EPICTETUS AND SENECA. Seneca. Epictetus! I desired your master Epaphroditus to send you hither, having been much pleased with his report of your conduct, and much surprised at the ingenuity of your writings. Epictetus. Then I am afraid, my friend! . . . Seneca. My friend! are these the expressions.. Well, let it pass. Philosophers must bear bravely. The people expect it. Epictetus. Are philosophers then only philosophers for the people? and, instead of instructing them, must they play tricks before them? Give me rather the gravity of dancing dogs. Their motions are for the rabble; their reverential eyes and pendent paws are under the pressure of awe at a master; but they are dogs, and not below their destinies. Seneca. Epictetus! I will give you three talents to let me take that sentiment for my own. Epictetus. I would give thee twenty, if I had them, to make it thine. Seneca. You mean, by lending to it the graces of my language. Epictetus. I mean, by lending it to thy conduct. And now let me console and comfort thee, under the calamity I brought on thee by calling thee my friend. If thou art not my friend, why send for me? Enemy I can have none: being a slave, Fortune has now done with me. Seneca. Continue then your former observations. What were you saying? Epictetus. That which thou interruptedst. Epictetus. I should have remarked that, if thou foundest ingenuity in my writings, thou must have discovered in them some deviation from the plain homely truths of Zeno and Cleanthes. Seneca. We all swerve a little from them. Seneca. Yes, even in practice, I am afraid. Seneca. Too often. Epictetus. Strange! I have been attentive, and yet have remarked but one difference among you great personages at Rome. Seneca. What difference fell under your observation? Epictetus. Crates and Zeno and Cleanthes taught us, that our desires were to be subdued by philosophy alone. In this city, their acute and inventive scholars take us aside, and show us that there is not only one way, but two. Seneca. Two ways? Epictetus. They whisper in our ear, "These two ways are philosophy and enjoyment: the wiser man will take the readier, or, not finding it, the alternative." Thou reddenest. Seneca. Monstrous degeneracy! Epictetus. What magnificent rings! I did not notice them until thou liftedst up thy hands to heaven, in detestation of such effeminacy and impudence. Seneca. The rings are not amiss: my rank rivets them upon my fingers: I am forced to wear them. Our emperor gave me one, Epaphroditus another, Tigellinus the third. I cannot lay them aside a single day, for fear of offending the gods, and those whom they love the most worthily. Epictetus. Although they make thee stretch out thy fingers, like the arms and legs of one of us slaves upon a cross. Seneca. O horrible! Find some other resemblance. Epictetus. The extremities of a fig-leaf. Epictetus. The claws of a toad, trodden on or stoned. Seneca. You have great need, Epictetus, of an instructor in eloquence and rhetoric: you want topics and tropes and figures. Epictetus. I have no room for them. They make such a buzz in the house, a man's own wife can not understand what he says to her. Seneca. Let us reason a little upon style. I would set you right, and remove from before you the prejudices of a somewhat rustic education. We may adorn the simplicity of the wisest. Epictetus. Thou canst not adorn simplicity. What is naked or defective is susceptible of decoration: what is decorated is simplicity no longer. Thou mayest give another thing in exchange for it; but if thou wert master of it, thou wouldst preserve it inviolate. It is no wonder that we mortals, little able as we are to see truth, should be less able to express it. Seneca. You have formed at present no idea of style. Epictetus. I never think about it. First I consider whether what I am about to say is true; then whether I can say it with brevity, in such a manner as that others shall see it as clearly as I do in the light of truth; for if they survey it as an ingenuity, my desire is ungratified, my duty unfulfilled. I go not with those who dance round the image of Truth, less out of honour to her than to display their agility and address. Seneca. We must attract the attention of readers by novelty and force and grandeur of expression. Epictetus. We must. Nothing is so grand as truth, nothing so forcible, nothing so novel. Seneca. Sonorous sentences are wanted, to awaken the lethargy of indolence. Epictetus. Awaken it to what? Here lies the question; and a weighty one it is. If thou awakenest men where they can see nothing and do no work, it is better to let them rest: but will not they, thinkest thou, look up at a rainbow, unless they are called to it by a clap of thunder? Seneca. Your early youth, Epictetus, has been I will not say neglected, but cultivated with rude instruments and unskilful hands. Epictetus. I thank God for it. Those rude in struments