Pythagoras.—In Egypt, among the wise men there.
Customer.—Suppose I buy you, now, what will you teach me?
Pythagoras.—I will teach you nothing—only recall things to your memory.
Customer.—How will you do that?
Pythagoras.—First, I will clean out your mind, and wash out all the rubbish.
Customer.—Well, suppose that done, how do you proceed to refresh the memory?
Pythagoras.—First, by long repose and silence, speaking no word for five whole years.
Customer.—Why, look ye, my good fellow, you’d best go teach the dumb son of Crœsus! I want to talk and not be a dummy. Well—but after this silence, and these five years?
Pythagoras.—You shall learn music and geometry.
Customer.—A queer idea, that one must be a fiddler before one can be a wise man!