5.1
Again, among all the pleasures that prove too strong for many men, who can mention one to which Agesilaus yielded? Drunkenness, he thought, should be avoided like madness, overeating like idleness.μανίας and ἀργίας are adopted from the text of Athenaeus, who refers to this passage (p. 613 c). The MSS. of the Agesilaus have λαιμαργίας, gluttony, and ἁμαρτίας, error. Moreover, he received a double ration at the public meals, but instead of consuming both portions himself, he distributed both and left neither for himself, holding that the purpose of this double allowance to the king was not to provide him with a heavy meal, but to give him the opportunity of honouring whomsoever he would.
5.2
As for sleep,Xen. Const. Lac. 15.4; Xen. Cyrop. 8.2.4 it was not his master, but the servant of his activities; and unless he occupied the humblest bed among his comrades, he could not conceal his shame: for he thought that a ruler’s superiority over ordinary men should be shown not by weakness but by endurance.
5.3
There were things, to be sure, of which he was not ashamed to take more than his share — for instance, the summer’s heat and the winter’s cold:Xen. Cyrop. 1.4.25 and whenever his army was faced with a hard task, he toiled willingly beyond all others, believing that all such actions were an encouragement to the men. Not to labour the point, Agesilaus gloried in hard work, and showed a strong distaste for indolence.
