Plutarch: Selections from the Life of Alexander

Plutarch, a Roman historian who lived during the first century AD (ca. 46-119), wrote his Lives of the Noble
Grecians and Romans intending to draw parallels between great figures of Greek antiquity and Romans of
his own time. He chose to compare Alexander the Great with Julius Caesar. In his Life of Alexander,
Plutarch tells some of the most famous stories related about Alexander.

Questions:
1. Plutarch tells about an important episode in Alexander's life. What characteristics is it intended to show?
2. What, in Plutarch's opinion, makes a "great man"? Is Alexander great?

When Philonieus, the Thessalian, offered the horse named Bucephalus in sale to Philip [Alexander's father],
at the price of thirteen talents, the king, with the prince and many others, went into the field to see some
trial made of him. The horse appeared extremely vicious and unmanageable, and was so far from suffering
himse lf to be mounted, that he would not bear to be spoken to, but turned fiercely on all the grooms.
Philip was displeased at their bringing him so wild and ungovernable a horse, and bade them take him
away. But Alexander, who had observed him well, said, "What a horse they are losing, for want of skill and
spirit to manage him!" Philip at first took no notice of this, but, upon the prince's often repeating the same
expression, and showing great uneasiness, said, "Young man, you find fault with your elders, as if you knew
more than they, or could manage the horse better." "And I certainly could," answered the prince. "If you
should not be able to ride him, what forfeiture will you submit to for your rashness?" "I will pay the price of
the horse."

Upon this all the company laughed, but the king and prince agreeing as to the forfeiture, Alexander ran to
the horse, and laying hold on the bridle, turned him to the sun; for he had observed, it seems, that the
shadow which fell before the horse, and continually moved as he moved, greatly disturbed him. While his
fierceness and fury abated, he kept speaking to him softly and stroking him; after which he gently let fall
his mantle, leaped lightly upon his back, and got his seat very safe. Then, without pulling the reins too
hard, or using either whip or spur, he set him a-going. As soon as he perceived his uneasiness abated, and
that he wanted only to run, he put him in a full gallop, and pushed him on both with the voice and spur.

Philip and all his court were in great distress for him at first, and a profound silence took place. But when
the prince had turned him and brought him straight back, they all received him with loud acclamations,
except his father, who wept for joy, and kissing him, said, "Seek another kingdom, my son, that may be
worthy of thy abilities; for Macedonia is too small for thee..."

[Philip] sent for Aristotle, the most celebrated and learned of all the philosophers; and the reward he gave
him for forming his son Alexander was not only honorable, but remarkable for its propriety. He had formerly
dismantled the city of Stagira, where that philosopher was born, and now he re-built it, and reestablished
the inhabitants, who had either fled or been reduced to slavery... Aristotle was the man Alexander admired
in his younger years, and, as he said himself, he had no less affection for him than for his own father...

[Alexander] was only twenty years old when he succeeded to the crown, and he found the kingdom torn
into pieces by dangerous parties and implacable animosities. The barbarous nations, even those that
bordered upon Macedonia, could not brook subjection, and they longed for their natural kings... Alexander
was of opinion, that the only way to security, and a thorough establishment of his affairs, was to proceed
with spirit and magnanimity. For he was persuaded, that if he appeared to abate of his dignity in the least
article, he would be universally insulted. He therefore quieted the commotions, and put a stop to the rising
wars among the barbarians, by marching with the utmost expediency as far as the Danube, where he
fought a great battle...

The barbarians, we are told, lost in this battle twenty thousand foot and two thousand five hundred horse,
whereas Alexander had no more than thirty-four men killed, nine of which were the infantry. To do honor to
their memory, he erected a statue to each of them in brass, the workmanship of Lysippus. And that the
Greeks might have their share in the glory of the day, he sent them presents out of the spoil: to the
Athenians in particular he sent three hundred bucklers. Upon the rest of the spoils he put this pompous
inscription, WON BY ALEXANDER THE SON OF PHILIP, AND THE GREEKS (EXCEPTING THE
LACEDAEMONIANS), OF THE BARBARIANS IN ASIA. The greatest part of the plate, the purple furniture, and
other things of that kind which he took from the Persians, he sent to his mother.

