Kitap 7
5.4
Silence following upon this, What application, said I, shall reason make, or how shall it assist? For I do not think it will apply those ear-covers of Xenocrates, or force us to rise from the table as soon as we hear a harp struck or a pipe blown. No indeed, replied Lamprias, but as soon as we meet with the foresaid intoxications, we ought to make our application to the Muses, and fly to the Helicon of the ancients. To him that loves a costly strumpet, we cannot bring a Panthea or Penelope for cure; but one that delights in mimics and buffoons, loose odes, or debauched songs, we can bring to Euripides, Pindar, and Menander, that he might wash (as Plato phraseth it) his salt hearing with fresh reason. As the exorcists command the possessed to read over and pronounce Ephesian letters, so we in those possessions, amid all the madness of music and dancing, when We toss our hands with noise, and madly shout, remembering those venerable and sacred writings, and comparing with them those odes, poems, and vain empty compositions, shall not be altogether cheated by them, or permit ourselves to be carried away sidelong, as by a smooth and undisturbed stream.
Question VI. CONCERNING THOSE GUESTS THAT ARE CALLED SHADOWS, AND WHETHER BEING INVITED BY SOME TO GO TO ANOTHER’S HOUSE, THEY OUGHT TO GO; AND WHEN, AND TO WHOM. PLUTARCH, FLORUS, CAESERNIUS.
