BOOK I.

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CICERO'S TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS;

ALSO, TREATISES ON

THE NATURE OF THE GODS,

AND ON

THE COMMONWEALTH.

LITERALLY TRANSLATED, CHIEFLY BY

C. D. YONGE.

NEW YORK:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,

FRANKLIN SQUARE.

1877.

HARPER'S NEW CLASSICAL LIBRARY.

COMPRISING LITERAL TRANSLATIONS OF

CÆSAR.

VIRGIL.

SALLUST.

HORACE.

CICERO'S ORATIONS.

CICERO'S OFFICES &c.

CICERO ON ORATORY AND ORATORS.

CICERO'S TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS, the Republic, and the Nature of the Gods.

TERENCE.

TACITUS.

LIVY. 2 Vols.

JUVENAL.

XENOPHON.

HOMER'S ILIAD.

HOMER'S ODYSSEY.

HERODOTUS.

DEMOSTHENES. 2 Vols.

THUCIDIDES.

ÆSCHYLUS.

SOPHOCLES.

EURIPIDES. 2 Vols.

PLATO. [SELECT DIALOGUES.]

12mo, Cloth, $1.50 per Volume.

HARPER & BROTHERS _will send either of the above works by mail, postage

prepaid, to any part of the United States, on receipt of the price_.

NOTE.

The greater portion of the Republic was previously translated by

Francis Barham, Esq., and published in 1841. Although ably performed,

it was not sufficiently close for the purpose of the "CLASSICAL

LIBRARY," and was therefore placed in the hands of the present editor

for revision, as well as for collation with recent texts. This has

occasioned material alterations and additions.

The treatise "On the Nature of the Gods" is a revision of that usually

ascribed to the celebrated Benjamin Franklin.

CONTENTS.

_Tusculan Disputations_

_On the Nature of the Gods_

_On the Commonwealth_

THE TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS.

INTRODUCTION.

In the year A.U.C. 708, and the sixty-second year of Cicero's age, his

daughter, Tullia, died in childbed; and her loss afflicted Cicero to

such a degree that he abandoned all public business, and, leaving the

city, retired to Asterra, which was a country house that he had near

Antium; where, after a while, he devoted himself to philosophical

studies, and, besides other works, he published his Treatise de

Finibus, and also this treatise called the Tusculan Disputations, of

which Middleton gives this concise description:

"The first book teaches us how to contemn the terrors of death, and to

look upon it as a blessing rather than an evil;

"The second, to support pain and affliction with a manly fortitude;

"The third, to appease all our complaints and uneasinesses under the

accidents of life;

"The fourth, to moderate all our other passions;

"And the fifth explains the sufficiency of virtue to make men happy."

It was his custom in the opportunities of his leisure to take some

friends with him into the country, where, instead of amusing themselves

with idle sports or feasts, their diversions were wholly speculative,

tending to improve the mind and enlarge the understanding. In this

manner he now spent five days at his Tusculan villa in discussing with

his friends the several questions just mentioned. For, after employing

the mornings in declaiming and rhetorical exercises, they used to

retire in the afternoon into a gallery, called the Academy, which he

had built for the purpose of philosophical conferences, where, after

the manner of the Greeks, he held a school, as they called it, and

invited the company to call for any subject that they desired to hear

explained, which being proposed accordingly by some of the audience

became immediately the argument of that day's debate. These five

conferences, or dialogues, he collected afterward into writing in the

very words and manner in which they really passed; and published them

under the title of his Tusculan Disputations, from the name of the

villa in which they were held.

* * * * *

BOOK I.

ON THE CONTEMPT OF DEATH.

I. At a time when I had entirely, or to a great degree, released myself

from my labors as an advocate, and from my duties as a senator, I had

recourse again, Brutus, principally by your advice, to those studies

which never had been out of my mind, although neglected at times, and

which after a long interval I resumed; and now, since the principles

and rules of all arts which relate to living well depend on the study

of wisdom, which is called philosophy, I have thought it an employment

worthy of me to illustrate them in the Latin tongue, not because

philosophy could not be understood in the Greek language, or by the

teaching of Greek masters; but it has always been my opinion that our

countrymen have, in some instances, made wiser discoveries than the

Greeks, with reference to those subjects which they have considered

worthy of devoting their attention to, and in others have improved upon

their discoveries, so that in one way or other we surpass them on every

point; for, with regard to the manners and habits of private life, and

family and domestic affairs, we certainly manage them with more

elegance, and better than they did; and as to our republic, that our

ancestors have, beyond all dispute, formed on better customs and laws.

What shall I say of our military affairs; in which our ancestors have

been most eminent in valor, and still more so in discipline? As to

those things which are attained not by study, but nature, neither

Greece, nor any nation, is comparable to us; for what people has

displayed such gravity, such steadiness, such greatness of soul,

probity, faith--such distinguished virtue of every kind, as to be equal

to our ancestors. In learning, indeed, and all kinds of literature,

Greece did excel us, and it was easy to do so where there was no

competition; for while among the Greeks the poets were the most ancient

species of learned men--since Homer and Hesiod lived before the

foundation of Rome, and Archilochus[1] was a contemporary of

Romulus--we received poetry much later. For it was about five hundred

and ten years after the building of Rome before Livius[2] published a

play in the consulship of C. Claudius, the son of Cæcus, and M.

Tuditanus, a year before the birth of Ennius, who was older than

Plautus and Nævius.

II. It was, therefore, late before poets were either known or received

among us; though we find in Cato de Originibus that the guests used, at

their entertainments, to sing the praises of famous men to the sound of

the flute; but a speech of Cato's shows this kind of poetry to have

been in no great esteem, as he censures Marcus Nobilior for carrying

poets with him into his province; for that consul, as we know, carried

Ennius with him into Ætolia. Therefore the less esteem poets were in,

the less were those studies pursued; though even then those who did

display the greatest abilities that way were not very inferior to the

Greeks. Do we imagine that if it had been considered commendable in

Fabius,[3] a man of the highest rank, to paint, we should not have had

many Polycleti and Parrhasii? Honor nourishes art, and glory is the

spur with all to studies; while those studies are always neglected in

every nation which are looked upon disparagingly. The Greeks held skill

in vocal and instrumental music as a very important accomplishment, and

therefore it is recorded of Epaminondas, who, in my opinion, was the

greatest man among the Greeks, that he played excellently on the flute;

and Themistocles, some years before, was deemed ignorant because at an

entertainment he declined the lyre when it was offered to him. For this

reason musicians flourished in Greece; music was a general study; and

whoever was unacquainted with it was not considered as fully instructed

in learning. Geometry was in high esteem with them, therefore none were

more honorable than mathematicians. But we have confined this art to

bare measuring and calculating.

III. But, on the contrary, we early entertained an esteem for the

orator; though he was not at first a man of learning, but only quick at

speaking: in subsequent times he became learned; for it is reported

that Galba, Africanus, and Lælius were men of learning; and that even

Cato, who preceded them in point of time, was a studious man: then

succeeded the Lepidi, Carbo, and Gracchi, and so many great orators

after them, down to our own times, that we were very little, if at all,

inferior to the Greeks. Philosophy has been at a low ebb even to this

present time, and has had no assistance from our own language, and so

now I have undertaken to raise and illustrate it, in order that, as I

have been of service to my countrymen, when employed on public affairs,

I may, if possible, be so likewise in my retirement; and in this I must

take the more pains, because there are already many books in the Latin

language which are said to be written inaccurately, having been

composed by excellent men, only not of sufficient learning; for,

indeed, it is possible that a man may think well, and yet not be able

to express his thoughts elegantly; but for any one to publish thoughts

which he can neither arrange skilfully nor illustrate so as to

entertain his reader, is an unpardonable abuse of letters and

retirement: they, therefore, read their books to one another, and no

one ever takes them up but those who wish to have the same license for

careless writing allowed to themselves. Wherefore, if oratory has

acquired any reputation from my industry, I shall take the more pains

to open the fountains of philosophy, from which all my eloquence has

taken its rise.

IV. But, as Aristotle,[4] a man of the greatest genius, and of the most

various knowledge, being excited by the glory of the rhetorician

Isocrates,[5] commenced teaching young men to speak, and joined

philosophy with eloquence: so it is my design not to lay aside my

former study of oratory, and yet to employ myself at the same time in

this greater and more fruitful art; for I have always thought that to

be able to speak copiously and elegantly on the most important

questions was the most perfect philosophy. And I have so diligently

applied myself to this pursuit, that I have already ventured to have a

school like the Greeks. And lately when you left us, having many of my

friends about me, I attempted at my Tusculan villa what I could do in

that way; for as I formerly used to practise declaiming, which nobody

continued longer than myself, so this is now to be the declamation of

my old age. I desired any one to propose a question which he wished to

have discussed, and then I argued that point either sitting or walking;

and so I have compiled the scholæ, as the Greeks call them, of five

days, in as many books. We proceeded in this manner: when he who had

proposed the subject for discussion had said what he thought proper, I

spoke against him; for this is, you know, the old and Socratic method

of arguing against another's opinion; for Socrates thought that thus

the truth would more easily be arrived at. But to give you a better

notion of our disputations, I will not barely send you an account of

them, but represent them to you as they were carried on; therefore let

the introduction be thus:

V. _A._ To me death seems to be an evil.

_M._ What, to those who are already dead? or to those who must die?

_A._ To both.

_M._ It is a misery, then, because an evil?

_A._ Certainly.

_M._ Then those who have already died, and those who have still got to

die, are both miserable?

_A._ So it appears to me.

_M._ Then all are miserable?

_A._ Every one.

_M._ And, indeed, if you wish to be consistent, all that are already

born, or ever shall be, are not only miserable, but always will be so;

for should you maintain those only to be miserable, you would not

except any one living, for all must die; but there should be an end of

misery in death. But seeing that the dead are miserable, we are born to

eternal misery, for they must of consequence be miserable who died a

hundred thousand years ago; or rather, all that have ever been born.

_A._ So, indeed, I think.

_M._ Tell me, I beseech you, are you afraid of the three-headed

Cerberus in the shades below, and the roaring waves of Cocytus, and the

passage over Acheron, and Tantalus expiring with thirst, while the

water touches his chin; and Sisyphus,

Who sweats with arduous toil in vain

The steepy summit of the mount to gain?

Perhaps, too, you dread the inexorable judges, Minos and Rhadamanthus;

before whom neither L. Crassus nor M. Antonius can defend you; and

where, since the cause lies before Grecian judges, you will not even be

able to employ Demosthenes; but you must plead for yourself before a

very great assembly. These things perhaps you dread, and therefore look

on death as an eternal evil.

VI. _A._ Do you take me to be so imbecile as to give credit to such

things?

_M._ What, do you not believe them?

_A._ Not in the least.

_M._ I am sorry to hear that.

_A._ Why, I beg?

_M._ Because I could have been very eloquent in speaking against them.

_A._ And who could not on such a subject? or what trouble is it to

refute these monstrous inventions of the poets and painters?[6]

_M._ And yet you have books of philosophers full of arguments against

these.

_A._ A great waste of time, truly! for who is so weak as to be

concerned about them?

_M._ If, then, there is no one miserable in the infernal regions, there

can be no one there at all.

_A._ I am altogether of that opinion.

_M._ Where, then, are those you call miserable? or what place do they

inhabit? For, if they exist at all, they must be somewhere.

_A._ I, indeed, am of opinion that they are nowhere.

_M._ Then they have no existence at all.

_A._ Even so, and yet they are miserable for this very reason, that

they have no existence.

_M._ I had rather now have you afraid of Cerberus than speak thus

inaccurately.

_A._ In what respect?

_M._ Because you admit him to exist whose existence you deny with the

same breath. Where now is your sagacity? When you say any one is

miserable, you say that he who does not exist, does exist.

_A._ I am not so absurd as to say that.

_M._ What is it that you do say, then?

_A._ I say, for instance, that Marcus Crassus is miserable in being

deprived of such great riches as his by death; that Cn. Pompey is

miserable in being taken from such glory and honor; and, in short, that

all are miserable who are deprived of this light of life.

_M._ You have returned to the same point, for to be miserable implies

an existence; but you just now denied that the dead had any existence:

if, then, they have not, they can be nothing; and if so, they are not

even miserable.

_A._ Perhaps I do not express what I mean, for I look upon this very

circumstance, not to exist after having existed, to be very miserable.

_M._ What, more so than not to have existed at all? Therefore, those

who are not yet born are miserable because they are not; and we

ourselves, if we are to be miserable after death, were miserable before

we were born: but I do not remember that I was miserable before I was

born; and I should be glad to know, if your memory is better, what you

recollect of yourself before you were born.

VII. _A._ You are pleasant: as if I had said that those men are

miserable who are not born, and not that they are so who are dead.

_M._ You say, then, that they are so?

_A._ Yes; I say that because they no longer exist after having existed

they are miserable.

_M._ You do not perceive that you are asserting contradictions; for

what is a greater contradiction, than that that should be not only

miserable, but should have any existence at all, which does not exist?

When you go out at the Capene gate and see the tombs of the Calatini,

the Scipios, Servilii, and Metelli, do you look on them as miserable?

_A._ Because you press me with a word, henceforward I will not say they

are miserable absolutely, but miserable on this account, because they

have no existence.

_M._ You do not say, then, "M. Crassus is miserable," but only

"Miserable M. Crassus."

_A._ Exactly so.

_M._ As if it did not follow that whatever you speak of in that manner

either is or is not. Are you not acquainted with the first principles

of logic? For this is the first thing they lay down, Whatever is

asserted (for that is the best way that occurs to me, at the moment, of

rendering the Greek term [Greek: axiôma]; if I can think of a more

accurate expression hereafter, I will use it), is asserted as being

either true or false. When, therefore, you say, "Miserable M. Crassus,"

you either say this, "M. Crassus is miserable," so that some judgment

may be made whether it is true or false, or you say nothing at all.

_A._ Well, then, I now own that the dead are not miserable, since you

have drawn from me a concession that they who do not exist at all can

not be miserable. What then? We that are alive, are we not wretched,

seeing we must die? for what is there agreeable in life, when we must

night and day reflect that, at some time or other, we must die?

VIII. _M._ Do you not, then, perceive how great is the evil from which

you have delivered human nature?

_A._ By what means?

_M._ Because, if to die were miserable to the dead, to live would be a

kind of infinite and eternal misery. Now, however, I see a goal, and

when I have reached it, there is nothing more to be feared; but you

seem to me to follow the opinion of Epicharmus,[7] a man of some

discernment, and sharp enough for a Sicilian.

_A._ What opinion? for I do not recollect it.

_M._ I will tell you if I can in Latin; for you know I am no more used

to bring in Latin sentences in a Greek discourse than Greek in a Latin

one.

_A._ And that is right enough. But what is that opinion of Epicharmus?

_M._

I would not die, but yet

Am not concerned that I shall be dead.

_A._ I now recollect the Greek; but since you have obliged me to grant

that the dead are not miserable, proceed to convince me that it is not

miserable to be under a necessity of dying.

_M._ That is easy enough; but I have greater things in hand.

_A._ How comes that to be so easy? And what are those things of more

consequence?

_M._ Thus: because, if there is no evil after death, then even death

itself can be none; for that which immediately succeeds that is a state

where you grant that there is no evil: so that even to be obliged to

die can be no evil, for that is only the being obliged to arrive at a

place where we allow that no evil is.

_A._ I beg you will be more explicit on this point, for these subtle

arguments force me sooner to admissions than to conviction. But what

are those more important things about which you say that you are

occupied?

_M._ To teach you, if I can, that death is not only no evil, but a

good.

_A._ I do not insist on that, but should be glad to hear you argue it,

for even though you should not prove your point, yet you will prove

that death is no evil. But I will not interrupt you; I would rather

hear a continued discourse.

_M._ What, if I should ask you a question, would you not answer?

_A._ That would look like pride; but I would rather you should not ask

but where necessity requires.

IX. _M._ I will comply with your wishes, and explain as well as I can

what you require; but not with any idea that, like the Pythian Apollo,

what I say must needs be certain and indisputable, but as a mere man,

endeavoring to arrive at probabilities by conjecture, for I have no

ground to proceed further on than probability. Those men may call their

statements indisputable who assert that what they say can be perceived

by the senses, and who proclaim themselves philosophers by profession.

_A._ Do as you please: We are ready to hear you.

_M._ The first thing, then, is to inquire what death, which seems to be

so well understood, really is; for some imagine death to be the

departure of the soul from the body; others think that there is no such

departure, but that soul and body perish together, and that the soul is

extinguished with the body. Of those who think that the soul does

depart from the body, some believe in its immediate dissolution; others

fancy that it continues to exist for a time; and others believe that it

lasts forever. There is great dispute even what the soul is, where it

is, and whence it is derived: with some, the heart itself (_cor_) seems

to be the soul, hence the expressions, _excordes_, _vecordes_,

_concordes;_ and that prudent Nasica, who was twice consul, was called

Corculus, _i.e._, wise-heart; and Ælius Sextus is described as

_Egregie_ cordatus _homo, catus Æliu' Sextus_--that great

_wise-hearted_ man, sage Ælius. Empedocles imagines the blood, which is

suffused over the heart, to be the soul; to others, a certain part of

the brain seems to be the throne of the soul; others neither allow the

heart itself, nor any portion of the brain, to be the soul, but think

either that the heart is the seat and abode of the soul, or else that

the brain is so. Some would have the soul, or spirit, to be the

_anima_, as our schools generally agree; and indeed the name signifies

as much, for we use the expressions _animam agere_, to live; _animam

efflare_, to expire; _animosi_, men of spirit; _bene animati_, men of

right feeling; _exanimi sententia_, according to our real opinion; and

the very word _animus_ is derived from _anima_. Again, the soul seems

to Zeno the Stoic to be fire.

X. But what I have said as to the heart, the blood, the brain, air, or

fire being the soul, are common opinions: the others are only

entertained by individuals; and, indeed, there were many among the

ancients who held singular opinions on this subject, of whom the latest

was Aristoxenus, a man who was both a musician and a philosopher. He

maintained a certain straining of the body, like what is called harmony

in music, to be the soul, and believed that, from the figure and nature

of the whole body, various motions are excited, as sounds are from an

instrument. He adhered steadily to his system, and yet he said

something, the nature of which, whatever it was, had been detailed and

explained a great while before by Plato. Xenocrates denied that the

soul had any figure, or anything like a body; but said it was a number,

the power of which, as Pythagoras had fancied, some ages before, was

the greatest in nature: his master, Plato, imagined a threefold soul, a

dominant portion of which--that is to say, reason--he had lodged in the

head, as in a tower; and the other two parts--namely, anger and

desire--he made subservient to this one, and allotted them distinct

abodes, placing anger in the breast, and desire under the præcordia.

But Dicæarchus, in that discourse of some learned disputants, held at

Corinth, which he details to us in three books--in the first book

introduces many speakers; and in the other two he introduces a certain

Pherecrates, an old man of Phthia, who, as he said, was descended from

Deucalion; asserting, that there is in fact no such thing at all as a

soul, but that it is a name without a meaning; and that it is idle to

use the expression "animals," or "animated beings;" that neither men

nor beasts have minds or souls, but that all that power by which we act

or perceive is equally infused into every living creature, and is

inseparable from the body, for if it were not, it would be nothing; nor

is there anything whatever really existing except body, which is a

single and simple thing, so fashioned as to live and have its

sensations in consequence of the regulations of nature. Aristotle, a

man superior to all others, both in genius and industry (I always

except Plato), after having embraced these four known sorts of

principles, from which all things deduce their origin, imagines that

there is a certain fifth nature, from whence comes the soul; for to

think, to foresee, to learn, to teach, to invent anything, and many

other attributes of the same kind, such as to remember, to love, to

hate, to desire, to fear, to be pleased or displeased--these, and

others like them, exist, he thinks, in none of those first four kinds:

on such account he adds a fifth kind, which has no name, and so by a

new name he calls the soul [Greek: endelecheia], as if it were a

certain continued and perpetual motion.

XI. If I have not forgotten anything unintentionally, these are the

principal opinions concerning the soul. I have omitted Democritus, a

very great man indeed, but one who deduces the soul from the fortuitous

concourse of small, light, and round substances; for, if you believe

men of his school, there is nothing which a crowd of atoms cannot

effect. Which of these opinions is true, some God must determine. It is

an important question for us, Which has the most appearance of truth?

Shall we, then, prefer determining between them, or shall we return to

our subject?

_A._ I could wish both, if possible; but it is difficult to mix them:

therefore, if without a discussion of them we can get rid of the fears

of death, let us proceed to do so; but if this is not to be done

without explaining the question about souls, let us have that now, and

the other at another time.

_M._ I take that plan to be the best, which I perceive you are inclined

to; for reason will demonstrate that, whichever of the opinions which I

have stated is true, it must follow, then, that death cannot be an

evil; or that it must rather be something desirable; for if either the

heart, or the blood, or the brain, is the soul, then certainly the

soul, being corporeal, must perish with the rest of the body; if it is

air, it will perhaps be dissolved; if it is fire, it will be

extinguished; if it is Aristoxenus's harmony, it will be put out of

tune. What shall I say of Dicæarchus, who denies that there is any

soul? In all these opinions, there is nothing to affect any one after

death; for all feeling is lost with life, and where there is no

sensation, nothing can interfere to affect us. The opinions of others

do indeed bring us hope; if it is any pleasure to you to think that

souls, after they leave the body, may go to heaven as to a permanent

home.

_A._ I have great pleasure in that thought, and it is what I most

desire; and even if it should not be so, I should still be very willing

to believe it.

_M._ What occasion have you, then, for my assistance? Am I superior to

Plato in eloquence? Turn over carefully his book that treats of the

soul; you will have there all that you can want.

_A._ I have, indeed, done that, and often; but, I know not how it comes

to pass, I agree with it while I am reading it; but when I have laid

down the book, and begin to reflect with myself on the immortality of

the soul, all that agreement vanishes.

_M._ How comes that? Do you admit this--that souls either exist after

death, or else that they also perish at the moment of death?

_A._ I agree to that. And if they do exist, I admit that they are

happy; but if they perish, I cannot suppose them to be unhappy,

because, in fact, they have no existence at all. You drove me to that

concession but just now.

_M._ How, then, can you, or why do you, assert that you think that

death is an evil, when it either makes us happy, in the case of the

soul continuing to exist, or, at all events, not unhappy, in the case

of our becoming destitute of all sensation?

XII. _A._ Explain, therefore, if it is not troublesome to you, first,

if you can, that souls do exist after death; secondly, should you fail

in that (and it is a very difficult thing to establish), that death is

free from all evil; for I am not without my fears that this itself is

an evil: I do not mean the immediate deprivation of sense, but the fact

that we shall hereafter suffer deprivation.

