(When I take all this into account, I do indeed congratulate you on your good fortune, though I do not reproach myself. For perhaps it is some god who has made me prefer my own ways. Be assured then that I have no grievance against those who quarrel with my way of life and my choice. But I myself add, as far as I can, to the sarcasms against myself and with a more liberal hand I pour down on my own head these abusive charges. For it was due to my own folly that I did not understand what has been the temper of this city from the beginning; and that too though I am convinced that I have turned over quite as many books as any man of my own age. You know of course the tale that is told about the king who gave his name to this city—or rather whose name the city received when it was colonised, for it was founded by Seleucus, though it takes its name from the son(717) of Seleucus—; they say(718) then that out of excessive softness and luxury the latter was constantly falling in love and being loved, and finally he conceived a dishonourable passion for his own step‐mother. And though he wished to conceal his condition he could not, and little by little his body began to waste away and to become transparent, and his powers to wane, and his breathing was feebler than usual. But what could be the matter with him was, I think, a sort of riddle, since his malady had no visible cause, or rather it did not even appear what was its nature, though the youth’s weakness was manifest. Then the physician of Samos(719) was set a difficult problem, namely to discover what was the nature of the malady. Now he, suspecting from the words of Homer(720) what is the nature of “cares that devour the limbs,” and that in many cases it is not a bodily weakness but an infirmity of soul that causes a wasting of the body; and seeing moreover that the youth was very susceptible to love because of his time of life and his habits, he took the following way of tracking down the disease. He sat near the youth’s couch and watched his face, after ordering handsome youths and women to walk past him, beginning with the queen(721) herself. Now when she entered, apparently to see how he was, the young man at once began to show the symptoms of his malady. He breathed like one who is being choked; for though he was very anxious to control his agitated breathing, he could not, but it became disordered, and a deep blush spread over his face. The physician on seeing this laid his hand to his breast, and found that his heart was beating terribly fast and was trying to burst forth from his breast. Such were his symptoms while she was present; but when she had gone away and others came in he remained calm and was like a man in a normal state of health. Then Erasistratus saw what ailed him and told the king, and he out of love for his son said that he would give up his wife to him. Now the youth for the moment refused; but when his father died not long after, he sought with