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I entered the grammar school of the teacher Dionysius, and saw there the young men who are accounted the most comely in form and of distinguished family, and their lovers. Now it chanced that two of the young people were disputing, but about what, I did not clearly overhear: it appeared, however, that they were disputing either about Anaxagoras The Ionian philosopher who lived in friendship with Pericles at Athens. or about Oenopides; A philosopher of Chios, distinguished as a geometer and astronomer. at any rate, they appeared to be drawing circles, and they were imitating certain inclinations i.e., the slopes of the contours of the earth, and of the apparent course of the sun(ecliptic). with their arms, bending to it and taking it most earnestly. Then I—for I was sitting beside the lover of one of the pair—nudged him with my elbow and asked him what on earth the two youngsters were so earnest about, and I said: Is it then something great and fine, in which they are so earnestly immersed?
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Great and fine, indeed! he replied: why, these fellows are prating about the heavenly bodies, and babbling philosophy. Then I, surprised at his answer, said: Young man, do you consider philosophizing to be shameful? Else, why do you speak so sharply?