_M._ I have the best authority in support of the opinion you desire to

have established, which ought, and generally has, great weight in all

cases. And, first, I have all antiquity on that side, which the more

near it is to its origin and divine descent, the more clearly, perhaps,

on that account, did it discern the truth in these matters. This very

doctrine, then, was adopted by all those ancients whom Ennius calls in

the Sabine tongue Casci; namely, that in death there was a sensation,

and that, when men departed this life, they were not so entirely

destroyed as to perish absolutely. And this may appear from many other

circumstances, and especially from the pontifical rites and funeral

obsequies, which men of the greatest genius would not have been so

solicitous about, and would not have guarded from any injury by such

severe laws, but from a firm persuasion that death was not so entire a

destruction as wholly to abolish and destroy everything, but rather a

kind of transmigration, as it were, and change of life, which was, in

the case of illustrious men and women, usually a guide to heaven, while

in that of others it was still confined to the earth, but in such a

manner as still to exist. From this, and the sentiments of the Romans,

In heaven Romulus with Gods now lives,

as Ennius saith, agreeing with the common belief; hence, too, Hercules

is considered so great and propitious a God among the Greeks, and from

them he was introduced among us, and his worship has extended even to

the very ocean itself. This is how it was that Bacchus was deified, the

offspring of Semele; and from the same illustrious fame we receive

Castor and Pollux as Gods, who are reported not only to have helped the

Romans to victory in their battles, but to have been the messengers of

their success. What shall we say of Ino, the daughter of Cadmus? Is she

not called Leucothea by the Greeks, and Matuta by us? Nay, more; is not

the whole of heaven (not to dwell on particulars) almost filled with

the offspring of men?

Should I attempt to search into antiquity, and produce from thence what

the Greek writers have asserted, it would appear that even those who

are called their principal Gods were taken from among men up into

heaven.

XIII. Examine the sepulchres of those which are shown in Greece;

recollect, for you have been initiated, what lessons are taught in the

mysteries; then will you perceive how extensive this doctrine is. But

they who were not acquainted with natural philosophy (for it did not

begin to be in vogue till many years later) had no higher belief than

what natural reason could give them; they were not acquainted with the

principles and causes of things; they were often induced by certain

visions, and those generally in the night, to think that those men who

had departed from this life were still alive. And this may further be

brought as an irrefragable argument for us to believe that there are

Gods--that there never was any nation so barbarous, nor any people in

the world so savage, as to be without some notion of Gods. Many have

wrong notions of the Gods, for that is the nature and ordinary

consequence of bad customs, yet all allow that there is a certain

divine nature and energy. Nor does this proceed from the conversation

of men, or the agreement of philosophers; it is not an opinion

established by institutions or by laws; but, no doubt, in every case

the consent of all nations is to be looked on as a law of nature. Who

is there, then, that does not lament the loss of his friends,

principally from imagining them deprived of the conveniences of life?

Take away this opinion, and you remove with it all grief; for no one is

afflicted merely on account of a loss sustained by himself. Perhaps we

may be sorry, and grieve a little; but that bitter lamentation and

those mournful tears have their origin in our apprehensions that he

whom we loved is deprived of all the advantages of life, and is

sensible of his loss. And we are led to this opinion by nature, without

any arguments or any instruction.

XIV. But the greatest proof of all is, that nature herself gives a

silent judgment in favor of the immortality of the soul, inasmuch as

all are anxious, and that to a great degree, about the things which

concern futurity:

One plants what future ages shall enjoy,

as Statius saith in his Synephebi. What is his object in doing so,

except that he is interested in posterity? Shall the industrious

husbandman, then, plant trees the fruit of which he shall never see?

And shall not the great man found laws, institutions, and a republic?

What does the procreation of children imply, and our care to continue

our names, and our adoptions, and our scrupulous exactness in drawing

up wills, and the inscriptions on monuments, and panegyrics, but that

our thoughts run on futurity? There is no doubt but a judgment may be

formed of nature in general, from looking at each nature in its most

perfect specimens; and what is a more perfect specimen of a man than

those are who look on themselves as born for the assistance, the

protection, and the preservation of others? Hercules has gone to

heaven; he never would have gone thither had he not, while among men,

made that road for himself. These things are of old date, and have,

besides, the sanction of universal religion.

XV. What will you say? What do you imagine that so many and such great

men of our republic, who have sacrificed their lives for its good,

expected? Do you believe that they thought that their names should not

continue beyond their lives? None ever encountered death for their

country but under a firm persuasion of immortality! Themistocles might

have lived at his ease; so might Epaminondas; and, not to look abroad

and among the ancients for instances, so might I myself. But, somehow

or other there clings to our minds a certain presage of future ages;

and this both exists most firmly, and appears most clearly, in men of

the loftiest genius and greatest souls. Take away this, and who would

be so mad as to spend his life amidst toils and dangers? I speak of

those in power. What are the poet's views but to be ennobled after

death? What else is the object of these lines,

Behold old Ennius here, who erst

Thy fathers' great exploits rehearsed?

He is challenging the reward of glory from those men whose ancestors he

himself had ennobled by his poetry. And in the same spirit he says, in

another passage,

Let none with tears my funeral grace, for I

Claim from my works an immortality.

Why do I mention poets? The very mechanics are desirous of fame after

death. Why did Phidias include a likeness of himself in the shield of

Minerva, when he was not allowed to inscribe his name on it? What do

our philosophers think on the subject? Do not they put their names to

those very books which they write on the contempt of glory? If, then,

universal consent is the voice of nature, and if it is the general

opinion everywhere that those who have quitted this life are still

interested in something, we also must subscribe to that opinion. And if

we think that men of the greatest abilities and virtues see most

clearly into the power of nature, because they themselves are her most

perfect work, it is very probable that, as every great man is

especially anxious to benefit posterity, there is something of which he

himself will be sensible after death.

XVI. But as we are led by nature to think there are Gods, and as we

discover, by reason, of what description they are, so, by the consent

of all nations, we are induced to believe that our souls survive; but

where their habitation is, and of what character they eventually are,

must be learned from reason. The want of any certain reason on which to

argue has given rise to the idea of the shades below, and to those

fears which you seem, not without reason, to despise; for as our bodies

fall to the ground, and are covered with earth (_humus_), from whence

we derive the expression to be interred (_humari_), that has occasioned

men to imagine that the dead continue, during the remainder of their

existence, under ground; which opinion has drawn after it many errors,

which the poets have increased; for the theatre, being frequented by a

large crowd, among which are women and children, is wont to be greatly

affected on hearing such pompous verses as these,

Lo! here I am, who scarce could gain this place,

Through stony mountains and a dreary waste;

Through cliffs, whose sharpen'd stones tremendous hung,

Where dreadful darkness spread itself around.

And the error prevailed so much, though indeed at present it seems to

me to be removed, that although men knew that the bodies of the dead

had been burned, yet they conceived such things to be done in the

infernal regions as could not be executed or imagined without a body;

for they could not conceive how disembodied souls could exist; and,

therefore, they looked out for some shape or figure. This was the

origin of all that account of the dead in Homer. This was the idea that

caused my friend Appius to frame his Necromancy; and this is how there

got about that idea of the lake of Avernus, in my neighborhood,

From whence the souls of undistinguish'd shape,

Clad in thick shade, rush from the open gate

Of Acheron, vain phantoms of the dead.

And they must needs have these appearances speak, which is not possible

without a tongue, and a palate, and jaws, and without the help of lungs

and sides, and without some shape or figure; for they could see nothing

by their mind alone--they referred all to their eyes. To withdraw the

mind from sensual objects, and abstract our thoughts from what we are

accustomed to, is an attribute of great genius. I am persuaded, indeed,

that there were many such men in former ages; but Pherecydes[8] the

Syrian is the first on record who said that the souls of men were

immortal, and he was a philosopher of great antiquity, in the reign of

my namesake Tullius. His disciple Pythagoras greatly confirmed this

opinion, who came into Italy in the reign of Tarquin the Proud; and all

that country which is called Great Greece was occupied by his school,

and he himself was held in high honor, and had the greatest authority;

and the Pythagorean sect was for many ages after in such great credit,

that all learning was believed to be confined to that name.

XVII. But I return to the ancients. They scarcely ever gave any reason

for their opinion but what could be explained by numbers or

definitions. It is reported of Plato that he came into Italy to make

himself acquainted with the Pythagoreans; and that when there, among

others, he made an acquaintance with Archytas[9] and Timæus,[10] and

learned from them all the tenets of the Pythagoreans; and that he not

only was of the same opinion with Pythagoras concerning the immortality

of the soul, but that he also brought reasons in support of it; which,

if you have nothing to say against it, I will pass over, and say no

more at present about all this hope of immortality.

_A._ What, will you leave me when you have raised my expectations so

high? I had rather, so help me Hercules! be mistaken with Plato, whom I

know how much you esteem, and whom I admire myself, from what you say

of him, than be in the right with those others.

_M._ I commend you; for, indeed, I could myself willingly be mistaken

in his company. Do we, then, doubt, as we do in other cases (though I

think here is very little room for doubt in this case, for the

mathematicians prove the facts to us), that the earth is placed in the

midst of the world, being, as it were, a sort of point, which they call

a [Greek: kentron], surrounded by the whole heavens; and that such is

the nature of the four principles which are the generating causes of

all things, that they have equally divided among them the constituents

of all bodies; moreover, that earthy and humid bodies are carried at

equal angles by their own weight and ponderosity into the earth and

sea; that the other two parts consist, one of fire, and the other of

air? As the two former are carried by their gravity and weight into the

middle region of the world, so these, on the other hand, ascend by

right lines into the celestial regions, either because, owing to their

intrinsic nature, they are always endeavoring to reach the highest

place, or else because lighter bodies are naturally repelled by

heavier; and as this is notoriously the case, it must evidently follow

that souls, when once they have departed from the body, whether they

are animal (by which term I mean capable of breathing) or of the nature

of fire, must mount upward. But if the soul is some number, as some

people assert, speaking with more subtlety than clearness, or if it is

that fifth nature, for which it would be more correct to say that we

have not given a name to than that we do not correctly understand

it--still it is too pure and perfect not to go to a great distance from

the earth. Something of this sort, then, we must believe the soul to

be, that we may not commit the folly of thinking that so active a

principle lies immerged in the heart or brain; or, as Empedocles would

have it, in the blood.

XVIII. We will pass over Dicæarchus,[11] with his contemporary and

fellow-disciple Aristoxenus,[12] both indeed men of learning. One of

them seems never even to have been affected with grief, as he could not

perceive that he had a soul; while the other is so pleased with his

musical compositions that he endeavors to show an analogy betwixt them

and souls. Now, we may understand harmony to arise from the intervals

of sounds, whose various compositions occasion many harmonies; but I do

not see how a disposition of members, and the figure of a body without

a soul, can occasion harmony. He had better, learned as he is, leave

these speculations to his master Aristotle, and follow his own trade as

a musician. Good advice is given him in that Greek proverb,

Apply your talents where you best are skill'd.

I will have nothing at all to do with that fortuitous concourse of

individual light and round bodies, notwithstanding Democritus insists

on their being warm and having breath, that is to say, life. But this

soul, which is compounded of either of the four principles from which

we assert that all things are derived, is of inflamed air, as seems

particularly to have been the opinion of Panætius, and must necessarily

mount upward; for air and fire have no tendency downward, but always

ascend; so should they be dissipated that must be at some distance from

the earth; but should they remain, and preserve their original state,

it is clearer still that they must be carried heavenward, and this

gross and concrete air, which is nearest the earth, must be divided and

broken by them; for the soul is warmer, or rather hotter, than that

air, which I just now called gross and concrete: and this may be made

evident from this consideration--that our bodies, being compounded of

the earthy class of principles, grow warm by the heat of the soul.

XIX. We may add, that the soul can the more easily escape from this

air, which I have often named, and break through it, because nothing is

swifter than the soul; no swiftness is comparable to the swiftness of

the soul, which, should it remain uncorrupt and without alteration,

must necessarily be carried on with such velocity as to penetrate and

divide all this atmosphere, where clouds, and rain, and winds are

formed, which, in consequence of the exhalations from the earth, is

moist and dark: but, when the soul has once got above this region, and

falls in with, and recognizes, a nature like its own, it then rests

upon fires composed of a combination of thin air and a moderate solar

heat, and does not aim at any higher flight; for then, after it has

attained a lightness and heat resembling its own, it moves no more, but

remains steady, being balanced, as it were, between two equal weights.

That, then, is its natural seat where it has penetrated to something

like itself, and where, wanting nothing further, it may be supported

and maintained by the same aliment which nourishes and maintains the

stars.

Now, as we are usually incited to all sorts of desires by the stimulus

of the body, and the more so as we endeavor to rival those who are in

possession of what we long for, we shall certainly be happy when, being

emancipated from that body, we at the same time get rid of these

desires and this rivalry. And that which we do at present, when,

dismissing all other cares, we curiously examine and look into

anything, we shall then do with greater freedom; and we shall employ

ourselves entirely in the contemplation and examination of things;

because there is naturally in our minds a certain insatiable desire to

know the truth, and the very region itself where we shall arrive, as it

gives us a more intuitive and easy knowledge of celestial things, will

raise our desires after knowledge. For it was this beauty of the

heavens, as seen even here upon earth, which gave birth to that

national and hereditary philosophy (as Theophrastus calls it), which

was thus excited to a desire of knowledge. But those persons will in a

most especial degree enjoy this philosophy, who, while they were only

inhabitants of this world and enveloped in darkness, were still

desirous of looking into these things with the eye of their mind.

XX. For if those men now think that they have attained something who

have seen the mouth of the Pontus, and those straits which were passed

by the ship called Argo, because,

From Argos she did chosen men convey,

Bound to fetch back the Golden Fleece, their prey;

or those who have seen the straits of the ocean,

Where the swift waves divide the neighboring shores

Of Europe, and of Afric;

what kind of sight do you imagine that will be when the whole earth is

laid open to our view? and that, too, not only in its position, form,

and boundaries, nor those parts of it only which are habitable, but

those also that lie uncultivated, through the extremities of heat and

cold to which they are exposed; for not even now is it with our eyes

that we view what we see, for the body itself has no senses; but (as

the naturalists, ay, and even the physicians assure us, who have opened

our bodies, and examined them) there are certain perforated channels

from the seat of the soul to the eyes, ears, and nose; so that

frequently, when either prevented by meditation, or the force of some

bodily disorder, we neither hear nor see, though our eyes and ears are

open and in good condition; so that we may easily apprehend that it is

the soul itself which sees and hears, and not those parts which are, as

it were, but windows to the soul, by means of which, however, she can

perceive nothing, unless she is on the spot, and exerts herself. How

shall we account for the fact that by the same power of thinking we

comprehend the most different things--as color, taste, heat, smell, and

sound--which the soul could never know by her five messengers, unless

every thing were referred to her, and she were the sole judge of all?

And we shall certainly discover these things in a more clear and

perfect degree when the soul is disengaged from the body, and has

arrived at that goal to which nature leads her; for at present,

notwithstanding nature has contrived, with the greatest skill, those

channels which lead from the body to the soul, yet are they, in some

way or other, stopped up with earthy and concrete bodies; but when we

shall be nothing but soul, then nothing will interfere to prevent our

seeing everything in its real substance and in its true character.

XXI. It is true, I might expatiate, did the subject require it, on the

many and various objects with which the soul will be entertained in

those heavenly regions; when I reflect on which, I am apt to wonder at

the boldness of some philosophers, who are so struck with admiration at

the knowledge of nature as to thank, in an exulting manner, the first

inventor and teacher of natural philosophy, and to reverence him as a

God; for they declare that they have been delivered by his means from

the greatest tyrants, a perpetual terror, and a fear that molested them

by night and day. What is this dread--this fear? What old woman is

there so weak as to fear these things, which you, forsooth, had you not

been acquainted with natural philosophy, would stand in awe of?

The hallow'd roofs of Acheron, the dread

Of Orcus, the pale regions of the dead.

And does it become a philosopher to boast that he is not afraid of

these things, and that he has discovered them to be false? And from

this we may perceive how acute these men were by nature, who, if they

had been left without any instruction, would have believed in these

things. But now they have certainly made a very fine acquisition in

learning that when the day of their death arrives, they will perish

entirely. And if that really is the case--for I say nothing either

way--what is there agreeable or glorious in it? Not that I see any

reason why the opinion of Pythagoras and Plato may not be true; but

even although Plato were to have assigned no reason for his opinion

(observe how much I esteem the man), the weight of his authority would

have borne me down; but he has brought so many reasons, that he appears

to me to have endeavored to convince others, and certainly to have

convinced himself.

XXII. But there are many who labor on the other side of the question,

and condemn souls to death, as if they were criminals capitally

convicted; nor have they any other reason to allege why the immortality

of the soul appears to them to be incredible, except that they are not

able to conceive what sort of thing the soul can be when disentangled

from the body; just as if they could really form a correct idea as to

what sort of thing it is, even when it is in the body; what its form,

and size, and abode are; so that were they able to have a full view of

all that is now hidden from them in a living body, they have no idea

whether the soul would be discernible by them, or whether it is of so

fine a texture that it would escape their sight. Let those consider

this, who say that they are unable to form any idea of the soul without

the body, and then they will see whether they can form any adequate

idea of what it is when it is in the body. For my own part, when I

reflect on the nature of the soul, it appears to me a far more

perplexing and obscure question to determine what is its character

while it is in the body--a place which, as it were, does not belong to

it--than to imagine what it is when it leaves it, and has arrived at

the free æther, which is, if I may so say, its proper, its own

habitation. For unless we are to say that we cannot apprehend the

character or nature of anything which we have never seen, we certainly

may be able to form some notion of God, and of the divine soul when

released from the body. Dicæarchus, indeed, and Aristoxenus, because it

was hard to understand the existence and substance and nature of the

soul, asserted that there was no such thing as a soul at all. It is,

indeed, the most difficult thing imaginable to discern the soul by the

soul. And this, doubtless, is the meaning of the precept of Apollo,

which advises every one to know himself. For I do not apprehend the

meaning of the God to have been that we should understand our members,

our stature, and form; for we are not merely bodies; nor, when I say

these things to you, am I addressing myself to your body: when,

therefore, he says, "Know yourself," he says this, "Inform yourself of

the nature of your soul;" for the body is but a kind of vessel, or

receptacle of the soul, and whatever your soul does is your own act. To

know the soul, then, unless it had been divine, would not have been a

precept of such excellent wisdom as to be attributed to a God; but even

though the soul should not know of what nature itself is, will you say

that it does not even perceive that it exists at all, or that it has

motion? On which is founded that reason of Plato's, which is explained

by Socrates in the Phædrus, and inserted by me, in my sixth book of the

Republic.

XXIII. "That which is always moved is eternal; but that which gives

motion to something else, and is moved itself by some external cause,

when that motion ceases, must necessarily cease to exist. That,

therefore, alone, which is self-moved, because it is never forsaken by

itself, can never cease to be moved. Besides, it is the beginning and

principle of motion to everything else; but whatever is a principle has

no beginning, for all things arise from that principle, and it cannot

itself owe its rise to anything else; for then it would not be a

principle did it proceed from anything else. But if it has no

beginning, it never will have any end; for a principle which is once

extinguished cannot itself be restored by anything else, nor can it

produce anything else from itself; inasmuch as all things must

necessarily arise from some first cause. And thus it comes about that

the first principle of motion must arise from that thing which is

itself moved by itself; and that can neither have a beginning nor an

end of its existence, for otherwise the whole heaven and earth would be

overset, and all nature would stand still, and not be able to acquire

any force by the impulse of which it might be first set in motion.

Seeing, then, that it is clear that whatever moves itself is eternal,

can there be any doubt that the soul is so? For everything is inanimate

which is moved by an external force; but everything which is animate is

moved by an interior force, which also belongs to itself. For this is

the peculiar nature and power of the soul; and if the soul be the only

thing in the whole world which has the power of self-motion, then

certainly it never had a beginning, and therefore it is eternal."

Now, should all the lower order of philosophers (for so I think they

may be called who dissent from Plato and Socrates and that school)

unite their force, they never would be able to explain anything so

elegantly as this, nor even to understand how ingeniously this

conclusion is drawn. The soul, then, perceives itself to have motion,

and at the same time that it gets that perception, it is sensible that

it derives that motion from its own power, and not from the agency of

another; and it is impossible that it should ever forsake itself. And

these premises compel you to allow its eternity, unless you have

something to say against them.

_A._ I should myself be very well pleased not to have even a thought

arise in my mind against them, so much am I inclined to that opinion.

XXIV. _M._ Well, then, I appeal to you, if the arguments which prove

that there is something divine in the souls of men are not equally

strong? But if I could account for the origin of these divine

properties, then I might also be able to explain how they might cease

to exist; for I think I can account for the manner in which the blood,

and bile, and phlegm, and bones, and nerves, and veins, and all the

limbs, and the shape of the whole body, were put together and made; ay,

and even as to the soul itself, were there nothing more in it than a

principle of life, then the life of a man might be put upon the same

footing as that of a vine or any other tree, and accounted for as

caused by nature; for these things, as we say, live. Besides, if

desires and aversions were all that belonged to the soul, it would have

them only in common with the beasts; but it has, in the first place,

memory, and that, too, so infinite as to recollect an absolute

countless number of circumstances, which Plato will have to be a

recollection of a former life; for in that book which is inscribed

Menon, Socrates asks a child some questions in geometry, with reference

to measuring a square; his answers are such as a child would make, and

yet the questions are so easy, that while answering them, one by one,

he comes to the same point as if he had learned geometry. From whence

Socrates would infer that learning is nothing more than recollection;

and this topic he explains more accurately in the discourse which he

held the very day he died; for he there asserts that, any one, who

seeming to be entirely illiterate, is yet able to answer a question

well that is proposed to him, does in so doing manifestly show that he

is not learning it then, but recollecting it by his memory. Nor is it

to be accounted for in any other way, how children come to have notions

of so many and such important things as are implanted, and, as it were,

sealed up, in their minds (which the Greeks call [Greek: ennoiai]),

unless the soul, before it entered the body, had been well stored with

knowledge. And as it had no existence at all (for this is the

invariable doctrine of Plato, who will not admit anything to have a

real existence which has a beginning and an end, and who thinks that

that alone does really exist which is of such a character as what he

calls [Greek: eidea], and we species), therefore, being shut up in the

body, it could not while in the body discover what it knows; but it

knew it before, and brought the knowledge with it, so that we are no

longer surprised at its extensive and multifarious knowledge. Nor does

the soul clearly discover its ideas at its first resort to this abode

to which it is so unaccustomed, and which is in so disturbed a state;

but after having refreshed and recollected itself, it then by its

memory recovers them; and, therefore, to learn implies nothing more

than to recollect. But I am in a particular manner surprised at memory.

