[8,0] The Eighth Discourse:  Diogenes or On Virtue. 
1 When Diogenes was exiled from his native Sinope, he came to Athens, looking like 
the veriest beggar; and there he found a goodly number still of Socrates' companions: 
to wit, Plato, Aristippus, Aeschylus, Antisthenes, and Eucleides of Megara; but 
Xenophon was in exile on account of his campaign with Cyrus. Now it was not long 
before he despised them all save Antisthenes, whom he cultivated, not so much from 
approval of the man himself as of the words he spoke, which he felt to be alone true 
and best adapted to whether mankind. 2 For when he contrasted the man Antisthenes 
with his words, he sometimes made this criticism, that the man himself was much 
weaker; and so in reproach he would call him a trumpet because he could not hear his 
own self, no matter how much noise he made. Antisthenes tolerated this banter of his 
since he greatly admired the man's character; 3 and so, in requital for being called a 
trumpet, he used to say that Diogenes was like the wasps, the buzz of whose wings is 
slight but the sting very sharp. Therefore he took delight in the outspokenness of 
Diogenes, just as horsemen, when they get a horse that is high-strung and yet 
(p379) courageous and willing to work, do not object to the difficult temper of the 
animal, but dislike and have no use for the lazy and slow. 4 Sometimes, therefore, he 
used to key Diogenes up, while at other times he tried to relax his tension, just as 
those who twist strings for musical instruments stretch the strings, taking care, 
however, not to break them. 
After Antisthenes' death he moved to Corinth, since he considered none of the others 
worth associating with, and there he lived without renting a house or staying with a 
friend, but camping out in the Craneion. 5 For he observed that large numbers 
gathered at Corinth on account of the harbours and the hetaerae, and because the 
city was situated as it were at the cross-roads of Greece. Accordingly, just as the good 
physician should go and offer his services where the sick are most numerous, so, said 
he, the man of wisdom should take up his abode where fools are thickest in order to 
convict them of their folly and reprove them. 
6 So, when the time for the Isthmian games arrived, and everybody was at Isthmus, 
he went down also. For it was his custom at the great assemblies  to make a study of 
the pursuits and ambitions of men, of their reasons for being abroad, and of the 
things on which they prided themselves. 7 He gave his time also to any who wished to 
interview him, remarking that he was surprised by the fact that (p381) had he claimed to 
be a physician for the teeth, everybody would flock to him who needed to have a tooth 
pulled; yes, and by heavens, had he professed to treat the eyes, all who were suffering 
from sore eyes would present themselves, and similarly, if he had claimed to know of 
a medicine for diseases of the spleen or for gout or for running of the nose; 8 but 
when he declared that all who should follow his treatment would be relieved of folly, 
wickedness, and intemperance, not a man would listen to him or seek to be cured by 
him, no matter how much richer he might become thereby, as though he were less 
inconvenienced by these spiritual complaints than by the other kind, or as though it 
were worse for a man to suffer from an enlarged spleen or a decayed tooth than from 
a soul that is foolish, ignorant, cowardly, rash, pleasure-loving, illiberal, irascible, 
unkind, and wicked, in fact utterly corrupt. 
9 That was the time, too, when one could hear crowds of wretched sophists around 
Poseidon's temple shouting and reviling one another, and their disciples, as they were 
called, fighting with one another, many writers reading aloud their stupid works, 
many poets reciting their poems while others applauded them, many jugglers 
showing their tricks, many fortune-tellers interpreting fortunes, lawyers innumerable 
perverting judgment, and peddlers not a few peddling whatever they happened to 
have. 

[8,10] Naturally a crowd straightway gathered about him too; no Corinthians, 
however, for they did not think it would be at all worth their while, since they were 
accustomed to see (p383) him every day in Corinth. The crowd that gathered was 
composed of strangers, and each of these, after speaking or listening for a short time, 
went his way, fearing his refutation of their views. 11 Just for that reason, said 
Diogenes, he was like the Laconian dogs; there were plenty of men to pat them and 
play with them when they were shown at the popular gatherings, but no one was 
willing to buy any because he did not know how to deal with them. 
And when a certain man asked whether he too came to see the contest, he said, "No, 
but to take part." Then when the man laughed and asked him who his competitors 
were, 12 he said with that customary glance  of his: "The toughest there are and the 
hardest to beat, men whom no Greek can look straight in the eye; not competitors, 
however, who sprint, or wrestle or jump, not those that box, throw the spear, and hurl 
the discus, but those that chasten a man." 13 "Who are they, pray?" asked the other. 
