5
If I saw that they truly found any refuge from poverty in such household positions, I should not quibble with them in behalf of excessive liberty; but when they receive what resembles “the diet of invalids,” as our splendid orator once said,Demosthenes3, 33. how can one avoid thinking that even in this particular they are ill advised, inasmuch as their condition in life always remains the same? They are always poor, they must continue to receive, there is nothing put by, no surplus to save: on the contrary, what is given, even if it is given, even if payment is received in full, is all spent to the last copper and without satisfying their need. It would have been better not to excogitate any such measures, which keep poverty going by simply giving first aid against it, but such as will do away with it altogether—yes, and to that end perhaps even .to plunge into the deep-bosomed sea if one must, Theognis, and down precipitous cliffs, as you ~ say. But if a man who is always poor and needy and on an allowance thinks that thereby he has escaped poverty, I do not know how one can avoid thinking that such a man deludes himself.
