the wounds on his body, and his shield pierced by a dart. "Now I,"
said he, "when I was besieging Samos, was quite ashamed if an arrow
fell near me, thinking that I was exposing myself more boyishly than
was fitting for the general and leader of so important a force." In
cases where the personal risk of the general is of great moment to
his army, then he must fight and expose himself without stint, and
disregard those who say that a general should die of old age, or at
any rate, when an old man. But where the gain is small in case of
success, while failure ruins everything, no one demands that the work
of the common soldier be performed at the risk of the general's life.

These prefatory remarks occurred to me in writing the Lives of
Pelopidas and Marcellus, great men who fell in a manner scarce worthy
of themselves: for being both of them most stout in battle, and having
each illustrated his country by splendid campaigns, against, too, the
most terrible antagonists--the one, as we read, having routed
Hannibal, who before was invincible, and the other having in a pitched
battle conquered the Lacedæmonians, the ruling state by sea and
land--yet they without any consideration endangered themselves and
flung away their lives just at the time when there was special need
for such men to live and command. And on this account I have drawn a
parallel between their lives, tracing out the points of resemblance
between them.

III. The family of Pelopidas, the son of Hippokles, was an honourable
one at Thebes, as likewise was that of Epameinondas. Bred in great
affluence, and having early succeeded to a splendid inheritance, he
showed eagerness to relieve the deserving poor, that he might prove
that he had become the master, not the servant of his riches. In most
cases, Aristotle observes, men either do not use their wealth through