Discourses - Book III   

of all men; the men are his sons, the women are his daughters: he so
carefully visits all, so well does he care for all. Do you think
that it is from idle impertinence that he rebukes those whom he meets?
He does it as a father, as a brother, and as the minister of the
father of all, the minister of Zeus.
If you please, ask me also if a Cynic shall engage in the
administration of the state. Fool, do you seek a greater form of
administration than that in which he is engaged? Do you ask if he
shall appear among the Athenians and say something about the
revenues and the supplies, he who must talk with all men, alike with
Athenians, alike with Corinthians, alike with Romans, not about
supplies, nor yet about revenues, nor about peace or war, but about
happiness and unhappiness, about good fortune and bad fortune, about
slavery and freedom? When a man has undertaken the administration of
such a state, do you ask me if he shall engage in the administration
of a state? ask me also if he shall govern: again I will say to you:
Fool, what greater government shall he exercise than that which he
exercises now?
It is necessary also for such a man to have a certain habit of body:
for if he appears to be consumptive, thin and pale, his testimony
has not then the same weight. For he must not only by showing the
qualities of the soul prove to the vulgar that it is in his power
independent of the things which they admire to be a good man, but he
must also show by his body that his simple and frugal way of living in
the open air does not injure even the body. "See," he says, "I am a
proof of this, and my own body also is." So Diogenes used to do, for
he used to go about fresh-looking, and he attracted the notice of
the many by his personal appearance. But if a Cynic is an object of
compassion, he seems to a beggar: all persons turn away from him,
all are offended with him; for neither ought he to appear dirty so
that he shall not also in this respect drive away men; but his very
roughness ought to be clean and attractive.
There ought also to belong to the Cynic much natural grace and
sharpness; and if this is not so, he is a stupid fellow, and nothing
else; and he must have these qualities that he may be able readily and
fitly to be a match for all circumstances that may happen. So Diogenes
replied to one who said, "Are you the Diogenes who does not believe
that there are gods?" "And, how," replied Diogenes, "can this be
when I think that you are odious to the gods?" On another occasion
in reply to Alexander, who stood by him when he was sleeping, and
quoted Homer's line,

A man a councilor should not sleep all night,

he answered, when he was half-asleep,

The people's guardian and so full of cares.

But before all the Cynic's ruling faculty must be purer than the
sun; and, if it is not, he must be a cunning knave and a fellow of