Diogenes on the Folly of Feasting

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Bacchus (1597)

Luxurious foods and drinks… in no way produce freedom from harm and a healthy condition in the flesh. One must regard wealth beyond what is natural as of no more use than water to a container that is full to overflowing. Real value is generated not by theatres and baths and perfumes and ointments… but by natural science.

–Diogenes of Oinoanda, The Epicurean Inscriptions of Oinoanda frag. 109 (ca. 120 CE)(M. F. Smith transl. 1993)