Nigrinus

A Why, that isn’t drunkenness, it is sobriety and temperance! I should like to hear just what he said, if possible. It is far, very far from right, in my opinion, to be stingy with it, especially if the person who wants to hear is a friend and has the same interests.

B Cheer up, good soul! you spur a willing horse, as Homer says,[*](Iliad 8, 293.) and if you hadn’t got ahead of me, I myself should have begged you to listen to my tale, for I want to have you bear witness before the world that my madness has reason in it. Then, too,

I take pleasure in calling his words to mind frequently, and have already made it a regular exercise : even if nobody happens to be at hand, I repeat them to myself two or three times a day just the same.