Amyn. Do I talk nonsense, if I wish to recover my money?
Strep. You can't be in your senses yourself.
Amyn. Why, pray?
Strep. You appear to me to have had your brains shaken as it were.[1]
Amyn. And you appear to me, by Hermes, to be going to be summoned, if you will not pay me the money.[2]
Strep. Tell me now, whether do you think that Jupiter always rains fresh rain on each occasion, or that the sun draws from below the same water back again?
Amyn. I know not which; nor do I care.
Strep. How then is it just that you should recover your money, if you know nothing of meteorological matters?
Amyn. Well, if you are in want, pay me the interest of my money.
Strep. What sort of animal is this interest?[3]
Amyn. Most assuredly the money is always becoming more[4] and more every month and every day as the time slips away.
Strep. You say well. What then? Is it possible[5] that you consider the sea to be greater now than formerly?
Pas. No, by Jupiter, but equal: for it is not fitting that it should be greater.
Strep. And how then, you wretch,[6] does this become no way greater, though the rivers flow into it, while you seek to increase your money?—Will you not take yourself off from my house? Bring me the goad. [Enter servant with a goad.]
- ↑ "Gleichsam ein Erdstoss, will mich bedünken, traf's Gehirn." Droysen.
- ↑ "He does not actually summon him, because he has no "bailiff" with him, and therefore the notice would not hold good in law." Walsh.
- ↑ "What sort of animal is this same interest?" Walsh.
"Was ist das für ein Geschöpf?" Droysen.
- ↑ "Nun, Lieber, dass mit jedem Monat, jedem Tag
Die Summe Geldes gross und immer grösser wird,
Je lang und längere Zeit verfliesst." Droysen.Comp. note on vs. 1448.
- ↑ Comp. vs. 1345.
- ↑ "Oh thou miser!
That would'st stint the ocean, and vet cram
Thy swelling coffers till they overflow." Cumberland.
ἀπὸ νοῦ, it will be from your senses. ἀπ᾽ ὄνου πεσὼν is said proverbially of an unskilful man, who cannot even sit an ass." Bergler.
