72
PELOPIDAS. Pelopidas, Epaminondas’s colleague, when his friends told him that he neglected a necessary business, that was the gathering of money, replied: In good deed money is necessary for this Nicomedas, pointing to a lame man that could not go. As he was going out to fight, his wife beseeched him to have a care of himself. To others you may give this advice, said he; but a commander and general you must advise that he should save his countrymen. A soldier told him, We are fallen among the enemies. Said he, How are we fallen among them, more than they among us? When Alexander, the tyrant of Pherae, broke his faith and cast him into prison, he reviled him; and when the other told him he did but hasten his death, That is my design, said he, that the Thebans may be exasperated against you, and be revenged on you the sooner. Thebe, the wife of the tyrant, came to him, and told him she wondered to see him so merry in chains. He answered, he wondered more at her, that she could endure Alexander without being chained. When Epaminondas caused him to be released, he said: I thank Alexander, for I have now found by trial that I have not only courage to fight, but to die.
Roman Apophthegms.
73
M.’ CURIUS. When some blamed M.’ Curius for distributing but a small part of a country he took from the enemy, and preserving the greater part for the commonwealth, he prayed there might be no Roman who would think that estate little which was enough to maintain him. The Samnites after an overthrow came to him to offer him gold, and found him boiling rape-roots. He answered the Samnites that he that could sup so wanted no gold, and that he had rather rule over those who had gold than have it himself.
