUS AS AN HISTORIAN

What epithet ought one to apply to Timaeus, and what word will

properly characterise him? A man of his kind appears to me to deserve

the very bitterest of the terms which he has applied to others. It

has already been sufficiently proved that he is a carping, false and

impudent writer; and from what remains to be said he will be shown to

be unphilosophical, and, in short, utterly uninstructed. For towards

the end of his twenty-first book, in the course of his “harangue of

Timoleon,” he remarks that “the whole sublunary world being divided

into three parts—Asia, Libya, and Europe....”[38] One could scarcely

believe such a remark to have come, I don’t say from Timaeus, but even

from the proverbial Margites....

(_a_) The proverb tells us that one drop from the largest vessel is

sufficient to show the whole contents. This is applicable to the

present case. When one or two false statements have been discovered

in a history, and they have been shown to be wilful, it is clear that

nothing which such an historian may say can be regarded as certain

or trustworthy. But in order to convince the more careful student, I

must speak on his method and practice in regard to public speeches,

military harangues, ambassador’s orations, and all compositions of that

class; which are, as it were, a compendium of events and an epitome of

all history. Now that he has given these in his writings with entire

disregard of truth, and that of set purpose, can any reader of Timaeus

fail to be aware? He has not written down the words actually used, nor

the real drift of these speeches; but imagining how they ought to have

been expressed, he enumerates all the arguments used, and makes the

words tally with the circumstances, like a schoolboy declaiming on a

set theme: as though his object were to display his own ability, not to

give a report of what was in reality said....

(_b_) The special province of history is, first, to ascertain what

the actual words used were; and secondly, to learn why it was that

a particular policy or argument failed or succeeded. For a bare

statement of an occurrence is interesting indeed, but not instructive:

but when this is supplemented by a statement of cause, the study of

history becomes fruitful. For it is by applying analogies to our own

circumstances that we get the means and basis for calculating the

future; and for learning from the past when to act with caution, and

when with greater boldness, in the present. The historian therefore

who omits the words actually used, as well as all statement of the

determining circumstances, and gives us instead conjectures and mere

fancy compositions, destroys the special use of history. In this

respect Timaeus is an eminent offender, for we all know that his books

are full of such writing.

(_c_) But perhaps some one may raise the question as to how it comes

about that, being the sort of writer that I am showing him to be, he

has obtained acceptance and credit among certain people. The reason

is that his work abounds with hostile criticism and invective against

others: and he has been judged not by the positive merits of his own

composition and his independent narrative, but by his skill in refuting

his fellow historians; to which department he appears to me to have

brought great diligence and an extraordinary natural aptitude. The case

of the physicist Strato is almost precisely similar. As long as this

man is endeavouring to descredit and refute the opinions of others,

he is admirable: directly he brings forward anything of his own, or

expounds any of his own doctrines, he at once seems to men of science

to lose his faculties and become stupid and unintelligent. And for my

part, I look upon this difference in writers as strictly analogous to

the facts of everyday life. In this too it is easy to criticise our

neighbours, but to be faultless ourselves is hard. One might almost say

that those who are most ready at finding fault with others are most

prone to errors in their own life.

(_d_) Besides these I may mention another error of Timaeus. Having

stayed quietly at Athens for about fifty years, during which he devoted

himself to the study of written history, he imagined that he was in

possession of the most important means of writing it. To my mind this

was a great mistake. History and the science of medicine are alike in

this respect, that both may be divided broadly into three departments;

and therefore those who study either must approach them in three ways.

For instance the three departments of medicine are the rhetorical, the

dietetic, and the surgical and pharmaceutical. [The second of these

though important is discredited by some.][39] The first, which takes

its rise from the school of Herophilus and Callimachus of Alexandria,

does indeed rightly claim a certain position in medical science; but

by its speciousness and liberal promises acquires so much reputation

that those who are occupied with other branches of the art are supposed

to be completely ignorant. But just bring one of these professors to

an actual invalid: you will find that they are as completely wanting

in the necessary skill as men who have never read a medical treatise.

