The New International Encyclopædia/Diogenes

​DIOGENES, dī-ŏj′𝑒-nēz (Lat., from Gk. Διογένης) (c.412–323 B.C.). A cynic philosopher. He was a native of Sinope, in Pontus. His father, Icesias, a banker, was convicted of debasing the coinage, and his son, being implicated in the matter, was obliged to leave Sinope. On coming to Athens he attached himself to Antisthenes, by whom, however, his first advances were repelled. In spite of his inhospitable reception, Diogenes renewed the attempt to find favor with Antisthenes; but though driven away by blows, his perseverance at last prevailed, and Antisthenes, moved with compassion, consented to admit him as a pupil. Diogenes now plunged into the extreme of austerity and self-mortification. His clothing was of the coarsest, his food of the plainest, and was provided by the pity of the Athenians. His bed was the bare ground, whether in the open street or under the porticoes. On one occasion, in default of a better place, he took up his residence temporarily in a huge jar, πίθος, in the Metroum, that thereby he might show his contempt of ordinary men. His eccentric life did not, however, cost him the respect of the Athenians, who admired his contempt of comfort and allowed him a wide latitude of comment and rebuke. Practical good was the chief aim of his philosophy; for literature and the fine arts he did not conceal his disdain. He laughed at men of letters for reading the sufferings of Odysseus while neglecting their own; at musicians who spent in stringing their lyres the time which would have been much better employed in making their own discordant natures harmonious; at savants for gazing at the heavenly bodies, while sublimely incognizant of earthly ones; and at orators who studied how to enforce truth but not how to practice it. He was seized by pirates on a voyage to Ægina, and carried to Crete, where he was sold as a slave. When asked what business he was proficient in, he answered, “In commanding.” He was purchased by a certain Xeniades of Corinth, who recognized his worth, set him free, and made him tutor to his children. It is here that he is said to have had his famous, but probably mythical, interview with Alexander the Great. The King opened the conversation with, “I am Alexander the Great,” to which the philosopher answered, “And I am Diogenes the Cynic.” Alexander then asked him in what way he could serve him, to which Diogenes rejoined, “You can stand out of the sunshine.” Alexander is said to have been so struck with the Cynic’s self-possession that he went away remarking, “If I were not Alexander, I should wish to be Diogenes.” Diogenes died at Corinth in B.C. 323, according to tradition, on the same day with Alexander the Great. Diogenes was wholly concerned with practical wisdom, and established no system of philosophy. Certain literary works were early attributed to him, but were recognized as spurious even in antiquity. Consult Hermann, Zur Geschichte und Kritik des Diogenes von Sinope (Heilbronn, 1860); Zeller, Philosophie der Griechen, vol. i. (1889).