Plutarch's Life of Alcibiades: Story, Text and Moralism

Introduction

Introduction 1. Moralism 1.1. The Moralism of the Parallel Lives 1.1.1. The moral purpose of the Parallel Lives During the final years of the first and the early decades of the second century A.D., Plutarch of Chaeronea (ca A.D. 45-120) published a series of at least twenty-three pairs of biographies of Greek and Roman statesmen1 . In the proem to Aemilius-Timoleon, Plutarch explains why he wrote these so-called Parallel Lives (Aem. 1.1-6): Ἐμοὶ [μὲν] τῆς τῶν βίων ἅψασθαι μὲν γραφῆς συνέβη δι᾽ ἑτέρους, ἐπιμένειν δὲ καὶ φιλοχωρεῖν ἤδη καὶ δι᾽ ἐμαυτόν, ὥσπερ ἐν ἐσόπτρῳ τῇ ἱστορίᾳ πειρώμενον ἁμῶς γέ πως κοσμεῖν καὶ ἀφομοιοῦν πρὸς τὰς ἐκείνων ἀρετὰς τὸν βίον. (1.2) οὐδὲν γὰρ ἀλλ᾽ ἢ συνδιαιτήσει καὶ συμβιώσει τὸ γινόμενον ἔοικεν, ὅταν ὥσπερ ἐπιξενούμενον ἕκαστον αὐτῶν ἐν μέρει διὰ τῆς ἱστορίας ὑποδεχόμενοι καὶ παραλαμβάνοντες ἀναθεωρῶμεν “ὅσσος ἔην οἷός τε”, τὰ κυριώτατα καὶ κάλλιστα πρὸς γνῶσιν ἀπὸ τῶν πράξεων λαμβάνοντες. (1.3) “φεῦ φεῦ, τί τούτου χάρμα μεῖζον ἂν λάβοις” (1.4) πρὸς ἐπανόρθωσιν ἠθῶν ἐνεργότερον; Δημόκριτος μὲν γὰρ εὔχεσθαί φησι δεῖν, ὅπως εὐλόγχων εἰδώλων τυγχάνωμεν, καὶ τὰ σύμφυλα καὶ τὰ χρηστὰ μᾶλλον ἡμῖν ἐκ τοῦ περιέχοντος ἢ τὰ φαῦλα καὶ τὰ σκαιὰ συμφέρηται, λόγον οὔτ᾽ ἀληθῆ καὶ πρὸς ἀπεράντους ἐκφέροντα δεισιδαιμονίας εἰς φιλοσοφίαν καταβάλλων. (1.5) ἡμεῖς δὲ τῇ περὶ τὴν ἱστορίαν διατριβῇ καὶ τῆς γραφῆς τῇ συνηθείᾳ παρασκευάζομεν ἑαυτούς, τὰς τῶν ἀρίστων καὶ δοκιμωτάτων μνήμας ὑποδεχομένους ἀεὶ ταῖς ψυχαῖς, εἴ τι φαῦλον ἢ κακόηθες ἢ ἀγεννὲς αἱ τῶν συνόντων ἐξ ἀνάγκης ὁμιλίαι προσβάλλουσιν, ἐκκρούειν καὶ διωθεῖσθαι, πρὸς τὰ κάλλιστα τῶν παραδειγμάτων ἵλεω καὶ πρᾳεῖαν ἀποστρέφοντες τὴν διάνοιαν. (1.6) ὧν ἐν τῷ παρόντι προκεχειρίσμεθά σοι τὸν Τιμολέοντος τοῦ Κορινθίου καὶ Αἰμιλίου Παύλου βίον,... 1 For a general introduction to the life and works of Plutarch, see Ziegler 1949; Barrow 1967; Gianakaris 1970; D.A. Russell 1972; Wardman 1974; Sirinelli 2000; Lamberton 2001. On the starting date of the series, see C.P. Jones 1966, 70. 20 introduction I began the writing of my Lives for the sake of others, but I find that I am continuing it and enjoying it now for my own sake too, trying in some way or other, using history as a mirror, to adorn my life and to make it like the virtues of those men. (1.2) What happens is like nothing else than spending time together and living together, whenever, receiving and welcoming each of them in turn as our guest, so to speak, through history, we examine carefully “how great he was and of what kind”, taking from his deeds the most important and most beautiful to know. (1.3) “Ah! what greater joy than this could you obtain”, (1.4) and what more effective for moral improvement ? Democritus says we ought to pray that we may encounter propitious phantoms, and that it may be those that are agreeable to our nature and good rather than the evil and inauspicious ones that come to us from out of the circumambient air, thereby introducing into philosophy a doctrine which is untrue and leads to boundless superstitions. (1.5) We, on the other