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Ἑρμίου εὐνούχου ἤδ’ Εὐβούλου ἅμα δούλου Σῆμα κενὸν κενόφρων τεῦξεν Ἀριστοτέλης· Ὃς διὰ τὴν ἀκρατῆ γαστρὸς φύσιν εἴλετο ναίειν Ἀντ’ Ἀκαδημείας Βορβόρου ἐν προχοαῖς. |
Cf. Plutarch, De Exilio, p. 603.
[17] Stahr, Aristotelia, vol. ii. p. 290.
[18] Athenæus, ix. 398; Pliny, H. N. viii. c. 16. Athenæus alludes to 800 talents as having been given by Alexander to Aristotle for this purpose. Pliny tells us that Alexander put thousands of men at his service for enquiry and investigation. The general fact is all that we can state with confidence, without pretending to verify amounts.
[19] Vit. Aristotelis, Leyden, 1861, Robbe, pp. 4-6; Aristokles ap. Eusebium Præp. Evang. xv. 2. Respecting the Epistles of Aristotle, and the collection thereof by Artemon, see Rose, Aristoteles Pseudepigr. pp. 594-598.
[20] We may infer this fact from the insulting reply made by Alexander, not long before his death, to Kassander, who had just then joined him for the first time at Babylon, having been sent by Antipater at the head of a reinforcement. Some recent comers from Greece complained to Alexander of having been ill-used by Antipater. Kassander being present at the complaint, endeavoured to justify his father and to invalidate their testimony, upon which Alexander silenced him by the remark that he was giving a specimen of sophistical duplicity learnt from Aristotle. Ταῦτα ἐκεῖνα σοφίσματα τῶν Ἀριστοτέλους εἰς ἑκάτερον τῶν λόγων, οἰμωξομένων, ἂν καὶ μικρὸν ἀδικοῦντες τοὺς ἀνθρώπους φανῆτε (Plutarch, Alex. 74).
I have recounted elsewhere how the character of Alexander became gradually corrupted by unexampled success and Asiatic influences;[21] how he thus came to feel less affection and esteem for Aristotle, to whom he well knew that his newly acquired imperial and semi-divine pretensions were not likely to be acceptable; how, on occasion of the cruel sentence passed on Kallisthenes, he threatened even to punish Aristotle himself, as having recommended Kallisthenes, and as sympathizing with the same free spirit; lastly, how Alexander became more or less alienated, not only from the society of Hellenic citizens, but even from his faithful viceroy, the Macedonian Antipater. But these changed relations between Aristotle and Alexander did not come before the notice of the Athenians, nor alter the point of view in which they regarded the philosopher; the rather, since the relations of Aristotle with Antipater continued as intimate as ever.
[21] Histor. of Greece, ch. xciv. pp. 291, 301, 341; Plutarch, Alexand. c. lv.; Dion Chrysostom. Orat. 64, p. 338, Reiske.
It will thus appear, that though all the preserved writings of Aristotle are imbued with a thoroughly independent spirit of theorizing contemplation and lettered industry, uncorrupted by any servility or political bias — yet his position during the twelve years between 335-323 B.C. inevitably presented him to the Athenians as the macedonizing philosopher, parallel with Phokion as the macedonizing politician, and in pointed antithesis to Xenokrates at the Academy, who was attached to the democratical constitution, and refused kingly presents. Besides that enmity which he was sure to incur, as an acute and self-thinking philosopher, from theology and the other anti-philosophical veins in the minds of ordinary men, Aristotle thus became the object of unfriendly sentiment from many Athenian patriots,[22] who considered the school of Plato generally as hostile to popular liberty, and who had before their eyes examples of individual Platonists, ruling their respective cities with a sceptre forcibly usurped.[23]
[22] The statement of Aristokles (ap. Eusebium, Præp. Ev. xv. 2) is doubtless just — φανερὸν οὖν, ὅτι καθάπερ πολλοῖς καὶ ἄλλοις, οὕτω καὶ Ἀριστοτέλει συνέβη, διά τε τὰς πρὸς τοὺς βασιλεῖς φιλίας καὶ διὰ τὴν ἐν τοῖς λόγοις ὑπεροχήν, ὑπὸ τῶν τότε σοφιστῶν φθονεῖσθαι. The like is said by the rhetor Aristeides — Or. xii. p. 144, Dindorf.