On Fortune

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Title:     On Fortune
Author: Plutarch [More Titles by Plutarch]

Sec. I. "Fortune, not wisdom, rules the affairs of mortals."[946] And does not justice, and fairness, and sobriety, and decorum rule the affairs of mortals? Was it of fortune or owing to fortune that Aristides persevered in his poverty, when he might have been lord of much wealth? And that Scipio after taking Carthage neither saw nor received any of the spoil? Was it of fortune or owing to fortune that Philocrates spent on harlots and fish the money he had received from Philip? And that Lasthenes and Euthycrates lost Olynthus, measuring happiness by their belly and lusts? Was it of fortune that Alexander the son of Philip not only himself abstained from the captive women, but punished others that outraged them? Was it under the influence of an evil genius and fortune that Alexander,[947] the son of Priam, intrigued with the wife of his host and ran away with her, and filled two continents with war and evils? For if all these things are due to fortune, what hinders our saying that cats and goats and apes are under the influence of fortune in respect of greediness, and lust, and ribaldry?

Sec. II. And if there are such things as sobriety and justice and fortitude, with what reason can we deny the existence of prudence, and if prudence exists, how can we deny the existence of wisdom? For sobriety is a kind of prudence, as people say, and justice also needs the presence of prudence. Nay more, we call the wisdom and prudence that makes people good in regard to pleasure self-control and sobriety, and in dangers and hardships endurance and fortitude, and in dealings between man and man and in public life equity and justice. And so, if we are to ascribe to fortune the acts of wisdom, let us ascribe justice and sobriety to fortune also, aye, and let us put down to fortune stealing, and picking pockets, and lewdness, and let us bid farewell to argument, and throw ourselves entirely on fortune, as if we were, like dust or refuse, borne along and hurried away by a violent wind. For if there be no wisdom, it is not likely that there is any deliberation or investigation of matters, or search for expediency, but Sophocles only talked nonsense when he said,

"Whate'er is sought is found, what is neglected
Escapes our notice;"[948]

and again in dividing human affairs,

"What can be taught I learn, what can be found out
Duly investigate, and of the gods
I ask for what is to be got by prayer."[949]

For what can be found out or learnt by men, if everything is due to fortune? And what deliberative assembly of a state is not annulled, what council of a king is not abrogated, if all things are subject to fortune? whom we abuse as blind because we ourselves are blind in our dealings with her. Indeed, how can it be otherwise, seeing that we repudiate wisdom, which is like plucking out our eyes, and take a blind guide of our lives?

Sec. III. Supposing any of us were to assert that seeing is a matter of fortune, not of eyesight, nor of the eyes that give light, as Plato says, and that hearing is a matter of fortune, and not the imbibing of a current of air through the ear and brain, it would be well for us then to be on our guard against the evidence of our senses. But indeed nature has given us sight and hearing and taste and smell, and all other parts of the body and their functions, as ministers of wisdom and prudence. For "it is the mind that sees, and the mind that hears, everything else is deaf and blind." And just as, if there were no sun, we should have perpetual night for all the stars, as Heraclitus says, so man for all his senses, if he had no mind or reason, would be little better than the beasts. But as it is, it is not by fortune or chance that we are superior to them and masters of them, but Prometheus, that is reason, is the cause of this,

"Presenting us with bulls, horses, and asses,
To ease us of our toil, and serve instead,"

as AEschylus says.[950] For as to fortune and natural condition, most of the beasts are better off than we are. For some are armed with horns and tusks and stings, and as for the hedgehog, as Empedocles says, it has its back all rough with sharp bristles, and some are shod and protected by scales and fur and talons and hoofs worn smooth by use, whereas man alone, as Plato says, is left by nature naked, unarmed, unshod, and uncovered. But by one gift, that of reason and painstaking and forethought, nature compensates for all these deficiencies. "Small indeed is the strength of man, but by the versatility of his intellect he can tame the inhabitants of the sea, earth, and air."[951] Nothing is more agile and swift than horses, yet they run for man; the dog is a courageous and high-spirited creature, yet it guards man; fish is most pleasant to the taste, the pig the fattest of all animals, yet both are food and delicacies for man. What is huger or more formidable in appearance than the elephant? Yet it is man's plaything, and a spectacle at public shows, and learns to dance and kneel. And all these things are not idly introduced, but to the end that they may teach us to what heights reason raises man, and what things it sets him above, and how it makes him master of everything.

"For we are not good boxers, nor good wrestlers,
Nor yet swift runners,"[952]

for in all these points we are less fortunate than the beasts. But by our experience and memory and wisdom and cunning, as Anaxagoras says, we make use of them, and get their honey and milk, and catch them, and drive and lead them about at our will. And there is nothing of fortune in this, it is all the result of wisdom and forethought.

