10. Moreover, what reason is there for saying that those who lie in prison under sentence of death do not receive their punishment until they are decapitated? or that he who has drunk the hemlock-juice, but is still walking about waiting for the heaviness to get into his legs, until he is seized by anaesthesia and the rigor of death, (has not received his?) If we regard the consummation of the punishment as the punishment itself, we overlook the intervening sufferings and fears, as well as the apprehension and regret with which every evil-doer is harassed. Is not this just as if we were to say of the fish that has swallowed the hook, that it is not caught until we see it broiled or cut up by the cooks? Every one who has committed a crime is firmly held by justice and has then and there fastened within himself, like a bait the sweet morsel of iniquity. Having an avenging conscience in his breast, ‘Like a frantic tunny he spins round in the sea.’ For the well-known reckless audacity and over-confidence of vice is active and ardent until the evil deed has been done; then the passion subsiding like a wind, sinks down weak and cowed under the weight of fears and superstitions; so that it is entirely in accordance with the event and the truth that Stesichorus attributes a dream to Klytemnestra in about these words: ‘She thought a dragon with gory head approached her, and from it Pleisthenades came forth.’ For visions by night and apparitions by day and oracles and celestial portents and whatever other phenomenon is regarded as caused by the direct interposition of God, cause anxieties and fears to persons who have a guilty conscience. For example, it is said, that Apollodorus once in a dream saw himself flayed by the Scythians, then boiled, and heard his heart speaking from the caldron and saying, ‘I am the cause of all this’; and that at another time he saw his daughters all ablaze, their bodies encircled with flame, running about him. Hipparchus also, the son of Peisistratus, a little before his death saw Aphrodite flinging blood in his face from a kind of basin; and the favorites of Ptolemy the Thunderer, saw him summoned before a tribunal by Seleucus where vultures and wolves were the judges, distributing many pieces of flesh among his enemies. Pausanias, likewise, having caused a free maiden to be brought by force from Byzantium in order to pass the night with her, but when she was come, owing to some perturbation of mind and suspicion, had her put to death—this maiden he frequently saw in a dream calling to him, ‘Hasten to judgment; assuredly lust brings sorrow on men.’ As the apparition did not cease to haunt him, it is said that he set sail for the oracle of the dead at Heracleia where he called up the ghost of the damsel by expiatory rites and libations. Appearing before him, she said that he would be freed from his troubles when he came to Lacedaemon; but as soon as he arrived there he died.
11. If then the soul has no sensation after death, and dissolution is the end of all rewards and punishments, one might rather say that the divinity deals kindly and indulgently with the wicked who are speedily chastised and die. For if we were to assert nothing more than that as long as they live and during the present existence no evil befalls the bad, but that when vice is exposed and is seen to be a fruitless and barren thing, that it brings nothing good or worth an effort, in spite of many severe agonies of mind—the recognition of these facts renders life an uneasy one. A case in point is the story told of Lysimachus that under stress of thirst he gave up his body and his dominions to the Getae, but that when he had got into their hands and received a draught he cried out, ‘Shame on my baseness for depriving myself of such a kingdom for so short-lived a pleasure.’ Yet it is exceedingly difficult to resist the needs of our physical nature; but when a man, either for the sake of money or from avidity for political honors or influence, commits a lawless and wicked act, and when, after the thirst and madness of his passion have been allayed, he finds, in the course of time, that the ignominy and the bitter sorrow for his crimes remain behind, and that villainy has been neither advantageous nor necessary nor profitable, must not the thought, so servile and mean, often occur to him, that for empty glory or fleeting enjoyment he has trampled under foot the dearest and highest rights of mankind, only to fill his life with shame and confusion. For as Simonides jestingly said, that he always found the chest he kept for money full and the one he kept for gratitude empty; so wicked men, when they examine their own evil hearts, discover that for the sake of a pleasure which directly proves to be an empty one, they find them void of hope but full of sorrows and pain, unpleasant memories, and anxiety for the future, but big with distrust of the present. Just as we hear Ino crying out in the theater when filled with regret for what she had done, ‘Dear women, how can I again dwell in the house of Athamas? Would that I had done none of the deeds I committed!’ So the soul of every villain ought to consider well and reflect how it may rid itself of the memory of its iniquities and exorcise a bad conscience, undergo a process of purification and live life over again. When the bad is deliberately preferred, it shows a lack of confidence and firmness and strength and stability—unless, forsooth, we admit that evil-doers are a class of sages. Wherever there exists an uncontrollable love of money and pleasure, and insatiable avarice coupled with malice or a bad character, there you will find also, if you look closely, latent superstitions and an aversion to labor and fear of death and sudden gusts of passion and an eagerness to be talked about joined to a penchant for boasting. Such men fear those who censure them and are afraid of those who praise them as persons who have been wronged by deception; they are particularly hostile to the wicked because they freely praise those who have the reputation of being virtuous. For that which hardens men in vice is like the brittleness in poor iron and is easily shivered. Whence it comes that as they, in the course of time, gain a deeper insight into the nature of things, are weighed down with sorrow and become morose and abhor their own past life. It surely cannot be but that a bad man who has restored a trust, or become surety for a friend, or who from a love of glory or fame has given and contributed something to his country, will forthwith regret what he has done, because he is unstable in his ways and fickle in his purpose; sometimes persons of this kind, even when applauded in the theaters, groan inwardly because the love of money has supplanted the love of glory; nor can it be that those who have sacrificed men for the attainment of sovereignty or to carry out a conspiracy, as did Apollodorus, or who have taken away money from their friends, as did Glaucus, do not repent, nor hate themselves, and do not feel regret for what they have done. I, for my part, do not believe, if I may say so, that there is need of any god or man to punish the impious, but that their life, ruined and made uneasy by vice, is fully sufficient.”
12. “Consider, however,” I said, “whether we are not examining the argument at greater length than its importance demands.” To this Timon replied, “It may be, in view of what is yet to come and of what has been omitted. For I shall now bring up as a sort of reserve the final difficulty, since we have in a measure worked our way through those that preceded. What Euripides alleges against the gods when he boldly charges them with turning ‘the transgressions of the parents over to their children,’ this, believe me, we also tacitly impute to them as an injustice. For, if those who have committed offenses have themselves expiated them, there is no further need of punishing those who have committed none, since it is not just to punish a second time for the same crime those who are innocent; or if through negligence they have failed to punish the real criminals, and long after visit the penalty upon the innocent, they do not justly make up for their tardiness by injustice. Something of this kind is told of Aesop who, it is said, came here (to Delphi) with gold from Crœsus in order to make a magnificent oblation to the god and to distribute to each of the Delphians four minae; but some difficulty arising, as it seems, and he having got into a quarrel with the parties here, performed the sacrifice but sent the money back to Sardis, alleging that the men were not worthy to receive it; thereupon they trumped up a charge of temple-robbery against him and put him to death by hurling him from the rock called Hyampeia. For this the god is said to have become incensed at them and to have sent a famine upon the land, together with all manner of strange diseases; so that they went around to the Hellenic festivals proclaiming and making known everywhere that whoever wished might wreak vengeance upon them for the wrong they had done to Aesop. In the third generation came one Iadmon, a man in no way related to Aesop, but a descendant of those who had bought him in Samos; and to this man, having in some way made satisfaction (for the wrong done to Aesop), the Delphians were released from their calamities. After that date also, they say, the punishment of temple-robbery was transferred to Nauplia from Hyampeia. Those who are great admirers of Alexander, of which number we also are, do not commend him for destroying the city of the Branchidae and putting them all to death, without distinction of age or sex, because their forefathers had betrayed the temple at Miletus. Agathocles, too, the usurper of Syracuse, mockingly told the Corcyreans, in answer to the question why he had laid waste their island, ‘That it most assuredly was because their fathers had kindly received Ulysses.’ To the people of Ithaca he likewise replied when they expostulated with him because his soldiers carried off their sheep, ‘Your king also came to us and even blinded the shepherd.’ And is not Apollo even more unreasonable if he is destroying the present generation of Pheneatae by blocking up the barathrum and inundating their entire territory, because a thousand years ago, as they say, Hercules carried off the prophetic tripod and took it to Pheneus? or when he foretold to the Sybarites a release from their ills, whenever they had appeased the anger of the Leucadian Hera, by a demolition three times repeated? And in truth, it is not long since the Lacedaemonians ceased to send virgins to Troy ‘who without upper garments and with bare feet, like slaves, at early dawn swept around the altar of Athena, without the wimple, even though old age bore heavy upon them,’ on account of the lasciviousness of Ajax. Where, pray, is the logic or justice of these things? We do not approve the custom of the Thracians, who even at the present day tattoo their wives for the purpose of avenging Orpheus, nor that of the barbarians along the Po for wearing black garments in token of mourning for Pentheus, as they say. And it would have been still more ridiculous, I think, if the men who lived at the time when Phaethon perished had not concerned themselves about him, but those who were born five or ten generations after his death had begun to change their garments for his sake and to put on mourning. Nevertheless this is merely silly and has nothing pernicious or irremediable about it. But with what reason does the anger of the gods sometimes suddenly disappear like certain rivers, only to break out afterwards against others in order to plunge them into the direst misfortunes?”
