(64) If a fool be associated with a wise man even all his life, he will perceive the truth as little as a spoon perceives the taste of soup.

(2) Whatever, therefore, he has in his mind, he bears on his tongue, to those who are worthy to hear, speaking as well as living from assent and inclination. For he both thinks and speaks the truth; unless at any time, medicinally, as a physician for the safety of the sick, he may deceive or tell an untruth, according to the Sophists.

(5) 'Fools dwelling in darkness, wise in their own conceit, and puffed up with vain knowledge, go round and round, staggering to and fro, like blind men led by the blind.'

(24) Though the Doctor, it may be, knows what the Tincture is, yet the Simple and Unlearned do not, who many Times (if they had the Art) have better Gifts and Understanding than the Doctor, therefore I write for those that seek; though indeed I hold, that neither the Doctor, nor the Alchemist, has the Ground of the Tincture, unless he be born again in the Spirit; such a One sees through all, whether he be learned or unlearned; with God the Peasant is as acceptable as the Doctor.

(63) The fool who knows his foolishness, is wise at least so far. But a fool who thinks himself wise, he is called a fool indeed.

(391) No man who down upon the earth and upon tables is wise.

(8) Fools dwelling in darkness, wise in their own conceit, and puffed up with vain knowledge, go round and round staggering to and fro, like blind men led by the blind.

(408) death, and for this reason he was struck by lightning. But we, in accordance with the principle already affirmed by us, will not believe them when they tell us both;—if he was the son of a god, we maintain that he was not avaricious; or, if he was avaricious, he was not the son of a god. All that, Socrates, is excellent; but I should like to put a question to you: Ought there not to be good physicians in a State, and are not the best those who have treated the greatest number of constitutions good and bad? and are not the best judges in like manner those who are acquainted with all sorts of moral natures? Yes, I said, I too would have good judges and good physicians. But do you know whom I think good? Will you tell me? I will, if I can. Let me however note that in the same question you join two things which are not the same. How so? he asked. Why, I said, you join physicians and judges. Now the most skilful physicians are those who, from their youth upwards, have combined with the knowledge of their art the greatest experience of disease; they had better not be robust in health, and should have had all manner of diseases in their own persons. For the body, as I conceive, is not the instrument with which they cure the body; in that case we could not allow them ever to be or to have been sickly; but they cure the body with the mind, and the mind which has become and is sick can cure nothing. That is very true, he said.

(69) Where is a man (who is) wise or powerful in intelligence, or a man whose devices are many because he knows wisdom? Let him speak wisdom; let him utter great boasting! For every man has become a fool and has spoken out of his (own) knowledge. For he (Christ) confounded the counsels of guileful people, and he prevailed over those wise in their own understanding.

(65) If an intelligent man be associated for one minute only with a wise man, he will soon perceive the truth, as the tongue perceives the taste of soup.

(8) They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. But go ye and learn what that meaneth. I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

(242) Cleverness is as a wind raising storms of pride; Be foolish, so that your heart may be at peace; Not with the folly that doubles itself by vain babble, But with that arising from bewilderment at "The Truth." Those Egyptian women who cut their hands were fools Fools as to their hands, being amazed at Yusuf's face. Make sacrifice of reason to love of "The Friend," Men of wisdom direct their reason heavenwards, Vain babblers halt on earth where no "Friend" is. If through bewilderment your reason quits your head,

(1) UNTO Jesus was brought one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb; and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.

(349) Nothing, he said, can be better than that statement. And the unjust is good and wise, and the just is neither? Good again, he said. And is not the unjust like the wise and good and the just unlike them? Of course, he said, he who is of a certain nature, is like those who are of a certain nature; he who is not, not. Each of them, I said, is such as his like is? Certainly, he replied. Very good, Thrasymachus, I said; and now to take the case of the arts: you would admit that one man is a musician and another not a musician? Yes. And which is wise and which is foolish? Clearly the musician is wise, and he who is not a musician is foolish. And he is good in as far as he is wise, and bad in as far as he is foolish? Yes. And you would say the same sort of thing of the physician? Yes. And do you think, my excellent friend, that a musician when he adjusts the lyre would desire or claim to exceed or go beyond a musician in the tightening and loosening the strings? I do not think that he would. But he would claim to exceed the non-musician? Of course. And what would you say of the physician? In prescribing meats and drinks would he wish to go beyond another physician or beyond the practice of medicine? He would not. But he would wish to go beyond the non-physician? Yes. And about knowledge and ignorance in general; see whether you think that any man who has knowledge ever would wish to have the choice of saying or doing more than another man who has knowledge. Would he not rather say or do the same as his like in the same case? That, I suppose, can hardly be denied. And what of the ignorant? would he not desire to have

(13) Then the tongue said to him: 'If I am the richest, thou art the richest.' The eye said to him: 'If I am the firm rest, thou art the firm rest 2.'

(23) For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.

(409) he cannot recognise an honest man, because he has no pattern of honesty in himself; at the same time, as the bad are more numerous than the good, and he meets with them oftener, he thinks himself, and is by others thought to be, rather wise than foolish. Most true, he said. Then the good and wise judge whom we are seeking is not this man, but the other; for vice cannot know virtue too, but a virtuous nature, educated by time, will acquire a knowledge both of virtue and vice: the virtuous, and not the vicious, man has wisdom—in my opinion. And in mine also. This is the sort of medicine, and this is the sort of law, which you will sanction in your state. They will minister to better natures, giving health both of soul and of body; but those who are diseased in their bodies they will leave to die, and the corrupt and incurable souls they will put an end to themselves. That is clearly the best thing both for the patients and for the State. And thus our youth, having been educated only in that simple music which, as we said, inspires temperance, will be reluctant to go to law. Clearly.

(23) My feeble wit conjured up vain imaginations." How can an infant on the road know the thoughts of men? How far its fancies are removed from true knowledge! The thoughts of infants run on the nurse and milk, Or on raisins or nuts, or on crying and wailing. The blind imitator is like a feeble infant, His preoccupation with obscure arguments and proofs His stock of lore, which is the salve of his eyes, Ah! man of imitation, come out of Bokhara! Then you will, behold another Bokhara within you, Though a footman may be swift of foot on land,

(9) And although I shall scarce be able to tell the Letters, in this so high a way, yet it i shall be so high, that many will have enough to learn in it all their Life long: He that supposes that he knows it very well, he has not yet learnt the first Letter of Paradise, for no Doctors are to be found on this Way in this School, but only Scholars [or Learners.]

(5) Those, then, are to be believed, who hold firmly to the truth. And we may broadly make use of this reply, and say to them, that physicians holding opposite opinions according to their own schools, yet equally in point of fact treat patients. Does one, then, who is ill in body and needing treatment, not have recourse to a physician, on account of the different schools in medicine?