Nay, it has happened before now that certain persons, who had really

nothing serious the matter with them, have been persuaded by their

powerful arguments to commit themselves to their treatment, and have

thereby endangered their lives: for they are like men trying to steer

a ship out of a book. Still such men go from city to city with great

_éclât_, and get the common people together to listen to them. But if,

when this is done, they induce certain people to submit as a specimen

to their practical treatment; they only succeed in reducing them to

a state of extreme discomfort, and making them a laughing stock to

the audience.[40] So completely does a persuasive address frequently

get the advantage over practical experience. The third branch of the

medical science, though it involves genuine skill in the treatment of

the several cases, is not only rare in itself, but is also frequently

cast into the shade, thanks to the folly of popular judgment, by

volubility and impudence.

(_e_) In the same way the science of genuine history is threefold:

first, the dealing with written documents and the arrangement of the

material thus obtained; second, topography, the appearance of cities

and localities, the description of rivers and harbours, and, speaking

generally, the peculiar features of seas and countries and their

relative distances; thirdly, political affairs. Now, as in the case of

medicine, it is the last branch that many attach themselves to, owing

to their preconceived opinions on the subject. And the majority of

writers bring to the undertaking no spirit of fairness at all: nothing

but dishonesty, impudence and unscrupulousness. Like vendors of drugs,

their aim is to catch popular credit and favour, and to seize every

opportunity of enriching themselves. About such writers it is not worth

while to say more.

(_f_) But some of those who have the reputation of approaching history

in a reasonable spirit are like the theoretical physicians. They spend

all their time in libraries, and acquire generally all the learning

which can be got from books, and then persuade themselves that they

are adequately equipped for their task.... Yet in my opinion they

are only partially qualified for the production of genuine history.

To inspect ancient records indeed, with the view of ascertaining

the notions entertained by the ancients of certain places, nations,

polities and events, and of understanding the several circumstances

and contingencies experienced in former times, is useful; for the

history of the past directs our attention in a proper spirit to the

future, if a writer can be found to give a statement of facts as they

really occurred. But to persuade one’s self, as Timaeus does, that

such ability in research is sufficient to enable a man to describe

subsequent transactions with success is quite foolish. It is as though

a man were to imagine that an inspection of the works of the old

masters would enable him to become a painter and a master of the art

himself.

[Sidenote: Ephorus was fairly acquainted with naval, but not with

military tactics.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 371. B.C. 362.]

This will be rendered still more evident from what I have now to say,

particularly from certain passages in the history of Ephorus. This

writer in his history of war seems to me to have had some idea of

naval tactics, but to be quite unacquainted with fighting on shore.

Accordingly, if one turns one’s attention to the naval battles at

Cyprus and Cnidus, in which the generals of the king were engaged

against Evagoras of Salamis[41] and then against the Lacedaemonians,

one will be struck with admiration of the historian, and will learn

many useful lessons as to what to do in similar circumstances.

But when he tells the story of the battle of Leuctra between the

Thebans and Lacedaemonians, or again that of Mantinea between the

same combatants, in which Epaminondas lost his life, if in these one

examines attentively and in detail the arrangements and evolutions in

the line of battle, the historian will appear quite ridiculous, and

betray his entire ignorance and want of personal experience of such

matters. The battle of Leuctra indeed was simple, and confined to

one division of the forces engaged, and therefore does not make the

writer’s lack of knowledge so very glaring: but that of Mantinea was

complicated and technical, and is accordingly unintelligible and indeed

completely inconceivable, to the historian. This will be rendered clear

by first laying down a correct plan of the ground, and then measuring

the extent of the movements as described by him. The same is the case

with Theopompus, and above all with Timaeus, the subject of this book.

These latter writers also can conceal their ignorance, so long as they

deal with generalities; but directly they attempt minute and detailed

description, they show that they are no better than Ephorus....

(_g_) It is in fact as impossible to write well on the operations in

a war, if a man has had no experience of actual service, as it is

to write well on politics without having been engaged in political

transactions and vicissitudes. And when history is written by the

book-learned, without technical knowledge, and without clearness of

detail, the work loses all its value. For if you take from history its

element of practical instruction, what is left of it has nothing to

attract and nothing to teach. Again, in the topography of cities and

localities, when such men attempt to go into details, being entirely

without personal knowledge, they must in a similar manner necessarily

pass over many points of importance; while they waste words on many

that are not worth the trouble. And this is what his failure to make

personal inspection brings upon Timaeus....

[Sidenote: Timaeus’s want of practical knowledge.]

