Marcus Tullius Cicero

“ Now allow yourself to be scolded, if you deserve it. For you say in the letter from Buthrotum, delivered to me by C. Decimus, that you think you will have to go to Asia. There did not, by Hercules, seem to me to be anything that made it matter in the least whether you did the business by agents or in person; or anything to make you go so often and so far from your friends. But I could have wished that I had urged this on you before you had taken any step. For I certainly should have had some influence on you. As things are, I will suppress the rest of my scolding. ”

“ I have added two young men, Q. Tubero and P. Rutilius, and the two sons-in-law of Laelius, Scaevola and Fannius. So I am thinking how (since I employ introductions to each book, as Aristotle does in what he calls his "Exoterics") to contrive some pretext for naming your friend in a natural way, as I understand is your wish. ”

“ In those books which you commend you complain of the absence of Scaevola among the speakers. Well, I did not withdraw him without a set purpose, but I did exactly what that god of our idolatry, Plato, did in his Republic. When Socrates had come to the Piraeus on a visit to Cephalus, a wealthy and cheerful old man, during all the introductory conversation the old man takes part in the discussion ”