It is really a terrible thing, is ignorance, a cause
of many woes to humanity; for it envelops things
in a fog, so to speak, and obscures the truth and
overshadows each man’s life. Truly, we all resemble
people lost in the dark—nay, we are even like blind
men. Now we stumble inexcusably, now we lift our
feet when there is no need of it; and we do not see
what is near and right before us, but fear what is far
away and extremely remote as if it blocked our path.
In short, in everything we do we are always making
plenty of missteps. For this redson the writers of
tragedy have found in this universal truth many and
many a motive for their dramas—take for example,
the house of Labdacus,
 King of Thebes, father of Laius. the house of Pelops and their
like. Indeed, most of the troubles that.are put on
the stage are supplied to the poets, you will find, by
ignorance, as though it were a sort of tragic divinity.
What I have in mind more than anything else is
slanderous lying about acquaintances and friends,
through which families have been rooted out, cities
have utterly perished, fathers have been driven mad



 

against their children, brothers against own brothers,
children against their parents and lovers against
those they love. Many a friendship, too, has. been
parted and many an oath broken through belief in
slander.
 

In order, then, that we may as far as
possible avoid being involved in it, I wish to show in
words, as if in a painting, what sort of thing slander
is, how it begins and what it does. I should say, however, that Apelles of Ephesus
long ago preempted this subject for a picture ; and
with good reason, for he himself had been slandered
to Ptolemy on the ground that he had taken part
with Theodotas in the conspiracy in Tyre, although
Apelles had never set eyes on Tyre and did not
know who Theodotas was, beyond having heard that
he was one of Ptolemy’s governors, in charge of affairs
in Phoenicia.
 The story is apocryphal, as Apelles must have been in
his grave nearly a hundred years when Theodotus (not
Theodotas) betrayed Ptolemy Philopator (219 3.c.). 
Nevertheless, one of his rivals named
Antiphilus, through envy of his favour at court
and professional jealousy, maligned him by telling
Ptolemy that he had taken part in the whole enterprise, and that someone had seen him dining with
Theodotas in Phoenicia and whispering into his ear
all through the meal; and in the end he declared
that the revolt of Tyre and the capture of Pelusium
had taken place on the advice of Apelles.

 

Ptolemy, who in general was not particularly sound
of judgment, but had been brought up in the midst
of courtly flattery, was so inflamed and upset by this



 

surprising charge that he did not take into account
any of the probabilities, not considering either that
the accuser was a rival or that a painter was too
insignificant a person for so great a piece of treason—
a painter, too, who had been well treated by him
and honoured above any of his fellow-craftsmen.
Indeed, he did not even enquire whether Apelles
had gone to Tyre at all. On the contrary, he at
once began to rave and filled the palace with noise,
shouting “The ingrate,” “The plotter,’ and “The
conspirator.”’ And if one of his fellow-prisoners,
who was indignant at the impudence of-Antiphilus
and felt sorry for poor Apelles, had not said that the
man had not taken any part whatever in the affair,
he would have had his head cut off, and so would
have shared the consequences of the troubles in Tyre
without being himself to blame for them in any way.

 

Ptolemy is said to have been so ashamed of the
affair that he presented Apelles with a hundred
talents and gave him Antiphilus for his slave.
Apelles, for his part, mindful of the risk that he had
run, hit back at slander in a painting.

 

On the right
of it sits a man with very large ears, almost like
those of Midas, extending his hand to Slander while
she is still at some distance from him. Near him,
on one side, stand two women—Ignorance, I think,
and Suspicion. On the other side, Slander is coming
up, a woman beautiful beyond measure, but full of
passion and excitement, evincing as she does fury
and wrath by carrying in her left hand a blazing
torch and with the other dragging by the hair a
young man who stretches out his hands to heaven


 

and calls the gods to witness his innocence, She is ©
conducted by a pale ugly man who has a piercing
eye and looks as if he had wasted away in long illness; he may be supposed to be Envy. Besides,
there are two women in attendance on Slander,
egging her on, tiring her and tricking her out.
According to the interpretation of them given me
by the guide to the picture, one was Treachery and
the other Deceit. They were followed by a woman
dressed in deep mourning, with black clothes all in
tatters—Repentance, I think, her name was. At all
events, she was turning back with tears in her eyes
and casting a stealthy glance, full of shame, at
Truth, who was approaching. That is the way in which Apelles represented in
the painting his own hairbreadth escape.