pay his soldiers, requiring no other service from
him, than that he should with his conquering army lay Athens level
with the ground, and burn, slay, kill all her inhabitants; not sparing
the old men for their white beards, for (he said) they were usurers,
nor the young children for their seeming innocent smiles, for those
(he said) would live, if they grew up, to be traitors; but to steel
his eyes and ears against any sights or sounds that might awaken
compassion; and not to let the cries of virgins, babes, or mothers,
hinder him from making one universal massacre of the city, but to
confound them all in his conquest; and when he had conquered, he
prayed that the gods would confound him also, the conqueror: so
thoroughly did Timon hate Athens, Athenians, and all mankind.

While he lived in this forlorn state, leading a life more brutal than
human, he was suddenly surprised one day with the appearance of a
man standing in an admiring posture at the door of his cave. It was
Flavius, the honest steward, whom love and zealous affection to his
master had led to seek him out at his wretched dwelling, and to offer
his services! and the first sight of his master, the once noble Timon,
in that abject condition, naked as he was born, living in the manner
of a beast among beasts, looking like his own sad ruins and a monument
of decay, so affected this good servant, that he stood speechless,
wrapt up in horror, and confounded. And when he found utterance at
last to his words, they were so choaked with tears, that Timon had
much ado to know him again, or to make out who it was that had come
(so contrary to the experience he had had of mankind) to offer him
service in extremity. And being in the form and shape of a man, he
suspected him for a traitor, and his tears for false; but the good
servant by so many tokens confirmed the truth of his fidelity, and
made it clear that nothing but love and zealous duty to his once dear
master had brought him there, that Timon was forced to confess that
the world contained one honest man; yet, being in the shape and form
of a man, he could not look upon his man's face without abhorrence,
or hear words uttered from his man's lips without loathing; and this
singly honest man was forced to depart, because he was a man, and
because, with a heart more gentle and compassionate than is usual to
man, he bore man's detested form and outward feature.

But greater visitants than a poor steward were about