Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

​Stilpo of Megara in Greece attended the lectures of some of the followers of Euclides; though some say that he heard Euclides himself, and also Thrasymachus of Corinth, who was a pupil of Ichthyas, as Heraclides says. He so far surpassed others in inventiveness of argument and sophistry that nearly the whole of Greece was on the verge of "Megarizing" by looking toward him. Concerning him, Philippus the Megarian says literally as follows: "For indeed, from Theophrastus he drew away Metrodorus the theorist and Timagoras of Gela, and from Aristotle the Cyrenaic he drew away Cleitarchus and Simmias; and among the dialecticians, he drew away Paeonius from Aristides, and when Diphilus the Bosporan, pupil of Euphantus, and Myrmex, son of Exaenetus, arrived with the intention of refuting him, he won over both as admirers."

"Furthermore, besides these, he won over Phrasidemus the Peripatetic, who was well versed in physics; and Alcimus the rhetorician, foremost among all the rhetoricians in Greece, as well as Crates and exceedingly many others did he capture; and indeed he also carried off Zeno the Phoenician along with these." He was also most capable in statesmanship. He married a wife; but he also lived with the courtesan Nicarete, as Onetor also says somewhere. And he fathered a dissolute daughter, whom a pupil of his, Simmias of Syracuse, married. When she was living in an unruly manner, someone said to Stilpo that she brought shame upon him; but he said: "No more than I bring honor to her."

​They say that Ptolemy Soter also received him with favor. When Ptolemy became master of Megara, he offered him money and invited him to sail with him to Egypt; but Stilpo accepted only a moderate portion of the sum of money, and declining the journey, withdrew to Aegina until the king had sailed away. Moreover, Demetrius, the son of Antigonus, having captured Megara, also took care that Stilpo's house should be guarded and that all the plundered goods should be restored to him. On which occasion, when Demetrius wished to receive from him an inventory of what had been lost, Stilpo said that he had lost none of his own possessions; for no one had carried off education, and he still had his reason and his knowledge.

​And having conversed with Demetrius on doing good to men, he captivated him so much that he paid heed to him. They say that he proposed an argument of the following sort concerning the Athena of Phidias: "Is Athena, the daughter of Zeus, a god?" And upon the other saying, "Yes," he said: "Yet this statue is not of Zeus, but of Phidias." And this being granted, he said: "Therefore she is not a god." When on this account he was summoned before the Areopagus, he did not deny it, but asserted that he had argued correctly: for she was not a male god, but a goddess; and 'gods' are males. And indeed the Areopagites immediately ordered him to leave the city. At which time also Theodorus, surnamed the Atheist, said mockingly: "And whence did Stilpo know this? Did he lift up her robe and inspect her garden?" In truth, this Theodorus was most brazen, whereas Stilpo was most clever.