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gaping jaws of wild beasts with no less pleasure than those which

painters and sculptors show by imitation; and in an old woman and

an old man he will be able to see a certain maturity and comeliness;

and the attractive loveliness of young persons he will be able to

look on with chaste eyes; and many such things will present themselves,

not pleasing to every man, but to him only who has become truly familiar

with nature and her works.

Hippocrates after curing many diseases himself fell sick and died.

The Chaldaei foretold the deaths of many, and then fate caught them

too. Alexander, and Pompeius, and Caius Caesar, after so often completely

destroying whole cities, and in battle cutting to pieces many ten

thousands of cavalry and infantry, themselves too at last departed

from life. Heraclitus, after so many speculations on the conflagration

of the universe, was filled with water internally and died smeared

all over with mud. And lice destroyed Democritus; and other lice killed

Socrates. What means all this? Thou hast embarked, thou hast made

the voyage, thou art come to shore; get out. If indeed to another

life, there is no want of gods, not even there. But if to a state

without sensation, thou wilt cease to be held by pains and pleasures,

and to be a slave to the vessel, which is as much inferior as that

which serves it is superior: for the one is intelligence and deity;

the other is earth and corruption.

Do not waste the remainder of thy life in thoughts about others, when

thou dost not refer thy thoughts to some object of common utility.

For thou losest the opportunity of doing something else when thou

hast such thoughts as these, What is such a person doing, and why,

and what is he saying, and what is he thinking of, and what is he

contriving, and whatever else of the kind makes us wander away from

the observation of our own ruling power. We ought then to check in

the series of our thoughts everything that is without a purpose and

useless, but most of all the over-curious feeling and the malignant;

and a man should use himself to think of those things only about which

if one should suddenly ask, What hast thou now in thy thoughts? With

perfect openness thou mightest, immediately answer, This or That;

so that from thy words it should be plain that everything in thee

is simple and benevolent, and such as befits a social animal, and

one that cares not for thoughts about pleasure or sensual enjoyments

at all, nor has any rivalry or envy and suspicion, or anything else

for which thou wouldst blush if thou shouldst say that thou hadst

it in thy mind. For the man who is such and no longer delays being

among the number of the best, is like a priest and minister of the

gods, using too the deity which is planted within him, which makes

the man uncontaminated by pleasure, unharmed by any pain, untouched

by any insult, feeling no wrong, a fighter in the noblest fight, one

who cannot be overpowered by any passion, dyed deep with justice,

accepting with all his soul everything which happens and is assigned

to him as his portion; and not often, nor yet without great necessity

and for the general interest, imagining what another says, or does,

or thinks. For it is only what belongs to himself that he makes the

matter for his activity; and he constantly thinks of that which is

allotted to himself out of the sum total of things, and he makes his

own acts fair, and he is persuaded that his own portion is good. For

the lot which is assigned to each man is carried along with him and

carries him along with it. And he remembers also that every rational

animal is his kinsman, and that to care for all men is according to

man's nature; and a man should hold on to the opinion not of all,

but of those only who confessedly live according to nature. But as

to those who live not so, he always bears in mind what kind of men

they are both at home and from home, both by night and by day, and

what they are, and with what men they live an impure life. Accordingly,

he does not value at all the praise which comes from such men, since

they are not even satisfied with themselves.

Labour not unwillingly, nor without regard to the common interest,

nor without due consideration, nor with distraction; nor let studied

ornament set off thy thoughts, and be not either a man of many words,

or busy about too many things. And further, let the deity which is

in thee be the guardian of a living being, manly and of ripe age,

and engaged in matter political, and a Roman, and a ruler, who has

taken his post like a man waiting for the signal which summons him

from life, and ready to go, having need neither of oath nor of any

man's testimony. Be cheerful also, and seek not external help nor

the tranquility which others give. A man then must stand erect, not

be kept erect by others.

If thou findest in human life anything better than justice, truth,

temperance, fortitude, and, in a word, anything better than thy own

mind's self-satisfaction in the things which it enables thee to do

according to right reason, and in the condition that is assigned to

thee without thy own choice; if, I say, thou seest anything better

than this, turn to it with all thy soul, and enjoy that which thou

hast found to be the best. But if nothing appears to be better than

the deity which is planted in thee, which has subjected to itself

all thy appetites, and carefully examines all the impressions, and,

as Socrates said, has detached itself from the persuasions of sense,

and has submitted itself to the gods, and cares for mankind; if thou

findest everything else smaller and of less value than this, give

place to nothing else, for if thou dost once diverge and incline to

it, thou wilt no longer without distraction be able to give the preference

to that good thing which is thy proper possession and thy own; for

it is not right that anything of any other kind, such as praise from

the many, or power, or enjoyment of pleasure, should come into competition

with that which is rationally and politically or practically good.

All these things, even though they may seem to adapt themselves to

the better things in a small degree, obtain the superiority all at

once, and carry us away. But do thou, I say, simply and freely choose

the better, and hold to it.- But that which is useful is the better.-

Well then, if it is useful to thee as a rational being, keep to it;