SelfDefinition.Org
Hiero a.k.a Tyrannicus
by Xenophon
(430-354 BC)
Part 6
(1) "I wish, Simonides," he said, "to make clear to you those pleasures which I enjoyed when I was a private man; now, since I became a tyrant, I perceive that I am deprived of them.
(2) "I was together with companions of my own age, taking pleasure in them, and they in me; I was a companion to myself when I desired peace and tranquility; I lived amid banquets, often until I forgot everything harsh in human life, and often until my soul was completely absorbed in song, festivity, and dancing, and often until there was desire for intercourse between me and those who were present.
(3) "Now I am deprived of those who take pleasure in me, because I have slaves instead of friends for comrades. I myself am deprived of pleasant intimacy with them, because I see in them no good will for me. And I guard against strong drink and sleep as if I were in an ambush.
(4) "To fear the crowd, yet to fear solitude; to fear being without a guard, and to fear the very men who are guarding; to be unwilling to have unarmed men about me, yet not gladly to see them armed—how could this fail to be a painful condition?
(5) "Furthermore, to trust strangers more than citizens, barbarians more than Greeks; to desire to keep the free slaves, and be compelled to make the slaves free—do not all these things seem to you signs of a soul distracted by fears?
(6) "Fear, you know, when in the soul is not only painful itself, it also becomes the spoiler of all the pleasures it accompanies.
(7) "If you too have experience of war, Simonides, and have ever before now been posted near the enemy line, recall what sort of food you took at that time, and what sort of sleep you had.
(8) "The kind of pain you suffered then is the kind the tyrants have, and that more terrible. For the tyrants believe they see enemies not only in front of them, but on every side."
(9) After he heard this, Simonides interrupted and said, "I think you put some things extremely well. For war is a fearful thing. But nevertheless, Hiero, we at any rate post guards, when we are on a campaign, and take our share of food and sleep with confidence."
(10) And Hiero said, "Yes, by Zeus, Simonides, for the laws stand watch over the guards, so that they fear for themselves and in your behalf. But the tyrants hire guards, like harvesters, for pay.
(11) "And surely the guards, if they ought to be capable of doing anything, ought to be faithful. Yet one faithful man is much harder to find than a great many workers for whatever kind of task you wish, especially when those doing the guarding are only present for the sake of money, and when they may get in a moment much more by killing the tyrant than all they earn from him being his guards for a long time.
(12) "As to why you were jealous of us, because we are most able to benefit out friends, and because we, above all men, master our private enemies, this is not the case either.
(13) "For as to friends, how would you believe that you ever confer a benefit, when you know well that the one who receives the most from you would the most gladly get out of your sight as quickly as possible? For whatever it is he receives from a tyrant, no one believes it his own until he is beyond the tyrant's power to command.
(14) "As for private enemies in their turn, how would you say the tyrants have the most ability to master them, when they know well that all their subjects are their enemies, and when it is not possible either to kill all these outright or to put them in chains? For who then would be left for [the tyrant] to rule? But knowing that they are his enemies, he must at the same time guard against, and be compelled to make use of, these very men.
(15) "Know well, Simonides, that those whom they fear among the citizens they find it hard to see alive, and yet hard to kill. It is just as if there were a good horse who yet gives rise to the fear that he might do some irreparable harm; a man would find it hard to kill him because of his virtue, yet hard to manage him alive, being constantly alert against his working irreparable harm in the midst of danger.
(16) "So too with respect to as many other possessions as are hard to manage but useful; all alike give pain to their possessors, and to those who are rid of them."