10. But the Epicureans are not the only men who are addicted to pleasure; but those philosophers are so too who belong to what are called the Cyrenaic and the Mnesistratean sects; for these men delight to live luxuriously, as Posidonius tells us. And Speusippus did not much differ from them, though he was a pupil and a relation of Plato's. At all events, Dionysius the tyrant, in his letters to him, enumerating all the instances of his devotion to pleasure, and also of his covetousness, and reproaching him with having levied contributions on numbers of people, attacks him also on account of his love for Lasthenea, the Arcadian courtesan. And, at the end of all, he says this—"Whom do you charge with covetousness, when you yourself omit no opportunity of amassing base gain? For what is there that you have been ashamed to do? Are you not now attempting to collect contributions, after having paid yourself for Hermeas all that he owed?"

11. And about Epicurus, Timon, in the third book of his Silli, speaks as follows:—

Seeking at all times to indulge his stomach,
Than which there's no more greedy thing on earth.

For, on account of his stomach, and of the rest of his sensual pleasures, the man was always flattering Idomeneus and Metrodorus. And Metrodorus himself, not at all disguising this admirable principle of his, says, somewhere or other, "The fact is, Timocrates, my natural philosopher, that every investigation which is guided by principles of nature, fixes its ultimate aim entirely on gratifying the stomach." For Epicurus was the tutor of all these men; who said, shouting it out, as I may say, "The fountain and root of every good is the pleasure of the stomach: and all wise rules, and all superfluous rules, are measured alike by this standard." And in his treatise on the Chief Good, he speaks nearly as follows: "For I am not able to understand what is good, if I leave out of consideration the pleasures which arise from delicately-flavoured food, and if I

[[440]]also leave out the pleasures which arise from amatory indulgences; and if I also omit those which arise from music, and those, too, which are derived from the contemplation of beauty and the gratification of the eyesight." And, proceeding a little further, he says, "All that is beautiful is naturally to be honoured; and so is virtue, and everything of that sort, if it assists in producing or causing pleasure. But if it does not contribute to that end, then it may be disregarded.

12. And before Epicurus, Sophocles, the tragic poet, in his Antigone, had uttered these sentiments respecting pleasure—

For when a man contemns and ceases thus
To seek for pleasure, I do not esteem
That such an one doth live; I only deem him
A breathing corpse:—he may, indeed, perhaps
Have store of wealth within his joyless house;
He may keep up a kingly pomp and state;
But if these things be not with joy attended,
They are mere smoke and shadow, and contribute,
No, not one jot, to make life enviable.

And Philetærus says, in his Huntress,—

For what, I pray you, should a mortal do,
But seek for all appliances and means
To make his life from day to day pass happily?
This should be all our object and our aim,
Reflecting on the chance of human life.
And never let us think about to-morrow,
Whether it will arrive at all or not.
It is a foolish trouble to lay up
Money which may become stale and useless.

And the same poet says, in his Œnopion,—