Source:

From: John Langhorne and William Langhorne, eds., Plutarch's Lives, Translated from the Original Greek.
Cincinatti: Applegate, Pounsford and Co., 1874, pp. 434-439.

Thanks to Belle Tuten..

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PHILOSOPHICAL BACKGROUND OF THE HELLENISTIC AGE

Hellenistic1 philosophy in contrast with the philosophy of Plato, which focused on the
affairs of the polis, concentrated on the individual and his personal welfare. In general,
Hellenistic philosophy recommended that the individual, in order to attain happiness,
attempt to manage only what was for him personally manageable, his own character and
thoughts. Man must become self-sufficient and not rely on anyone or anything outside
himself for his well-being. Also, he must adopt an attitude toward external events which
will result in attaining ataraxia `imperturbability' (i.e., `peace of mind'), the goal of most
Hellenistic philosophies.
1
The word "Hellenistic" comes from the verb hellenizein, which means `to speak Greek'
and also `to Hellenize', that is, to make a non-Greek Greek. Because Alexander the Great
had conquered the non-Greek East as far as India and had introduced Greek culture into
that area, modern scholars have given the name `Hellenistic' to the period of Greek
history and culture following his death in 323 B.C. extending down to 146 B.C. when
begins the period of Roman domination.

In the Hellenistic period various philosophies were devised in order to help man achieve
happiness. The most popular was Stoicism. The founder of Stoicism was a Cypriot named
Zeno (335-263 B.C.) who came to Athens in 313 and taught in a public colonnaded hall
called the Stoa Poikile `Painted Porch', from which his philosophy acquired its name. The
doctrines of Zeno's philosophy aimed at the typically Hellenistic ideals of peace of mind
and self-sufficiency and viewed man first and foremost as a member of the human race
and secondarily a citizen of a particular polis.
Stoicism adopted a physical theory of the universe in part derived from that of the
Presocratic Heraclitus. The basic stuff of the universe is not inert matter, but a living
creative fire which contains the seeds of all creation. This fire pervades the whole
universe in greater and smaller amounts. Higher forms of existence have more of it while
lower forms, less. In its purest form it is identified with Reason and God, who is
sometimes called Zeus or Jupiter, his Roman counterpart. Although Stoicism uses these
traditional names which usually designate an anthropomorphic divinity, its concept of
divinity is entirely non-anthropomorphic. The existence of the other gods is not denied,
but they are often interpreted symbolically as natural phenomena (e.g., Apollo = the sun),
as natural substances (Hera [Juno] = air; Poseidon [Neptune] = the sea) or as human
feelings (e.g., Aphrodite [Venus] = sexual urges).

The divine rational fire of the universe is also identified by the Stoics with Fate. Under
the influence of Babylonian astrology Stoicism adopted the idea of the sympathy of the
universe. According to astrology, what happens in one part of the universe affects what
happens in another part. Man as a microcosm of the universe is affected by what happens
in the heavens. This suited well the Stoic doctrine that man, whose soul consisted of a
portion of the divine fire, was governed by the universal divine fire, which plotted out in
advance human events. The most important difference between astrological fate and Stoic
fate, however, is that the former is viewed pessimistically while the latter is seen
optimistically as a rational and providential principle. Stoic providential fate is best
summed up in the modern saying: "Everything turns out for the best". Thus, human
events which seem bad are only apparent evils; if the ultimate purposes of God were
known, they would be seen as leading to some good. Man must learn to adjust to and
accept what happens; to resist divine providence (i.e., whatever happens) is wrong and
useless. The only result of such resistance is loss of peace of mind. Willing cooperation
with the Divine Will is the only sensible course of action and the essence of Stoic virtue.

