Russian Women

www.russianwomen4westernmen.blogspot.com/2007/02/russian-brides-whats-catch.html

Some Things in Life Seem Too Good to be True
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If you're using the internet to search for a partner, a healthy dose of scepticism is not a bad thing. It can even be critical when sorting the genuine from the non-genuine, the suitable from the non-suitable. When you see profiles of women who seem to be "just too good to be true", then the next thought is usually, "OK, if they're genuine - what's the catch?" To many men from Western nations, it is highly refreshing to see not only physical attractiveness exhibited by the "average" Russian lady, but also real feminine beauty in their thoughts, desires, interests, and expectations of relationships and family. 

What's the catch? There will, of course, be some cultural differences, usually some language difficulties to overcome, adjustment to a new life. But, not only are these easy to overcome, they can also be an enriching and positive aspect to your relationship. (I think this is so important and so overlooked by most people that it will be written-up as a seperate article in the future.) Really, the only thing men should keep in mind that may possibly seen as a "catch" is: Russian women want CHILDREN. 

If you see a Russian lady as the ideal partner, but you do not want children, you are looking in the wrong place for your future wife. Of course, having children is the ultimate achievement for all of us - male or female, but whereas many women in the West may increasingly see it as a "choice", to Russian women, it is an essential part of womanhood. It is an absolute given that a Russian woman should marry and have children. 

It is a cornerstone piece of their cultural make-up and upbringing. Any man who wants to have children should take this as a "godsend", because not only does she want to have children, she will take it as a joy and a pleasure to nurture your children in the most loving and caring way - like you have never seen before. To see a Russian woman with her baby is nothing short of beautiful. To see how she sees it as a blessing and a privilege to cater to that child's needs and healthy upbringing, (and not a chore, or a burden, or a "difficult responsibility") - is breath-taking! 

OK, so what if she already HAS children? That now becomes an individual question. If she has more than one child already, she will most likely be content to not have any more. Even if she has only one child, she may also be content to not have any more, as it is not unusual for Russians to have only one or two children. What if YOU already have children? She may be fully accepting of your existing children, but she will still want to have at least one child herself. Life would not otherwise be complete for her as a woman. 

Is it better to have a child together regardless of how many existing children either of you have? In my opinion, yes, but of course it will depend upon both of your individual wants and desires. Your ages may also have a bearing on your decision. If you're both over 35, and already have children, then you are probably both past the "having children" stage, and are content to seek stable family life with your existing brood. 

Your (and her) choice. So is there no other scenario? There always exceptions to the "rules", but the vast majority of Russian women fall into this category. Children are an essential part of life. It is natural for them, and they will tell you just that! A dream to be fulfilled. To any real man, this should not be daunting in any way, it should be a huge relief! Not only can you find the ideal WIFE, but ideal MOTHER to your children. You've hit the jackpot! The best of both worlds - in more ways than one. If that doesn't inspire you to pursue this particular road to happiness and fulfillment, then I seriously don't know what will. You can give shallow women the flick. Real women are out there.
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http://au.answers.yahoo.com/answers2/frontend.php/question?qid=20071104113225AATBpOQ&show=7
I Need To Raise My IQ By 46 Points!?
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I'd like to join the high IQ society GIGA. The home of the super elite. The 1 in 1,000,000,000! Only 7 members who hold their name with pride on the list of the superiorly intelligent! But, the problem is my IQ's only 150 and it would probably score even lower on one of Paul Cooijman's tests!!! How can I raise my IQ by 46 points then? Is there a program I can follow? Maybe a book? Anything as long as I can double my IQ! Appreciate any answers!
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HEY! I CAN PROVE THAT 1 + 1 = 1
At C cubed 1 inverts to 0, inverts to 1.
0/x = infinity
infinity = 0x
infinity = 0
Hence this universe is made of nothing.
Also, the inverse of 1+1=1 is 1 = 1 - 1 = 0
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So, I am right! You'll probably think I took one of those online tests, don't you? Well, I officially took an IQ test from a psychologist and she said I reached the ceiling of 150 in the test. Oh yes, and concerning IQ, all the other 10 year old in South Shields, England are totally dumbed down. I mean, they don't even know what 10*9 is! On the IQ test you gave me, I scored 18 points. By Athorgar...
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Best Answer - Chosen by Asker Surely you jest! One's IQ, a relative number generated by answering in a convergent, rather than divergent, thought is readily changed. Your true, absolute capabilities are not. Just as it takes thousands of hours and pound of free-weights to build a Mr. Olympia-type body (along with years of steroid treatments), Your IQ score can be augmented by being a well read and studied person and answering the questions with the desired answer. Example, in the game show 'JEOPARDY', you can correctly question all answers listed with this:

"what is the answer to this question?"

You will be correct, but score no $$$ and you will lose. It is very similar on IQ tests, you must give the answer that is predetermined, even if another answer or answers are correct or, at least fitting. Some are very good at abstract thinking, but not so apt at common sense things. If you could learn all accumulated human knowledge, and not recall it or process it you would not score well, either, even though you actually knew everything. The results of IQ tests are determined, to a certain extent, by the makers of the tests, who have arbitrarily decided the following:

• They, themselves, are capable of judging where the veriations in intelligence are

• Likewise, they are able to judge what thing are important in qualifying intelligence

• They are right and answers not in accordance to their thinking are, by definition, wrong

• (this is possibly most striking) Ignorance of a thing is equal to lack of intelligence.

If you have a fantastic memory, if you are able to apply and understand what you learn, then you can improve, markedly, you IQ score. There are far more important ways to spend your time than this self serving, unimportant, and exceedingly egotistical goal. If you were able to score 100% on every IQ test ever devised, so what? What good would that do for anyone? Be of great value and make a difference in the lives of those around you. Waiting for some test to validate you won't cut it!

Source(s): I have taken many, many IQ tests (i think that OMNI magazines 'hardest IQ test in the world', from the late 70's or early 80's was the toughest) and I have scored from a low of 143 to a high of 183. None of the scores changed my actual abilities of accomplishments.
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www.mega-genius.com/mega_genius_intelligence_briefing_no_39.htm
Mega Genius® Intelligence Briefing: A Commencement Address to Michael
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Choose your vocation wisely, Michael: the universe is unforgiving. It seems that only yesterday you were small. You slept as I cradled you in my arms and laughed as I carried you on my shoulders. When you were five years old, I urged you to buy a ticket to the fun house at the Maui County Fair, but you would have none of that. Instead, you gripped your $1 tightly, until you invested it in a game of skill on the midway. I pegged you as an up-and-coming investment banker. Now, at age 17, you are enrolling in one of the top ranked universities in the world and soon will have to decide what you want to be. 

I will explain the most intelligent way to do that. It is the secret to preventing misfortunate from derailing your life, by guaranteeing that you are on track to get where you want to go. Freedom is having choices. Having choices means making decisions. You are considering entering the political arena or the field of geology. I am undecided, too; I am contemplating whether I should take up playing the piano or polo. Most people would say that I am too old for the latter, but playing the piano and polo are both just forms of communication, and I have never agreed to limit my communication because of what others may think. 

I have always communicated enthusiastically. Although I can remember much earlier, I recall, at age two, my mother telling me to “pipe down,” as my noise was interfering with my great-uncle Ben’s ability to tune our piano. You had pipes of your own, Michael. Do you recall, when you were five, I used to refer to your mouth as your “noise hole?” When I was five, my first grade teacher sealed my mouth with cellophane tape, in hope of teaching me to communicate less. She failed to achieve that objective. 

The world trains children to inhibit their communication, but it is a lesson I never learned. I also never learned to play the piano, although I have owned several. Maybe it is time for me to take up the piano. As a child, when people asked if I could play that instrument, I replied, “I don’t know; I’ve never tried.” Several world famous pianists have coached me. In 1968, I became friends with Liberace, through his manager, Seymour Heller, who had also represented many big band clients, including Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey and Guy Lombardo. Liberace, who claimed to play "classical music with the boring parts left out," was recognized by Ripley’s Believe it or Not as the “world’s fastest pianist” and by “Guinness World Records” as the world’s highest paid musician and pianist. By 1954, at age 35, Lee was already earning $138,000 for a single performance.
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When Lee and I first shook hands and I noticed how small his were, particularly compared to mine, I was especially inspired to play something. Accordingly, I learned to play several minutes of the allegro scherzando theme from Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor. Although I have occasionally impressed others with that ability, I confess that it is merely an automatic, unthinking exercise for me. 

I cannot play the piano with understanding. I probably cannot even play Chopsticks. (All this has suddenly taken a turn that I prefer not to dwell on, since it just makes me look bad.) On the other hand, maybe I should learn to play polo. The Federation of International Polo is headquartered in Beverly Hills, California. Glen A. Holden, former United States Ambassador to Jamaica, is past President of that world governing body of the sport. 

Glen and I have been friends and occasional business associates for more than 30 years, since I first began rooting for him in polo games, on Sunday afternoons, in Pacific Palisades. The Will Rogers State Historic Park there is a beautiful area, a few blocks above Sunset Boulevard, with a commanding view of western Los Angeles, Santa Monica and the Pacific Ocean. 

It was originally the private estate of Will Rogers, the celebrated humorist, highest-paid actor in Hollywood, and the most famous man in America in the 1930s. Rogers landscaped his polo field there in 1926, two years before he built his home, where he played polo with Academy Award-winning motion picture producer, director and entrepreneur Walt Disney, producers Darryl Zanuck and Hal Roach, and movie stars Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, and David Niven. In 1944, Rogers’ widow gifted the estate to the State of California, on the condition that equestrian activities continue there. 

The field and stables that Will Rogers built are now the Will Rogers Polo Club, which was started in 1953 by his close friend, C.D. LeBlanc. It is still a working ranch and a regional center for polo, hosting charity matches, fundraisers, and the annual C.D. LeBlanc Memorial Tournament.
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I probably should learn to play polo. For decades, I was also a close friend of the late C.D. LeBlanc, a legendary polo player. Few knew that his real name was Clesmey D. LeBlanc. Everyone called him C.D. (we can all figure out why). He was a consummate gentleman, though rough around the edges. But then, polo can be a rough sport. 

Once, after Will Rogers had broken a couple of bones when his hand collided with a horse’s skull, Rogers observed, “They call it a gentleman’s game for the same reason they call a tall man ‘Shorty.’” For decades, C.D. owned a spacious ranch near the Will Rogers Polo Club, where he allowed members of Hollywood society to board their polo ponies and other horses. At an early age, C.D. discovered the value of communicating effectively. 

In 1988, over Thanksgiving dinner at his ranch, he told me that as a young orphan he had teamed up with an older mentor to learn the real estate business. One day in the 1940s, while cruising through Beverly Hills, his mentor had abruptly pulled his automobile to a stop in front of a spectacular house and suggested to C.D. that they might encounter a financial windfall by buying the residence and its contents, repackaging everything, and then selling it all for a profit.

In those years, Betty Grable was the top pinup girl for American soldiers and the highest-paid female star in Hollywood. Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation insured her famous legs for $1,000,000. Hugh Hefner confirmed many years later that Betty Grable was his inspiration for founding the Playboy empire. Harry James was a trumpet virtuoso and the first famous bandleader to hire the young Frank Sinatra. Harry was also the husband of Betty Grable (some people have all the luck). 

