but on the contrary, has exposed himself to personal danger for the public service. He had never borne any illwill to Philoctetes: but when his presence was detrimental to the army, he advised his removal; now that it is discovered to be necessary for the success of the expedition, he exerts his utmost endeavours to bring him back to Troy. He knows the character of Philoctetes too well, to suppose that his resentment will ever give way to persuasion (103), and the arrows of Hercules are a safeguard against open force. He therefore finds himself compelled to resort to artifice, which on this occasion appears the more defensible, because it is employed for the benefit not only of the Grecian army, but of Philoctetes himself, who, once deprived of his weapons, will probably consent to listen to reason. Neoptolemus, though his natural feelings are shocked by the proposal of Ulysses, is unable to resist the force of his arguments, and suffers himself to be persuaded that, by the step he is about to take, he shall earn the reputation not only of a wise, but a good man[1]. It is true that he retains some misgivings, which, when strengthened by pity for Philoctetes, ripen into a complete change of purpose. But Ulysses never repents of his counsels, but considers the young man's abandonment of the enterprize as a culpable weakness, a breach of his duty to the common cause. In his own judgement this cause hallows the undertaking, and renders the fraud he has practised pious and laudable[2]. And hence when assailed by Philoctetes with the most virulent invectives, he preserves his temper, and replies to them in a tone of conscious rectitude. "He could easily refute them, if this were a season for argument; but he will confine himself to one plea: where the public weal demands such expedients, he scruples not to use them; with this exception, he may boast that no one surpasses him in justice and piety." Such language accords so well with the spirit of the Greek institutions, according to which the individual lived only in and for the state, that from the lips of Ulysses it can raise no doubt
- ↑ 117. Οδ. ὡς τοῦτο γ᾽ ἔρξας, δύο φέρει δωρήματα. Νε. Ποίω; μαθὼν γάρ, οὐκ ἂν ἀρνοίμην τὸ δρᾶν. Οδ. Σοφός τ᾽ ἂν αὐτὸς κἀγαθὸς κεκλῇ ἅμα.
- ↑ Hence with the god of craft he invokes the goddess of political prudence, his peculiar patroness: (133) Ἕρμης δ᾽ ὁ πέμπων Δόλιος ἡγήσαιτο νῷν, Νίκη τ᾽ Ἀθάνα Πολιάς, ἣ σὠζει μ᾽ ἀεί.