Sec. IV. Moreover the labours of carpenters and coppersmiths and house-builders and statue-makers are affairs of mortals, and we see that no success in such trades is got by fortune or chance. For that fortune plays a very small part in the life of a wise man, whether coppersmith or house-builder, and that the greatest works are wrought by art alone, is shown by the poet in the following lines:--

"All handicraftsmen go into the street,
Ye that with fan-shaped baskets worship Ergane,
Zeus' fierce-eyed daughter;"[953]

for Ergane[954] and Athene, and not Fortune, do the trades regard as their patrons. They do indeed say that Nealces,[955] on one occasion painting a horse, was quite satisfied with his painting in all other respects, but that some foam on the bridle from the horse's breath did not please him, so that he frequently tried to rub it out; at last in his anger he threw his sponge (just as it was, full of colours) at the picture, and this very wonderfully produced exactly the effect he desired. This is the only fortunate accident in art that history records. Artificers everywhere use rules and weights and measures, that none of their work may be done at random and anyhow. And indeed the arts may be considered as wisdom on a small scale, or rather as emanations from and fragments of wisdom scattered about among the necessities of life; as the fire of Prometheus is riddled to have been divided and scattered about in all quarters of the world. For thus small particles and fragments of wisdom, breaking up as it were and getting divided into pieces, have formed into order.

Sec. V. It is strange then that the arts do not require fortune to attain to their ends, and yet that the most important and complete of all the arts, the sum total of man's glory and merit, should be so completely powerless. Why, there is a kind of wisdom even in the tightening or slackening of chords, which people call music, and in the dressing of food, which we call the art of cooking, and in cleaning clothes, which we call the art of the fuller, and we teach boys how to put on their shoes and clothes generally, and to take their meat in the right hand and their bread in the left, since none of these things come by fortune, but require attention and care. And are we to suppose that the most important things which make so much for happiness do not call for wisdom, and have nothing to do with reason and forethought? Why, no one ever yet wetted earth with water and then left it, thinking it would become bricks by fortune and spontaneously, or procured wool and leather, and sat down and prayed Fortune that it might become clothes and shoes; nor does anyone getting together much gold and silver and a quantity of slaves, and living in a spacious hall with many doors, and making a display of costly couches and tables, believe that these things will constitute his happiness, and give him a painless happy life secure from changes, unless he be wise also. A certain person asked the general Iphicrates in a scolding way who he was, as he seemed neither a heavy-armed soldier, nor a bowman, nor a targeteer, and he replied, "I am the person who rule and make use of all these."

Sec. VI. So wisdom is neither gold, nor silver, nor fame, nor wealth, nor health, nor strength, nor beauty. What is it then? It is what can use all these well, and that by means of which each of these things becomes pleasant and esteemed and useful, and without which they are useless; and unprofitable and injurious, and a burden and disgrace to their possessor. So Hesiod's Prometheus gives very good advice to Epimetheus, "not to receive gifts from Olympian Zeus but to send them back,"[956] meaning external things and things of fortune. For as if he urged one who knew nothing of music not to play on the pipe, or one who knew nothing of letters not to read, or one who was not used to horses not to ride, so he advised him not to take office if he were foolish, nor to grow rich if he were illiberal, nor to marry if likely to be ruled by his wife. For success beyond their merit is to foolish persons a cause of folly, as Demosthenes said,[957] and good fortune beyond their merit is to those who are not sensible a cause of misfortune.[958]

FOOTNOTES:

[946] A line from Chaeremon.

[947] Better known as Paris.

[948] "Oedipus Tyrannus," 110, 111. Wyttenbach compares Terence, "Heauton Timorumenos," 675. "Nil tam difficilest, quin quaerende investigari possiet."

[949] Soph., Frag. 723.

[950] AEschylus, Fragm. 180. Reading [Greek: antidoula] with Reiske and the MSS.

[951] Euripides, "AEolus," Fragm. 27.

[952] Homer, "Odyssey," viii. 246, 247.

[953] Soph., Frag. 724.

[954] "The Worker." Generally a title of Athene, as Pausanias, i. 24; iii. 17; v. 14; vi. 26; viii. 32; ix. 26. Gataker thinks [Greek: kai ten] should be expunged. Hercher omits [Greek: kai ten 'Athenan] altogether.

[955] So Hercher after Madvig. See Pliny, "Hist. Nat.," XXXV. 36, 20.

[956] Hesiod, "Works and Days," 86, 87.

[957] "Olynth.," i. 23.

[958] The whole of this essay reminds one of the well-known lines of Juvenal, twice repeated--namely, x. 365, 366; and xiv. 315, 316:--

"Nullum numen habes, si sit prudentia; nos te,
Nos facimus, Fortuna, deam caeloque locamus."

[The end]
Plutarch's essay: On Fortune

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