3
My good man, you had better teach the son of Croesus!?One of the sons of Crocsus was mute: Herod. 1. 34, 85. I want to be talkative, not a graven image. However, what comes after the silence and the five years?
3
Thou shalt be practised in music and geometry.
3
That is delightful; I am to become a fiddler before being wise!
4
Then, in addition to this, in counting.
4
I know how to count now.
4
How dost thou count?
4
One, two, three, four—
4
Lo! what thou thinkest four is ten, and a perfect triangle, and our oath.Four is ten, because it contains three, two and one, and 1 2 3 4 10. The perfect triangle is
4
Well, by your greatest oath, by Four, I never heard diviner doctrines or more esoteric.
4
Thereafter, my friend, thou shalt learn of earth and air and water and fire, what their flux is, and what form they have and how they move.
4
Why, has fire form, or air, or water?
4
Yea, very notably, for without shape and form there can be no motion. And in addition thou shalt learn that God is number and mind and harmony.
4
What you say is wonderful.
5
And beside all that I have said, thou shalt learn that thou, who thinkest thyself a single individual, art one person in semblance and another in reality.
5
What’s that? I am another and not this man who now talks to you!
5
Now thou art he, but erstwhile thou didst manifest thyself in another body and under another name, and in time thou shalt again migrate into another person.
5
You mean that I shall be immortal, changing into many forms? But enough of this.
6
How do you stand in the matter of diet?
6
I eat nothing at all that hath life, but all else save beans.
6
Why so? Do you dislike beans?
