Plutarch · a new plain-English translation from the Greek
I see, Cornelius Pulcher, that you have chosen the gentlest style of political life, one that is most useful to the community while making you the least troublesome to those you deal with privately. But since a land without wild beasts—like the Crete of the historians—can be found, while a constitution that has produced neither envy nor rivalrous jealousy, the most fertile passions of enmity, has not yet come into being, it seems that, if nothing else, friendships entangle us in enmities as well. This is what the wise Chilon had in mind when, hearing a man say he had no enemy, he asked whether he had a friend either. It seems to me that the statesman ought to have thought through the whole subject of enemies as well, and to have taken seriously what Xenophon said—no idle remark—that it belongs to a man of sense to derive benefit even from his enemies.
This, then, is what occurred to me to say on the subject the other day; I have gathered it together under roughly the same headings and sent it to you, sparing you, as far as I could, what has already been written in the Political Precepts, since I see you often have that book at hand. For the ancients it was enough not to be wronged by foreign and wild animals, and that was the whole aim of their struggles against beasts; but their descendants, once they had learned to make use of them, derive benefit as well—being fed on their flesh, clothed in their hair, treated medicinally with their gall and rennet, and arming themselves with their hides—so that one might well fear that, once the wild animals run out, man's life would itself become bestial, resourceless, and untamed. Since, then, for most people it is enough simply not to be harmed by their enemies, but Xenophon says that men of sense actually derive benefit from those at variance with them, we ought not to disbelieve this, but rather to look for the method and skill by which this good may be secured for people who cannot possibly live without an enemy.
No farmer can cultivate every tree, nor can any hunter tame every wild animal; so each has sought to gain some other use—one from what bears no fruit, the other from what is wild. The sea's water is undrinkable and harmful, yet it feeds fish and everywhere serves as a highway and a vehicle for those who travel upon it. When the satyr first saw fire and wanted to kiss and embrace it, Prometheus said, "Goat, you will mourn your beard, for it burns whoever touches it"—but it also gives light and warmth and is the instrument of every art to those who have learned to use it. Consider, then, the enemy too: even though he is harmful in other respects and hard to deal with, he somehow offers a point of contact, a use of his own, and proves beneficial. Among our affairs there are many things unloved, hateful, and hostile to those who encounter them; yet you see that some men have used bodily illness as an occasion for leisure, and toils that befell many have strengthened and trained them.
Some have even made the loss of their country and the loss of their property a resource for leisure and philosophy, as Diogenes and Crates did. Zeno, when he heard that his ship had been wrecked, said, "Well done, Fortune, for driving us into the cloak of philosophy." For just as the sturdiest stomachs and the healthiest of animals digest snakes and scorpions when they eat them, and some even feed on stones and shells, changing them through the strength and heat of their internal fire, while the squeamish and sickly vomit up even bread and wine they take in—so the foolish corrupt even their friendships, while the wise are able to make skillful use even of their enmities.
First, then, it seems to me that the most harmful part of enmity could become most beneficial to those who pay attention. What do I mean by this? Your enemy is always awake, lying in wait over your affairs, seeking a handle from every quarter, and he patrols your whole life—not seeing only through oak trees, like Lynceus, nor only through stones and shells, but ferreting out what is done through a friend, a servant, and every intimate as far as possible, digging into and searching out your plans. For friends often fail to notice us even when we are ill and dying, through carelessness and neglect, but of our enemies we all but pry into their very dreams; illnesses, debts, and quarrels with their wives escape the notice of the very people involved sooner than they escape the enemy. He clings especially to our faults and tracks them down. Just as vultures are drawn to the smell of decaying bodies and have no sense of what is clean and healthy, so it is the sick, base, and afflicted parts of our life that stir the enemy, and it is toward these that those who hate us dart, seizing and tearing at them.