For what is that faculty by which we remember? what is its force? what

its nature? I am not inquiring how great a memory Simonides[13] may be

said to have had, or Theodectes,[14] or that Cineas[15] who was sent to

Rome as ambassador from Pyrrhus; or, in more modern times,

Charmadas;[16] or, very lately, Metrodorus[17] the Scepsian, or our own

contemporary Hortensius[18]: I am speaking of ordinary memory, and

especially of those men who are employed in any important study or art,

the great capacity of whose minds it is hard to estimate, such numbers

of things do they remember.

XXV. Should you ask what this leads to, I think we may understand what

that power is, and whence we have it. It certainly proceeds neither

from the heart, nor from the blood, nor from the brain, nor from atoms;

whether it be air or fire, I know not, nor am I, as those men are,

ashamed, in cases where I am ignorant, to own that I am so. If in any

other obscure matter I were able to assert anything positively, then I

would swear that the soul, be it air or fire, is divine. Just think, I

beseech you: can you imagine this wonderful power of memory to be sown

in or to be a part of the composition of the earth, or of this dark and

gloomy atmosphere? Though you cannot apprehend what it is, yet you see

what kind of thing it is, or if you do not quite see that, yet you

certainly see how great it is. What, then? Shall we imagine that there

is a kind of measure in the soul, into which, as into a vessel, all

that we remember is poured? That indeed is absurd; for how shall we

form any idea of the bottom, or of the shape or fashion of such a soul

as that? And, again, how are we to conceive how much it is able to

contain? Shall we imagine the soul to receive impressions like wax, and

memory to be marks of the impressions made on the soul? What are the

characters of the words, what of the facts themselves? and what, again,

is that prodigious greatness which can give rise to impressions of so

many things? What, lastly, is that power which investigates secret

things, and is called invention and contrivance? Does that man seem to

be compounded of this earthly, mortal, and perishing nature who first

invented names for everything; which, if you will believe Pythagoras,

is the highest pitch of wisdom? or he who collected the dispersed

inhabitants of the world, and united them in the bonds of social life?

or he who confined the sounds of the voice, which used to seem

infinite, to the marks of a few letters? or he who first observed the

courses of the planets, their progressive motions, their laws? These

were all great men. But they were greater still who invented food, and

raiment, and houses; who introduced civilization among us, and armed us

against the wild beasts; by whom we were made sociable and polished,

and so proceeded from the necessaries of life to its embellishments.

For we have provided great entertainments for the ears by inventing and

modulating the variety and nature of sounds; we have learned to survey

the stars, not only those that are fixed, but also those which are

improperly called wandering; and the man who has acquainted himself

with all their revolutions and motions is fairly considered to have a

soul resembling the soul of that Being who has created those stars in

the heavens: for when Archimedes described in a sphere the motions of

the moon, sun, and five planets, he did the very same thing as Plato's

God, in his Timæus, who made the world, causing one revolution to

adjust motions differing as much as possible in their slowness and

velocity. Now, allowing that what we see in the world could not be

effected without a God, Archimedes could not have imitated the same

motions in his sphere without a divine soul.

XXVI. To me, indeed, it appears that even those studies which are more

common and in greater esteem are not without some divine energy: so

that I do not consider that a poet can produce a serious and sublime

poem without some divine impulse working on his mind; nor do I think

that eloquence, abounding with sonorous words and fruitful sentences,

can flow thus without something beyond mere human power. But as to

philosophy, that is the parent of all the arts: what can we call that

but, as Plato says, a gift, or, as I express it, an invention, of the

Gods? This it was which first taught us the worship of the Gods; and

then led us on to justice, which arises from the human race being

formed into society; and after that it imbued us with modesty and

elevation of soul. This it was which dispersed darkness from our souls,

as it is dispelled from our eyes, enabling us to see all things that

are above or below, the beginning, end, and middle of everything. I am

convinced entirely that that which could effect so many and such great

things must be a divine power. For what is memory of words and

circumstances? What, too, is invention? Surely they are things than

which nothing greater can be conceived in a God! For I do not imagine

the Gods to be delighted with nectar and ambrosia, or with Juventas

presenting them with a cup; nor do I put any faith in Homer, who says

that Ganymede was carried away by the Gods on account of his beauty, in

order to give Jupiter his wine. Too weak reasons for doing Laomedon

such injury! These were mere inventions of Homer, who gave his Gods the

imperfections of men. I would rather that he had given men the

perfections of the Gods! those perfections, I mean, of uninterrupted

health, wisdom, invention, memory. Therefore the soul (which is, as I

say, divine) is, as Euripides more boldly expresses it, a God. And

thus, if the divinity be air or fire, the soul of man is the same; for

as that celestial nature has nothing earthly or humid about it, in like

manner the soul of man is also free from both these qualities: but if

it is of that fifth kind of nature, first introduced by Aristotle, then

both Gods and souls are of the same.

XXVII. As this is my opinion, I have explained it in these very words,

in my book on Consolation.[19] The origin of the soul of man is not to

be found upon earth, for there is nothing in the soul of a mixed or

concrete nature, or that has any appearance of being formed or made out

of the earth; nothing even humid, or airy, or fiery. For what is there

in natures of that kind which has the power of memory, understanding,

or thought? which can recollect the past, foresee the future, and

comprehend the present? for these capabilities are confined to divine

beings; nor can we discover any source from which men could derive

them, but from God. There is therefore a peculiar nature and power in

the soul, distinct from those natures which are more known and familiar

to us. Whatever, then, that is which thinks, and which has

understanding, and volition, and a principle of life, is heavenly and

divine, and on that account must necessarily be eternal; nor can God

himself, who is known to us, be conceived to be anything else except a

soul free and unembarrassed, distinct from all mortal concretion,

acquainted with everything, and giving motion to everything, and itself

endued with perpetual motion.

XXVIII. Of this kind and nature is the intellect of man. Where, then,

is this intellect seated, and of what character is it? where is your

own, and what is its character? Are you able to tell? If I have not

faculties for knowing all that I could desire to know, will you not

even allow me to make use of those which I have? The soul has not

sufficient capacity to comprehend itself; yet, the soul, like the eye,

though it has no distinct view of itself, sees other things: it does

not see (which is of least consequence) its own shape; perhaps not,

though it possibly may; but we will pass that by: but it certainly sees

that it has vigor, sagacity, memory, motion, and velocity; these are

all great, divine, eternal properties. What its appearance is, or where

it dwells, it is not necessary even to inquire. As when we behold,

first of all, the beauty and brilliant appearance of the heavens;

secondly, the vast velocity of its revolutions, beyond power of our

imagination to conceive; then the vicissitudes of nights and days, the

fourfold division of the seasons, so well adapted to the ripening of

the fruits of the earth, and the temperature of our bodies: and after

that we look up to the sun, the moderator and governor of all these

things; and view the moon, by the increase and decrease of its light,

marking, as it were, and appointing our holy days; and see the five

planets, borne on in the same circle, divided into twelve parts,

preserving the same course with the greatest regularity, but with

utterly dissimilar motions among themselves; and the nightly appearance

of the heaven, adorned on all sides with stars; then, the globe of the

earth, raised above the sea, and placed in the centre of the universe,

inhabited and cultivated in its two opposite extremities, one of which,

the place of our habitation, is situated towards the north pole, under

the seven stars:

Where the cold northern blasts, with horrid sound,

Harden to ice the snowy cover'd ground;

the other, towards the south pole, is unknown to us, but is called by

the Greeks [Greek: antichthona]: the other parts are uncultivated,

because they are either frozen with cold, or burned up with heat; but

where we dwell, it never fails, in its season,

To yield a placid sky, to bid the trees

Assume the lively verdure of their leaves:

The vine to bud, and, joyful, in its shoots,

Foretell the approaching vintage of its fruits:

The ripen'd corn to sing, while all around

Full riv'lets glide; and flowers deck the ground:

then the multitude of cattle, fit part for food, part for tilling the

ground, others for carrying us, or for clothing us; and man himself,

made, as it were, on purpose to contemplate the heavens and the Gods,

and to pay adoration to them: lastly, the whole earth, and wide

extending seas, given to man's use. When we view these and numberless

other things, can we doubt that they have some being who presides over

them, or has made them (if, indeed, they have been made, as is the

opinion of Plato, or if, as Aristotle thinks, they are eternal), or who

at all events is the regulator of so immense a fabric and so great a

blessing to men? Thus, though you see not the soul of man, as you see

not the Deity, yet, as by the contemplation of his works you are led to

acknowledge a God, so you must own the divine power of the soul, from

its remembering things, from its invention, from the quickness of its

motion, and from all the beauty of virtue. Where, then, is it seated,

you will say?

XXIX. In my opinion, it is seated in the head, and I can bring you

reasons for my adopting that opinion. At present, let the soul reside

where it will, you certainly have one in you. Should you ask what its

nature is? It has one peculiarly its own; but admitting it to consist

of fire, or air, it does not affect the present question. Only observe

this, that as you are convinced there is a God, though you are ignorant

where he resides, and what shape he is of; in like manner you ought to

feel assured that you have a soul, though you cannot satisfy yourself

of the place of its residence, nor its form. In our knowledge of the

soul, unless we are grossly ignorant of natural philosophy, we cannot

but be satisfied that it has nothing but what is simple, unmixed,

uncompounded, and single; and if this is admitted, then it cannot be

separated, nor divided, nor dispersed, nor parted, and therefore it

cannot perish; for to perish implies a parting-asunder, a division, a

disunion, of those parts which, while it subsisted, were held together

by some band. And it was because he was influenced by these and similar

reasons that Socrates neither looked out for anybody to plead for him

when he was accused, nor begged any favor from his judges, but

maintained a manly freedom, which was the effect not of pride, but of

the true greatness of his soul; and on the last day of his life he held

a long discourse on this subject; and a few days before, when he might

have been easily freed from his confinement, he refused to be so; and

when he had almost actually hold of that deadly cup, he spoke with the

air of a man not forced to die, but ascending into heaven.

XXX. For so indeed he thought himself, and thus he spoke: "That there

were two ways, and that the souls of men, at their departure from the

body, took different roads; for those which were polluted with vices

that are common to men, and which had given themselves up entirely to

unclean desires, and had become so blinded by them as to have

habituated themselves to all manner of debauchery and profligacy, or to

have laid detestable schemes for the ruin of their country, took a road

wide of that which led to the assembly of the Gods; but they who had

preserved themselves upright and chaste, and free from the slightest

contagion of the body, and had always kept themselves as far as

possible at a distance from it, and while on earth had proposed to

themselves as a model the life of the Gods, found the return to those

beings from whom they had come an easy one." Therefore, he argues, that

all good and wise men should take example from the swans, who are

considered sacred to Apollo, not without reason, but particularly

because they seem to have received the gift of divination from him, by

which, foreseeing how happy it is to die, they leave this world with

singing and joy. Nor can any one doubt of this, unless it happens to us

who think with care and anxiety about the soul (as is often the case

with those who look earnestly at the setting sun), to lose the sight of

it entirely; and so the mind's eye, viewing itself, sometimes grows

dull, and for that reason we become remiss in our contemplation. Thus

our reasoning is borne about, harassed with doubts and anxieties, not

knowing how to proceed, but measuring back again those dangerous tracts

which it has passed, like a boat tossed about on the boundless ocean.

But these reflections are of long standing, and borrowed from the

Greeks. But Cato left this world in such a manner as if he were

delighted that he had found an opportunity of dying; for that God who

presides in us forbids our departure hence without his leave. But when

God himself has given us a just cause, as formerly he did to Socrates,

and lately to Cato, and often to many others--in such a case, certainly

every man of sense would gladly exchange this darkness for that light:

not that he would forcibly break from the chains that held him, for

that would be against the law; but, like a man released from prison by

a magistrate or some lawful authority, so he too would walk away, being

released and discharged by God. For the whole life of a philosopher is,

as the same philosopher says, a meditation on death.

XXXI. For what else is it that we do, when we call off our minds from

pleasure, that is to say, from our attention to the body, from the

managing our domestic estate, which is a sort of handmaid and servant

of the body, or from duties of a public nature, or from all other

serious business whatever? What else is it, I say, that we do, but

invite the soul to reflect on itself? oblige it to converse with

itself, and, as far as possible, break off its acquaintance with the

body? Now, to separate the soul from the body, is to learn to die, and

nothing else whatever. Wherefore take my advice; and let us meditate on

this, and separate ourselves as far as possible from the body, that is

to say, let us accustom ourselves to die. This will be enjoying a life

like that of heaven even while we remain on earth; and when we are

carried thither and released from these bonds, our souls will make

their progress with more rapidity; for the spirit which has always been

fettered by the bonds of the body, even when it is disengaged, advances

more slowly, just as those do who have worn actual fetters for many

years: but when we have arrived at this emancipation from the bonds of

the body, then indeed we shall begin to live, for this present life is

really death, which I could say a good deal in lamentation for if I

chose.

_A._ You have lamented it sufficiently in your book on Consolation; and

when I read that, there is nothing which I desire more than to leave

these things; but that desire is increased a great deal by what I have

just heard.

_M._ The time will come, and that soon, and with equal certainty,

whether you hang back or press forward; for time flies. But death is so

far from being an evil, as it lately appeared to you, that I am

inclined to suspect, not that there is no other thing which is an evil

to man, but rather that there is nothing else which is a real good to

him; if, at least, it is true that we become thereby either Gods

ourselves, or companions of the Gods. However, this is not of so much

consequence, as there are some of us here who will not allow this. But

I will not leave off discussing this point till I have convinced you

that death can, upon no consideration whatever, be an evil.

_A._ How can it, after what I now know?

_M._ Do you ask how it can? There are crowds of arguers who contradict

this; and those not only Epicureans, whom I regard very little, but,

somehow or other, almost every man of letters; and, above all, my

favorite Dicæarchus is very strenuous in opposing the immortality of

the soul: for he has written three books, which are entitled Lesbiacs,

because the discourse was held at Mitylene, in which he seeks to prove

that souls are mortal. The Stoics, on the other hand, allow us as long

a time for enjoyment as the life of a raven; they allow the soul to

exist a great while, but are against its eternity.

XXXII. Are you willing to hear then why, even allowing this, death

cannot be an evil.

_A._ As you please; but no one shall drive me from my belief in

mortality.

_M._ I commend you, indeed, for that; though we should not be too

confident in our belief of anything; for we are frequently disturbed by

some subtle conclusion. We give way and change our opinions even in

things that are more evident than this; for in this there certainly is

some obscurity. Therefore, should anything of this kind happen, it is

well to be on our guard.

_A._ You are right in that; but I will provide against any accident.

_M._ Have you any objection to our dismissing our friends the

Stoics--those, I mean, who allow that the souls exist after they have

left the body, but yet deny that they exist forever?

_A._ We certainly may dismiss the consideration of those men who admit

that which is the most difficult point in the whole question, namely,

that a soul can exist independently of the body, and yet refuse to

grant that which is not only very easy to believe, but which is even

the natural consequence of the concession which they have made--that if

they can exist for a length of time; they most likely do so forever.

_M._ You take it right; that is the very thing. Shall we give,

therefore, any credit to Pauæstius, when he dissents from his master,

Plato? whom he everywhere calls divine, the wisest, the holiest of men,

the Homer of philosophers, and whom he opposes in nothing except this

single opinion of the soul's immortality: for he maintains what nobody

denies, that everything which has been generated will perish, and that

even souls are generated, which he thinks appears from their

resemblance to those of the men who begot them; for that likeness is as

apparent in the turn of their minds as in their bodies. But he brings

another reason--that there is nothing which is sensible of pain which

is not also liable to disease; but whatever is liable to disease must

be liable to death. The soul is sensible of pain, therefore it is

liable to perish.

XXXIII. These arguments may be refuted; for they proceed from his not

knowing that, while discussing the subject of the immortality of the

soul, he is speaking of the intellect, which is free from all turbid

motion; but not of those parts of the mind in which those disorders,

anger and lust, have their seat, and which he whom he is opposing, when

he argues thus, imagines to be distinct and separate from the mind. Now

this resemblance is more remarkable in beasts, whose souls are void of

reason. But the likeness in men consists more in the configuration of

the bodies: and it is of no little consequence in what bodies the soul

is lodged; for there are many things which depend on the body that give

an edge to the soul, many which blunt it. Aristotle, indeed, says that

all men of great genius are melancholy; so that I should not have been

displeased to have been somewhat duller than I am. He instances many,

and, as if it were matter of fact, brings his reasons for it. But if

the power of those things that proceed from the body be so great as to

influence the mind (for they are the things, whatever they are, that

occasion this likeness), still that does not necessarily prove why a

similitude of souls should be generated. I say nothing about cases of

unlikeness. I wish Panætius could be here: he lived with Africanus. I

would inquire of him which of his family the nephew of Africanus's

brother was like? Possibly he may in person have resembled his father;

but in his manners he was so like every profligate, abandoned man, that

it was impossible to be more so. Whom did the grandson of P. Crassus,

that wise and eloquent and most distinguished man, resemble? Or the

relations and sons of many other excellent men, whose names there is no

occasion to mention? But what are we doing? Have we forgotten that our

purpose was, when we had sufficiently spoken on the subject of the

immortality of the soul, to prove that, even if the soul did perish,

there would be, even then, no evil in death?

_A._ I remembered it very well; but I had no dislike to your digressing

a little from your original design, while you were talking of the

soul's immortality.

_M._ I perceive you have sublime thoughts, and are eager to mount up to

heaven.

XXXIV. I am not without hopes myself that such may be our fate. But

admit what they assert--that the soul does not continue to exist after

death.

_A._ Should it be so, I see that we are then deprived of the hopes of a

happier life.

_M._ But what is there of evil in that opinion? For let the soul perish

as the body: is there any pain, or indeed any feeling at all, in the

body after death? No one, indeed asserts that; though Epicurus charges

Democritus with saying so; but the disciples of Democritus deny it. No

sense, therefore, remains in the soul; for the soul is nowhere. Where,

then, is the evil? for there is nothing but these two things. Is it

because the mere separation of the soul and body cannot be effected

without pain? But even should that be granted, how small a pain must

that be! Yet I think that it is false, and that it is very often

unaccompanied by any sensation at all, and sometimes even attended with

pleasure; but certainly the whole must be very trifling, whatever it

is, for it is instantaneous. What makes us uneasy, or rather gives us

pain, is the leaving all the good things of life. But just consider if

I might not more properly say, leaving the evils of life; only there is

no reason for my now occupying myself in bewailing the life of man, and

yet I might, with very good reason. But what occasion is there, when

what I am laboring to prove is that no one is miserable after death, to

make life more miserable by lamenting over it? I have done that in the

book which I wrote, in order to comfort myself as well as I could. If,

then, our inquiry is after truth, death withdraws us from evil, not

from good. This subject is indeed so copiously handled by Hegesias, the

Cyrenaic philosopher, that he is said to have been forbidden by Ptolemy

from delivering his lectures in the schools, because some who heard him

made away with themselves. There is, too, an epigram of Callimachus[20]

on Cleombrotus of Ambracia, who, without any misfortune having befallen

him, as he says, threw himself from a wall into the sea, after he had

read a book of Plato's. The book I mentioned of that Hegesias is called

[Greek: Apokarterterôn], or "A Man who starves himself," in which a man

is represented as killing himself by starvation, till he is prevented

by his friends, in reply to whom he reckons up all the miseries of

human life. I might do the same, though not so fully as he, who thinks

it not worth any man's while to live. I pass over others. Was it even

worth my while to live, for, had I died before I was deprived of the

comforts of my own family, and of the honors which I received for my

public services, would not death have taken me from the evils of life

rather than from its blessings?

XXXV. Mention, therefore, some one, who never knew distress; who never

received any blow from fortune. The great Metellus had four

distinguished sons; but Priam had fifty, seventeen of whom were born to

him by his lawful wife. Fortune had the same power over both, though

she exercised it but on one; for Metellus was laid on his funeral pile

by a great company of sons and daughters, grandsons, and

granddaughters; but Priam fell by the hand of an enemy, after having

fled to the altar, and having seen himself deprived of all his numerous

progeny. Had he died before the death of his sons and the ruin of his

kingdom,

With all his mighty wealth elate,

Under rich canopies of state;

would he then have been taken from good or from evil? It would indeed,

at that time, have appeared that he was being taken away from good; yet

surely it would have turned out advantageous for him; nor should we

have had these mournful verses,

Lo! these all perish'd in one flaming pile;

The foe old Priam did of life beguile,

And with his blood, thy altar, Jove, defile.

As if anything better could have happened to him at that time than to

lose his life in that manner; but yet, if it had befallen him sooner,

it would have prevented all those consequences; but even as it was, it

released him from any further sense of them. The case of our friend

Pompey[21] was something better: once, when he had been very ill at

Naples, the Neapolitans, on his recovery, put crowns on their heads, as

did those of Puteoli; the people flocked from the country to

congratulate him--it is a Grecian custom, and a foolish one; still it

is a sign of good fortune. But the question is, had he died, would he

have been taken from good, or from evil? Certainly from evil. He would

not have been engaged in a war with his father-in-law;[22] he would not

have taken up arms before he was prepared; he would not have left his

own house, nor fled from Italy; he would not, after the loss of his

army, have fallen unarmed into the hands of slaves, and been put to

death by them; his children would not have been destroyed; nor would

his whole fortune have come into the possession of the conquerors. Did

not he, then, who, if he had died at that time, would have died in all

his glory, owe all the great and terrible misfortunes into which he

subsequently fell to the prolongation of his life at that time?

XXXVI. These calamities are avoided by death, for even though they

should never happen, there is a possibility that they may; but it never

occurs to a man that such a disaster may befall him himself. Every one

hopes to be as happy as Metellus: as if the number of the happy

exceeded that of the miserable; or as if there were any certainty in

human affairs; or, again, as if there were more rational foundation for

hope than fear. But should we grant them even this, that men are by

death deprived of good things; would it follow that the dead are

therefore in need of the good things of life, and are miserable on that

account? Certainly they must necessarily say so. Can he who does not

exist be in need of anything? To be in need of has a melancholy sound,

because it in effect amounts to this--he had, but he has not; he

regrets, he looks back upon, he wants. Such are, I suppose, the

distresses of one who is in need of. Is he deprived of eyes? to be

blind is misery. Is he destitute of children? not to have them is

misery. These considerations apply to the living, but the dead are

neither in need of the blessings of life, nor of life itself. But when

I am speaking of the dead, I am speaking of those who have no

existence. But would any one say of us, who do exist, that we want

horns or wings? Certainly not. Should it be asked, why not? the answer

would be, that not to have what neither custom nor nature has fitted

you for would not imply a want of them, even though you were sensible

that you had them not. This argument should be pressed over and over

again, after that point has once been established, which, if souls are

mortal, there can be no dispute about--I mean, that the destruction of

them by death is so entire as to remove even the least suspicion of any

sense remaining. When, therefore, this point is once well grounded and

established, we must correctly define what the term to want means; that

there may be no mistake in the word. To want, then, signifies this: to

be without that which you would be glad to have; for inclination for a

thing is implied in the word want, excepting when we use the word in an

entirely different sense, as we do when we say that a fever is wanting

to any one. For it admits of a different interpretation, when you are

without a certain thing, and are sensible that you are without it, but

yet can easily dispense with having it. "To want," then, is an

expression which you cannot apply to the dead; nor is the mere fact of

wanting something necessarily lamentable. The proper expression ought

to be, "that they want a good," and that is an evil.