The celebrated couple lived in that spectacular house. C.D.’s mentor told him, “This is the home of Harry James. Go up there and ring the doorbell. If he is home, point to me here in the car and tell him that I am your business partner and that we are prepared to offer him $100,000 in cash for his house and everything in it. We don’t want his toothbrush, but we want all the furnishings.” (At that time, $100,000 was equal to about $1,178,000 in today’s funds, using the consumer price index.) 

 Young C.D. gulped, walked subserviently up to the house, and rang the doorbell. The renowned bandleader himself opened the door. C.D. boldly announced, “Good morning, Mr. James. I am C.D. LeBlanc and that’s my business partner in the automobile, and we are prepared to offer you $100,000 in cash for your house and everything in it.”
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“Well,” Harry James replied, eyebrows rising. Then sizing up the young stranger and his well-dressed partner in the expensive car at the curb, the famous musician continued, “Ordinarily I wouldn’t have the slightest interest in your offer, son, but my wife and I just had one holy hell of a fight. Tell your partner to come on up here. Let’s talk business.” They quickly agreed upon the terms of the sale and Harry James pocketed the cash. 

Young C.D. and his mentor got the house, the land, and all the furnishings, including even the legendary band-leader’s personal piano -- which ended up in my house half a century later. Now I am back to considering learning to play the piano, again. Now that transaction may appear to have been especially fortuitous for C.D. and his mentor, but it was actually the result of a thoughtful assessment. It can be advantageous to think. The person who does not bother to think has no advantage over the person who is unable to think. 

The trick is to think as intelligently as possible, Michael, for your life will be the sum of your decisions. Let’s look at some of the workable laws that pertain to your upcoming decision to be, or become, something. First, you should reflect on your past, with the intention of identifying any purposes that you have had that you became discouraged about due to the criticism or ridicule of others. Basic purposes that have been stifled will linger on life support, but they never die. Just the act of recognizing them today as basic purposes will magically resurrect them. Here is something else to discover about yourself. 

When you were a young child, Michael, I am sure you wanted to become something specific when you grew up. If you recall what that was, you will realize that it was something particularly helpful. It is true of all young children. For example, little Julie may long to be a princess, or Johnny may want to be a comedian, or Billy may imagine himself as Batman. In fact, Julie wants to be helpful by being a role model, Johnny wants to help others by making them laugh, and Billy wants to help by saving people from all sorts of maladies. Their common denominator is that they want to grow up to become especially helpful. Helping is what healthy children want to do when they are young. So, what happens? Life happens. 

Twenty years later, Julia is an assistant manager in a hardware store, Jonathan is a stand-up comic, and William welds doohickeys onto widgets. All three occupations are somewhat helpful, but guess which person is the happiest, never feels that he works a day in his life, gets the most satisfaction from his occupation, and incidentally becomes the wealthiest. It is Jonathan, who followed his heart and continually helps others by making them laugh. (Actually, I am thinking of my friend Jonathan Winters, who became one of the world’s most successful comedians.)  

Second, take advantage of your greatest abilities. Your occupation should make use of the best gifts you have. A wise person uses, and refines, his natural talents. Third, you should do something that you love doing, that you feel passionate about, and that electrifies you. Then you will reap abundant rewards, probably including wealth, since you will “work” so fervently. You do not need to feel so fanatical about your work that, as you awake each morning, you sit upright on your bed, burrow your fingernails into your thighs, and growl like a wolverine, but it is essential that you find and tap the fire within yourself. It is there.
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Fourth, realize that life consists of being, doing, and having. The word being means the assumption or choosing of a category of identity. An example of being would be your own name. Another would be your chosen profession. Think of it as what you are. The word doing means action, accomplishment, the fulfillment of purpose, the attainment of goals, or any change of position in space. Think of it as action you perform. 

The word having means owning, possessing, or being capable of commanding, positioning, or taking charge of objects, energies or spaces. Think of it as what you get. One has to be something … in order to do something, in order to have something. The order always progresses from be, through do, to have. For example, looking at it backwards, to have a polo trophy, one must do well playing the game, by first being an accomplished polo player. Proper “being” is followed by effective “doing” and, consequently, successful “having.” Therefore, Michael, to identify an overall purpose for your career, complete this sentence: My primary objective is to have …. 

Then you should ensure that the activity in which you intend to engage would actually lead to the objective that you want to have. Then you will know what you need to be. Subsequently, you will be what you need to be, to do what it takes, to have your primary objective. Just watch! Your peers will choose their vocations backwards. Each will decide first what he wants to be, which will then resolve what he must do and, unbeknownst to him, determine what he will have. That is like a captain establishing the course for his ship, without ever having determined his destination. 

That is why few people ever get where they actually want to go. It is the reason almost everyone agrees that life is what happens to you while you are making plans. Before you decide what you are going to be, and do, select your primary objective. Here, in 100 words or less, is the best advice that I can give to you, Michael, or to any other young person who needs to decide what to be, or even to anyone older who wants to realign his vocation, pursue a new occupation, or just chose an avocation. 

Forget about what you need to be. Instead, decide specifically what you want to have, so that you can determine what you need to do to have it. After that, you will know what you need to be. Ensure that you are using your best natural talents in an activity that you are passionate about, so that your work is never drudgery, but a delight. Ensure that what you do is extremely useful to others, for your helpfulness will be how they will measure your value when they write your obituary.
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For example, Will Rogers taught Americans to laugh at themselves in the economically strenuous 1930s. That was so helpful to people that when he died in a plane crash, in 1935, The New York Times devoted four pages to his demise. To increase your value, increase your helpfulness. As for myself, I think I will pass on the piano, for now. I may not have the physical finesse anyhow; I once accidentally broke a $100,000 museum-quality tribal sculpture. (I will not be dwelling on how I did that, either.) 

At this time, I do not own a piano and, frankly, I have been apprehensive about playing one ever since U.S. President Harry S Truman revealed, “My choice early in life was either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference.” Those who enter politics, Michael, discover that Truman meant that, either way, you have no control on the action next door. I think I will pass on polo, too. At this time, I do not own a horse. In addition, I have an allergy to breaking my own bones, and the sport has always seemed pretentious to me. 

As Will Rogers wrote, “Polo is played by us lazy ones, because the horse does all the work and we love to just go for the ride.” Instead, I think that I will yo-yo more fervently. I have dozens of yo-yos, including a $50 Coral Snake, by Henrys, and a $100 401k, by YoYoFactory. Admittedly, I am not yet an expert, but I have had personal instructions from all four National Yo-Yo Grand Masters -- Dennis McBride, Dale Oliver, Dale Myrberg and Bill de Boiseblanc -- and, most importantly, I like the objectives of setting a world record in the sport and helping others to laugh by yo-yoing for them.  

Of course, most people think that I am too old to be playing with a top on a string. Nevertheless, yo-yoing is just another form of communication. The easiest way, Michael, to become derailed from the track of controlling what you be, do and have, is to limit your communication because of what others may think. Early on, I established that it took more than an authoritative adult with a roll of tape to suppress my communication. 

Never allow the world to inhibit you, either. Regardless of what you decide to be, you will be only as successful as you can communicate effectively. Will Rogers also said, “An ignorant person is one who doesn’t know what you have just found out.” At your university, Michael, you will discover that there are many ignorant people in this world. However, if you are smart enough to apply what you have learned today, you can have the world on a string.
 
Mega Genius® April 22, 2008
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www.nyu.edu/classes/neimark/TWIN1.HTM
Who Can Explain the Mystery of "I"? Maybe "Them"--Twins, Those Doppelgangers that Fascinate Us All
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Last April I went down to West 27th Street in Manhattan to sit in the audience of the Maury Povich show, and meet four sets of identical twins who had been separated at birth and adopted into different families. I wanted to see if the same soul stared out of those matched pairs of eyes, to contemplate the near miracle of DNA, double helix twisting around itself like twin umbilical cords, ticking out a perfect code for two copies of a human. 

One pair, a Polish nun and a Michigan housewife, had been filmed at the airport by CNN the week before, reunited for the first time in 51 years and weeping in each other's arms, marveling at their instinctive rapport. Yet how alike were they really, if one spent her days on rescue missions to places like Rwanda, while the other cleaned houses to supplement her husband's income?
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Twins are nature’s handmade clones, doppelgangers moving in synchrony through circumstances that are often eerily similar, as if they were unwitting dancers choreographed by genes or fate or God, thinking each others thoughts, wearing each other's clothes, exhibiting the same quirks and odd habits. They leave us to wonder about our own uniqueness and loneliness, and whether it's possible to inhabit another person's being. 

Twins provoke questions about the moment our passions first ignite for they have been seen on sonogram in the womb, kissing, punching, stroking each other. They are living fault lines in the ever shifting geography of the nature/nurture debate, and their peculiar puzzle ultimately impacts politics, crime and its punishment, education, and social policy. 

It isn't such a short leap from studies of behavioral genetics to books like the infamous The Bell Curve (by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray) and a kind of sotto-voce eugenics. And so everything from homosexuality to IQ, religious affiliation, alcoholism, temperament, mania, depression, height, weight, and fraternal twins and their relatives.
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Yet the answers--which these days seem to confirm biology's power--raise unsettling questions. Twin research is flawed, provocative, and fascinating, and it topples some of our most cherished notions--the legacies of Freud and Skinner included--such as our beliefs that parenting style makes an irrevocable difference, that we can mold our children, that we are free agents piecing together our destinies. 

Today, we've gone twin-mad. Ninety thousand people gather yearly at the International Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio. We're facing a near epidemic of twins. One in 50 babies born this year will have a fraternal or identical double; the number of such births rose 33 percent in 1994 alone, peaking at over 97,000--largely due to women delaying childbirth (which skewers the odds in favor of twins) and to the fertility industry, which relies on drugs that super ovulate would-be mothers. 

Recently, a stunning scientific feat enabled an ordinary sheep to give up a few cells and produce a delayed identical twin - a clone named Dolly, who was born with her donor's 6-year-old nucleus in every cell of her body. The international furor this Scottish lamb engendered has at its heart some of the same wonder and fear that every twin birth evokes. wins are a break, a rift in the customary order, and they call into question our own sense of self. Just how special and unique are we? 

The history of twins is rich with stones that seem to reveal them as two halves of the same self--twins adopted into different families falling down stairs at the same age, marrying and miscarrying in the same year, identical twins inventing secret languages, "telepathic" twins seemingly connected across thousands of miles, "evil" twins committing arson or murder together, conjoined twins sharing a single body, so that when one coughs the other reflexively raises a hand to cover the first one's mouth. 

And yet the lives of twins are full of just as many instances of discordance, differences, disaffection. Consider the 22-year-old Korean twins, Sunny and Jeen Young Han of San Diego County; Jeen hired two teenagers to murder her sister, hoping to assume her identity.
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So what is truly other, what is self? As the living embodiment of that question, twins are not just the mirrors of each other; they are a mirror for us all. Separated at Birth But Joined at the Hip The woman seated alone onstage at the opening of the Maury Povich show was already famous in the twin literature: Barbara Herbert, a plump 58-year-old with a broad, pretty face and short, silver hair, found her lost twin, Daphne Goodship, 18 years ago. Both had been adopted as babies into separate British families after their Finnish single mother killed herself. 