have left the turf lying yet toward the | her, or should recommend her as an inseparable sun; and those unskilful hands have plucked out mate to his heir. the docks. Seneca. We hope and believe that we have attained a vein of eloquence, brighter and more varied than has been hitherto laid open to the world. Epictetus. Than any in the Greek? Epictetus. Than your Cicero's? Seneca. If the declaration may be made without an offence to modesty. Surely you cannot estimate or value the eloquence of that noble pleader. Epictetus. Imperfectly; not being born in Italy; and the noble pleader is a much less man with me than the noble philosopher. I regret that having farms and villas, he would not keep his distance from the pumping up of foul words, against thieves, cut-throats, and other rogues : and that he lied, sweated, and thumped his head and thighs, in behalf of those who were no better. Seneca. Senators must have clients, and must protect them. Epictetus. Innocent or guilty? Epictetus. If it becomes a philosopher to regret at all, and if I regret what is, and might not be, I may regret more what both is and must be. However it is an amiable thing, and no small merit in the wealthy, even to trifle and play at their leisure hours with philosophy. It can not be expected that such a personage should espouse Seneca. I would. Epictetus. Yes, Seneca, but thou hast no son to make the match for; and thy recommendation, I suspect, would be given him before he could consummate the marriage. Every man wishes his sons to be philosophers while they are young; but takes especial care, as they grow older, to teach them its insufficiency and unfitness for their intercourse with mankind. The paternal voice says, You must not be particular: you are about to have a profession to live by: follow those who have thriven the best in it." Now among these, whatever be the profession, canst thou point out to me one single philosopher? " Seneca. Not just now. Nor, upon reflection, do I think it feasible. Epictetus. Thou indeed mayest live much to thy ease and satisfaction with philosophy, having (they say) two thousand talents. Seneca. And a trifle to spare. . pressed upon me by that godlike youth, my pupil Nero. Epictetus. Seneca! where God hath placed a mine, he hath placed the materials of an earthquake. Seneca. A true philosopher is beyond the reach of Fortune. Epictetus. The false one thinks himself so. Fortune cares little about philosophers; but she remembers where she hath set a rich man, and she laughs to see the Destinies at his door. PETER THE GREAT AND ALEXIS. father, hath supplied my wants of every kind. Peter. And so, after flying from thy father's house anywhere; and hitherto your liberality, my house, thou hast returned again from Vienna. After this affront in the face of Europe, thou darest to appear before me? Alexis. My emperor and father! I am brought before your majesty, not at my own desire. Peter. I believe it well. Alexis. I would not anger you. Peter. What hope hadst thou, rebel, in thy flight to Vienna ? Alexis. The hope of peace and privacy; the hope of security; and above all things, of never more offending you. Peter. That hope thou hast accomplished. Thou imaginedst then that my brother of Austria would maintain thee at his court. . speak! Alexis. No, sir! I imagined that he would have afforded me a place of refuge. Peter. Didst thou then take money with thee? Peter. He would have given thee promises for half the money; but the double of it does not purchase a house: ignorant wretch ! Alexis. I knew as much as that; although my birth did not appear to destine me to purchase a Peter. Not of wisdom, not of duty, not of spirit, not of courage, not of ambition. I have educated thee among my guards and horses, among my drums and trumpets, among my flags and masts. When thou wert a child, and couldst hardly walk, I have taken thee into the arsenal, though children should not enter, according to regulations; I have there rolled cannon-balls before thee over iron plates; and I have shown thee bright new arms, bayonets and sabres; and I have pricked the back of my hands until the blood came out in many places; and I have made thee lick it; and I have then done the same to thine. Afterward, from thy tenth year, I have mixed gunpowder in thy grog; I have peppered thy peaches: I have poured bilge-water (with a little good wholesome tar in it) upon thy melons; I have brought out girls to mock thee and cocker thee, and talk like mariners, to make thee braver. Nothing would do. Nay, recollect thee! I have myself led thee forth to the window when fellows were hanged and shot; and I have shown thee every day the halves and quarters of bodies; and I have sent an orderly or chamberlain for the heads; and I have pulled the cap up from over the eyes; and I have made thee, in spite of thee, look stedfastly upon them; incorrigible | mourners; that frugality was supplanted