Seneca: DIALOGI

1. Viuere, Gallio frater, omnes beate uolunt, sed ad peruidendum quid sit quod beatam uitam efficiat caligant; adeoque non est facile consequi beatam uitam ut eo quisque ab ea longius recedat quo ad illam concitatius fertur, si uia lapsus est; quae ubi in contrarium ducit, ipsa uelocitas maioris interualli causa fit.

1. To live, brother Gallio, all wish blessedly, but when it comes to seeing through what
it is that makes a blessed life, they are in the dark; and so it is not so easy to attain
a blessed life that each person, the more swiftly he is borne toward it, the farther he
is carried away from it, if he has slipped from the road; and when it leads in the contrary
direction, the very velocity becomes the cause of a greater interval.

Proponendum est itaque primum quid sit quod adpetamus; tunc circumspiciendum qua contendere illo celerrime possimus, intellecturi in ipso itinere, si modo rectum erit, quantum cotidie profligetur quantoque propius ab eo simus ad quod nos cupiditas naturalis inpellit. 2. Quam diu quidem passim uagamur non ducem secuti sed fremitum et clamorem dissonum in diuersa uocantium, conteretur uita inter errores, breuis etiam si dies noctesque bonae menti laboremus. Decernatur itaque et quo tendamus et qua, non sine perito aliquo cui explorata sint ea in quae procedimus, quoniam quidem non eadem hic quae in ceteris peregrinationibus condicio est: in illis comprensus aliquis limes et interrogati incolae non patiuntur errare, at hic tritissima quaeque uia et celeberrima maxime decipit.

It must therefore first be set forth what it is that we aim at; then we must look around by what way we may hasten thither most swiftly, understanding on the journey itself—if only it be straight—how much is accomplished each day and how much nearer we are to that which our natural desire impels us toward. 2. So long as we wander everywhere at random, not following a leader but the din and discordant clamor of those calling in different directions, life will be worn away amid errors, brief even if we labor day and night with a good mind. Let it therefore be determined both whither we are tending and by what way, not without some expert to whom the things into which we are advancing have been explored, since indeed the condition here is not the same as in other peregrinations: in those, a marked track and the inhabitants when asked do not allow one to err, but here every most worn and most frequented road deceives most of all.

3. Nihil ergo magis praestandum est quam ne pecorum ritu sequamur antecedentium gregem, pergentes non quo eundum est sed quo itur. Atqui nulla res nos maioribus malis inplicat quam quod ad rumorem componimur, optima rati ea quae magno adsensu recepta sunt, quodque exempla bonis multa sunt nec ad rationem sed ad similitudinem uiuimus. 4. Inde ista tanta coaceruatio aliorum super alios ruentium.

3. Nothing therefore is more to be ensured than that we not, in the manner of cattle, follow the herd of those going before, proceeding not where one ought to go but where people are going. But indeed nothing entangles us in greater evils than that we are conformed to rumor, reckoning best those things which have been received with great assent, and that examples goods are many, and we live not by reason but by similitude. 4. From this comes that so great accumulation of others rushing over others.

Quod in strage hominum magna euenit, cum ipse se populus premit — nemo ita cadit ut non et alium in se adtrahat, primique exitio sequentibus sunt — hoc in omni uita accidere uideas licet. Nemo sibi tantummodo errat, sed alieni erroris et causa et auctor est; nocet enim adplicari antecedentibus et, dum unusquisque mauult credere quam iudicare, numquam de uita iudicatur, semper creditur, uersatque nos et praecipitat traditus per manus error. Alienis perimus exemplis: sanabimur, [si] separemur modo a coetu.

What happens in a great slaughter of men, when the people themselves press upon themselves
— no one so falls that he does not also drag another onto himself, and the first are ruin to those following —
this you may see to occur in all life. No one errs for himself alone,
but is both the cause and the author of another’s error; for it is harmful to be attached to antecedents,
and, while each person prefers to believe rather than to judge, there is never judgment about life,
there is always credence, and the error handed down from hand to hand turns us about and precipitates us headlong.
We perish by others’ examples: we shall be healed, [if] only we be separated from the crowd.

5. Nunc uero stat contra rationem defensor mali sui populus. Itaque id euenit quod in comitiis, in quibus eos factos esse praetores idem qui fecere mirantur, cum se mobilis fauor circumegit: eadem probamus, eadem reprehendimus; hic exitus est omnis iudicii in quo secundum plures datur.

5. Now indeed the people stand, against reason, as the defender of their own evil. And so it comes about as in the comitia, in which those who made them praetors are the same who marvel that they have been made, when fickle favor has wheeled around: the same things we approve, the same we censure; this is the outcome of every judgment in which sentence is given according to the majority.

II.

1. Cum de beata uita agetur, non est quod mihi illud discessionum more respondeas: 'haec pars maior esse uidetur.' Ideo enim peior est. Non tam bene cum rebus humanis agitur ut meliora pluribus placeant: argumentum pessimi turba est. 2. Quaeramus ergo quid optimum factu sit, non quid usitatissimum, et quid nos in possessione felicitatis aeternae constituat, non quid uulgo, ueritatis pessimo interpreti, probatum sit.

1. When the discussion is about the blessed life, there is no reason for you to answer me in the manner of divisions: ‘this party seems to be the greater.’ For that very reason it is the worse. Things do not go so well with human affairs that the better should please the more numerous: the multitude is an argument of the worst. 2. Let us, therefore, seek what is best to do, not what is most usual, and what sets us in the possession of eternal felicity, not what has been approved by the common crowd, the worst interpreter of truth.

Vulgum autem tam chlamydatos quam coronatos uoco; non enim colorem uestium quibus praetexta sunt corpora aspicio. Oculis de homine non credo, habeo melius et certius lumen quo a falsis uera diiudicem: animi bonum animus inueniat. Hic, si umquam respirare illi et recedere in se uacauerit, o quam sibi ipse uerum tortus a se fatebitur ac dicet: 3. 'quidquid feci adhuc infectum esse mallem, quidquid dixi cum recogito, mutis inuideo, quidquid optaui inimicorum execrationem puto, quidquid timui, di boni, quanto leuius fuit quam quod concupii!

I call the common herd both the chlamys-clad and the crowned; for I do not look at the color of the garments with which bodies are adorned. I do not trust my eyes about a man; I have a better and surer light by which to judge true from false: let the mind find the mind’s good. This one, if ever it has leisure to breathe and to recede into itself, O how, tormented by himself, he will confess the truth to himself and will say: 3. 'whatever I have done thus far I would prefer to be undone; whatever I said, when I reconsider, I envy the mute; whatever I have desired I reckon the execration of my enemies; whatever I feared—good gods—how much lighter it was than what I have coveted!'

Cum multis inimicitias gessi et in gratiam ex odio, si modo ulla inter malos gratia est, redii: mihi ipsi nondum amicus sum. Omnem operam dedi ut me multitudini educerem et aliqua dote notabilem facerem: quid aliud quam telis me opposui et maleuolentiae quod morderet ostendi? 4. Vides istos qui eloquentiam laudant, qui opes sequuntur, qui gratiae adulantur, qui potentiam extollunt?

Although with many
I have waged enmities and returned into favor from hatred—if indeed there is any favor among the wicked—I am not yet a friend to myself. I devoted every effort to lead myself forth to the multitude and to make myself notable by some endowment: what else did I do but set myself against weapons and show to malevolence something to bite? 4. Do you see those who praise eloquence,
who pursue wealth, who adulate favor, who exalt power?

omnes aut sunt hostes aut, quod in aequo est, esse possunt; quam magnus mirantium tam magnus inuidentium populus est. Quin potius quaero aliquod usu bonum, quod sentiam, non quod ostendam? ista quae spectantur, ad quae consistitur, quae alter alteri stupens monstrat, foris nitent, introrsus misera sunt.'

all are either enemies or, which is on a level with it, can be; as great as the populace of the marveling, so great is the populace of the envious. Why not rather do I seek some good in use, which I may feel, not which I may display? those things which are looked at, at which men halt, which one, astonished, points out to another, shine on the outside; inwardly they are wretched.'

III.

1. Quaeramus aliquod non in speciem bonum, sed solidum et aequale et a secretiore parte formosius; hoc eruamus. Nec longe positum est: inuenietur, scire tantum opus est quo manum porrigas; nunc uelut in tenebris uicina transimus, offensantes ea ipsa quae desideramus.

1. Let us seek some good not for show, but solid and equal and more beautiful from the more secret part; let us unearth this. Nor is it set far off: it will be found, only to know where you may extend your hand is needful; now as if in darkness things nearby we pass by, bumping against those very things which we desire.

2. Sed ne te per circumitus traham, aliorum quidem opiniones praeteribo — nam et enumerare illas longum est et coarguere: nostram accipe. Nostram autem cum dico, non alligo me ad unum aliquem ex Stoicis proceribus: est et mihi censendi ius. Itaque aliquem sequar, aliquem iubebo sententiam diuidere, fortasse et post omnes citatus nihil inprobabo ex iis quae priores decreuerint et dicam 'hoc amplius censeo'. 3. Interim, quod inter omnis Stoicos conuenit, rerum naturae adsentior; ab illa non deerrare et ad illius legem exemplumque formari sapientia est.

2. But lest I drag you by roundabout ways, I will pass over the opinions of others — for both to enumerate them is long and to refute them: accept ours. And when I say “ours,” I do not bind myself to any one of the leaders among the Stoics: I too have the right of giving an opinion. And so I will follow one, I will bid another to divide the question, perhaps even, when called upon after all the rest, I shall disapprove nothing of the things which my predecessors have decreed and I shall say, ‘I am of the opinion this further.’ 3. Meanwhile, in what all the Stoics agree, I assent to Nature; not to stray from her and to be formed according to her law and exemplar is wisdom.

Beata est ergo uita conueniens naturae suae, quae non aliter contingere potest quam si primum sana mens est et in perpetua possessione sanitatis suae, deinde fortis ac uehemens, tunc pulcherrime patiens, apta temporibus, corporis sui pertinentiumque ad id curiosa non anxie, tum aliarum rerum quae uitam instruunt diligens sine admiratione cuiusquam, usura fortunae muneribus, non seruitura. 4. Intellegis, etiam si non adiciam, sequi perpetuam tranquillitatem, libertatem, depulsis iis quae aut irritant nos aut territant; nam uoluptatibus et * * * pro illis quae parua ac fragilia sunt et ~ipsis flagitiis noxia~ ingens gaudium subit, inconcussum et aequale, tum pax et concordia animi et magnitudo cum mansuetudine; omnis enim ex infirmitate feritas est.

Blessed, then, is the life consonant with its own nature, which cannot come to pass otherwise than if first the mind is sound and in perpetual possession of its own soundness, then brave and vehement, then most beautifully patient, apt to the times, careful about its body and the things pertaining to it, not anxiously, then diligent about other things which equip life, without admiration of anyone, making use of fortune’s gifts, not going to serve. 4. You understand, even if I do not add it, that there follows perpetual tranquillity, liberty, with those things which either irritate us or terrify us driven away; for, instead of pleasures and * * * in place of those things which are small and fragile and ~harmful by the very vices~, a vast joy comes in, unshaken and equal, then peace and concord of mind and magnitude with gentleness; for all ferocity is from weakness.

IV.

1. Potest aliter quoque definiri bonum nostrum, id est eadem sententia non isdem comprendi uerbis. Quemadmodum idem exercitus modo latius panditur modo in angustum coartatur et aut in cornua sinuata media parte curuatur aut recta fronte explicatur, uis illi, utcumque ordinatus est, eadem est et uoluntas pro eisdem partibus standi, ita finitio summi boni alias diffundi potest et exporrigi, alias colligi et in se cogi. 2. Idem itaque erit, si dixero 'summum bonum est animus fortuita despiciens, uirtute laetus' aut 'inuicta uis animi, perita rerum, placida in actu cum humanitate multa et conuersantium cura'. Licet et ita finire, ut beatum dicamus hominem eum cui nullum bonum malumque sit nisi bonus malusque animus, honesti cultorem, uirtute contentum, quem nec extollant fortuita nec frangant, qui nullum maius bonum eo quod sibi ipse dare potest nouerit, cui uera uoluptas erit uoluptatum contemptio.

1. Our good can also be defined otherwise, that is, the same sentiment be comprehended not in the same words. Just as the same army now spreads wider, now is contracted into narrowness, and either, with its wings curved, bends at the middle part, or is deployed with a straight front, its force, however it is arrayed, is the same, and likewise its will to stand by the same parts; so the definition of the highest good can at one time be diffused and stretched out, at another gathered up and compressed into itself. 2. Thus it will be the same, if I say, 'the highest good is a mind despising fortuitous things, rejoicing in virtue,' or 'an unconquered force of mind, skilled in affairs, tranquil in action, with much humanity and care for those with whom it converses.' It is also permitted to define it thus: that we call blessed the man to whom nothing is good or evil except a good or evil mind, a cultivator of the honorable, content with virtue, whom fortuitous things neither exalt nor break, who knows no greater good than that which he can give to himself, for whom true pleasure will be the contempt of pleasures.

