Such was the delicate nature of Aristippus, who groped after error by touch. He is said to have ordered a partridge to be bought at a cost of fifty drachmae, and, when someone censured him, he inquired, “‘ Would not you have given an obol for it? ’ and, being answered in the affirmative, rejoined, “ Fifty drachmae are no more to me.” And when Dionysius gave him his choice of three courtesans, he carried off all three, saying, “ Paris paid dearly for giving the preference to one out of three.” And when he had brought them as far as the porch, he let them go. To such lengths did he go both in choosing and in disdaining. Hence the remark of Strato, or by some accounts of Plato, “You alone are endowed with the gift to flaunt in robes or go in rags.’’ He bore with Dionysius when he spat on him, and to one who took him to task he replied, “ If the fishermen let themselves be drenched with sea-water in order to catch a gudgeon, ought I not to endure to be wetted with negus in order to take a blenny ?”’ Diogenes, washing the dirt from his vegetables, saw him passing and jeered at him in these terms, “If you had learnt to make these your diet, you would not have paid court to kings,’’ to which his rejoinder was, “ And if you knew how to associate with men, you would not be washing vegetables.” Being asked what he had gained from philosophy, he replied, “The ability to feel at ease in any society.” Being reproached for his extravagance, he said, “If it were wrong to be extravagant, it would not be in vogue at the festivals of the gods.”