The concordances in their lives send a shiver up the spine: both women grew up in towns outside of London, left school at 14, fell down stairs at 15 and weakened their ankles, went to work in local government, met their future husbands at age 16 at the Town Hall dance, miscarried in the same month, then gave birth to two boys and a girl. 

Both tinted their hair auburn when young, were squeamish about blood and heights, and drank their coffee cold. When they met, both were wearing cream-colored dresses and brown velvet jackets. Both had the same crooked little fingers, a habit of pushing up their nose with the palm of their hand--which both nicknamed "squidging"--and a way of bursting into laughter that soon had people referring to them as the Giggle Twins. 

The two have been studied for years now at the University of Minnesota’s Center for Twin and Adoption Research, founded by Thomas J. Bouchard, Ph.D. It is the largest, ongoing study of separated twins in the world, with nearly 100 pairs registered, and they are poked, probed, and prodded by psychologists, psychiatrists, cardiologists, dentists, ophthalmologists, pathologists, and geneticists, testing everything from blood pressure to dental caries. At the center, it was discovered that the two women had the same heart murmurs, thyroid problems, and allergies as well as IQ's a point apart. 

The two showed remarkably similar personalities on psychological tests. So do the other sets of twins--in fact, the genetic influence is pervasive across most domains tested Another set of twins had been reunited in a hotel room when they were young adults, and as they unpacked found that they used the same brand of shaving lotion (Canoe), hair tonic (Vitalis), and toothpaste (Vademecum). They both smoked Lucky Strikes, and after they met they returned to their separate cities and mailed each other identical birthday presents. 

Other pairs have discovered they like to read magazines from back to front, store rubber bands on their wrists, or enter the ocean backwards and only up to their knees. Candid photos of every pair of twins in the study show virtually all the identicals posed the same way; while fraternal twins positioned hands and arms differently. Bouchard--a big, balding, dynamic Midwesterner who can't help but convey his irrepressible passion about this research--recalls the time he reunited a pair of twins in their mid-30s at the Minneapolis airport. 

"I was following them down the ramp to baggage claim and they started talking to each other. One would stop and a nanosecond later the other would start, and when she stopped a nanosecond later the other would start. They never once interrupted each other. I said to myself, "This is incredible, I can't carry on a conversation like that with my wife and we've been married for 36 years. No psychologist would believe this is happening." When we finally got to baggage claim they turned around and said, 'It's like we've known each other all our lives.'" 

Just Puppets Dancing To Music of the Genes?
 
I asked Bouchard if the results of his research puncture our myth that we consciously shape who we are. "You're not a believer in free will, are you?" he laughed, a little too heartily. "What's free will, some magical process in the brain?" Yet I am a believer (a mystical bent and fierce independence actually run in my family, as if my genes have remote controlled a beguiling but misbegotten sense of freedom and transcendence. I was mesmerized and disturbed by the specificity of the twins' concordances. 

David Teplica, M.D., a Chicago plastic surgeon who for the last 10 years has been photographing more than 100 pairs of twins, has found the same number of crow's feet at the corners of twins' eyes, the same skin cancer developing behind twins ears in the same year. Says Teplica, "It's almost beyond comprehension that one egg and one sperm could predict that." I could imagine, I told Bouchard, that since genes regulate hormones and neurochemicals, and thus impact sexual attraction and behavior, DNA might influence the shaving lotion twins liked or the hue they tinted their hair. 

But the same esoteric brand of toothpaste? Walking into the sea backwards? This implies an influence so far-reaching its unnerving. "Nobody has the vaguest idea how that happens," he admitted, unfazed. "We're studying a set of triplets now, two identical females and a brother, and all three have Tourette's syndrome. How can the genes get so specific? I was talking yesterday in Houston to a bunch of neuroscientists and I said, 'This is the kind of thing you guys have to figure out.' There is tons of stuff to work on here, its all open territory."
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He paused to marvel over the tremendous shift in our understanding of human behavior. "When we began studying twins at the university in 1979, there was great debate on the power of genetics. I remember arguing in one graduate school class that the major psychoses were largely genetic in origin. Everyone in the classroom just clobbered me. It was the era of the domination of behaviorism, and although there's nothing wrong with Skinner's work, it had been generalized to explain everything under the sun. 

Nothing explains everything. Even genetics influences us, on the average, about 50 percent." Yet that 50 percent seems omnipresent. It impacts everything from extroversion to IQ to religious and social attitudes--and drops only m the influence on homosexuality and death. Though some researchers have criticized Minnesota's twin sample for being too small and perhaps self selected (how many separated twins out there don't participate or don't even know they're twins?), it generally confirms the results of larger studies of twins reared together--studies that have taken place around the world. 

Twin studies allow us to double blind our nature/nurture research in a unique way. Identical twins share 100 percent of their genes, while fraternals share 50 percent. But usually they grow up together, sharing a similar environment in the womb and the world. When separated, they give us a clue about the strength of genetic influence in the face of sometimes radically different environments. Soon Bouchard and his colleagues will study siblings in families that have adopted a twin, thus testing environmental influences when no genes are shared. Like a prism yielding different bands of light, twin studies are rich and multifaceted. Here are some of the major findings on nature and nurture thus far: 

• Political and social attitudes, ranging from divorce to the death penalty, were found to have a strong genetic influence in one Australian study. A Swedish study found genes significantly influenced two of the so-called "big five" personality traits - openness to experience" and "conscientiousness" - while environment had little impact. In contrast, environment influenced "agreeableness" more than genes did. (The two other traits are "neuroticism" and "extroversion.") Another study, at the University of Texas at Austin, found that personality in identicals correlated 50 percent, in fraternals about 25 percent.

• Body fat is under genetic influence. Identical twins reared together will have the same amount of body fat 75 percent of the time; for those reared apart it's 61 percent, showing a heavy genetic and mild environmental influence, according to a 1991 study.

• Both optimism and pessimism are heavily influenced by genes, but shared environment influences only optimism, not pessimism, according to a study of 522 pairs of middle aged identical and fraternal twins. Thus family life and genes can be equal contributors to an optimistic outlook, which influences both mental and physical health. But pessimism seems largely controlled by genes.

• Religiosity is influenced by genes. Identical and fraternal twins, raised together and apart, demonstrate that 50 percent of religiosity (demonstrated by religious conviction and church attendance) can be attributed to genes.

• Sexual orientation is under genetic influence, though not solely, according to studies by Michael Bailey, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology at Northwestern University. In one study he found that if one identical twin is gay, the other is also gay 50 percent of the time. However, when Bailey analyzed a sample of 5,000 twins from the Australian twin registry, the genetic impact was less. In identical male twins, if one was gay the likelihood of his twin being gay was 20 percent; in fraternal twins the likelihood was almost zero. In women, there was little evidence of heritability for homosexuality.

• When substance abuse was studied in 295 identical and fraternal twin pairs, year of birth was the most powerful predictor of drug use. Younger twins were most likely to have abused drugs, reflecting widespread drug use in the culture at large. Alcoholism, however, has a significant genetic component, according to Andrew Heath, Ph.D., at the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine.

• Attention deficit disorder may be influenced by genes 70 percent of the time, according to Lindon Eaves, M.D., director of the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics. Eaves and colleagues studied 1,400 families of twins and found genetic influence on "all the juvenile behavior disorders," usually in the range of 30 to 50 percent.

• Twins tend to start dating, to marry, and to start having children at about the same time. David Lykken, Ph.D., and Matthew McGue, Ph.D., at the University of Minnesota, found that if an identical twin had divorced, there was a 45 percent chance the other had also. For fraternals, the chance was 30 percent. The researchers think this is due to inherited personality traits.

• Schizophrenia occurs more often in identical twins, and if one twin suffers from the disorder, the children of the healthy identical sibling are also at greater risk, according to psychiatrist Irving Gottesman, M.D., of the University of Virginia. The risk is about twice as high for the children of a twin whose identical counterpart is ill, as it is for the children of a twin whose fraternal counterpart is ill.

Hidden Differences Between Twins
 
A few fascinating kinks in the biology of twin research have recently turned up, weaving an even more complex pattern for us to study and learn from. It turns out that not all identical twins are truly identical, or share all their genetic traits. In one tragic instance, one twin was healthy and a gymnast, while the other suffered from severe muscular dystrophy, a genetic disorder, and was dead by age 16. Yet the twins were identical. 

One way twins can differ is in sex chromosomes that turn them into male or female, and which contain other genes as well, such as those that code for muscular dystrophy or color blindness. All girls inherit two X chromosomes, one from each parent, while boys inherit an X and a Y. Girls automatically shut off one X in every cell, sometimes some of the mother's and some of the father's, in other cases all of the mother's or all the father's. 

A girl may not shut off her extra set of X chromosomes in the same pattern as her identical twin does. Identical twins may not be exposed to the same world in the womb, either. It depends on the time their mother’s fertilized egg split, and that timing may explain why some identicals seem more eerily alike than others. At Lutheran University, researchers looked at the placentas of some 10,000 twin births. They've found that an egg that separates in the first four days of pregnancy develops not only into separate twins, but results in separate placentas, chorionic casings, and amniotic sacs.
. . . .
These twins are like two singletons in the womb and have the best chance of survival. Twins who separate between the fifth and eighth days share a single placenta and chorion, but still have the benefit of two amniotic sacs. Here, one twin can have a distinct advantage over the other. The umbilical cord may be positioned centrally on one sac, while the other is on the margin, receiving fewer nutrients. Studies of these twins show that with a nurturing environment, the weaker twin will catch up in the first few years of life. 

However, it's possible that viruses may penetrate separate sacs at different rates or in different ways--perhaps increasing the risk for schizophrenia or other illnesses later in life. Twins who split between the eighth and 12th days share their amniotic sac, and often their cords get entangled. One cord may be squeezed until no blood flows through it, and that twin dies. Finally, twins who split after the 12th day become conjoined--and even though they share organs and limbs, anecdotal evidence suggests that they often have distinctly different temperaments, habits, and food cravings. 

 In one hotly debated hypothesis, pediatrician and geneticist Judith Hall, of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, speculates that twinning occurs because of genetic differences within in an embryo. Perhaps mutations occur at a very early stage in some cells, which then are sensed as different, and expelled from the embryo. Those cells may survive and grow into a twin. Hall suggests this could account for the higher incidence of birth defects among twins. 

While identical twins can be more distinct than we imagine, fraternal twins might come from the same egg, according to behavioral geneticist Charles Boklage, M.D., of the East Carolina University School of Medicine. Boklage proposes that occasionally an older egg may actually split before it is fertilized by two of the father's sperm. With advances in gene mapping and blood testing, he says, we may find that one-egg fraternal twins occur as often as do two-egg fraternals. We may be mistaking some same sex fraternal twins for identical twins.
 
