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In a word, his own actions weaken and confute all the arguments of his best counsel. Take Eteocles of Thebes reflecting upon his brother and flying out after this manner: I’d mount the Heavens, I’d strive to meet the sun In’s setting forth, I’d travel within him down
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Beneath the earth, I’d balk no enterprise, To gain Jove’s mighty power and tyrannize. Eurip. Phoeniss. 504 and 536.
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Suppose, I say, out of this rage, he had presently fallen into the softer strain of good advice to his children, charging them thus: Prize gentle amity that vies With none for grandeur; concord prize That joins together friends and states, And keeps them long confederates. Equality!—whatever else deceives Our trust, ’tis this our very selves outlives;
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who is there that would not have despised him? Or what would you have thought of Atreus, after he had treated his brother at a barbarous supper, to hear him afterwards thus instructing his children: Such love as doth become related friends Alone, when ills betide, its succor lends?
