The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 1 (of 3)Athenaeus, of Naucratis
General
The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 1 (of 3)
Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Civilization, Greco-Roman; Dinners and dining -- Greece; Greece -- Social life and customs; Homosexuality -- Greece
22. But Aristotle, in his book on Drunkenness, says, that some men who
have been fond of salt meat have yet not had their thirst stimulated by
it; of whom Archonides the Argive was one. And Mago the Carthaginian
passed three times through the African desert eating dry meal and never
drinking. And Polemo the Academic philosopher, from the time that he
was thirty years of age to the day of his death, never drank anything
but water, as is related by Antigonus the Carystian. And Demetrius the
Scepsian says that Diocles of Peparethus drank cold water to the day of
his death. And Demosthenes the orator, who may well be admitted as a
witness in his own case, says that he drank nothing but water for a
considerable length of time. And Pytheas says, "But you see the
demagogues of the present day, Demosthenes and Demades, how very
differently they live. For the one is a water-drinker, and devotes his
nights to contemplation, as they say; and the other is a debauchee, and
is drunk every day, and comes like a great potbellied fellow, as he is,
into our assemblies." And Euphorion the Chalcidean writes in this
way:--"Lasyrtas the Lasionian never required drink as other men do, and
still it did not make him different from other men. And many men, out of
curiosity, were careful to watch him, but they desisted before they
ascertained what was the truth. For they continued watching him for
thirty days together in the summer season, and they saw that he never
abstained from salt meat, and yet that, though drinking nothing, he
seemed to have no complaint in his bladder. And so they believed that he
spoke the truth. And he did, indeed, sometimes take drink, but still he
did not require it.
A change of meat is often good,
And men, when tired of common food,
Redoubled pleasure often feel,
When sitting at a novel meal.
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