Even in times of great danger this characteristic shows itself. A good instance is his answer to the dangerous question of Tigellinus, “What think you of Nero?” “I think better of him than you do,” retorted Apollonius, “for you think he ought to sing, and I think he ought to keep silence” (iv. 44). So again his reproof to a young Crœsus of the period is as witty as it is wise. “Young sir,” he said, “methinks it is not you who own your house, but your house you” (v. 22). Of the same style also is his answer to a glutton who boasted of his gluttony. He copied Hercules, he said, who was as famous for the food he ate as for his labours. “Yes,” said Apollonius, “for he was Hercules. But _you_, what virtue have you, midden-heap? Your only claim to notice is your chance of being burst” (iv. 23). But to turn to more serious occasions. In answer to Vespasian’s earnest prayer, “Teach me what should a good king do,” Apollonius is said to have replied somewhat in the following words: “You ask me what can not be taught. For kingship is the greatest thing within a mortal’s reach; it is not taught. Yet will I tell you what if you will do, you will do well. Count not that wealth which is stored up--in what is this superior to the sand haphazard heaped? nor that which comes from men who groan beneath taxation’s heavy weight--for gold that comes from tears is base and black. You’ll use wealth best of any king, if you supply the needs of those in want and make their wealth secure for those with many goods. Be fearful of the power to do whate’er you please, so will you use it with more prudence. Do not lop off the ears of corn that show beyond the rest and raise their heads--for Aristotle is not just in this[116]--but rather weed their disaffection out like tares from corn, and show yourself a fear to stirrers up of strife not in ‘I punish you’ but in ‘I _will_ do so.’ Submit yourself to law, O prince, for you will make the laws with greater wisdom if you do not despise the law yourself. Pay reverence more than ever to the Gods; great are the gifts you have received from them, and for great things you pray.[117] In what concerns the state act as a king; in what concerns yourself, act as a private man” (v. 36). And so on much in the same strain, all good advice and showing a deep knowledge of human affairs. And if we are to suppose that this is merely a rhetorical exercise of Philostratus and not based on the substance of what Apollonius said, then we must have a higher opinion of the rhetorician than the rest of his writings warrant. There is an exceedingly interesting Socratic dialogue between Thespesion, the abbot of the Gymnosophist community, and Apollonius on the comparative merits of the Greek and Egyptian ways of representing the Gods. It runs somewhat as follows: