3
As soon as a propitious day was settled on for beginning my trade, I was handed over to my uncle, with no very strong objection on my part, for it seemed to me to offer a delightful form of play and a chance to cut a figure before my mates, if I should be seen carving gods and making little statues for myself and my chosen favorites. The first thing I did was what might have been expected of a beginner. My uncle gave me a chisel of some sort and bade me work gently at a flat block that lay in the middle of the room, addressing me in the words of the proverb: "Well begun is half done." But in my ignorance I bore down too hard and broke the block. My uncle, in a fury, caught up a stick that lay to his hand and struck at my devoted head in no gentle or persuasive fashion, so that tears were my introduction to art.
4
I ran away from him and came home, bawling all the way with streaming eyes, and I related the story of the stick and denounced what I called my uncle's brutality, adding that he treated me thus from jealousy lest I should surpass him in his art. My mother was greatly incensed, and called her brother all manner of hard names, and when night came I fell asleep, still in tears, and my mind was busy all night long.
5
Now, up to this point all that I have told is the laughable history of a hobbledehoy; but listen, my friends, to a sequel no longer contemptible, but calling for close attention. For, to quote Homer, The gods sent me a vision in my sleep through the ambrosial night, so vivid that it fell in nowise short of reality. To this day, after so great a lapse of time, the forms I saw remain in my eyes and the sounds I heard ring in my ears, and this shows how distinct it all was.