Is this, then, beneficial? Very much so—it makes us live cautiously and pay attention to ourselves, neither doing nor saying anything carelessly or thoughtlessly, but always keeping our life blameless, as if under a strict regimen. For this caution, which thus restrains the passions and holds the reasoning faculty together, produces practice and a settled purpose of living decently and irreproachably. Just as cities disciplined by wars with their neighbors and continual campaigns come to cherish good order and a sound constitution, so those who are compelled by certain enmities to stay sober in their conduct of life and to guard against carelessness and contempt, and to do everything with due care, without realizing it are led by habit into blamelessness and have their character set in order—provided reason also lends some small assistance. For the line "then indeed would Priam and Priam's sons rejoice" is always at hand for such people, and it turns them back, diverts them, and keeps them away from just those things over which their enemies rejoice and mock.
Moreover, we see that the artists devoted to Dionysus perform in a relaxed and half-hearted way, often without precision, when they compete in the theaters on their own; but whenever there is a contest and a rivalry against others, they focus not only themselves but their instruments more intently, tuning their strings, adjusting themselves more carefully, and playing their pipes with greater exactness. So whoever knows that his enemy is a rival for his reputation and his life pays closer attention to himself, watches over his affairs more carefully, and orders his life accordingly. For it is also a mark of vice to feel more shame before enemies than before friends for the wrongs we commit.
Hence Nasica, when some people thought and said that Rome's affairs were now secure, since the Carthaginians had been destroyed and the Achaeans enslaved, said, "In fact we are now in a precarious position, having left ourselves neither anyone to fear nor anyone before whom to feel shame." Take also, further, the saying of Diogenes, a very philosophical and statesmanlike one: "How shall I defend myself against my enemy?"—"By becoming good and noble yourself." Men are pained to see their enemies' horses winning renown, and their dogs praised; if they see a well-tended estate or a flourishing garden, they groan. What, then, do you suppose they feel when they see you showing yourself a just, sound-minded, decent man, esteemed in speech, blameless in conduct, orderly in your way of life, reaping a deep furrow of the mind from which good counsels spring?
"Conquered," says Pindar, "men are bound by lack of resource"—not simply and not all men, but those who see themselves conquered by their enemies through diligence, decency, magnanimity, kindness, and good deeds; these things, as Demosthenes says, turn back the tongue, stop up the mouth, choke it, and force it into silence. So then, distinguish yourself from base men, for it is in your power. If you wish to vex the man who hates you, do not call him effeminate, soft, licentious, or vulgar and servile—rather, be a man yourself, be sound-minded, speak the truth, and treat those you meet with kindness and justice. But if you are led on to abuse him, keep yourself as far as possible from the very faults you are abusing him for.
Look within your own soul, examine what is unsound there, lest some vice of your own whisper against you, as the tragic poet says, "physician of others, yourself full of sores." If you call him uneducated, intensify your own love of learning and diligence; if you call him cowardly, rouse instead your own courage and manliness; and if you call him licentious and undisciplined, erase from your soul any hidden trace of love of pleasure, if such remains. For nothing is more shameful, and nothing more painful, than an insult that recoils on the speaker—just as reflected light troubles weak eyes more, so also blame that rebounds upon the blamers themselves, from the very truth of the matter, is most painful. For just as the northeast wind gathers the clouds, so a base life draws abuse upon itself.
Whenever Plato encountered people behaving disgracefully, he used to say to himself, "Surely I am not like that?" And the man who, having abused another's life, immediately examines his own and reforms it, correcting and turning it in the opposite direction, will gain something useful from his abuse, which otherwise seems, and is, useless and empty. Now most people laugh when someone who is himself bald or hunchbacked mocks others for the same things; but it is altogether ridiculous to abuse or mock anything that can be turned back against oneself, as when Leon of Byzantium, mocked by a hunchback for weakness of eyesight, said, "You reproach me with a merely human affliction, while carrying your own retribution on your back."
