Advice About Keeping Well (1)

MOSCHION. So, Zeuxippus, yesterday you drove away Glaucus, the physician, when he wished to join in your philosophical discussions.

ZEUXIPPUS. No, my dear Moschion, I did not drive him away, nor did he wish to join in philosophical discussion, but I avoided him and feared giving an opening to a man fond of contention. In medicine the man is, as Homer [*] puts it, Worth many others together, but he is not kindly disposed towards philosophy, and there is always a certain harshness and ill-nature inherent in his remarks. And just then he was coming at us full tilt, crying out, even before he came near us, that it was no small or suitable task, amounting in fact to a confusion of all bounds, which had been boldly assumed by us in discussing a healthful manner of living. For he asserted that the subjects of philosophy and medicine are as far remote from each other as are the boundaries of any Mysians and Phrygians [*]; and thereupon, as he had at the tip of his tongue some statements of ours, which, though not very carefully formulated, are certainly not without utility, he proceeded to tear them to pieces.

MOSCHION. Well, in this and in other matters, Zeuxippus, I should be very glad to be your attentive listener.

ZEUXIPPUS. That is because you, Moschion, have a natural gift for philosophy, and you feel incensed at the philosopher who does not take an interest in medicine, and you are indignant that such a man should imagine it more becoming for him, in the eyes of mankind, to profess some knowledge of geometry, logical discussion, and music, than to desire to seek out and know

All that of evil and good may have chanced to betide in the dwelling [*]

which is his own body. And yet you will see a larger number of spectators in the theatres where money to pay for admission is distributed to those who gather together, as at Athens; and of the liberal arts medicine is inferior to none in elegance, distinction, and the satisfaction which it yields, and it gives to its students admission to something of very great importance — the preservation of their life and health. Consequently, the charge of trespass ought not to lie against philosophers if they discuss matters of health, but rather should they be blamed if they do not consider it their duty to abolish all boundarylines altogether, and to make a single field, as it were, of all honourable studies, and therein to cultivate them in common, thus aiming in their discussion at both the pleasant and the essential.

MOSCHION. Well, Zeuxippus, let us say no more about Glaucus, who is so self-important that he wants to be a law unto himself, needing no help from philosophy; but do you tell us in detail the whole discussion; or, if you prefer, just those statements [*] which you first referred to as not altogether carefully formulated, which you say Glaucus seized upon.