13. As soon as he ceased, I, fearing lest he might again proceed anew to more and greater absurdities, spoke up and asked him: “Very well, but do you accept all these things as true?” To which he replied, “Even if not all, but only some of them are true, do you not think the question presents the same difficulty?” “Perhaps,” said I, “and yet when persons are suffering from a high fever, the same or nearly the same heat remains whether they have on them one or more garments; nevertheless it affords some relief (to the patient) to remove what is superfluous. Still, if you do not wish to go on, we will let this matter pass; at any rate, these stories look like fables and inventions; remember, however, the festival of Theoxenia, recently celebrated, and the honorable place the heralds assign to the descendants of Pindar; how imposing and delightful the ceremony appeared to you. Who would not, I said, be charmed with the bestowal of this honor, so entirely in harmony with the spirit of Greek antiquity, unless his ‘black heart had been forged with cold flame,’ to use one of Pindar’s own expressions? Then I forbear to mention, I said, a proclamation similar to this in Sparta called, After the Lesbian Bard, in honor and memory of Terpander the Ancient, for the argument is the same. And you too, descendants of Opheltas, forsooth, claim somewhat more consideration than others among the Boeotians and at the hands of the Phokians because of Diophantus; besides, you were present and were the first to support me when I upheld the traditional honor of Herakles and the right to wear a crown which the Lycormae and the Satilaiae laid claim to; for I said it was altogether proper that the descendants of Herakles should enjoy unimpaired honors and benefits for services which he had rendered to the Greeks, but for which he had not himself received adequate recognition and requital.” “You have recalled to my mind a noble contest,” he said, “and one well worthy of a philosopher.” “Retract, then, my friend,” said I, “this serious charge, and do not take it ill if the descendants of wicked or base men are sometimes punished; or cease to speak with approval of the honors conferred upon those who are of noble ancestry. For it is incumbent upon us, if we are to requite to their descendants, the services of their forefathers, as a matter of consistency not to think that punishment ought to cease or be discontinued at once after the crime, but that it ought to run along with it and render a recompense corresponding to it. He who is pleased to see the family Kimon honored at Athens, but feels sore and aggrieved when the descendants of Lachares or Aristo are expelled, is very weak and inconsistent; or rather, he is captious and hypercritical as regards the deity: for he finds fault if the grand-children of a wicked and unjust man seem to meet with good fortune, and he finds fault again, if the offspring of the vicious are cut off and blotted out. He blames God equally whether the children of a good man or a bad man fare ill.”
