Vitarum auctio

Pythagoras Next you will learn to count.

First Dealer I can do that already.

Pythagoras Let me hear you.

First Dealer One, two, three, four,—

Pythagoras There you are, you see. Four (as you call it) is ten. Four the perfect triangle. Four the oath of our school.

First Dealer Now by Four, most potent Four!—higher and holier mysteries than these I never heard.

Pythagoras Then you will learn of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water; their action, their movement, their shapes.

First Dealer Have Fire and Air and Water shapes?

Pythagoras Clearly. That cannot move which lacks shape and form. You will also find that God is a number; an intelligence; a harmony.

First Dealer You surprise me.;

Pythagoras

More than this, you have to learn that you yourself are § not the person you appear to be.

First Dealer What, I am some one else, not the I who am speaking to you?

Pythagoras You are that you now: but you have formerly inhabited another body, and borne another name. And in course of time you will change once more.

First Dealer Why then I shall be immortal, and take one shape after another?

But enough of this, And now what is your diet?

Pythagoras Of living things I eat none. All else I eat, except beans.

First Dealer And why no beans? Do you dislike them?

Pythagoras No. But they are sacred things. Their nature is a mystery. Consider them first in their generative aspect; take a green one and peel it, and you will see what I mean. Again, boil one and expose it to moonlight for a proper number of nights, and you have—blood. What is more, the Athenians use beans to vote with.

First Dealer Admirable! A very feast of reason. Now just strip, and let me see what you are like. Bless me, here is a creed with a golden thigh! He is no mortal, he is a God. I must have him at any price. What do you start him at?

Heraclitus Forty pounds.

First Dealer He is mine for forty pounds,

Zeus Take the gentleman’s name and address.

Heraclitus He must come from Italy, I should think; Croton or Tarentum, or one of the Greek towns in those parts. But he is not the only buyer. Some three hundred of them have clubbed together.

Zeus They are welcome to him. Now up with the next.