The teachings of the early Stoics emphasized that man must learn to deal with whatever
happens to him, whether good or bad, by eliminating the passions which disturb his soul,
such as fear, greed, grief and joy. He must attain a state of apatheia `a complete lack of
feeling' in order to achieve peace of mind. This unrealistic demand on human nature was
characteristic of the extreme idealism of early Stoicism, which aimed at creating a limited
utopian community of perfect wise men who alone could achieve these high ideals. The
Greek Stoic philosopher Panaetius (c.185-109 B.C.), however, made Stoicism a less
exclusive philosophy embracing the whole human race by rejecting the doctrine of
apatheia without diminishing the importance of self-control and by emphasizing the
equality and brotherhood of all men on the basis that every man's soul is derived from the
divine rational fire. On a visit to Rome Panaetius became friendly with Publius Scipio
Aemilianus, the conqueror of Carthage, who was at the head of a group of prominent
philhellenic Romans known today as the Scipionic Circle. In this way the more humane
values of Panaetius's version of Stoicism became popular among the Romans, who as a
pragmatic people had little use for Greek philosophical idealism. Stoicism remained the
dominant philosophy at Rome until the arrival of Christianity and even had a strong
influence on the new religion.
Second only to Stoicism in popularity was the philosophy of Epicurus (341-270 B.C.),
the son of an Athenian schoolteacher, who established his school at Athens in a garden
attached to his house. For this reason Epicureanism was often referred to as the
philosophy of "the Garden". Epicurus's associates (including women and slaves) lived
together in his house in a philosophical community linked by close friendships isolating
themselves from civic affairs and sharing an almost ascetic way of life. Epicurus was a
prolific writer, but most of his works are lost including his major work On Nature.

Epicureanism shared with other Hellenistic philosophies the emphasis on the individual
rather than the state, peace of mind, and self-sufficiency, but what set it apart was its
common-sense approach to life. Since man naturally seeks pleasure and avoids pain,
Epicurus identified man's chief good as pleasure. This emphasis on pleasure earned
Epicurus a bad reputation both in ancient and modern times, which survives in the
archaic meaning of the word `epicure' as a person devoted to the pleasures of the senses
and to luxury. This is a misunderstanding of Epicurus's teachings; he was not a hedonist
in the pejorative sense of the word. He saw pleasure as the absence of pain and pain as an
unsatisfied desire for pleasure. But not every desire had to be satisfied. Epicurus divided
bodily pleasures into three categories: 1. physical and necessary (e.g., food, drink,
clothing, shelter) 2. physical and not necessary (e.g., sex) 3. neither physical nor
necessary (e.g., luxurious clothing or any luxury): #1 must be satisfied, #2 must be
enjoyed prudently and #3 must be avoided. Pain, therefore, will only result when desires
for pleasures of the first category are not satisfied. But perhaps even more

critical to human happiness, according to Epicurus, is the avoidance of mental pains,

which typically ruin human happiness: anxiety caused by involvement in public affairs,
remorse brought about by a guilty conscience and the fear of the gods and of death. To
avoid these pains is to experience pleasure of the mind and thus achieve ataraxia.

Epicurus supported his moral teachings with the physical theory of atomism, which he
borrowed from the Presocratic philosopher Democritus of Abdera. His interest in
atomism is not at all speculative but quite pragmatic. Epicurus saw in atomism an
explanation of the origin of the universe that eliminated the gods from the world2 and
proved that the soul was mortal. If man accepted atomism, then he would not be subject
to those two great fears, which are most destructive of human happiness: the fear of the
gods and of punishment in the afterlife.
2
But this is not to say that Epicurus was an atheist. He believed that the gods exist in the
interspaces between the innumerable worlds and, because they have no involvement with
the world and the troublesome life of mankind, are models of Epicurean ataraxia.