(_h_) In his thirty-fourth book Timaeus says that “he spent fifty

continuous years at Athens as an alien, and never took part in any

military service, or went to inspect the localities.” Accordingly, when

he comes upon any such matters in the course of his history, he shows

much ignorance and makes many misstatements; and if he ever does come

near the truth, he is like one of those animal-painters who draw from

models of stuffed skins. Such artists sometimes preserve the correct

outline, but the vivid look and life-like portraiture of the real

animal, the chief charm of the painter’s art, are quite wanting. This

is just the case with Timaeus, and in fact with all who start with mere

book-learning; there is nothing vivid in their presentment of events,

for that can only come from the personal experience of the writers. And

hence it is, that those who have gone through no such course of actual

experience produce no genuine enthusiasm in the minds of their readers.

Former historians showed their sense of the necessity of making

professions to this effect in their writings. For when their subject

was political, they were careful to state that the writer had of course

been engaged in politics, and had had experience in matters of the

sort; or if the subject was military, that he had served a campaign and

been actually engaged; and again, when the matter was one of everyday

life, that he had brought up children and had been married; and so on

in every department of life, which we may expect to find adequately

treated by those writers alone who have had personal experience, and

have accordingly made that branch of history their own. It is difficult

perhaps for a man to have been actually and literally engaged in

everything: but in the most important actions and most frequently

occurring he must have been so.

(_i_) And that this is no impossibility, Homer is a convincing

instance; for in him you may see this quality of personal knowledge

frequently and conspicuously displayed. The upshot of all this is that

the study of documents is only one of three elements in the preparation

of an historian, and is only third in importance. And no clearer

proof of this could be given than that furnished by the deliberative

speeches, harangues of commanders, and orations of ambassadors as

recorded by Timaeus. For the truth is, that the occasions are rare

which admit of all possible arguments being set forth; as a rule, the

circumstances of the case confine them to narrow limits. And of such

speeches one sort are regarded with favour by men of our time, another

by those of an earlier age; different styles again are popular with

Aetolians, Peloponnesians, and Athenians. But to make digressions,

in season and out of season, for the purpose of setting forth every

possible speech that could be made, as Timaeus does by his trick of

inventing words to suit every sort of occasion, is utterly misleading,

pedantic, and worthy of a schoolboy essayist. And this practice has

brought failure and discredit on many writers. Of course to select from

time to time the proper and appropriate language is a necessary part

of our art: but as there is no fixed rule to decide the quantity and

quality of the words to be used on a particular occasion, great care

and training is required if we are to instruct and not mislead our

readers. The exact nature of the situation is difficult to communicate

always; still it may be brought home to the mind by means of systematic

demonstration, founded on personal and habitual experience. The best

way of securing that this should be realised is for historians, first,

to state clearly the position, the aims, and the circumstances of

those deliberating; and then, recording the real speeches made, to

explain to us the causes which contributed to the success or failure

of the several speakers. Thus we should obtain a true conception of

the situation, and by exercising our judgment upon it, and drawing

analogies from it, should be able to form a thoroughly sound opinion

upon the circumstances of the hour. But I suppose that tracing causes

is difficult, while stringing words together in books is easy. Few

again have the faculty of speaking briefly to the point, and getting

the necessary training for doing so; while to produce a long and futile

composition is within most people’s capacity and is common enough.

[Sidenote: Timaeus on Sicilian history.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 413. Thucyd. 7, 42 _sqq._]

[Sidenote: B.C. 405. Hermocrates was not there. Xen. _Hellen._ 1, 1,

27-31.]

(_k_) To confirm the judgment I have expressed of Timaeus, on his

wilful misstatements as well as his ignorance, I shall now quote

certain short passages from his acknowledged works as specimens.... Of

all the men who have exercised sovereignty in Sicily, since the elder

Gelo, tradition tells us that the most able have been Hermocrates,

Timoleon, and Pyrrhus of Epirus, who are the last persons in the world

on whom to father pedantic and scholastic speeches. Now Timaeus tells

us in his twenty-first book that on his arrival in Sicily Eurymedon

urged the cities there to undertake the war against Syracuse; that

subsequently the people of Gela becoming tired of the war, sent an

embassy to Camarina to make a truce; that upon the latter gladly

welcoming the proposal, each state sent ambassadors to their respective

allies begging them to despatch men of credit to Gela to deliberate on

a pacification, and to secure the common interests. Upon the arrival of

these deputies in Gela and the opening of the conference, he represents

Hermocrates as speaking to the following effect: “He praised the people

of Gela and Camarina first, for having made the truce; secondly,

because they were the cause of the assembling of this peace congress;

