whom the rest of the deities have assigned the province of divining with an accuracy superior to that of all the rest.
XLVIII. There is also a story told of Silenus, who, when taken prisoner by Midas, is said to have made him this present for his ransom—namely, that he informed him[1] that never to have been born was by far the greatest blessing that could happen to man; and that the next best thing was to die very soon; which very opinion Euripides makes use of in his Cresphontes, saying,
When man is born, ‘tis fit, with solemn show,
We speak our sense of his approaching woe;
With other gestures and a different eye,
Proclaim our pleasure when he’s bid to die.[2]
There is something like this in Crantor’s Consolation; for he says that Terinæsus of Elysia, when he was bitterly lamenting the loss of his son, came to a place of divination to be informed why he was visited with so great affliction, and received in his tablet these three verses:
Thou fool, to murmur at Euthynous’ death!
The blooming youth to fate resigns his breath:
The fate, whereon your happiness depends,
At once the parent and the son befriends.[3]
On these and similar authorities they affirm that the question has been determined by the Gods. Nay, more; Alcidamas, an ancient rhetorician of the very highest reputation, wrote even in praise of death, which he endeavored to establish by an enumeration of the evils of life; and his Dissertation has a great deal of eloquence in it; but
- ↑ This was expressed in the Greek verses,
Ἀρχὴς μὲν μὴ φῦναι ἐπιχθονίοισιν ἄριστον,
φύντα δ’ ὅπως ὤκιστα πύλας Ἀΐδϋο περῆσαιwhich by some authors are attributed to Homer.
- ↑ This is the first fragment of the Cresphontes.—Ed. Var. vii., p. 594.
Ἔδει γὰρ ἡμᾶς σύλλογον ποιουμένους
Τὸν φύντα θρηνεῖν, εἰς ὅσ’ ἔρχεται κακά.
Τὸν δ’ αὖ θανόντα καὶ πόνων πεπαυμένον
χαίροντας εὐφημοῖντας ἐκπέμειν δόμων - ↑ The Greek verses are quoted by Plutarch:
Ἤπου νήπιε, ἠλίθιοι φρένες ἀνδρῶν
Εὐθύνοος κεῖται μοιριδίῳ θανάτῳ
Οὐκ ἠν γὰρ ζώειν καλὸν αὐτῷ οὔτε γονεῦσι.