"Hardships," he replied, "very severe and insuperable for gluttonous and folly-
stricken men who feast the livelong day and snore at night, but which yield to thin, 
spare men, whose waists are more pinched in than those of wasps. 14 Or do you think 
those pot-bellies are good for anything? — creatures whom sensible people ought to 
lead around, subject to the ceremony of purification, and then thrust beyond the 
borders,  or, rather, kill, quarter, and use as (p385) food just as people do with the flesh 
of large fish, don't you know, boiling it in brine and melting out the fat, the way our 
people at home in Pontus do with the lard of pigs when they want to anoint 
themselves. For I think these men have less soul than hogs. 15 But the noble man 
holds his hardships to be his greatest antagonists, and with them he is ever wont to 
battle day and night, not to win a sprig of parsley  as so many goats might do, nor for 
a bit of wild olive,  or of pine,  but to win happiness and virtue throughout all the 
days of his life, and not merely when the Eleans make proclamation, or the 
Corinthians, or the Thessalian assembly.  He is afraid of none of those opponents 
nor does he pray to draw another antagonist, 16 but challenges them one after 
another, grappling with hunger and cold, withstanding thirst, and disclosing no 
weakness even though he must endure the lash or give his body to be cut or burned. 
Hunting, exile, loss of reputation, and the like have no terrors for him; nay, he holds 
them as mere trifles, and while in their very grip the perfect man is often as sportive 
as boys with their dice and their coloured balls. 
(p387) 17 "Of course," he continued, "these antagonists do seem terrible and invincible 
to all cravens; but if you treat them with contempt and meet them boldly, you will 
find them cowardly and unable to master strong men, in this greatly resembling dogs, 
which pursue and bite people who run away from them, while some they seize and 
tear to pieces, but fear and slink away from men who face them and show fight, and 
in the end wag their tails when they come to know them. 18 Most people, however, are 
in mortal terror of these antagonists, always avoiding them by flight and never 
looking them in the face. And indeed, just as skilful boxers, if they anticipate their 
opponents, are not hit at all, but often actually end by winning the bout themselves, 
but if, on the contrary, they give ground through fear, they receive the heaviest blow; 
in the same way, if we accept our hardships in a spirit of contempt for them and 
approach them cheerfully, they avail very little against us; but if we hang back and 
give way, they appear altogether greater and more severe. 19 You can see that the 
same thing applies to fire also: if you attack it most vigorously, you put it out; but if 
with caution and fear, you get badly burned, just as children do when in sport they 
sometimes try to put out a fire with their tongues. The adversaries of this class are a 
good deal like the pancratiasts, who strike, choke, rend, and occasionally kill. 

[8,20] (p389) "But there is another battle more terrible and a struggle not slight but much 
greater than this and fraught with greater danger, I mean the fight against pleasure. 
Nor is it like that battle which Homer speaks of when he says,  
"Fiercely then around the ships 
The struggle was renewed. 
With halberds and with trenchant battle-axe 
They fought, with mighty sword and two-edged spear". 
21 No, it is no such battle, for pleasure uses no open force but deceives and casts a 
spell with baneful drugs, just as Homer says Circe  drugged the comrades of 
Odysseus, and some forthwith became swine, some wolves, and some other kinds of 
beasts. Yes, such is this thing pleasure, that hatches no single plot but all kinds of 
plots, and aims to undo men through sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch, with food 
too, and drink and carnal lust, tempting the waking and the sleeping alike. 22 For it is 
not possible to set guards and then lie down to sleep as in ordinary warfare, since it is 
just then of all times that she makes her attack, at one time weakening and enslaving 
the soul by means of sleep itself, at another, sending mischievous and insidious 
dreams that suggest her. 
23 "Now work is carried on by means of touch for the most part and proceeds in that 
way, but pleasure (p391) assails a man through each and every sense that he has; and 
while he must face and grapple with work, to pleasure he must give the widest berth 
possible and have none but unavoidable dealings with her. 24 And herein the 
strongest man is indeed strongest, one might almost say, who can keep the farthest 
away from pleasures; for it is impossible to dwell with pleasure or even to dally with 
her for any length of time without being completely enslaved. Hence when she gets 
the mastery and overpowers the soul by her charms, the rest of Circe's sorcery at once 
follows. With a stroke of her wand pleasure coolly drives her victim into a sort of sty 
and pens him up, 25 and now from that time forth the man goes on living as a pig or a 
wolf. Pleasure also brings divers and deadly vipers into being, and other crawling 
things that attend constantly upon her as they lie about her doors, and though 
yearning for pleasure and serving her, they yet suffer a thousand hardships all in 
vain. 26 For pleasure, after overpowering and taking possession of her victims, 
delivers them over to hardships, the most hateful and most difficult to endure. 
