Plutarch · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Since, then, great reversals of fortune befell both men, let us first look at the matter of power and reputation: to the one there was an inheritance already accomplished by others, since Antigonus, having become the mightiest of the Successors, before Demetrius came of age had overrun and mastered most of Asia;
Antony, born of a father who was otherwise agreeable, but unwarlike and left him nothing great to be proud of, dared to aim at Caesar's power, which belonged to him by no family right at all, and made himself the successor to what that man had labored to build. And he grew so strong, setting out from nothing but his own resources, that when he divided the whole into two parts he chose and took for himself the more illustrious share, and even while he himself was absent, through his subordinates and lieutenant-generals, defeated the Parthians many times over and drove the barbarian peoples about the Caucasus back to the Caspian Sea.
Proofs of his greatness are found also in the very things for which he is ill spoken of. For Demetrius' father was glad to see him marry Antipater's daughter Phila, though she was above his years, as a match more distinguished than his age warranted; whereas for Antony the marriage to Cleopatra was held a reproach, though she surpassed in power and splendor all the kings of her time save Arsaces. Yet he made himself so great that to others he seemed worthy of greater things than he himself wished.
The policy by which each acquired power, however, deserves no censure in Demetrius' case, since he wished to rule and reign over a people already used to obeying kings; Antony's course, on the other hand, was harsh and tyrannical, for he made slaves of the Roman people at the very moment they had thrown off monarchy under Caesar.
The greatest and most illustrious of his achievements is the war against Cassius and Brutus, which was waged in order to strip his fatherland and fellow citizens of their freedom. Demetrius, even before he came upon hard necessity, continued without ceasing to free Greece and to drive garrisons out of the cities — not like Antony, who took pride, in Macedonia, in having killed the very men who had freed Rome.
One thing, then, that is praised in Antony is his generosity and lavishness in giving; and in this Demetrius so far surpasses him that he granted to his enemies what Antony did not give even to his friends. And yet Antony did win esteem for ordering that Brutus be buried and properly laid out; but Demetrius gave burial rites to all the enemy dead without exception, and sent back to Ptolemy those he had taken captive, together with money and gifts.
Both men, in their good fortune, were given to insolence, and given over to luxuries and indulgence. Yet no one could say that opportunity for action ever escaped Demetrius while he lived amid his pleasures and companions; rather, out of the abundance of his leisure he brought in his pleasures besides, and, quite simply playing and drowsing, he passed his time with Lamia as if she were the mythical monster of that name.
But in his preparations for war his spear had no ivy wound about it, nor did his helmet smell of perfumes, nor did he come forth to battle gleaming and blooming as if fresh from the women's quarters; instead, putting the revel-bands to rest and bringing the Bacchic rites to a close, he turned into what Euripides calls a minister of Ares the unhallowed, and through pleasure or idleness he never once simply stumbled.
Antony, on the other hand — just as we see in paintings Heracles' club being stolen away by Omphale, and his lion-skin stripped from him — was again and again disarmed and bewitched by Cleopatra, and persuaded by her to let great undertakings and necessary campaigns slip from his hands, and to idle and play about with her on the shores near Canopus and Taphosiris.
And in the end, like Paris, he fled from the battle and sank down into her embrace; or rather, Paris, once defeated, fled into his chamber, but Antony, in pursuit of Cleopatra, fled and let victory go from his grasp.
Furthermore, Demetrius — in a practice not forbidden but rather customary among the kings of Macedon, going back to Philip and Alexander — took several wives one after another, as did Lysimachus and Ptolemy, and he held in honor as many as he married; whereas Antony was the first to take two wives at once, a thing no Roman before him had dared to do, and then drove out his lawful citizen wife to please the foreign woman who was not joined to him under the laws; hence from marriage nothing came upon the one, but the greatest of evils befell the other.
Yet no impiety arising from licentiousness attaches to Antony's deeds so great as attaches to those of Demetrius. For the historians say that even dogs were barred from the whole of the Acropolis, because that animal most openly displays its mating; but Demetrius, within the Parthenon itself, consorted with prostitutes and debauched many citizen women besides.
And in that very sphere where one would least expect such luxuries and pleasures to have any part in cruelty, this is nonetheless found in Demetrius' love of pleasure: he allowed — or rather compelled — the noblest and most temperate of the Athenians to die pitiably, in flight from being violated. In sum: Antony wronged himself through his lack of self-control, but Demetrius wronged others.
Toward his parents, however, Demetrius showed himself blameless in every respect; but Antony handed over his mother's brother to secure Cicero's death — a deed vile and savage in itself, so that Antony could scarcely win pardon for it, even granting that his uncle's safety was the price paid for Cicero's death.
As for the oaths that both broke and the treaties both violated — the one by seizing Artabazus, the other by killing Alexander — Antony has an acknowledged excuse: he had been abandoned by Artabazus in Media and betrayed. But many say that Demetrius, having invented false charges, brought accusation for the very things he himself had done, and was avenging a wrong not done to him rather than defending himself against one he had suffered. Again, Demetrius was himself the doer of his own successes; Antony, by contrast, in campaigns where he was not even present, carried off through his generals the fairest and greatest victories credited to his name.
Both fell from power through their own fault, yet not in the same way: the one was abandoned, for the Macedonians deserted him; the other did the abandoning, for he fled from the men who were risking their lives on his behalf. So that it stands as a charge against the one that he made the men fighting for him so hostile toward himself, and as a charge against the other that he abandoned a goodwill and loyalty already prepared and waiting for him.
Concerning how they died, praise is due to neither man, though Demetrius deserves the greater censure. For he submitted to becoming a captive, and once shut up, was content to gain three more years of life, having grown tame to wine and his belly like a beast. Antony died a cowardly, pitiable, and dishonorable death, and yet, before the enemy could become master of his body, he took himself out of life.