“Do not do the things you would blame in another.”
— Thales of MiletusReported in Diogenes Laertius 1.36 among the moral maxims attributed to Thales; approximate English rendering
Commentary
This maxim, attributed to Thales in Diogenes Laertius, states a principle of consistency between judgment and conduct, asking the speaker to refrain from what he would criticise in others. The principle is a common feature of Greek moral teaching and appears in several traditions, so its attribution to Thales is traditional rather than secure. A. A. Long notes that the sages' maxims were often formulated as general rules of conduct, and that this one belongs to the wider ethics of reciprocity. G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, and M. Schofield observe that such maxims cannot be placed with confidence in the sixth century BCE, though they reflect early Greek moral concerns. Charles Kahn argues that the Milesian intellectual environment, with its commercial and civic life, would have encouraged such norms. Jonathan Barnes cautions that the maxim should be read as a later formulation of a widely shared ethic. The English is an approximate rendering of a Greek maxim, and the Greek should be checked before quotation.
Commentary
This maxim, attributed to Thales in Diogenes Laertius, states a principle of consistency between judgment and conduct, asking the speaker to refrain from what he would criticise in others. The principle is a common feature of Greek moral teaching and appears in several traditions, so its attribution to Thales is traditional rather than secure. A. A. Long notes that the sages' maxims were often formulated as general rules of conduct, and that this one belongs to the wider ethics of reciprocity. G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, and M. Schofield observe that such maxims cannot be placed with confidence in the sixth century BCE, though they reflect early Greek moral concerns. Charles Kahn argues that the Milesian intellectual environment, with its commercial and civic life, would have encouraged such norms. Jonathan Barnes cautions that the maxim should be read as a later formulation of a widely shared ethic. The English is an approximate rendering of a Greek maxim, and the Greek should be checked before quotation.