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He is one of the best story-tellers of antiquity, and from his works a series of "Percy Anecdotes" of ancient men might easily be compiled. "Such anecdotes will not," says he, in his Life of Timoleon, "be thought, I conceive, either foreign to my purpose of writing lives, or unprofitable in themselves, by such readers as are not in too much haste, or busied and taken up with other concerns."
Leptines, also, the tyrant of Apollonia and divers other little towns, after some resistance made, seeing the danger he was in of being taken by force, surrendered himself; upon which Timoleon spared his life, and sent him away to Corinth, counting it a glorious thing that the mother city should expose to the view of other Greeks these Sicilian tyrants, living now in an exiled and a low condition.
XIII. These portents, it seems, did not merely presage the victory, but also the subsequent events, of which this was the prosperous beginning. Immediately several cities sent ambassadors and joined Timoleon, as did also Mamercus the despot of Katana, a man of warlike tastes and great wealth, who made an alliance with him.
Three hundred were killed, six hundred taken, and the rest, abandoning their camp, hastened at all speed back to Syracuse. Again the gods spoke in favor of Timoleon. Just as the battle began the gates of the temple of Adranus burst open, and the god himself appeared with brandished spear and perspiring face. So said the awe-struck Adranians, and there was no one to contradict their testimony.
And still, I do not say that Timoleon is to be blamed for having received a fine house and estate; for there is no disgrace in receiving it by such means, though not to take it is better, and shows almost superhuman virtue, which cares not to take what is lawfully within its reach.
Four several times in 360 in the time of Dionysius the elder; in 410 in that of Timoleon; in 445 in that of Agathocles; in 476 in that of Pyrrhus the Carthaginians were masters of all Sicily excepting Syracuse, and were baffled by its solid walls; almost as often the Syracusans, under able leaders, such as were the elder Dionysius, Agathocles, and Pyrrhus, seemed equally on the eve of dislodging the Africans from the island.
But the Carthaginians who were left in Rhegium perceiving, when the assembly was dissolved, that Timoleon had given them the go by, were not a little vexed to see themselves outwitted, much to the amusement of the Rhegians, who could not but smile to find Phoenicians complain of being cheated.
These letters from Timoleon being delivered at Corinth, and the ambassadors of Syracuse beseeching them at the same time, that they would take upon them the care of their poor city, and once again become the founders of it, the Corinthians were not tempted by any feeling of cupidity to lay hold of the advantage.
A Timoleon, a Brutus, and a Themistocles, incomparably classic, stood on the plateau; and a rapier which had belonged to Doria, and a sabre which had been worn by Castruccio, hung on either side of the mantelpiece.
And to learn what means they must use to retain their authority, they have only to take example by the conduct of good princes, such as Timoleon of Corinth, Aratus of Sicyone, and the like, in whose lives they will find such security and content, both on the side of the ruler and the ruled, as ought to stir them with the desire to imitate them, which, for the reasons already given, it is easy for them to do.
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