Timon, or the Misanthrope (41-45)

TIMON Come, pick, be strong for me now and don’t flag in the task of calling Treasure out of the depths to the light of day. O Zeus, god of miracles! O gracious Corybants! O Hermes, god of gain! Where did all this gold come from? « Is this a dream? I am afraid I may wake up and find nothing but ashes. No,

verily it is coined gold, red and heavy and mighty good to look upon.

O gold, thou fairest gift that comes to man!

Euripides, Danae, fr. 326 Nauck. In very truth you stand out like blazing fire, not only by night but by day.[*] Come to me, my precious, my pretty! Now I am convinced that Zeus once turned into gold, for what maid would not open her bosom and receive so beautiful a lover coming down through the roof in a shower?

O Midas! O Croesus! O treasures of Delphi! How little worth you are beside Timon and the wealth of Timon! Yes, even the king of Persia is not a match for me.

Pick and darling coat of skin, it is best that I should hang you up here as an offering to Pan. For myself, I purpose now to buy the whole farm, build a tower over the treasure just large enough for me to live in, and have it for my tomb when I am dead.

“Be it resolved and enacted into law, to be binding for the rest of my life, that I shall associate with no one, recognize no one and scorn everyone. Friends, guests, comrades and Altars of Mercy[*] shall be matter for boundless mockery. To pity one who weeps, to help one who is in need shall be a misdemeanour and an infringement of the constitution. My life shall be solitary, like that of wolves; Timon shall be my only friend,

and all others shall be enemies and conspirators. To talk to any of them shall be pollution, and if I simply see one of them, that day shall be under a curse. In short, they shall be no more than statues of stone or bronze in my sight. I shall receive no ambassadors from

them and make no treaties with them, and the desert shall sunder me from them. Tribe, clan, deme and native land itself shall be inane and useless names, and objects of the zeal of fools. Timon shall keep his wealth to himself, scorn everyone and live in luxury all by himself, remote from flattery and tiresome praise. He shall sacrifice to the gods and celebrate his feast-days by himsclf, his own sole neighbour and crony, shaking free of all others. Be it once for all resolved that he shall give himself the farewell hand-clasp when he comes to die, and shall set the funeral wreath upon his own brow.

His favourite name shall be ‘the Misanthrope,’ and his characteristic traits shall be testiness, acerbity, rudeness, wrathfulness and inhumanity. If I see anyone perishing in a fire and begging to have it put out, I am to put it out with pitch and oil; and if anyone is being swept off his feet by the river in winter and stretches out his hands, begging me to take hold, I am to push him in head-foremost, plunging him down so deep that he cannot come up again. In that way they will get what they deserve. Moved by Timon, son of Echecratides, of Collytus ; motion submitted to the assembly by the aforesaid Timon.”

Good! Let us pass this resolution and abide by it stoutly.

Yet I would have given a great deal if everybody could have found out somehow that I am tremendously rich ; they would be fit to hang themselves over the thing. But what is this? I say,

what haste they make! They are running up from all sides, dusty and out of breath, for they scent the gold somehow or other. Shall I climb this hill and drive them off with a skirmish fire of stones from above, or shall I break the law to the extent of talking to them just this once, in order that they may be hurt even more by being treated with contempt? That way is better, I think; so let us stand our ground now and receive them. Let me see, who is the first of them? Gnathonides the toady, the man who gave me a rope the other day when I asked for a loan, though often he has spewed up whole jars of wine at my house. I am glad he came: he shall be the first to smart.