Epicurus takes a purely utilitarian view of virtue, which he sees as secondary in

importance to the avoidance of pain. Any virtue which brings pain is not to be practiced.
On the other hand, we can most often avoid serious mental pain by being virtuous,
because when we do wrong, we are tortured by remorse. In Epicurean ethics justice is not
the all-encompassing moral principle presented by Plato, but a simple agreement among
men not to harm or be harmed. In this light, justice is basically an effective means of
diminishing the possibility of pain by agreeing not to inflict pain on others in return for
not suffering pain.

Despite the Roman poet Lucretius's attempt in his poem On the Nature of the Universe to
win his fellow citizens over to Epicureanism, this philosophy did not gain a large number
of adherents at Rome. The Romans were a very religious people and religion was an
essential part of the political structure at Rome. The political process with its extensive
use of augury was predicated on the assumption that the gods were involved in the affairs
of the Romans. The generally puritanical Romans also regarded with suspicion a
philosophy which was so concerned with pleasure. Finally, Epicurus's recommendation of
withdrawal from public life was not likely to earn his philosophy wide acceptance among
an aristocracy which saw politics as a worthy and noble endeavor. With the advent of
Christianity, Epicureanism met with even more hostility. Epicurus's teachings that the
soul is mortal, that the world is the result of a chance combination of atoms, that there is
no providential god and that the chief good is pleasure were totally at odds with Christian
doctrine.

LETTER: Thomas Jefferson to William Short

William Short had been Jefferson's Private Secretary when he was Minister in
Paris, 1786-1789. They were neighbors in central Virgina, Short living in the
Village of Shadwell.

Monticello, October 31, 1819

Dear Sir, Your favor of the 21st is received....

[The first paragraph discusses Jefferson's recovery from a recent illness.]

.... As you say of yourself, I TOO AM AN EPICUREAN. I consider the genuine

(not the imputed) doctrines of Epicurus as containing every thing rational in moral
philosophy which Greece and Rome have left us. Epictetus, indeed, has given us
what was good of the Stoics; all beyond, of their [doctrines] dogmas, being
hypocrisy and grimace. Their great crime was in their calumnies of Epicurus and
misrepresentations of his doctrines; in which we lament to see the candid
character of Cicero engaging as an accomplice. The merit of his philosophy is in
the beauties of his style. Diffuse, vapid, rhetorical, but enchanting. His prototype
Plato, eloquent as himself, dealing out mysticisms incomprehensible to the
human mind, has been deified by certain sects usurping the name of Christians;
because, in his foggy conceptions, they found a basis of impenetrable darkness
whereon to rear fabrications as delirious of their own invention. These they
fathered blasphemously on Him whom they claimed as their Founder, but who
would disclaim them with the indignation which their caricatures of His religion so
justly excite. Of Socrates we have nothing genuine but in the Memorabilia of
Xenophon; for Plato makes him one of his Collocutors merely to cover his own
whimsies under the mantle of his name; a liberty of which we are told Socrates
honestly complained. Seneca is indeed a fine moralist, disfiguring his work at
times with some Stoicisms, and affecting too much antithesis and point, yet
giving us on the whole a great deal of sound and practical morality. But the
greatest of all the reformers of the depraved religion of His own country was
Jesus of Nazareth. Abstracting what is really Huis from the rubbish in which he is
buried, easily distinguished by its lustre from the dross of His biographers, and as
separable from that as the diamond from the dunghill, we have the outlines of a
system of the most sublime morality which has ever fallen from the lips of man;
outlines which it is lamentable He did not live to fill up. Epictetus and Epicurus
give laws for governing ourselves, Jesus a supplement of the duties and charities
we owe to others The establishment of the innocent and genuine character of
this benevolent Moralist, and the rescuing it from the imputation of imposture
which has resulted from [misconstructions of his words by his pretended votaries]
artificial systems*, invented by ultra-Christian sects, unauthorized by a single
word ever uttered by Him, is a most desirable object, and one to which Priestley
has successfully devoted his labors and learning It would in time, it is to be
hoped, effect a quiet euthanasia of the heresies of bigotry and fanaticism which
have so long triumphed over human reason, and so generally and deeply
afflicted mankind; but this work is to be begun by winnowing the grain from the
chaff of the historians of His life I have sometimes thought of translating
Epictetus (for he has never been tolerably translated into English) by adding the
genuine doctrines of Epicurus from the Syntagma of Gassendi, and an abstract
from the Evangelists of whatever has the stamp of the eloquence and fine
imagination of Jesus. The last I attempted too hastily some twelve or fifteen
years ago. It was the work of two or three nights only, at Washington, after
getting through the evening task of reading the letters and papers of the day. But
with one foot in the grave, these are now idle projects for me. My business is to
beguile the wearisomeness of declining life, as I endeavor to do, by the delights
of classical reading and of mathematical truths, and by the consolations of a
sound philosophy, equally indifferent to hope and fear.

