302 The lessons drawn 



simple rusticity of the rustic, and the mutual distrust and mean jealousy 

 of the townsfolk, shew in numerous touches that we have in this narra- 

 tive a highly coloured scene. But the picture of the decayed city, with 

 its ancient walls a world too wide for its shrunk population, is com- 

 panion to that of the deserted countryside. Both panels of this mournful 

 diptych could have been paralleled in the case of many a city and terri- 

 tory in Italy and Greece. The moral reflexions, in which the lecturer 

 proceeds to apply the lessons of the narrative, are significant. He en- 

 larges on the superiority of the poor to the rich in many virtues, un- 

 selfishness in particular. Poverty in itself is not naturally an evil. If 

 men will only work with their own hands, they may supply their own 

 needs, and live a life worthy of freemen. The word avrovpyeiv occurs 

 more than once in this spirited appeal, shewing clearly that Dion had 

 detected the plague-spot in the civilization of his day. But he honestly 

 admits the grave difficulties that beset artisans in the various trades 

 practised in towns. They lack necessary 1 capital: everything has to 

 be paid for, food clothing lodging fuel and what not, for they get 

 nothing free but water, and own nothing but their bodies. Yet we can- 

 not advise them to engage in foul degrading vocations. We desire them 

 to live honourably, not to sink below the standards of the greedy 

 usurer or the owners of lodging-houses or ships or gangs of slaves. 

 What then are we to do with the decent poor ? Shall we have to pro- 

 pose turning them out of the cities and settling them on allotments in 

 the country? Tradition tells us rural settlement prevailed throughout 

 Attica of yore: and the system worked well, producing citizens of a 

 better and more discreet type than the town-bred mechanics who 

 thronged the Assemblies and law-courts of Athens. 



It may be said that Dion is a mere itinerant philosopher, who 

 travels about seeing the world and proposing impracticable remedies 

 for contemporary evils in popular sermons to idle audiences. But he 

 knew his trade, and his trade was to make his hearers 'feel better' for 

 attending his discourses. When he portrays the follies or vices of the 

 age, he is dealing with matters of common knowledge, and not likely 

 to misrepresent facts seriously. When he suggests remedies, it matters 

 little that there is no possibility of applying them. Present company 

 are always excepted, and the townsfolk who listened to the preacher 

 would neither resent his strictures on city life nor have the slightest 

 intention of setting their own hands to the spade or plough. That 

 there was a kind of moral reaction 2 in this period, and that lecturers 



Tjy. This passage seems openly to recognize the ruinous competition of slave labour 

 under capitalists, which the single artisan was unable to face. The admission is so far as I 

 know very rare in ancient writers. That Dion's mind was greatly exercised on the subject of 

 slavery in general, is shewn by Orations x, xiv, xv, and many scattered references elsewhere. 

 2 See the chapter on Musonius. 



