The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [19]
30. Plousios asked, ‘Is it ever right to tell a lie?’ And Penicros answered, ‘In three cases lying is permissible: in war, in reconciling man to man, and in appeasing one’s spouse.
31. ‘And more generally, it has been well said that it does an injury to tell an untimely truth.’
32. Plousios said, ‘You are not a beggar but a wise man.’ And Penicros answered, ‘Indeed; for it is you who have been the beggar, asking wisdom from me.
33. ‘In life reason is the pilot, law is the light it steers by, wisdom is knowing that the law comes from nature; and reason is nature’s gift to man.
34. ‘Man has neither claws to fight with nor a furred pelt to abide the winter, but may rule the clawed and furred if he will.’
35. Plousios said, ‘For what you have taught me today, tell me what you would have as a reward.’
36. To which Penicros replied, ‘It is said of Diogenes the philosopher that when Emperor Alexander spoke to him as he lay in his barrel, offering him rewards, he answered, “Yes, you may reward me, by standing out of my sunlight.”
37. ‘But I will indeed accept a reward from you: allow me to build a hut in your forest, and to live there in peace.’
38. And Plousios, who that same day had ordered Penicros to be hanged for building a hut in his forest, granted him permission to live there ever afterwards.
39. Such is the recompense of wisdom.
Chapter 2
1. A man called Charicles, a scholar who lived in former times in the city of five gates and ten towers, told of a dream he once had,
2. In which he was woken from his afternoon sleep by a stranger carrying a basket of food,
3. Containing a round crusted loaf of bread, the white cheese of goat’s milk, bunches of sweet grapes, and a flask of wine, red as rubies.
4. The stranger invited him saying, ‘Come eat my bread and cheese, and drink the ruby-red wine with me, as if we were sons of the same mother.’
5. And the stranger carried a lit lamp, even though it was daylight and the sun cast its beams into every corner of the house.
6. Charicles pointed at the basket and asked the stranger, ‘What are these things, and why are you offering them to me?’
7. The stranger replied, ‘They are my wine, my bread and cheese, and my sweet grapes; come, eat with me, and drink, and we will be as if sons of the same mother.’
8. But Charicles said, ‘I cannot eat until I have washed my face and hands, because sleep still hangs heavily on me in this afternoon heat.’
9. ‘Wash,’ said the stranger, ‘if you will; then come eat my bread and grapes with me, and drink the ruby-red wine.’
10. So Charicles washed, and set himself down with the stranger, and began to eat;
11. And he ate some of the bread and cheese, and the grapes, but he declined to drink the wine.
12. ‘Why will you not taste my wine?’ asked the stranger. ‘It is from my own vineyard, and the grapes were crushed by my own feet.’
13. ‘I could not drink your wine,’ said Charicles, ‘or any wine. It blinds the eyes, robs the mind of wisdom and the body of strength, reveals the secrets of friends, and raises dissension between brothers.’
14. At this the stranger smiled. ‘Why do you blaspheme against wine,’ he said, ‘and believe these falsehoods about it?
15. ‘Wine brings joy; it chases away sorrow, strengthens the sentiments, makes hearts generous, prolongs pleasure, defers old age, and brings a shine to the face and brightness to the senses.
16. ‘Wine is life, and has the sweetness in it of the best of life; it takes the veils of everyday concerns from the eyes so that one can see life’s promises.’
17. ‘Well,’ Charicles said, ‘perhaps you are right; and after I have finished eating, and taken some water, I will try a little of your wine.’
18. So after Charicles finished eating, and had taken some water, he accepted a goblet from the stranger in which the ruby-red wine gleamed, and round the rim of which the small bubbles gathered.
19. But he did not put the goblet to his lips; he held it in his hand as if to