“All types of all characters march through all fables: tremblers and boasters; victims and bullies: dupes and knaves; long-eared Neddies, giving themselves leonine airs; Tartuffes wearing virtuous clothing; lovers and their trials, their blindness, their folly and constancy. With the very first page of the human story do not love, and lies too, begin? So the tales were told ages before Æsop; and asses under lions’ manes roared in Hebrew; and sly foxes flattered in Etruscan; and wolves in sheep’s clothing gnashed their teeth in Sanscrit, no doubt. The sun shines to-day as he did when he first began shining; and the birds in the tree overhead, while I am writing, sing very much the same note they have sung ever since there were finches. There may be nothing new under and including the sun; but it looks fresh every morning, and we rise with it to toil, hope, scheme, laugh, struggle, love, suffer, until the night comes and quiet. And then will wake Morrow and the eyes that look on it; and so da capo.” All this is very true; the changes which may be observed in human nature are small, and the old types of Theophrastus are all about us nowadays and really look and act much the same as they did to the eyes of the ancient Peripatetic. Offices and institutions have somewhat changed, and many character-types due to new vocations have come into being since then, e.g. the newsboy, the bishop, the reporter, the hotel-clerk, and the jockey. But these are only accidents of civilization, and the peculiarities of office or the type or professional character do not touch the vital essence of human nature, although they may modify its expression.
When one speaks of a coward, one means an intrinsic quality in human kind which is essentially the same whether found in a hoplite or in a modern infantryman, but which may express itself differently in the two cases. The types described by Theophrastus are types of such intrinsic qualities, and his pictures of ancient vices and weaknesses show men much as we see them now. They are not merely types of professions or callings.
Similarity between Greek and Modern Types
The Flatterer
The Officious Man
Apart from slight variations of local coloring and institutions, the descriptions of the old Greek philosopher might apply almost as well to the present inhabitants of London or Boston as to the Athenians of 300 B.C. Then, as now, the flatterer plied his wily trade, indulging in smooth compliment of his hero’s person or actions. “As he walks with an acquaintance, he says: ‘Behold! How the eyes of all men are turned upon you! There is not a man in the city who enjoys so much notice as yourself. Yesterday your praises were the talk of the Porch. While above thirty men were sitting there together and the conversation fell upon the topic: “Who is our noblest citizen?” they all began and ended with your name.’” “If his friend essay a jest, the flatterer laughs and stuffs his sleeve into his mouth as though he could not contain himself.” But the flatterer of old could be subtle too. “He buys apples and pears, carries them to his hero’s house, and gives them to the children, and in the presence of their father he kisses them, exclaiming: ‘Chips of the old block!’” and “while his talk is directed to others in the company, his eye is ever fixed upon his hero.” Then as now there existed the officious man, always over-ready to undertake the impossible or to interfere in the affairs of others. “At a banquet, he forces the servants to mix more wine than the guests can drink. If he sees two men in a quarrel, he rushes in between, even though he knows neither one.” “If the doctor leave instructions that no wine be given the patient, he administers ‘just a little’ on the plea that he wants to set the sufferer right.”
The Tactless Man
There existed, of course, then as now, the tactless person, who “selects a man’s busiest hour for a lengthy conference, and who sings love ditties under his sweetheart’s window as she lies ill of a fever.” “At a wedding, he declaims against womankind, and when a friend has just finished a journey, he invites him to go for a walk.” “If he happens to be standing by when a slave is flogged, he tells the story of how he once flogged a slave of his, who then went and hanged himself.”
The Mean Man
There was the mean man, too, who, if his servant broke a pot or plate, deducted its value from the poor fellow’s rations. “He permits no one to take a fig from his garden or cross his field, or even to pick up windfalls under his fruit trees. He forbids his wife to lend salt or lamp-wicks or a pinch of cummin, marjoram, or meal, observing that these trifles make a large sum in a year.”