Twins Who Vanish, Twins Who Merge
 
Whatever the cause of twinning, once it begins, mysterious and unsettling events can occur. Some twins disappear or even merge together into one person. Ultrasound equipment has revealed twin pregnancies that later turn into singletons. One of the twins is absorbed into the body, absorbed by the other twin, or shed and noticed by the mother only as some extra vaginal bleeding. "Only one in 80 twin conceptions makes it to term as two living people," notes Boklage. "For every one that results in a twin birth, about 12 make it to term as a sole survivor. 

And those people never know they were twins." Because twins tend to be left-handed more often than singletons, Boklage speculates that many left-handers could be the survivors of a twin pregnancy. And a few of those twin pregnancies may lead to what Boklage terms a "chimera," based on the Greek monster with the tail of a serpent, body of a goat, and head of lion - a mosaic of separate beings. "We find people entirely by accident who have two different blood types or several different versions of a single gene. 

Those people look perfectly normal, but I believe they come from two different cell lines." It's as if fantastical, primitive acts of love, death, merging, and emerging occur from the very moment life ignites, even as the first strands of DNA knit themselves into the human beings we will later become--carrying on those same acts in the world at large, acts that define us, and that we still are not certain we can call our own.
 
When Twins Die, Kill, Burn and Love
 
Though it doesn't happen often, occasionally in history a set of mythic twins seem to burst into our awareness, more wedded and bonded than any couple, even darkly so. Some twins live with a passion the rest of us experience only in the almost unbearably intense first flush of romantic love. England's the Gibbons twins are one such pair. Jennifer and June Gibbons were born 35 years ago, the youngest children of Aubrey Gibbons, a West Indian technician for the British Royal Air Force. 

The girls communicated with each other in a self-made dialect and were elective mutes with the rest of the world. By the time they were 11, they refused to sit in the same room with their parents or siblings. Their mother delivered their meals on a tray and slipped mail under the door. They taught themselves to read, and eventually locked themselves in their bedroom, writing literally millions of words in diaries. Later they lost their virginity to the same boy within a week of each other, triggering jealous rage. Jennifer tried to strangle June with a cord, and June tried to drown Jennifer in a river. 

When publishers rejected their work, they went on a spree of arson and theft, and were committed to Broadmoor, England's most notorious institution for the criminally insane. "Nobody suffers the way I do," June wrote in her diary "This sister of mine, a dark shadow robbing me of sunlight, is my one and only torment." In another passage, Jennifer described one lying in the bunk bed above her: Her perception was sharper than steel, it sliced through to my own perception. 

l read her mind, I knew all about her mood. My perception. Her perception... clashing, knowing, cunning, sly." After more than a decade of confinement, they were set free. That same afternoon, Jennifer was rushed to the hospital with viral myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart, and that night she died.
. . . .
The pathologist who saw her heart seemed to be speaking poetically of their lethal passion when he described Jennifer's illness as "a fulminating, roaring inflammation with the heart muscle completely destroyed." June, the survivor, has said that she was "born in captivity, trapped in twinship." 

Eventually, June claims, they began to accept that one must die so the other could be free. Today, June lives in Wales. Another set of twins, 22-year-old Jeen Young Han (nicknamed Gina) and her sister Sunny, have been dubbed the "evil" and "good" twins by the media, after one tried to murder the other. Although the twins were both valedictorians at their small country high school in San Diego County and got along well, after they graduated they began to battle one another. Both sisters were involved in petty crime, but when Gina stole Sunny's BMW and credit cards, Sunny had her jailed. She escaped, but in November 1996 Sunny and her roommate were attacked and Gina was arrested for conspiracy to commit murder. She'd planned to have Sunny killed at her Irvine condominium, and then assume her identity.

For twin researcher and obstetrician Louis Keith, M.D., of Northwestern University Medical School, the idea of killing a twin is practically unthinkable. "I'm an identical twin, and yesterday I attended the funeral of another identical twin. I kept trying to imagine what my life would be like without my twin. My brother and I have had telepathic experiences. I was in East Germany, being driven on a secluded highway with evening snow falling, and suddenly felt intense heat over the entire front of my body and knew it could only mean one thing, that my brother was sending intense signals to me to call him. 

When one of the Communist telephone operators agreed to put the call through, I found out that my aunt had died and my twin wanted me to come to the funeral. The twin bond is greater than the spousal bond, absolutely." Raymond Brandt, publisher of Twins World magazine, agrees. ''I'm 67, and my identical twin died when we were 20. Move my wife and sons in a very special way, but my twin was one half of me, he was my first love. Living without my twin for 47 years has been a hell of an existence." 

These remarkable stories seem to indicate an extra dimension to the twin bond, as if they truly shared a common, noncorporeal soul. What little study has been done on paranormal phenomena and twins, however, indicates that once again genes may be responsible. A study by British parapsychologist Susan Blackmore found that when twins were separated in different rooms and asked to draw whatever came into their minds, they often drew the same things. When one was asked to draw an object and transmit that to the other twin, who then was asked to draw what she telepathically received, the results were disappointing. Blackmore concluded that when twins seem to be clairvoyant, it's simply because their thought patterns are so similar.
 
Is There No Nurture?
 
Over a century ago, in 1875, British anthropologist Francis Gallon, first compared a small group of identical and fraternal twins and concluded that "nature prevails enormously over nurture." Time and research seem to have proved him right. "It’s no accident that we are what we are," contends Nancy Segal, Ph.D., professor of developmental psychology at California State University at Fullerton and director of the Twin Studies Center there. "We are born with biological propensities that steer us in one direction or another." 

Yet critics of twin studies scoff. Richard Rose, Ph.D., professor of psychology and medical genetics at Indiana University in Bloomington, has studied personality in more than 7,000 pairs of identical twins and concluded that environment, both shared and unshared, has nearly twice the influence of genes. However, both the nature and nurture camps may be looking at the same data and interpreting it differently. 

According to Lindon Eaves, unshared environment may actually be "chosen" by the genes, selected because of biological preferences. Scientists dub this the "nature of nurture." Genetically influenced personality traits in a child may cause parents to respond in specific ways. So how can we ever tease out the truth? Nature and nurture interact in a never-ending Mobius strip that can't be traced back to a single starting point. 

Yet if genes are a powerful and a priori given, they nonetheless have a range of activity that is calibrated in the womb by nutrition and later in life by the world. "Remember," says Eaves, "only 50 percent of who you are is influenced by genes. The other 50 percent includes the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, accidents of development, sheer chaos, small and cumulative changes both within and without." 

Environment, it turns out, may be most powerful when it limits through trauma, deprivation, malnutrition. Studies by Sandra Scarr, Ph.D. professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, show that IQ scores for white twins at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder, and for all black twins, are heavily influenced by environment. Social and economic deprivation keep scores artificially lower than twine' genetic potential.
. . . .
Otherwise, Scarr postulates, genes bias you in a certain direction, causing you to select what you are already genetically programmed to enjoy Children may be tiny gene powerhouses, shaping their parents' behavior as much as parents shape their children. "Where does this leave us?" concludes Bouchard. "your job as a parent is really to maximize the environment so that you and your children can manifest your full genetic potential." 

Under the best of environmental circumstances, our genes might be free to play the entire symphony of self. And yet what of Irina, the Michigan housewife, and her twin, Yanina, the Polish nun? I sat with them over lunch, newly united twins who couldn't stop smiling at each other, clasping each other's hands. Their luminous hazel eyes were virtual replicas, but the two women couldn't have appeared more different otherwise: Irina bejeweled and blonde, Yanina in a combat-green nun’s habit, a few tufts of brown hair peeping out, skin weathered. 

She described rescuing bloodied children from the arms of mothers who'd been shot to death and rising at dawn in a convent to pray silently for hours; her American counterpart portrayed a life filled with errands, cleaning homes, and caring for family. "Rushing, rushing, rushing to get everything done" was Irina's summary of her life. "Teaching love, the kind of love that will make you happy," was her sister's. Listening to them speak, one in slow, gentle Midwestern cadences, the other in the rolled drumbeat of a Slavic tongue enriched by laughter and hand gestures, it was hard to believe they carried the same genetic imprint. To me, their differences are so striking they seem to defy the last 20 years of twin research. "

Right now we understand a little bit about human behavior and its biological and cultural roots," says Eaves. "But our lived understanding is far richer than any of that. People are yielding the ground too easily to genetics." As I mused over the intricate turnings of twin research, I could only conclude the findings were as complex as the self we hope to illuminate with these studies. Fascinating, tantalizing, yes, but twin research, like any great scientific endeavor, ultimately points us toward the ineffable, inexplicable. 

As Charles Boklage notes: "The development of the self is chaotic, nonlinear, and dynamic. Very small variations in conditions can lead to huge changes. Different twin studies give different answers. And whenever the mind tries to understand something, it has to be bigger than the subject it encompasses. You cannot bite your own teeth." "

In the end," says Eaves, "I don’t give a damn whether you call it God or natural selection, we're trying to find words that instill reverence for the mysterious stuff from which we are made." God, fate, genes, luck, a random event like a move to America or Poland, or perhaps something stubbornly individual and free about us all, something that can never be quantified but can only be lived....The play of self goes on, and whatever hand or eye has orchestrated us, who in the end, twin or not, can know the dancer from the dance? 


©Sussex Publishers/Psychology Today
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http://homepage.mac.com/cparada/GML/Croesus.html
Croesus- Between Legend and History
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The Seven Sages

"As for Solon's interview with Croesus, some think to prove by chronology that it is fictitious. But when a story is so famous and so well-attested, and, what is more to the point, when it comports so well with the character of Solon, and is so worthy of his magnanimity and wisdom, I do not propose to reject it out of deference to any chronological canons, so called, which thousands are to this day revising, without being able to bring their contradictions into any general agreement." (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Solon 27.1).

"… even I cannot eradicate from myself that passion for wealth which the gods have put into the human soul and by which they have made us all poor alike, but I, too, am as insatiate of wealth as other people are. However, I think I am different from most people, in that others, when they have acquired more than a sufficiency, bury some of their treasure and allow some to decay, and some they weary themselves with counting, measuring, weighing, airing, and watching; and though they have so much at home, they never eat more than they can hold, for they would burst if they did, and they never wear more than they can carry, for they would be suffocated if they did; they only find their superfluous treasure a burden." (Cyrus to Croesus. Xenophon, Cyropaedia 8.2.20-21).

 
King Croesus of Lydia became proverbial for his wealth and the prosperity of his kingdom. His life and deeds crossed the border between Myth and History; and himself, having been double-crossed by the oracles, crossed with an army the river separating his country from that of the Persians, and caused thereby his own ruin.


King of Lydia
 
History, and not the myths, affirms that Croesus reigned, as last king of Lydia, from 560 to 546 BC, over all peoples and cities between the Aegean coast of Asia Minor in the west and the river Halys in the East, having as his capital the city of Sardis, which is between Mount Tmolus and the river Hermos.