But a living man does not want a good, unless he is distressed without

it; and yet, we can easily understand how any man alive can be without

a kingdom. But this cannot be predicated of you with any accuracy: it

might have been asserted of Tarquin, when he was driven from his

kingdom. But when such an expression is used respecting the dead, it is

absolutely unintelligible. For to want implies to be sensible; but the

dead are insensible: therefore, the dead can be in no want.

XXXVII. But what occasion is there to philosophize here in a matter

with which we see that philosophy is but little concerned? How often

have not only our generals but whole armies, rushed on certain death!

But if it had been a thing to be feared, L. Brutus would never have

fallen in fight, to prevent the return of that tyrant whom he had

expelled; nor would Decius the father have been slain in fighting with

the Latins; nor would his son, when engaged with the Etruscans, nor his

grandson with Pyrrhus have exposed themselves to the enemy's darts.

Spain would never have seen, in one campaign, the Scipios fall fighting

for their country; nor would the plains of Cannæ have witnessed the

death of Paulus and Geminus, or Venusia that of Marcellus; nor would

the Latins have beheld the death of Albinus, nor the Leucanians that of

Gracchus. But are any of these miserable now? Nay, they were not so

even at the first moment after they had breathed their last; nor can

any one be miserable after he has lost all sensation. Oh, but the mere

circumstance of being without sensation is miserable. It might be so if

being without sensation were the same thing as wanting it; but as it is

evident there can be nothing of any kind in that which has no

existence, what can there be afflicting to that which can neither feel

want nor be sensible of anything? We might be said to have repeated

this over too often, only that here lies all that the soul shudders at

from the fear of death. For whoever can clearly apprehend that which is

as manifest as the light--that when both soul and body are consumed,

and there is a total destruction, then that which was an animal becomes

nothing--will clearly see that there is no difference between a

Hippocentaur, which never had existence, and King Agamemnon, and that

M. Camillus is no more concerned about this present civil war than I

was at the sacking of Rome, when he was living.

XXXVIII. Why, then, should Camillus be affected with the thoughts of

these things happening three hundred and fifty years after his time?

And why should I be uneasy it I were to expect that some nation might

possess itself of this city ten thousand years hence? Because so great

is our regard for our country, as not to be measured by our own

feeling, but by its own actual safety.

Death, then, which threatens us daily from a thousand accidents, and

which, by reason of the shortness of life, can never be far off, does

not deter a wise man from making such provision for his country and his

family as he hopes may last forever; and from regarding posterity, of

which he can never have any real perception, as belonging to himself.

Wherefore a man may act for eternity, even though he be persuaded that

his soul is mortal; not, indeed, from a desire of glory, which he will

be insensible of, but from a principle of virtue, which glory will

inevitably attend, though that is not his object. The process, indeed,

of nature is this: that just in the same manner as our birth was the

beginning of things with us, so death will be the end; and as we were

noways concerned with anything before we were born, so neither shall we

be after we are dead. And in this state of things where can the evil

be, since death has no connection with either the living or the dead?

The one have no existence at all, the other are not yet affected by it.

They who make the least of death consider it as having a great

resemblance to sleep; as if any one would choose to live ninety years

on condition that, at the expiration of sixty, he should sleep out the

remainder. The very swine would not accept of life on those terms, much

less I. Endymion, indeed, if you listen to fables, slept once on a time

on Latmus, a mountain of Caria, and for such a length of time that I

imagine he is not as yet awake. Do you think that he is concerned at

the Moon's being in difficulties, though it was by her that he was

thrown into that sleep, in order that she might kiss him while

sleeping. For what should he be concerned for who has not even any

sensation? You look on sleep as an image of death, and you take that on

you daily; and have you, then, any doubt that there is no sensation in

death, when you see there is none in sleep, which is its near

resemblance?

XXXIX. Away, then, with those follies, which are little better than the

old women's dreams, such as that it is miserable to die before our

time. What time do you mean? That of nature? But she has only lent you

life, as she might lend you money, without fixing any certain time for

its repayment. Have you any grounds of complaint, then, that she

recalls it at her pleasure? for you received it on these terms. They

that complain thus allow that if a young child dies, the survivors

ought to bear his loss with equanimity; that if an infant in the cradle

dies, they ought not even to utter a complaint; and yet nature has been

more severe with them in demanding back what she gave. They answer by

saying that such have not tasted the sweets of life; while the other

had begun to conceive hopes of great happiness, and, indeed, had begun

to realize them. Men judge better in other things, and allow a part to

be preferable to none. Why do they not admit the same estimate in life?

Though Callimachus does not speak amiss in saying that more tears had

flowed from Priam than his son; yet they are thought happier who die

after they have reached old age. It would be hard to say why; for I do

not apprehend that any one, if a longer life were granted to him, would

find it happier. There is nothing more agreeable to a man than

prudence, which old age most certainly bestows on a man, though it may

strip him of everything else. But what age is long, or what is there at

all long to a man? Does not

Old age, though unregarded, still attend

On childhood's pastimes, as the cares of men?

But because there is nothing beyond old age, we call that long: all

these things are said to be long or short, according to the proportion

of time they were given us for. Artistotle saith there is a kind of

insect near the river Hypanis, which runs from a certain part of Europe

into the Pontus, whose life consists but of one day; those that die at

the eighth hour die in full age; those who die when the sun sets are

very old, especially when the days are at the longest. Compare our

longest life with eternity, and we shall be found almost as short-lived

as those little animals.

XL. Let us, then, despise all these follies--for what softer name can I

give to such levities?--and let us lay the foundation of our happiness

in the strength and greatness of our minds, in a contempt and disregard

of all earthly things, and in the practice of every virtue. For at

present we are enervated by the softness of our imaginations, so that,

should we leave this world before the promises of our fortune-tellers

are made good to us, we should think ourselves deprived of some great

advantages, and seem disappointed and forlorn. But if, through life, we

are in continual suspense, still expecting, still desiring, and are in

continual pain and torture, good Gods! how pleasant must that journey

be which ends in security and ease! How pleased am I with Theramenes!

Of how exalted a soul does he appear! For, although we never read of

him without tears, yet that illustrious man is not to be lamented in

his death, who, when he had been imprisoned by the command of the

thirty tyrants, drank off, at one draught, as if he had been thirsty,

the poisoned cup, and threw the remainder out of it with such force

that it sounded as it fell; and then, on hearing the sound of the

drops, he said, with a smile, "I drink this to the most excellent

Critias," who had been his most bitter enemy; for it is customary among

the Greeks, at their banquets, to name the person to whom they intend

to deliver the cup. This celebrated man was pleasant to the last, even

when he had received the poison into his bowels, and truly foretold the

death of that man whom he named when he drank the poison, and that

death soon followed. Who that thinks death an evil could approve of the

evenness of temper in this great man at the instant of dying? Socrates

came, a few years after, to the same prison and the same cup by as

great iniquity on the part of his judges as the tyrants displayed when

they executed Theramenes. What a speech is that which Plato makes him

deliver before his judges, after they had condemned him to death!

XLI. "I am not without hopes, O judges, that it is a favorable

circumstance for me that I am condemned to die; for one of these two

things must necessarily happen--either that death will deprive me

entirely of all sense, or else that, by dying, I shall go from hence

into some other place; wherefore, if all sense is utterly extinguished,

and if death is like that sleep which sometimes is so undisturbed as to

be even without the visions of dreams--in that case, O ye good Gods!

what gain is it to die? or what length of days can be imagined which

would be preferable to such a night? And if the constant course of

future time is to resemble that night, who is happier than I am? But if

on the other hand, what is said be true, namely, that death is but a

removal to those regions where the souls of the departed dwell, then

that state must be more happy still to have escaped from those who call

themselves judges, and to appear before such as are truly so--Minos,

Rhadamanthus, Æacus, Triptolemus--and to meet with those who have lived

with justice and probity![23] Can this change of abode appear otherwise

than great to you? What bounds can you set to the value of conversing

with Orpheus, and Musæus, and Homer, and Hesiod? I would even, were it

possible, willingly die often, in order to prove the certainty of what

I speak of. What delight must it be to meet with Palamedes, and Ajax,

and others, who have been betrayed by the iniquity of their judges!

Then, also, should I experience the wisdom of even that king of kings,

who led his vast troops to Troy, and the prudence of Ulysses and

Sisyphus: nor should I then be condemned for prosecuting my inquiries

on such subjects in the same way in which I have done here on earth.

And even you, my judges, you, I mean, who have voted for my acquittal,

do not you fear death, for nothing bad can befall a good man, whether

he be alive or dead; nor are his concerns ever overlooked by the Gods;

nor in my case either has this befallen me by chance; and I have

nothing to charge those men with who accused or condemned me but the

fact that they believed that they were doing me harm." In this manner

he proceeded. There is no part of his speech which I admire more than

his last words: "But it is time," says he, "for me now to go hence,

that I may die; and for you, that you may continue to live. Which

condition of the two is the best, the immortal Gods know; but I do not

believe that any mortal man does."

XLII. Surely I would rather have had this man's soul than all the

fortunes of those who sat in judgment on him; although that very thing

which he says no one except the Gods know, namely, whether life or

death is most preferable, he knows himself, for he had previously

stated his opinion on it; but he maintained to the last that favorite

maxim of his, of affirming nothing. And let us, too, adhere to this

rule of not thinking anything an evil which is a general provision of

nature; and let us assure ourselves, that if death is an evil, it is an

eternal evil, for death seems to be the end of a miserable life; but if

death is a misery, there can be no end of that. But why do I mention

Socrates, or Theramenes, men distinguished by the glory of virtue and

wisdom? when a certain Lacedæmomian, whose name is not so much as

known, held death in such contempt, that, when led to it by the ephori,

he bore a cheerful and pleasant countenance; and, when he was asked by

one of his enemies whether he despised the laws of Lycurgus, "On the

contrary," answered he, "I am greatly obliged to him, for he has

amerced me in a fine which I can pay without borrowing, or taking up

money at interest." This was a man worthy of Sparta. And I am almost

persuaded of his innocence because of the greatness of his soul. Our

own city has produced many such. But why should I name generals, and

other men of high rank, when Cato could write that legions have marched

with alacrity to that place from whence they never expected to return?

With no less greatness of soul fell the Lacedæmonians at Thermopylæ, on

whom Simonides wrote the following epitaph:

Go, stranger, tell the Spartans, here we lie,

Who to support their laws durst boldly die.[24]

What was it that Leonidas, their general, said to them? "March on with

courage, my Lacedæmonians. To-night, perhaps, we shall sup in the

regions below." This was a brave nation while the laws of Lycurgus were

in force. One of them, when a Persian had said to him in conversation,

"We shall hide the sun from your sight by the number of our arrows and

darts," replied, "We shall fight, then in the shade." Do I talk of

their men? How great was that Lacedæmonian woman, who had sent her son

to battle, and when she heard that he was slain, said, "I bore him for

that purpose, that you might have a man who durst die for his country!"

However, it is a matter of notoriety that the Spartans were bold and

hardy, for the discipline of a republic has great influence.

XLIII. What, then, have we not reason to admire Theodorus the Cyrenean,

a philosopher of no small distinction, who, when Lysimachus threatened

to crucify him, bade him keep those menaces for his courtiers? "To

Theodorus it makes no difference whether he rot in the air or

underground." By which saying of the philosopher I am reminded to say

something of the custom of funerals and sepulture, and of funeral

ceremonies, which is, indeed, not a difficult subject, especially if we

recollect what has been before said about insensibility. The opinion of

Socrates respecting this matter is clearly stated in the book which

treats of his death, of which we have already said so much; for when he

had discussed the immortality of the soul, and when the time of his

dying was approaching rapidly, being asked by Criton how he would be

buried, "I have taken a great deal of pains," saith he, "my friends, to

no purpose, for I have not convinced our Criton that I shall fly from

hence, and leave no part of me behind. Notwithstanding, Criton, if you

can overtake me, wheresoever you get hold of me, bury me as you please:

but believe me, none of you will be able to catch me when I have flown

away from hence." That was excellently said, inasmuch as he allows his

friend to do as he pleased, and yet shows his indifference about

anything of this kind. Diogenes was rougher, though of the same

opinion; but in his character of a Cynic he expressed himself in a

somewhat harsher manner; he ordered himself to be thrown anywhere

without being buried. And when his friends replied, "What! to the birds

and beasts?" "By no means," saith he; "place my staff near me, that I

may drive them away." "How can you do that," they answer, "for you will

not perceive them?" "How am I then injured by being torn by those

animals, if I have no sensation?" Anaxagoras, when he was at the point

of death at Lampsacus, and was asked by his friends, whether, if

anything should happen to him, he would not choose to be carried to

Clazomenæ, his country, made this excellent answer, "There is," says

he, "no occasion for that, for all places are at an equal distance from

the infernal regions." There is one thing to be observed with respect

to the whole subject of burial, that it relates to the body, whether

the soul live or die. Now, with regard to the body, it is clear that,

whether the soul live or die, that has no sensation.

XLIV. But all things are full of errors. Achilles drags Hector, tied to

his chariot; he thinks, I suppose, he tears his flesh, and that Hector

feels the pain of it; therefore, he avenges himself on him, as he

imagines. But Hecuba bewails this as a sore misfortune:

I saw (a dreadful sight) great Hector slain,

Dragg'd at Achilles' car along the plain.

What Hector? or how long will he be Hector? Accius is better in this,

and Achilles, too, is sometimes reasonable:

I Hector's body to his sire convey'd,

Hector I sent to the infernal shade.

It was not Hector that you dragged along, but a body that had been

Hector's. Here another starts from underground, and will not suffer his

mother to sleep:

To thee I call, my once-loved parent, hear,

Nor longer with thy sleep relieve thy care;

Thine eye which pities not is closed--arise;

Ling'ring I wait the unpaid obsequies.

When these verses are sung with a slow and melancholy tune, so as to

affect the whole theatre with sadness, one can scarce help thinking

those unhappy that are unburied:

Ere the devouring dogs and hungry vultures...

He is afraid he shall not have the use of his limbs so well if they are

torn to pieces, but is under no such apprehensions if they are burned:

Nor leave my naked bones, my poor remains,

To shameful violence and bloody stains.

I do not understand what he could fear who could pour forth such

excellent verses to the sound of the flute. We must, therefore, adhere

to this, that nothing is to be regarded after we are dead, though many

people revenge themselves on their dead enemies. Thyestes pours forth

several curses in some good lines of Ennius, praying, first of all,

that Atreus may perish by a shipwreck, which is certainly a very

terrible thing, for such a death is not free from very grievous

sensations. Then follow these unmeaning expressions:

May

On the sharp rock his mangled carcass lie,

His entrails torn, to hungry birds a prey!

May he convulsive writhe his bleeding side,

And with his clotted gore the stones be dyed!

The rocks themselves were not more destitute of feeling than he who was

hanging to them by his side; though Thyestes imagines he is wishing him

the greatest torture. It would be torture, indeed, if he were sensible;

but as he is not, it can be none; then how very unmeaning is this:

Let him, still hovering o'er the Stygian wave,

Ne'er reach the body's peaceful port, the grave!

You see under what mistaken notions all this is said. He imagines the

body has its haven, and that the dead are at rest in their graves.

Pelops was greatly to blame in not having informed and taught his son

what regard was due to everything.

XLV. But what occasion is there to animadvert on the opinions of

individuals, when we may observe whole nations to fall into all sorts

of errors? The Egyptians embalm their dead, and keep them in their

houses; the Persians dress them over with wax, and then bury them, that

they may preserve their bodies as long as possible. It is customary

with the Magi to bury none of their order, unless they have been first

torn by wild beasts. In Hyrcania, the people maintain dogs for the

public use; the nobles have their own--and we know that they have a

good breed of dogs; but every one, according to his ability, provides

himself with some, in order to be torn by them; and they hold that to

be the best kind of interment. Chrysippus, who is curious in all kinds

of historical facts, has collected many other things of this kind; but

some of them are so offensive as not to admit of being related. All

that has been said of burying is not worth our regard with respect to

ourselves, though it is not to be neglected as to our friends, provided

we are thoroughly aware that the dead are insensible. But the living,

indeed, should consider what is due to custom and opinion; only they

should at the same time consider that the dead are noways interested in

it. But death truly is then met with the greatest tranquillity when the

dying man can comfort himself with his own praise. No one dies too soon

who has finished the course of perfect virtue. I myself have known many

occasions when I have seemed in danger of immediate death; oh! how I

wish it had come to me! for I have gained nothing by the delay. I had

gone over and over again the duties of life; nothing remained but to

contend with fortune. If reason, then, cannot sufficiently fortify us

to enable us to feel a contempt for death, at all events let our past

life prove that we have lived long enough, and even longer than was

necessary; for notwithstanding the deprivation of sense, the dead are

not without that good which peculiarly belongs to them, namely, the

praise and glory which they have acquired, even though they are not

sensible of it. For although there be nothing in glory to make it

desirable, yet it follows virtue as its shadow; and the genuine

judgment of the multitude on good men, if ever they form any, is more

to their own praise than of any real advantage to the dead. Yet I

cannot say, however it may be received, that Lycurgus and Solon have no

glory from their laws, and from the political constitution which they

established in their country; or that Themistocles and Epaminondas have

not glory from their martial virtue.

XLVI. For Neptune shall sooner bury Salamis itself with his waters than

the memory of the trophies gained there; and the Boeotian Leuctra shall

perish sooner than the glory of that great battle. And longer still

shall fame be before it deserts Curius, and Fabricius, and Calatinus,

and the two Scipios, and the two Africani, and Maximus, and Marcellus,

and Paulus, and Cato, and Lælius, and numberless other heroes; and

whoever has caught any resemblance of them, not estimating it by common

fame, but by the real applause of good men, may with confidence, when

the occasion requires, approach death, on which we are sure that even

if the chief good is not continued, at least no evil is. Such a man

would even wish to die while in prosperity; for all the favors that

could be heaped on him would not be so agreeable to him as the loss of

them would be painful. That speech of the Lacedæmonian seems to have

the same meaning, who, when Diagoras the Rhodian, who had himself been

a conqueror at the Olympic games, saw two of his own sons conquerors

there on the same day, approached the old man, and, congratulating him,

said, "You should die now, Diagoras, for no greater happiness can

possibly await you." The Greeks look on these as great things; perhaps

they think too highly of them, or, rather, they did so then. And so he

who said this to Diagoras, looking on it as something very glorious,

that three men out of one family should have been conquerors there,

thought it could answer no purpose to him to continue any longer in

life, where he could only be exposed to a reverse of fortune.

I might have given you a sufficient answer, as it seems to me, on this

point, in a few words, as you had allowed the dead were not exposed to

any positive evil; but I have spoken at greater length on the subject

for this reason, because this is our greatest consolation in the losing

and bewailing of our friends. For we ought to bear with moderation any

grief which arises from ourselves, or is endured on our own account,

lest we should seem to be too much influenced by self-love. But should

we suspect our departed friends to be under those evils, which they are

generally imagined to be, and to be sensible of them, then such a

suspicion would give us intolerable pain; and accordingly I wished, for

my own sake, to pluck up this opinion by the roots, and on that account

I have been perhaps somewhat more prolix than was necessary.

XLVII. _A._ More prolix than was necessary? Certainty not, in my

opinion. For I was induced, by the former part of your speech, to wish

to die; but, by the latter, sometimes not to be unwilling, and at

others to be wholly indifferent about it. But the effect of your whole

argument is, that I am convinced that death ought not to be classed

among the evils.

_M._ Do you, then, expect that I am to give you a regular peroration,

like the rhetoricians, or shall I forego that art?

_A._ I would not have you give over an art which you have set off to

such advantage; and you were in the right to do so, for, to speak the

truth, it also has set you off. But what is that peroration? For I

should be glad to hear it, whatever it is.

_M._ It is customary, in the schools, to produce the opinions of the

immortal Gods on death; nor are these opinions the fruits of the

imagination alone of the lecturers, but they have the authority of

Herodotus and many others. Cleobis and Biton are the first they

mention, sons of the Argive priestess; the story is a well-known one.

As it was necessary that she should be drawn in a chariot to a certain

annual sacrifice, which was solemnized at a temple some considerable

distance from the town, and the cattle that were to draw the chariot

had not arrived, those two young men whom I have just mentioned,

pulling off their garments, and anointing their bodies with oil,

harnessed themselves to the yoke. And in this manner the priestess was

conveyed to the temple; and when the chariot had arrived at the proper

place, she is said to have entreated the Goddess to bestow on them, as

a reward for their piety, the greatest gift that a God could confer on

man. And the young men, after having feasted with their mother, fell

asleep; and in the morning they were found dead. Trophonius and

Agamedes are said to have put up the same petition, for they, having

built a temple to Apollo at Delphi, offered supplications to the God,

and desired of him some extraordinary reward for their care and labor,

particularizing nothing, but asking for whatever was best for men.

Accordingly, Apollo signified to them that he would bestow it on them

in three days, and on the third day at daybreak they were found dead.

And so they say that this was a formal decision pronounced by that God

to whom the rest of the deities have assigned the province of divining

with an accuracy superior to that of all the rest.

XLVIII. There is also a story told of Silenus, who, when taken prisoner

by Midas, is said to have made him this present for his ransom--namely,

that he informed him[25] that never to have been born was by far the

greatest blessing that could happen to man; and that the next best

thing was to die very soon; which very opinion Euripides makes use of

in his Cresphontes, saying,

When man is born, 'tis fit, with solemn show,

We speak our sense of his approaching woe;

With other gestures and a different eye,

Proclaim our pleasure when he's bid to die.[26]

There is something like this in Crantor's Consolation; for he says that

Terinæsus of Elysia, when he was bitterly lamenting the loss of his

son, came to a place of divination to be informed why he was visited

with so great affliction, and received in his tablet these three

verses:

Thou fool, to murmur at Euthynous' death!