by incoward! And now another word with thee about thy scandalous flight from the palace; in time of quiet too! To the point! did my brother of Austria invite thee? Did he, or did he not? Alexis. May I answer without doing an injury or disservice to his Imperial Majesty? Peter. Thou mayest. What injury canst thou or anyone do, by the tongue, to such as he is? Alexis. At the moment, no; he did not. Nor indeed can I assert that he at any time invited me: but he said he pitied me. Peter. About what? hold thy tongue: let that pass. Princes never pity but when they would make traitors: then their hearts grow tenderer than tripe. He pitied thee, kind soul, when he would throw thee at thy father's head; but finding thy father too strong for him, he now commiserates the parent, laments the son's rashness and disobedience, and would not make God angry for the world. At first, however, there must have been some overture on his part; otherwise thou art too shame-faced for intrusion. Come thou hast never had wit enough to lie .. tell me the truth, the whole truth. Alexis. He said that, if ever I wanted an asylum, his court was open to me. Peter. Open! so is the tavern; but folks pay for what they get there. Open truly and didst thou find it so ? Alexis. He received me kindly. Peter. I see he did. temperance; that order was succeeded by confusion; and that your majesty was destroying the glorious plans you alone were capable of devising. Peter. I destroy them! how? Of what plans art thou speaking? Alexis. Of civilising the Muscovites. The Polanders in part were civilised: the Swedes more than any other nation on the continent; and so excellently versed were they in military science, and so courageous, that every man you killed cost you seven or eight. Peter. Thou liest; nor six. And civilised forsooth! Why, the robes of the metropolitan, him at Upsal, are not worth three ducats, between Jew and Livornese. I have no notion that Poland and Sweden shall be the only countries that produce great princes. What right have they to such as Gustavus and Sobieski? Europe ought to look to this, before discontent becomes general and the people does to us what we have the privilege of doing to the people. I am wasting my words: there is no arguing with positive fools like thee. So thou wouldst have desired me to let the Polanders and Swedes lie still and quiet! Two such powerful nations! Alexis. For that reason and others I would have gladly seen them rest, until our own people had increased in numbers and prosperity. Peter. And thus thou disputest my right, before my face, to the exercise of the supreme power. Alexis. Sir! God forbid! Peter. God forbid indeed! What care such Alexis. Derision, O my father, is not the fate villains as thou art what God forbids! He forbids I merit. Peter. True, true! it was not intended. Alexis. Kind father! punish me then as you will. Peter. Villain! wouldst thou kiss my hand too? Art thou ignorant that the Austrian threw thee away from him, with the same indifference as he would the outermost leaf of a sandy sunburnt lettuce? Alexis. Alas! I am not ignorant of this. Peter. He dismissed thee at my order. If I had demanded from him his daughter, to be the bedfellow of a Kalmuc, he would have given her, and praised God. Alexis. O father! is his baseness my crime? Peter. No; thine is greater. Thy intention, I know, is to subvert the institutions it has been the labour of my lifetime to establish. Thou hast never rejoiced at my victories. : the son to be disobedient to the father he forbids.. he forbids. . twenty things. I do not wish, and will not have, a successor who dreams of dead people. Alexis. My father! I have dreamt of none such. Peter. Thou hast; and hast talked about them Scythians I think they call 'em. Now who told thee, Mr. Professor, that the Scythians were a happier people than we are; that they were inoffensive; that they were free; that they wandered with their carts from pasture to pasture, from river to river; that they traded with good faith; that they fought with good courage; that they injured none, invaded none, and feared none? At this rate I have effected nothing. The great founder of Rome, I heard in Holland, slew his brother for despiting the weakness of his walls and shall the founder of this better place spare a degenerate Alexis. I have rejoiced at your happiness and son, who prefers a vagabond life to a civilised one, your safety. Peter. Liar! coward! traitor! when the Polanders and Swedes fell before me, didst thou from thy soul congratulate me? Didst thou get drunk at home or abroad, or praise the Lord of Hosts and saint Nicolas? Wert thou not silent and civil and low-spirited? a cart to a city, a Scythian to a Muscovite? Have I not shaved my people, and breeched them? Have I not formed them into regular armies, with bands of music and havresacs? Are bows better than cannon? shepherds than dragoons, mare's