Book 4
1.3
When he was already crippled by paralysis, he sent a message to Xenocrates entreating him to come and take over the charge of the school.The most trustworthy account of what happened when Xenocrates was elected is furnished by Index Academicus, pp. 38 sq. ed. Mekler. They say that, as he was being conveyed to the Academy in a tiny carriage, he met and saluted Diogenes, who replied, Nay, if you can endure to live in such a plight as this, I decline to return your greeting. At last in old age he became so despondent that he put an end to his life. Here follows my epigram upon himAnth. Pal. viii. 101.: Had I not learnt that Speusippus would die thus, no one would have persuaded me to say that he was surely not of Plato’s blood; for else he would never have died in despair for a trivial cause.
1.4
Plutarch in the Lives of Lysander and Sulla makes his malady to have been morbus pedicularis.Cf. supra, iii. 40. That his body wasted away is affirmed by Timotheus in his book On Lives. Speusippus, he says, meeting a rich man who was in love with one who was no beauty, said to him, Why, pray, are you in such sore need of him? For ten talents I will find you a more handsome bride.