14. “Let these things,” I said, “serve you as a sort of bulwark against those over hasty and carping critics; but let us take up again, as one may say, the beginning of the thread of this obscure problem concerning the Deity, with its many windings and ramifications, and let us follow them up with care but without fear, to what is probable as well as what is reasonable; this at least is clear and well established, that even in those things which we ourselves do, we cannot always give the reason. For example, why do we direct the children of those who have died of consumption or dropsy to sit with both feet in the water until the corpse is buried? for it is believed that in this way the disease will not pass to them or come near them. Again, for what reason does a whole herd of goats stand still if one of their number gets eryngo in its mouth, until the herdsman comes up and takes it out? And there are other forces in nature that interact among each other and pass back and forth with incredible swiftness through a great extent of space. Yet we are surprised at intervals of time, but not those of space. With all that, it is more wonderful if Athens is infected with a disease that had its origin in Ethiopia and of which Pericles died and from which Thucydides suffered than if the penalty for the crimes committed by the Delphians or Sybarites should be carried down to and visited upon their children. The forces of nature have certain connections, and inter-relations with each other extending from their farthest endings to their very beginnings, the cause of which, though unknown by us, silently produce their proper effects.
15. And, in truth, the wrath of the gods, when it falls upon a whole city, has its justification. For a city is a unit and an entirety, just like an animal, that does not lose its identity with the passing of the years, nor is transformed from one thing into something different in the course of time, but is always affected by like feelings and has a character peculiar to itself. It merits all the praise and all the blame for what it has done in its sovereign capacity, so long as the community which makes it one and binds it together preserves its unity. To make one city, in the course of time, consist of many cities, or rather, of a countless number, is like dividing one man into many because he is now older, but was formerly younger, and still earlier, a stripling. This is altogether like the well-known argument of Epicharmus, the so-called increasing syllogism, much used by the Sophists, that the man who had incurred a debt some time ago does not owe it now as he has become another man, and that he who was invited to a banquet yesterday comes to-day an unbidden guest because he is another person. Advancing age produces greater changes in each one of us than in the general character of cities. Any one would recognize Athens if he saw it thirty years ago; the customs of to-day, the motions, the sports, the occupations, the likes and dislikes of the people are precisely the same they were in former times; but a man whom a relative or a friend might chance to meet after an interval of time, he would scarcely recognize, and the change of character easily seen in every remark and occupation and in the feelings and habits have, even for those who are about us all the time, something strange and striking by their novelty. Nevertheless a man is regarded as one person from his birth to his death; and in like manner we think it right that the city, which remains the same, ought to be held responsible for the transgressions of its former citizens with the same show of reason that it shares in their glory and prestige; otherwise we shall, without being aware of it, cast everything into the river of Heracleitus into which he says nothing goes twice because nature keeps all things in motion and changes their form.
16. If then a city is a unit and a continuous thing, the same is undoubtedly true of the family that springs from one and the same beginning and engenders a certain power and a natural bond of sympathy between all its members. That which is begotten is not as if it were the handiwork of an artisan, separate from him who begets, for it is something that proceeds out of him, not something framed by him; consequently it possesses and bears within itself some portion of its original that may rightfully be chastised or honored. If I were not afraid I should be thought to be jesting I would say that the statue of Kasander has suffered a greater wrong at the hands of the Athenians when it was melted down, and the body of Dionysius when after death it was carried beyond their boundary by the Syracusans, than their descendants in paying the penalty for the deeds of these men. For in a statue of Kasander there was no part of him, and the soul of Dionysius had left the dead body long previously; but in the case of Nysaeus and of Apollokrates and of Antipater and of Philip and of all other persons in like manner who are the children of vicious parents, nature has implanted this predominant principle and it is ever present with them; is not dormant or inoperative, but they live in it and are nurtured by it; with them it abides and it directs their actions. It is not cruel or unreasonable if the children of these men share their destiny. All things considered, here, as in the healing art, what is advantageous is just, and he would make himself ridiculous who should affirm that in diseases of the hip-joint it was wrong to cauterize the thumb, and in the case of an ulcerated liver, to make an incision in the belly, and to anoint the tips of the horns of cattle if their hoofs are soft. So in the matter of punishments; he who thinks anything else is just than what will cure vice, and is scandalized if the healing is affected on one party for the sake of another,—like the opening of a vein to relieve the eyes—evidently sees no farther than what is plain to the senses. He does not take into account that even a schoolmaster, when he punishes one pupil also corrects others, and that a general who decimates his army punishes all his soldiers. Likewise, certain qualities, good as well as bad, are transmitted not only from one body to another, but even more readily from one soul to another. For in the one case it seems reasonable that the same conditions should also produce the same change, while in the other, the soul impelled by motives and impulses is naturally inclined by boldness or timidity to become worse or better.”
