How we cite our quotes: (Chapter, Paragraph)
Quote #1
"—tell me, was not that humor, of Diogenes, which led him to live, a merry-andrew, in the flower-market, better than that of the less wise Athenian, which made him a skulking scare-crow in pine-barrens? An injudicious gentleman, Lord Timon." (24, 56)
Name-drop time: who exactly is Diogenes? Glad you asked. He's a cynic from classical Greece who wasn't too impressed with society or its leaders, people like Alexander the Great. His claim to fame? He hung out in a tub in his birthday suit in public making a ruckus.
So why's Diogenes brought up here? Well, Frank is trying to get Pitch to party—you know, be the opposite of a misanthrope. In order to do that, he says that if Pitch is going to be a grumpus, then it's better to be a grumpus like Diogenes, who used to hang out being wild and crazy in the town center, rather than a grumpus like Timon of Athens, another misanthrope who ran away into the woods and bellyached all the time about how bad everybody was. He didn't come to a good end.
Quote #2
"Your hand!" seizing it.
"Bless me, how cordial a squeeze. It is agreed we shall be brothers, then?"
"As much so as a brace of misanthropes can be," with another and terrific squeeze. "I had thought that the moderns had degenerated beneath the capacity of misanthropy. Rejoiced, though but in one instance, and that disguised, to be undeceived." (24, 57-59)
Pitch misunderstands Frank. When Frank invokes Diogenes, Pitch thinks that after all, Frank must just be a regular misanthrope himself. Apparently, Pitch is cool with a brotherhood if that bro-life means hating on others. For Pitch, this "revelation" gives him faith in humanity, that there are still people out there who…hate humanity. Irony alert.
Quote #3
"No man is a stranger. You accost anybody. Warm and confiding, you wait not for measured advances. And though, indeed, mine, in this instance, have met with no very hilarious encouragement, yet the principle of a true citizen of the world is still to return good for ill." (24, 10)
Frank is explaining what it's like to be a cosmopolitan. The main job requirement is to be ready to be awesome to others, even if they're bags of doo-doo to you. That's some major charity, in the form of generosity of spirit—and it's a fairly tall order.