ever in which Epaminondas or Agesilaus acted, for though they
associated with very many men and states and different modes of life,
they maintained everywhere their usual demeanour, both in dress and diet
and language and behaviour. So Plato[375] at Syracuse was exactly the
same man as in the Academy, the same with Dionysius as with Dion.

Sec. VIII. As to the changes of the flatterer, which resemble those of the
polypus,[376] a man may most easily detect them by himself pretending to
change about frequently, and by censuring the kind of life he used
formerly to praise, and anon approving of the words actions and modes of
life that he used to be displeased with. He will then see that the
flatterer is never consistent or himself, never loving hating rejoicing
grieving at his own initiative, but like a mirror, merely reflecting the
image of other people's emotions and manners and feelings. Such a one
will say, if you censure one of your friends to him, "You are slow in
finding the fellow out, he never pleased me from the first." But if on
the other hand you change your language and praise him, he will swear by
Zeus that he rejoices at it, and is himself under obligations to the
man, and believes in him. And if you talk of the necessity of changing
your mode of life, of retiring from public life to a life of privacy and
ease, he says, "We ought long ago to have got rid of uproar[377] and
envy." But if you think of returning again to public life, he chimes in,
"Your sentiments do you honour: retirement from business is pleasant,
but inglorious and mean." One ought to say at once to such a one,
"'Stranger, quite different now you look to what you did before.'[378] I
do not need a friend to change his opinions with me and to assent to me
in everything, my shadow will do that better, but I need one that will
speak the truth and help me with his judgement." This is one way of
detecting the flatterer.

Sec. IX. We must also observe another difference in the resemblance between
the friend and flatterer. The true friend does not imitate you in
everything, nor is he too keen to praise, but praises only what is
excellent, for as Sophocles says,

"He is not born to share in hate but love,"[379]

yes, by Zeus, and he is born to share in doing what is right and in
loving what is noble, and not to share in wrong-doing or misbehaviour,
unless it be that, as a running of the eyes is catching, so through
companionship and intimacy he