Political fragments of Archytas, Charondas, Zaleucus, and other ancient Pythagoreans, preserved by Stobæus

by Unknown

Let no one curse him by whom he has been injured. For praise is more divine than defamation.

Let him be thought to be a better citizen who is superior to anger, than him who is an offender through it.

Let not him be praised but disgraced, who, in the sumptuousness of his expence, surpasses temples and palaces. For let nothing private be more magnificent and venerable than things of a public nature.

Let him who is a slave to wealth and money be despised, as one who is pusillanimous and illiberal, and is astonished by sumptuous possessions, and let him be considered as one who leads a tragical life, and whose soul is vile. For he who is magnanimous foresees with himself all human concerns, and is not disturbed by any thing of this kind [whether prosperous or adverse], when it accedes.

Let no one speak obscenely, in order that he may not in his thoughts approach to base deeds, and that he may not fill his soul with impudence and defilement. For we call things which are decorous and lovely, by their proper names, and by those appellations which are established by law. But we abstain from naming things to which we are hostile, on account of their baseness. Let it also be considered as base, to speak of a base thing.

Let every one dearly love his lawful wife, and beget children from her. But let no one emit the seed of his children[23] into any other person; nor let him illegally consume that which is honourable both by nature and law, and act with wanton insolence. For nature produced the seed, for the sake of procreating children, and not for the sake of lust.

But it is requisite that a wife should be chaste, and should not admit the impious connection with other men, as by so doing she will subject herself to the vengeance of the dæmons, whose office it is to expel those to whom they are hostile from their houses, and to produce hatred.

Let not him be praised who gives a stepmother to his children[24], but disgraced, as being the cause of domestic dissension.

And as it is proper to observe these mandates, let him who transgresses them be obnoxious to political execration.

The law also orders that these proems should be known by all the citizens, and should be read in festivals after the pæans[25] by him who is appointed for this purpose by the master of the feast, in order that the precepts may be inserted in the minds of all that hear them.