Kings of Sardis

Sardis is said to have been founded by Sardo, son of Sthenelus 7, otherwise unknown, but the country Lydia, previously known as land of the Meii, was called after King Lydus, son either of Heracles 1, or of Atys 3 and Callithea, daughter of Choraeus. The first king of Lydia was Manes, son of Zeus and Gaia. He had, by the Oceanid Callirrhoe 1, two sons: Atys 3 and Cotys 2. Atys 3 is also said to have been the son of Cotys 2 and Halie 2, daughter of Tyllus, an autochthon; but in any case it was Atys 3, considered to be a descendant of Heracles 1 and Omphale, who succeeded his father Manes in the throne.

Descendants of Heracles 1
 
When the throne had thus passed from Manes to Atys 3 and from Atys 3 to Lydus, it came into the hands of Agron 2, who could or not be the same that History remembers as Adadnirari III. Agron 2 was the son of the Assyrian queen Semiramis, who lived about 810 BC and turned, at her death, into a white dove, which is quite natural, given that her mother Dercetis 1, a Babylonian, had changed into a fish. Semiramis, who ended her life by committing suicide, was married to Ninus, whom he murdered. Ninus, credited with the foundation of Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrians, was known as son of Belus 3, son of Alcaeus 6, son of Heracles 1 and Omphale, or of Heracles 1 and a female slave of King Iardanus, otherwise called father of Omphale. In addition some would probably say that this Heracles was not Heracles 1, but an Asiatic god or man instead. 

The Naked Queen

In any case, the line of Agron 2 ruled in Sardis down to Candaules, who lost his throne for being limitless obsessed with his wife's beauty.For it happened that Candaules, being unable to control his idée fixe, and knowing that men trust their ears less than their eyes, not only told his favourite bodyguard Gyges about her beauty, but also wished him to watch the queen naked from a hiding place. At first, Gyges refused, entreating his master not to ask lawless acts of him; but when the king insisted, he had to consent, and was brought by Candaules himself to the queen's chamber, at bed time. 

The queen laid her garments aside, and Gyges saw her naked; but on leaving the room, she saw him and understood what her husband had contrived. At the moment she said nothing, but having decided to punish Candaules—for as they say it was a great shame among the Lydians to be seen naked—, she called Gyges the next day, giving him the following choice: either to kill Candaules and take her as wife along with the throne, or himself be killed. Gyges entreated her not to impose on him such a choice, but he could not move her more than he had moved Candaules when the whole affair was started. This is why Gyges plotted against his master, and following the queen's instructions, he came out from the same hiding place, and slew the king as he slept with the dagger that she had given him for that same purpose.

Vengeance in the Fifth Generation
 
The regicide caused a revolt, but Gyges and the Lydians agreed that if the Oracle of Delphi should confirm him in power, then he should reign. And since the oracle did so ordain, the descendants of Heracles 1 lost the sovereignty, and Gyges became king. Yet some have said that the family of Croesus also descended from Heracles 1 and Omphale through their son Agelaus 1, who could or not be the same as Lamus 1, or Hyllus 3. The oracle also said that vengeance would fall upon Gyges' posterity in the fifth generation, which proved to be Croesus'; for Croesus is son of Alyattes, son of Sadyattes, son of Ardys, son of Gyges (himself son of Dascylus). But at the time, Gyges had all reasons to be grateful to the oracle, and that is why he is reported to have been the first foreigner, after King Midas, to send many valuable offerings in silver and gold to Delphi.
 
Gyges and Successors
 
Gyges kept great devotion for the woman who had been his mistress and whom he won as wife through murder, letting her rule the country. And when she died, he honoured her with a monument high enough as to be seen from the region about Mount Tmolus and many parts of Lydia. Gyges, who reigned thirty-eight years, took the city of Colophon and started a long war against Miletus that was inherited by his successors, until peace was agreed between Thrasybulus, ruler of Miletus, and Gyges' great grandson Alyattes, contemporary of King Periander, under whose reign Arion 2 was rescued by a dolphin. Alyattes is said to have married twice, having children by both women, one from Caria and the second from Ionia. It is said that the latter plotted against her stepson Croesus, giving poison to the woman who baked the bread, and telling her to knead it into it. But the baker told Croesus, and served the bread to the stepmother's children instead. It is for this reason that later, when Croesus became a wealthy king, he let a golden statue of the baker be made, and offered it at Delphi.

King Croesus
 
When Alyattes died, his thirty-five years old son by the Carian woman, Croesus, came to the throne, probably in 560 BC, after destroying a faction that conspired to win the throne for his half-brother Pantaleon, son of Alyattes by the Ionian mother. When Croesus was victorious, he confiscated the estate of his enemy, and put him to death by drawing him across a carding-comb. It was under Croesus' rule that the Greeks living in the Asiatic mainland were made tributary for the first time, and that all other nations west of the river Halys were subdued, becoming his subjects. 

This successful expansion resulted in great wealth, and since wealth, along with the power that derives from it, attracts many, including the wise, Sardis became the magnet of its time, being visited, as they say, by many teachers from Hellas. For teachers go preferably where their wages can be paid, and not necessarily where their knowledge is more needed. And there they met Croesus, the great potentate of his time, who "… was decked out with everything in the way of precious stones, dyed raiment, and wrought gold that men deem remarkable, or extravagant, or enviable, in order that he might present a most august and gorgeous spectacle." (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Solon 27.2).

Solon Visits Croesus
 
Among the wise men who visited Sardis, they say, was the Athenian statesman and poet Solon (c. 640 - c. 560 BC), whom Croesus entertained in his palace, showing him the treasures, greatness and prosperity of his country; for besides being spent, wealth may be used to cause admiration. After having thus acquainted his visitor with the country's riches, Croesus, who supposed himself to be the most blessed man, asked Solon, who was renowned for his wisdom and for having seen the world and travelled far while seeking knowledge, if he had ever seen a man more happy than he. Solon, however, gave the first prize of happiness to an inconspicuous Athenian, and when asked again, he gave the second to a couple of Argive brothers, which caused Croesus to exclaim:

"… Is our prosperity, then, held by you so worthless that you match us not even with common men." (Croesus to Solon. Herodotus, History 1.32)

 
Solon replied that the life of man was entirely chance, being completely unknown what any day might bring; and then, speaking of his host he added:

"To me you seem to be very rich and to be king of many people, but I cannot answer your question before I learn that you ended your life well. The very rich man is not more fortunate than the man who has only his daily needs, unless he chances to end his life with all well. Many very rich men are unfortunate, many of moderate means are lucky. The man who is very rich but unfortunate surpasses the lucky man in only two ways, while the lucky surpasses the rich but unfortunate in many. The rich man is more capable of fulfilling his appetites and of bearing a great disaster that falls upon him, and it is in these ways that he surpasses the other. The lucky man is not so able to support disaster or appetite as is the rich man, but his luck keeps these things away from him, and he is free from deformity and disease, has no experience of evils, and has fine children and good looks. If besides all this he ends his life well, then he is the one whom you seek, the one worthy to be called fortunate. But refrain from calling him fortunate before he dies; call him lucky … Whoever passes through life with the most and then dies agreeably is the one who, in my opinion…deserves to bear this name. It is necessary to see how the end of every affair turns out, for heaven promises fortune to many people and then utterly ruins them." (Solon to Croesus. Herodotus, History 1.32).

Wisdom, Power and Tact

This was Solon's view on the subject of happiness; but since he seemed to disregard prosperity, concentrating mainly in the end of every matter, Croesus concluded that his visitor was a man of no account, and sent him away accordingly. Aesop the fabulist, who flourished in the same period of time as the Seven Sages (among which Solon was counted), remarked once: "These men do not know how to act in the company of a ruler; for a man should associate with rulers either as little as possible, or with the best grace possible." (Diodorus, The Library of History 9.28.1ff.). But for all his tact, Aesop could not escape being killed by the Delphians on a false charge of sacrilege, when he had come to make an offering in Croesus' name. Others say that Aesop, knowing that Croesus had not treated Solon kindly, brought up the subject with the Athenian statesman:
 

Aesop: "O Solon, our converse with kings should be either as rare, or as pleasing as is possible."
Solon: "No, indeed, but either as rare or as beneficial as is possible." (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Solon 28.1).

 
Still others seem to have deemed these encounters unavoidable, probably because those who have wisdom usually lack wealth, and those who have wealth usually lack wisdom: "It is natural for wisdom and great power to come together, and they are for ever pursuing and seeking each other and consorting together." (Plato, Letters 310e).



 
Croesus' Children
 
Croesus had children, apparently both sons and daughters. One of the sons, being both deaf and dumb, meant very little for Croesus; but the one he loved was accidentally killed while hunting by a Phrygian whom Croesus had received in his own house after cleansing him for the death of his brother, whom he had slain, also accidentally. The Phrygian declared that he did not deserve to live, but Croesus, who at first was angry at him, decided not to punish him, blaming his own fortune, and not the intent of the young Phrygian. Nevertheless, the latter, having killed two men by accident, went to the tomb of Croesus' son, and slew himself upon it. 

Croesus Would Destroy a Great Empire
 
It was a couple of years after the death of his beloved son that Croesus started to worry about the growth of the power of the Persians, conceiving a preemptive war against them. With this purpose in mind, he consulted and tested the credibility of several oracles, being more satisfied with the answers provided by the one at Delphi, and the oracle of Amphiaraus at Thebes. And after sending many gifts to both, he sent Lydian envoys to inquire the following: "Shall Croesus send an army against the Persians: and shall he take to himself any allied host?" (Herodotus, History 1.53). 

Both oracles, they say, gave the same answer, namely that if he should send an army against the Persians he would destroy a great empire; and they also advised him to make alliance with the mightiest of powers in Hellas. Pleased with these answers (as well as with the previous tests), he sent splendid gifts to Delphi, which in turn pleased the Delphians so much that they granted him and the Lydians the right of first consulting the oracle, freedom from charges, the best seats at festivals, and life-long right of Delphian citizenship to whoever should wish. And following the oracle, Croesus sent messengers to Sparta, and made an alliance with the Lacedaemonians. 

A Mule King
 
When he had obtained such privileges at Delphi, Croesus made yet an inquiry, asking whether his sovereignty should last long; and the answer of the Pythia was: "Lydian, beware of the day when a mule is lord of the Medians." (Herodotus, History 1.55). This answer also pleased Croesus; for he did not deem likely that a mule would ever be king of the Medians instead of a man. 

Sandanis' Counsel
 
Now, war is always a dangerous business to be feared and respected, no matter which side strength and surprise and other factors seem to favour; for unexpected turns, sometimes having far reaching effects, can never be dismissed. And since what is risked through war should be carefully compared with the eventual gains of a successful campaign, the Lydian wise man Sandanis counselled Croesus in the following manner, when he was preparing to march against the Persians:

"O King, you are making ready to march against men who wear trousers of leather and their other garments of the same, and who eat not what they desire but what they have; for their land is stony. Further they use no wine, but are water drinkers, nor have they figs to eat, nor aught else that is good. Now if you conquer them, of what will you deprive them, seeing that they have nothing? But if on the other hand you are conquered, then see how many good things you will lose …" (Sandanis to Croesus. Herodotus, History 1.71).

Fears Growing Power
 
However Croesus, seeing how Cyrus had gained control over the land of the Medes, making himself the master of their vast territory, and thereby bringing the Persians to the eastern bank of the river Halys, did not listen to Sandanis and put his forces in motion. It is said that Croesus, among other measures, dispatched an agent Eurybatus of Ephesus with money to recruit Greek mercenaries; but instead Eurybatus went over to Cyrus, revealing his master's plans. 