The blooming youth to fate resigns his breath:

The fate, whereon your happiness depends,

At once the parent and the son befriends.[27]

On these and similar authorities they affirm that the question has been

determined by the Gods. Nay, more; Alcidamas, an ancient rhetorician of

the very highest reputation, wrote even in praise of death, which he

endeavored to establish by an enumeration of the evils of life; and his

Dissertation has a great deal of eloquence in it; but he was

unacquainted with the more refined arguments of the philosophers. By

the orators, indeed, to die for our country is always considered not

only as glorious, but even as happy: they go back as far as

Erechtheus,[28] whose very daughters underwent death, for the safety of

their fellow-citizens: they instance Codrus, who threw himself into the

midst of his enemies, dressed like a common man, that his royal robes

might not betray him, because the oracle had declared the Athenians

conquerors, if their king was slain. Menoeceus[29] is not overlooked by

them, who, in compliance with the injunctions of an oracle, freely shed

his blood for his country. Iphigenia ordered herself to be conveyed to

Aulis, to be sacrificed, that her blood might be the cause of spilling

that of her enemies.

XLIX. From hence they proceed to instances of a fresher date. Harmodius

and Aristogiton are in everybody's mouth; the memory of Leonidas the

Lacedæmonian and Epaminondas the Theban is as fresh as ever. Those

philosophers were not acquainted with the many instances in our

country--to give a list of whom would take up too much time--who, we

see, considered death desirable as long as it was accompanied with

honor. But, notwithstanding this is the correct view of the case, we

must use much persuasion, speak as if we were endued with some higher

authority, in order to bring men to begin to wish to die, or cease to

be afraid of death. For if that last day does not occasion an entire

extinction, but a change of abode only, what can be more desirable? And

if it, on the other hand, destroys, and absolutely puts an end to us,

what can be preferable to the having a deep sleep fall on us, in the

midst of the fatigues of life, and being thus overtaken, to sleep to

eternity? And, should this really be the case, then Ennius's language

is more consistent with wisdom than Solon's; for our Ennius says,

Let none bestow upon my passing bier

One needless sigh or unavailing tear.

But the wise Solon says,

Let me not unlamented die, but o'er my bier

Burst forth the tender sigh, the friendly tear.[30]

But let us, if indeed it should be our fate to know the time which is

appointed by the Gods for us to die, prepare ourselves for it with a

cheerful and grateful mind, thinking ourselves like men who are

delivered from a jail, and released from their fetters, for the purpose

of going back to our eternal habitation, which may be more emphatically

called our own; or else to be divested of all sense and trouble. If, on

the other hand, we should have no notice given us of this decree, yet

let us cultivate such a disposition as to look on that formidable hour

of death as happy for us, though shocking to our friends; and let us

never imagine anything to be an evil which is an appointment of the

immortal Gods, or of nature, the common parent of all. For it is not by

hazard or without design that we have been born and situated as we

have. On the contrary, beyond all doubt there is a certain power which

consults the happiness of human nature; and this would neither have

produced nor provided for a being which, after having gone through the

labors of life, was to fall into eternal misery by death. Let us rather

infer that we have a retreat and haven prepared for us, which I wish we

could crowd all sail and arrive at; but though the winds should not

serve, and we should be driven back, yet we shall to a certainty arrive

at that point eventually, though somewhat later. But how can that be

miserable for one which all must of necessity undergo? I have given you

a peroration, that you might not think I had overlooked or neglected

anything.

_A._ I am persuaded you have not; and, indeed, that peroration has

confirmed me.

_M._ I am glad it has had that effect. But it is now time to consult

our health. To-morrow, and all the time we continue in this Tusculan

villa, let us consider this subject; and especially those portions of

it which may ease our pain, alleviate our fears, and lessen our

desires, which is the greatest advantage we can reap from the whole of

philosophy.

* * * * *

BOOK II.

ON BEARING PAIN.

I. Neoptolemus, in Ennius, indeed, says that the study of philosophy

was expedient for him; but that it required limiting to a few subjects,

for that to give himself up entirely to it was what he did not approve

of. And for my part, Brutus, I am perfectly persuaded that it is

expedient for me to philosophize; for what can I do better, especially

as I have no regular occupation? But I am not for limiting my

philosophy to a few subjects, as he does; for philosophy is a matter in

which it is difficult to acquire a little knowledge without acquainting

yourself with many, or all its branches, nor can you well take a few

subjects without selecting them out of a great number; nor can any one,

who has acquired the knowledge of a few points, avoid endeavoring with

the same eagerness to understand more. But still, in a busy life, and

in one mainly occupied with military matters, such as that of

Neoptolemus was at that time, even that limited degree of acquaintance

with philosophy may be of great use, and may yield fruit, not perhaps

so plentiful as a thorough knowledge of the whole of philosophy, but

yet such as in some degree may at times deliver us from the dominion of

our desires, our sorrows, and our fears; just as the effect of that

discussion which we lately maintained in my Tusculan villa seemed to be

that a great contempt of death was engendered, which contempt is of no

small efficacy towards delivering the mind from fear; for whoever

dreads what cannot be avoided can by no means live with a quiet and

tranquil mind. But he who is under no fear of death, not only because

it is a thing absolutely inevitable but also because he is persuaded

that death itself hath nothing terrible in it, provides himself with a

very great resource towards a happy life. However, I am not tolerant

that many will argue strenuously against us; and, indeed, that is a

thing which can never be avoided, except by abstaining from writing at

all. For if my Orations, which were addressed to the judgment and

approbation of the people (for that is a popular art, and the object of

oratory is popular applause), have been criticised by some people who

are inclined to withhold their praise from everything but what they are

persuaded they can attain to themselves, and who limit their ideas of

good speaking by the hopes which they conceive of what they themselves

may attain to, and who declare, when they are overwhelmed with a flow

of words and sentences, that they prefer the utmost poverty of thought

and expression to that plenty and copiousness (from which arose the

Attic kind of oratory, which they who professed it were strangers to,

though they have now been some time silenced, and laughed out of the

very courts of justice), what may I not expect, when at present I

cannot have the least countenance from the people by whom I used to be

upheld before? For philosophy is satisfied with a few judges, and of

her own accord industriously avoids the multitude, who are jealous of

it, and utterly displeased with it; so that, should any one undertake

to cry down the whole of it, he would have the people on his side;

while, if he should attack that school which I particularly profess, he

would have great assistance from those of the other philosophers.

II. But I have answered the detractors of philosophy in general, in my

Hortensius. And what I had to say in favor of the Academics, is, I

think, explained with sufficient accuracy in my four books of the

Academic Question.

But yet I am so far from desiring that no one should write against me,

that it is what I most earnestly wish; for philosophy would never have

been in such esteem in Greece itself, if it had not been for the

strength which it acquired from the contentions and disputations of the

most learned men; and therefore I recommend all men who have abilities

to follow my advice to snatch this art also from declining Greece, and

to transport it to this city; as our ancestors by their study and

industry have imported all their other arts which were worth having.

Thus the praise of oratory, raised from a low degree, is arrived at

such perfection that it must now decline, and, as is the nature of all

things, verge to its dissolution in a very short time. Let philosophy,

then, derive its birth in Latin language from this time, and let us

lend it our assistance, and bear patiently to be contradicted and

refuted; and although those men may dislike such treatment who are

bound and devoted to certain predetermined opinions, and are under such

obligations to maintain them that they are forced, for the sake of

consistency, to adhere to them even though they do not themselves

wholly approve of them; we, on the other hand, who pursue only

probabilities, and who cannot go beyond that which seems really likely,

can confute others without obstinacy, and are prepared to be confuted

ourselves without resentment. Besides, if these studies are ever

brought home to us, we shall not want even Greek libraries, in which

there is an infinite number of books, by reason of the multitude of

authors among them; for it is a common practice with many to repeat the

same things which have been written by others, which serves no purpose

but to stuff their shelves; and this will be our case, too, if many

apply themselves to this study.

III. But let us excite those, if possible, who have had a liberal

education, and are masters of an elegant style, and who philosophize

with reason and method.

For there is a certain class of them who would willingly be called

philosophers, whose books in our language are said to be numerous, and

which I do not despise; for, indeed, I never read them: but still,

because the authors themselves declare that they write without any

regularity, or method, or elegance, or ornament, I do not care to read

what must be so void of entertainment. There is no one in the least

acquainted with literature who does not know the style and sentiments

of that school; wherefore, since they are at no pains to express

themselves well, I do not see why they should be read by anybody except

by one another. Let them read them, if they please, who are of the same

opinions; for in the same manner as all men read Plato and the other

Socratics, with those who sprung from them, even those who do not agree

with their opinions, or are very indifferent about them; but scarcely

any one except their own disciples take Epicurus or Metrodorus into

their hands; so they alone read these Latin books who think that the

arguments contained in them are sound. But, in my opinion, whatever is

published should be recommended to the reading of every man of

learning; and though we may not succeed in this ourselves, yet

nevertheless we must be sensible that this ought to be the aim of every

writer. And on this account I have always been pleased with the custom

of the Peripatetics and Academics, of disputing on both sides of the

question; not solely from its being the only method of discovering what

is probable on every subject, but also because it affords the greatest

scope for practising eloquence; a method that Aristotle first made use

of, and afterward all the Aristotelians; and in our own memory Plilo,

whom we have often heard, appointed one time to treat of the precepts

of the rhetoricians, and another for philosophical discussion, to which

custom I was brought to conform by my friends at my Tusculum; and

accordingly our leisure time was spent in this manner. And therefore,

as yesterday before noon we applied ourselves to speaking, and in the

afternoon went down into the Academy, the discussions which were held

there I have acquainted you with, not in the manner of a narration, but

in almost the very same words which were employed in the debate.

IV. The discourse, then, was introduced in this manner while we were

walking, and it was commenced by some such an opening as this:

_A._ It is not to be expressed how much I was delighted, or rather

edified, by your discourse of yesterday. For although I am conscious to

myself that I have never been too fond of life, yet at times, when I

have considered that there would be an end to this life, and that I

must some time or other part with all its good things, a certain dread

and uneasiness used to intrude itself on my thoughts; but now, believe

me, I am so freed from that kind of uneasiness that there is nothing

that I think less worth any regard.

_M._ I am not at all surprised at that, for it is the effect of

philosophy, which is the medicine of our souls; it banishes all

groundless apprehensions, frees us from desires, and drives away fears:

but it has not the same influence over all men; it is of very great

influence when it falls in with a disposition well adapted to it. For

not only does Fortune, as the old proverb says, assist the bold, but

reason does so in a still greater degree; for it, by certain precepts,

as it were, strengthens even courage itself. You were born naturally

great and soaring, and with a contempt for all things which pertain to

man alone; therefore a discourse against death took easy possession of

a brave soul. But do you imagine that these same arguments have any

force with those very persons who have invented, and canvassed, and

published them, excepting indeed some very few particular persons? For

how few philosophers will you meet with whose life and manners are

conformable to the dictates of reason! who look on their profession,

not as a means of displaying their learning, but as a rule for their

own practice! who follow their own precepts, and comply with their own

decrees! You may see some of such levity and such vanity, that it would

have been better for them to have been ignorant; some covetous of

money, some others eager for glory, many slaves to their lusts; so that

their discourses and their actions are most strangely at variance; than

which nothing in my opinion can be more unbecoming: for just as if one

who professed to teach grammar should speak with impropriety, or a

master of music sing out of tune, such conduct has the worst appearance

in these men, because they blunder in the very particular with which

they profess that they are well acquainted. So a philosopher who errs

in the conduct of his life is the more infamous because he is erring in

the very thing which he pretends to teach, and, while he lays down

rules to regulate life by, is irregular in his own life.

V. _A._ Should this be the case, is it not to be feared that you are

dressing up philosophy in false colors? For what stronger argument can

there be that it is of little use than that some very profound

philosophers live in a discreditable manner?

_M._ That, indeed, is no argument at all, for as all the fields which

are cultivated are not fruitful (and this sentiment of Accius is false,

and asserted without any foundation,

The ground you sow on is of small avail;

To yield a crop good seed can never fail),

it is not every mind which has been properly cultivated that produces

fruit; and, to go on with the comparison, as a field, although it may

be naturally fruitful, cannot produce a crop without dressing, so

neither can the mind without education; such is the weakness of either

without the other. Whereas philosophy is the culture of the mind: this

it is which plucks up vices by the roots; prepares the mind for the

receiving of seeds; commits them to it, or, as I may say, sows them, in

the hope that, when come to maturity, they may produce a plentiful

harvest. Let us proceed, then, as we began. Say, if you please, what

shall be the subject of our disputation.

_A._ I look on pain to be the greatest of all evils.

_M._ What, even greater than infamy?

_A._ I dare not indeed assert that; and I blush to think I am so soon

driven from my ground.

_M._ You would have had greater reason for blushing had you persevered

in it; for what is so unbecoming--what can appear worse to you, than

disgrace, wickedness, immorality? To avoid which, what pain is there

which we ought not (I will not say to avoid shirking, but even) of our

own accord to encounter, and undergo, and even to court?

_A._ I am entirely of that opinion; but, notwithstanding that pain is

not the greatest evil, yet surely it is an evil.

_M._ Do you perceive, then, how much of the terror of pain you have

given up on a small hint?

_A._ I see that plainly; but I should be glad to give up more of it.

_M._ I will endeavor to make you do so; but it is a great undertaking,

and I must have a disposition on your part which is not inclined to

offer any obstacles.

_A._ You shall have such: for as I behaved yesterday, so now I will

follow reason wherever she leads.

VI. _M._ First, then, I will speak of the weakness of many

philosophers, and those, too, of various sects; the head of whom, both

in authority and antiquity, was Aristippus, the pupil of Socrates, who

hesitated not to say that pain was the greatest of all evils. And after

him Epicurus easily gave in to this effeminate and enervated doctrine.

After him Hieronymus the Rhodian said, that to be without pain was the

chief good, so great an evil did pain appear to him to be. The rest,

with the exceptions of Zeno, Aristo, Pyrrho, were pretty much of the

same opinion that you were of just now--that it was indeed an evil, but

that there were many worse. When, then, nature herself, and a certain

generous feeling of virtue, at once prevents you from persisting in the

assertion that pain is the chief evil, and when you were driven from

such an opinion when disgrace was contrasted with pain, shall

philosophy, the preceptress of life, cling to this idea for so many

ages? What duty of life, what praise, what reputation, would be of such

consequence that a man should be desirous of gaining it at the expense

of submitting to bodily pain, when he has persuaded himself that pain

is the greatest evil? On the other side, what disgrace, what ignominy,

would he not submit to that he might avoid pain, when persuaded that it

was the greatest of evils? Besides, what person, if it be only true

that pain is the greatest of evils, is not miserable, not only when he

actually feels pain, but also whenever he is aware that it may befall

him. And who is there whom pain may not befall? So that it is clear

that there is absolutely no one who can possibly be happy. Metrodorus,

indeed, thinks that man perfectly happy whose body is free from all

disorders, and who has an assurance that it will always continue so;

but who is there who can be assured of that?

VII. But Epicurus, indeed, says such things that it should seem that

his design was only to make people laugh; for he affirms somewhere that

if a wise man were to be burned or put to the torture--you expect,

perhaps, that he is going to say he would bear it, he would support

himself under it with resolution, he would not yield to it (and that by

Hercules! would be very commendable, and worthy of that very Hercules

whom I have just invoked): but even this will not satisfy Epicurus,

that robust and hardy man! No; his wise man, even if he were in

Phalaris's bull, would say, How sweet it is! how little do I regard it!

What, sweet? Is it not sufficient, if it is not disagreeable? But those

very men who deny pain to be an evil are not in the habit of saying

that it is agreeable to any one to be tormented; they rather say that

it is cruel, or hard to bear, afflicting, unnatural, but still not an

evil: while this man who says that it is the only evil, and the very

worst of all evils, yet thinks that a wise man would pronounce it

sweet. I do not require of you to speak of pain in the same words which

Epicurus uses--a man, as you know, devoted to pleasure: he may make no

difference, if he pleases, between Phalaris's bull and his own bed; but

I cannot allow the wise man to be so indifferent about pain. If he

bears it with courage, it is sufficient: that he should rejoice in it,

I do not expect; for pain is, beyond all question, sharp, bitter,

against nature, hard to submit to and to bear. Observe Philoctetes: We

may allow him to lament, for he saw Hercules himself groaning loudly

through extremity of pain on Mount Oeta. The arrows with which Hercules

presented him were then no consolation to him, when

The viper's bite, impregnating his veins

With poison, rack'd him with its bitter pains.

And therefore he cries out, desiring help, and wishing to die,

Oh that some friendly hand its aid would lend,

My body from this rock's vast height to send

Into the briny deep! I'm all on fire,

And by this fatal wound must soon expire.

It is hard to say that the man who was obliged to cry out in this

manner was not oppressed with evil, and great evil too.

VIII. But let us observe Hercules himself, who was subdued by pain at

the very time when he was on the point of attaining immortality by

death. What words does Sophocles here put in his mouth, in his

Trachiniæ? who, when Deianira had put upon him a tunic dyed in the

centaur's blood, and it stuck to his entrails, says,

What tortures I endure no words can tell,

Far greater these, than those which erst befell

From the dire terror of thy consort, Jove--

E'en stern Eurystheus' dire command above;

This of thy daughter, Oeneus, is the fruit,

Beguiling me with her envenom'd suit,

Whose close embrace doth on my entrails prey,

Consuming life; my lungs forbid to play;

The blood forsakes my veins; my manly heart

Forgets to beat; enervated, each part

Neglects its office, while my fatal doom

Proceeds ignobly from the weaver's loom.

The hand of foe ne'er hurt me, nor the fierce

Giant issuing from his parent earth.

Ne'er could the Centaur such a blow enforce,

No barbarous foe, nor all the Grecian force;

This arm no savage people could withstand,

Whose realms I traversed to reform the land.

Thus, though I ever bore a manly heart,

I fall a victim to a woman's art.

IX. Assist, my son, if thou that name dost hear,

My groans preferring to thy mother's tear:

Convey her here, if, in thy pious heart,

Thy mother shares not an unequal part:

Proceed, be bold, thy father's fate bemoan,

Nations will join, you will not weep alone.

Oh, what a sight is this same briny source,

Unknown before, through all my labors' course!

That virtue, which could brave each toil but late,

With woman's weakness now bewails its fate.

Approach, my son; behold thy father laid,

A wither'd carcass that implores thy aid;

Let all behold: and thou, imperious Jove,

On me direct thy lightning from above:

Now all its force the poison doth assume,

And my burnt entrails with its flame consume.

Crestfallen, unembraced, I now let fall

Listless, those hands that lately conquer'd all;

When the Nemæan lion own'd their force,

And he indignant fell a breathless corse;

The serpent slew, of the Lernean lake,

As did the Hydra of its force partake:

By this, too, fell the Erymanthian boar:

E'en Cerberus did his weak strength deplore.

This sinewy arm did overcome with ease

That dragon, guardian of the Golden Fleece.

My many conquests let some others trace;

It's mine to say, I never knew disgrace.[31]

Can we then, despise pain, when we see Hercules himself giving vent to

his expressions of agony with such impatience?

X. Let us see what Æschylus says, who was not only a poet but a

Pythagorean philosopher also, for that is the account which you have

received of him; how doth he make Prometheus bear the pain he suffered

for the Lemnian theft, when he clandestinely stole away the celestial

fire, and bestowed it on men, and was severely punished by Jupiter for

the theft. Fastened to Mount Caucasus, he speaks thus:

Thou heav'n-born race of Titans here fast bound,

Behold thy brother! As the sailors sound

With care the bottom, and their ships confine

To some safe shore, with anchor and with line;

So, by Jove's dread decree, the God of fire

Confines me here the victim of Jove's ire.

With baneful art his dire machine he shapes;

From such a God what mortal e'er escapes?

When each third day shall triumph o'er the night,

Then doth the vulture, with his talons light,

Seize on my entrails; which, in rav'nous guise,

He preys on! then with wing extended flies

Aloft, and brushes with his plumes the gore:

But when dire Jove my liver doth restore,

Back he returns impetuous to his prey,

Clapping his wings, he cuts th' ethereal way.

Thus do I nourish with my blood this pest,

Confined my arms, unable to contest;

Entreating only that in pity Jove

Would take my life, and this cursed plague remove.

But endless ages past unheard my moan,

Sooner shall drops dissolve this very stone.[32]

And therefore it scarcely seems possible to avoid calling a man who is

suffering, miserable; and if he is miserable, then pain is an evil.

XI. _A._ Hitherto you are on my side; I will see to that by-and-by;

and, in the mean while, whence are those verses? I do not remember

them.

_M._ I will inform you, for you are in the right to ask. Do you see

that I have much leisure?

_A._ What, then?

_M._ I imagine, when you were at Athens, you attended frequently at the

schools of the philosophers.

_A._ Yes, and with great pleasure.

_M._ You observed, then, that though none of them at that time were

very eloquent, yet they used to mix verses with their harangues.

_A._ Yes, and particularly Dionysius the Stoic used to employ a great

many.

_M._ You say right; but they were quoted without any appropriateness or

elegance. But our friend Philo used to give a few select lines and well

adapted; and in imitation of him, ever since I took a fancy to this

kind of elderly declamation, I have been very fond of quoting our

poets; and where I cannot be supplied from them, I translate from the

Greek, that the Latin language may not want any kind of ornament in

this kind of disputation.

But, do you not see how much harm is done by poets? They introduce the

bravest men lamenting over their misfortunes: they soften our minds;

and they are, besides, so entertaining, that we do not only read them,

but get them by heart. Thus the influence of the poets is added to our

want of discipline at home, and our tender and delicate manner of

living, so that between them they have deprived virtue of all its vigor

and energy. Plato, therefore, was right in banishing them from his

commonwealth, where he required the best morals, and the best form of

government. But we, who have all our learning from Greece, read and

learn these works of theirs from our childhood; and look on this as a

liberal and learned education.

XII. But why are we angry with the poets? We may find some

philosophers, those masters of virtue, who have taught that pain was

the greatest of evils. But you, young man, when you said but just now

that it appeared so to you, upon being asked by me what appeared

greater than infamy, gave up that opinion at a word. Suppose I ask

Epicurus the same question. He will answer that a trifling degree of

pain is a greater evil than the greatest infamy; for that there is no

evil in infamy itself, unless attended with pain. What pain, then,

attends Epicurus, when he says that very thing, that pain is the

greatest evil! And yet nothing can be a greater disgrace to a

philosopher than to talk thus. Therefore, you allowed enough when you

admitted that infamy appeared to you to be a greater evil than pain.

And if you abide by this admission, you will see how far pain should be

resisted; and that our inquiry should be not so much whether pain be an

evil, as how the mind may be fortified for resisting it. The Stoics

infer from some petty quibbling arguments that it is no evil, as if the

dispute were about a word, and not about the thing itself. Why do you

impose upon me, Zeno? For when you deny what appears very dreadful to

me to be an evil, I am deceived, and am at a loss to know why that

which appears to me to be a most miserable thing should be no evil. The

answer is, that nothing is an evil but what is base and vicious. You

return to your trifling, for you do not remove what made me uneasy. I

know that pain is not vice--you need not inform me of that: but show me

that it makes no difference to me whether I am in pain or not. It has

never anything to do, say you, with a happy life, for that depends upon

virtue alone; but yet pain is to be avoided. If I ask, why? It is

disagreeable, against nature, hard to bear, woful and afflicting.