3. Licet, si euagari uelis, idem in aliam atque aliam faciem salua et integra potestate transferre; quid enim prohibet nos beatam uitam dicere liberum animum et erectum et interritum ac stabilem, extra metum, extra cupiditatem positum, cui unum bonum sit honestas, unum malum turpitudo, cetera uilis turba rerum nec detrahens quicquam beatae uitae nec adiciens, sine auctu ac detrimento summi boni ueniens ac recedens? 4. Hunc ita fundatum necesse est, uelit nolit, sequatur hilaritas continua et laetitia alta atque ex alto ueniens, ut qui suis gaudeat nec maiora domesticis cupiat. Quidni ista bene penset cum minutis et friuolis et non perseuerantibus corpusculi motibus?

3. You may, if you wish to wander, transfer the same thing into one and another form with its power safe and intact; for what forbids us to call the blessed life a mind free and erect and un-terrified and stable, placed outside fear, outside desire, for which the one good is honorableness, the one evil turpitude, the rest a cheap rabble of things, neither detracting anything from the blessed life nor adding, coming and going without increase or diminution of the supreme good? 4. Such a one, thus founded, it is necessary, whether he will or not, that continuous cheerfulness and deep joy, coming from on high, follow, so that he rejoices in his own and does not desire things greater than what is domestic. Why should he not weigh these well against the minute and frivolous and non‑persevering motions of the little body?

Quo die infra uoluptatem fuerit, et infra dolorem erit; uides autem quam malam et noxiosam seruitutem seruiturus sit quem uoluptates doloresque, incertissima dominia inpotentissimaque, alternis possidebunt: ergo exeundum ad libertatem est. 5. Hanc non alia res tribuit quam fortunae neglegentia: tum illud orietur inaestimabile bonum, quies mentis in tuto conlocatae et sublimitas expulsisque erroribus ex cognitione ueri gaudium grande et inmotum comitasque et diffusio animi, quibus delectabitur non ut bonis sed ut ex bono suo ortis.

On whatever day he is beneath pleasure, and he will be beneath pain; and you see how evil and noxious a servitude he is about to serve, he whom pleasures and pains, most uncertain and most impotent lordships, will possess by turns: therefore one must go out to freedom. 5. No other thing bestows this than a neglect of fortune: then there will arise that inestimable good—the quiet of a mind set in safety and loftiness—and, with errors expelled, from the cognition of the true a great and unmoved joy, and comity and a diffusion of spirit, with which he will take delight not as in goods but as sprung from his own good.

1. Quoniam liberaliter agere coepi, potest beatus dici qui nec cupit nec timet beneficio rationis, quoniam et saxa timore et tristitia carent nec minus pecudes; non ideo tamen quisquam felicia dixerit quibus non est felicitatis intellectus. 2. Eodem loco pone homines quos in numerum pecorum et animalium redegit hebes natura et ignoratio sui. Nihil interest inter hos et illa, quoniam illis nulla ratio est, his praua et malo suo atque in peruersum sollers; beatus enim dici nemo potest extra ueritatem proiectus.

1. Since I have begun to act liberally, he can be called blessed who neither desires nor fears by the benefit of reason, since even stones lack fear and sadness, and no less do cattle; not for that reason, however, will anyone call felicitous those to whom there is no understanding of felicity. 2. In the same place set men whom dull nature and ignorance of self has driven back into the number of cattle and animals. There is no difference between these and those, since to those there is no reason, while to these there is a crooked reason, clever for its own ill and toward the perverse; for no one can be called blessed who has been cast outside the truth.

3. Beata ergo uita est in recto certoque iudicio stabilita et inmutabilis. Tunc enim pura mens est et soluta omnibus malis, quae non tantum lacerationes sed etiam uellicationes effugerit, statura semper ubi constitit ac sedem suam etiam irata et infestante fortuna uindicatura. 4. Nam quod ad uoluptatem pertinet, licet circumfundatur undique et per omnis uias influat animumque blandimentis suis leniat aliaque ex aliis admoueat quibus totos partesque nostri sollicitet, quis mortalium, cui ullum superest hominis uestigium, per diem noctemque titillari uelit et deserto animo corpori operam dare?

3. Therefore the blessed life is established by a straight and sure judgment and is immutable. For then the mind is pure and released from all evils, which has fled not only rendings but even tuggings, standing always where it has taken its stand and about to vindicate its own seat even with Fortune angry and assailing. 4. For as concerns pleasure, though it be poured around on every side and flow in by all ways and soothe the mind with its blandishments, and set one thing after another in place by which it may sollicit our whole and our parts, which of mortals, in whom any vestige of man remains, would wish to be tickled by day and by night and, the mind abandoned, to give service to the body?

VI.

1. 'Sed animus quoque' inquit 'uoluptates habebit suas.' Habeat sane sedeatque luxuriae et uoluptatium arbiter; inpleat se eis omnibus quae oblectare sensus solent, deinde praeterita respiciat et exoletarum uoluptatium memor exultet prioribus futurisque iam immineat ac spes suas ordinet et, dum corpus in praesenti sagina iacet, cogitationes ad futura praemittat: hoc mihi uidebitur miserior, quoniam mala pro bonis legere dementia est. Nec sine sanitate quisquam beatus est nec sanus cui futura pro optimis adpetuntur. 2. Beatus ergo est iudicii rectus; beatus est praesentibus qualiacumque sunt contentus amicusque rebus suis; beatus est is cui omnem habitum rerum suarum ratio commendat.

1. 'But the mind also,' he says, 'will have its pleasures.' Let it have them indeed
and let it sit as arbiter of luxury and of pleasures; let it fill itself with all those things which
are accustomed to delight the senses, then let it look back on what is past and, mindful of obsolete pleasures,
exult in the earlier ones, and already hang over the future ones and arrange its hopes, and,
while the body lies in present fattening, let it send its thoughts ahead to the future:
this will seem to me the more wretched, since to choose evils in place of goods is dementia. Nor is anyone happy without sanity, nor is he sane to whom things future are sought as the best.
2. Happy, therefore, is he who is right in judgment; happy is he who, with present things,
whatever they are, is content and a friend to his own circumstances; happy is he to whom reason commends the whole
condition of his own affairs.

VII.

1. Vident et in iliis qui summum bonum dixerunt quam turpi illud loco posuerint. Itaque negant posse uoluptatem a uirtute diduci et aiunt nec honeste quemquam uiuere ut non iucunde uiuat, nec iucunde ut non honeste quoque. Non uideo quomodo ista tam diuersa in eandem copulam coiciantur.

1. They see, even in those who have pronounced the supreme good, how shameful a place they have set it. Therefore they deny that pleasure can be separated from virtue, and they say that no one lives honorably so as not to live pleasantly, nor pleasantly so as not also honorably. I do not see how things so diverse can be cast into the same coupling.

Quid est, oro uos, cur separari uoluptas a uirtute non possit? uidelicet, quia omne bonis ex uirtute principium est, ex huius radicibus etiam ea quae uos et amatis et expetitis oriuntur? Sed si ista indiscreta essent, non uideremus quaedam iucunda sed inhonesta, quaedam uero honestissima sed aspera, per dolores exigenda.

What is it, I pray you, why pleasure cannot be separated from virtue? Evidently,
because every principle of goods is from virtue, and from its roots even those things arise
which you both love and seek? But if these were indiscrete, we would not see certain things pleasant but dishonorable, and certain indeed most honorable but harsh, to be achieved through pains.

2. Adice nunc quod uoluptas etiam ad uitam turpissimam uenit, at uirtus malam uitam non admittit, et infelices quidam non sine uoluptate, immo ob ipsam uoluptatem sunt; quod non eueniret si uirtuti se uoluptas inmiscuisset, qua uirtus saepe caret, numquam indiget. 3. Quid dissimilia, immo diuersa componitis? Altum quiddam est uirtus, excelsum et regale, inuictum infatigabile: uoluptas humile seruile, inbecillum caducum, cuius statio ac domicilium fornices et popinae sunt.

2. Add now that pleasure even comes to the most disgraceful life, but virtue does not admit an evil life, and certain unhappy men are not without pleasure—nay, they are such on account of pleasure itself; which would not have come to pass if pleasure had mingled itself with virtue, which virtue often lacks, never needs. 3. Why do you put together things dissimilar, nay, even diverse? Virtue is something high, exalted and regal, unconquered, indefatigable; pleasure is low, servile, feeble, caducous, whose station and domicile are the brothels and taverns.

Virtutem in templo conuenies, in foro in curia, pro muris stantem, puluerulentam coloratam, callosas habentem manus: uoluptatem latitantem saepius ac tenebras captantem circa balinea ac sudatoria ac loca aedilem metuentia, mollem eneruem, mero atque unguento madentem, pallidam aut fucatam et medicamentis pollinctam. 4. Summum bonum inmortale est, nescit exire, nec satietatem habet nec paenitentiam; numquam enim recta mens uertitur nec sibi odio est nec quicquam ~mutauit~ optima. At uoluptas tunc cum maxime delectat extinguitur; non multum loci habet, itaque cito inplet et taedio est et post primum impetum marcet.

You will meet Virtue
in the temple, in the forum, in the curia, standing before the walls, dusty,
colored, with calloused hands; Pleasure, more often hiding and snatching at the shadows,
around baths and sweating-rooms and places that fear the aedile, soft,
enervate, dripping with wine and unguent, pale or painted and anointed with medicaments.
4. The highest good is immortal; it does not know how to pass away, and it has neither satiety
nor repentance; for a right mind is never turned, nor is it hateful to itself, nor has the best changed anything.
But pleasure, just when it most delights, is extinguished; it has not much room, and so it is quickly filled up and is a weariness, and
after the first onset it withers.

Nec id umquam certum est cuius in motu natura est: ita ne potest quidem ulla eius esse substantia quod uenit transitque celerrime in ipso usu sui periturum; eo enim pertendit ubi desinat, et dum incipit spectat ad finem.

Nor is that ever certain whose nature is in motion:
thus there cannot even be any substance of that which comes and passes most swiftly,
destined to perish in the very use of itself; for it tends toward the point where it will cease, and
while it begins it looks to the end.

VIII.

1. Quid quod tam bonis quam malis uoluptas inest nec minus turpes dedecus suum quam honestos egregia delectant? Ideoque praeceperunt ueteres optimam sequi uitam, non iucundissimam, ut rectae ac bonae uoluntatis non dux sed comes sit uoluptas. Natura enim duce utendum est; hanc ratio obseruat, hanc consulit.

1. What of this, that pleasure is innate in the good as well as in the bad, and that the base are no less delighted by their own disgrace than the honorable by distinguished things? And therefore the ancients prescribed to follow the best life, not the most pleasant, so that pleasure be not the leader but the companion of a right and good will. For Nature must be used as leader; Reason observes her, Reason consults her.

2. Idem est ergo beate uiuere et secundum naturam. Hoc quid sit iam aperiam: si corporis dotes et apta naturae conseruarimus diligenter et inpauide tamquam in diem data et fugacia, si non subierimus eorum seruitutem nec nos aliena possederint, si corpori grata et aduenticia eo nobis loco fuerint quo sunt in castris auxilia et armaturae leues — seruiant ista, non imperent — ita demum utilia sunt menti. 3. Incorruptus uir sit externis et insuperabilis miratorque tantum sui,

2. Therefore to live happily is the same as to live according to nature. I will now explain what this is: if we preserve the endowments of the body and the things apt to nature diligently and fearlessly, as given for the day and fleeting, if we do not undergo their servitude nor let alien things possess us, if things pleasing to the body and adventitious are for us in that position in which in camps are the auxiliaries and the light armaments — let those things serve, not command — then and only then are they useful to the mind. 3. Let the man be uncorrupted by externals and unconquerable, and an admirer only of himself,

artifex uitae; fiducia eius non sine scientia sit, scientia non sine constantia; maneant illi semel placita nec ulla in decretis eius litura sit. Intellegitur, etiam si non adiecero, compositum ordinatumque fore talem uirum et in iis quae aget cum comitate magnificum. ~erat uera.

an artificer of life; let his confidence not be without science, and his science not without constancy; let the things once approved remain for him, and let there be no erasure in his decrees. It is understood, even if I do not add it, that such a man will be composed and ordered, and in the things which he does magnificent with comity. ~it was true.

