§ ix. As it is likely that much learning will produce wordiness, and so Pythagoras enjoined five years' silence on his scholars, calling it a truce from words,[621] so defamation of character is sure to go with curiosity. For what people are glad to hear they are glad to talk about, and what they eagerly pick up from others they joyfully retail to others. And so, amongst the other mischiefs of curiosity, the disease runs counter to their desires; for all people fight shy of them, and conceal their affairs from them, and neither care to do or say anything in their presence, but defer consultations, and put off investigations, till such people are out of the way; and if, when some secret is just about to be uttered, or some important business is just about to be arranged, some curious man happen to pop in, they are mum at once and reserved, as one puts away fish if the cat is about; and so frequently things seen and talked about by all the rest of the world are unknown only to them. For the same reason the curious person never gets the confidence of anybody. For we would rather entrust our letters and papers and seals to slaves and strangers than to curious friends and intimates. The famous Bellerophon,[622] though he carried letters against his life, opened them not, but abstained from reading the letter to the king, as he had refused to sell his honour to Proetus' wife, so great was his continence.[623] For curiosity and adultery both come from incontinence, and to the latter is added monstrous folly and insanity. For to pass by so many common and public women, and to intrude oneself on some married woman,[624] who is sure to be more costly, and possibly less pretty to boot, is the acme of madness. Yet such is the conduct of curious people. They neglect many gay sights, fail to hear much that would be well worth hearing, lose much fine sport and pastime, to break open private letters, to put their ears to their neighbour's walls, and to whisper to their slaves and women-servants, practices always low, and frequently dangerous.
§ x. It will be exceedingly useful, therefore, to deter the curious from these propensities, for them to remember their past experience. Simonides used to say that he occasionally opened two chests for rewards and thanks that he had by him, and found the one full for rewards, but the one for thanks always empty.[625] So if anyone were to open occasionally the stores that curiosity had amassed, and observe what a cargo there was of useless and idle and unlovely things, perhaps the sight of all this poor stuff would inspire him with disgust. Suppose someone, in studying the writings of the ancients, were to pick out only their worst passages, and compile them into a volume, as Homer's imperfect lines, and the solecisms of the tragedians, and Archilochus' indecent and bitter railings against women, by which he so exposed himself, would he not be worthy of the curse of the tragedian,
"Perish, compiler of thy neighbours' ills?"
And independently of such a curse, the piling up of other people's misdoings is indecent and useless, and like the town which Philip founded and filled with the vilest and most dissolute wretches, and called Rogue Town. Curious persons, indeed, making a collection of the faults and errors and solecisms, not of lines or poems but of people's lives, render their memory a most inelegant and unlovely register of dark deeds. Just as there are in Rome some people who care nothing for pictures and statues, or even handsome boys or women exposed for sale, but haunt the monster-market, and make eager inquiries about people who have no calves, or three eyes, or arms like weasels, or heads like ostriches, and look about for some
"Unnatural monster like the Minotaur,"[626]
and for a time are greatly captivated with them, but if anyone continually gazes at such sights, they will soon give him satiety and disgust; so let those who curiously inquire into the errors and faults of life, and disgraces of families, and disorders in other people's houses, first remember what little favour or advantage such prying has brought them on previous occasions.
§ xi. Habit will be of the utmost importance in stopping this propensity, if we begin early to practise self-control in respect to it, for as the disease increases by habit and degrees, so will its cure, as we shall see when we discuss the necessary discipline. In the first place, let us begin with the most trifling and unimportant matters. What hardship will it be when we walk abroad not to read the epitaphs on graves, or what detriment shall we suffer by not glancing at the inscriptions on walls in the public walks? Let us reflect that there is nothing useful or pleasant for us in these notices, which only record that so-and-so remembered so-and-so out of gratitude, and, "Here lies the best of friends," and much poor stuff of that kind;[627] which indeed do not seem to do much harm, except indirectly, to those that read them, by engendering the practice of curiosity about things immaterial. And as huntsmen do not allow the hounds to follow any scent and run where they please, but check and restrain them in leashes, keeping their sense of smell pure and fresh for the object of their chase, that they may the keener dart on their tracks, "following up the traces of the unfortunate beasts by their scent," so we must check and repress the sallies and excursions of the curious man to every object of interest, whether of sight or hearing, and confine him to what is useful. For as eagles and lions on the prowl keep their claws sheathed that they may not lose their edge and sharpness, so, when we remember that curiosity for learning has also its edge and keenness, let us not entirely expend or blunt it on inferior objects.
§ xii. Next let us accustom ourselves when we pass a strange house not to look inside at the door, or curiously inspect the interior, as if we were going to pilfer something, remembering always that saying of Xenocrates, that it is all one whether one puts one's feet or eyes in another person's house. For such prying is neither honourable, nor comely, nor even agreeable.
"Stranger, thou'lt see within untoward sights."
For such is generally the condition inside houses, utensils kicking about, maids lolling about, no work going on, nothing to please the eye; and moreover such side glances, and stray shots as it were, distort the soul, and are unhandsome, and the practice is a pernicious one. When Diogenes saw Dioxippus, a victor at Olympia, driving up in his chariot and unable to take his eyes off a handsome woman who was watching the procession, but still turning round and casting sheep's eyes at her, he said, "See you yon athlete straining his neck to look at a girl?" And similarly you may see curious people twisting and straining their necks at every spectacle alike, from the habit and practice of turning their eyes in all directions. And I think the senses ought not to rove about, like an ill-trained maid, when sent on an errand by the soul, but to do their business, and then return quickly with the answer, and afterwards to keep within the bounds of reason, and obey her behests. But it is like those lines of Sophocles,