Grym. So my relations have taught me!
Flex. Then may your excellence, my lord (mi domine), present some overwhelming proof of the right teaching of your relatives!
Gorg. You seem to me to sneer at this boy. He is not a common boy, so don’t treat him so!
Family Teaching
Grym. In the first place, they have taught me that I am of most honourable lineage, which yields to none in this province, and, on that account, I must take care diligently, and strive earnestly, not to degenerate from the rank of my ancestors; that they have won great honour to themselves by yielding to no one in position, dignity, authority, in name, and that I ought to do the same. If any one should wish to detract from that honour, immediately I must fight him. It behoves me to be lavish with money, and even profuse, but sparing and frugal in paying honour to others. That it behoves me, and those like me, by no means to rise up in the presence of others, nor to make way for them, nor to let them lead me, hither and thither, nor to bare the head or bow the knee to them; not as if any one could deserve to be shown such honours from me, but that so I shall conciliate to myself the favour of men, shall catch the breeze of popularity, and shall obtain that honour which we always so greatly have borne in men’s mouths and hearts! It is in this education that the difference exists between those who are nobles, and those who are not; since the noble has been rightly accustomed to be educated to excel in all these matters, whilst the common people (ignobiles), trained to rustic manners, in none of these things.
Flex. And what thinks your excellency, my lord, of such a method of education?
Grym. What indeed! Why, it is by far the highest, and worthy of my race.
Flex. What else then do you seek to learn from me?
Grym. In my opinion, nothing further would remain to be learned, had not my father hurried me hither to you. My father ordered me, or rather rigidly enjoined me, to come to you; so that if there was anything of a more hidden kind, and more sacred as if of mysteries, by which I might get more honour for myself, then that you might, as a favour to him, not feel it a burden to expound it, that thus our family, so honourable and exalted, may ascend still higher, since there are not a few new men who, relying on their opulence, have come to light, and seized upon dignities and honours so that they even dare to vie with the old standing and honours of our race.
Flex. Shameful thing!