17. While I was yet speaking, Olympichus interrupting me, said, “You seem, in your discourse, to proceed on a weighty assumption, namely, the continued existence of the soul.” “You will surely grant this,” I replied, “or rather, have granted it, for my argument has proceeded from the beginning on the hypothesis that God distributes to us all rewards and punishments according to our deserts.”
Hereupon he replied, “Do you then think it follows of necessity, from the fact that because the gods observe all our actions, and apportion rewards and punishments, that souls are either altogether incorruptible, or that they continue to exist for some time after death?” “My good friends,” said I, “God is not impatient, or so occupied with trifles, that if there were not something of the divinity in us, something at least in a measure similar to Himself, but if, like unto leaves, as Homer says, we are altogether transitory, and doomed to perish in a little while, He would treat us with so much consideration—like those women who plant the gardens of Adonis in fragments of pottery and bestow pains on them—cherishing those ephemeral souls of ours, that dwell in a frail body, and when they are sprung up have no firm root in life, but are forever extinguished by any sudden calamity. But if you are agreed, let us pass over the other gods and let us consider ours here (in Delphi), whether you think, if he were aware that the souls of those who have passed from life, forthwith dissolve into nothing, like clouds or smoke, as soon as they leave the body, he would have instituted so many ceremonies for the dead, and would still require large gifts and honors for the deceased, merely to impose upon and delude the credulous. For my part, I could never give up (my faith in) the immortality of the soul unless some one should again, like another Herakles, take away the tripod of the Pythia, and eradicate and destroy the oracle. So long as even in our day many such oracular responses are rendered, as they say were given to Korax the Naxian, it is impious to assert that the soul can die.” Here Patrocleas asked, “What was the response and who was this Korax? for to me both the name and the circumstance are unknown.” “Not at all,” said I, “but I am to blame for using a cognomen instead of a name. The man who slew Archilochus in battle was called Kalondas, as you know; but he bore the eponym, Korax. Repelled at first by the Pythia for killing a devotee of the Muses, he next had recourse to prayers and humble supplications in order to secure his restoration to favor, then was commanded to repair to the habitation of Tettix, in order to appease the soul of Archilochus. This was at Taenarus, for thither, they say, Tettix the Cretan came with his fleet, founded a city and settled near an oracle of the dead. In like manner, also, an oracle came to the Spartans, bidding them conciliate the soul of Pausanias, persons who could evoke the dead having been sent for to Italy; these, after offering sacrifice, conjured up the ghost of the dead man in the temple.
18. This, then is one argument which establishes the providence of God and at the same time the immortality of the soul, and it is not possible to reject the one and accept the other. Now if the soul survives after the death of the body, it is also quite reasonable that it shares the rewards and punishments (of the latter). For in this life it is engaged in a contest, like an athlete, and when the contest is ended it receives its deserts. To the rewards and punishments meted out when existing there by itself (separate from the body) for the deeds of the previous life, the living attach no importance; they are concealed from our knowledge, and discredited. But those that are transmitted to children and through successive generations, being plainly evident to all who live here, turn many bad men from their ways and hold them in check. There is no more grievous chastisement, and none that reaches more to the quick, than for men to see their descendants in misfortune on their account; and when the soul of an impious and unjust man beholds, after death, not statues overturned and honors annulled, but children and friends and his own household overwhelmed with calamities and paying the penalty for crimes that he has himself committed,—there is no one who would again be unjust, or who would yield to his unbridled passion, for the honors of Zeus. I have also a story to tell that I recently heard, but I hesitate to do so lest you think it a fable, I will therefore keep to what is probable. “By no means,” said Olympichus, “but repeat it entire.” When the others also joined in the request, I said, “Permit me to repeat what is probable in the story and afterward, if you like, we will take up the fable, granting, of course, that it is a fable.”