"This is the contest which I steadfastly maintain,  and in which I risk my life against 
pleasure and hardship, yet not a single wretched mortal gives heed to me, but only to 
the jumpers and runners and dancers. 27 Neither, indeed, did men have eyes for 
struggles and labours of Heracles or have any interest in them, but perhaps even then 
they were admiring certain athletes such as Zetes,  Calaïs,  (p393) Peleus,  and other 
like runners and wrestlers; and some they would admire for their beauty and others 
for their wealth, as, for example, Jason  and Cinyras.  28 About Pelops, too, the story 
ran that he had an ivory shoulder, as if there were any use in a man having a golden 
or ivory hand or eyes of diamond or malachite; but the kind of soul he had men did 
not notice. As for Heracles, they pitied him while he toiled and struggled and called 
him the most 'trouble-ridden,' or wretched, of men; indeed, this is why they gave the 
name 'troubles,' or tasks, to his labours and works, as though a laborious life were a 
trouble-ridden, or wretched  life; but now that he is dead they honour him beyond all 
others, deify him, and say he has Hebe  to wife, and all pray to him that they may not 
themselves be wretched — to him who in his labours suffered wretchedness 
exceedingly great. 
29 "They have an idea, too, that Eurystheus  had him in his power and ordered him 
about, Eurystheus, whom they considered a worthless fellow and to whom no one 
ever prayed or sacrificed. Heracles, however, roved over all Europe and Asia, 

[8,30] though 
he did not look at all like any of these athletes; for where could he have penetrated, 
had he carried so much flesh or required so much meat or drink into such depths of 
sleep? No, he was as alert and lean like a lion, keen of eye and ear, recking naught of 
cold or heat, having no use for bed, (p395) shawl, or rug, clad in a dirty skin, with an air 
of hunger about him, as he succoured the good and punished the bad. 31 And because 
Diomede,  the Thracian, wore such fine raiment and sat upon a throne drinking the 
livelong day in high revel, and treated strangers unrighteously as well as his own 
subjects, and kept a large stable, Heracles smote him with his club and smashed him 
as if he had been an old jar. Then Geryones,  who had ever so many cattle and was 
the richest of all western lords and the most arrogant, he also killed along with his 
brothers and drove his cattle away. 32 And when he found Busiris  very diligently 
training, eating the whole day long, and exceeding proud of his wrestling, Heracles 
burst him open like an over-filled bag by dashing him to the ground. He loosed the 
girdle of the Amazon, who tried to coquet with him and thought to win by means of 
her beauty. For he both consorted with her and made her understand that he could 
never be overcome by beauty and would never tarry far away from his own 
possessions for a woman's sake. 33 And Prometheus,  whom I take to have been a sort 
of sophist, he found being destroyed by popular opinion; for his liver swelled and 
grew whenever he was praised and shrivelled again when he was censured. So he took 
(p397) pity on him, frightened --- , and thus relieved him of his vanity and inordinate 
ambition; and straightway he disappeared after making him whole. 
"Now in all those exploits he was not doing a favour to Eurystheus at all. 34 And as to 
the golden apples that he got and brought back — I mean those of the Hesperides — 
he did give them to him, since he had no use for them himself, but told him to keep 
them and go hang; for he explained that apples of gold are of no use to a man, nor 
had the Hesperides,  either, found them to be. Then, finally, when he was growing 
ever slower and weaker, from fear that he would not be able to live as before, and 
besides, I suppose, because he was attacked by some disease, he made the best 
provision that was humanly possible for himself, for he reared a pyre of the very 
driest wood in the courtyard and showed that he minded the fiery heat precious little. 
35 But before that, to avoid creating the opinion that he did only impressive and 
mighty deeds, he went and removed and cleaned away the dung in the Augean 
stables,  that immense accumulation of many years. For he considered that he ought 
to fight stubbornly and war against opinion  as much as against wild beasts and 
wicked men." 
36 While Diogenes thus spoke, many stood about and listened to his words with great 
pleasure. Then, (p399) possibly with this thought of Heracles  in his mind, he ceased 
speaking and, squatting on the ground, performed an indecent act, whereat the crowd 
straightway scorned him and called him crazy, and again the sophists raised their din, 
like frogs in a pond when they do not see the water-snake.