For who can deem Dionysius to have accomplished a greater thing, when by the greatest exertion he snatched their liberties from the citizens, than Archimedes his countryman, who appearing to be occupied in nothing, produced this sphere of which we were but now conversing? Are they not more alone, who find no one in the forum or in the crowd who chooses to talk with them, than those who without any witness can converse with themselves; or as it were, be present at the councils of the most learned men, when they solace themselves with their discoveries and writings? Who in truth can imagine any one to be more rich, than the man who has no wants, beyond the simple calls of nature; or more powerful than him, who has attained the possession of al that he desires; or more blessed than him who is freed from all anxiety of mind? or what man’s fortune is better established than his, who can carry along with him, or out of a shipwreck as men are wont to say, all his possessions? What command, what office, what kingdom can be preferred to that condition of mind, which looking down upon all things human, and esteeming them to be the objects of an inferior wisdom, turns ever to the contemplation of those things that are divine and eternal: persuaded that they only deserve to be called men, who are refined by the sciences of humanity? That which has been said of Plato, or of some other sage, appears to me therefore very excellent. Who being borne by a tempest to unknown lands, and cast on a desert shore, while his companions were apprehensive on account of their ignorance of the place, is said to have perceived geometrical figures described on the sand. Which when he saw, he bade them all be of good heart, for he had seen vestiges of men. Not that he judged so from the cultivation of the fields which he beheld, but from these indications of science. For all these reasons, Tubero, learning, and learned men, and these thy studies have always been pleasing to me. XVIII. Then said Lælius, “I am not bold enough, Scipio, to speak of these things: nor even to thee, or Philus, or Manilius * * * * * [Two pages wanting] * * * * in his paternal house we have had a friend, worthy to be imitated by him. “Ælius Sextus, conspicuously discreet and wise.” That he was conspicuously discreet and wise, is said by Ennius, not because he sought after what he was not able to discover, but because he answered those who made inquiries of him, in a manner to solve their difficulties and anxieties, in whose mouth when arguing against the studies of Gallus, were always these words of Achilles, in Iphigenia. “Astrology, its signs; how are they read in heaven? When goat or scorpion, or ferocious names arise, The obvious earth is shunned, to scrutinize the skies.”