Perde 1
[Textpart 2]
To this place (pointing to the house.)
LYDUS
Why to this place? Who lives there?
PISTOCLERUS
Love, Pleasure, Venus, Beauty, Joy, Jesting, Dalliance, Converse, and Sweet-kissing.
115
LYDUS
What intercourse have you with these most destructive Deities?
PISTOCLERUS
Bad are those men who speak evil of the good. You speak not well of even the Gods themselves; you do what is not right.
LTD.
Is Sweet-kissing, then, some God?
120
PISTOCLERUS
And do you not think she is? O Lydus, why, what a barbariansWhat a barbarian: He alludes to Lydia, the country of Lydus, which was barbara. you are, you, whom I had deemed to be far more wise than Thales hinselfThan Thales himself: Thales of Miletus was one of the seven wise men of Greece. He was the founder of the Ionic sect of philosophers.. Go to, you are more foolish than Potitius, the foreignerPotitius, the foreigner: Barbaro signifies Roman, the scene being in Attica. We learn from St. Augustine that the Potitii received the epithet of stulti, unwise, from the following circumstance. They were the hereditary priests of Hercules, at Rome. Wishing to lighten their duties, they instructed some slaves in their office, for which, by the wrath of the Divinity twelve families of them were destroyed in one night., who, at an age so advanced, knew not the names of the Divinities.
LYDUS
This dress of yours pleases me not.
125
PISTOCLERUS
But no one prepared it for you; it was prepared for myself, whom it pleases well.
125
LYDUS
And do you commence upon your repartees against myself even? You, who, if you had even ten tongues, ought to be silent.
PISTOCLERUS
Not every age, Lydus, is suited for schoolSuited for school: There is here a Paronomasia, or jingle upon the resemblance of the words Lyde, Lydus, and ludo, a school..
One thing especially is just now on my mind, how the cook may with due care attend to these things as befits the elegance of the entertainment.
130
LYDUS
Now have you undone yourself and me and all my labours, me who so oft have shown you what is right, all to no purpose.
PISTOCLERUS
In the same place have I lost my labour where you’ve lost yours: your instructions profit neither me nor yourself.
PISTOCLERUS
You are troublesome to me. Hold your tongue, Lydus, and follow me.
LYDUS
Now, see that, please; he no longer callsHe no longer calls: He is shocked at the want of respect shown to him by his pupil. me tutor, but mere Lydus.
PISTOCLERUS
It seems not proper, nor can it be fit, that,
when a person is in a house, and is reclining at the feast together with his mistress, and is kissing her, and the other guests are reclining too, the tutor should be there too in their presence.
140
LYDUS
Are these provisions purchased for such a purpose, pray?