Crosses the Border
 
Having led his army to the border, Croesus crossed the river Halys at a place not far from Sinope in the coast of the Black Sea, either through bridges, or being helped by the celebrated sage Thales of Miletus, who by digging a semicircular trench, turned the course of the river, causing part of its stream to flow in the trench to the rear of the Lydian camp, and passing it, return to its former bed. Croesus began his campaign laying waste farms, enslaving cities, and driving the inhabitants from their homes. 

But then King Cyrus (who is the elder Cyrus, the son of Cambyses), a man fortunate in war, and as it is said, a wise ruler, came to meet the invader, gathering more men as he marched and campaigned against many foes in Asia. It is told that before the battle Cyrus sent messengers to Croesus, saying that he would forgive him and appoint him satrap of Lydia if Croesus presented himself at the Persian court acknowledging Cyrus as his master. But Croesus answered that Cyrus should submit instead, given that until then the Persians had been under Median rule.

Return to Sardis

The Lydian army, supported among others by Egyptian units, attempted to surround the Persians, but failed. Some have said that the battle ended in stalemate, and others that the Lydians were defeated. But in any case Croesus has been reported to have judged prudent to march away to Sardis. Having returned to his capital, Croesus summoned his allies, among which the Lacedaemonians, to join him at Sardis in five months time for a spring campaign against the Persians, and in the meantime, some say, he disbanded many of his Lydian units, believing that after such equal encounter the Persian king would not dare to march against his capital. 

Portents Reported
 
At this moment, portents were reported to have been witnessed in the outer part of Sardis, such as horses devouring snakes, which seers, with their usual sharp-wittedness, interpreted as a sign of invaders conquering the country; for the snakes, they said, represent the children of the earth, and the horses stand for the enemy and the foreigner. They were right; for Cyrus, having learned of the state of the Lydian army, and caring little for the previous stalemate, marched with all speed against Sardis without giving Croesus any chance to assemble his forces again. 

Sardis Beleaguered
 
The Lydian king, however, led the remains of his army to the plain that is before the city, arraying his skilled cavalry to meet the invaders. But Cyrus, they say, assembled all the camels he normally used for transportation of food and baggage, setting men upon them equipped like cavalrymen; and behind them he put his infantry, and behind the infantry he put his horsemen. And in this manner, they tell, when the Lydian horses saw the Persian camels, they were frightened, and the battle being thereby lost, Sardis was beleaguered. 

Sardis Taken
 
At first, the Persian army made unsuccessful assaults. But when fourteen days had passed, the Persians discovered a certain part of the citadel neglected by the defence because of its height and difficult access, and climbing up on this side, which faces towards Mount Tmolus, the Persians succeeded in taking the city. This fortunate discovery was made by a Persian soldier called Hyroeades, who during the days of siege, observed a Lydian defender descending by this part of the citadel in order to fetch a helmet that had fallen down. 

It has also been told that, in former times, when King Meles ruled Sardis, his concubine borne him a lion; it was then declared that if the lion were carried round the walls Sardis would never be taken. Meles, they say, did as it was prophesied and carried the beast round the walls. However, he excepted that part of the acropolis which he judged impossible to attack on account of its height; and it was here that Hyroeades and the rest of the Persians climbed up, taking the city. 

Pyre for Croesus (I)
 
Croesus, some assert, had prepared himself for this day of utter defeat; and being determined to escape slavery he had built a pyre, which he mounted together with his wife and daughters, when the Persians were about to sack the city. The women were weeping inconsolably as he, while reproaching Apollo's ingratitude, ordered a slave to kindle the pyre. It was then that Zeus sent the rain-cloud that quenched the flames, and Apollo came to bring Croesus and his family to live among the Hyperboreans "… since of all mortals he sent the greatest gifts to holy Pytho." (Bacchylides, Odes 3.64)... and as if it were suspected that some could find this impossible, it is added: "Nothing is unbelievable which is brought about by the gods' ambition." (Bacchylides, Odes 3.57). 

Mute Speaks
 
But others tell otherwise. For they say that during the sack of Sardis a Persian soldier came at Croesus with intent of killing him, not because he wished to disobey King Cyrus, who had given orders to capture Croesus alive, but because—as it often happens—he did not know who Croesus was. And when Croesus' dumb son, who at the moment was with his father, saw the Persian soldier coming, he, who had never uttered a single word, broke into speech and exclaimed: "Man, do not kill Croesus!" (Croesus' son to the Persian soldier. Herodotus, History 1.85). In this way another oracle was fulfilled that had prophesied that Croesus' son would speak some unfortunate day:

"O you of Lydian stock, over many king. You great fool Croesus: never wish to hear within your halls the much-desired sound of your son speaking. Better far for you that he remain apart; for the first words he speaks shall be upon a luckless day." (Diodorus, The Library of History 9.33.2).

The Persian soldier then, obeying his king, spared the life of Croesus, who was made a prisoner after fourteen years of reign and fourteen days of siege. This is how the oracle was fulfilled; for by attacking the Persians the king of Lydia destroyed a great empire, as it had been foretold. 

Pyre for Croesus (II)
 
It is now that the pyre appears, others assert, and he who had it built was not Croesus but Cyrus, although the man to be burnt on it was the same. And so, while Sardis was still being sacked, Croesus saw himself bound in chains together with fourteen Lydian boys, all awaiting death by the flames. 

Remembers Solon
 
As he stood in this evil plight, he remembered Solon, the man who used to concentrate in the end of every matter and who, years ago, had not wished to call anybody happy before his death. And sighing and groaning Croesus said "Solon, Solon, Solon …", being heard by Cyrus, who now bade interpreters to ask him what he meant (for Solon was not so well known then as he is now). Croesus was reluctant to speak, but being harassed, he finally said "I would prefer to great wealth his coming into discourse with all despots." (Croesus to the Persians. Herodotus, History 1.86).… but as this was still unintelligible they asked again, and Croesus told them about Solon and all his sayings, which greatly admired Cyrus.

Fire Cannot Be Mastered
 
In the meantime, and while this wholesome conversation between Croesus and the Persians was taking place, the flames in the outer parts of the pyre grew higher and higher, as if reminding that there is always very little time for wisdom. Now Cyrus, seizing the meaning of that narrow instant, considered that there was no purpose in burning alive a man that had once been as fortunate as himself, and ordered to quench the fire and bring Croesus and the Lydian boys down from the pyre. However his servants, for all their efforts, could not master the fire. 

Croesus Saved by Rain
 
And when it seemed that it was too late the rain fell from clouds gathered in a clear and windless sky, when Croesus, having seen Cyrus' repentance, invoked Apollo, the god that he had pleased with so many gifts. And as this most violent rain quenched the fire, Cyrus, perceiving that Croesus was beloved of the gods, brought him down from the pyre and set him near to himself. And since Cyrus changed his mind on account of what Croesus had told about Solon it was later said that: "Solon had the reputation of saving one king and instructing another by means of a single saying." (Plutarch, Parallel Lives Solon 28.4).

Plunder 

Having escaped death in such an extraordinary manner, Croesus sat in silence with his thoughts. But then, seeing how the Persian army sacked the city, he asked Cyrus what they were doing, and the following dialogue followed:

Cyrus: "They are plundering your city and carrying off your possessions".
Croesus: "Nay, not my city, nor my possessions; for I have no longer any share of all this; it is your wealth that they are ravishing …" (Herodotus, History 1.89).

Having said this and noticing that the Persian king listened to him, Croesus counselled him as to how to deal properly with the matter of spoils of war. But others say that Cyrus himself knew from the beginning how to handle the matter of plunder, and that he, during the taking of Sardis, threatened those among his allies who were guilty of insubordination and had run into the city to get plunder from the houses. In any case Croesus' insights pleased Cyrus, who having praised him greatly, took the possessions of the inhabitants of Sardis for the Royal Treasury. 

Croesus Becomes Wiser
 
Cyrus, they say, gave Croesus a place in his council, believing him to be a sagacious man for having associated with so many men of learning. Some believe that these are the reasons why Cyrus attained so much greatness; for he treated all those he subdued with the same consideration and respect that he treated Croesus, thus appearing more as a benefactor than as a conqueror. In that manner the fame of his clemency spread all over the world, and many wished to become his allies. 

Still Annoyed
 
Despite his newly acquired wisdom, and despite the fact that he had just been saved by an unexpected rain after invoking Apollo, Croesus was still bitter against the oracles that had, as he saw it, double-crossed him. So when Cyrus, who now had come to like his prisoner, asked him for whatever boon he desired, Croesus bade the king to let him send his own chains to Delphi, as a reproach to the god that had deluded him. 

Oracles Explained
 
This is why Lydians came to Delphi carrying Croesus' chains, and asking if the god were not ashamed for having encouraged Croesus to attack the Persians. But there they learned from the Pythia that Croesus was the man appointed by fate, for being the fifth generation, to pay for the death of Candaules, whom Gyges, ancestor of Croesus, had murdered. Moreover, the Pythia said, Apollo had wished that Sardis had fallen after Croesus' time, but he could not turn the purpose of the MOERAE (***); therefore the god could only favour Croesus in so far as they would accept, being able just to delay the taking of Sardis for three years and save Croesus from the pyre. 

Besides, the Pythian priestess added, the oracle had rightly declared that if Croesus should lead an army against the Persians he would destroy a great empire, and it had been up to Croesus himself to further ask which empire was meant. Croesus, the Pythia added, did not understand either the oracle concerning the mule, by which Cyrus himself had been meant; for this king was the son of two persons belonging to different nations. And whereas his mother was nobler for being a Median princess, his father was a Persian of lesser estate under Median rule. These were the Pythia's answers, and on learning about them, Croesus they say, admitted that he was to blame and not Loxias, who is Apollo the Oblique. 

It Was Then That the Persians Reached the Aegean Sea
 
Such is the story of Croesus, chosen by fate to pay for Gyges' crime, and remembered for his wealth. Yet he believed that happiness was a greater good than wealth; for otherwise he had not called to his court the wisest men of his time, whom he generously sent away with many presents. An important part of his wealth he used for military purposes, but he believed that heaven rules, and not strength; for otherwise he had not sent so many valuable gifts to Delphi and other places. He lacked talent to understand oracles, but he understood enough to put the interpreters of the gods to the test, showing that his piety was not blind. When his empire was destroyed, the Persians came to the Aegean Sea, subduing the Greeks of the Asiatic mainland, and threatening the islanders and the whole of Hellas.

***  The prudent counsel and remarks as to the relations between Persians and Lydians, whereby Croesus is said by Herodotus to have first earned this favorable treatment, are hardly worth repeating; but the indignant remonstrance sent by Croesus to the Delphian god is too characteristic to be passed over. He obtained permission from Cyrus to lay upon the holy pavement of the Delphian temple the chains with which he had at first been bound. The Lydian envoys were instructed, after exhibiting to the god these humiliating memorials, to ask whether it was his custom to deceive his benefactors, and whether he was not ashamed to have encouraged the king of Lydia in an enterprise so disastrous? 

