Book 2
8.80
A similar remark is ascribed to Ariston. For, he said, when Odysseus went down into the under-world, he saw nearly all the dead and made their acquaintance, but he never set eyes upon their queen herself.
8.80
Again, when Aristippus was asked what are the subjects which handsome boys ought to learn, his reply was, Those which will be useful to them when they are grown up. To the critic who censured him for leaving Socrates to go to Dionysius, his rejoinder was, Yes, but I came to Socrates for education and to Dionysius for recreation. When he had made some money by teaching, Socrates asked him, Where did you get so much? to which he replied, Where you got so little.
8.81
A courtesan having told him that she was with child by him, he replied, You are no more sure of this than if, after running through coarse rushes, you were to say you had been pricked by one in particular. Someone accused him of exposing his son as if it was not his offspring Whereupon he replied, Phlegm, too, and vermin we know to be of our own begetting, but for all that, because they are useless, we cast them as far from us as possible. He received a sum of money from Dionysius at the same time that Plato carried off a book and, when he was twitted with this, his reply was,, Well, I want money, Plato wants books. Some one asked him why he let himself be refuted by Dionysius. For the same reason, said he, as the others refute him.
