Stoics, cannot be expected to know the savour of other people's mouths.
Chrysippus, on the other hand, might say as much or more if I were to put
_him_ out of court and betake myself to Platonism, in reliance upon
some one who had conversed with Plato alone. And in a word, as long as it
is uncertain which is the true philosophic school, I choose none; choice
of one is insult to the rest.

_Her_. For Heaven's sake, Lycinus, let us leave Plato, Aristotle,
Epicurus, and the rest of them alone; to argue with them is not for me.
Why not just hold a private inquiry, you and I, whether philosophy is
what I say it is? As for the Ethiopians and Gelo's wife, what a long way
you have brought them on none of their business!

_Ly_. Away with them, then, if you find their company superfluous.
And now do you proceed; my expectations are high.

_Her_. Well, it seems to me perfectly possible, Lycinus, after
studying the Stoic doctrines alone, to get at the truth from them,
without going through a course of all the others too. Look at it this
way: if any one tells you simply, Twice two is four, need you go round
all the mathematicians to find out whether there is one who makes it
five, or seven; or would you know at once that the man was right?

_Ly_. Certainly I should.

_Her_. Then why should you think it impossible for a man who finds,
without going further, that the Stoics make true statements, to believe
them and dispense with further witness? He knows that four can never be
five, though ten thousand Platos or Pythagorases said it was.