Praeparatio Evangelica (The Preparation of the Gospel)

[ARISTOCLES] 'FOR how is it possible that, as Epicurus says in his Epistle concerning moral habits, when a young man he squandered his patrimony, and afterwards, was forced into military service, and being unsuccessful in this had recourse to selling drugs, then, after Plato's walk had been thrown open to all, joined himself to him?

'Or how could any one accept what Timaeus of Tauromenium says in his Histories, that when advanced in years he kept the doors of an obscure surgery, or any others?

'Or who would believe what Aristoxenus the musician says in his Life of Plato? For he states that during his wandering and long absence from home certain strangers rose up against him and built a Peripatos in opposition to him. Some therefore think that he says this in reference to Aristotle, whereas Aristoxenus always speaks of Aristotle with reverence.

'One may also say with reason that the memoirs by Alexinus the Eristic are ridiculous. For he makes Alexander when a boy converse with his father Philip, and pour contempt upon Aristotle's doctrines, while approving Nicagoras, who was surnamed Hermes.

'Eubulides, also, in his book against Aristotle manifestly lies, first in bringing forward some frigid poems as written by others concerning his marriage and his intimacy with Hermias, and secondly in asserting that he offended Philip, and did not come to visit Plato when dying, and that he had corrupted his writings.

'As to the accusation of Demochares against the philosophers, why need we mention it? For he has reviled not Aristotle only, but all the rest as well. Moreover, any one glancing at the calumnies themselves would say that the man talks nonsense. For he says that there have been discovered letters of Aristotle against the Athenian state, and that he betrayed Stageira, his native city, to the Macedonians; and further, that, when Olynthus was destroyed, at the place where the booty was sold he pointed out to Philip the most wealthy of the Olynthians.

'Foolish also are the calumnies which have been brought against him by Cephisodorus, the disciple of Isocrates, saying that he was luxurious and a gourmand, and other things of this kind.

'But all are surpassed in folly .by the statements of Lycon, who says that he is himself a Pythagorean. For he affirms that Aristotle offered to his wife after death a sacrifice such as the Athenians offer to Demeter, and that he used to bathe in warm oil, and then sell it: and that when he was starting for Chalcis, the custom-house officers found in the vessel seventy-five brass plates.

'These are nearly all the chief detractors of Aristotle: of whom some lived at the same time with him, and others a little later, but all were Sophists, and Eristics, and Rhetoricians, whose very names and books are more dead than their bodies. As to those who came after them, and then repeated their statements, we may put them aside altogether, and especially those who have not even read their books, but invent for themselves, of which kind are those who say that he had three hundred dishes: for nobody could be found among his contemporaries, except Lycon, who has said any such thing about him. He, however, has said, as I mentioned before, that there were seventy-five plates found.

'But not only from the dates and from the persons who have reviled him might one infer that all the things that have been stated are false, but also from the fact that they do not all bring the same charges, but each says some things of his own: in which if there was any one word of truth, he deserved surely to have been put to death by his contemporaries not once only but ten thousand times.

'It is manifest therefore that it has happened to Aristotle, as to many others, to be envied by the Sophists of his time, both for his friendships with kings, and for his superiority in argument. But those who are right-minded must look not only to the detractors, but also to those who praise and emulate him: for these will be found much more in number and in worth.

'Now all the other stories are manifestly invented: but credit seems to be given to these two things for which some blame him; one, that he married Pythias, who was by birth the sister, and by adoption the daughter, of Hermias, to flatter him. For instance Theocritus of Chios wrote an epigram of this kind:

"To Hermias, eunuch and Eubulus' slave, This empty tomb by empty sage was rais'd, Who left the groves of Academe, and dwelt By Borborus' streams, his ravenous maw to fill."

'The other charge was that Aristotle was ungrateful to Plato.

'Now among many authors who have written of Hermias and Aristotle's friendship with him, the chief is Apellicon, and any one after reading his books will soon cease to speak evil of them.

'But with regard to his marriage to Pythias he has himself made sufficient defence in his Epistles to Antipater. For after the death of Hermias he married her because of his affection for him, she being also a modest and good woman, but in misfortune by reason of the calamities which had overtaken her brother.'

Then afterwards he says:

'But after the death of Pythias, the daughter of Hermias, Aristotle married Herpyllis of Stageira, by whom a son Nicomachus was born to him. And he, it is said, was brought up as an orphan by Theophrastus, and when a very young man was killed in war.'

But enough of these extracts from the aforesaid book of Aristocles: for it is time now to consider the dogmatic philosophy of Aristotle.