I have no praise, therefore, either for these men or
for those who are very free with me, but only for
those who will do what is best and observe modera-

 

tion in the thing, neither holding hands off altogether
nor throwing me away outright.
Look at it in this way, Zeus, in the name of Zeus.
If a man should take a young and beautiful woman
for his lawful wife and then should not keep watch
of her or display jealousy at all, but should let her
go wherever she would by night and by day and
have to do with anyone who wished, nay more,
should himself induce her to commit adultery,
opening his doors and playing the go-between and
inviting everybody in to her, would such a man appear to love her?



You at least, Zeus, who have
often been in love, would not say so! On the other
hand, suppose a man should take a woman of gentle
birth into his house in due form for the procreation of
children, and then should neither lay a finger on the
ripe and beautiful maiden himself nor suffer anyone
else to look at her, but should lock her up and keep
her a maid, childless and sterile, asserting, however,
that he loved her and making it plain that he did so by
his colour and wasted flesh and sunken eyes. Would
not such a man appear to be out of his mind when,
although he ought to have children and get some
good of his marriage, he lets so fair and lovely a girl
fade by keeping her all her life as if she were vowed
to Demeter? That is the sort of thing I myself am
angry about; for some of them kick me about
shamefully and tear my flesh and pour me out like
water, while others keep me in shackles like a runaway slave with a brand on his forehead.

 ZEUS 
Then why are you angry at them? Both sorts
pay a fine penalty ; for these last, like Tantalus, go
hungry and thirsty and dry-lipped, merely gaping at

 

their gold, while the others, like Phineus, have their
food snatched out of their mouths by the Harpies.
But be off with you now to Timon, whom you will
find far more discreet.
 RICHES 
What, will he ever stop acting as if he were in a
leaky boat and baling me out in haste before I have
entirely flowed in, wanting to get ahead of the
entering stream for fear that I will flood the boat and
swamp him? No, and so I expect to carry water to
the jar of the Danaids and pour it in without result, because the vessel is not tight but all that flows
in will run out almost before it flows in, so much
wider is the vent of the jar and so unhindered is
the escape. There are two distinct figures here. In both of them wealth is compared to water; but in the first it leaks in and is ladled out, while in the second it is ladled in and leaks out. In the first figure we want a word meaning “boat,” not ‘“basket”; and I assume therefore that κόφινος means “a coracle” here. 
 ZEUS 
Well, if he doesn’t intend to stop that vent and it
turns out to have been opened once for all, you will
speedily run out and he will have no trouble in finding his coat of skin and his pick again in the lees of
the jar. But be off now and make him rich; and
when you come back, Hermes, be sure to bring me
the Cyclopes from Actna, so that they may point my
thunderbolt and put it in order, for we shall soon
need it sharp.

 HERMES 
Let us be going, Riches. What’s this? You're
limping? I didn’t know that you were lame as well
as blind, my good sir.

 

 RICHES 
It is not always this way, Hermes. When I go to
visit anyone on a mission from Zeus, for some reason
or other I am sluggish and lame in both legs, so that
I have great difficulty in reaching my journey’s end,
and not infrequently the man who is awaiting me
grows old before I arrive. But when I am to go
away, I have wings, you will find, and am far swifter
than a dream. Indeed, no sooner is the signal given
for the start than I am proclaimed the winner,
after covering the course so fast that sometimes the
onlookers do not even catch sight of me.
 HERMES 
What you say is not so. I myself could name you
plenty of men who yesterday had not a copper to
buy a rope with, but to-day are suddenly rich and
wealthy, riding out behind a span of white horses
when they never before owned so much as a donkey.
In spite of that, they: go about dressed in purple,
with rings on their fingers, themselves unable to
believe, I fancy, that their wealth is not a dream.