Si non tanta quies iret frigusque caloremque
Inter, et exciperet caeli indulgentia terras.[50]
Georgics, ii. 336–336.
Bell. I have not quite followed it.
Mal. And I still less, as I think.
Joan. Learn the verses thoroughly, or you won’t understand them, for they are taken from the depths of philosophy, as are very many others of that poet.
Mal. We will question the schoolmaster Orbilius about them, for here he is coming to meet us.
The Mind
Joan. He is by no means the man to meet the difficulty. Let us just salute him and let him go his way, for he is a fierce man, fond of flogging (plagosus), imbued with a vast haughtiness, instead of being learned in literature, although he has seriously persuaded himself that he is the Alpha of learned teachers. Moreover, we have only spoken of the body. How greatly are the soul and mind exhilarated and aroused by such an early morning as this! There is no time so suitable for good learning, for observing things, and for attentively listening to what is said, and whatever you read; nor is it otherwise with reflection and with thinking a problem out, whatever it may be. You can give your mind to it. Not undeservedly has it been said: “The dawn (Aurora) is most pleasing to the Muses.”
Bell. But let me tell you I’m famishing with hunger. Let us get back home to breakfast.