The Good King

Dio Chrysostom was a Greek philosopher and a pagan who lived from about A.D. 40 to about A.D. 120. In his first discourse on kingship, he communicates to emperor Trajan regarding the characteristics of the good king. It somehow seemed worth sharing a brief excerpt, taken from pages 13 through 21 of the first volume of the English translation by J. W. Cohoon in the Loeb Classical Library collection:

The good king also believes it to be due to his position to have the larger portion, not of wealth or of pleasures, but of painstaking care and anxieties; hence he is actually more fond of toil than many others are of pleasure or of wealth. For he knows that pleasure, in addition to the general harm it does to those who constantly indulge therein, also quickly renders them incapable of pleasure, whereas toil, besides conferring other benefits, continually increases a man's capacity for toil. He alone, therefore, may call his soldiers "fellow-soldiers" and his associates "friends" without making mockery of the word friendship; and not only may he be called by the title "Father" of his people and his subjects, but he may justify the title by his deeds. In the title "master," however, he can take no delight, nay, not even in relation to his slaves, much less to his free subjects; for he looks upon himself as being king, not for the sake of his individual self, but for the sake of all men. . . .

They who come into his presence and behold him feel neither terror nor fear; but into their hearts creeps a feeling of profound respect, something much stronger and more powerful that fear. For those who fear must inevitably hate and want to escape; those who feel respect must linger and admire.

He holds that sincerity and truthfulness are qualities befitting a king and a prudent man, while unscrupulousness and deceit are for the fool and the slave, for he observes that among the wild beasts also it is the most cowardly and ignoble which surpass all the rest in lying and deceiving.

Though naturally covetous of honour, and knowing that it is the good that men are prone to honour, he has less hope of winning honour from the unwilling than he has of gaining the friendship of those who hate him. . . .

But I will pass over most of the details and give the clearest mark of a true king: he is one whom all good men can praise without compunction not only during his life but even afterwards. And yet, even so, he does not himself covet the praise of the vulgar and the loungers about the market-place, but only that of the free-born and noble, men who would prefer to die rather than be guilty of falsehood. Who, therefore, would not account such a man and such a life blessed? From what remote lands would men not come to see him and to profit from his honourable and upright character? What spectacle is more impressive than that of a noble and diligent king? What can give greater pleasure than a gentle and kindly ruler who desires to serve all and has it in his power so to do? What is more profitable than an equitable and just king? Whose life is safer than his whom all alike protect, whose is happier than his who esteems no man an enemy, and whose is freer from vexation than his who has no cause to blame himself? Who is more fortunate, too, than that man whose goodness is known of all?

In plain and simple language I have described the good king. If any of his attributes seem to belong to you, happy are you in your gracious and excellent nature, and happy are we who share its blessings with you.