XIII. Here are many words to express that by so many different forms

which we call by the single word evil. You are defining pain, instead

of removing it, when you say, it is disagreeable, unnatural, scarcely

possible to be endured or borne, nor are you wrong in saying so: but

the man who vaunts himself in such a manner should not give way in his

conduct, if it be true that nothing is good but what is honest, and

nothing evil but what is disgraceful. This would be wishing, not

proving. This argument is a better one, and has more truth in it--that

all things which Nature abhors are to be looked upon as evil; that

those which she approves of are to be considered as good: for when this

is admitted, and the dispute about words removed, that which they with

reason embrace, and which we call honest, right, becoming, and

sometimes include under the general name of virtue, appears so far

superior to everything else that all other things which are looked upon

as the gifts of fortune, or the good things of the body, seem trifling

and insignificant; and no evil whatever, nor all the collective body of

evils together, appears to be compared to the evil of infamy.

Wherefore, if, as you granted in the beginning, infamy is worse than

pain, pain is certainly nothing; for while it appears to you base and

unmanly to groan, cry out, lament, or faint under pain; while you

cherish notions of probity, dignity, honor, and, keeping your eye on

them, refrain yourself, pain will certainly yield to virtue, and, by

the influence of imagination, will lose its whole force.--For you must

either admit that there is no such thing as virtue, or you must despise

every kind of pain. Will you allow of such a virtue as prudence,

without which no virtue whatever can even be conceived? What, then?

Will that suffer you to labor and take pains to no purpose? Will

temperance permit you to do anything to excess? Will it be possible for

justice to be maintained by one who through the force of pain discovers

secrets, or betrays his confederates, or deserts many duties of life?

Will you act in a manner consistently with courage, and its attendants,

greatness of soul, resolution, patience, and contempt for all worldly

things? Can you hear yourself called a great man when you lie

grovelling, dejected, and deploring your condition with a lamentable

voice; no one would call you even a man while in such a condition. You

must therefore either abandon all pretensions to courage, or else pain

must be put out of the question.

XIV. You know very well that, even though part of your Corinthian

furniture were gone, the remainder might be safe without that; but if

you lose one virtue (though virtue in reality cannot be lost), still

if, I say, you should acknowledge that you were deficient in one, you

would be stripped of all. Can you, then, call yourself a brave man, of

a great soul, endued with patience and steadiness above the frowns of

fortune? or Philoctetes? for I choose to instance him, rather than

yourself, for he certainly was not a brave man, who lay in his bed,

which was watered with his tears,

Whose groans, bewailings, and whose bitter cries,

With grief incessant rent the very skies.

I do not deny pain to be pain--for were that the case, in what would

courage consist?--but I say it should be assuaged by patience, if there

be such a thing as patience: if there be no such thing, why do we speak

so in praise of philosophy? or why do we glory in its name? Does pain

annoy us? Let it sting us to the heart: if you are without defensive

armor, bare your throat to it; but if you are secured by Vulcanian

armor, that is to say by resolution, resist it. Should you fail to do

so, that guardian of your honor, your courage, will forsake and leave

you.--By the laws of Lycurgus, and by those which were given to the

Cretans by Jupiter, or which Minos established under the direction of

Jupiter, as the poets say, the youths of the State are trained by the

practice of hunting, running, enduring hunger and thirst, cold and

heat. The boys at Sparta are scourged so at the altars that blood

follows the lash in abundance; nay, sometimes, as I used to hear when I

was there, they are whipped even to death; and yet not one of them was

ever heard to cry out, or so much as groan. What, then? Shall men not

be able to bear what boys do? and shall custom have such great force,

and reason none at all?

XV. There is some difference between labor and pain; they border upon

one another, but still there is a certain difference between them.

Labor is a certain exercise of the mind or body, in some employment or

undertaking of serious trouble and importance; but pain is a sharp

motion in the body, disagreeable to our senses.--Both these feelings,

the Greeks, whose language is more copious than ours, express by the

common name of [Greek: Ponos]: therefore they call industrious men

painstaking, or, rather, fond of labor; we, more conveniently, call

them laborious; for laboring is one thing, and enduring pain another.

You see, O Greece! your barrenness of words, sometimes, though you

think you are always so rich in them. I say, then, that there is a

difference between laboring and being in pain. When Caius Marius had an

operation performed for a swelling in his thigh, he felt pain; when he

headed his troops in a very hot season, he labored. Yet these two

feelings bear some resemblance to one another; for the accustoming

ourselves to labor makes the endurance of pain more easy to us. And it

was because they were influenced by this reason that the founders of

the Grecian form of government provided that the bodies of their youth

should be strengthened by labor, which custom the Spartans transferred

even to their women, who in other cities lived more delicately, keeping

within the walls of their houses; but it was otherwise with the

Spartans.

The Spartan women, with a manly air,

Fatigues and dangers with their husbands share;

They in fantastic sports have no delight,

Partners with them in exercise and fight.

And in these laborious exercises pain interferes sometimes. They are

thrown down, receive blows, have bad falls, and are bruised, and the

labor itself produces a sort of callousness to pain.

XVI. As to military service (I speak of our own, not of that of the

Spartans, for they used to march slowly to the sound of the flute, and

scarce a word of command was given without an anapæst), you may see, in

the first place, whence the very name of an army (_exercitus_[33]) is

derived; and, secondly, how great the labor is of an army on its march:

then consider that they carry more than a fortnight's provision, and

whatever else they may want; that they carry the burden of the

stakes,[34] for as to shield, sword, or helmet, they look on them as no

more encumbrance than their own limbs, for they say that arms are the

limbs of a soldier, and those, indeed, they carry so commodiously that,

when there is occasion, they throw down their burdens, and use their

arms as readily as their limbs. Why need I mention the exercises of the

legions? And how great the labor is which is undergone in the running,

encounters, shouts! Hence it is that their minds are worked up to make

so light of wounds in action. Take a soldier of equal bravery, but

undisciplined, and he will seem a woman. Why is it that there is this

sensible difference between a raw recruit and a veteran soldier? The

age of the young soldiers is for the most part in their favor; but it

is practice only that enables men to bear labor and despise wounds.

Moreover, we often see, when the wounded are carried off the field, the

raw, untried soldier, though but slightly wounded, cries out most

shamefully; but the more brave, experienced veteran only inquires for

some one to dress his wounds, and says,

Patroclus, to thy aid I must appeal

Ere worse ensue, my bleeding wounds to heal;

The sons of Æsculapius are employ'd,

No room for me, so many are annoy'd.

XVII. This is certainly Eurypylus himself. What an experienced

man!--While his friend is continually enlarging on his misfortunes, you

may observe that he is so far from weeping that he even assigns a

reason why he should bear his wounds with patience.

Who at his enemy a stroke directs,

His sword to light upon himself expects.

Patroclus, I suppose, will lead him off to his chamber to bind up his

wounds, at least if he be a man: but not a word of that; he only

inquires how the battle went:

Say how the Argives bear themselves in fight?

And yet no words can show the truth as well as those, your deeds and

visible sufferings.

Peace! and my wounds bind up;

but though Eurypylus could bear these afflictions, Æsopus could not,

Where Hector's fortune press'd our yielding troops;

and he explains the rest, though in pain. So unbounded is military

glory in a brave man! Shall, then, a veteran soldier be able to behave

in this manner, and shall a wise and learned man not be able? Surely

the latter might be able to bear pain better, and in no small degree

either. At present, however, I am confining myself to what is

engendered by practice and discipline. I am not yet come to speak of

reason and philosophy. You may often hear of old women living without

victuals for three or four days; but take away a wrestler's provisions

but for one day, and he will implore the aid of Jupiter Olympius, the

very God for whom he exercises himself: he will cry out that he cannot

endure it. Great is the force of custom! Sportsmen will continue whole

nights in the snow; they will bear being almost frozen upon the

mountains. From practice boxers will not so much as utter a groan,

however bruised by the cestus. But what do you think of those to whom a

victory in the Olympic games seemed almost on a par with the ancient

consulships of the Roman people? What wounds will the gladiators bear,

who are either barbarians, or the very dregs of mankind! How do they,

who are trained to it, prefer being wounded to basely avoiding it! How

often do they prove that they consider nothing but the giving

satisfaction to their masters or to the people! for when covered with

wounds, they send to their masters to learn their pleasure: if it is

their will, they are ready to lie down and die. What gladiator, of even

moderate reputation, ever gave a sigh? who ever turned pale? who ever

disgraced himself either in the actual combat, or even when about to

die? who that had been defeated ever drew in his neck to avoid the

stroke of death? So great is the force of practice, deliberation, and

custom! Shall this, then, be done by

A Samnite rascal, worthy of his trade;

and shall a man born to glory have so soft a part in his soul as not to

be able to fortify it by reason and reflection? The sight of the

gladiators' combats is by some looked on as cruel and inhuman, and I do

not know, as it is at present managed, but it may be so; but when the

guilty fought, we might receive by our ears perhaps (but certainly by

our eyes we could not) better training to harden us against pain and

death.

XVIII. I have now said enough about the effects of exercise, custom,

and careful meditation. Proceed we now to consider the force of reason,

unless you have something to reply to what has been said.

_A._ That I should interrupt you! By no means; for your discourse has

brought me over to your opinion. Let the Stoics, then, think it their

business to determine whether pain be an evil or not, while they

endeavor to show by some strained and trifling conclusions, which are

nothing to the purpose, that pain is no evil. My opinion is, that

whatever it is, it is not so great as it appears; and I say, that men

are influenced to a great extent by some false representations and

appearance of it, and that all which is really felt is capable of being

endured. Where shall I begin, then? Shall I superficially go over what

I said before, that my discourse may have a greater scope?

This, then, is agreed upon by all, and not only by learned men, but

also by the unlearned, that it becomes the brave and magnanimous--those

that have patience and a spirit above this world--not to give way to

pain. Nor has there ever been any one who did not commend a man who

bore it in this manner. That, then, which is expected from a brave man,

and is commended when it is seen, it must surely be base in any one to

be afraid of at its approach, or not to bear when it comes. But I would

have you consider whether, as all the right affections of the soul are

classed under the name of virtues, the truth is that this is not

properly the name of them all, but that they all have their name from

that leading virtue which is superior to all the rest: for the name

"virtue" comes from _vir_, a man, and courage is the peculiar

distinction of a man: and this virtue has two principal duties, to

despise death and pain. We must, then, exert these, if we would be men

of virtue, or, rather, if we would be men, because virtue (_virtus_)

takes its very name from _vir_, man.

XIX. You may inquire, perhaps, how? And such an inquiry is not amiss,

for philosophy is ready with her assistance. Epicurus offers himself to

you, a man far from a bad--or, I should rather say, a very good man: he

advises no more than he knows. "Despise pain," says he. Who is it saith

this? Is it the same man who calls pain the greatest of all evils? It

is not, indeed, very consistent in him. Let us hear what he says: "If

the pain is excessive, it must needs be short." I must have that over

again, for I do not apprehend what you mean exactly by "excessive" or

"short." That is excessive than which nothing can be greater; that is

short than which nothing is shorter. I do not regard the greatness of

any pain from which, by reason of the shortness of its continuance, I

shall be delivered almost before it reaches me. But if the pain be as

great as that of Philoctetes, it will appear great indeed to me, but

yet not the greatest that I am capable of bearing; for the pain is

confined to my foot. But my eye may pain me, I may have a pain in the

head, or sides, or lungs, or in every part of me. It is far, then, from

being excessive. Therefore, says he, pain of a long continuance has

more pleasure in it than uneasiness. Now, I cannot bring myself to say

so great a man talks nonsense; but I imagine he is laughing at us. My

opinion is that the greatest pain (I say the greatest, though it may be

ten atoms less than another) is not therefore short, because acute. I

could name to you a great many good men who have been tormented many

years with the acutest pains of the gout. But this cautious man doth

not determine the measure of that greatness or of duration, so as to

enable us to know what he calls excessive with regard to pain, or short

with respect to its continuance. Let us pass him by, then, as one who

says just nothing at all; and let us force him to acknowledge,

notwithstanding he might behave himself somewhat boldly under his colic

and his strangury, that no remedy against pain can be had from him who

looks on pain as the greatest of all evils. We must apply, then, for

relief elsewhere, and nowhere better (if we seek for what is most

consistent with itself) than to those who place the chief good in

honesty, and the greatest evil in infamy. You dare not so much as

groan, or discover the least uneasiness in their company, for virtue

itself speaks to you through them.

XX. Will you, when you may observe children at Lacedæmon, and young men

at Olympia, and barbarians in the amphitheatre, receive the severest

wounds, and bear them without once opening their mouths--will you, I

say, if any pain should by chance attack you, cry out like a woman?

Will you not rather bear it with resolution and constancy? and not cry,

It is intolerable; nature cannot bear it! I hear what you say: Boys

bear this because they are led thereto by glory; some bear it through

shame, many through fear, and yet are we afraid that nature cannot bear

what is borne by many, and in such different circumstances? Nature not

only bears it, but challenges it, for there is nothing with her

preferable, nothing which she desires more than credit, and reputation,

and praise, and honor, and glory. I choose here to describe this one

thing under many names, and I have used many that you may have the

clearer idea of it; for what I mean to say is, that whatever is

desirable of itself, proceeding from virtue, or placed in virtue, and

commendable on its own account (which I would rather agree to call the

only good than deny it to be the chief good) is what men should prefer

above all things. And as we declare this to be the case with respect to

honesty, so we speak in the contrary manner of infamy; nothing is so

odious, so detestable, nothing so unworthy of a man. And if you are

thoroughly convinced of this (for, at the beginning of this discourse,

you allowed that there appeared to you more evil in infamy than in

pain), it follows that you ought to have the command over yourself,

though I scarcely know how this expression may seem an accurate one,

which appears to represent man as made up of two natures, so that one

should be in command and the other be subject to it.

XXI. Yet this division does not proceed from ignorance; for the soul

admits of a twofold division, one of which partakes of reason, the

other is without it. When, therefore, we are ordered to give a law to

ourselves, the meaning is, that reason should restrain our rashness.

There is in the soul of every man something naturally soft, low,

enervated in a manner, and languid. Were there nothing besides this,

men would be the greatest of monsters; but there is present to every

man reason, which presides over and gives laws to all; which, by

improving itself, and making continual advances, becomes perfect

virtue. It behooves a man, then, to take care that reason shall have

the command over that part which is bound to practise obedience. In

what manner? you will say. Why, as a master has over his slave, a

general over his army, a father over his son. If that part of the soul

which I have called soft behaves disgracefully, if it gives itself up

to lamentations and womanish tears, then let it be restrained, and

committed to the care of friends and relations, for we often see those

persons brought to order by shame whom no reasons can influence.

Therefore, we should confine those feelings, like our servants, in safe

custody, and almost with chains. But those who have more resolution,

and yet are not utterly immovable, we should encourage with our

exhortations, as we would good soldiers, to recollect themselves, and

maintain their honor. That wisest man of all Greece, in the Niptræ,

does not lament too much over his wounds, or, rather, he is moderate in

his grief:

Move slow, my friends; your hasty speed refrain,

Lest by your motion you increase my pain.

Pacuvius is better in this than Sophocles, for in the one Ulysses

bemoans his wounds too vehemently; for the very people who carried him

after he was wounded, though his grief was moderate, yet, considering

the dignity of the man, did not scruple to say,

And thou, Ulysses, long to war inured,

Thy wounds, though great, too feebly hast endured.

The wise poet understood that custom was no contemptible instructor how

to bear pain. But the same hero complains with more decency, though in

great pain:

Assist, support me, never leave me so;

Unbind my wounds, oh! execrable woe!

He begins to give way, but instantly checks himself:

Away! begone! but cover first the sore;

For your rude hands but make my pains the more.

Do you observe how he constrains himself? not that his bodily pains

were less, but because he checks the anguish of his mind. Therefore, in

the conclusion of the Niptræ, he blames others, even when he himself is

dying:

Complaints of fortune may become the man,

None but a woman will thus weeping stand.

And so that soft place in his soul obeys his reason, just as an abashed

soldier does his stern commander.

XXII. The man, then, in whom absolute wisdom exists (such a man,

indeed, we have never as yet seen, but the philosophers have described

in their writings what sort of man he will be, if he should exist);

such a man, or at least that perfect and absolute reason which exists

in him, will have the same authority over the inferior part as a good

parent has over his dutiful children: he will bring it to obey his nod

without any trouble or difficulty. He will rouse himself, prepare and

arm himself, to oppose pain as he would an enemy. If you inquire what

arms he will provide himself with, they will be contention,

encouragement, discourse with himself. He will say thus to himself:

Take care that you are guilty of nothing base, languid, or unmanly. He

will turn over in his mind all the different kinds of honor. Zeno of

Elea will occur to him, who suffered everything rather than betray his

confederates in the design of putting an end to the tyranny. He will

reflect on Anaxarchus, the pupil of Democritus, who, having fallen into

the hands of Nicocreon, King of Cyprus, without the least entreaty for

mercy or refusal, submitted to every kind of torture. Calanus the

Indian will occur to him, an ignorant man and a barbarian, born at the

foot of Mount Caucasus, who committed himself to the flames by his own

free, voluntary act. But we, if we have the toothache, or a pain in the

foot, or if the body be anyways affected, cannot bear it. For our

sentiments of pain as well as pleasure are so trifling and effeminate,

we are so enervated and relaxed by luxuries, that we cannot bear the

sting of a bee without crying out. But Caius Marius, a plain

countryman, but of a manly soul, when he had an operation performed on

him, as I mentioned above, at first refused to be tied down; and he is

the first instance of any one's having had an operation performed on

him without being tied down. Why, then, did others bear it afterward?

Why, from the force of example. You see, then, that pain exists more in

opinion than in nature; and yet the same Marius gave a proof that there

is something very sharp in pain for he would not submit to have the

other thigh cut. So that he bore his pain with resolution as a man;

but, like a reasonable person, he was not willing to undergo any

greater pain without some necessary reason. The whole, then, consists

in this--that you should have command over yourself. I have already

told you what kind of command this is; and by considering what is most

consistent with patience, fortitude, and greatness of soul, a man not

only restrains himself, but, somehow or other, mitigates even pain

itself.

XXIII. Even as in a battle the dastardly and timorous soldier throws

away his shield on the first appearance of an enemy, and runs as fast

as he can, and on that account loses his life sometimes, though he has

never received even one wound, when he who stands his ground has

nothing of the sort happen to him, so they who cannot bear the

appearance of pain throw themselves away, and give themselves up to

affliction and dismay. But they that oppose it, often come off more

than a match for it. For the body has a certain resemblance to the

soul: as burdens are more easily borne the more the body is exerted,

while they crush us if we give way, so the soul by exerting itself

resists the whole weight that would oppress it; but if it yields, it is

so pressed that it cannot support itself. And if we consider things

truly, the soul should exert itself in every pursuit, for that is the

only security for its doing its duty. But this should be principally

regarded in pain, that we must not do anything timidly, or dastardly,

or basely, or slavishly, or effeminately, and, above all things, we

must dismiss and avoid that Philoctetean sort of outcry. A man is

allowed sometimes to groan, but yet seldom; but it is not permissible

even in a woman to howl; for such a noise as this is forbidden, by the

twelve tables, to be used even at funerals. Nor does a wise or brave

man ever groan, unless when he exerts himself to give his resolution

greater force, as they who run in the stadium make as much noise as

they can. The wrestlers, too, do the same when they are training; and

the boxers, when they aim a blow with the cestus at their adversary,

give a groan, not because they are in pain, or from a sinking of their

spirits, but because their whole body is put upon the stretch by the

throwing-out of these groans, and the blow comes the stronger.

XXIV. What! they who would speak louder than ordinary are they

satisfied with working their jaws, sides, or tongue or stretching the

common organs of speech and utterance? The whole body and every muscle

is at full stretch if I may be allowed the expression; every nerve is

exerted to assist their voice. I have actually seen the knees of Marcus

Antonius touch the ground when he was speaking with vehemence for

himself, with relation to the Varian law. For, as the engines you throw

stones or darts with throw them out with the greater force the more

they are strained and drawn back; so it is in speaking, running, or

boxing--the more people strain themselves, the greater their force.

Since, therefore, this exertion has so much influence--if in a moment

of pain groans help to strengthen the mind, let us use them; but if

they be groans of lamentation, if they be the expression of weakness or

abjectness, or unmanly weeping, then I should scarcely call him a man

who yielded to them. For even supposing that such groaning could give

any ease, it still should be considered whether it were consistent with

a brave and resolute man. But if it does not ease our pain, why should

we debase ourselves to no purpose? For what is more unbecoming in a man

than to cry like a woman? But this precept which is laid down with

respect to pain is not confined to it. We should apply this exertion of

the soul to everything else. Is anger inflamed? is lust excited? we

must have recourse to the same citadel, and apply to the same arms. But

since it is pain which we are at present discussing, we will let the

other subjects alone. To bear pain, then, sedately and calmly, it is of

great use to consider with all our soul, as the saying is, how noble it

is to do so, for we are naturally desirous (as I said before, but it

cannot be too often repeated) and very much inclined to what is

honorable, of which, if we discover but the least glimpse, there is

nothing which we are not prepared to undergo and suffer to attain it.

From this impulse of our minds, this desire for genuine glory and

honorable conduct, it is that such dangers are supported in war, and

that brave men are not sensible of their wounds in action, or, if they

are sensible of them, prefer death to the departing but the least step

from their honor. The Decii saw the shining swords of their enemies

when they were rushing into the battle. But the honorable character and

the glory of the death which they were seeking made all fear of death

of little weight. Do you imagine that Epaminondas groaned when he

perceived that his life was flowing out with his blood? No; for he left

his country triumphing over the Lacedæmonians, whereas he had found it

in subjection to them. These are the comforts, these are the things

that assuage the greatest pain.

XXV. You may ask, How the case is in peace? What is to be done at home?

How we are to behave in bed? You bring me back to the philosophers, who

seldom go to war. Among these, Dionysius of Heraclea, a man certainly

of no resolution, having learned fortitude of Zeno, quitted it on being

in pain; for, being tormented with a pain in his kidneys, in bewailing

himself he cried out that those things were false which he had formerly

conceived of pain. And when his fellow-disciple, Cleanthes, asked him

why he had changed his opinion, he answered, "That the case of any man

who had applied so much time to philosophy, and yet was unable to bear

pain, might be a sufficient proof that pain is an evil; that he himself

had spent many years at philosophy, and yet could not bear pain: it

followed, therefore, that pain was an evil." It is reported that

Cleanthes on that struck his foot on the ground, and repeated a verse

out of the Epigonæ:

Amphiaraus, hear'st thou this below?

