Cicero,
On Divination 2.24.51 (tr. W.A. Falconer):
But indeed, that was quite a clever remark which Cato made many years ago: "I wonder," said he, "that a soothsayer doesn't laugh when he sees another soothsayer."
vetus autem illud Catonis admodum scitum est, qui mirari se aiebat quod non rideret haruspex haruspicem cum vidisset.
Arthur Stanley Pease ad loc.:
For the remark cf. N.D. 1, 71:
mirabile videtur quod non rideat haruspex
cum haruspicem viderit (where the lack
of ascription to Cato may indicate that
the remark had become more or less
proverbial). Similarly Diogenes the
Cynic, according to Diog. 1. 6, 24: ὅταν (sc. ἴδῃ) ... ὀνειροκρίτας καὶ μάντεις καὶ τοὺς προσέχοντας τούτοις ... οὐδὲν ματαιότερον νομίζειν ἀνθρώπου; Voltaire, Essai sur
les Moeurs, 31: "Mais qui fut celui qui
inventa cet art (i.e., divination)? Ce fut
le premier fripon qui rencontra un imbécile."
Jean-Léon Gérome, Les deux augures
