Testimonials to the conclusion I have just stated exist in abundance. A conspicuous example was provided during the war against Pyrrhus,1 by Gaius Fabricius Luscinus (then consul for the second time) and our Senate. Without provocation, Pyrrhus had declared war on Rome. The stake was imperial supremacy – and our enemy was a powerful, illustrious monarch. One day a deserter from the army of Pyrrhus presented himself at Fabricius’s camp and undertook, on promise of a reward, to return to Pyrrhus’s camp as secretly as he had come, and kill the king by poison. But Fabricius had the man taken back to Pyrrhus; and our Senate applauded his decision. Yet, suppose the semblance of advantage – the popular conception of advantage -were all that we were looking for. Then a terrible war, and a formidable enemy of our rule, would both have been eliminated at one blow through the agency of this single deserter! On the other hand, the prize of the war was glory: and the employment of crime instead of courage as our conquering weapon would have been a dreadful scandal and disgrace.
What Aristides2 had been to Athens, Fabricius was to Rome. Our Senate always identified advantage with principle. So one can see why they preferred to fight the enemy with battle-weapons rather than with poison. If the struggle is for supreme power, and the incentive is glory, then there must be no crimes, since out of crime glory cannot come. Indeed, even when gains are sought for reasons other than glory, the same remains true: if shameful means have been employed to acquire them, they can bring no advantage.
This applies, for example, to the proposal of Lucius Marcius Philip-pus, the son of Quintus. Acting in accordance with a decree of the Senate, Sulla had exempted certain communities1 from taxation upon their payment of a lump sum. Philippus recommended that their exemptions should be cancelled, but that the payments they had made to secure them should not be reimbursed; and the Senate accepted this proposal. What a disgrace to our government! On this occasion even a pirate could have improved upon the Senate’s good faith.
The argument of the other side is that since Philippus’s measure meant an increase in our revenues, the result would be advantageous. But will people for ever incorrigibly see advantage in what is wrong? Governments cannot do without a splendid reputation and the goodwill of their allies. So how can unpopularity and infamy possibly be to their advantage?
On this subject I frequently disagreed even with my friend Marcus Porcius Cato. He seemed to me to be carrying his vigilance over the treasury and its revenues to the point of obstinacy. In consequence, he turned down every request from the tax-farmers and a great many from our allies:2 whereas our correct course would have been to treat the allies generously and the tax-farmers as if they were our own tenants. This was particularly desirable seeing that harmony between the different grades of our society was essential to our national well-being.
Gaius Scribonius Curio the elder, too, was wrong when, while admitting that the demands of the Transpadanesd3 were justified, he nevertheless invariably added: Let advantage prevail He would have done better to argue that these claims were not justified, because they were not to our national advantage, than to admit their justice but deny their advantage.
*
The sixth book of Hecato’s work On Duties is full of questions like this: “When food is extremely scarce, is a decent man entitled to let his slaves go hungry?’ Hecato gives both sides of the case, but finally bases his decision on advantage, as he interprets the term, rather than on human feeling.
Here is another of his problems: ‘If there is a storm at sea, and cargo has to be thrown overboard, should a man prefer to lose a valuable horse or a valueless slave?’ La this case his pocket pulls one way, human feeling the other.
Another question was this: ‘If the ship has sunk and some person of little intelligence has grabbed a plank, will a wise man take this away from him if he can?’ ‘No,’ says Hecato, ‘that would be wrong.’
‘What about the man who owns the ship, then? Will he take the plank away?’
‘Certainly not – any more than he would propose to throw a passenger overboard in deep water. For until the ship reaches the port for which it was chartered it does not belong to the owner, but to the passengers.’
‘Well, then, if there were only one plank, and two shipwrecked people – both men of true wisdom! – should each of them try to seize this single plank for himself, or should one give way to the other?’
‘ One should give way; the plank should be left with the man whose life is more valuable to himself or his country.’
‘But what if both lives are equally valuable in both respects?’
‘Then they will not compete, but one will give way to the other, as though the matter were decided by lot or by the game of odds and evens’.1
‘Again, suppose a man’s father were stealing from temples or digging an underground passage to the Treasury – ought his son to report him to the authorities?’
‘No, that would be a sin. Indeed, if the father were charged, his son ought to defend him.’
