because it was all so unlike the life of the world, and yet was so
strangely like it. There was work going on there, I found, but the
nature of it I could not discern, because that was kept hidden from me.
Men and women excused themselves from our company, saying they must
return to their work; but most of the time was spent in leisurely
converse about things which I confess from the first did not interest
me. There was much wit and laughter, and there were constant games and
assemblies and amusements. There were feasts of delicious things, music,
dramas. There were books read and discussed; it was just like a very
cultivated and civilised society. But what struck me about the people
there was that it was all very restless and highly-strung, a perpetual
tasting of pleasures, which somehow never pleased. There were two people
there who interested me most. One was a very handsome and courteous
man, who seemed to desire my company, and spoke more freely than the
rest; the other a young man, who was very much occupied with the girl,
my companion, and made a great friendship with her. The elder of the
two, for I must give them names, shall be called Charmides, which seems
to correspond with his stately charm, and the younger may be known as
Lucius.

I sat one day with Charmides, listening to a great concert of stringed
and wind instruments, in a portico which gave on a large sheltered
garden. He was much absorbed in the music, which was now of a brisk and
measured beauty, and now of a sweet seriousness which had a very
luxurious effect upon my mind. "It is wonderful to me," said Charmides,
as the last movement drew to a close of liquid melody, "that these
sounds should pass into the heart like wine, heightening and uplifting
the thought--there is nothing so beautiful as the discrimination of
mood with which it affects one, weighing one delicate phrase against
another, and finding all so perfect."