4. Ratio uera~ sensibus inritata et capiens inde principia — nec enim habet aliud unde conetur aut unde ad uerum impetum capiat — in se reuertatur. Nam mundus quoque cuncta complectens rectorque uniuersi deus in exteriora quidem tendit, sed tamen introsum undique in se redit. Idem nostra mens faciat: cum secuta sensus suos per illos se ad externa porrexerit, et illorum et sui potens sit.

4. Let true reason, provoked by the senses and taking from them its principles—for it has nothing else whence it may attempt, or whence it may take an impetus toward the true—return into itself. For the world too, embracing all things, and God, the rector of the universe, does indeed tend toward outward things, yet nevertheless from everywhere turns back inward into himself. Let our mind do the same: when, having followed its senses, through them it has extended itself to externals, let it be potent over both them and itself.

5. Hoc modo una efficietur uis ac potestas concors sibi et ratio illa certa nascetur, non dissidens nec haesitans in opinionibus comprensionibusque nec in persuasione, quae cum se disposuit et partibus suis consensit et, ut ita dicam, concinuit, summum bonum tetigit. 6. Nihil enim praui, nihil lubrici superest, nihil in quo arietet aut labet; omnia faciet ex imperio suo nihilque inopinatum accidet, sed quidquid agetur in bonum exibit facile et parate et sine tergiuersatione agentis; nam pigritia et haesitatio pugnam et inconstantiam ostendit. Quare audaciter licet profitearis summum bonum esse animi concordiam; uirtutes enim ibi esse debebunt ubi consensus atque unitas erit: dissident uitia.

5. In this way there will be produced a single force and power concordant with itself, and that certain reason will be born, not dissenting nor hesitating in opinions and apprehensions nor in persuasion, which, when it has arranged itself and has agreed with its parts and, so to speak, has harmonized, has touched the highest good. 6. For nothing depraved, nothing slippery remains, nothing against which it may butt or in which it may slip; it will do all by its own command and nothing unforeseen will happen, but whatever is done will go out into good easily and readily and without the agent’s tergiversation; for sloth and hesitation show conflict and inconstancy. Wherefore you may boldly profess that the highest good is the concord of the mind; for the virtues must be there where consensus and unity will be: vices are in dissidence.

IX.

1. 'Sed tu quoque' inquit 'uirtutem non ob aliud colis quam quia aliquam ex illa speras uoluptatem.' Primum non, si uoluptatem praestatura uirtus est, ideo propter hanc petitur; non enim hanc praestat, sed et hanc, nec huic laborat, sed labor eius, quamuis aliud petat, hoc quoque adsequetur. 2. Sicut in aruo quod segeti proscissum est aliqui flores internascuntur, non tamen huic herbulae, quamuis delectet oculos, tantum operis insumptum est — aliud fuit serenti propositum, hoc superuenit — sic uoluptas non est merces nec causa uirtutis sed accessio, nec quia delectat placet, sed, si placet, et delectat. 3. Summum bonum in ipso iudicio est et habitu optimae mentis, quae cum suum inpleuit et finibus se suis cinxit, consummatum est summum bonum nec quicquam amplius desiderat; nihil enim extra totum est, non magis quam ultra finem.

1. 'But you too,' he says, 'cultivate virtue for no other reason than because you hope for some pleasure from it.' First, no: if virtue is going to bestow pleasure, it is not for this reason that it is sought; for it does not confer this as its aim, but this too; nor does it labor for this, but its labor, although it seeks something else, will attain this as well. 2. Just as in a field that has been furrowed for a crop certain flowers are born of themselves, nevertheless for this little plant, although it delights the eyes, not so much work has been expended — the sower had another purpose, this supervened — so pleasure is not the wage nor the cause of virtue but an accession, nor does it please because it delights, but, if it pleases, it also delights. 3. The highest good is in the very judgment and habit of the best mind, which, when it has fulfilled what is its own and has girded itself with its own boundaries, the highest good has been consummated and desires nothing further; for nothing is outside the whole, any more than beyond the end.

4. Itaque erras cum interrogas quid sit illud propter quod uirtutem petam; quaeris enim aliquid supra summum. Interrogas quid petam ex uirtute? ipsam.

4. Thus you err when you ask what that is on account of which I should seek virtue; for you are seeking something beyond the highest. You ask what I should seek from virtue? Itself.

Nihil enim habet melius [enim], ipsa pretium sui. An hoc parum magnum est? Cum tibi dicam 'summum bonum est infragilis animi rigor et prouidentia et sublimitas et sanitas et libertas et concordia et decor', aliquid etiamnunc exigis maius ad quod ista referantur?

For it has nothing better [indeed]; it is its own price. Is this not great enough? When I tell you, 'the highest good is the infrangible rigor of mind and providence and sublimity and sanity and liberty and concord and decor', do you even now demand something greater to which these may be referred?

Quid mihi uoluptatem nominas? hominis bonum quaero, non uentris, qui pecudibus ac beluis laxior est.

Why do you name pleasure to me? I seek the good of man, not of the belly, which in cattle and beasts is more capacious.

10.

1. 'Dissimulas' inquit 'quid a me dicatur; ego enim nego quemquam posse iucunde uiuere nisi simul et honeste uiuit, quod non potest mutis contingere animalibus nec bonum suum cibo metientibus. Clare, inquam, ac palam testor hanc uitam quam ego iucundam uoco non nisi adiecta uirtute contingere.' 2. Atqui quis ignorat plenissimos esse uoluptatibus uestris stultissimos quosque et nequitiam abundare iucundis animumque ipsum genera uoluptatis praua et multa suggerere? — in primis insolentiam et nimiam aestimationem sui tumoremque elatum super ceteros et amorem rerum suarum caecum et inprouidum et ex minimis ac puerilibus causis exultationem, iam dicacitatem ac superbiam contumeliis gaudentem, desidiam dissolutionemque segnis animi, deliciis fluentis, indormientis sibi.

1. 'You dissemble,' he says, 'as to what is said by me; for I deny that anyone is able to live pleasantly unless at the same time he lives honestly, which cannot befall mute animals nor those measuring their good by food. Clearly, I say, and openly I attest that this life which I call pleasant does not befall unless virtue be added.' 2. And yet who is ignorant that the most foolish are most full of your pleasures, and that wickedness abounds in delights, and that the mind itself suggests perverse and many kinds of pleasures? — in the first place, insolence and an excessive estimation of oneself, and a swelling lifted above the rest, and a blind and improvident love of one’s own things, and exultation from the smallest and childish causes; now dicacity and pride rejoicing in contumelies; sloth and the dissolution of a sluggish spirit, flowing in delights, dozing upon itself.

3. Haec omnia uirtus discutit et aurem peruellit et uoluptates aestimat antequam admittat nec quas probauit magni pendit ~utique enim~ admittit nec usu earum sed temperantia laeta est. Temperantia autem, cum uoluptates minuat, summi boni iniuria est. Tu uoluptatem complecteris, ego compesco; tu uoluptate frueris, ego utor; tu illam summum bonum putas, ego nec bonum; tu omnia uoluptatis causa facis, ego nihil.

3. All these things virtue shakes off and tweaks the ear, and it appraises pleasures before it admits them, nor does it set great value on those which it has approved — ~for indeed~ it admits them — and it is joyful not in their use but in temperance. But temperance, since it diminishes pleasures, is an injury to the highest good. You embrace pleasure, I restrain it; you enjoy pleasure, I use it; you think it the highest good, I not even a good; you do everything for the sake of pleasure, I nothing.

XI.

11.

1. Cum dico me nihil uoluptatis causa facere, de illo loquor sapiente, cui soli concedimus uoluptatem. Non uoco autem sapientem supra quem quicquam est, nedum uoluptas. Atqui ab hac occupatus quomodo resistet labori et periculo, egestati et tot humanam uitam circumstrepentibus minis?

1. When I say that I do nothing for the sake of pleasure, I speak of that wise man, to whom alone we concede pleasure. I do not, however, call him wise above whom there is anything— much less pleasure. But, occupied with this, how will he resist toil and danger, destitution, and the so many menaces clamoring around human life?

Quomodo conspectum mortis, quomodo dolores feret, quomodo mundi fragores et tantum acerrimorum hostium, a tam molli aduersario uictus? 'Quidquid uoluptas suaserit faciet.' Age, non uides quam multa suasura sit? 2. 'Nihil' inquit 'poterit turpiter suadere, quia adiuncta uirtuti est.' Non uides iterum quale sit summum bonum cui custode opus est ut bonum sit?

How will he bear the sight of death, how pains, how the crashes of the world and so great a host of the fiercest enemies, conquered by so soft an adversary? 'Whatever pleasure shall have persuaded, he will do.' Come now, do you not see how many things she will be about to persuade? 2. 'Nothing,' he says, 'will be able to persuade basely, because she is adjoined to virtue.' Do you not see again of what sort the highest good is, which needs a custodian in order to be good?

Virtus autem quomodo uoluptatem reget, quam sequitur, cum sequi parentis sit, regere imperantis? a tergo ponis quod imperat? Egregium autem habet uirtus apud uos officium, uoluptates praegustare!

Virtue, moreover,
how will it rule pleasure, which it follows, since to follow is the part of the one obeying, to rule of the one commanding?
Do you put in the rear that which commands? A distinguished duty, indeed, virtue has among you,
to pre-taste pleasures!

3. Sed uidebimus an apud quos tam contumeliose tractata uirtus est adhuc uirtus sit, quae habere nomen suum non potest, si loco cessit; interim, de quo agitur, multos ostendam uoluptatibus obsessos, in quos fortuna omnia munera sua effudit, quos fatearis necesse est malos. 4. Aspice Nomentanum et Apicium, terrarum ac maris, ut isti uocant, bona conquirentis et super mensam recognoscentis omnium gentium animalia; uide hos eosdem e suggestu rosae despectantis popinam suam, aures uocum sono, spectaculis oculos, saporibus palatum suum delectantis; mollibus lenibusque fomentis totum lacessitur eorum corpus et, ne nares interim cessent, odoribus uariis inficitur locus ipse in quo luxuriae parentatur. Hos esse in uoluptatibus dices, nec tamen illis bene erit, quia non bono gaudent.

3. But we shall see whether among those by whom Virtue has been handled so contumeliously she is still Virtue, who cannot have her own name if she has yielded her place; meanwhile, as to the matter in hand, I will show many besieged by pleasures,
upon whom Fortune has poured out all her gifts, whom you must needs admit
to be wicked. 4. Look at Nomentanus and Apicius, acquiring the goods of lands and sea, as they call them,
and, over the table, reviewing the animals of all nations; see these same men from a platform of roses looking down upon their cookshop, their ears delighting in the sound of voices, their eyes in spectacles, their palate in flavors; with soft and gentle fomentations their whole body is titillated, and, lest the nostrils meanwhile
be idle, the very place in which provision is made for luxury is imbued with various odors. You will say that these are in pleasures, and yet it will not go well with them, because they do not rejoice in a good.

XII.

12.

1. 'Male' inquit 'illis erit, quia multa interuenient quae perturbent animum et opiniones inter se contrariae mentem inquietabunt.' Quod ita esse concedo; sed nihilominus illi ipsi stulti et inaequales et sub ictu paenitentiae positi magnas percipient uoluptates, ut fatendum sit tam longe tum illos ab omni molestia abesse quam a bona mente et, quod plerisque contingit, hilarem insaniam insanire ac per risum furere. 2. At contra sapientium remissae uoluptates et modestae ac paene languidae sunt compressaeque et uix notabiles, ut quae neque accersitae ueniant nec, quamuis per se accesserint, in honore sint neque ullo gaudio percipientium exceptae; miscent enim illas et interponunt uitae ut ludum iocumque inter seria.

1. 'Badly,' he says, 'will it be for them, because many things will intervene which perturb the spirit, and opinions contrary to one another will disquiet the mind.' That this is so I concede; but nonetheless those very fools, inconstant and unequal and set under the stroke of repentance, will perceive great pleasures, so that it must be confessed that then they are as far removed from every vexation as from a good mind, and, as happens to most, to rave a cheerful madness and to be frantic with laughter. 2. But on the contrary, the pleasures of the wise are remiss and modest and almost languid, restrained and scarcely noticeable, as being such as neither come when summoned nor, although they have come of themselves, are held in honor, nor are received with any joy by the perceivers; for they mix them in and interpose them into life as play and jest among serious things.

3. Desinant ergo inconuenientia iungere et uirtuti uoluptatem inplicare, per quod uitium pessimis quibusque adulantur. Ille effusus in uoluptates, ructabundus semper atque ebrius, quia scit se cum uoluptate uiuere, credit et cum uirtute (audit enim uoluptatem separari a uirtute non posse); deinde uitiis suis sapientiam inscribit et abscondenda profitetur. 4. Itaque non ab Epicuro inpulsi luxuriantur, sed uitiis dediti luxuriam suam in philosophiae sinu abscondunt et eo concurrunt ubi audiant laudari uoluptatem.

