These passages portray the man who rules alone and by fear. Herodotus and Livy tell the same lesson in two forms: a ruler shows how to keep power by silently cutting off the tallest ears of corn, or the tallest poppies. Virgil and Eusebius list the cruelties of particular tyrants. Plato, Cicero and Boethius argue that the tyrant is himself the most wretched of men, a slave to his own fear; Cicero adds that power held by fear never lasts.
Chosen by hand, not counted: a passage is here when it is plainly about the topic, and the list is not every mention. Each is shown in the order the books were written, and each links to the section it is in.
Socles of Corinth warns Sparta against tyranny, telling of Cypselus, Periander and Thrasybulus’s cut ears of corn.
… Surely now the heaven shall be below the earth, and the earth raised up on high above the heaven, and men shall have their dwelling in the sea, and fishes shall have that habitation which men had before, seeing that ye, Lacedemonians, are doing away with free governments 79 and are preparing to bring back despotism again into our cities, than which there is no more unjust or more murderous thing among men. … Book 5 →Socrates argues that the real tyrant is the real slave, fearful, friendless and most miserable of men.
… He who is the real tyrant, whatever men may think, is the real slave, and is obliged to practise the greatest adulation and servility, and to be the flatterer of the vilest of mankind. He has desires which he is utterly unable to satisfy, and has more wants than any one, and is truly poor, if you know how to inspect the whole soul of him: all his life long he is beset with fear and is full of convulsions and … Book 9 →Cicero argues that rule by fear never lasts, and that tyrants such as Dionysius live in fear themselves.
… Furthermore, those who wish to be feared must inevitably be afraid of those whom they intimidate. What, for instance, shall we think of the elder Dionysius? With what tormenting fears he used to be racked! For through fear of the barber's razor he used to have his hair singed off with a glowing coal. In what state of mind do we fancy Alexander of Pherae lived? We read in history that he dearly loved his wife Thebe; … Book 2 →Evander tells how Mezentius bound the living to the dead until his people drove him out.
… Not far from hence there stands a hilly town, Of ancient building, and of high renown, Torn from the Tuscans by the Lydian race, Who gave the name of Caere to the place, Once Agyllina call’d. It flourish’d long, In pride of wealth and warlike people strong, Till curs’d Mezentius, in a fatal hour, Assum’d the crown, with arbitrary pow’r. … Book 8 →Tarquin answers his son’s messenger by striking off the tallest poppies; Sextus kills the leading men of Gabii.
… The king going into a garden of the palace, as it were to consider of the matter, followed by his son's messenger; walking there for some time in silence, he is said to have struck off the heads of the tallest poppies with his staff. … Livy I 54 →Eusebius lists the crimes of Maxentius at Rome: adultery, the massacre of citizens and magic.
… Maxentius his son, who obtained the government at Rome, at first feigned our faith, in complaisance and flattery toward the Roman people. On this account he commanded his subjects to cease persecuting the Christians, pretending to religion that he might appear merciful and mild beyond his predecessors. 2. … Book 8 →Philosophy argues that kings are not truly powerful, citing the tyrant’s image of a sword over his head.
… The tyrant who had made trial of the perils of his condition figured the fears that haunt a throne under the image of a sword hanging over a man's head. What sort of power, then, is this which cannot drive away the gnawings of anxiety, or shun the stings of terror? Fain would they themselves have lived secure, but they cannot; … Book 3 →