He meant Zeno: he was sorry the other had degenerated from him.

But it was not so with our friend Posidonius, whom I have often seen

myself; and I will tell you what Pompey used to say of him: that when

he came to Rhodes, after his departure from Syria, he had a great

desire to hear Posidonius, but was informed that he was very ill of a

severe fit of the gout; yet he had great inclination to pay a visit to

so famous a philosopher. Accordingly, when he had seen him, and paid

his compliments, and had spoken with great respect of him, he said he

was very sorry that he could not hear him lecture. "But indeed you

may," replied the other, "nor will I suffer any bodily pain to occasion

so great a man to visit me in vain." On this Pompey relates that, as he

lay on his bed, he disputed with great dignity and fluency on this very

subject: that nothing was good but what was honest; and that in his

paroxysms he would often say, "Pain, it is to no purpose;

notwithstanding you are troublesome, I will never acknowledge you an

evil." And in general all celebrated and notorious afflictions become

endurable by disregarding them.

XXVI. Do we not observe that where those exercises called gymnastic are

in esteem, those who enter the lists never concern themselves about

dangers? that where the praise of riding and hunting is highly

esteemed, they who practice these arts decline no pain? What shall I

say of our own ambitious pursuits or desire of honors? What fire have

not candidates run through to gain a single vote? Therefore Africanus

had always in his hands Xenophon, the pupil of Socrates, being

particularly pleased with his saying, that the same labors were not

equally heavy to the general and to the common man, because the honor

itself made the labor lighter to the general. But yet, so it happens,

that even with the illiterate vulgar an idea of honor is of great

influence, though they cannot understand what it is. They are led by

report and common opinion to look on that as honorable which has the

general voice. Not that I would have you, should the multitude be ever

so fond of you, rely on their judgment, nor approve of everything which

they think right: you must use your own judgment. If you are satisfied

with yourself when you have approved of what is right, you will not

only have the mastery over yourself (which I recommended to you just

now), but over everybody, and everything. Lay this down, then, as a

rule, that a great capacity, and lofty elevation of soul, which

distinguishes itself most by despising and looking down with contempt

on pain, is the most excellent of all things, and the more so if it

does not depend on the people and does not aim at applause, but derives

its satisfaction from itself. Besides, to me, indeed, everything seems

the more commendable the less the people are courted, and the fewer

eyes there are to see it. Not that you should avoid the public, for

every generous action loves the public view; yet no theatre for virtue

is equal to a consciousness of it.

XXVII. And let this be principally considered: that this bearing of

pain, which I have often said is to be strengthened by an exertion of

the soul, should be the same in everything. For you meet with many who,

through a desire of victory, or for glory, or to maintain their rights,

or their liberty, have boldly received wounds, and borne themselves up

under them; and yet those very same persons, by relaxing that

intenseness of their minds, were unequal to bearing the pain of a

disease; for they did not support themselves under their former

sufferings by reason or philosophy, but by inclination and glory.

Therefore some barbarians and savage people are able to fight very

stoutly with the sword, but cannot bear sickness like men; but the

Grecians, men of no great courage, but as wise as human nature will

admit of, cannot look an enemy in the face, yet the same will bear to

be visited with sickness tolerably, and with a sufficiently manly

spirit; and the Cimbrians and Celtiberians are very alert in battle,

but bemoan themselves in sickness. For nothing can be consistent which

has not reason for its foundation. But when you see those who are led

by inclination or opinion, not retarded by pain in their pursuits, nor

hindered by it from succeeding in them, you may conclude, either that

pain is no evil, or that, notwithstanding you may choose to call an

evil whatever is disagreeable and contrary to nature, yet it is so very

trifling an evil that it may so effectually be got the better of by

virtue as quite to disappear. And I would have you think of this night

and day; for this argument will spread itself, and take up more room

some time or other, and not be confined to pain alone; for if the

motives to all our actions are to avoid disgrace and acquire honor, we

may not only despise the stings of pain, but the storms of fortune,

especially if we have recourse to that retreat which was pointed out in

our yesterday's discussion; for, as if some God had advised a man who

was pursued by pirates to throw himself overboard, saying, "There is

something at hand to receive you; either a dolphin will take you up, as

it did Arion of Methymna; or those horses sent by Neptune to Pelops

(who are said to have carried chariots so rapidly as to be borne up by

the waves) will receive you, and convey you wherever you please. Cast

away all fear." So, though your pains be ever so sharp and

disagreeable, if the case is not such that it is worth your while to

endure them, you see whither you may betake yourself. I think this will

do for the present. But perhaps you still abide by your opinion.

_A._ Not in the least, indeed; and I hope I am freed by these two days'

discourses from the fear of two things that I greatly dreaded.

_M._ To-morrow, then, for rhetoric, as we were saying. But I see we

must not drop our philosophy.

_A._ No, indeed; we will have the one in the forenoon, and this at the

usual time.

_M._ It shall be so, and I will comply with your very laudable

inclinations.

* * * * *

BOOK III.

ON GRIEF OF MIND.

I. What reason shall I assign, O Brutus, why, as we consist of mind and

body, the art of curing and preserving the body should be so much

sought after, and the invention of it, as being so useful, should be

ascribed to the immortal Gods; but the medicine of the mind should not

have been so much the object of inquiry while it was unknown, nor so

much attended to and cultivated after its discovery, nor so well

received or approved of by some, and accounted actually disagreeable,

and looked upon with an envious eye by many? Is it because we, by means

of the mind, judge of the pains and disorders of the body, but do not,

by means of the body, arrive at any perception of the disorders of the

mind? Hence it comes that the mind only judges of itself when that very

faculty by which it is judged is in a bad state. Had nature given us

faculties for discerning and viewing herself, and could we go through

life by keeping our eye on her--our best guide--there would be no

reason certainly why any one should be in want of philosophy or

learning; but, as it is, she has furnished us only with some feeble

rays of light, which we immediately extinguish so completely by evil

habits and erroneous opinions that the light of nature is nowhere

visible. The seeds of virtues are natural to our constitutions, and,

were they suffered to come to maturity, would naturally conduct us to a

happy life; but now, as soon as we are born and received into the

world, we are instantly familiarized with all kinds of depravity and

perversity of opinions; so that we may be said almost to suck in error

with our nurse's milk. When we return to our parents, and are put into

the hands of tutors and governors, we are imbued with so many errors

that truth gives place to falsehood, and nature herself to established

opinion.

II. To these we may add the poets; who, on account of the appearance

they exhibit of learning and wisdom, are heard, read, and got by heart,

and make a deep impression on our minds. But when to these are added

the people, who are, as it were, one great body of instructors, and the

multitude, who declare unanimously for what is wrong, then are we

altogether overwhelmed with bad opinions, and revolt entirely from

nature; so that they seem to deprive us of our best guide who have

decided that there is nothing better for man, nothing more worthy of

being desired by him, nothing more excellent, than honors and commands,

and a high reputation with the people; which indeed every excellent man

aims at; but while he pursues that only true honor which nature has in

view above all other objects, he finds himself busied in arrant

trifles, and in pursuit of no conspicuous form of virtue, but only some

shadowy representation of glory. For glory is a real and express

substance, not a mere shadow. It consists in the united praise of good

men, the free voice of those who form a true judgment of pre-eminent

virtue; it is, as it were, the very echo of virtue; and being generally

the attendant on laudable actions, should not be slighted by good men.

But popular fame, which would pretend to imitate it, is hasty and

inconsiderate, and generally commends wicked and immoral actions, and

throws discredit upon the appearance and beauty of honesty by assuming

a resemblance of it. And it is owing to their not being able to

discover the difference between them that some men ignorant of real

excellence, and in what it consists, have been the destruction of their

country and of themselves. And thus the best men have erred, not so

much in their intentions as by a mistaken conduct. What? is no cure to

be attempted to be applied to those who are carried away by the love of

money, or the lust of pleasures, by which they are rendered little

short of madmen, which is the case of all weak people? or is it because

the disorders of the mind are less dangerous than those of the body? or

because the body will admit of a cure, while there is no medicine

whatever for the mind?

III. But there are more disorders of the mind than of the body, and

they are of a more dangerous nature; for these very disorders are the

more offensive because they belong to the mind and disturb it; and the

mind, when disordered, is, as Ennius says, in a constant error: it can

neither bear nor endure anything, and is under the perpetual influence

of desires. Now, what disorders can be worse to the body than these two

distempers of the mind (for I overlook others), weakness and desire?

But how, indeed, can it be maintained that the mind cannot prescribe

for itself, when she it is who has invented the medicines for the body,

when, with regard to bodily cures, constitution and nature have a great

share, nor do all who suffer themselves to be cured find that effect

instantly; but those minds which are disposed to be cured, and submit

to the precepts of the wise, may undoubtedly recover a healthy state?

Philosophy is certainly the medicine of the soul, whose assistance we

do not seek from abroad, as in bodily disorders, but we ourselves are

bound to exert our utmost energy and power in order to effect our cure.

But as to philosophy in general, I have, I think, in my Hortensius,

sufficiently spoken of the credit and attention which it deserves:

since that, indeed, I have been continually either disputing or writing

on its most material branches; and I have laid down in these books all

the discussions which took place between myself and my particular

friends at my Tusculan villa. But as I have spoken in the two former of

pain and death, this book shall be devoted to the account of the third

day of our disputations.

We came down into the Academy when the day was already declining

towards afternoon, and I asked one of those who were present to propose

a subject for us to discourse on; and then the business was carried on

in this manner:

IV. _A._ My opinion is, that a wise man is subject to grief.

_M._ What, and to the other perturbations of mind, as fears, lusts,

anger? For these are pretty much like what the Greeks call [Greek:

pathê]. I might call them diseases, and that would be a literal

translation, but it is not agreeable to our way of speaking. For envy,

delight, and pleasure are all called by the Greeks diseases, being

affections of the mind not in subordination to reason; but we, I think,

are right in calling the same motions of a disturbed soul

perturbations, and in very seldom using the term diseases; though,

perhaps, it appears otherwise to you.

_A._ I am of your opinion.

_M._ And do you think a wise man subject to these?

_A._ Entirely, I think.

_M._ Then that boasted wisdom is but of small account, if it differs so

little from madness?

_A._ What? does every commotion of the mind seem to you to be madness?

_M._ Not to me only; but I apprehend, though I have often been

surprised at it, that it appeared so to our ancestors many ages before

Socrates; from whom is derived all that philosophy which relates to

life and morals.

_A._ How so?

_M._ Because the name madness[35] implies a sickness of the mind and

disease; that is to say, an unsoundness and an unhealthiness of mind,

which they call madness. But the philosophers call all perturbations of

the soul diseases, and their opinion is that no fool is ever free from

these; but all that are diseased are unsound; and the minds of all

fools are diseased; therefore all fools are mad. For they held that

soundness of the mind depends on a certain tranquillity and steadiness;

and a mind which was destitute of these qualities they called insane,

because soundness was inconsistent with a perturbed mind just as much

as with a disordered body.

V. Nor were they less ingenious in calling the state of the soul devoid

of the light of the mind, "a being out of one's mind," "a being beside

one's self." From whence we may understand that they who gave these

names to things were of the same opinion with Socrates, that all silly

people were unsound, which the Stoics have carefully preserved as being

derived from him; for whatever mind is distempered (and, as I just now

said, the philosophers call all perturbed motions of the mind

distempers) is no more sound than a body is when in a fit of sickness.

Hence it is that wisdom is the soundness of the mind, folly a sort of

unsoundness, which is insanity, or a being out of one's mind: and these

are much better expressed by the Latin words than the Greek, which you

will find the case also in many other topics. But we will discuss that

point elsewhere: let us now attend to our present subject. The very

meaning of the word describes the whole thing about which we are

inquiring, both as to its substance and character. For we must

necessarily understand by "sound" those whose minds are under no

perturbation from any motion as if it were a disease. They who are

differently affected we must necessarily call "unsound." So that

nothing is better than what is usual in Latin, to say that they who are

run away with by their lust or anger have quitted the command over

themselves; though anger includes lust, for anger is defined to be the

lust of revenge. They, then, who are said not to be masters of

themselves, are said to be so because they are not under the government

of reason, to which is assigned by nature the power over the whole

soul. Why the Greeks should call this mania, I do not easily apprehend;

but we define it much better than they, for we distinguish this madness

(_insania_), which, being allied to folly, is more extensive, from what

we call _furor_, or raving. The Greeks, indeed, would do so too, but

they have no one word that will express it: what we call _furor_, they

call [Greek: melancholia], as if the reason were affected only by a

black bile, and not disturbed as often by a violent rage, or fear, or

grief. Thus we say Athamas, Alcmæon, Ajax, and Orestes were raving

(_furere_); because a person affected in this manner was not allowed by

the Twelve Tables to have the management of his own affairs; therefore

the words are not, if he is mad (_insanus_), but if he begins to be

raving (_furiosus_). For they looked upon madness to be an unsettled

humor that proceeded from not being of sound mind; yet such a person

might perform his ordinary duties, and discharge the usual and

customary requirements of life: but they considered one that was raving

as afflicted with a total blindness of the mind, which, notwithstanding

it is allowed to be greater than madness, is nevertheless of such a

nature that a wise man may be subject to raving (_furor_), but cannot

possibly be afflicted by insanity (_insania_). But this is another

question: let us now return to our original subject.

VI. I think you said that it was your opinion that a wise man was

liable to grief.

_A._ And so, indeed, I think.

_M._ It is natural enough to think so, for we are not the offspring of

flints; but we have by nature something soft and tender in our souls,

which may be put into a violent motion by grief, as by a storm; nor did

that Crantor, who was one of the most distinguished men that our

Academy has ever produced, say this amiss: "I am by no means of their

opinion who talk so much in praise of I know not what insensibility,

which neither can exist, nor ought to exist. "I would choose," says he,

"never to be ill; but should I be so, still I should choose to retain

my sensation, whether there was to be an amputation or any other

separation of anything from my body. For that insensibility cannot be

but at the expense of some unnatural ferocity of mind, or stupor of

body." But let us consider whether to talk in this manner be not

allowing that we are weak, and yielding to our softness.

Notwithstanding, let us be hardy enough, not only to lop off every arm

of our miseries, but even to pluck up every fibre of their roots. Yet

still something, perhaps, may be left behind, so deep does folly strike

its roots: but whatever may be left it will be no more than is

necessary. But let us be persuaded of this, that unless the mind be in

a sound state, which philosophy alone can effect, there can be no end

of our miseries. Wherefore, as we began, let us submit ourselves to it

for a cure; we shall be cured if we choose to be. I shall advance

something further. I shall not treat of grief alone, though that indeed

is the principal thing; but, as I originally proposed, of every

perturbation of the mind, as I termed it; disorder, as the Greeks call

it: and first, with your leave, I shall treat it in the manner of the

Stoics, whose method is to reduce their arguments into a very small

space; afterward I shall enlarge more in my own way.

VII. A man of courage is also full of faith. I do not use the word

confident, because, owing to an erroneous custom of speaking, that word

has come to be used in a bad sense, though it is derived from

confiding, which is commendable. But he who is full of faith is

certainly under no fear; for there is an inconsistency between faith

and fear. Now, whoever is subject to grief is subject to fear; for

whatever things we grieve at when present we dread when hanging over us

and approaching. Thus it comes about that grief is inconsistent with

courage: it is very probable, therefore, that whoever is subject to

grief is also liable to fear, and to a broken kind of spirits and

sinking. Now, whenever these befall a man, he is in a servile state,

and must own that he is overpowered; for whoever admits these feelings,

must admit timidity and cowardice. But these cannot enter into the mind

of a man of courage; neither, therefore, can grief: but the man of

courage is the only wise man; therefore grief cannot befall the wise

man. It is, besides, necessary that whoever is brave should be a man of

great soul; that whoever is a man of a great soul should be invincible;

whoever is invincible looks down with contempt on all things here, and

considers them, beneath him. But no one can despise those things on

account of which he may be affected with grief; from whence it follows

that a wise man is never affected with grief: for all wise men are

brave; therefore a wise man is not subject to grief. And as the eye,

when disordered, is not in a good condition for performing its office

properly; and as the other parts, and the whole body itself, when

unsettled, cannot perform their office and business; so the mind, when

disordered, is but ill-fitted to perform its duty. The office of the

mind is to use its reason well; but the mind of a wise man is always in

condition to make the best use of his reason, and therefore is never

out of order. But grief is a disorder of the mind; therefore a wise man

will be always free from it.

VIII. And from these considerations we may get at a very probable

definition of the temperate man, whom the Greeks call [Greek: sôphrôn]:

and they call that virtue [Greek: sôphrosynên], which I at one time

call temperance, at another time moderation, and sometimes even

modesty; but I do not know whether that virtue may not be properly

called frugality, which has a more confined meaning with the Greeks;

for they call frugal men [Greek: chrêsimous], which implies only that

they are useful; but our name has a more extensive meaning: for all

abstinence, all innocency (which the Greeks have no ordinary name for,

though they might use the word [Greek: ablabeia], for innocency is that

disposition of mind which would offend no one) and several other

virtues are comprehended under frugality; but if this quality were of

less importance, and confined in as small a compass as some imagine,

the surname of Piso[36] would not have been in so great esteem. But as

we allow him not the name of a frugal man (_frugi_), who either quits

his post through fear, which is cowardice; or who reserves to his own

use what was privately committed to his keeping, which is injustice; or

who fails in his military undertakings through rashness, which is

folly--for that reason the word frugality takes in these three virtues

of fortitude, justice, and prudence, though it is indeed common to all

virtues, for they are all connected and knit together. Let us allow,

then, frugality itself to be another and fourth virtue; for its

peculiar property seems to be, to govern and appease all tendencies to

too eager a desire after anything, to restrain lust, and to preserve a

decent steadiness in everything. The vice in contrast to this is called

prodigality (_nequitia_). Frugality, I imagine, is derived from the

word _fruge_, the best thing which the earth produces; _nequitia_ is

derived (though this is perhaps rather more strained; still, let us try

it; we shall only be thought to have been trifling if there is nothing

in what we say) from the fact of everything being to no purpose

(_nequicquam_) in such a man; from which circumstance he is called also

_Nihil_, nothing. Whoever is frugal, then, or, if it is more agreeable

to you, whoever is moderate and temperate, such a one must of course be

consistent; whoever is consistent, must be quiet; the quiet man must be

free from all perturbation, therefore from grief likewise: and these

are the properties of a wise man; therefore a wise man must be free

from grief.

IX. So that Dionysius of Heraclea is right when, upon this complaint of

Achilles in Homer,

Well hast thou spoke, but at the tyrant's name

My rage rekindles, and my soul's in flame:

'Tis just resentment, and becomes the brave,

Disgraced, dishonor'd like the vilest slave[37]--

he reasons thus: Is the hand as it should be, when it is affected with

a swelling? or is it possible for any other member of the body, when

swollen or enlarged, to be in any other than a disordered state? Must

not the mind, then, when it is puffed up, or distended, be out of

order? But the mind of a wise man is always free from every kind of

disorder: it never swells, never is puffed up; but the mind when in

anger is in a different state. A wise man, therefore, is never angry;

for when he is angry, he lusts after something; for whoever is angry

naturally has a longing desire to give all the pain he can to the

person who he thinks has injured him; and whoever has this earnest

desire must necessarily be much pleased with the accomplishment of his

wishes; hence he is delighted with his neighbor's misery; and as a wise

man is not capable of such feelings as these, he is therefore not

capable of anger. But should a wise man be subject to grief, he may

likewise be subject to anger; for as he is free from anger, he must

likewise be free from grief. Again, could a wise man be subject to

grief, he might also be liable to pity, or even might be open to a

disposition towards envy (_invidentia_); I do not say to envy

(_invidia_), for that can only exist by the very act of envying: but we

may fairly form the word _invidentia_ from _invidendo_, and so avoid

the doubtful name _invidia;_ for this word is probably derived from

_in_ and _video_, looking too closely into another's fortune; as it is

said in the Melanippus,

Who envies me the flower of my children?

where the Latin is _invidit florem._ It may appear not good Latin, but

it is very well put by Accius; for as _video_ governs an accusative

case, so it is more correct to say _invideo florem_ than _flori._ We

are debarred from saying so by common usage. The poet stood in his own

right, and expressed himself with more freedom.

X. Therefore compassion and envy are consistent in the same man; for

whoever is uneasy at any one's adversity is also uneasy at another's

prosperity: as Theophrastus, while he laments the death of his

companion Callisthenes, is at the same time disturbed at the success of

Alexander; and therefore he says that Callisthenes met with man of the

greatest power and good fortune, but one who did not know how to make

use of his good fortune. And as pity is an uneasiness which arises from

the misfortunes of another, so envy is an uneasiness that proceeds from

the good success of another: therefore whoever is capable of pity is

capable of envy. But a wise man is incapable of envy, and consequently

incapable of pity. But were a wise man used to grieve, to pity also

would be familiar to him; therefore to grieve is a feeling which cannot

affect a wise man. Now, though these reasonings of the Stoics, and

their conclusions, are rather strained and distorted, and ought to be

expressed in a less stringent and narrow manner, yet great stress is to

be laid on the opinions of those men who have a peculiarly bold and

manly turn of thought and sentiment. For our friends the Peripatetics,

notwithstanding all their erudition, gravity, and fluency of language,

do not satisfy me about the moderation of these disorders and diseases

of the soul which they insist upon; for every evil, though moderate, is

in its nature great. But our object is to make out that the wise man is

free from all evil; for as the body is unsound if it is ever so

slightly affected, so the mind under any moderate disorder loses its

soundness; therefore the Romans have, with their usual accuracy of

expression, called trouble, and anguish, and vexation, on account of

the analogy between a troubled mind and a diseased body, disorders. The

Greeks call all perturbation of mind by pretty nearly the same name;

for they name every turbid motion of the soul [Greek: pathos], that is

to say, a distemper. But we have given them a more proper name; for a

disorder of the mind is very like a disease of the body. But lust does

not resemble sickness; neither does immoderate joy, which is an elated

and exulting pleasure of the mind. Fear, too, is not very like a

distemper, though it is akin to grief of mind, but properly, as is also

the case with sickness of the body, so too sickness of mind has no name

separated from pain. And therefore I must explain the origin of this

pain, that is to say, the cause that occasions this grief in the mind,

as if it were a sickness of the body. For as physicians think they have

found out the cure when they have discovered the cause of the

distemper, so we shall discover the method of curing melancholy when

the cause of it is found out.

