Know others!—know them well—that’s my advice.”
Philemon exhibited the first of his ninety-seven comedies when Menander was a boy of eleven. Nine years later Menander’s first piece appeared, and the rivalry between the poets began. In their subsequent contests, Philemon sometimes stooped to unworthy means to defeat his opponent; still, that his countrymen really admired him is evident from the legend current of his death. As he was concluding a comedy in his ninety-ninth year, nine beautiful maidens were said to have entered his chamber and beckoned him away. They were the Muses, about to wing their flight from Athens forever, and with them departed the soul of Philemon—the last of the Athenian poets.
FRAGMENTS FROM PHILEMON.
“Have faith in God, and fear; seek not to know him,
For thou wilt gain naught else beyond thy search:
Whether he is or is not, shun to ask:
As one who is, and sees thee, always fear him.”
“All are not just because they do no wrong,
But he who will not wrong me when he may,
He is the truly just. I praise not them