milk than brandy, raw steaks than broiled? Thine are tenets that strike at the root of politeAlexis. I lamented the irretrievable loss of ness and sound government. Every prince in human life; I lamented that the bravest and Europe is interested in rooting them out by fire noblest were swept away the first; that the and sword. There is no other way with false gentlest and most domestic were the earliest doctrines: breath against breath does little. A A Alexis. Sire, I never have attempted to disseminate my opinions. Peter. How couldst thou? the seed would fall only upon granite. Those, however, who caught it brought it to me. Alexis. Never have I undervalued civilisation: on the contrary, I regretted whatever impeded it. In my opinion, the evils that have been attributed to it, sprang from its imperfections and voids; and no nation has yet acquired it more than very scantily. Peter. How so? give me thy reasons; thy fancies rather; for reason thou hast none. Peter. Conduct this youth with thee, and let them judge him: thou understandest me. Chancellor. Your majesty's commands are the breath of our nostrils. Peter. If these rascals are remiss, I will try my new cargo of Livonian hemp upon 'em. Chancellor (returning). Sire! sire! Chancellor. No, sire! Nor has either been done. Peter. Curse thy silly sires ! what art thou about? Chancellor. Alas! he fell. Peter. Tie him up to thy chair then. Cowardly beast! what made him fall? Alexis. When I find the first of men, in rank and genius, hating one another, and becoming slanderers and liars in order to lower and vilify an opponent; when I hear the God of mercy invoked to massacres, and thanked for furthering what he reprobates and condemns; I look back in vain on any barbarous people for worse barbarism. I have expressed my admiration of our forefathers, who, not being Christians, were yet more virtu- Peter. Thou puzzlest me; prythee speak ous than those who are; more temperate, more | just, more sincere, more chaste, more peaceable. Peter. Malignant atheist ! Alexis. Indeed, my father, were I malignant I must be an atheist; for malignity is contrary to the command, and inconsistent with the belief, of God. Chancellor. The hand of Death; the name of father. plainlier. Chancellor. We told him that his erime was Peter. He did! did he! Impudence shall do him little good. Who could have expected it from that smock-face! Go on: what then? Chancellor. He said calmly, but not without sighing twice or thrice, "Lead me to the scaffold: I am weary of life: nobody loves me." I con Peter. Am I Czar of Muscovy, and hear discourses on reason and religion! from my own son too! No, by the Holy Trinity! thou art no son of mine. If thou touchest my knee again, I crack thy knuckles with this tobacco-stopper : | doled with him, and wept upon his hand, holding I wish it were a sledge-hammer for thy sake. Off, sycophant! Off, run-away slave! Alexis. Father! father! my heart is broken! If I have offended, forgive me! Peter. The state requires thy signal punish ment. Alexis. If the state requires it, be it so: but let my father's anger cease! Peter. The world shall judge between us. I will brand thee with infamy. Alexis. Until now, O father! I never had a proper sense of glory. Hear me, O Czar! let not a thing so vile as I am stand between you and the world ! Let none accuse you ! Peter. Accuse me! rebel! Accuse me! traitor! Alexis. Let none speak ill of you, O my father! The public voice shakes the palace; the public voice penetrates the grave; it precedes the chariot of Almighty God, and is heard at the judgmentseat. | the paper against my bosom. He took the corner of it between his fingers, and said, “Read me this paper: read my death-warrant. Your silence and tears have signified it; yet the law has its forms. Do not keep me in suspense. My father says, too truly, I am not courageous: but the death that leads me to my God shall never terrify me." Peter. I have seen these white-livered knaves die resolutely I have seen them quietly fierce like white ferrets, with their watery eyes and tiny teeth. You read it? Chancellor. In part, sire! When he heard your majesty's name, accusing him of treason and attempts at rebellion and parricide, he fell speechless. We raised him up: he was motionless: he was dead! Peter. Inconsiderate and barbarous varlet as thou art, dost thou recite this ill accidént to a father! And to one who has not dined! Bring Peter. Let it go to the devil! I will have none | me a glass of brandy. of it here in Petersburgh. Our church says Chancellor. And it please your majesty, might nothing about it; our laws forbid it. As for I call a . . a .. Ho there! chancellor! What! come at last! Peter. Away, and bring it: scamper! All equally and alike shall obey and serve me. Hearkye bring the bottle with it: I must cool myself.. and.. hearkye! a rasher of bacon on thy life! and some pickled sturgeon, and some krout and