So do not abuse another as an adulterer if you yourself are mad for boys, nor as a spendthrift if you yourself are stingy. "You are of the same stock as a husband-slaying woman," said Alcmaeon to Adrastus. What was his reply? He turned back on Alcmaeon not another's reproach but his very own: "But you are the one who killed with your own hand the mother who bore you." To Crassus, Domitius said, "Didn't you weep when your pet lamprey, which you kept in a fish-pond, died?" And the other replied, "And didn't you fail to weep when you buried three wives?" The man who is going to abuse another need not be clever, loud-voiced, and reckless, but rather one who is himself beyond reproach and blameless. For it seems that god enjoins nothing so much upon the man who is about to censure another as "know thyself," so that in saying what they wish they may not hear in return what they do not wish to hear. For such a man, as Sophocles says, "loves to pour out his tongue in vain, and unwillingly hears the very words he willingly spoke against another."
This, then, is one benefit and use that lies in abusing one's enemy; and there is another no less useful—namely, being abused and hearing ill of oneself from one's enemies. That is why Antisthenes rightly said that those who are to be saved need either genuine friends or ardent enemies—the former admonishing those who err, the latter turning them away by their abuse. But since friendship nowadays has become tongue-tied when it comes to frank speech, and its flattering side is talkative while its admonishing side is voiceless, we must be ready to hear the truth even from our enemies. For just as Telephus, lacking his own physician, submitted his wound to the enemy's spear, so those in need of good will's admonition must be ready to endure even the speech of a hostile enemy, if it exposes and chastises their vice—looking to the deed rather than to the intention of the man who speaks harshly.
Just as the man who intended to kill the Thessalian Prometheus struck his tumor with a sword and cut it in such a way that the man was saved and freed from the tumor when it burst, so too, often, abuse hurled in anger or enmity has cured an evil of the soul that was either unrecognized or neglected. But most people, when abused, do not consider whether what is said applies to them, but rather what fault applies to the one abusing them—and, like wrestlers, they do not wipe the dust off themselves, but instead sprinkle each other with it, so that they become smeared and stained by their collision with one another. When abused by an enemy, one ought to remove the fault that actually clings to oneself, more readily than one would remove a stain that has been shown to be on one's cloak; but even if someone says things that do not apply, still one should seek out the cause from which the slander arose, and be on guard and fearful lest, without noticing it, we are at fault in something close to or resembling what is said.
For instance, a certain arrangement of hair and a rather soft gait led people to accuse Lacydes, king of the Argives, of effeminacy, and led them to accuse Pompey—though he was as far as could be from softness and licentiousness—of the same, because he scratched his head with one finger. Crassus was accused of having relations with one of the Vestal virgins, because he wanted to buy from her a fine piece of land and for that reason often met and courted her privately. Postumia was accused, because she laughed too readily and spoke rather boldly in the company of men, so that she was actually brought to trial for unchastity; she was in fact found innocent of the charge, but the high priest Spurius Minucius, in acquitting her, warned her not to use language less dignified than her way of life required. Themistocles, though he did no wrong, incurred suspicion of treason from Pausanias because he made use of him as a friend and wrote to him and sent messages to him continually.
So whenever something untrue is said, one must not simply despise and disregard it on the ground that it is false, but rather examine what it is in one's words, actions, pursuits, or associations that has given the slander its semblance of truth, and take care to guard against and avoid that. For if other people, falling into circumstances they did not wish for, learn something useful from them—as Merope says, "Fortune, taking as her wage the dearest of what was mine, made me wise"—what is to prevent one from taking the enemy as an unpaid teacher and gaining benefit, learning something one had not noticed? For the enemy perceives much about his enemy that the friend, being blinded, does not; for, as Plato says, "love is blind concerning the beloved," whereas hatred comes together with prying curiosity and talkativeness.