3. Let them therefore cease to join incongruent things and to implicate pleasure with virtue, by which fault they adulate all the worst people. That man poured out into pleasures, ever belching and drunk, since he knows that he lives with pleasure, believes that he lives with virtue as well (for he hears that pleasure cannot be separated from virtue); then he inscribes his vices with the title of wisdom and professes things that ought to be hidden. 4. And so they do not luxuriate impelled by Epicurus, but, given over to vices, they hide their luxury in the bosom of philosophy and run together to the place where they hear pleasure praised.

Nec aestimant uoluptas illa Epicuri — ita enim mehercules sentio - quam sobria ac sicca sit, sed ad nomen ipsum aduolant quaerentes libidinibus suis patrocinium aliquod ac uelamentum. 5. Itaque quod unum habebant in malis bonum perdunt, peccandi uerecundiam; laudant enim ea quibus erubescebant et uitio gloriantur; ideoque ne resurgere quidem ~adulescentiae~ licet, cum honestus turpi desidiae titulus accessit. Hoc est cur ista uoluptatis laudatio perniciosa sit, quia honesta praecepta intra latent, quod corrumpit apparet.

Nor do they reckon that pleasure of Epicurus — for thus, by Hercules, I feel — how sober and dry it is, but they flock to the very name, seeking some patronage and a veil for their libidines.
5. And so they lose the one good they had among evils, the shame of sinning; for they praise the things at which they used to blush and they glory in vice; and therefore not even is ~youth~ allowed to rise again, when an honorable title has been added to base sloth.
This is why that praise of pleasure is pernicious, because honorable precepts lie within, while what corrupts is what appears.

XIII.

13.

1. In ea quidem ipse sententia sum — inuitis hoc nostris popularibus dicam — sancta Epicurum et recta praecipere et si propius accesseris tristia; uoluptas enim illa ad paruum et exile reuocatur et quam nos uirtuti legem dicimus, eam ille dicit uoluptati. Iubet illam parere naturae; parum est autem luxuriae quod naturae satis est. 2. Quid ergo est?

1. I am indeed myself of this sentiment — I will say this with our compatriots unwilling — that Epicurus prescribes things sacred and right, and, if you come closer, grim; for that pleasure is recalled to something small and meager, and what we call a law for virtue, he calls a law for pleasure. He bids it obey nature; but what is enough for nature is too little for luxury. 2. What then is it?

Ille, quisquis desidiosum otium et gulae ac libidinis uices felicitatem uocat, bonum malae rei quaerit auctorem et, cum illo uenit blando nomine inductus, sequitur uoluptatem non quam audit sed quam attulit, et uitia sua cum coepit putare similia praeceptis, indulget illis non timide nec obscure, luxuriatur etiam inde aperto capite. Itaque non dicam quod plerique nostrorum, sectam Epicuri flagitiorum magistram esse, sed illud dico: male audit, infamis est. 'At inmerito.' 3. Hoc scire qui potest nisi interius admissus?

He—whoever calls idle leisure and the alternations of gluttony and libido “happiness”—looks for an author of “good” for a bad affair; and, when he comes under that coaxing name, he follows not the pleasure he hears of but the one he brought, and when he has begun to think his vices akin to the precepts, he indulges them neither timidly nor covertly; he even luxuriates thereupon with head uncovered. And so I will not say what most of our people say, that the sect of Epicurus is a mistress of flagitious acts, but I say this: it has a bad reputation, it is infamous. “But unjustly.” 3. Who can know this unless admitted within?

frons eius ipsa dat locum fabulae et ad malam spem inritat. Hoc tale est quale uir fortis stolam indutus: constat tibi pudicitia, uirilitas salua est, nulli corpus tuum turpi patientiae uacat, sed in manu tympanum est. Titulus itaque honestus eligatur et inscriptio ipsa excitans animum: quae stat, inuenerunt uitia.

its very front
gives room for fable and provokes to evil hope. This is like a brave man
clad in a stola: pudicity is established for you, virility is safe, your body
is vacant for no shameful endurance, but in your hand is a tympanum. Therefore let an honest title
be chosen, and an inscription itself exciting the mind: once that stands, the vices have found [their way].

4. Quisquis ad uirtutem accessit, dedit generosae indolis specimen: qui uoluptatem sequitur uidetur eneruis, fractus, ~degenerans uiro~, peruenturus in turpia nisi aliquis distinxerit illi uoluptates, ut sciat quae ex eis intra naturale desiderium resistant, quae praeceps ferantur infinitaeque sint et quo magis inplentur eo magis inexplebiles. 5. Agedum, uirtus antecedat, tutum erit omne uestigium. Et uoluptas nocet nimia: in uirtute non est uerendum ne quid nimium sit, quia in ipsa est modus; non est bonum quod magnitudine laborat sua.

4. Whoever has approached virtue has given a specimen of a generous disposition: whoever follows pleasure seems enervate, broken, ~degenerating from manhood~, destined to arrive at shameful things unless someone distinguishes the pleasures for him, so that he may know which of them remain within natural desire, which are borne headlong and are boundless, and the more they are filled the more insatiable they are. 5. Come then, let virtue go before, every step will be safe. And pleasure harms when excessive: in virtue there is no need to fear lest anything be too much, because in it there is measure; that is not a good which suffers from its own magnitude.

Rationalem porro sortitis naturam quae melius res quam ratio proponitur? Et si placet ista iunctura, si hoc placet ad beatam uitam ire comitatu, uirtus antecedat, comitetur uoluptas et circa corpus ut umbra uersetur: uirtutem quidem, excelsissimam dominam, uoluptati tradere ancillam nihil magnum animo capientis est.

Having been allotted a rational nature, what thing better than reason is put forward? And if that conjunction pleases, if this pleases—to go to the blessed life with such a company—let virtue go before, let pleasure accompany, and let it move around the body like a shadow: to hand over virtue, indeed, the most exalted mistress, as a handmaid to pleasure, is the mark of one who conceives nothing great in spirit.

XIV.

14.

1. Prima uirtus eat, haec ferat signa: habebimus nihilominus uoluptatem, sed domini eius et temperatores erimus; aliquid nos exorabit, nihil coget. At ei qui uoluptati tradidere principia utroque caruere; uirtutem enim amittunt, ceterum non ipsi uoluptatem, sed ipsos uoluptas habet, cuius aut inopia torquentur aut copia strangulantur, miseri si deseruntur ab illa, miseriores si obruuntur; sicut deprensi mari Syrtico modo in sicco relinquuntur, modo torrente unda fluctuantur. 2. Euenit autem hoc nimia intemperantia et amore caeco rei; nam mala pro bonis petenti periculosum est adsequi.

1. Let virtue go first, let this bear the standards: we shall nevertheless have pleasure, but we shall be its masters and moderators; it will entreat us for something, it will compel nothing. But those who have handed over the primacy to pleasure have lacked both; for they lose virtue, and moreover it is not they who have pleasure, but pleasure has them, by the want of which they are racked or by the abundance they are strangled, wretched if they are deserted by it, more wretched if they are overwhelmed; just as, caught in the Syrtic sea, now on the dry they are left, now by a torrent wave they are tossed. 2. But this comes to pass from excessive intemperance and a blind love of the thing; for to one seeking evils in place of goods, to obtain them is perilous.

Vt feras cum labore periculoque uenamur et captarum quoque illarum sollicita possessio est — saepe enim laniant dominos — ita habent se magnae uoluptates: in magnum malum euasere captaeque cepere; quae quo plures maioresque sunt, eo ille minor ac plurium seruus est quem felicem uulgus appellat. 3. Permanere libet in hac etiamnunc huius rei imagine. Quemadmodum qui bestiarum cubilia indagat et

Just as we hunt wild beasts with labor and peril, and the possession
of those captured is anxious as well — for often they lacerate their masters — so stand
great pleasures: they have issued into a great evil, and, captured, have taken captive; and the more
and the greater they are, to that extent that man is the smaller and the slave of more masters,
whom the vulgar crowd calls “happy.” 3. It pleases me to remain even now in this image of this matter. Just as one who investigates the lairs of beasts and

laqueo captare feras

to capture wild beasts with a noose

magno aestimat et

he esteems highly and

latos canibus circumdare saltus,

to encircle the broad woodland glades with dogs,

ut illarum uestigia premat, potiora deserit multisque officiis renuntiat, ita qui sectatur uoluptatem omnia postponit et primam libertatem neglegit ac pro uentre dependit, nec uoluptates sibi emit sed se uoluptatibus uendit.

so that he may press their footprints, he forsakes better things and renounces many duties; thus he who follows pleasure postpones everything and neglects primary freedom and depends upon the belly, nor does he buy pleasures for himself but sells himself to pleasures.

XV.

15.

1. 'Quid tamen' inquit 'prohibet in unum uirtutem uoluptatemque confundi et ita effici summum bonum ut idem et honestum et iucundum sit?' Quia pars honesti non potest esse nisi honestum nec summum bonum habebit sinceritatem suam, si aliquid in se uiderit dissimile meliori. 2. Ne gaudium quidem quod ex uirtute oritur, quamuis bonum sit, absoluti tamen boni pars est, non magis quam laetitia et tranquillitas, quamuis ex pulcherrimis causis nascantur; sunt enim ista bona, sed consequentia summum bonum, non consummantia. 3. Qui uero uirtutis uoluptatisque societatem facit et ne ex aequo quidem, fragilitate alterius boni quidquid in altero uigoris est hebetat libertatemque illam, ita demum si nihil se pretiosius nouit inuictam, sub iugum mittit.

1. 'What, however,' he says, 'prevents virtue and pleasure from being confounded into one, and thus the highest good be brought about so that it is the same thing both honorable and pleasant?' Because a part of the honorable cannot be anything except the honorable, nor will the highest good have its own purity, if it sees in itself anything dissimilar to what is better. 2. Not even the joy which arises from virtue, although it is a good, is nevertheless a part of the absolute good, any more than gladness and tranquility, although they are born from the most beautiful causes; for these are indeed goods, but consequent upon the highest good, not consummating it. 3. But he who makes a partnership of virtue and pleasure—and not even on equal terms—by the fragility of the one good dulls whatever vigor there is in the other, and that liberty, unconquered only if it knows nothing more precious than itself, he sends under the yoke.

Nam, quae maxima seruitus est, incipit illi opus esse fortuna; sequitur uita anxia, suspiciosa, trepida, casum pauens, temporum suspensa momentis. 4. Non das uirtuti fundamentum graue, inmobile, sed iubes illam in loco uolubili stare; quid autem tam uolubile est quam fortuitorum expectatio et corporis rerumque corpus adficientium uarietas? Quomodo hic potest deo parere et quidquid euenit bono animo excipere nec de fato queri casuum suorum benignus interpres, si ad uoluptatum dolorumque punctiunculas concutitur?

For—and this is the greatest servitude—he begins to have need of Fortune; there follows a life anxious, suspicious, trembling, fearing chance, suspended on the moments of the times. 4. You do not give to virtue a foundation weighty, immovable, but you order it to stand in a rolling place; but what is so unstable as the expectation of fortuitous things and the variety of the body and of the things affecting the body? How can this man obey God and with good spirit receive whatever happens, and not complain of Fate, a benign interpreter of his own accidents, if he is shaken by the tiny punctures of pleasures and pains?

Sed ne patriae quidem bonus tutor aut uindex est nec amicorum propugnator, si ad uoluptates uergit. 5. Illo ergo summum bonum escendat unde nulla ui detrahitur, quo neque dolori neque spei nec timori sit aditus nec ulli rei quae deterius summi boni ius faciat; escendere autem illo sola uirtus potest. Illius gradu cliuus iste frangendus est; illa fortiter stabit et quidquid euenerit feret non patiens tantum sed etiam uolens, omnemque temporum difficultatem sciet legem esse naturae et ut bonus miles feret uulnera, numerabit cicatrices, et transuerberatus telis moriens amabit eum pro quo cadet imperatorem; habebit illud in animo uetus praeceptum: deum sequere.

But he is not even a good guardian of his fatherland or avenger, nor a champion of his friends, if he inclines toward pleasures. 5. Therefore let the supreme good ascend to that place whence it is dragged down by no force, where there is access neither for pain nor for hope nor for fear nor for any thing that would make worse the right of the supreme good; but to ascend there only virtue can. By its step this slope must be broken; she will stand bravely and will bear whatever shall have happened, not only patient but even willing, and she will know that every difficulty of times is a law of nature, and like a good soldier she will bear wounds, she will count her scars, and, transfixed with missiles, dying, she will love the commander for whom she falls; she will have this in mind, an old precept: follow God.

