Diogenes

Diogenes, the Cynic philosopher, was a native of Sinope, in Pontus, where he was born about 412 B.C. His father, a banker named Icesias or Icetas, was convicted of swindling, and so the young Diogenes had to leave Sinope and go to Athens. His youth had been that of a spendthrift and a rake, but at Athens his interest was arrested by the character of Antisthenes, who, however, re- pelled his first advances. But not even blows could restrain the enthusiastic ardour of the young disciple, and at length Antisthenes, moved with compassion, consented to admit him as a pupil. From an extravagant debauchee, Diogenes at once became an ascetic of the extremest austerity. He would roll in hot sand during the heat of summer; in winter, he would embrace a statue covered with snow. His clothing was of the coarsest, his food of the plainest. His bed was the bare ground, whether in the open street or under the porticoes. At length he found himself a permanent residence in a tub which belonged to the Metroum, or the temple of the Mother of the Gods. His eccentric life did not cost him the respect of the Athenians, who admired his contempt for comfort, and allowed him a wide latitude of comment and rebuke. Practical good was the chief aim of his philosophy; for literature and the fine arts he did not conceal his disdain. He laughed at men of letters for reading the sufferings of Ulysses, while neglecting their own; at musicians who spent in stringing their lyres the time which would have been much better employed in making their own discordant natures harmonious; at philosophers for gazing at the heavenly bodies, while sublimely incognisant of earthly ones; at orators who studied how to enforce truth, but not how to practise it. He was seized by pirates on a voyage to Ægina, and carried to Crete, where he was sold as a slave. When asked what business he understood, he answered: 'How to command men.' His purchaser was Xeniaides of Corinth; but the slave soon came to rule the master, acquired his freedom, was appointed tutor to the children, and spent his old age as one of the household. It was here that he had his interview with Alexander the Great. The king opened the conversation with: 'I am Alexander the Great,' to which the philosopher answered: 'And I am Diogenes the Cynic.' Alexander then asked him in what way he could serve him, to which Diogenes rejoined: 'You can stand out of the sunshine.' Alexander is said to have been so struck with the Cynic's self-possession, that he went away remarking: 'If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.' The philosopher lived at Corinth till his death at the age of ninety, 323 B.C. See Hermann, Zur Geschichte und Kritik des Diogenes (Heilbronn, 1860).