Hiero was mocked by one of his enemies for the bad odor of his mouth. So he went home and said to his wife, "What is this? Did you never tell me this either?" And she, being modest and without guile, said, "I supposed that all men smelled like that." So it is that things perceptible to the senses, bodily things, things obvious to everyone, one can learn from enemies sooner than from friends and intimates. Without this, moreover, it is not possible to have mastery over the tongue—no small part of virtue—always obedient and compliant to reason, unless one works upon the worst of the passions, such as anger, through practice, exercise, and diligence. For "the word that unwillingly slips out" and "the word that escaped the barrier of the teeth," and the way some words fly out unbidden—especially in tempers that have had no training, as it were slipping and pouring out—come about through weakness in the face of anger, through an undisciplined judgment, and through a reckless way of life.
For, according to the divine Plato, of all things speech is the lightest, yet its penalty is the heaviest, following both from gods and from men. Silence, on the other hand, is everywhere free of blame—not only
...not only blameless everywhere but also, as Hippocrates says, thirst-quenching; and in the face of abuse it is dignified and Socratic — or rather Heraclean, seeing that Heracles too paid no more heed than to a fly to hateful words. Yet nothing is more dignified or finer than to keep quiet in the face of a reviling enemy, swimming past him as past a smooth, mocking rock; nor is there any greater discipline than this. For if you accustom yourself to bear an enemy's abuse in silence, you will very easily bear
a wife's anger when she speaks ill of you, and you will listen unruffled to the bitterest words of a friend or a brother; and if struck and pelted by father or mother you will show yourself undismayed and free of resentment. For Socrates put up with Xanthippe, who was hot-tempered and difficult, reasoning that he would then get along easily with everyone else, once he had trained himself to bear with her; but it is far better, having exercised oneself against the repulsive behavior, angers, and
taunts and abuse of enemies and strangers, to accustom one's temper to remain calm and not be vexed when reviled. Gentleness and forbearance, then, can be displayed in this way in one's enmities, while simplicity, magnanimity, and kindness are shown rather in one's friendships. For with a friend, doing him good is not so admirable a thing as failing to do so, when he is in need, is shameful; but with an enemy, even foregoing revenge when the opportunity
presents itself is a decent thing. As for the man who sympathizes with an enemy who has stumbled, who lends aid to one who asks it, and who shows some zeal and eagerness toward an enemy's children and household when they fall into need — whoever does not admire such goodwill or praise such kindness has a black heart forged of adamant or iron. When Caesar ordered that the honors of Pompey, which had been thrown down, be set up again, Cicero said, “By setting up
Pompey's statues, you have fixed your own in place.” Hence one should not withhold praise or honor from an enemy who has justly won a good reputation. For this brings greater praise to those who give it, and it also lends credibility when one criticizes him again, showing that one hates not the man but disapproves of the deed. But the finest and most useful result is this: the man who has accustomed himself
to praise his enemies and not to be stung or envious when they prosper is thereby placed at the furthest remove from envy toward friends who flourish and kinsmen who succeed. And indeed, what other discipline produces a greater benefit for our souls, or a better disposition, than the one that removes our proneness to jealousy and envy? For just as in war many things done from necessity would otherwise be base, yet, taken up by habit, acquire the force of law and cannot easily be shaken off even when they prove harmful, so too enmity, in bringing along
envy together with hatred, leaves behind jealousy, malicious delight in another's misfortune, and grudge-bearing. Besides this, cunning, deceit, and scheming — which are not thought base or unjust when directed against an enemy — once they take root, remain and are hard to shake off; then people go on using them against their own friends too, out of habit, if they have not guarded against using them against enemies. If, then, Pythagoras was right, when in the case of irrational animals he trained people to abstain from cruelty and greed,
turning away bird-catchers and, when he bought up hauls of fish, ordering that they be released, and forbidding the killing of any tame creature, then it is surely far more admirable, in disputes and rivalries with other people, being a noble, just, and truthful enemy, to punish and humble the base, ignoble, and unscrupulous passions, so that in one's dealings with friends they remain entirely quiet and one refrains
from wrongdoing. Scaurus was an enemy of Domitius, and his prosecutor. Now a slave of Domitius came to him before the trial, claiming to have information to reveal that was hidden from his master; but Scaurus would not let him speak, and instead seized the man and led him back to his master. When Cato was prosecuting Murena for bribery and gathering his proofs, those who by custom kept watch on his doings would follow him about.
So they would often ask him whether he intended that day to gather or prepare anything toward the prosecution; and if he said no, they trusted him and went away. Now this is the greatest proof of his reputation; but greater and finer still is this: that once we have accustomed ourselves to deal justly even with our enemies, we will never treat our intimates and friends unjustly or unscrupulously. And since every crested lark, according to Simonides,
must grow a crest of its own, and since every human nature carries within it rivalry, jealousy, and envy — the companion of empty-minded men, as Pindar says — one would be helped no small amount by purging these passions off onto one's enemies, diverting them, like channels, as far as possible from one's companions and kin. And it was this, it seems, that the statesman Onomademus grasped, when, in Chios, during
a civil conflict, finding himself in the winning faction, he urged his companions not to drive out all their political opponents, but to leave some behind, “so that,” he said, “we do not begin to quarrel with our friends, once we are entirely rid of our enemies.” So too in our own case, these passions, once spent upon our enemies, will trouble our friends the less. For “potter need not envy potter,” nor “singer, singer,”
as Hesiod says, nor need one envy a neighbor, a cousin, or a brother who is “hastening toward wealth” and meeting with good fortune. But if there is no other way to be rid of strife, envy, and rivalry, accustom yourself to feel the sting only when your enemies prosper, and provoke and whet your competitive spirit by sharpening it upon them. For just as skilled farmers make their roses and violets better
by planting garlic and onions alongside them — believing that all the pungent, foul-smelling matter in the soil is drawn off into those plants — so too an enemy who takes up and cultivates your ill nature and envy will render you more kindly and less pained toward friends who are prospering. For this reason, one's contests with enemies should be waged over reputation, office, or just gains, without being stung
merely because they have some advantage over us, but rather carefully observing all the sources of their advantage, and trying to surpass them through diligence, hard work, self-control, and attentiveness to oneself — just as Themistocles said that the trophy of Miltiades at Marathon would not let him sleep. For the man who supposes his enemy surpasses him in good fortune — whether in offices, advocacies, political leadership, or
standing with friends and leaders — and who, instead of taking action and striving to match him, sinks entirely into envy and despondency, lives with an idle and unproductive envy. But the man who is not blinded regarding the object of his hatred, but becomes instead a fair observer of his enemy's life, character, words, and deeds, will see that most of the things he envies arise from diligence, foresight, and honorable actions
on the part of those who possess them; and by striving toward these same ends he will train his own love of honor and love of what is fine, while cutting away idle indifference and laziness. And if enemies, by flattering, scheming, bribing, or hiring themselves out, seem to reap shameful and servile positions of power at courts or in political life, this will not trouble us but will rather delight us, as we set against it our own freedom and the purity of our lives, and
our freedom from insult. For “all the gold above the earth and beneath it is not worth virtue in exchange,” as Plato says; and one must always keep ready at hand the saying of Solon: “but we would not exchange our virtue for their wealth” — nor for the applause of theater crowds feasted beforehand, nor for honors and front-row seats granted by eunuchs, concubines, and satraps of kings; for nothing base can be either enviable or admirable
when it springs from something shameful. But since, as Plato says, love is blind where the beloved is concerned, and since our enemies give us a sharper perception when they behave disgracefully, we must let neither our pleasure at their errors lie idle, nor our pain at their successes, but must reason from both, so that by guarding against the one we may become better than they are, and by imitating the other we may not become worse.