But even if he kept silence, I am not going to do so. For I know that if one passes over the Hippocratic view and makes some other pronouncement about the function of the kidneys, one cannot fail to make oneself utterly ridiculous. It was for this reason that Erasistratus kept silence and Asclepiades lied; they are like slaves who have had plenty to say in the early part of their career, and have managed by excessive rascality to escape many and frequent accusations, but who, later, when caught in the act of thieving, cannot find any excuse; the more modest one then keeps silence, as though thunderstruck, whilst the more shameless continues to hide the missing article beneath his arm and denies on oath that he has ever seen it. For it was in this way also that Asclepiades, when all subtle excuses had failed him and there was no longer any room for nonsense about "conveyance towards the rarefied part [of the air],"[156] and when it was impossible without incurring the greatest derision to say that this superfluity [_i.e._ the urine] is generated by the kidneys as is bile by the canals in the liver--he, then, I say, clearly lied when he swore that the urine does not reach the kidneys, and maintained that it passes, in the form of vapour, straight from the region of the vena cava,[157] to collect in the bladder. Like slaves, then, caught in the act of stealing, these two are quite bewildered, and while the one says nothing, the other indulges in shameless lying. XVI Erasistratos d' ouk oid' hopôs heterais men tisi doxais euêthesin anteipe dia makrôn, hyperebê de teleôs tên Hippokratous, oud' achri tou mnêmoneusai monon autês, hôs en tois peri kataposeôs epoiêsen, axiôsas. en ekeinois men gar achri tosoutou phainetai mnêmoneuôn, hôs tounom' eipein tês holkês monon hôde pôs graphôn; "Holkê men oun tês koilias oudemia phainetai einai"; peri de tês || anadoseôs ton logon poioumenos oud' achri 61 syllabês mias emnêmoneuse tês Hippokrateiou doxês. kaitoi g' epêrkesen an hêmin, ei kai tout' egrapse monon, hôs Hippokratês eipôn "Sarkes holkoi kai ek koiliês kai exôthen" pseudetai; oute gar ek tês koilias out' exôthen helkein dynantai. ei de kai hoti mêtras aitiômenos arrhôston auchena kakôs eipen "Ou gar dynatai auteês ho stomachos eirysai tên gonên," ê ei kai ti toiouton allo graphein ho Erasistratos êxiôse, tot' an kai hêmeis pros auton apologoumenoi eipomen;