ed: But, sir, I
perceive you design to have an airy skirmish with these images, and
try the excellence of this old opinion, as you would a picture, by your
nail. And Autobulus replied: Pray, sir, do not endeavor to cheat us any
longer; for we know very well that you, designing to make Aristotle's
opinion appear the better, have used this of Democritus only as its
shade. Therefore I shall pass by that, and impugn Aristotle's opinion,
which unjustly lays the blame on the new fruit. For both the summer and
the early autumn witness in its favor, when, as Antimachus says, the
fruit is most fresh and juicy; for then, though we eat the new fruit,
yet our dreams are not so vain as at other times. And the months when
the leaves fall, being next to winter, so concoct the corn and remaining
fruit, that they grow shrivelled and less, and lose all their brisk
agitating spirit. As for new wine, those that drink it soonest forbear
till February, which is after winter; and the day on which we begin
we call the day of the Good Genius, and the Athenians the day of
cask-opening. For whilst wine is working, we see that even common,
laborers will not venture on it. Therefore no more accusing the gifts of
the gods, let us seek after another cause of vain dreams, to which
the name of the season will direct us. For it is called LEAF-SHEDDING,
because the leaves then fall off by reason of their dryness and
coldness; except the leaves of hot and oily trees, as of the olive, the
laurel, or the palm; or of the moist, as of the myrtle and the ivy. But
the temperature of these preserves them, though not others; because in
others the vicious humor that holds the leaves is constipated by the
cold, or being weak and little is dried up. Now moisture and heat are
necessary for the growth and preservation of plants, but especially of
animals; and on the contrary, coldness and dryness are very noxious
to both. And therefore Homer elegantly calls men moist and juicy:
to rejoice he calls to be warmed; and anything that is grievous and
frightful he calls cold and icy. Besides, the words [Greek omitted] and
[Greek omitted] are applied to the dead, those names intimating their
extreme dryness. But more, our blood, the principal thing in our whole
body, is moist and hot. And old age hath neither of those two qualities.
Now the autumn seems to be as it were the old age of the decaying
year; for the moisture doth not yet fall, and the heat decays. And
its inclining