134
The same applied to food, he admitted. Then I went on and tried to compel him also to admit that everything else connected with the body when most beneficial, was the moderate thing, not the much or the little; and he admitted that it was the moderate thing.
134
And now, I said, as regards the soul; are moderate or immoderate things beneficial, as adjuncts of it?
134
Moderate things, he replied.
134
And are studies among the adjuncts of the soul?
134
He admitted they were.
134
So among these also it is the moderate that are beneficial, and not the much?
134
He agreed.
134
Then whom should we be justified in asking what sort of exercise or food is moderate for the body?
134
The three of us agreed that it must be a doctor or a trainer. And whom should we ask about the moderate measure in the sowing of seed?
134
In that matter, we agreed, it must be a farmer.
134
And whom should we be justified in asking as to the moderate degree and kind, in regard to the sowing and planting of studies in the soul?
135
At this point we all began to be full of perplexity; then I, mocking at them, asked: Do you mind, since we are in perplexity, if we ask these boys here? or perhaps we are ashamed, as Homer Od. xxi. 285 foll., where the suitors of Penelope are ashamed, after they have failed to string the great bow of Odysseus, to let its owner, disguised as a beggar, try his strength on it, and perhaps succeed. said the suitors were, and do not think it fit there should be someone else who will string the bow?
