Apophthegmata Laconica

When someone inquired of him how they could become able to conquer the Thracians, he said, If we should make the best man our general.

When a physician paid him a visit and said, You have nothing wrong with you, he said, No, for I do not employ you as my physician.

When one of his friends blamed him because he spoke ill of a certain physician, although he had never had anything to do with him, and had not suffered any harm at his hands, he said, Because if I had ever had anything to do with him I should not now be alive.

When the physician said to him, You have lived to be an old man, he said, That is because I never employed you as my physician.