The Mistaken Critic, or a Discourse on the Word (16-20)

It remains, perhaps, for you to say that you knew the word, but criticised the inappropriate use of it. Come now, on this point too I shall respond to you fittingly, and you must pay attention, unless not knowing matters very little to you. The ancients were before me in hurling many such taunts at the like of you, each at the men of their day; for in that time too there were, of course, dirty fellows, disgusting traits, and ungentle dispositions. One man called a certain person “Buskin,” comparing his principles, which were adaptable, to that kind of footwear; another called a man “Rampage” because he was a turbulent orator and disturbed the assembly, and another someone else “Seventh Day” because he acted in the assemblies as children do on the

We avoid those who are lame in the right foot, especially if we should see them early in the morning; and if anyone should see a cut priest or a eunuch or a monkey immediately upon leaving the house, he returns upon his tracks and goes back, auguring that his daily business for that day will not be successful, thanks to the bad and inauspicious omen at the start. But in the beginning of the whole year, at its door, on its first going forth, in its early morning, if one should see a profligate who commits and submits to unspeakable practices, notorious for it, broken in health, and all but called by the name of his actions themselves, a cheat, a swindler, a perjurer, a pestilence, a pillory, a pit,[*] will not one shun him, will not one compare him to a nefandous day?

Well, are you not such a person? You will not deny it, if I know your boldness; indeed, it seems to me that you are actually vain over the fact that you

And of course they remember also the effrontery that you displayed in the theatre, when you acted secondary parts for the dancers and thought you were leader of the company.[*] Nobody might enter the theatre before you, or indicate the name of the play; you were sent in first, very properly arrayed, wearing golden sandals and the robe of a tyrant, to beg for favour from the audience, winning wreaths and making your exit amid applause, for already you were held in esteem by them. But now you are a public speaker and a lecturer! So those people, if ever they hear such a thing as that about you, believe they see two suns, as in the tragedy,[*] and twin cities of Thebes, and everyone is quick to say, “That man who then—, and after that—?” Therefore you do well in not going there at all or living in their neighbourhood, but of your own accord remaining in exile from your native city, thoughit is neither “bad in winter” not “oppressive in summer,”[*] but the fairest and

In view of all this, you can never by any means persuade your fellow-citizens not to think you the most odious man in the world, a common disgrace to the whole city.

Could you, though, perhaps win over the other inhabitants of Syria to vote for you if you said that you had done nothing bad or culpable in your life? Heracles! Antioch was an eye-witness of your misconduct with that youth from Tarsus whom you took aside—but to unveil these matters is no doubt shameful for me. However, it is known about and remembered by those who surprised the pair of you then and saw him doing—you know what, unless you are absolutely destitute of memory.