caviar, and good strong cheese. SOLIMAN AND MUFTI Soliman. Mufti, my teacher and slave, I say unto thee welcome. Mufti. Welcome I say unto thee, my master and disciple. Soliman. God, he is merciful: God, he is God. Good fortune follow that pious eructation of thine, O leader of true believers, under me the prince of the Faithful! Mufti. O son of Selim! may the Almighty deliver into thy hands those thou lovest and those thou hatest. Thy servant here awaits thy commands. Soliman. My commands are, O Mufti ! fountain of truth and wisdom to the preachers of the word! that praises be offered up in every mosk, for our victory over the infidel. Mufti. If thy slave might request, unblameably, a farther illumination from thy countenance, O mediterranean of light! he would presume to inquire of thy pure intelligence, what victory? For verily the Merciful hath bestowed on thee such a series of them, that if anything, after the miracles of our Prophet, were wanting to demonstrate God's reprobation of the unbeliever, the years of thy reign, like successive lightnings that open the heavens and strike the earth, would severally declare it. First, the strongest and most beautiful of European cities, Belgrade, abased her towers and threw open her gates before thy scimetar. The following year ran the swifter its celestial course, that it might behold the sunny Rhodes adorn her brow with the crescent, and the flower of Christian chivalry lie dishonoured in the dust. Hungary, the richest portion of the unbeliever's heritage, hath cast her fortresses at thy feet, and hath left her king extinct in the midst of them. Barbarossa, at thy order, hath shaken the principalities of Africa, and hath fixed his flag immovably on the citadel of Tunis. The incestuous Charles hath now lost his navy and army on that coast; hardly a vessel, hardly a soldier, escaping from the wreck. well and thoroughly: I have given orders already for the commencement. Let those who believe, believe now the better; and those who never believed, begin. Mufti. O son of Selim! if every man reads, one or two in every province will think. Soliman. Let them, let them: few shall have leisure for that. What harm would it do among the old and lame; the only people left out of the soldiery, in wise and good governments? Mufti. The lame and the old grow stronger in the tongue; as the deaf grow stronger in the sense of feeling, the blind in that of hearing. They will chatter about things holy. Soliman. Why not? Mufti. Alas! O son of Selim! the miracles of our prophet, those gems of our religion, would lose their lustre, handled and turned over by the ungodly. Soliman. No doubt they would therefore I will make them godly, and teach them the true word. Mufti. Serene highness! let us of the mosk do that. The Clement hath appointed us to his ministry. Soliman. My resolution is, to scatter the good seed in all lands, having now well ploughed and harrowed them. Mufti. Suppose, O my master and lord, we turn the plough and harrow over them another time or two. Soliman. God is merciful! we cannot do that, if they embrace the faith. Mufti. The Koran would lose much of its beauty if we attempted to translate it from the language in which it was delivered to us by our Prophet. Soliman. Swine do not look for sightly food, but for plentiful. The Koran would bestow on the dogs (dogs indeed no longer when once circumcised) everlasting life, taken in what manner and in what words it may be. Mufti. Think, O magnificent!.. Soliman. My intention is, to enlighten the dim- Soliman. I will think no more about the matsighted, by ordering the Koran to be translated|ter: it shall be done : I see no other way of making into the languages of all nations. Why dost thou raise thine eyes, Mufti? Mufti. God is God; and Mahomet is his prophet! Soliman. Very true: that is what I wish to teach the world universally. good subjects. Mufti. The waters of Damascus have not lost their virtues in tempering the sabre. Books never made men believers. We must, under that benign influence which Heaven showers upon the son of Selim, preserve the Koran, preserve the Mufti. God is great! God is merciful! God is book of life, from the vulgar. just! Soliman. Who the devil doubts it? Mufti. God loveth his people! God abases the proud! God exalts the humble! Soliman. Let him, let him. What is that to the purpose? Are we at prayers? are we in the mosk that thou utterest these idle fancies. . truths I mean.. making thy lips quiver like a pointer's at a partridge. Get the Koran translated Soliman. What! shall we, acknowledged even by our enemies as the most honest and just of men, descend from that high station, and imitate the impostures of popes? Shall we say at one moment, "This is the book of life;" and at the next, "It is death to touch it!" Answer me: no evasion! Mufti. Prince of the faithful! it behoveth not us to follow or to countenance the errors of the |