hand, prepare ourselves through our study of history and our habit of writing: always receiving in our souls the memories of the noblest and most respectable men, we are able, if our unavoidable associations with the people around us confront us with something base, infamous or ignoble, to drive it back and push it away, turning our thoughts in a gracious and gentle temper to the best of our examples. (1.6) Among them are Timoleon the Corinthian and Aemilius Paulus, whose Lives we have now undertaken to lay before you,... Plutarch begins this passage with an emphatic “I”, but from the second sentence onwards he starts using the first person plural. As Christopher Pelling has noted, Plutarch’s ‘we’s are often inclusive, creating “an impression of happy unanimity between narrator and narratee”2 . Such is also the case in Aem. 1.2-5, even if it is clear that the last ‘we’ of the passage quoted above only refers to Plutarch himself (Aem. 1.6: προκεχειρίσμεθά σοι)3 . It appears then that Plutarch wrote his Parallel Lives with a moral purpose: he expected his readers to do what he says he did himself, i.e. to use the examples of great men of the past to improve one’s own conduct4 . This method of self-improvement is further discussed in Plutarch’s ethical treatise On Moral Progress5 . People making moral progress, 2 Pelling 2002c, 272-273. 3 Such shifts are not uncommon in Plutarch: cf. e.g. Dem. 1-3; TG et CG 1.1. 4 Cf. Duff 1999a, 30: “In the prologue to the Lives of Aemilius and Timoleon (Aem. 1.1-4), Plutarch presents himself as a paradigmatic reader of his own Lives”. On the moral purpose of the Lives, see also a.o. Desideri 1989, 199-204 and 212-215; Nikolaidis 1982-1984, 94-95; Pelling 1988a, 11; Stadter 2000, 493. 5 On this treatise, see now Roskam 2005, 220-363. introduction 21 Plutarch argues (84b-85a), will not merely admire good men; they will be eager to emulate their actions, will begin to love their disposition, and will try to make themselves like them, not being deterred by any adversity experienced by their ‘idols’. In fact, they will constantly use them as models for their own behaviour (85ab): ἤδη δὲ τοῖς τοιούτοις παρέπεται τὸ βαδίζουσιν ἐπὶ πράξεις τινὰς ἢ λαβοῦσιν ἀρχὴν ἢ χρησαμένοις τύχῃ τίθεσθαι πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν τοὺς ὄντας ἀγαθοὺς ἢ γενομένους, καὶ διανοεῖσθαι “τί δ᾽ ἂν ἔπραξεν ἐν τούτῳ Πλάτων, τί δ᾽ ἂν εἶπεν Ἐπαμεινώνδας, ποῖος δ᾽ ἂν ὤφθη Λυκοῦργος ἢ Ἀγησίλαος”, οἷόν τι πρὸς ἔσοπτρα κοσμοῦντας ἑαυτοὺς ἢ μεταρρυθμίζοντας ἢ φωνῆς ἀγεννεστέρας αὑτῶν ἐπιλαμβανομένους ἢ πρός τι πάθος ἀντιβαίνοντας. οἱ μὲν γὰρ ἐκμεμαθηκότες τὰ τῶν Ἰδαίων ὀνόματα Δακτύλων χρῶνται πρὸς τοὺς φόβους αὐτοῖς ὡς ἀλεξικάκοις, ἀτρέμα καταλέγοντες ἕκαστον. ἡ δὲ τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἀνδρῶν ἐπίνοια καὶ μνήμη ταχὺ παρισταμένη καὶ διαλαμβάνουσα τοὺς προκόπτοντας, ἐν πᾶσι πάθεσι καὶ ἀπορίαις ἁπάσαις ὀρθούς τε καὶ ἀπτῶτας διαφυλάττει. With men of this sort it has already become a constant practice, on proceeding to any business, or on taking office, or on encountering any dispensation of Fortune...