The Scythian or Consul (62)

But I want to tell you another, similar thing, about sampling philosophy, and do not think that I am being blasphemous about it if I say that it is like a deadly poison—hemlock, for example, or aconite, or some other such. Not even they, deadly though they are, will kill, if you scrape off a tiny piece with the tip of your nail and taste that. No, if the quantity, method of consumption, and mixture are wrong, you can take it and not die. You claimed, however, that the tiniest piece was quite enough to give you a complete knowledge of what the whole was like.