‘So patriotism does not, then, come before all other obligations?’
‘Yes, it does indeed, but our country will benefit by having sons who are loyal to their parents.’
‘Then if a man’s father tries to seize autocratic power or betray his country, will his son say nothing?’
‘Of course he will; he will beg his father not to. If this appeal fails, he will reproach his father and even threaten him, and if, finally, national ruin seems imminent, he will put his country’s safety before his father’s.’
Hecato also asks: if a wise man inadvertently accepts a counterfeit coin, will he, on discovering his mistake, pass the piece off to someone else as good, in payment of a debt? Diogenes says yes, Antipater says no – and I agree with him.
And then, if a man knows that the wine he sells is going bad, ought he to disclose the fact? Diogenes says he need not, Antipater thinks an honest man should. The Stoics discuss problems of this kind like disputed points of law. Again, ‘when you are selling a slave ought his defects to be declared – not only those which there is a legal obligation to declare (otherwise the transaction is liable to be cancelled), but also the fact that he is a liar or gambler or thief or inebriate?’ One of the philosophers maintains that you ought to declare such facts, the other says you need not.
‘If someone thinks he is selling brass when he is really selling gold, should an honest man tell him the metal is gold, or buy it at one-thousandth of its value?’
But it is clear by this time where the two philosophers disagree -and what my own opinion is.
*
However, assuming that an agreement or promise has not been obtained by force or by criminal fraud (as the praetors put the matter), does this undertaking always have to be kept?
Suppose one man present another with a cure for dropsy and stipulates that, if the treatment is successful, the recipient must never use the same cure again. The patient duly recovers; some years later, however, there is a recurrence of the complaint. But this time the man who previously agreed to help him refuses to let him have the remedy again. What ought the sufferer to do? My answer is that the owner of the cure, who would lose nothing by agreeing to its further employment, is inhuman to refuse, so the sick man is entitled to take whatever steps are necessary to safeguard his life and health.
Again: imagine that a wise man is going to be left a hundred million sesterces. But first the testator insists that his prospective beneficiary should perform a dance publicly in the Forum, in broad daylight. The wise man promises to comply, because otherwise he will lose the legacy: should he then keep his promise or not? Now, first of all, I think it is a pity he promised! A refusal would have been more dignified. However, we are assuming that the promise was given. Well, then, if he considers dancing in the Forum morally wrong, he will do better to break his promise, even if he gets not a penny from the legacy, than to keep the promise, and pocket the fortune. Unless, maybe, he contributes the money to the state during some crisis. For if the country is going to benefit, even dancing in the Forum could not be wrong.
Again, promises which are contrary to the interests of those to whom they are given need not be kept. To quote an instance from mythology, the Sun-god once told his son Phaethon to make any request he liked, and it would be granted. His request was that he should be allowed to ride in his father’s chariot. The wish was granted. But while Phaethon was still riding in the heavens, a flash of lightning burnt him up. In this case how much better it would have been for his father to break his promise!
And then there was Neptune’s promise to Theseus, which Theseus insisted should be kept. Neptune had offered him three wishes,1 and Theseus, suspecting his wife’s relations with his own son Hippolytus (who was her stepson), wished for his son’s death. The wish was granted, and Theseus was overwhelmed with grief. Again, when Agamemnon had vowed to sacrifice to Diana the most beautiful creature born that year in his kingdom, this proved to be his own daughter Iphigenia; so he sacrificed her.2 But, rather than commit such an appalling crime, he ought to have repudiated his vow.
That is to say, promises do not always have to be honoured – and trusts do not always need to be made good. Suppose someone, while in his right mind, leaves his sword in your care; then he becomes insane, and demands the sword back. But compliance now would be criminal and you must refuse. Or suppose that a man who has entrusted you with a sum of money intends to take treasonable action against your country: should you return him his money? In my opinion you should not, for this would be against the interests of your country, which ought to be dearer to you than anything else in the world.
In special circumstances, then, a number of things which look natural and right may turn out not to be right after all. If the original advantage which prompted an undertaking, or agreement, or trust no longer exists, then its fulfilment may cease to be right and become wrong.
And now I feel I have said enough about courses of action which look intelligent and consequently advantageous, yet are the reverse of right.