And the rest of that passage—“And Solon was the first person who called the thirtieth day of the month ἔνη καὶ νέα.”[15] He was the first person also who assembled the nine archons together to deliver their opinions, as Apollodorus tells us in the second book of his Treatise on Lawgivers. And once, when there was a sedition in the city, he took part neither with the citizens, nor with the inhabitants of the plain, nor with the men of the sea-coast.
X. He used to say, too, that speech was the image of actions, and that the king was the mightiest man as to his power; but that laws were like cobwebs—for that if any trifling or powerless thing fell into them, they held it fast; but if a thing of any size fell into them, it broke the meshes and escaped. He used also to say that discourse ought to be sealed by silence, and silence by opportunity. It was also a saying of his, that those who had influence with tyrants, were like the pebbles which are used in making calculations; for that every one of those pebbles were sometimes worth more, and sometimes less, and so that the tyrants sometimes made each of these men of consequence, and sometimes neglected them. Being asked why he had made no law concerning parricides, he made answer, that he did not expect that any such person would exist. When he was asked how men could be most effectually deterred from committing injustice, he said, “If those who are not injured feel as much indignation as those who are.” Another apophthegm of his was, that satiety was generated by wealth, and insolence by satiety.
XI. He it was who taught the Athenians to regulate their days by the course of the moon; and he also forbade Thespis to perform and represent his tragedies, on the ground of falsehood being unprofitable; and when Pisistratus wounded himself, he said it all came of Thespis’s tragedies.
XII. He gave the following advice, as is recorded by Apollodorus in his Treatise on the Sects of Philosophers:—“Consider your honour, as a gentleman, of more weight than an oath.—Never speak falsely.—Pay attention to matters of importance.—Be not hasty in making friends; and do not cast off those whom you have made.—Rule, after you have first learnt to submit to rule.—Advise not what is most agreeable, but what is best.—Make reason your guide.—Do not associate with the wicked.—Honour the gods; respect your parents.”
XIII. They say also that when Mimnermus had written:—
Happy’s the man who ’scapes disease and care,
And dies contented in his sixtieth year
Solon rebuked him, and said:—
Be guided now by me, erase this verse,