6. Quisquis autem queritur et plorat et gemit, imperata facere ui cogitur et inuitus rapitur ad iussa nihilominus. Quae autem dementia est potius trahi quam sequi! tam mehercules quam stultitia et ignoratio condicionis est suae dolere quod deest aliquid tibi aut incidit durius, aeque mirari aut indigne ferre ea quae tam bonis accidunt quam malis, morbos dico, funera, debilitates et cetera ex transuerso in uitam humanam incurrentia.

6. Whoever complains and weeps and groans is compelled by force to do the things commanded, and is dragged unwilling to the orders nonetheless. What madness it is to be dragged rather than to follow! This, by Hercules, is as much stupidity and ignorance of one’s condition as to grieve that something is lacking to you or that something harsher has fallen upon you, and equally to marvel at or to bear with indignation those things which befall the good as well as the bad—I mean diseases, funerals, debilities, and the other things that, crosswise, rush into human life.

7. Quidquid ex uniuersi constitutione patiendum est, magno suscipiatur animo: ad hoc sacramentum adacti sumus, ferre mortalia nec perturbari iis quae uitare non est nostrae potestatis. In regno nati sumus: deo parere libertas est.

7. Whatever from the constitution of the universe must be endured, let it be undertaken with a great spirit: to this sacrament we have been sworn, to bear mortal things and not be disturbed by those things which it is not in our power to avoid. We were born in a kingdom: to obey god is freedom.

XVI.

16.

1. Ergo in uirtute posita est uera felicitas. Quid haec tibi uirtus suadebit? ne quid aut bonum aut malum existimes quod nec uirtute nec malitia continget; deinde ut sis inmobilis et contra malum ex bono, ut qua fas est deum effingas.

1. Therefore true felicity is placed in virtue. What will this virtue advise you? that you deem nothing either good or evil which will befall neither by virtue nor by malice; then that you be immovable both against evil in good, so that, in so far as it is lawful, you fashion God.

2. Quid tibi pro hac expeditione promittit? ingentia et aequa diuinis: nihil cogeris, nullo indigebis, liber eris, tutus indemnis; nihil frustra temptabis, nihil prohibeberis; omnia tibi ex sententia cedent, nihil aduersum accidet, nihil contra opinionem ac uoluntatem. 3. 'Quid ergo?

2. What does it promise you in return for this expedition? vast things and on a par with things divine: you will be compelled to nothing, you will need nothing, you will be free, safe, unharmed; you will attempt nothing in vain, you will be prohibited from nothing; everything will turn out according to your mind, nothing adverse will happen, nothing against expectation and will. 3. 'What then?

uirtus ad beate uiuendum sufficit?' Perfecta illa et diuina quidni sufficiat, immo superfluat? Quid enim deesse potest extra desiderium omnium posito? Quid extrinsecus opus est ei qui omnia sua in se collegit?

'Does virtue suffice for living blessedly?' That perfect and divine virtue—why would it not suffice, nay, even be superfluous? For what can be lacking to one set beyond desire for anything? What need is there of anything extrinsic for him who has gathered all his own into himself?

Sed ei qui ad uirtutem tendit, etiam si multum processit, opus est aliqua fortunae indulgentia adhuc inter humana luctanti, dum nodum illum exsoluit et omne uinculum mortale. Quid ergo interest? quod arte alligati sunt alii, adstricti [alii], districti quoque: hic qui ad superiora progressus est et se altius extulit laxam catenam trahit, nondum liber, iam tamen pro libero.

But for him who tends toward virtue, even if he has advanced much, there is need of some indulgence of Fortune, as he still wrestles among human things, while he unties that knot and every mortal bond. What, then, is the difference? That some are bound tightly, others constrained [others], and even drawn taut: this man, who has advanced to higher things and has lifted himself higher, drags a loose chain, not yet free, yet already as if free.

XVII.

17.

1. Si quis itaque ex istis qui philosophiam conlatrant quod solent dixerit: 'quare ergo tu fortius loqueris quam uiuis? Quare et superiori uerba summittis et pecuniam necessarium tibi instrumentum existimas et damno moueris et lacrimas audita coniugis aut amici morte demittis et respicis famam et malignis sermonibus tangeris? 2. Quare cultius rus tibi est quam naturalis usus desiderat?

1. If therefore someone from those who bark at philosophy should say, as they are wont: 'why then do you speak more bravely than you live? Why also do you submit words to your superior, and consider money a necessary instrument for yourself, and are moved by loss, and let fall tears upon hearing of the death of a spouse or a friend, and have regard for fame, and are touched by malign talks? 2. Why is your country-place more cultivated for you than natural use desires?

Cur non ad praescriptum tuum cenas? Cur tibi nitidior supellex est? Cur apud te uinum aetate tua uetustius bibitur?

Why do you not dine according to your own precept?
Why are your furnishings more polished?
Why, at your place, is wine drunk that is older than your own age?

Cur aurum disponitur? Cur arbores nihil praeter umbram daturae conseruntur? Quare uxor tua locupletis domus censum auribus gerit?

Why is gold set out? Why are trees destined to give nothing beyond shade planted? Why does your wife carry on her ears the census of a wealthy house?

Quare paedagogium pretiosa ueste succingitur? Quare ars est apud te ministrare nec temere et ut libet conlocatur argentum sed perite struitur et est aliquis scindendi obsonii magister?' Adice si uis: 'cur trans mare possides? Cur plura quam nosti?

Why is the paedagogium girt with precious vesture? Why is it an art at your house to serve, and the silver is not placed rashly and as one pleases,
but is expertly arrayed, and there is someone a master of carving the viands?' Add, if you wish: 'why do you possess across the sea? Why more things than you know?

<Cur> turpiter aut tam neglegens es ut non noueris pauculos seruos aut tam luxuriosus ut plures habeas quam quorum notitiae memoria sufficiat?' 3. Adiuuabo postmodo conuicia et plura mihi quam putas obiciam, nunc hoc respondeo tibi: non sum sapiens et, ut maliuolentiam tuam pascam, nec ero. Exige itaque a me, non ut optimis par sim, sed ut malis melior: hoc mihi satis est, cotidie aliquid ex uitiis meis demere et errores meos obiurgare. 4. Non perueni ad sanitatem, ne perueniam quidem; delenimenta magis quam remedia podagrae meae compono, contentus si rarius accedit et si minus uerminatur: uestris quidem pedibus comparatus, debiles, cursor sum.

<Why> are you either so shamefully
or so negligent that you do not know your few slaves, or so luxurious
as to have more than those for whose acquaintance your memory suffices?' 3. I will presently help along
the revilings and will bring more charges against myself than you suppose; for now I answer you this: I am not
wise, and, to feed your malevolence, I shall not be. Demand therefore of me,
not that I be equal to the best, but that I be better than the bad: this is enough for me—to subtract daily
something from my vices and to objurgate my errors. 4. I have not reached
health, nor shall I even reach it; I compose palliatives rather than remedies for my podagra,
content if it comes on more rarely and if it crawls less: compared with your
feet, indeed—feeble as they are—I am a runner.

Haec non pro me loquor — ego enim in alto uitiorum omnium sum — sed pro illo cui aliquid acti est.

I do not speak these things on my own behalf
— for indeed I am in the deep of all vices — but on behalf of that man for whom something has been accomplished
is.

XVIII.

18.

1. 'Aliter' inquis 'loqueris, aliter uiuis.' Hoc, malignissima capita et optimo cuique inimicissima, Platoni obiectum est, obiectum Epicuro, obiectum Zenoni; omnes enim isti dicebant non quemadmodum ipsi uiuerent, sed quemadmodum esset ipsis uiuendum. De uirtute, non de me loquor, et cum uitiis conuicium facio, in primis meis facio: cum potuero, uiuam quomodo oportet. 2. Nec malignitas me ista multo ueneno tincta deterrebit ab optimis; ne uirus quidem istud quo alios spargitis, quo uos necatis, me inpediet quominus perseuerem laudare uitam non quam ago sed quam agendam scio, quominus uirtutem adorem et ex interuallo ingenti reptabundus sequar.

1. 'Otherwise,' you say, 'you speak; otherwise you live.' This, most malignant heads and most inimical to every best man, has been objected to Plato, objected to Epicurus, objected to Zeno; for all those men were declaring not how they themselves lived, but how even by themselves it ought to be lived. I speak about virtue, not about myself, and when I rail at vices, I do so chiefly at my own: when I am able, I shall live as is fitting. 2. Nor will that malignity, steeped in much venom, deter me from the best things; not even that virus with which you sprinkle others, with which you kill yourselves, will hinder me from persevering to praise the life not which I live but which I know must be lived, from adoring virtue and, crawling, to follow it from a vast interval.

3. Expectabo scilicet ut quicquam maliuolentiae inuiolatum sit, cui sacer nec Rutilius fuit nec Cato? Curet aliquis an istis nimis diues uideatur quibus Demetrius Cynicus parum pauper est? Virum acerrimum et contra omnia naturae desideria pugnantem, hoc pauperiorem quam ceteros Cynicos quod, cum sibi interdixerit habere, interdixit et poscere, negant satis egere.

3. Am I to wait, forsooth, that anything be left inviolate by malevolence, to which neither Rutilius nor Cato was sacred? Should anyone care whether he seems too rich to those to whom Demetrius the Cynic is too little poor? A man most keen and warring against all the desires of nature—poorer in this respect than the other Cynics, because, when he interdicted himself from having, he also interdicted asking—they maintain is not needy enough.

Vides enim: non uirtutis scientiam sed egestatis professus est.

For you see: he professed not the science of virtue but of indigence.

XIX.

19.

1. Diodorum, Epicureum philosophum, qui intra paucos dies finem uitae suae manu sua inposuit, negant ex decreto Epicuri fecisse quod sibi gulam praesecuit: alii dementiam uideri uolunt factum hoc eius, alii temeritatem. Ille interim beatus ac plenus bona conscientia reddidit sibi testimonium uita excedens laudauitque aetatis in portu et ad ancoram actae quietem et dixit quod uos inuiti audistis, quasi uobis quoque faciendum sit:

1. They say that Diodorus, an Epicurean philosopher, who within a few days put an end to his life by his own hand, did not do, according to the decree of Epicurus, that by which he slit his own throat: some wish this deed of his to seem dementia, others temerity. He, meanwhile, blessed and full of good conscience, rendered testimony to himself as he was departing life, and praised the quiet of an age spent in harbor and at anchor, and said what you heard unwillingly, as if you too must do it:

uixi et quem dederat cursum fortuna peregi.

I have lived, and I have completed the course which Fortune had given.

2. De alterius uita, de alterius morte disputatis et ad nomenmagnorum ob aliquam eximiam laudem uirorum, sicut ad occursum ignotorum hominum minuti canes, latratis; expedit enim uobis neminem uideri bonum, quasi aliena uirtus exprobratio delictorum ~omnium~ sit. Inuidi splendida cum sordibus uestris confertis nec intellegitis quanto id uestro detrimento audeatis. Nam si illi qui uirtutem sequuntur auari libidinosi ambitiosique sunt, quid uos estis quibus ipsum nomen uirtutis odio est?

2. You dispute about one man’s life, about another’s death, and at the name of great men on account of some exceptional praise of men, like small
dogs at the encounter of unknown people, you bark; for it is expedient for you that no one seem good, as if another’s
virtue were an exprobration of the sins ~of all~. Envious, you compare splendid things with your own filth, nor do you understand how greatly to your own detriment you dare that. For if those who follow virtue are avaricious, libidinous, and ambitious,
what are you, to whom the very name of virtue is hateful?

3. Negatis quemquam praestare quae loquitur nec ad exemplar orationis suae uiuere: quid mirum, cum loquantur fortia ingentia, omnis humanas tempestates euadentia? Cum refigere se crucibus conentur — in quas unusquisque uestrum clauos suos ipse adigit — ad supplicium tamen acti stipitibus singulis pendent: hi qui in se ipsi animum aduertunt quot cupiditatibus tot crucibus distrahuntur. At maledici, in alienam contumeliam uenusti sunt.

3. You deny that anyone performs what he speaks nor lives according to the exemplar of his oration: what marvel, when they speak bold and vast things, escaping all the tempests of human life? While they try to unfasten themselves from crosses — onto which each one of you himself drives his own nails — nevertheless, driven to punishment, they hang upon separate stakes: those who turn their mind upon themselves are torn on as many crosses as they have desires. But slanderers are witty in another’s contumely.

Crederem illis hoc uacare, nisi quidam ex patibulo suo spectatores conspuerent.

I would believe that they had leisure for this, were it not that certain men, from their own gibbet, spit upon the spectators.

XX.

20.

1. 'Non praestant philosophi quae loquuntur.' Multum tamen praestant quod loquuntur, quod honesta mente concipiunt. Vtinam quidem et paria dictis agerent: quid esset illis beatius? Interim non est quod contemnas bona uerba et bonis cogitationibus plena praecordia: studiorum salutarium etiam citra effectum laudanda tractatio est.