and thirdly because they had taken precautions to prevent the mass

of the citizens from taking part in the discussion, and had secured

that it should be confined to the leading men in the states, who knew

the difference between peace and war.” Then after making two or three

practical suggestions, Hermocrates is represented as expressing an

opinion that “if they seriously consider the matter they will learn the

profound difference between peace and war,”—although just before he had

said that it was precisely this which moved his gratitude to the men

of Gela, that “the discussion did not take place in the mass assembly,

but in a congress of men who knew the difference between peace and

war.” This is an instance in which Timaeus not only fails to show the

ability of an historian, but sinks below the level of a school theme.

For, I presume, it will be universally admitted that what an audience

requires is a demonstration of that about which they are in ignorance

or uncertainty; but to exhaust one’s ingenuity in finding arguments

to prove what is known already is the most futile waste of time. But

besides his cardinal mistake of directing the greater part of the

speech to points which stood in need of no arguments at all, Timaeus

also puts into the mouth of Hermocrates certain sentences of which

one could scarcely believe that any commonplace youth would have been

capable, much less the colleague of the Lacedaemonians in the battle of

Aegospotami, and the sole conqueror of the Athenian armies and generals

in Sicily.

+26.+ For first he “thinks that he should remind the congress that in

war sleepers are woke at dawn by bugles, in peace by cocks.”[42] Then

he says that “Hercules established the Olympic games and the sacred

truce during them, as an exemplification of his own principles;” and

that “he had injured all those persons against whom he waged war, under

compulsion and in obedience to the order of another, but was never

voluntarily the author of harm to any man.”[43] Next he quotes the

instance of Zeus in Homer as being displeased with Ares, and saying[44]—

“Of all the gods that on Olympus dwell

I hold thee most detested; for thy joy

Is ever strife and war and battle.”

And again the wisest of the heroes says[45]—

“He is a wretch, insensible and dead

To all the charities of social life,

Whose pleasure is in civil broil and war.”

Then he goes on to allege that Euripides agrees with Homer in the

lines[46]—

“O well of infinite riches!

O fairest of beings divine!

O Peace, how alas! thou delayest;

My heart for thy coming is fain.

I tremble lest age overtake me,

Ere thy beauty and grace I behold;

Ere the maidens shall sing in their dancing,

And revels be gladsome with flowers.”

Next he remarks that “war is like disease, peace like health; for that

the latter restores those that are sick, while in the former even the

healthy perish. Moreover, in time of peace, the old are buried by the

young as nature directs, while in war the case is reversed; and above

all in war there is no security even as far as the city walls, while

in peace it extends to the frontier of the territory”—and so on. I

wonder what other arguments would have been employed by a youth who had

just devoted himself to scholastic exercises and studies in history;

and who wished, according to the rules of the art, to adapt his words

to the supposed speakers? Just these I think which Timaeus represents

Hermocrates as using.

[Sidenote: Timoleon’s victory over the Carthaginians, B.C. 344.]

(_a_) Again, in the same book, Timoleon is exhorting the Greeks to

engage the Carthaginians;[47] and when they are on the very point of

coming to close quarters with the enemy, who are many times superior

to them in number, Timaeus represents him as saying, “Do not look to

the numbers of the foe, but to their cowardice. For though Libya is

fully settled and abounds in inhabitants, yet when we wish to express

complete desolation we say ‘more desolate than Libya,’ not meaning to

refer to its emptiness, but to the poor spirit of its inhabitants. And

after all, who would be afraid of men who, when nature gives hands as

the distinctive feature of man among all living creatures, carry them

about all their life inside their tunics idle?[48] And more than all,

who wear shirts under their inner tunics, that they may not even when

they fall in battle show their nakedness to their enemies?...”

[Sidenote: Gelo. See Herod. 7, 157-165, B.C. 481.]

(_b_) When Gelo promised to help the Greeks with twenty thousand land

forces and two hundred decked ships, if they would concede to him the

chief command either by land or sea, they say that the congress of

Greeks, sitting at Corinth, gave Gelo’s envoys a most spirited answer.

