[135]
The subjects of conversation are usually affairs of
the home or politics or the practice of the professions
[p. 139]
and learning. Accordingly, if the talk begins to
drift off to other channels, pains should be taken to
bring it back again to the matter in hand—but with
due consideration to the company present; for we
are not all interested in the same things at all times
or in the same degree. We must observe, too, how
far the conversation is agreeable and, as it had a
reason for its beginning, so there should be a point
at which to close it tactfully.
M. Tullius Cicero. De Officiis. With An English Translation. Walter Miller. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1913.
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