to us but not to the Scythians, or why the Carthaginians value leather
which is worthless to us, or the Lacedaemonians find wealth in iron and we
do not, can we not get an answer in some such way as this: Would an
Athenian, who had a thousand talents weight of the stones which lie about
in the Agora and which we do not employ for any purpose, be thought to be
any the richer?

ERASISTRATUS: He certainly would not appear so to me.

SOCRATES: But if he possessed a thousand talents weight of some precious
stone, we should say that he was very rich?

ERASISTRATUS: Of course.

SOCRATES: The reason is that the one is useless and the other useful?

ERASISTRATUS: Yes.

SOCRATES: And in the same way among the Scythians a house has no value
because they have no use for a house, nor would a Scythian set so much
store on the finest house in the world as on a leather coat, because he
could use the one and not the other. Or again, the Carthaginian coinage is
not wealth in our eyes, for we could not employ it, as we can silver, to
procure what we need, and therefore it is of no use to us.

ERASISTRATUS: True.

SOCRATES: What is useful to us, then, is wealth, and what is useless to us
is not wealth?