I take the liberty of observing that you are not a true disciple of our master
Epicurus, in indulging the indolence to which you say you are yielding. One of his
canons, you know, was that "that indulgence which presents a greater pleasure,
or produces a greater pain, is to be avoided." Your love of repose will lead, in its
progress, to a suspension of healthy exercise, a relaxation of mind, an
indifference to everything around you, and finally to a debility of body, and
hebetude of mind, the farthest of all things from the happiness which the well-
regulated indulgences of Epicurus ensure; fortitude, you know, is one of his four
cardinal virtues. That teaches us to meet and surmount difficulties; not to fly from
them, like cowards; and to fly, too, in vain, for they will meet and arrest us at
every turn of our road....

[A paragraph follows, inviting Short and his friend Correa to Monticello, with some
news of the progress at the University]

I will place under this a syllabus of the doctrines of Epicurus, somewhat in the
lapidary style, which I wrote some twenty years ago; a like one of the philosophy
of Jesus, of nearly the same age, is too long to be copied. Vale, et tibi persuade
carissimum te esse mihi.

Syllabus of the Doctrines of Epicurus

Physical-
The Universe is eternal.
Its parts, great and small, interchangeable.
Matter and Void alone
Motion--inherent in matter which is weighty and declining.
Eternal circulation of the elements of bodies.
Gods, an order of beings next superior to man, enjoying in their sphere,
their own felicities; but not meddling with the concerns of the scale of
beings below them.

Moral -
Happiness is the aim of life.
Virtue the foundation of happiness.
Utility the test of virtue.
Pleasure active and In-do-lent.
In-do-lence [a-tarax-ia] is the absence of pain, the true felicity.
Active, consists in agreeable motion; it is not happiness, but the means to
produce it.
Thus the absence of hunger is an article of felicity; eating the means to
obtain it.
The summum bonum is to be not pained in body, nor troubled in mind.
i.e. In-do-lence of body, tranquillity of mind.
To procure tranquillity of mind we must avoid desire and fear, the two
principal diseases of the mind.
Man is a free agent.
Virtue consists in 1. Prudence 2. Temperence 3. Fortitude 4. Justice.
To which are opposed, 1. Folly. 2. Desire. 3. Fear. 4. Deceipt.

*e.g the immaculate conception of Jesus, his deification, the creation of the world
by him, his miraculous powers, his resurrection & visible ascension, his corporeal
presence in the Eucharist, the Trinity, original sin, atonement, regeneration,
election orders of Hierarchy etc. [This footnote is often expurgated from
published texts]

Text: The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (ed. A. A.

Lipscome and A. E. Bergh) Volume XV (Washington
DC: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association
1905) pp. 219-224. For an appreciation of Jefferson's
editorial work, see C. Bruce Hunter, "Jeffersons Bible:
Cutting and Pasting the Good Book, " Bible Review
13. 1 (February 1997) 38-41; 46.

Photograph of the original (in the Library of Congress:

The Thomas Jefferson Papers), transcribed and
edited by Gerard W. Gawalt, Manuscript Division,
Library of Congress: