“Cum ob hanc offensam praeclusissem mihi aditum, quem feceram, iterum ad licentiam redii.  Interpositis enim paucis diebus, cum similis casus nos in eandem fortunam rettulisset, ut intellexi stertere patrem, rogare coepi ephebum, ut reverteretur in gratiam mecum, id est ut pateretur satis fieri sibi, et cetera quae libido distenta dictat.  At ille plane iratus nihil aliud dicebat nisi hoc:  ’aut dormi, aut ego iam dicam patri.’  Nihil est tam arduum, quod non improbitas extorqueat.  Dum dicit:  ‘patrem excitabo,’ irrepsi tamen et male repugnanti gaudium extorsi.  At ille non indelectatus nequitia mea, postquam diu questus est deceptum se et derisum traductumque inter condiscipulos, quibus iactasset censum meum, ‘videris tamen’ inquit ‘non ero tui similis.  Si quid vis, fac iterum.’  Ego vero deposita omni offensa cum puero in gratiam redii ususque beneficio eius in somnum delapsus sum.  Sed non fuit contentus iteratione ephebus planae maturitatis et annis ad patiendum gestientibus.  Itaque excitavit me sopitum et ‘numquid vis?’ inquit.  Et non plane iam molestum erat munus.  Utcunque igitur inter anhelitus sudoresque tritus, quod voluerat, accepit, rursusque in somnum decidi gaudio lassus.  Interposita minus hora pungere me manu coepit et dicere:  ’quare non facimus?’ tum ego totiens excitatus plane vehementer excandui et reddidi illi voces suas:  ‘aut dormi, aut ego iam patri dicam.’”

This discourse diverting my grief, I began to question the old gentleman about the antiquity of some pieces, the stories of others I was not acquainted with, the reason why this age don’t come up to the former, and why the most excellent arts are lost, of which painting has not left the least sign of its being?  “Our love of riches,” reply’d he, “has been the only occasion:  for in old time, when virtue was admir’d for its own sake, all liberal arts flourisht, and the only emulation among men, was to make discoveries that might profit the age.  ’Twas in those times Democritus, content with poverty, found out the vertue of most herbs; and lest there might be any hidden excellence in stones and trees, spent the rest of his life in experiments about them:  ’Twas then Eudoxus abandon’d the world, to live on the top of a high mountain, to discover the motions of the heavens and Crisippus, the better to qualify his mind for invention, went thrice through a course of physick.

“But to return to imagery, Lysippus with that diligence imploy’d himself about one statue, that, neglecting his living, he dyed, for want:  and Myron, whose brazen images of men and beasts, you might have mistaken for living ones, dy’d very poor:  but our age is so wholly devoted to drinking and whoring, we’re so far from inventing, that we don’t acquaint our selves even with those arts that are found to our hands:  But, accusing antiquity, our schools become seminaries of vice only:  what’s our logick?  How little do we know of astronomy?  Where’s our philosopher?