Abstract

ιλοκαλομέν τε γρ μετ' ετελείας κα ιλοσοομεν νευ μαλακίαας. πλούτ τε ργου μλλον και ἢ λόγου κόμπ χρώμεθα, κα τ πένεσθαι οχ μολοσεν τιν ασχρόν, λλ μ διαεύγειν ργ ασχιον νι τε τος ατος οκείων μα κα πολιτικν πιμέλεια, κα τέροις πρς ργα τετραμμένοις τ πολιτικ μ νδες γνναι. J. Kakridis has seen in this famous passage a reflection of the popular debate, conducted most memorably by Amphion and Zethus in Euripides' Antiope and Callicles and Socrates in Plato's Gorgias, over the respective merits of the vita activa and vita contemplativa. Normally the intellectual is faulted as lazy and helpless, the politician as an ignorant busybody; yet Pericles, according to Kakridis, claims that Athenians avoid these faults and combine the traits of both lives at their best. This interpretation accords well with the idealism of the funeral oration, but it falters over what Pericles places between philosophy and politics, viz. πλοτος. Kakridis must struggle to account for the transition directly from philosophy to wealth, on the assumption that πλούτ τε…χρώμεθα serves to amplify νευ μαλακίας, while νιτε…πιμέλεια extends the description of the non-intellectual life from the private sphere of trade to the public one of politics.