Greek Texts & Translations

Lacydes, son of Alexander, was a native of Cyrene He was the founder of the New Academy and the successor of Arcesilaus: a man of very serious character who found numerous admirers; industrious from his youth up and, though poor, of pleasant manners and pleasant conversation. A most amusing story is told of his housekeeping. Whenever he brought anything out of the store-room, he would seal the door up again and throw his signet-ring inside through the opening, to ensure that nothing laid up there should be stolen or carried off. So soon, then, as his rogues of servants got to know this, they broke the seal and carried off what they pleased, afterwards throwing the ring in the same way through the opening into the store-room. Nor were they ever detected in this.

Lacydes used to lecture in the Academy, in the garden which had been laid out by King Attalus, and from him it derived its name of Lacydeum. He did what none of his predecessors had ever done; in his lifetime he handed over the school to Telecles and Evander, both of Phocaea. Evander was succeeded by Hegesinus of Pergamum, and he again by Carneades. A good saying is attributed to Lacydes. When Attalus sent for him, he is said to have remarked that statues are best seen from a distance. He stadied geometry late, and some one said to him, "Is this a proper time?" To which he replied, "Nay, is it not even yet the proper time?"

He assumed the headship of the school in the fourth year of the 134th Olympiad, ^note and at his death he had been head for twenty-six years. His end was a palsy brought on by drinking too freely. And here is a quip of my own upon the fact ^note:

Of thee too, O Lacydes, I have heard a tale, that Bacchus seized thee and dragged thee on tip-toe ^note to the underworld. Nay, was it not clear that when the wine-god comes in force into the frame, he loosens our limbs? Perhaps this is why he gets his name of the Loosener.

Carneades, the son of Epicomus or (according to Alexander in his Successions of Philosophers) of Philocomus, was a native of Cyrene. He studied carefully the writings of the Stoics and particularly those of Chrysippus, and by combating these successfully he became so famous that he would often say:

Without Chrysippus where should I have been?

The man's industry was unparalleled, although in physics he was not so strong as in ethics. Hence he would let his hair and nails grow long from intense devotion to study. Such was his predominance in philosophy that even the rhetoricians would dismiss their classes and repair to him to hear him lecture.

His voice was extremely powerful, so that the keeper of the gymnasium sent to him and requested him not to shout so loud. To which he replied, "Then give me something by which to regulate my voice." Thereupon by a happy hit the man replied in the words, "You have a regulator in your audience." His talent for criticizing opponents was remarkable, and he was a formidable controversialist. And for the reasons already given he further declined invitations to dine out. One of his pupils was Mentor the Bithynian, who tried to ingratiate himself with a concubine of Carneades; so on one occasion (according to Favorinus in his Miscellaneous History), when Mentor came to lecture, Carneades in the course of his remarks let fall these lines by way of parody at his expense:

Hither comes an old man of the sea, infallible, like to Mentor in person and in voice. ^note Him I proclaim to have been banished from this school.

Thereupon the other got up and replied: Those on their part made proclamation, and these speedily assembled. ^note

He seems to have shown some want of courage in the face of death, repeating often the words, "Nature which framed this whole will also destroy it." When he learnt that Antipater committed suicide by drinking a potion, he was greatly moved by the constancy with which he met his end, and exclaimed, "Give it then to me also." And when those about him asked "What?" "A honeyed draught," said he. At the time he died the moon is said to have been eclipsed, and one might well say that the brightest luminary in heaven next to the sun thereby gave token of her sympathy.