the habit of so doing, whether he
is prepared to argue that a man should pay more attention to the
cleanliness of his feet than to that of his teeth. Certainly, if like
you, Aemilianus, he never opens his mouth save to utter slander and
abuse, I should advise him to pay no attention to the state of his
mouth nor to attempt to remove the stains from his teeth with oriental
powders: he would be better employed in rubbing them with charcoal
from some funeral pyre. Least of all should he wash them with common
water; rather let his guilty tongue, the chosen servant of lies and
bitter words, rot in the filth and ordure that it loves! Is it
reasonable, wretch, that your tongue should be fresh and clean, when
your voice is foul and loathsome, or that, like the viper, you should
employ snow-white teeth for the emission of dark, deadly poison? On
the other hand it is only right that, just as we wash a vessel that is
to hold good liquor, he who knows that his words will be at once
useful and agreeable should cleanse his mouth as a prelude to speech.
But why should I speak further of man? Even the crocodile, the monster
of the Nile--so they tell me--opens his jaws in all innocence, that
his teeth may be cleaned. For his mouth being large, tongueless, and
continually open in the water, multitudes of leeches become entangled
in his teeth: these, when the crocodile emerges from the river and
opens his mouth, are removed by a friendly waterbird, which is allowed
to insert its beak without any risk to itself.

9. But enough of this! I now come to certain other of my verses, which
according to them are amatory; but so vilely and coarsely did they
read them as to leave no impression save one of disgust. Now what has
it to do with the malpractices of the black art, if I write poems in
praise of the boys of my friend Scribonius Laetus? Does the mere fact
of my being a poet make me a wizard? Who ever heard any orator produce
such likely ground for suspicion, such apt conjectures, such
close-reasoned argument? 'Apuleius has written verses!' If they are
bad, that is something against him _qua_ poet, but not _qua_
philosopher. If they be good, why do you accuse him? 'But they were
frivolous verses of an erotic character.' So that is the charge you
bring against me? and it was a mere slip of the tongue when you
indicted me for practising the black art? And yet many others have
written such verse, although you may be ignorant of the fact. Among