1. 'Philosophers do not carry out what they say.' Yet they do confer much by what they say, which they conceive with an honest mind. Would that indeed they also acted equal to their words: what could be more blessed for them? Meanwhile, there is no reason to despise good words and a heart full of good cogitations: the pursuit of salutary studies even short of effect is praiseworthy.

2. Quid mirum, si non escendunt in altum ardua adgressi? Sed si uir es, suspice, etiam si decidunt, magna conantis. Generosa res est respicientem non ad suas sed ad naturae suae uires conari alta temptare et mente maiora concipere quam quae etiam ingenti animo adornatis effici possunt.

2. What wonder, if they do not ascend into the heights, having undertaken arduous things?
But if you are a man, look up to them, even if they fall, as attempting great things.
It is a generous thing for one who looks not to his own but to the powers of his nature
to strive to attempt high things and to conceive in mind greater things than those which even by men furnished with a mighty spirit
can be brought to effect.

3. Qui sibi hoc proposuit: 'ego mortem eodem uultu quo audiam uidebo. Ego laboribus, quanticumque illi erunt, parebo, animo fulciens corpus. Ego diuitias et praesentis et absentis aeque contemnam, nec si aliubi iacebunt tristior, nec si circa me fulgebunt animosior.

3. He who has proposed this to himself: 'I will behold death with the same face with which I hear of it. I will submit to labors, whatever they shall be, propping the body with spirit. I will contemn riches equally whether present or absent, neither sadder if they lie elsewhere, nor more high-spirited if they glitter around me.'

Ego fortunam nec uenientem sentiam nec recedentem. Ego terras omnis tamquam meas uidebo, meas tamquam omnium. Ego sic uiuam quasi sciam aliis esse me natum et naturae rerum hoc nomine gratias agam: quo enim melius genere negotium meum agere potuit?

I will sense Fortune neither coming nor receding. I will behold all lands as mine, mine as those of all. I will live thus as if I knew that I was born for others, and I will give thanks to the nature of things on this account: for by what better kind could it have managed my affair?

unum me donauit omnibus, uni mihi omnis. 4. Quidquid habebo nec sordide custodiam nec prodige spargam; nihil magis possidere me credam quam bene donata. Non numero nec pondere beneficia nec ulla nisi accipientis aestimatione perpendam; numquam id mihi multum erit quod dignus accipiet.

she has given me, one, to all; to me alone, all things. 4.
Whatever I shall have, I will neither guard sordidly nor scatter prodigally; nothing will I believe myself to possess more than well-bestowed gifts. I will not weigh benefits by number nor by weight, nor by any estimation except that of the recipient; never will that be much to me which a worthy man will receive.

Nihil opinionis causa, omnia conscientiae faciam. Populo spectante fieri credam quidquid me conscio faciam. 5. Edendi mihi erit bibendique finis desideria naturae restinguere, non inplere aluum et exinanire.

I will do nothing for the sake of opinion, I will do everything for conscience. I will believe that whatever I do with myself as witness is done with the people looking on. 5. For me the limit of eating and of drinking will be to quench the desires of nature, not to fill the belly
and empty it.

Ero amicis iucundus, inimicis mitis et facilis. Exorabor antequam roger, et honestis precibus occurram. Patriam meam esse mundum sciam et praesides deos, hos supra me circaque me stare factorum dictorumque censores.

I will be pleasant to friends, to enemies mild and easy. I shall be prevailed upon before I am asked, and I will meet honorable entreaties. I shall know the world to be my fatherland and the presiding gods, these to stand above me and around me as censors of deeds and of words.

Quandoque aut natura spiritum repetet aut ratio dimittet, testatus exibo bonam me conscientiam amasse, bona studia, nullius per me libertatem deminutam, minime meam' — qui haec facere proponet, uolet, temptabit, ad deos iter faciet, ne ille, etiam si non tenuerit, magnis tamen excidit ausis.

Whenever either nature shall reclaim the spirit or reason shall dismiss it, I will depart, having attested that I have loved a good conscience, good studies, that no one’s liberty has been diminished through me, least of all my own' — whoever shall propose to do these things, will wish, will attempt, will make a journey to the gods; surely that man, even if he has not attained it, has nevertheless fallen short from great undertakings.

6. Vos quidem, quod uirtutem cultoremque eius odistis, nihil noui facitis. Nam et solem lumina aegra formidant et auersantur diem splendidum nocturna animalia, quae ad primum eius ortum stupent et latibula sua passim petunt, abduntur in aliquas rimas timida lucis. Gemite et infelicem linguam bonorum exercete conuicio, hiate commordete: citius multo frangetis dentes quam inprimetis.

6. You indeed, because you hate virtue and its cultivator, do nothing new. For both ailing eyes dread the sun, and the nocturnal animals turn away from the splendid day, which at its first rising are stupefied and seek their hiding places everywhere, are hidden away in some cracks, timid of the light. Groan and exercise your ill-starred tongue against the good with reviling, gape and nibble: much sooner will you break your teeth than you will imprint.

XXI.

21.

1. 'Quare ille philosophiae studiosus est et tam diues uitam agit? Quare opes contemnendas dicit et habet, uitam contemnendam putat et tamen uiuit, ualetudinem contemnendam, et tamen illam diligentissime tuetur atque optimam mauult? Et exilium uanum nomen putat et ait "quid enim est mali mutare regiones?" et tamen, si licet, senescit in patria?

1. 'Why is that man studious of philosophy and yet lives so rich a life? Why does he say that opulence is to be contemned and yet has it, think life to be contemned and yet live, health to be contemned, and yet he most diligently tends it and prefers the best? And he deems exile an empty name and says "for what is there of evil in changing regions?" and yet, if it is permitted, he grows old in his fatherland?

Et inter longius tempus et breuius nihil interesse iudicat, tamen, si nihil prohibet, extendit aetatem et in multa senectute placidus uiret?' 2. Ait ista debere contemni, non ne habeat, sed ne sollicitus habeat; non abigit illa a se, sed abeuntia securus prosequitur. Diuitias quidem ubi tutius fortuna deponet quam ibi unde sine querella reddentis receptura est? 3. M. Cato cum laudaret Curium et Coruncanium et illud saeculum in quo censorium crimen erat paucae argenti lamellae possidebat ipse quadragies sestertium, minus sine dubio quam Crassus, plus quam censorius Cato.

And he judges that between a longer time and a shorter there is no difference, nevertheless, if nothing prohibits, he extends his lifespan and, in very advanced old age, calm he flourishes?' 2. He says these things ought to be contemned, not so that he may not have them, but so that he may not have them anxiously; he does not drive them away from himself, but, as they are departing, untroubled he accompanies them. Where indeed will Fortune deposit riches more safely than with one from whom she will take them back without the complaint of the returner? 3. M. Cato, while praising Curius and Coruncanius and that age in which the possession of a few little plates of silver was a censorial crime, himself possessed forty times a hundred thousand sesterces (i.e., 4,000,000 sesterces), less, without a doubt, than Crassus, more than Cato the Censor.

Maiore spatio, si compararentur, proauum uicerat quam a Crasso uinceretur, et, si maiores illi obuenissent opes, non spreuisset. 4. Nec enim se sapiens indignum ullis muneribus fortuitis putat: non amat diuitias sed mauult; non in animum illas sed in domum recipit, nec respuit possessas sed continet, et maiorem uirtuti suae materiam subministrari uult.

By a greater span, if they were compared, he had surpassed his great-grandfather
than he would be surpassed by Crassus; and, if greater resources had fallen to him, he would not have spurned them. 4. For indeed the wise man does not consider himself unworthy of any fortuitous gifts: he does not love
riches but prefers them; he receives them not into his mind but into his house, nor does he reject
them when possessed, but contains them, and he wants greater material to be subministered to his virtue.

XXII.

22.

1. Quid autem dubii est quin haec maior materia sapienti uiro sit animum explicandi suum in diuitiis quam in paupertate, cum in hac unum genus uirtutis sit non inclinari nec deprimi, in diuitiis et temperantia et liberalitas et diligentia et dispositio et magnificentia campum habeat patentem? 2. Non contemnet se sapiens, etiam si fuerit minimae staturae, esse tamen se procerum uolet. Et exilis corpore aut amisso oculo ualebit, malet tamen sibi esse corporis robur, et hoc ita ut sciat esse aliud in se ualentius; malam ualetudinem tolerabit, bonam optabit.

1. But what doubt is there that this is a greater material for a wise man for unfolding his mind in riches than in poverty, since in the latter there is one kind of virtue—to not incline nor be depressed—whereas in riches temperance, liberality, diligence, disposition, and magnificence have an open field? 2. The wise man will not contemn himself, even if he has been of the least stature; yet he will want to be tall. And, though slight of body or with an eye lost, he will hold up; he will prefer, however, to have strength of body, and this in such a way that he knows there is something else in him stronger; he will tolerate ill health, he will opt for good health.

3. Quaedam enim, etiam si in summam rei parua sunt [ait] et subduci sine ruina principalis boni possunt, adiciunt tamen aliquid ad perpetuam laetitiam et ex uirtute nascentem: sic illum adficiunt diuitiae et exhilarant ut nauigantem secundus et ferens uentus, ut dies bonus et in bruma ac frigore apricus locus. 4. Quis porro sapientium — nostrorum dico, quibus unum est bonum uirtus — negat etiam haec quae indifferentia uocamus habere aliquid in se pretii et alia aliis esse potiora? Quibusdam ex iis tribuitur aliquid honoris, quibusdam multum; ne erres itaque, inter potiora diuitiae sunt.

3. Certain things, even if they are small in the total sum of the matter [he says] and can be subtracted without the collapse of the principal good,
yet add something to the perpetual joy that is born from virtue:
thus riches affect him and exhilarate him like a favorable and bearing wind to one sailing,
like a good day and, in midwinter and cold, a sunny spot. 4. Which of the wise — I mean of ours, for whom the one good is virtue —
denies that even these which we call “indifferents” have something of price in themselves and that some are preferable to others?
To some of these a little honor is allotted, to others much; therefore, do not err: among the more preferable are riches.

5. 'Quid ergo' inquis 'me derides, cum eundem apud te locum habeant quem apud me?' Vis scire quam non eundem habeant locum? mihi diuitiae si effluxerint, nihil auferent nisi semet ipsas, tu stupebis et uideberis tibi sine te relictus, si illae a te recesserint; apud me diuitiae aliquem locum habent, apud te summum; ad postremum diuitiae meae sunt, tu diuitiarum es.

5. 'What then,' you say, 'do you mock me, since they have the same place with you as with me?' Do you wish to know how they do not have the same place? If riches flow out from me, they will take away nothing except themselves; you will be stunned and will seem to yourself left without yourself, if they have withdrawn from you; with me riches have some place, with you the highest; finally, riches are mine, you belong to riches.

XXIII.

23.

1. Desine ergo philosophis pecunia interdicere: nemo sapientiam paupertate damnauit. Habebit philosophus amplas opes, sed nulli detractas nec alieno sanguine cruentas, sine cuiusquam iniuria partas, sine sordidis quaestibus, quarum tam honestus sit exitus quam introitus, quibus nemo ingemescat nisi malignus. In quantum uis exaggera illas: honestae sunt in quibus, cum multa sint quae sua quisque dici uelit, nihil est quod quisquam suum possit dicere.

1. So cease, then, to forbid money to philosophers: no one has condemned wisdom to poverty. The philosopher will have ample wealth, but not stripped from anyone nor blood-stained with another’s blood, acquired without anyone’s injury, without sordid gains, whose exit is as honest as its entrance, over which no one groans except the malignant. Heap them up as much as you wish: such riches are honorable, in which, though there are many things that each man would like to be called his, there is nothing that anyone can call his own.

2. Ille uero fortunae benignitatem a se non summouebit et patrimonio per honesta quaesito nec gloriabitur nec erubescet. Habebit tamen etiam quo glorietur, si aperta domo et admissa in res suas ciuitate poterit dicere 'quod quisque agnouerit tollat.' O magnum uirum, optime diuitem, si post hanc uocem tantundem habuerit! Ita dico: si tuto et securus scrutationem populo praebuerit, si nihil quisquam apud illum inuenerit quoi manus iniciat, audaciter et propalam erit diues.

2. He, however, will not remove Fortune’s benignity from himself, and with a patrimony sought through honest means he will neither glory nor blush. He will nevertheless also have something in which to glory, if, with his house open and the citizenry admitted into his affairs, he can say, 'let whoever has recognized something take it.' O great man, most excellent rich man, if after this utterance he shall have just as much! Thus I say: if safely and secure he will have offered his goods to the people’s scrutiny, if no one shall have found with him anything on which to lay a hand, he will be boldly and openly rich.

