_Leontion._ In youth it makes us uglier, as not appertaining to it: a little more or less ugliness in decrepitude is hardly worth considering, there being quite enough of it from other quarters: I would stop it here, however. _Ternissa._ Oh, what a thing is age! _Leontion._ Death without death's quiet. _Ternissa._ Leontion said that even bad writers may amuse our idle hours: alas! even good ones do not much amuse mine, unless they record an action of love or generosity. As for the graver, why cannot they come among us and teach us, just as you do? _Epicurus._ Would you wish it? _Ternissa._ No, no! I do not want them: only I was imagining how pleasant it is to converse as we are doing, and how sorry I should be to pore over a book instead of it. Books always make me sigh, and think about other things. Why do you laugh, Leontion? _Epicurus._ She was mistaken in saying bad authors may amuse our idleness. Leontion knows not then how sweet and sacred idleness is. _Leontion._ To render it sweet and sacred, the heart must have a little garden of its own, with its umbrage and fountains and perennial flowers--a careless company! Sleep is called sacred as well as sweet by Homer; and idleness is but a step from it. The idleness of the wise and virtuous should be both, it being the repose and refreshment necessary for past exertions and for future; it punishes the bad man, it rewards the good; the deities enjoy it, and Epicurus praises it. I was indeed wrong in my remark; for we should never seek amusement in the foibles of another, never in coarse language, never in low thoughts. When the mind loses its feeling for elegance, it grows corrupt and grovelling, and seeks in the crowd what ought to be found at home. _Epicurus._ Aspasia believed so, and bequeathed to Leontion, with every other gift that Nature had bestowed upon her, the power of delivering her oracles from diviner lips. _Leontion._ Fie! Epicurus! It is well you hide my face for me with your hand. Now take it away; we cannot walk in this manner. _Epicurus._ No word could ever fall from you without its weight; no breath from you ought to lose itself in the common air. _Leontion._ For shame! What would you have? _Ternissa._ He knows not what he would have nor what he would say. I must sit down again. I declare I scarcely understand a single syllable. Well, he is very good, to tease you no longer. Epicurus has an excellent heart; he would give pain to no one; least of all to you. _Leontion,_ I have pained him by this foolish book, and he would only assure me that he does not for a moment bear me malice. Take the volume; take it, Epicurus! tear it in pieces. _Epicurus._ No, Leontion! I shall often look with pleasure on this trophy of brave humanity; let me kiss the hand that raises it! _Ternissa._ I am tired of sitting: I am quite stiff: when shall we walk homeward? _Epicurus._ Take my arm, Ternissa!