Plutarch's Lives, Volume 3 (of 4)

PLUTARCH'S LIVES.

Translated from the Greek

WITH

_NOTES AND A LIFE OF PLUTARCH_.

BY

AUBREY STEWART, M.A.,
_Late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge_,

AND THE LATE

GEORGE LONG, M.A.,
_Formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge_,

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

VOL. III.

LONDON:

GEORGE BELL & SONS, YORK ST., COVENT GARDEN,
AND NEW YORK.

1892.

LONDON:

REPRINTED FROM THE STEREOTYPE PLATES BY WM. CLOWES & SONS, LTD.,

STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.




CONTENTS.

  LIFE OF NIKIAS                                    1
  LIFE OF CRASSUS (_By G. Long_.)                  36
  COMPARISON OF NIKIAS AND CRASSUS                 89
  LIFE OF SERTORIUS (_By G. Long_.)                94
  LIFE OF EUMENES                                 130
  COMPARISON OF SERTORIUS AND EUMENES             150
  LIFE OF AGESILAUS                               152
  LIFE OF POMPEIUS (_By G. Long_.)                195
  COMPARISON OF AGESILAUS AND POMPEIUS            295
  LIFE OF ALEXANDER                               300
  LIFE OF C. CÆSAR (_By G. Long_.)                379
  LIFE OF PHOKION                                 466
  LIFE OF CATO (_By G. Long_.)                    500



PLUTARCH'S LIVES.




LIFE OF NIKIAS.

As it appears to me that the life of Nikias forms a good
parallel to that of Crassus, and that the misfortunes of
the former in Sicily may be well compared with those
of the latter in Parthia, I must beg of my readers to
believe that in writing upon a subject which has been
described by Thucydides with inimitable grace, clearness,
and pathos, I have no ambition to imitate Timæus, who,
when writing his history, hoped to surpass Thucydides
himself in eloquence, and to show that Philistius was but
an ignorant bungler, and so plunges into an account of
the speeches and battles of his heroes, proving himself
not merely one

    "Who toils on foot afar
    Behind the Lydian car,"

as Pindar has it, but altogether unfit for the office of historian,
and, in the words of Diphilus,

     "Dull-witted, with Sicilian fat for brains."

He often seeks to shelter himself behind the opinions of Xenarchus, as
when he tells us that the Athenians thought it a bad omen that the
general whose name was Victory refused to command the expedition to
Sicily; and when he says that by the mutilation of the Hennas the gods
signified that the Athenians would suffer their chief disasters at the
hands of Hermokrates the son of Hermon; or, again, when he observes
that Herakles might be expected to take the side of the Syracusans
because of Proserpine, the daughter of Demeter, who gave him the dog
Kerberus, and to be angry with the Athenians because they protected
the people of Egesta, who were descended from the Trojans, whereas he
had been wronged by Laomedon, king of Troy, and had destroyed that
city. Timæus was probably led to write this sort of nonsense by the
same critical literary spirit which led him to correct the style of
Philistius, and to find fault with that of Aristotle and Plato. My own
opinion is that to pay too much attention to mere style and to
endeavour to surpass that of other writers, is both trifling and
pedantic, while any attempt to reproduce that of the unapproachable
masterpieces of antiquity springs from a want of power to appreciate
their real value. With regard, then, to the actions of Nikias
described by Thucydides and Philistius, more especially those which
illustrate his true character, having been performed under the stress
of terrible disasters, I shall briefly recapitulate them, lest I be
thought a careless biographer, adding to them whatever scattered
notices I have been able to collect from the writings of other
historians and from public documents and inscriptions; and of these
latter I shall quote only those which enable us to judge what manner
of man he was.

II. The first thing to be noted in describing Nikias is the saying of
Aristotle, that there had been in Athens three citizens of great
ability and patriotism, namely, Nikias, the son of Nikeratus,
Thucydides, the son of Melesias, and Theramenes, the son of Hagnon;
though the latter was not equal to the two former, but was reproached
with being a foreigner from the island of Keos; and, also, because he
was not a stable politician but always inclined to change sides, he
was nicknamed Kothornos, which means a large boot which will fit
either leg. Of these three statesmen the eldest was Thucydides, who
was the leader of the conservative opposition to Perikles; while
Nikias, who was a younger man, rose to a certain eminence during the
life of Perikles, as he acted as his colleague in the command of a
military force, and also filled the office of archon. On the death of
Perikles, Nikias at once became the foremost man in Athens, chiefly by
the favour of the rich and noble, who wished to make use of him to
check the plebeian insolence of Kleon; yet Nikias had the good-will
of the common people, and they were eager to further his interests.
Kleon, indeed, became very powerful by caressing the people and giving
them opportunities for earning money from the State, but in spite of
this, many of the lower classes whose favour he especially strove to
obtain, became disgusted with, his greed and insolence, and preferred
to attach themselves to Nikias.