"I believe they know how to make all of them." "What are you then afraid
of," added Socrates? "Why do you complain of poverty, since you know how
to get rich? Do not you observe how wealthy Nausicides is become, what
numerous herds he is master of, and what vast sums he lends the Republic?
Now what made this man so rich? Why, nothing but one of those
manufactures we mentioned, that of making oatmeal. You see, too, that
Cirthes keeps all his family, and lives at his ease upon what he has got
by being a baker. And how doth Demeas, of the village of Colyttus, get
his livelihood? By making cassocks. What makes Menon live so
comfortably? His cloak manufacture. And are not most of the inhabitants
of Megara in good circumstances enough by the trade which they drive of
coats and short jackets?" "I grant all this," said Aristarchus, "but
still there is a difference betwixt these persons and me: for, whereas,
they have with them some barbarians whom they have bought, and compel to
work what brings them in gain; I, for my part, keep only ladies and
gentlemen at my house, persons who are free, and some of them my own
relations. Now would you have me to set them to work?" "And because
they are free and your relations," said Socrates, "do you think they
ought to do nothing but eat and sleep? Do you observe that they, who
live thus idle and at their ease, lead more comfortable lives than
others? Do you think them more content, more cheerful, that is to say,
more happy than those who employ themselves in any of those manufactures
we have mentioned, or in whatever else tends to the utility or
convenience of life? Do you imagine that idleness and laziness
contribute toward our learning things necessary; that they can enable us
to retain those things we have already learnt; that they help to
strengthen the body or keep it in health; that they can assist us to get
riches, or keep what we have got already; and do you believe that labour
and industry are good for nothing? Why did your ladies learn what you
say they know. Did they believe them to be useless things, and had they