1I will come to dinner, but I make this bargain here and now: let it be simple, let it be frugal, let it abound only in Socratic conversation, and let it keep moderation even in that. 2There will be calls to pay before dawn, and not even Cato could run into those with impunity, though Gaius Caesar rebukes him in such a way as to praise him. 3For he describes how those who met him, when they had uncovered the drunken man's head, blushed; 3then he adds: 'You would have thought that it was not Cato who had been caught out by them, but they by Cato.' 3Could more authority have been attributed to Cato than if even when drunk he was so venerable?
4Yet let our dinner have a limit in time, as in preparation and expense. 4For we are not the kind of men whom not even their enemies can censure without praising them at the same time. 4Farewell.