The Scythian or Consul (33)

LYCINUS

Well, do you suppose that at this point the adherents of Plato and Pythagoras and Epicurus and the rest will keep quiet, and not laugh out loud and say to me: “What is your friend Hermotimus doing, Lycinus? He thinks it right to believe what our opponents say about us, and supposes our views to be whatever they say they are, although they either are ignorant of the truth or conceal it. So, if he sees some athlete training before his match, kicking into the air, or punching at empty space as though he were striking his opponent, he will, if he is referee, straightway proclaim him as unbeatable, will he? Or will he consider these romps easy and devoid of risk when he has no antagonist, and adjudge him the winner only when he has overcome and beaten his opponent in the flesh and the latter gives in, and not otherwise? So do not let Hermotimus suppose from the shadow-boxing his teachers practise against us in our absence that they are strong or that our tenets are such as can be easily overthrown. For such a fabrication would be like the houses which children make: they have built them weak in structure and knock them over at once; or again indeed like men practising archery who make bundles of twigs, then fix them up on a pole which they set up at no great distance in front of them, and taking aim let fly. If ever they score a hit and pierce the twigs, they at once give a shout as though they have done something great, because their shaft has gone right through their collection of sticks. But this is not what the Persians do nor the Scythian archers. No, in the first place they themselves are usually on moving horses when they shoot, and

secondly, they think that the targets should be moving too, not stationary and waiting for the impact of the shafts, but running about as fast as possible. They generally use wild animals as their targets, and some of them hit birds. If ever they want to test the impact of the shot on the target, they set up a hard-wood board or a raw-hide shield to pierce, and in that way they gain confidence that their arrows can even penetrate armour. So tell Hermotimus from us, Lycinus, that his teachers are setting up collections of sticks to shoot at and then saying that they have bested armed men; and that they are sparring with painted dummies which look like us, and when, as is natural, they have had the better of them they think they have the better of us. To them each of us would quote the words of Achilles about Hector:

‘My helmet’s front they do not see.’” [*]