3. Sapiens nullum denarium intra limen suum admittet male intrantem; idem magnas opes, munus fortunae fructumque uirtutis, non repudiabit nec excludet. Quid enim est quare illis bono loco inuideat? ueniant, hospitentur.

3. The wise man will admit no denarius within his threshold that enters ill; the same man will not repudiate nor exclude great riches, the gift of Fortune and the fruit of Virtue. For what reason should he envy them in a good place? let them come, let them be guests.

Nec iactabit illas nec abscondet — alterum infruniti animi est, alterum timidi et pusilli, uelut magnum bonum intra sinum continentis — nec, ut dixi, eiciet illas e domo. 4. Quid enim dicet? utrumne 'inutiles estis' an 'ego uti diuitiis nescio'? Quemadmodum etiam pedibus suis poterit iter conficere, escendere tamen uehiculum malet, sic pauper [si] poterit esse, diues uolet.

Nor will he vaunt them nor hide them — the one is of an impudent mind, the other of a timid and pusillanimous one, as if of a man containing a great good within his bosom — nor, as I said, will he cast them out of the house. 4. For what will he say? whether ‘you are useless’ or ‘I do not know how to use riches’? Just as he could also accomplish the journey on his own feet, yet he will prefer to climb into a vehicle, so, poor [if] he can be, he will want to be rich.

Habebit itaque opes, sed tamquam leues et auolaturas, nec ulli alii eas nec sibi graues esse patietur. 5. Donabit — quid erexistis aures, quid expeditis sinum? — donabit aut bonis aut eis quos facere poterit bonos, donabit cum summo consilio dignissimos eligens, ut qui meminerit tam expensorum quam acceptorum rationem esse reddendam, donabit ex recta et probabili causa, nam inter turpes iacturas malum munus est; habebit sinum facilem, non perforatum, ex quo multa exeant et nihil excidat.

He will therefore have wealth, but as light and about-to-fly-away, and he will allow them to be heavy for no one else nor for himself. 5. He will give — why have you pricked up your ears, why are you opening your lap? — he will give either to good men or to those whom he will be able to make good; he will give with the highest counsel, choosing the most worthy, as one who remembers that an account must be rendered of both disbursements and receipts; he will give for a right and probable cause, for amid base squanderings a gift is an evil gift; he will have a purse easy to access, not perforated, from which many things go out and nothing falls out.

XXIV.

24.

1. Errat si quis existimat facilem rem esse donare: plurimum ista res habet difficultatis, si modo consilio tribuitur, non casu et impetu spargitur. Hunc promereor, illi reddo; huic succurro, huius misereor; illum instruo dignum quem non deducat paupertas nec occupatum teneat; quibusdam non dabo quamuis desit, quia etiam si dedero erit defuturum; quibusdam offeram, quibusdam etiam inculcabo. Non possum in hac re esse neglegens; numquam magis nomina facio quam cum dono.

1. He errs if anyone esteems it an easy thing to bestow: this matter has very much difficulty, if only it is conferred with counsel, not scattered by chance and impulse. This one I merit, to that one I render back; to this one I succor, of this one I have pity; that one I equip, worthy, whom poverty should not lead astray nor keep occupied; to some I will not give, although he is in need, because even if I shall have given, it will still be lacking; to some I will offer, to some I will even press it upon them. I cannot be negligent in this matter; I never more make entries of names than when I give.

2. 'Quid? tu' inquis 'recepturus donas?' Immo non perditurus: eo loco sit donatio unde repeti non debeat, reddi possit. Beneficium conlocetur quemadmodum thesaurus alte obrutus, quem non eruas nisi fuerit necesse.

2. 'What? you,' you say, 'about to receive back, do you give?'
Rather, not so as to lose: let the donation be in such a place whence it ought not to be demanded back, yet may be repaid
by return. Let a benefaction be placed just as a treasure deeply buried, which
you do not unearth unless it is necessary.

3. Quid? domus ipsa diuitis uiri quantam habet bene faciendi materiam! Quis enim liberalitatem tantum ad togatos uocat?

3. What? the very house of a wealthy man, how much
material for well‑doing it has! For who calls liberality only to the toga‑clad
ones?

hominibus prodesse natura me iubet. Serui liberine sint hi, ingenui an libertini, iustae libertatis an inter amicos datae, quid refert? ubicumque homo est, ibi benefici locus est.

Nature bids me to be of use to human beings. Whether these are slaves or free, freeborn or freedmen, of lawful freedom or of that granted "among friends," what difference does it make? Wherever a human is, there is a place for a benefaction.

Potest itaque pecunia etiam intra limen suum diffundi et liberalitatem exercere, quae non quia liberis debetur sed quia a libero animo proficiscitur ita nominata est. Haec apud sapientem nec umquam in turpes indignosque inpingitur nec umquam ita defetigata errat ut non, quotiens dignum inuenerit, quasi ex pleno fluat.

Accordingly, money can also be spread even within its own threshold and exercise liberality, which is so named not because it is owed to children but because it proceeds from a free mind. This, with the wise man, is never thrust upon the base and unworthy, nor does it ever wander so wearied that it does not, as often as it has found someone worthy, flow as if from a full source.

4. Non est ergo quod perperam exaudiatis quae honeste fortiter animose a studiosis sapientiae dicuntur. Et hoc primum adtendite: aliud est studiosus sapientiae, aliud iam adeptus sapientiam. Ille tibi dicet: 'optime loquor, sed adhuc inter mala uolutor plurima.

4. Therefore there is no reason for you to take amiss the things said honorably, bravely, and spiritedly by the studious of wisdom. And attend to this first: it is one thing to be studious of wisdom, another to have already attained wisdom. The former will say to you: 'I speak very well, but still I wallow among very many evils.'

Non est quod me ad formulam meam exigas: cum maxime facio me et formo et ad exemplar ingens attollo; si processero quantumcumque proposui, exige ut dictis facta respondeant.' Adsecutus uero humani boni summam aliter tecum aget et dicet: 'primum non est quod tibi permittas de melioribus ferre sententiam; mihi iam, quod argumentum est recti, contigit malis displicere. 5. Sed ut tibi rationem reddam qua nulli mortalium inuideo, audi quid promittam et quanti quaeque aestimem. Diuitias nego bonum esse; nam si essent, bonos facerent: nunc, quoniam quod apud malos deprenditur dici bonum non potest, hoc illis nomen nego.

There is no reason for you to press me to my own formula: just now I am making myself and shaping myself and I raise myself to a mighty exemplar; if I shall have advanced however much I have proposed, then demand that deeds answer to words.' Having attained the sum of human good, however, he will deal otherwise with you and will say: 'first, there is no reason for you to permit yourself to pass sentence on your betters; to me already, which is an argument of rectitude, it has befallen to displease the bad. 5. But that I may render to you the rationale why I envy no mortal, hear what I promise and at how much I estimate each thing. I deny riches to be a good; for if they were, they would make men good: now, since what is found among the bad cannot be called good, I deny that name to them.

Ceterum et habendas esse et utiles et magna commoda uitae adferentis fateor.

However, I confess that they are both to be had and useful, and that they bring great commodities of life.

XXV.

25.

1. Quid ergo sit quare illas non in bonis numerem, et quid praestem in illis aliud quam uos, quoniam inter utrosque conuenit habendas, audite. Pone in opulentissima me domo, pone aurum argentumque in promiscuo usu sit: non suspiciam me ob ista quae, etiam si apud me, extra me tamen sunt. In Sublicium pontem me transfer et inter egentes abice: non ideo tamen me despiciam quod in illorum numero consedero qui manum ad stipem porrigunt.

1. What then is the reason why I do not number those things among goods, and what do I assert in them other than you, since between both sides it is agreed they are to be had—listen. Set me in a most opulent house, set me gold and silver are in common use: I will not look up to myself on account of those things which, even if they are with me, are nevertheless outside me. Transfer me to the Sublician bridge and cast me among the indigent: not on that account, however, will I despise myself because I have taken a seat in the number of those who stretch out a hand for alms.

Quid enim ad rem an frustum panis desit cui non deest mori posse? Quid ergo est? domum illam splendidam malo quam pontem.

For what does it matter whether a morsel of bread is lacking to one who does not lack the ability to die? What then? I prefer that splendid house to the bridge.

2. Pone instrumentis splendentibus et delicato apparatu: nihilo me feliciorem credam quod mihi molle erit amiculum, quod purpura conuiuis meis substernetur. Muta stragula mea: nihilo miserius ero si lassa ceruix mea in maniculo faeni adquiescet, si super Circense tomentum per sarturas ueteris lintei effluens incubabo. Quid ergo est?

2. Put me
shining instruments and delicate apparatus: I will believe myself not a whit happier
because a soft little cloak will be mine, because purple will be spread beneath my dinner-guests. Change my bedding: I shall be not a whit more wretched if my weary neck rests on a little handful
of hay, if upon Circensian stuffing, spilling out through the seams of an old linen
cloth, I lie. What, then, is it?

malo quid mihi animi sit ostendere praetextatus et ~causatus~ quam nudis scapulis aut ~sententis~. 3. Omnes mihi ex uoto dies cedant, nouae gratulationes prioribus subtexantur: non ob hoc mihi placebo. Muta in contrarium hanc indulgentiam temporis, hinc illinc percutiatur animus damno luctu incursionibus uariis, nulla hora sine aliqua querella sit: non ideo me dicam inter miserrima miserum, non ideo aliquem execrabor diem; prouisum est enim a me ne quis mihi ater dies esset. Quid ergo est?

I prefer to show what spirit I have, clad in the praetexta and ~causatus~, rather than with bare shoulders or ~sententis~. 3. May all days turn out for me according to my vow, let new congratulations be woven onto earlier ones: not on this account shall I please myself. Change into the contrary this indulgence of time; let the mind be struck from this side and that by loss, by mourning, by various incursions; let no hour be without some complaint: not for that reason shall I call myself wretched among the most wretched, not for that reason will I execrate any day; for it has been foreprovided by me that no day should be black for me. What then is it?

malo gaudia temperare quam dolores compescere.'

I prefer to temper joys rather than to restrain pains.'

4. Hoc tibi ille Socrates dicet: 'fac me uictorem uniuersarum gentium, delicatus ille Liberi currus triumphantem usque ad Thebas a solis ortu uehat, iura reges ~penatium~ petant: me hominem esse maxime cogitabo, cum deus undique consalutabor. Huic tam sublimi fastigio coniunge protinus praecipitem mutationem; in alienum inponar fericulum exornaturus uictoris superbi ac feri pompam: non humilior sub alieno curru agar quam in meo steteram. Quid ergo est?

4. That Socrates will say this to you: 'Make me the victor of all nations, let that delicate chariot of Liber carry me in triumph as far as Thebes from the rising of the sun, let kings seek the rights of the Penates: I will most of all think that I am a man, when I am saluted as a god from every side. To this so sublime height join straightway a headlong change; let me be set upon another’s litter, to adorn the pomp of a proud and fierce victor: I shall not be more abject to be driven beneath another’s chariot than I had stood in my own. What then is it?

uincere tamen quam capi malo. 5. Totum fortunae regnum despiciam, sed ex illo, si dabitur electio, meliora sumam. Quidquid ad me uenerit bonum fiet, sed malo faciliora ac iucundiora ueniant et minus uexatura tractantem.

Yet I prefer to conquer rather than to be captured. 5. I shall despise the whole realm of Fortune, but from it, if a choice is given, I will take the better things. Whatever comes to me will be made good, but I prefer that easier and more pleasant things come, and less vexatious to the one handling them.

Non est enim quod existimes ullam esse sine labore uirtutem, sed quaedam uirtutes stimulis, quaedam frenis egent. 6. Quemadmodum corpus in procliui retineri debet, aduersus ardua inpelli, ita quaedam uirtutes in procliui sunt, quaedam cliuum subeunt. An dubium est quin escendat nitatur obluctetur patientia fortitudo perseuerantia et quaecumque alia duris opposita uirtus est et fortunam subigit?

For there is no reason to think that there is any virtue without labor, but certain virtues need spurs, others reins. 6. Just as the body ought to be held back on a downhill, and driven forward against the arduous, so some virtues are on a downhill, some mount the slope. Is it doubtful that patience, fortitude, perseverance, and whatever other virtue is set against hardships climb, strive, wrestle, and subdue fortune?

7. Quid ergo? non aeque manifestum est per deuexum ire liberalitatem temperantiam mansuetudinem? In his continemus animum ne prolabatur, in illis exhortamur incitamusque acerrime.

7. What then? is it not equally
manifest that liberality, temperance, and mansuetude go along the declivity? In these we hold the mind in check lest it slip down, in those we exhort and incite it
most keenly.

