LYCINUS
Be brave now and keep cheerful. Look to the end of the journey and the happiness up there, especially since he is as keen as you are. But when does he suggest you may hope to come up? Did he suggest next year to reach the top—after the other Mysteries, say, or the Panathenaea?
Be brave now and keep cheerful. Look to the end of the journey and the happiness up there, especially since he is as keen as you are. But when does he suggest you may hope to come up? Did he suggest next year to reach the top—after the other Mysteries, say, or the Panathenaea?
HERMOTIMUS
Too soon, Lycinus.
Too soon, Lycinus.
LYCINUS
Next Olympiad, then?
Next Olympiad, then?
HERMOTIMUS
Too soon again for a training in virtue and the winning of happiness.
Too soon again for a training in virtue and the winning of happiness.
LYCINUS
After two Olympiads, surely? Or shall we accuse you of excessive sloth, if you cannot succeed even in all that time? You could easily make three journeys from Gibraltar to India and back in that time, even if you did not go straight without breaking your journey, but made excursions occasionally to visit the nations on the way. But this summit where your Virtue lives—how much higher and smoother are we to put it than Aornos which Alexander stormed in a few days?
After two Olympiads, surely? Or shall we accuse you of excessive sloth, if you cannot succeed even in all that time? You could easily make three journeys from Gibraltar to India and back in that time, even if you did not go straight without breaking your journey, but made excursions occasionally to visit the nations on the way. But this summit where your Virtue lives—how much higher and smoother are we to put it than Aornos which Alexander stormed in a few days?
Hermotimus. Lucian of Samosata. Kenneth Kilburn (Translator). Medford, MA. Perseus 5.0.
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