They urged Gelo to come to their aid with his forces, and observed that

the logic of facts would give the command to the bravest. This is not

the language of men depending for succour on the Syracusans, as a last

resource; but of men who felt confidence in themselves, and challenged

all comers to a rivalry of courage and for the crown of valour. In

spite of this, Timaeus spends such a wealth of rhetoric and earnestness

on these points, in his desire to exalt the importance of Sicily above

all the rest of Greece, to represent its history as the most splendid

and glorious of all the world, its men as the wisest of all who have

been great in philosophy, and the Syracusans as the most consummate

and divine of statesmen, that he could scarcely be surpassed by the

cleverest schoolboy declaimers when undertaking to prove such paradoxes

as that “Thersites was an excellent man,” or “Penelope a bad wife,” or

other thesis of that description.

(_c_) However, the only effect of such extravagant exaggeration is

to bring ridicule upon the men and the transactions which it is his

intention to champion; while he himself incurs the same discredit as

ill-trained disputants in the Academy; some of whom, in their desire

to embarrass their opponents on all subjects, possible or impossible

alike, carry their paradoxical and sophistical arguments to such a

length as to dispute whether it is possible for people at Athens to

smell eggs cooking at Ephesus: and to offer to maintain that, while

they are discussing these points, they are lying on their couches

at home and carrying on a second discussion on other subjects. This

extravagance of paradox has brought the whole school into such

disrepute, that even reasonable discussions have lost credit with the

world. And apart from their own futility, these persons have inspired

our young men with so depraved a taste, that they pay no attention

whatever to questions of ethics and politics, which bring benefit to

those who study them; but spend their lives in pursuit of an empty

reputation for useless and paradoxical verbiage.

(_d_) This is just the case with Timaeus and his imitators in history.

Paradoxical and tenacious, he has dazzled the multitude by skill in

words; and has forced attention to himself by a show of veracity, or

has conciliated confidence by a pretence of producing proof of his

assertions. The most conspicuous instances of his success in inspiring

this confidence are those parts of his work which treat of colonies,

founding of cities, and the relationships of nations. In these points

he makes such a parade of minute accuracy, and inveighs so bitterly

when refuting others, that people came to imagine that all other

historians have been mere dreamers, and have spoken at random in

describing the world; and that he is the only man who has made accurate

investigations, and unravelled every history with intelligence.

(_e_) As a matter of fact, his books contain much that is sound, but

also much that is false. Those, however, who have spent much time on

his earlier books, in which the passages I have alluded to occur,

when the confidence which they have fully given to his exaggerated

professions is disturbed by some one pointing out that Timaeus is

obnoxious to the same reproaches which he has brought with such

bitterness against others (as, for instance, in the misstatements as to

the Locrians, and other instances lately mentioned by me), become angry

and obstinate in controversy, and difficult to convince. And that, I

might almost say, is all the benefit which the most diligent students

of his history get from their reading. While those who devote their

attention to his speeches, and generally to the didactic part of his

work, become pedantic, sophistical, and wholly insensible to truth, for

reasons which I have already stated.

[Sidenote: Cp. Herod. 1, 8. Hor. A. P. 180.]

+27.+ Moreover, when he comes to deal with facts in his history, we

find a combination of all the faults which I have mentioned. The

reason I will now proceed to state. It will not, perhaps, to most

people seem to his credit, and it is in truth the real source of

his errors. For whereas he is thought to have possessed great and

wide knowledge, a faculty for historical inquiry, and extraordinary

industry in the execution of his work, in certain cases he appears

to have been the most ignorant and indolent person that ever called

himself an historian. And the following considerations will prove it.

Nature has bestowed on us two instruments of inquiry and research,

hearing and sight. Of these sight is, according to Heracleitus, by

far the truer; for eyes are surer witnesses than ears. And of these

channels of learning Timaeus has chosen the pleasanter and the worse;

for he entirely refrained from looking at things with his own eyes,

and devoted himself to learning by hearsay. But even the ear may be

instructed in two ways, reading and answers to personal inquiries: and

in the latter of these he was very indolent, as I have already shown.

