The Instructor 2.1.18

They say too that children's bodies grow well and increase in height when their food is scanty; for the breath that runs up into growth is not hindered by much food blocking the free passage of its course. So Plato, the philosopher who most zealously sought the truth, kindling the spark of Hebrew philosophy, condemning the luxurious life, says: “When I came, the life called happy there, full of Italian and Syracusan tables, did not please me at all: to live filling oneself twice a day and never sleeping alone at night, and all the practices that go with this life. For from these no one under heaven could ever become wise, practicing such things from youth, nor will he be blended with so wonderful a nature.” For Plato was not unacquainted with David, who, setting up the holy ark in his city in the middle of the tent, made merry with all the people under him, and “before the Lord distributed to all the host of Israel, from man to woman, to each a loaf of bread, a cake baked on the hearth, and a pancake from the pan.” This was sufficient food, the food of Israel; the food of the nations is excessive. The one who uses it “would never even be likely to become self-controlled,” having buried his mind in his belly, very like the fish called the ass, which alone of all animals, Aristotle says, has its heart in its stomach. Epicharmus the comic poet calls it “belly-turned.” Such are the people who have put their faith in the belly, “whose god is the belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.” For them the apostle foretold no good, saying, “whose end is destruction.”