(2) Mr. R. W. Taylor aptly quotes "Othello," III. iii. 157—
"Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing;
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him
And makes me poor indeed."
The errors of private persons he bore with gently, but those of rulers he looked upon as grave; since the mischief wrought in the one case was so small, and so large in the other. The proper attribute of royalty was, he maintained, not an avoidance of responsibility, but a constant striving after nobleness. (3)
(3) On the word {kalokagathia} so translated, see Demosth. 777, 5.
Whilst he would not suffer any image (4) of his bodily form to be set up (though many wished to present him with a statue), he never ceased elaborating what should prove the monument of his spirit, holding that the former is the business of a statuary, the latter of one's self. Wealth might procure the one, he said, but only a good man could produce the other.
(4) See Plut. "Ages." ii. (Clough, iv. p. 2); also Plut. "Ap. Lac." p.
115; ib. p. 103; Cic. "ad Div." V. xii. 7.
As for riches, he employed them not with justice merely, but with liberality, holding that for a just man it is sufficient if he let alone the things of others, but of a liberal man it is required that he should take of his own and give to supply another's needs.
He was ever subject to religious fear, (5) believing that no man during his lifetime, however well he lives, can be counted happy; it is only he who has ended his days with glory of whom it can be said that he has attained at last to blessedness. (6)
(5) See "Cyr." III. iii. 58, and for the word {deisidaimon}, see Jebb,
"Theophr. Char." p. 263 foll.; Mr. Ruskin, Preface to "Bibl.
Past." vol. i. p. xxv.
(6) See Herod. i. 34; Soph. "Oed. Tyr." 1529; and Prof. Jebb's note ad
loc.
In his judgment it was a greater misfortune to neglect things good and virtuous, knowing them to be so, than in ignorance. Nor was he enamoured of any reputation, the essentials of which he had not laboriously achieved. (7)
(7) Or, "for which he did not qualify himself by the appropriate
labour."