Book 2
8.102
For a while he stayed at the court of Ptolemy the son of Lagus, and was once sent by him as ambassador to Lysimachus. And on this occasion his language was so bold that Lysimachus said, Tell me, are you not the Theodorus who was banished from Athens? To which he replied, Your information is correct, for, when Athens could not bear me any more than Semele could Dionysus, she cast me out. And upon Lysimachus adding, Take care you do not come here again, I never will, said he, unless Ptolemy sends me. Mithras, the king’s minister, standing by and saying, It seems that you can ignore not only gods but kings as well, Theodorus replied, How can you say that I ignore the gods when I regard you as hateful to the gods? He is said on one occasion in Corinth to have walked abroad with a numerous train of pupils, and Metrocles the Cynic, who was washing chervil, remarked, You, sophist that you are, would not have wanted all these pupils if you had washed vegetables. Thereupon Theodorus retorted, And you, if you had known how to associate with men, would have had no use for these vegetables.
8.103
A similar anecdote is told of Diogenes and Aristippus, as mentioned above.See §68.
8.103
Such was the character of Theodorus and his surroundings. At last he retired to Cyrene, where he lived with Magas and continued to be held in high honour. The first time that he was expelled from Cyrene he is credited with a witty remark: Many thanks,Or, if κακῶς is the right reading, It is unkind of you. καλῶς is Stephanus’s conjecture. men of Cyrene, said he, for driving me from Libya into Greece.
