![]() He taught a strict asceticism, and called pleasure an evil and suffering good because the cravings of the body distracted the soul from gaining real education.Īs for the gods, Antisthenes said they were all bogus and there was only one true natural God. After giving him several severe beatings, he accepted Diogenes.Īntisthenes taught that it was the duty of man to to improve himself, and that gaining virtue was the only measure of nobility. Antisthenes hated everyone, including his own students, and he beat anyone who came to him for instruction with sticks to see if they really wanted to learn.īut Antisthenes had been a disciple of Socrates himself, he knew Plato well and he had contacts everywhere in the educational world. He made his way to Athens where he began his life work.ĭiogenes studied under Antisthenes, who was a very cranky philosopher in his own right. Diogenes wanted to be a philosopher, so he took this to mean that he was to devalue the pretensions and folly of other philosophers. The oracle told him his destiny was to debase coinage. As a young man, Diogenes he consulted the god Apollo at the temple at Delphi to find his future. The family had been prosperous until his father was caught debasing the coinage for personal profit and the whole family was banished for life and their property seized.Īs wanderers, the family came to know poverty all too well. Diogenes had been born in wealthy Sinope, where his father ran the municipal mint. Everyone in town knew him and his ceaseless criticisms of their accepted customs. “Please move to the side a few few paces. And so to impress the philosopher, Alexander put his head over the barrel and said, “Ask of me a boon and I shall give it to you, anything you ask.”ĭiogenes heard the king and thought for a moment. The careless attitude perplexed the king, who was used to people groveling before him. “And I am Diogenes,” the philosopher replied, not even bothering to look up. Approaching the barrel, the great king boomed out a loud greeting, worthy of a great man. Diogenes and the Cynics held worldly good and property in contempt, and people came from all over to consult them for guidance. Indeed, the word cynic comes from the Greek word for dog because this school of philosophers lived with dogs and like them in poverty. But before the great conqueror left Athens, he made a point of visiting Athens’ most famous philosopher of the day, Diogenes the Cynic.ĭiogenes lived in a clay barrel outside of town with a pack of dogs for friends. The Greeks were more than happy to assist Alexander, in the fond hope that it would get rid of him once and for all. At the age of only 20 he had already fought in three wars and won them, and now he was in wealthy Corinth to gain support for him and his men as they went to Asia Minor. He had rallied many of the Greek city states to assist him in invading the Persian Empire. ![]() King Alexander the Great was visiting the city of Corinth in the fourth century B.C.
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