Hootsville could fairly claim to be listening to about the best man in his own line that old Athens could send them, and that would help them to see how Hootsville and Athens compared with one another (_applause_). He was reminded of a story about a negro, called Rastus....” ‘Well,’ said Agathon, ‘he told a long story about an Ethiopian, and sat down with laughter and applause.’ Agathon then read: ‘“The visitor, Mr. Socrates S. Socrates, was understood to say: ‘Men of Hootsville, if you will bear with a stupid and ignorant man (_laughter_) I would like to correct what I am falsely supposed to think concerning liberty. I am not one of those who think that the ideal state will grant an indiscriminate liberty. For the rulers must regard liberty with caution. For I do not complain that here there is authority and that liberty is restricted, for that is necessary, but that the authority is in the hands of men in no way worthy to hold it and that the restrictions are not imposed for right objects but to achieve the mistaken notions of those holding chief influence in the land. I would not question your carelessness of liberty if you were restraining bad and selfish men, and I would applaud you if I saw the majority taking steps against too much interest in commerce. For commerce can do no more than provide the basis for the good life, but is treated here as though it were the good life itself. Indeed, you put notices, Men of Hootsville, in your offices to discourage the conversation of your friends, writing up: ‘This is our busy day,’ and keeping up the notice for many days in succession; exhorting also your friends ‘Come to the point, but don’t camp on it,’ and these things hinder a friend from opening his soul. For there are many points upon which it is excellent to camp, and chief among them the nature of the good. ‘“‘I see everywhere around me refreshing signs of a growing interest in the Greeks on the part of the Americans. You have taken an extreme interest in the Olympic Games. Your young men love to band themselves into brotherhoods and fraternities named after the letters of our Greek alphabet, while older men band themselves together in a Klan with a Greek name, when they would reform the general polity. I very greatly hope, Men of Hootsville, that it is not true, as your critics allege, that you are so careless and ignorant of Greek things that to you anything Greek is mysterious, and that these associations desire only to suggest secrecy and bewilderment when they name themselves with Greek names. Now we Greeks rightly understand liberty, for liberty is of the seas and of the mountains, and Greece has both indeed but Iowa neither. And your need in Iowa is for more Greeks to teach you (_vigorous dissent_).