The Scythian or Consul (16)

Well then, please teach me this first, how, right at the beginning, we can distinguish the best, the true philosophy, the one we must choose, leaving aside the others.

I will tell you. I saw that most people took to this one, so I guessed it was the best.

How many more Stoics are there than Epicureans or Platonists or Peripatetics? You obviously took a count of them as in a show of hands.

I didn’t count. I made an estimate.

So you are not prepared to teach me. You are cheating when you tell me you decide such a matter by guesswork and weight of numbers. You’re hiding the truth from me.

It wasn’t just that, Lycinus. I also heard everybody saying that the Epicureans were sensual and lovers of pleasure, that the Peripatetics loved riches and wrangling, and that the Platonists were puffed up and loved glory. But a lot of people said that the Stoics were manly and understood everything and that the man who went this way was the only king, the only rich man, the only wise man, and everything rolled into one.