[Footnote 1:  Translator’s Note.  These and other remarks on dueling will no doubt wear a belated look to English readers; but they are hardly yet antiquated for most parts of the Continent.]

There are a great many traits in the character of the ancients which show that they were entirely free from these prejudices.  When, for instance, Marius was summoned to a duel by a Teutonic chief, he returned answer to the effect that, if the chief were tired of his life, he might go and hang himself; at the same time he offered him a veteran gladiator for a round or two.  Plutarch relates in his life of Themistocles that Eurybiades, who was in command of the fleet, once raised his stick to strike him; whereupon Themistocles, instead of drawing his sword, simply said:  Strike, but hear me.  How sorry the reader must be, if he is an honorable man, to find that we have no information that the Athenian officers refused in a body to serve any longer under Themistocles, if he acted like that!  There is a modern French writer who declares that if anyone considers Demosthenes a man of honor, his ignorance will excite a smile of pity; and that Cicero was not a man of honor either![1] In a certain passage in Plato’s Laws[2] the philosopher speaks at length of [Greek:  aikia] or assault, showing us clearly enough that the ancients had no notion of any feeling of honor in connection with such matters.  Socrates’ frequent discussions were often followed by his being severely handled, and he bore it all mildly.  Once, for instance, when somebody kicked him, the patience with which he took the insult surprised one of his friends. Do you think, said Socrates, that if an ass happened to kick me, I should resent it?[3] On another occasion, when he was asked, Has not that fellow abused and insulted you?  No, was his answer, what he says is not addressed to me[4] Stobaeus has preserved a long passage from Musonius, from which we can see how the ancients treated insults.  They knew no other form of satisfaction than that which the law provided, and wise people despised even this.  If a Greek received a box on the ear, he could get satisfaction by the aid of the law; as is evident from Plato’s Gorgias, where Socrates’ opinion may be found.  The same thing may be seen in the account given by Gellius of one Lucius Veratius, who had the audacity to give some Roman citizens whom he met on the road a box on the ear, without any provocation whatever; but to avoid any ulterior consequences, he told a slave to bring a bag of small money, and on the spot paid the trivial legal penalty to the men whom he had astonished by his conduct.

[Footnote 1:_litteraires_:  par C. Durand.  Rouen, 1828.]

[Footnote 2:  Bk.  IX.].

[Footnote 3:  Diogenes Laertius, ii., 21.]

[Footnote 4:  Ibid 36.]