in
imagining (such a rooted hatred did he bear to his species) that out of
this heap, which in digging he had discovered, might arise some
mischief to plague mankind. And some soldiers passing through the woods
near to his cave at that instant, which proved to be a part of the
troops of the Athenian captain Alcibiades, who upon some disgust taken
against the senators of Athens (the Athenians were ever noted to be a
thankless and ungrateful people, giving disgust to their generals and
best friends), was marching at the head of the same triumphant army
which he had formerly headed in their defence, to war against them;
Timon, who liked their business well, bestowed upon their captain the
gold to pay his soldiers, requiring no other service from him, than
that he should with his conquering army lay Athens level with the
ground, and burn, slay, kill all her inhabitants; not sparing the old
men for their white beards, for (he said) they were usurers, nor the
young children for their seeming innocent smiles, for those (he said)
would live, if they grew up, to be traitors; but to steel his eyes and
ears against any sights or sounds that might awaken compassion; and not
to let the cries of virgins, babes, or mothers, hinder him from making
one universal massacre of the city, but to confound them all in his
conquest; and when he had conquered, he prayed that the gods would
confound him also, the conqueror: so thoroughly did Timon hate Athens,
Athenians, and all mankind.

While he lived in this forlorn state, leading a life more brutal than
human, he was suddenly surprised one day with the appearance of a man
standing in an admiring posture at the door of his cave. It was
Flavius, the honest steward, whom love and zealous affection to his
master had led to seek him out at his wretched dwelling, and to offer
his services; and the first sight of his master, the once noble Timon,
in that abject condition, naked as he was born, living in the manner of
a beast among beasts, looking like his own sad ruins and a monument of
decay, so affected this good servant, that he stood speechless, wrapped
up in horror, and confounded. And when he found utterance at last to
his words, they were so choked with tears, that Timon had much ado to
know him again, or to make out who it was that had come (so contrary to
the experience he had had of mankind) to offer him service in
extremity. And being in the form and shape of a man, he suspected him
for