Miscellanies 2.20.107

That is why the tragic poets, mocking him, cried out in reproach: “But you, when you saw her breast, threw away your sword and received her kiss, fawning on the traitorous bitch.” And again: “Have swords been blunted by beauty?” And I approve of Antisthenes, who said, “I would shoot Aphrodite if I could catch her, because she has corrupted many of our good and noble women.” And he says that love is a vice of nature; those overcome by it, the wretched, call the disease a god. For by these words it is shown that the more ignorant are overcome through ignorance by pleasure, which must not be admitted, even if it is called a god, that is, even if it has been given by God for the need of begetting children. And Xenophon, plainly calling pleasure vice, says: “Wretched one, what good do you know, or what noble thing do you consider? You who do not even wait for the desire for pleasant things, eating before you are hungry and drinking before you are thirsty; and to eat with pleasure you contrive cooks, and to drink with pleasure you provide costly wines and run about seeking snow in summer; and to sleep with pleasure you provide not only soft beds but also supports for the beds.”