Give Him Threepence Since He Must

This anecdote was recorded by the Greek anthologist Stobaeus (c. 5th century AD), who attributed it to Euclid's response to a student who asked what benefit he would gain from studying geometry. Euclid reportedly instructed a slave to give the student a coin, "since he must make gain out of what he learns." The story illustrates Euclid's view that geometry was to be studied for its own intellectual worth, not for practical advantage — a philosophical position shared by Plato and the Academy tradition.