ink you, or to compass his own swift
destruction?" (14)

(14) Or, "Is that to choose the path of safety, think you? Is it not
rather to sign his own death-warrent?" L. Dind. cf. Hesiod, "Works
and Days," 293. See Newman, op. cit. i. 393-397.

When some one asked him: "What he regarded as the best pursuit or
business (15) for a man?" he answered: "Successful conduct"; (16) and
to a second question: "Did he then regard good fortune as an end to
be pursued?"--"On the contrary," he answered, "for myself, I consider
fortune and conduct to be diametrically opposed. For instance, to
succeed in some desirable course of action without seeking to do so, I
hold to be good fortune; but to do a thing well by dint of learning and
practice, that according to my creed is successful conduct, (17) and
those who make this the serious business of their life seem to me to do
well."

(15) Or, "the noblest study."

(16) {eupraxia, eu prattein}--to do well, in the sense both of well or
right doing, and of welfare, and is accordingly opposed to
{eutukhia}, mere good luck or success. Cf. Plat. "Euthyd." 281 B.

(17) Lit. "well-doing"; and for the Socratic view see Newman, op. cit.
i. 305, 401.

They are at once the best and the dearest in the sight of God (18) (he
went on to say) who for instance in husbandry do well the things of
farming, or in the art of healing all that belongs to healing, or
in statecraft the affairs of state; whereas a man who does nothing
well--nor well in anything--is (he added) neither good for anything nor
dear to God.

(18) Or, "most divinely favoured." Cf. Plat. "Euthyphro," 7 A.

X

But indeed, (1) if chance brought him into conversation with any one
possessed of an art, and using it for daily purposes of business, he
never failed to be useful to this kind of person. For instance, stepping
one time into the studio of Parrhasius (2) the painter, and getting into
conversation with him--

(1) {alla men kai}... "But indeed the sphere of his helpfulness was
not circumscribed; if," etc.

(2) For Parrhasius of Ephesus, the son of Evenor and rival of Zeuxis,
see Woltmann and Woermann, "Hist. of Painting," p. 47 foll.;
Cobet, "Pros. Xen." p. 50 (cf. in particular Quint. XII. x. 627).
At the date of conversation (real or ideal) he may be supposed to
have been a young man.

I suppose, Parrhasius (said he), painting may be defined as "a
representation of visible o