The reason of his preference for the other it is easy to divine. Study

of documents involves no danger or fatigue, if one only takes care to

lodge in a city rich in such records, or to have a library in one’s

neighbourhood. You may then investigate any question while reclining on

your couch, and compare the mistakes of former historians without any

fatigue to yourself. But personal investigation demands great exertion

and expense; though it is exceedingly advantageous, and in fact is

the very corner-stone of history. This is evident from the writers of

history themselves. Ephorus says, “if writers could only be present

at the actual transactions, it would be far the best of all modes of

learning.” Theopompus says, “the best military historian is he who has

been present at the greatest number of battles; the best speech maker

is he who has been engaged in most political contests.” The same might

be said of the art of healing and of steering. Homer has spoken even

more emphatically than these writers on this point. For when he wishes

to describe what the man of light and leading should be, he introduces

Odysseus in these words—

“Tell me, oh Muse, the man of many shifts

Who wandered far and wide.”

and then goes on—

“And towns of many saw, and learnt their mind,

And suffered much in heart by land and sea.”

and again[49]—

“Passing through wars of men and grievous waves.”

[Sidenote: Historians must be practical men.]

[Sidenote: Timaeus on Ephorus.]

+28.+ It is such a man that the dignity of history appears to me to

require. Plato says that “human affairs will not go well until either

philosophers become kings or kings become philosophers.”[50] So I

should say that history will never be properly written, until either

men of action undertake to write it (not as they do now, as a matter of

secondary importance; but, with the conviction that it is their most

necessary and honourable employment, shall devote themselves through

life exclusively to it), or historians become convinced that practical

experience is of the first importance for historical composition.

Until that time arrives there will always be abundance of blunders

in the writings of historians. Timaeus, however, quite disregarded

all this. He spent his life in one place, of which he was not even a

citizen; and thus deliberately renounced all active career either in

war or politics, and all personal exertion in travel and inspection

of localities: and yet, somehow or another, he has managed to obtain

the reputation of a master in the art of history. To prove that I have

not misrepresented him, it is easy to bring the evidence of Timaeus

himself. In the preface to his sixth book he says that “some people

suppose that more genius, industry, and preparation are required for

rhetorical than for historical composition.” And that “this opinion

had been formerly advanced against Ephorus.” Then because this writer

had been unable to refute those who held it, he undertakes himself to

draw a comparison between history and rhetorical compositions: a most

unnecessary proceeding altogether. In the first place he misrepresents

Ephorus. For in truth, admirable as Ephorus is throughout his whole

work, in style, treatment, and argumentative acuteness, he is never

more brilliant than in his digressions and statements of his personal

views: in fact, whenever he is adding anything in the shape of a

commentary or a note. And it so happens that his most elegant and

convincing digression is on this very subject of a comparison between

historians and speech-writers. But Timaeus is anxious not to be thought

to follow Ephorus. Therefore, in addition to misrepresenting him and

condemning the rest, he enters upon a long, confused, and in every way

inferior, discussion of what had been already sufficiently handled by

others; and expected that no one living would detect him.

(_a_) However, he wished to exalt history; and, in order to do so,

he says that “history differs from rhetorical composition as much as

real buildings differ from those represented in scene-paintings.” And

again, that “to collect the necessary materials for writing history

is by itself more laborious than the whole process of producing

rhetorical compositions.” He mentions, for instance, the expense and

labour which he underwent in collecting records from Assyria, and

in studying the customs of the Ligures, Celts, and Iberians. But he

exaggerates these so much, that he could not have himself expected to

be believed. One would be glad to ask the historian which of the two

he thinks is the more expensive and laborious,—to remain quietly at

home and collect records and study the customs of Ligures and Celts,

or to obtain personal experience of all the tribes possible, and see

them with his own eyes? To ask questions about manœuvres on the field

of battle and the sieges of cities and fights at sea from those who

were present, or to take personal part in the dangers and vicissitudes

of these operations as they occur? For my part I do not think that

real buildings differ so much from those in stage-scenery, nor history

from rhetorical compositions, as a narrative drawn from actual and

personal experience differs from one derived from hearsay and the

report of others. But Timaeus had no such experience: and he therefore

naturally supposed that the part of an historian’s labour which is the

least important and lightest, that namely of collecting records and

making inquiries from those who had knowledge of the several events,

was in reality the most important and most difficult. And, indeed, in

this particular department of research, men who have had no personal

experience must necessarily fall into grave errors. For how is a man,

who has no knowledge of such things, to put the right questions as

to manœuvering of troops, sieges of cities, and fights at sea? And

how can he understand the details of what is told him? Indeed, the

questioner is as important as the narrator for getting a clear story.

For in the case of men who have had experience of real action, memory

is a sufficient guide from point to point of a narrative: but a man who

has had no such experience can neither put the right questions, nor

understand what is happening before his eyes. Though he is on the spot,

in fact, he is as good as absent....