Ergo paupertati adhibebimus illas quae pugnare sciunt fortiores, diuitiis illas diligentiores quae suspensum gradum ponunt et pondus suum sustinent. 8. Cum hoc ita diuisum sit, malo has in usu mihi esse quae exercendae tranquillius sunt quam eas quarum experimentum sanguis et sudor est. Ergo non ego aliter' inquit sapiens 'uiuo quam loquor, sed uos aliter auditis; sonus tantummodo uerborum ad aures uestras peruenit: quid significet non quaeritis.'

Therefore to poverty we will apply those stronger ones that know how to fight, to riches those more diligent ones that set down a poised step and sustain their own weight. 8. Since this is thus divided, I prefer to have in use for myself those which are exercised more tranquilly than those whose trial is blood and sweat. Therefore not I otherwise,' says the wise man, 'do I live than I speak, but you hear otherwise; the sound only of the words reaches your ears: what it signifies you do not inquire.'

XXVI.

26.

1. 'Quid ergo inter me stultum et te sapientem interest, si uterque habere uolumus?' Plurimum: diuitiae enim apud sapientem uirum in seruitute sunt, apud stultum in imperio; sapiens diuitiis nihil permittit, uobis diuitiae omnia; uos, tamquam aliquis uobis aeternam possessionem earum promiserit, adsuescitis illis et cohaeretis, sapiens tunc maxime paupertatem meditatur cum in mediis diuitiis constitit. 2. Numquam imperator ita paci credit ut non se praeparet bello quod, etiam si non geritur, indictum est: uos domus formonsa, tamquam nec ardere nec ruere possit, insolentes, uos opes, tamquam periculum omne transcenderint maioresque sint uobis quam quibus consumendis satis uirium habeat fortuna, obstupefaciunt. 3. Otiosi diuitiis luditis nec prouidetis illarum periculum, sicut barbari plerumque inclusi et ignari machinarum segnes laborem obsidentium spectant nec quo illa pertineant quae ex longinquo struuntur intellegunt.

1. 'What, then, is the difference between me, a fool, and you, a wise man, if we both wish to have them?' Very much: for riches with a wise man are in servitude, with a fool in command; the wise man allows nothing to riches, to you riches are everything; you, as though someone had promised you an eternal possession of them, grow accustomed to them and cling to them, while the wise man most of all meditates on poverty when he has taken his stand in the midst of riches. 2. Never does a commander so trust to peace that he does not prepare himself for war, which, even if it is not waged, has been proclaimed: a fair house makes you overbearing, as though it could neither burn nor fall; wealth, as though it had transcended every peril and were greater for you than the power which Fortune has to consume it, leaves you stupefied. 3. At leisure you play with riches and do not foresee their danger, just as barbarians, often shut in and ignorant of machines, sluggishly watch the toil of the besiegers and do not understand to what those things which are being constructed from afar tend.

Idem uobis euenit: marcetis in uestris rebus nec cogitatis quot casus undique immineant iam iamque pretiosa spolia laturi. Sapientis quisquis abstulerit diuitias, omnia illi sua relinquet; uiuit enim praesentibus laetus, futuri securus.

The same thing happens to you: you grow sluggish in your own affairs and do not consider how many accidents on every side are imminent, at any moment about to carry off precious spoils. Whoever takes away the wise man’s riches, will leave to him all that is his; for he lives glad with present things, secure for the future.

4. 'Nihil magis' inquit ille Socrates aut aliquis alius cui idem aduersus humana atque eadem potestas est 'persuasi mihi quam ne ad opiniones uestras actum uitae meae flecterem. Solita conferte undique uerba: non conuiciari uos putabo sed uagire uelut infantes miserrimos.' 5. Haec dicet ille cui sapientia contigit, quem animus uitiorum immunis increpare alios, non quia odit, sed in remedium iubet. Adiciet his illa: 'existimatio me uestra non meo nomine sed uestro mouet, quia ~clamitatis~ odisse et lacessere uirtutem bonae spei eiuratio est.

4. 'Nothing more,' says that Socrates or some other person who has the same toward human things and an equal power, 'have I persuaded myself of than not to bend the course of my life to your opinions. Gather your usual words from every side: I shall not think you are railing, but wailing like most miserable infants.' 5. This will be said by him upon whom wisdom has fallen, whom a mind immune from vices bids to rebuke others, not because he hates, but as a remedy. He will add this to these things: 'Your estimation moves me not on my own account but on yours, because you keep shouting that to hate and to provoke virtue is an abjuration of good hope.

Nullam mihi iniuriam facitis, sed ne dis quidem hi qui aras euertunt. Sed malum propositum apparet malumque consilium etiam ibi ubi nocere non potuit. 6. Sic uestras halucinationes fero quemadmodum Iuppiter optimus maximus ineptias poetarum, quorum alius illi alas inposuit, alius cornua, alius adulterum illum induxit et abnoctantem, alius saeuum in deos, alius iniquum in homines, alius raptorem ingenuorum et cognatorum quidem, alius parricidam et regni alieni paternique expugnatorem: quibus nihil aliud actum est quam ut pudor hominibus peccandi demeretur, si tales deos credidissent.

You do me no injury, but not even the gods do those who overturn altars. But an evil purpose appears and evil counsel even there where it could not harm. 6. Thus I bear your hallucinations just as Jupiter Best and Greatest [bears] the ineptitudes of the poets, of whom one imposed wings upon him, another horns, another introduced him as that adulterer and as spending the nights away from home, another as savage toward the gods, another iniquitous toward men, another a ravisher of the freeborn and indeed of kinsfolk, another a parricide and an overthrower of another’s and his father’s realm: by which nothing else was done than that the shame of sinning might be removed from men, if they believed the gods to be such.

7. Sed quamquam ista me nihil laedant, uestra tamen uos moneo causa: suspicite uirtutem, credite iis qui illam diu secuti magnum quiddam ipsos et quod in dies maius appareat sequi clamant, et ipsam ut deos ac professores eius ut antistites colite et, quotiens mentio sacrarum litterarum interuenerit, fauete linguis. Hoc uerbum non, ut plerique existimant, a fauore trahitur, sed imperat silentium ut rite peragi possit sacrum nulla uoce mala obstrepente; quod multo magis necessarium est imperari uobis, ut quotiens aliquid ex illo proferetur oraculo, intenti et compressa uoce audiatis. 8. Cum sistrum aliquis concutiens ex imperio mentitur, cum aliquis secandi lacertos suos artifex brachia atque umeros suspensa manu cruentat, cum aliqua genibus per uiam repens ululat laurumque linteatus senex et medio lucernam die praeferens conclamat iratum aliquem deorum, concurritis et auditis ac diuinum esse eum, inuicem mutuum alentes stuporem, adfirmatis.'

7. But although those things do me no hurt, I still warn you for your own sake: look up to virtue, believe those who have long followed her and cry out that they pursue something great in themselves and what appears greater day by day, and worship her herself as gods, and her professors as pontiffs; and, whenever mention of the sacred letters has intervened, “be favorable with your tongues.” This word is not, as most suppose, drawn from favor, but commands silence, so that the sacred rite may be duly performed with no ill voice clattering; which it is far more necessary to enjoin upon you, that whenever anything shall be brought forth from that oracle, you listen intent, with voice compressed. 8. When someone, shaking a sistrum, lies “by command;” when some craftsman at cutting his own muscles, with hand upraised, bloodies his arms and shoulders; when some woman, crawling on her knees along the road, howls, and a linen-clad old man, bearing laurel and carrying a lamp at midday, cries aloud that some one of the gods is angry, you run together and listen and affirm that he is divine, mutually nursing one another’s stupefaction.

XXVII.

27.

Ecce Socrates ex illo carcere quem intrando purgauit omnique honestiorem curia reddidit proclamat: 'qui iste furor, quae ista inimica dis hominibusque natura est infamare uirtutes et malignis sermonibus sancta uiolare? Si potestis, bonos laudate, si minus, transite; quod si uobis exercere taetram istam licentiam placet, alter in alterum incursitate. Nam cum in caelum insanitis, non dico sacrilegium facitis sed operam perditis.

Behold, Socrates, from that prison which by entering he purged and rendered more honorable than any curia, proclaims: 'what madness is this, what nature hostile to gods and men is it to defame virtues and to violate sacred things with malignant speeches? If you can, praise the good; if not, pass by; but if it pleases you to exercise that foul license, dash one against another. For when you rage against heaven, I do not say you commit sacrilege, but you waste your effort.'

2. Praebui ego aliquando Aristophani materiam iocorum, tota illa comicorum poetarum manus in me uenenatos sales suos effudit: inlustrata est uirtus mea per ea ipsa per quae petebatur; produci enim illi et temptari expedit, nec ulli magis intellegunt quanta sit quam qui uires eius lacessendo senserunt: duritia silicis nullis magis quam ferientibus nota est. 3. Praebeo me non aliter quam rupes aliqua in uadoso mari destituta, quam fluctus non desinunt, undecumque moti sunt, uerberare, nec ideo aut loco eam mouent aut per tot aetates crebro incursu suo consumunt. Adsilite, facite impetum: ferendo uos uincam.

2. I once provided
Aristophanes with material for jokes, that whole band of comic poets
poured out upon me their venomous witticisms: my virtue was made illustrious by
those very things by which it was being assailed; for it is expedient that it be brought forth and tested, nor
do any understand how great it is more than those who, by provoking its forces, have felt them:
the hardness of flint is known to none more than to those striking it. 3. I present myself no
otherwise than as some cliff left standing in a shallow sea, which the waves do not cease,
from wherever they are stirred, to beat; nor therefore do they either move it from its place or through so
many ages consume it by their frequent onrush. Leap on, make an assault: by enduring
I shall conquer you.

In ea quae firma et inexsuperabilia sunt quidquid incurrit malo suo uim suam exercet: proinde quaerite aliquam mollem cedentemque materiam in qua tela uestra figantur.

In those things which are firm and insuperable, whatever runs up against them to its own harm exerts its force: therefore seek some soft and yielding material in which your weapons may be fixed.

4. Vobis autem uacat aliena scrutari mala et sententias ferre de quoquam? "Quare hic philosophus laxius habitat? quare hic lautius cenat?" Papulas obseruatis alienas, obsiti plurimis ulceribus?

4. But have you, moreover, leisure to scrutinize another’s evils and to pass judgments about anyone? "Why does this philosopher dwell more laxly? why does this one dine more lavishly?" You observe others’ pimples, you who are covered with very many ulcers?

hoc tale est quale si quis pulcherrimorum corporum naeuos aut uerrucas derideat quem foeda scabies depascitur. 5. Obicite Platoni quod petierit pecuniam, Aristoteli quod acceperit, Democrito quod neglexerit, Epicuro quod consumpserit; mihi ipsi Alcibiaden et Phaedrum obiectate, ~o uos usu~ maxime felices, cum primum uobis imitari uitia nostra contigerit. 6. Quin potius mala uestra circumspicitis, quae uos ab omni parte confodiunt, alia grassantia extrinsecus, alia in uisceribus ipsis ardentia?

this is like as if someone
were to ridicule the naevi or verrucae of the most beautiful bodies, he whom foul scabies
is devouring. 5. Throw in Plato’s teeth that he sought money, in Aristotle’s that he
accepted it, in Democritus’s that he neglected it, in Epicurus’s that he consumed it; at me myself
throw Alcibiades and Phaedrus, ~O you by experience~ most happy, when first
it shall have befallen you to imitate our vices. 6. Why not rather look around at your own evils,
which stab you from every side, some rampaging from without, others burning
in your very entrails?

Non eo loco res humanae sunt, etiam si statum uestrum parum nostis, ut uobis tantum otii supersit ut in probra meliorum agitare linguam uacet.

Human affairs are not in such a condition, even if you know your own status too little,
that so much leisure remains to you that you have time to wag the tongue in the slanders of your betters.

XXVIII.

28.

1. Hoc uos non intellegitis et alienum fortunae uestrae uultum geritis, sicut plurimi quibus in circo aut theatro desidentibus iam funesta domus est nec adnuntiatum malum. At ego ex alto prospiciens uideo quae tempestates aut immineant uobis paulo tardius rupturae nimbum suum aut iam uicinae uos ac uestra rapturae propius accesserint. Quid porro?

1. You do not understand this, and you wear a countenance alien to your fortune, just as very many whose house, while they sit in the circus or the theater, is already funereal, and the evil has not been announced. But I, looking out from on high, see what storms either hang over you, a little slower to burst their own rain-cloud, or have already come nearer, ready to snatch away you and yours. What next?

nonne nunc quoque, etiam si parum sentitis, turbo quidam animos uestros rotat et inuoluit fugientes petentesque eadem et nunc in sublime adleuatos nunc in infima adlisos cir * * * ?'

is it not now too,
even if you perceive it but little, that a certain whirlwind rotates and involves your minds,
fleeing and seeking the same things, and now elevated to the sublime, now dashed down to the lowest,
cir * * * ?'