Exalted to an affluence, as he expresses it, beyond what "the Persian king can boast," the Timon of Lucian resolves to "purchase some retired spot, there build a tower to keep my gold in, and live for myself alone: this shall be my habitation; and, when I am dead, my sepulchre also: from this time forth it is my fixed resolution to have no commerce or connection with mankind, but to despise and avoid it. I will pay no regard to acquaintance, friendship, pity, or compassion: to pity the distressed or to relieve the indigent I shall consider as a weakness, nay, as a crime; my life, like the beasts of the field, shall be spent in solitude, and Timon alone shall be Timon's friend. I will treat all beside as enemies and betrayers; to converse with them were profanation; to herd with them, impiety: accursed be the day that brings them to my sight." Selfishness, so detestable, would have been incompatible with the high-minded disinterestedness of Shakspeare's Timon, whose generous spirit is a stranger to the vice of avarice. But the influence of Lucian's dialogue is nevertheless, even in this instance, to be traced in the play. Spurning, himself, the possession of his newly acquired wealth, Timon still devotes it to a purpose similar to that assigned to it in Lucian; he bestows it on his faithful steward, with this express condition and solemn admonition : "Here, take-the gods out of my misery Have sent thee treasure. Go, live rich and happy: When thou deny'st to men; let prisons swallow them, And may diseases lick up their false bloods!" + A brief notice of one or two other instances in which Lucian may be traced in the drama will suffice. In the first scene, Timon is the means of marrying the daughter of an old Athenian, by bestowing on a servant of his own, her suitor, a sum (three talents), equal to her portion; an act very much resembling what Lucian's Timon relates as having been done by himself: "he whom I gave a large piece of ground to, and two talents for his daughter's portion." One of the lords describes the dramatic Timon's profuse liberality, by representing the dispersion of his wealth as " pouring it out; Plutus the god of gold is but his steward." * In Lucian's dialogue, "Plutus" is sent by * Act IV. sc. 3. + Act I. sc. 1. Jupiter to " carry Timon a large treasure." In the play, we observe that the restoration of Timon to wealth, immediately brings out to him the sycophants, who in the days of his prosperity had preyed upon, and in the hour of adversity deserted him. Thus in Lucian. "But hush! whence all this noise and hurry? What crowds are here, all covered with dust and out of breath; somehow or other they have smelt out the gold. I'll get upon this hill, and pelt them from it with stones." To this measure he actually resorts, in order to rid himself of some of his sordid visitors; others he very unceremoniously beats. Shakspeare's Timon pelts Apemantus, and inflicts corporal chastisement on the poor poet and painter. In the powerful contrast and nice discrimination of characters, Shakspeare is unrivalled. How few authors would have ventured to produce two madmen on the scene together, as in Lear, or two misanthropists, as in the play before us; and who, besides himself, could, amidst difficulties so complicated, have arrived at conclusions so triumphant? Timon and Apemantus, at the first view similar, have nothing in common but their hatred of mankind. Disgusted with a world, the hollowness and ingratitude of which Timon in his own person proved, he madly rushes to the conclusion, that virtue is a stranger to the human breast; that love, gratitude, and integrity, are merely assumed for purposes of imposition; and that the sole business of man is one continued endeavour to overreach and defraud his fellow-creature. Timon's dignified and upright soul, incapable of concealing the deep rooted disgust with which the baseness of his sycophant friends had inspired him, vents itself in virtuous indignation; and abjuring all connection with monsters, in his estimation less tolerable than the beasts that range the desert, he seeks refuge from the contaminating influence of society, in the deep recesses of the woods; there resolved to pass the remainder of his days in the peaceful innocence of primitive simplicity. Mark the contrast in Apemantus. Apemantus is a vile, ill-natured churl, affecting singularity for the pitiful ambition of notoriety; railing at man for the purpose of creating vexation; and pretending to virtue which he neither feels nor knows. Timon's exposure of the philosopher's pretensions is "bitter beyond bitterness," as Johnson designates the last line of the quotation: "Thou art a slave, whom Fortune's tender arm With favour never clasp'd; but bred a dog. Hadst thou, like us, from our first swarth, proceeded Freely command, thou wouldst have plung'd thyself Why should'st thou hate men? . Hence! be gone! If thou hadst not been born the worst of men, Apemantus is, in fact, a cynic, and it was from Lucian that Shakspeare acquired his accurate knowledge of that sect: "But now, mind how you are to behave: you must be bold, saucy, and abusive to every body, kings and beggars alike; this is the way to make them to look upon you, and think you a great man. Your voice should be barbarous, and your speech dissonant, as like a dog as possible; your countenance rigid and inflexible, and your gait and demeanour suitable to it: every thing you say, savage and uncouth: modesty, equity, and moderation, you must have nothing to do with : never suffer a blush to come upon your cheek: * Act IV. sc. 3. |