The god, condescending to justify himself by the lips of the priestess, replied: “Not even a god can escape his destiny. Croesus has suffered for the sin of his fifth ancestor (Gyges), who, conspiring with a woman, slew his master and wrongfully seized the scepter. Apollo employed all his influence with the Moerae (Fates) to obtain that this sin might be expiated by the children of Croesus, and not by Croesus himself; but the Moerae would grant nothing more than a postponement of the judgment for three years. Let Croesus know that Apollo has thus procured for him a reign three years longer than his original destiny, after having tried in vain to rescue him altogether. 

Moreover he sent that rain which at the critical moment extinguished the burning pile. Nor has Croesus any right to complain of the prophecy by which he was encouraged to enter on the war; for when the god told him that he would subvert a great empire, it was his duty to have again inquired which empire the god meant; and if he neither understood the meaning, nor chose to ask for information, he has himself to blame for the result. Besides, Croesus neglected the warning given to him about the acquisition of the Median kingdom by a mule: Cyrus was that mule — son of a Median mother of royal breed, by a Persian father at once of different race and of lower position.”

http://historyweblog.com/2013/03/croesus-of-lydia-defeated/
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www.earth-history.com/Greece/herodotus-creususandsolon.htm


Herodotus- Solon and Croesus . . . .
. . . .

This part of Herodotus's History tells a famous story of the encounter between the Lydian King Croesus, reckoned as one of the richest men in the world, and Solon, the wise Athenian. When all these conquests had been added to the Lydian empire, and the prosperity of Sardis was now at its height, there came thither, one after another, all the sages of Greece living at the time, and among them Solon, the Athenian. 

He was on his travels, having left Athens to be absent ten years, under the pretence of wishing to see the world, but really to avoid being forced to repeal any of the laws which, at the request of the Athenians, he had made for them. Without his sanction the Athenians could not repeal them, as they had bound themselves under a heavy curse to be governed for ten years by the laws which should be imposed on them by Solon.  

On this account, as well as to see the world, Solon set out upon his travels, in the course of which he went to Egypt to the court of Amasis, and also came on a visit to Croesus at Sardis. Croesus received him as his guest, and lodged him in the royal palace. On the third or fourth day after, he bade his servants conduct Solon. over his treasuries, and show him all their greatness and magnificence. 

When he had seen them all, and, so far as time allowed, inspected them, Croesus addressed this question to him. "Stranger of Athens, we have heard much of thy wisdom and of thy travels through many lands, from love of knowledge and a wish to see the world. I am curious therefore to inquire of thee, whom, of all the men that thou hast seen, thou deemest the most happy?" This he asked because he thought himself the happiest of mortals: but Solon answered him without flattery, according to his true sentiments, "Tellus of Athens, sire." Full of astonishment at what he heard, Croesus demanded sharply, "And wherefore dost thou deem Tellus happiest?" 

To which the other replied, "First, because his country was flourishing in his days, and he himself had sons both beautiful and good, and he lived to see children born to each of them, and these children all grew up; and further because, after a life spent in what our people look upon as comfort, his end was surpassingly glorious. In a battle between the Athenians and their neighbours near Eleusis, he came to the assistance of his countrymen, routed the foe, and died upon the field most gallantly. The Athenians gave him a public funeral on the spot where he fell, and paid him the highest honours."
. . . .
Thus did Solon admonish Croesus by the example of Tellus, enumerating the manifold particulars of his happiness. When he had ended, Croesus inquired a second time, who after Tellus seemed to him the happiest, expecting that at any rate, he would be given the second place. "Cleobis and Bito," Solon answered; "they were of Argive race; their fortune was enough for their wants, and they were besides endowed with so much bodily strength that they had both gained prizes at the Games. 

Also this tale is told of them:- There was a great festival in honour of the goddess Juno at Argos, to which their mother must needs be taken in a car. Now the oxen did not come home from the field in time: so the youths, fearful of being too late, put the yoke on their own necks, and themselves drew the car in which their mother rode. Five and forty furlongs did they draw her, and stopped before the temple. This deed of theirs was witnessed by the whole assembly of worshippers, and then their life closed in the best possible way. 

Herein, too, God showed forth most evidently, how much better a thing for man death is than life. For the Argive men, who stood around the car, extolled the vast strength of the youths; and the Argive women extolled the mother who was blessed with such a pair of sons; and the mother herself, overjoyed at the deed and at the praises it had won, standing straight before the image, besought the goddess to bestow on Cleobis and Bito, the sons who had so mightily honoured her, the highest blessing to which mortals can attain. Her prayer ended, they offered sacrifice and partook of the holy banquet, after which the two youths fell asleep in the temple. 

They never woke more, but so passed from the earth. The Argives, looking on them as among the best of men, caused statues of them to be made, which they gave to the shrine at Delphi." When Solon had thus assigned these youths the second place, Croesus broke in angrily, "What, stranger of Athens, is my happiness, then, so utterly set at nought by thee, that thou dost not even put me on a level with private men?"
. . . .
"Oh! Croesus," replied the other, "thou askedst a question concerning the condition of man, of one who knows that the power above us is full of jealousy, and fond of troubling our lot. A long life gives one to witness much, and experience much oneself, that one would not choose. Seventy years I regard as the limit of the life of man. 

In these seventy years are contained, without reckoning intercalary months, twenty-five thousand and two hundred days. Add an intercalary month to every other year, that the seasons may come round at the right time, and there will be, besides the seventy years, thirty-five such months, making an addition of one thousand and fifty days. The whole number of the days contained in the seventy years will thus be twenty-six thousand two hundred and fifty, whereof not one but will produce events unlike the rest. 

Hence man is wholly accident. For thyself, oh! Croesus, I see that thou art wonderfully rich, and art the lord of many nations; but with respect to that whereon thou questionest me, I have no answer to give, until I hear that thou hast closed thy life happily. For assuredly he who possesses great store of riches is no nearer happiness than he who has what suffices for his daily needs, unless it so hap that luck attend upon him, and so he continue in the enjoyment of all his good things to the end of life. For many of the wealthiest men have been unfavoured of fortune, and many whose means were moderate have had excellent luck. Men of the former class excel those of the latter but in two respects; these last excel the former in many. 

The wealthy man is better able to content his desires, and to bear up against a sudden buffet of calamity. The other has less ability to withstand these evils (from which, however, his good luck keeps him clear), but he enjoys all these following blessings: he is whole of limb, a stranger to disease, free from misfortune, happy in his children, and comely to look upon. If, in addition to all this, he end his life well, he is of a truth the man of whom thou art in search, the man who may rightly be termed happy. Call him, however, until he die, not happy but fortunate. 

Scarcely, indeed, can any man unite all these advantages: as there is no country which contains within it all that it needs, but each, while it possesses some things, lacks others, and the best country is that which contains the most; so no single human being is complete in every respect- something is always lacking. He who unites the greatest number of advantages, and retaining them to the day of his death, then dies peaceably, that man alone, sire, is, in my judgment, entitled to bear the name of 'happy.' 

But in every matter it behoves us to mark well the end: for oftentimes God gives men a gleam of happiness, and then plunges them into ruin." Such was the speech which Solon addressed to Croesus, a speech which brought him neither largess nor honour. The king saw him depart with much indifference, since he thought that a man must be an arrant fool who made no account of present good, but bade men always wait and mark the end. After Solon had gone away a dreadful vengeance, sent of God, came upon Croesus, to punish him, it is likely, for deeming himself the happiest of men. First he had a dream in the night, which foreshowed him truly the evils that were about to befall him in the person of his son. 

For Croesus had two sons, one blasted by a natural defect, being deaf and dumb; the other, distinguished far above all his co-mates in every pursuit. The name of the last was Atys. It was this son concerning whom he dreamt a dream that he would die by the blow of an iron weapon. 

When he woke, he considered earnestly with himself, and, greatly alarmed at the dream, instantly made his son take a wife, and whereas in former years the youth had been wont to command the Lydian forces in the field, he now would not suffer him to accompany them. All the spears and javelins, and weapons used in the wars, he removed out of the male apartments, and laid them in heaps in the chambers of the women, fearing lest perhaps one of the weapons that hung against the wall might fall and strike him.
. . . .
Now it chanced that while he was making arrangements for the wedding, there came to Sardis a man under a misfortune, who had upon him the stain of blood. He was by race a Phrygian, and belonged to the family of the king. Presenting himself at the palace of Croesus, he prayed to be admitted to purification according to the customs of the country. Now the Lydian method of purifying is very nearly the same as the Greek. 

Croesus granted the request, and went through all the customary rites, after which he asked the suppliant of his birth and country, addressing him as follows:- "Who art thou, stranger, and from what part of Phrygia fleddest thou to take refuge at my hearth? And whom, moreover, what man or what woman, hast thou slain?" "Oh! king," replied the Phrygian, "I am the son of Gordias, son of Midas. I am named Adrastus. The man I unintentionally slew was my own brother. For this my father drove me from the land, and I lost all. Then fled I here to thee." 

"Thou art the offspring," Croesus rejoined, "of a house friendly to mine, and thou art come to friends. Thou shalt want for nothing so long as thou abidest in my dominions. Bear thy misfortune as easily as thou mayest, so will it go best with thee." Thenceforth Adrastus lived in the palace of the king. It chanced that at this very same time there was in the Mysian Olympus a huge monster of a boar, which went forth often from this mountain country, and wasted the corn-fields of the Mysians. Many a time had the Mysians collected to hunt the beast, but instead of doing him any hurt, they came off always with some loss to themselves. 

At length they sent ambassadors to Croesus, who delivered their message to him in these words: "Oh! king, a mighty monster of a boar has appeared in our parts, and destroys the labour of our hands. We do our best to take him, but in vain. Now therefore we beseech thee to let thy son accompany us back, with some chosen youths and hounds, that we may rid our country of the animal." Such was the tenor of their prayer. But Croesus bethought him of his dream, and answered, "Say no more of my son going with you; that may not be in any wise. He is but just joined in wedlock, and is busy enough with that. I will grant you a picked band of Lydians, and all my huntsmen and hounds; and I will charge those whom I send to use all zeal in aiding you to rid your country of the brute." 

With this reply the Mysians were content; but the king's son, hearing what the prayer of the Mysians was, came suddenly in, and on the refusal of Croesus to let him go with them, thus addressed his father: "Formerly, my father, it was deemed the noblest and most suitable thing for me to frequent the wars and hunting-parties, and win myself glory in them; but now thou keepest me away from both, although thou hast never beheld in me either cowardice or lack of spirit. What face meanwhile must I wear as I walk to the forum or return from it? What must the citizens, what must my young bride think of me? What sort of man will she suppose her husband to be? Either, therefore, let me go to the chase of this boar, or give me a reason why it is best for me to do according to thy wishes."
. . . .
Then Croesus answered, "My son, it is not because I have seen in thee either cowardice or aught else which has displeased me that I keep thee back; but because a vision which came before me in a dream as I slept, warned me that thou wert doomed to die young, pierced by an iron weapon. It was this which first led me to hasten on thy wedding, and now it hinders me from sending thee upon this enterprise. Fain would I keep watch over thee, if by any means I may cheat fate of thee during my own lifetime. For thou art the one and only son that I possess; the other, whose hearing is destroyed, I regard as if he were not." 

"Ah! father," returned the youth, "I blame thee not for keeping watch over me after a dream so terrible; but if thou mistakest, if thou dost not apprehend the dream aright, 'tis no blame for me to show thee wherein thou errest. Now the dream, thou saidst thyself, foretold that I should die stricken by an iron weapon. But what hands has a boar to strike with? What iron weapon does he wield? Yet this is what thou fearest for me. Had the dream said that I should die pierced by a tusk, then thou hadst done well to keep me away; but it said a weapon. Now here we do not combat men, but a wild animal. I pray thee, therefore, let me go with them."
. . . .
"There thou hast me, my son," said Croesus, "thy interpretation is better than mine. I yield to it, and change my mind, and consent to let thee go." Then the king sent for Adrastus, the Phrygian, and said to him, "Adrastus, when thou wert smitten with the rod of affliction- no reproach, my friend- I purified thee, and have taken thee to live with me in my palace, and have been at every charge. Now, therefore, it behoves thee to requite the good offices which thou hast received at my hands by consenting to go with my son on this hunting party, and to watch over him, if perchance you should be attacked upon the road by some band of daring robbers. Even apart from this, it were right for thee to go where thou mayest make thyself famous by noble deeds. They are the heritage of thy family, and thou too art so stalwart and strong." 

Adrastus answered, "Except for thy request, Oh! king, I would rather have kept away from this hunt; for methinks it ill beseems a man under a misfortune such as mine to consort with his happier compeers; and besides, I have no heart to it. On many grounds I had stayed behind; but, as thou urgest it, and I am bound to pleasure thee (for truly it does behove me to requite thy good offices), I am content to do as thou wishest. For thy son, whom thou givest into my charge, be sure thou shalt receive him back safe and sound, so far as depends upon a guardian's carefulness."
. . . .
Thus assured, Croesus let them depart, accompanied by a band of picked youths, and well provided with dogs of chase. When they reached Olympus, they scattered in quest of the animal; he was soon found, and the hunters, drawing round him in a circle, hurled their weapons at him. Then the stranger, the man who had been purified of blood, whose name was Adrastus, he also hurled his spear at the boar, but missed his aim, and struck Atys. Thus was the son of Croesus slain by the point of an iron weapon, and the warning of the vision was fulfilled. 

Then one ran to Sardis to bear the tidings to the king, and he came and informed him of the combat and of the fate that had befallen his son. If it was a heavy blow to the father to learn that his child was dead, it yet more strongly affected him to think that the very man whom he himself once purified had done the deed. In the violence of his grief he called aloud on Jupiter Catharsius to be a witness of what he had suffered at the stranger's hands. Afterwards he invoked the same god as Jupiter Ephistius and Hetaereus- using the one term because he had unwittingly harboured in his house the man who had now slain his son; and the other, because the stranger, who had been sent as his child's guardian, had turned out his most cruel enemy. 

Presently the Lydians arrived, bearing the body of the youth, and behind them followed the homicide. He took his stand in front of the corse, and, stretching forth his hands to Croesus, delivered himself into his power with earnest entreaties that he would sacrifice him upon the body of his son- "his former misfortune was burthen enough; now that he had added to it a second, and had brought ruin on the man who purified him, he could not bear to live." 

Then Croesus, when he heard these words, was moved with pity towards Adrastus, notwithstanding the bitterness of his own calamity; and so he answered, "Enough, my friend; I have all the revenge that I require, since thou givest sentence of death against thyself. But in sooth it is not thou who hast injured me, except so far as thou hast unwittingly dealt the blow. Some god is the author of my misfortune, and I was forewarned of it a long time ago." Croesus after this buried the body of his son, with such honours as befitted the occasion. 

Adrastus, son of Gordias, son of Midas, the destroyer of his brother in time past, the destroyer now of his purifier, regarding himself as the most unfortunate wretch whom he had ever known, so soon as all was quiet about the place, slew himself upon the tomb. Croesus, bereft of his son, gave himself up to mourning for two full years.
. . . .
At the end of this time the grief of Croesus was interrupted by intelligence from abroad. He learnt that Cyrus, the son of Cambyses, had destroyed the empire of Astyages, the son of Cyaxares; and that the Persians were becoming daily more powerful. This led him to consider with himself whether it were possible to check the growing power of that people before it came to a head. With this design he resolved to make instant trial of the several oracles in Greece, and of the one in Libya. So he sent his messengers in different directions, some to Delphi, some to Abae in Phocis, and some to Dodona; others to the oracle of Amphiaraus; others to that of Trophonius; others, again, to Branchidae in Milesia. These were the Greek oracles which he consulted. 

To Libya he sent another embassy, to consult the oracle of Ammon. These messengers were sent to test the knowledge of the oracles, that, if they were found really to return true answers, he might send a second time, and inquire if he ought to attack the Persians. 

The messengers who were despatched to make trial of the oracles were given the following instructions: they were to keep count of the days from the time of their leaving Sardis, and, reckoning from that date, on the hundredth day they were to consult the oracles, and to inquire of them what Croesus the son of Alyattes, king of Lydia, was doing at that moment. The answers given them were to be taken down in writing, and brought back to him. None of the replies remain on record except that of the oracle at Delphi. There, the moment that the Lydians entered the sanctuary, and before they put their questions, the Pythoness thus answered them in hexameter verse:-

I can count the sands, and I can measure the ocean; I have ears for the silent, and know what the dumb man meaneth;Lo! on my sense there striketh the smell of a shell-covered tortoise, Boiling now on a fire, with the flesh of a lamb, in a cauldron--Brass is the vessel below, and brass the cover above it.

These words the Lydians wrote down at the mouth of the Pythoness as she prophesied, and then set off on their return to Sardis. When all the messengers had come back with the answers which they had received, Croesus undid the rolls, and read what was written in each. Only one approved itself to him, that of the Delphic oracle. This he had no sooner heard than he instantly made an act of adoration, and accepted it as true, declaring that the Delphic was the only really oracular shrine, the only one that had discovered in what way he was in fact employed. 

For on the departure of his messengers he had set himself to think what was most impossible for any one to conceive of his doing, and then, waiting till the day agreed on came, he acted as he had determined. He took a tortoise and a lamb, and cutting them in pieces with his own hands, boiled them both together in a brazen cauldron, covered over with a lid which was also of brass. Such then was the answer returned to Croesus from Delphi. What the answer was which the Lydians who went to the shrine of Amphiarans and performed the customary rites obtained of the oracle there, I have it not in my power to mention, for there is no record of it. 

All that is known is that Croesus believed himself to have found there also an oracle which spoke the truth. After this Croesus, having resolved to propitiate the Delphic god with a magnificent sacrifice, offered up three thousand of every kind of sacrificial beast, and besides made a huge pile, and placed upon it couches coated with silver and with gold, and golden goblets, and robes and vests of purple; all which he burnt in the hope of thereby making himself more secure of the favour of the god. 

Further he issued his orders to all the people of the land to offer a sacrifice according to their means. When the sacrifice was ended, the king melted down a vast quantity of gold, and ran it into ingots, making them six palms long, three palms broad, and one palm in thickness. The number of ingots was a hundred and seventeen, four being of refined gold, in weight two talents and a half; the others of pale gold, and in weight two talents. 

He also caused a statue of a lion to be made in refined gold, the weight of which was ten talents. At the time when the temple of Delphi was burnt to the ground, this lion fell from the ingots on which it was placed; it now stands in the Corinthian treasury, and weighs only six talents and a half, having lost three talents and a half by the fire.
. . . .
On the completion of these works Croesus sent them away to Delphi, and with them two bowls of an enormous size, one of gold, the other of silver, which used to stand, the latter upon the right, the former upon the left, as one entered the temple. They too were moved at the time of the fire; and now the golden one is in the Clazomenian treasury, and weighs eight talents and forty-two minae; the silver one stands in the corner of the ante-chapel, and holds six hundred amphorae. 

This is known because the Delphians fill it at the time of the Theophania. It is said by the Delphians to be a work of Theodore the Samian, and I think that they say true, for assuredly it is the work of no common artist. Croesus sent also four silver casks, which are in the Corinthian treasury, and two lustral vases, a golden and a silver one. 

On the former is inscribed the name of the Lacedaemonians, and they claim it as a gift of theirs, but wrongly, since it was really given by Croesus. The inscription upon it was cut by a Delphian, who wished to pleasure the Lacedaemonians. His name is known to me, but I forbear to mention it. The boy, through whose hand the water runs, is (I confess) a Lacedaemonian gift, but they did not give either of the lustral vases. 

Besides these various offerings, Croesus sent to Delphi many others of less account, among the rest a number of round silver basins. Also he dedicated a female figure in gold, three cubits high, which is said by the Delphians to be the statue of his baking-woman; and further, he presented the necklace and the girdles of his wife. These were the offerings sent by Croesus to Delphi. To the shrine of Amphiaraus, with whose valour and misfortune he was acquainted, he sent a shield entirely of gold, and a spear, also of solid gold, both head and shaft. They were still existing in my day at Thebes, laid up in the temple of Ismenian Apollo. 

The messengers who had the charge of conveying these treasures to the shrines, received instructions to ask the oracles whether Croesus should go to war with the Persians and if so, whether he should strengthen himself by the forces of an ally. Accordingly, when they had reached their destinations and presented the gifts, they proceeded to consult the oracles in the following terms:- "Croesus, of Lydia and other countries, believing that these are the only real oracles in all the world, has sent you such presents as your discoveries deserved, and now inquires of you whether he shall go to war with the Persians, and if so, whether he shall strengthen himself by the forces of a confederate." 

Both the oracles agreed in the tenor of their reply, which was in each case a prophecy that if Croesus attacked the Persians, he would destroy a mighty empire, and a recommendation to him to look and see who were the most powerful of the Greeks, and to make alliance with them. 

At the receipt of these oracular replies Croesus was overjoyed, and feeling sure now that he would destroy the empire of the Persians, he sent once more to Pytho, and presented to the Delphians, the number of whom he had ascertained, two gold staters apiece. In return for this the Delphians granted to Croesus and the Lydians the privilege of precedency in consulting the oracle, exemption from all charges, the most honourable seat at the festivals, and the perpetual right of becoming at pleasure citizens of their town. After sending these presents to the Delphians, Croesus a third time consulted the oracle, for having once proved its truthfulness, he wished to make constant use of it. The question whereto he now desired an answer was- "Whether his kingdom would be of long duration?" The following was the reply of the Pythoness:-- 

Wait till the time shall come when a mule is monarch of Media; Then, thou delicate Lydian, away to the pebbles of Hermus; Haste, oh! haste thee away, nor blush to behave like a coward.

Of all the answers that had reached him, this pleased him far the best, for it seemed incredible that a mule should ever come to be king of the Medes, and so he concluded that the sovereignty would never depart from himself or his seed after him. Afterwards he turned his thoughts to the alliance which he had been recommended to contract, and sought to ascertain by inquiry which was the most powerful of the Grecian states.