XI. The whole cause, then, is in opinion; and this observation applies

not to this grief alone, but to every other disorder of the mind, which

are of four sorts, but consisting of many parts. For as every disorder

or perturbation is a motion of the mind, either devoid of reason, or in

despite of reason, or in disobedience to reason, and as that motion is

excited by an opinion of either good or evil; these four perturbations

are divided equally into two parts: for two of them proceed from an

opinion of good, one of which is an exulting pleasure, that is to say,

a joy elated beyond measure, arising from an opinion of some present

great good; the other is a desire which may fairly be called even a

lust, and is an immoderate inclination after some conceived great good

without any obedience to reason. Therefore these two kinds, the

exulting pleasure and the lust, have their rise from an opinion of

good, as the other two, fear and grief, have from an opinion of evil.

For fear is an opinion of some great evil impending over us, and grief

is an opinion of some great evil present; and, indeed, it is a freshly

conceived opinion of an evil so great that to grieve at it seems right:

it is of that kind that he who is uneasy at it thinks he has good

reason to be so. Now we should exert, our utmost efforts to oppose

these perturbations--which are, as it were, so many furies let loose

upon us and urged on by folly--if we are desirous to pass this share of

life that is allotted to us with ease and satisfaction. But of the

other feelings I shall speak elsewhere: our business at present is to

drive away grief if we can, for that shall be the object of our present

discussion, since you have said that it was your opinion that a wise

man might be subject to grief, which I can by no means allow of; for it

is a frightful, miserable, and detestable thing, which we should fly

from with our utmost efforts--with all our sails and oars, as I may

say.

XII. That descendant of Tantalus, how does he appear to you--he who

sprung from Pelops, who formerly stole Hippodamia from her

father-in-law, King Oenomaus, and married her by force?--he who was

descended from Jupiter himself, how broken-hearted and dispirited does

he not seem!

Stand off, my friends, nor come within my shade,

That no pollutions your sound hearts pervade,

So foul a stain my body doth partake.

Will you condemn yourself, Thyestes, and deprive yourself of life, on

account of the greatness of another's crime? What do you think of that

son of Phoebus? Do you not look upon him as unworthy of his own

father's light?

Hollow his eyes, his body worn away,

His furrow'd cheeks his frequent tears betray;

His beard neglected, and his hoary hairs

Rough and uncomb'd, bespeak his bitter cares.

O foolish Æetes! these are evils which you yourself have been the cause

of, and are not occasioned by any accidents with which chance has

visited you; and you behaved as you did, even after you had been inured

to your distress, and after the first swelling of the mind had

subsided!--whereas grief consists (as I shall show) in the notion of

some recent evil--but your grief, it is very plain, proceeded from the

loss of your kingdom, not of your daughter, for you hated her, and

perhaps with reason, but you could not calmly bear to part with your

kingdom. But surely it is an impudent grief which preys upon a man for

not being able to command those that are free. Dionysius, it is true,

the tyrant of Syracuse, when driven from his country, taught a school

at Corinth; so incapable was he of living without some authority. But

what could be more impudent than Tarquin, who made war upon those who

could not bear his tyranny; and, when he could not recover his kingdom

by the aid of the forces of the Veientians and the Latins, is said to

have betaken himself to Cuma, and to have died in that city of old age

and grief!

XIII. Do you, then, think that it can befall a wise man to be oppressed

with grief, that is to say, with misery? for, as all perturbation is

misery, grief is the rack itself. Lust is attended with heat, exulting

joy with levity, fear with meanness, but grief with something greater

than these; it consumes, torments, afflicts, and disgraces a man; it

tears him, preys upon his mind, and utterly destroys him: if we do not

so divest ourselves of it as to throw it completely off, we cannot be

free from misery. And it is clear that there must be grief where

anything has the appearance of a present sore and oppressing evil.

Epicurus is of opinion that grief arises naturally from the imagination

of any evil; so that whosoever is eye-witness of any great misfortune,

if he conceives that the like may possibly befall himself, becomes sad

instantly from such an idea. The Cyrenaics think that grief is not

engendered by every kind of evil, but only by unexpected, unforeseen

evil; and that circumstance is, indeed, of no small effect on the

heightening of grief; for whatsoever comes of a sudden appears more

formidable. Hence these lines are deservedly commended:

I knew my son, when first he drew his breath,

Destined by fate to an untimely death;

And when I sent him to defend the Greeks,

War was his business, not your sportive freaks.

XIV. Therefore, this ruminating beforehand upon future evils which you

see at a distance makes their approach more tolerable; and on this

account what Euripides makes Theseus say is much commended. You will

give me leave to translate them, as is usual with me:

I treasured up what some learn'd sage did tell,

And on my future misery did dwell;

I thought of bitter death, of being drove

Far from my home by exile, and I strove

With every evil to possess my mind,

That, when they came, I the less care might find.[38]

But Euripides says that of himself, which Theseus said he had heard

from some learned man, for the poet had been a pupil of Anaxagoras,

who, as they relate, on hearing of the death of his son, said, "I knew

that my son was mortal;" which speech seems to intimate that such

things afflict those men who have not thought on them before.

Therefore, there is no doubt but that all those things which are

considered evils are the heavier from not being foreseen. Though,

notwithstanding this is not the only circumstance which occasions the

greatest grief, still, as the mind, by foreseeing and preparing for it,

has great power to make all grief the less, a man should at all times

consider all the events that may befall him in this life; and certainly

the excellence and divine nature of wisdom consists in taking a near

view of, and gaining a thorough acquaintance with, all human affairs,

in not being surprised when anything happens, and in thinking, before

the event, that there is nothing but what may come to pass.

Wherefore ev'ry man,

When his affairs go on most swimmingly,

E'en then it most behooves to arm himself

Against the coming storm: loss, danger, exile,

Returning ever, let him look to meet;

His son in fault, wife dead, or daughter sick;

All common accidents, and may have happen'd

That nothing shall seem new or strange. But if

Aught has fall'n out beyond his hopes, all that

Let him account clear gain.[39]

XV. Therefore, as Terence has so well expressed what he borrowed from

philosophy, shall not we, from whose fountains he drew it, say the same

thing in a better manner, and abide by it with more steadiness? Hence

came that steady countenance, which, according to Xantippe, her husband

Socrates always had; so that she said that she never observed any

difference in his looks when he went out and when he came home. Yet the

look of that old Roman, M. Crassus, who, as Lucilius says, never smiled

but once in his lifetime, was not of this kind, but placid and serene,

for so we are told. He, indeed, might well have had the same look at

all times who never changed his mind, from which the countenance

derives its expression. So that I am ready to borrow of the Cyrenaics

those arms against the accidents and events of life by means of which,

by long premeditation, they break the force of all approaching evils;

and at the same time I think that those very evils themselves arise

more from opinion than nature, for if they were real, no forecast could

make them lighter. But I shall speak more particularly on these matters

after I have first considered Epicurus's opinion, who thinks that all

people must necessarily be uneasy who believe themselves to be in any

evils, let them be either foreseen and expected, or habitual to them;

for with him evils are not the less by reason of their continuance, nor

the lighter for having been foreseen; and it is folly to ruminate on

evils to come, or such as, perhaps, never may come: every evil is

disagreeable enough when it does come; but he who is constantly

considering that some evil may befall him is loading himself with a

perpetual evil; and even should such evil never light on him, he

voluntarily takes upon himself unnecessary misery, so that he is under

constant uneasiness, whether he actually suffers any evil, or only

thinks of it. But he makes the alleviation of grief depend on two

things--a ceasing to think on evil, and a turning to the contemplation

of pleasure. For he thinks that the mind may possibly be under the

power of reason, and follow her directions: he forbids us, therefore,

to mind trouble, and calls us off from sorrowful reflections; he throws

a mist over our eyes to hinder us from the contemplation of misery.

Having sounded a retreat from this statement, he drives our thoughts on

again, and encourages them to view and engage the whole mind in the

various pleasures with which he thinks the life of a wise man abounds,

either from reflecting on the past, or from the hope of what is to

come. I have said these things in my own way; the Epicureans have

theirs. However, let us examine what they say; how they say it is of

little consequence.

XVI. In the first place, they are wrong in forbidding men to

premeditate on futurity and blaming their wish to do so; for there is

nothing that breaks the edge of grief and lightens it more than

considering, during one's whole life, that there is nothing which it is

impossible should happen, or than, considering what human nature is, on

what conditions life was given, and how we may comply with them. The

effect of which is that we are always grieving, but that we never do

so; for whoever reflects on the nature of things, the various turns of

life, and the weakness of human nature, grieves, indeed, at that

reflection; but while so grieving he is, above all other times,

behaving as a wise man, for he gains these two things by it: one, that

while he is considering the state of human nature he is performing the

especial duties of philosophy, and is provided with a triple medicine

against adversity--in the first place, because he has long reflected

that such things might befall him, and this reflection by itself

contributes much towards lessening and weakening all misfortunes; and,

secondly, because he is persuaded that we should bear all the accidents

which can happen to man with the feelings and spirit of a man; and,

lastly, because he considers that what is blamable is the only evil.

But it is not your fault that something has happened to you which it

was impossible for man to avoid. For that withdrawing of our thoughts

which he recommends when he calls us off from contemplating our

misfortunes is an imaginary action; for it is not in our power to

dissemble or to forget those evils which lie heavy on us; they tear,

vex, and sting us--they burn us up, and leave no breathing time. And do

you order us to forget them (for such forgetfulness is contrary to

nature), and at the same time deprive us of the only assistance which

nature affords, the being accustomed to them? For that, though it is

but a slow medicine (I mean that which is brought by lapse of time), is

still a very effectual one. You order me to employ my thoughts on

something good, and forget my misfortunes. You would say something

worthy a great philosopher if you thought those things good which are

best suited to the dignity of human nature.

XVII. Should Pythagoras, Socrates, or Plato say to me, Why are you

dejected or sad? Why do you faint, and yield to fortune, which,

perhaps, may have power to harass and disturb you, but should not quite

unman you? There is great power in the virtues; rouse them, if they

chance to droop. Take fortitude for your guide, which will give you

such spirits that you will despise everything that can befall man, and

look on it as a trifle. Add to this temperance, which is moderation,

and which was just now called frugality, which will not suffer you to

do anything base or bad--for what is worse or baser than an effeminate

man? Not even justice will suffer you to act in this manner, though she

seems to have the least weight in this affair; but still,

notwithstanding, even she will inform you that you are doubly unjust

when you both require what does not belong to you, inasmuch as though

you who have been born mortal demand to be placed in the condition of

the immortals, and at the same time you take it much to heart that you

are to restore what was lent you. What answer will you make to

prudence, who informs you that she is a virtue sufficient of herself

both to teach you a good life and also to secure you a happy one? And,

indeed, if she were fettered by external circumstances, and dependent

on others, and if she did not originate in herself and return to

herself, and also embrace everything in herself, so as to seek no

adventitious aid from any quarter, I cannot imagine why she should

appear deserving of such lofty panegyrics, or of being sought after

with such excessive eagerness. Now, Epicurus, if you call me back to

such goods as these, I will obey you, and follow you, and use you as my

guide, and even forget, as you order me, all my misfortunes; and I will

do this the more readily from a persuasion that they are not to be

ranked among evils at all. But you are for bringing my thoughts over to

pleasure. What pleasures? Pleasures of the body, I imagine, or such as

are recollected or imagined on account of the body. Is this all? Do I

explain your opinion rightly? for your disciples are used to deny that

we understand at all what Epicurus means. This is what he says, and

what that subtle fellow, old Zeno, who is one of the sharpest of them,

used, when I was attending lectures at Athens, to enforce and talk so

loudly of; saying that he alone was happy who could enjoy present

pleasure, and who was at the same time persuaded that he should enjoy

it without pain, either during the whole or the greatest part of his

life; or if, should any pain interfere, if it was very sharp, then it

must be short; should it be of longer continuance, it would have more

of what was sweet than bitter in it; that whosoever reflected on these

things would be happy, especially if satisfied with the good things

which he had already enjoyed, and if he were without fear of death or

of the Gods.

XVIII. You have here a representation of a happy life according to

Epicurus, in the words of Zeno, so that there is no room for

contradiction in any point. What, then? Can the proposing and thinking

of such a life make Thyestes's grief the less, or Æetes's, of whom I

spoke above, or Telamon's, who was driven from his country to penury

and banishment? in wonder at whom men exclaimed thus:

Is this the man surpassing glory raised?

Is this that Telamon so highly praised

By wondering Greece, at whose sight, like the sun,

All others with diminish'd lustre shone?

Now, should any one, as the same author says, find his spirits sink

with the loss of his fortune, he must apply to those grave philosophers

of antiquity for relief, and not to these voluptuaries: for what great

abundance of good do they promise? Suppose that we allow that to be

without pain is the chief good? Yet that is not called pleasure. But it

is not necessary at present to go through the whole: the question is,

to what point are we to advance in order to abate our grief? Grant that

to be in pain is the greatest evil: whosoever, then, has proceeded so

far as not to be in pain, is he, therefore, in immediate possession of

the greatest good? Why, Epicurus, do we use any evasions, and not allow

in our own words the same feeling to be pleasure which you are used to

boast of with such assurance? Are these your words or not? This is what

you say in that book which contains all the doctrine of your school;

for I will perform on this occasion the office of a translator, lest

any one should imagine that I am inventing anything. Thus you speak:

"Nor can I form any notion of the chief good, abstracted from those

pleasures which are perceived by taste, or from what depends on hearing

music, or abstracted from ideas raised by external objects visible to

the eye, or by agreeable motions, or from those other pleasures which

are perceived by the whole man by means of any of his senses; nor can

it possibly be said that the pleasures of the mind are excited only by

what is good, for I have perceived men's minds to be pleased with the

hopes of enjoying those things which I mentioned above, and with the

idea that it should enjoy them without any interruption from pain." And

these are his exact words, so that any one may understand what were the

pleasures with which Epicurus was acquainted. Then he speaks thus, a

little lower down: "I have often inquired of those who have been called

wise men what would be the remaining good if they should exclude from

consideration all these pleasures, unless they meant to give us nothing

but words. I could never learn anything from them; and unless they

choose that all virtue and wisdom should vanish and come to nothing,

they must say with me that the only road to happiness lies through

those pleasures which I mentioned above." What follows is much the

same, and his whole book on the chief good everywhere abounds with the

same opinions. Will you, then, invite Telamon to this kind of life to

ease his grief? And should you observe any one of your friends under

affliction, would you rather prescribe him a sturgeon than a treatise

of Socrates? or advise him to listen to the music of a water organ

rather than to Plato? or lay before him the beauty and variety of some

garden, put a nosegay to his nose, burn perfumes before him, and bid

him crown himself with a garland of roses and woodbines? Should you add

one thing more, you would certainly wipe out all his grief.

XIX. Epicurus must admit these arguments, or he must take out of his

book what I just now said was a literal translation; or, rather, he

must destroy his whole book, for it is crammed full of pleasures. We

must inquire, then, how we can ease him of his grief who speaks in this

manner:

My present state proceeds from fortune's stings;

By birth I boast of a descent from kings;

Hence may you see from what a noble height

I'm sunk by fortune to this abject plight.

What! to ease his grief, must we mix him a cup of sweet wine, or

something of that kind? Lo! the same poet presents us with another

sentiment somewhere else:

I, Hector, once so great, now claim your aid.

We should assist her, for she looks out for help:

Where shall I now apply, where seek support?

Where hence betake me, or to whom resort?"

No means remain of comfort or of joy,

In flames my palace, and in ruins Troy;

Each wall, so late superb, deformed nods,

And not an altar's left t' appease the Gods.

You know what should follow, and particularly this:

Of father, country, and of friends bereft,

Not one of all these sumptuous temples left;

Which, while the fortune of our house did stand,

With rich wrought ceilings spoke the artist's hand.

O excellent poet! though despised by those who sing the verses of

Euphorion. He is sensible that all things which come on a sudden are

harder to be borne. Therefore, when he had set off the riches of Priam

to the best advantage, which had the appearance of a long continuance,

what does he add?

Lo! these all perish'd in one blazing pile;

The foe old Priam of his life beguiled,

And with his blood, thy altar, Jove, defiled.

Admirable poetry! There is something mournful in the subject, as well

as in the words and measure. We must drive away this grief of hers: how

is that to be done? Shall we lay her on a bed of down; introduce a

singer; shall we burn cedar, or present here with some pleasant liquor,

and provide her something to eat? Are these the good things which

remove the most afflicting grief? For you but just now said you knew of

no other good. I should agree with Epicurus that we ought to be called

off from grief to contemplate good things, if we could only agree upon

what was good.

XX. It may be said, What! do you imagine Epicurus really meant this,

and that he maintained anything so sensual? Indeed I do not imagine so,

for I am sensible that he has uttered many excellent things and

sentiments, and delivered maxims of great weight. Therefore, as I said

before, I am speaking of his acuteness, not of his morals. Though he

should hold those pleasures in contempt which he just now commended,

yet I must remember wherein he places the chief good. For he was not

contented with barely saying this, but he has explained what he meant:

he says that taste, and embraces, and sports, and music, and those

forms which affect the eyes with pleasure, are the chief good. Have I

invented this? have I misrepresented him? I should be glad to be

confuted; for what am I endeavoring at but to clear up truth in every

question? Well, but the same man says that pleasure is at its height

where pain ceases, and that to be free from all pain is the very

greatest pleasure. Here are three very great mistakes in a very few

words. One is, that he contradicts himself; for, but just now, he could

not imagine anything good unless the senses were in a manner tickled

with some pleasure; but now he says that to be free from pain is the

highest pleasure. Can any one contradict himself more? The next mistake

is, that where there is naturally a threefold division--the first, to

be pleased; next, to be in pain; the last, to be affected neither by

pleasure nor pain--he imagines the first and the last to be the same,

and makes no difference between pleasure and a cessation of pain. The

last mistake he falls into in common with some others, which is this:

that as virtue is the most desirable thing, and as philosophy has been

investigated with a view to the attainment of it, he has separated the

chief good from virtue. But he commends virtue, and that frequently;

and indeed C. Gracchus, when he had made the largest distributions of

the public money, and had exhausted the treasury, nevertheless spoke

much of defending the treasury. What signifies what men say when we see

what they do? That Piso, who was surnamed Frugal, had always harangued

against the law that was proposed for distributing the corn; but when

it had passed, though a man of consular dignity, he came to receive the

corn. Gracchus observed Piso standing in the court, and asked him, in

the hearing of the people, how it was consistent for him to take corn

by a law he had himself opposed. "It was," said he, "against your

distributing my goods to every man as you thought proper; but, as you

do so, I claim my share." Did not this grave and wise man sufficiently

show that the public revenue was dissipated by the Sempronian law? Read

Gracchus's speeches, and you will pronounce him the advocate of the

treasury. Epicurus denies that any one can live pleasantly who does not

lead a life of virtue; he denies that fortune has any power over a wise

man; he prefers a spare diet to great plenty, and maintains that a wise

man is always happy. All these things become a philosopher to say, but

they are not consistent with pleasure. But the reply is, that he doth

not mean _that_ pleasure: let him mean any pleasure, it must be such a

one as makes no part of virtue. But suppose we are mistaken as to his

pleasure; are we so, too, as to his pain? I maintain, therefore, the

impropriety of language which that man uses, when talking of virtue,

who would measure every great evil by pain.

XXI. And indeed the Epicureans, those best of men--for there is no

order of men more innocent--complain that I take great pains to inveigh

against Epicurus. We are rivals, I suppose, for some honor or

distinction. I place the chief good in the mind, he in the body; I in

virtue, he in pleasure; and the Epicureans are up in arms, and implore

the assistance of their neighbors, and many are ready to fly to their

aid. But as for my part, I declare that I am very indifferent about the

matter, and that I consider the whole discussion which they are so

anxious about at an end. For what! is the contention about the Punic

war? on which very subject, though M. Cato and L. Lentulus were of

different opinions, still there was no difference between them. But

these men behave with too much heat, especially as the opinions which

they would uphold are no very spirited ones, and such as they dare not

plead for either in the senate or before the assembly of the people, or

before the army or the censors. But, however, I will argue with them

another time, and with such a disposition that no quarrel shall arise

between us; for I shall be ready to yield to their opinions when

founded on truth. Only I must give them this advice: That were it ever

so true, that a wise man regards nothing but the body, or, to express

myself with more decency, never does anything except what is expedient,

and views all things with exclusive reference to his own advantage, as

such things are not very commendable, they should confine them to their

own breasts, and leave off talking with that parade of them.

XXII. What remains is the opinion of the Cyrenaics, who think that men

grieve when anything happens unexpectedly. And that is indeed, as I

said before, a great aggravation of a misfortune; and I know that it

appeared so to Chrysippus--"Whatever falls out unexpected is so much

the heavier." But the whole question does not turn on this; though the

sudden approach of an enemy sometimes occasions more confusion than it

would if you had expected him, and a sudden storm at sea throws the

sailors into a greater fright than one which they have foreseen; and it

is the same in many other cases. But when you carefully consider the

nature of what was expected, you will find nothing more than that all

things which come on a sudden appear greater; and this upon two

accounts: first of all, because you have not time to consider how great

the accident is; and, secondly, because you are probably persuaded that

you could have guarded against it had you foreseen if, and therefore

the misfortune, having been seemingly encountered by your own fault,

makes your grief the greater. That it is so, time evinces; which, as it

advances, brings with it so much mitigation that though the same

misfortunes continue, the grief not only becomes the less, but in some

cases is entirely removed. Many Carthaginians were slaves at Rome, and

many Macedonians, when Perseus their king was taken prisoner. I saw,

too, when I was a young man, some Corinthians in the Peloponnesus. They

might all have lamented with Andromache,

All these I saw......;

but they had perhaps given over lamenting themselves, for by their

countenances, and speech, and other gestures you might have taken them

for Argives or Sicyonians. And I myself was more concerned at the

ruined walls of Corinth than the Corinthians themselves were, whose

minds by frequent reflection and time had become callous to such

sights. I have read a book of Clitomachus, which he sent to his

fellow-citizens who were prisoners, to comfort them after the

destruction of Carthage. There is in it a treatise written by

Carneades, which, as Clitomachus says, he had inserted into his book;

the subject was, "That it appeared probable that a wise man would

grieve at the state of subjection of his country," and all the

arguments which Carneades used against this proposition are set down in

the book. There the philosopher applies such a strong medicine to a

fresh grief as would be quite unnecessary in one of any continuance;

nor, if this very book had been sent to the captives some years after,

would it have found any wounds to cure, but only scars; for grief, by a

gentle progress and slow degrees, wears away imperceptibly. Not that

the circumstances which gave rise to it are altered, or can be, but

that custom teaches what reason should--that those things which before

seemed to be of some consequence are of no such great importance, after

all.

XXIII. It may be said, What occasion is there to apply to reason, or to

any sort of consolation such as we generally make use of, to mitigate

the grief of the afflicted? For we have this argument always at hand,

that nothing ought to appear unexpected. But how will any one be

enabled to bear his misfortunes the better by knowing that it is

unavoidable that such things should happen to man? Saying this

subtracts nothing from the sum of the grief: it only asserts that

nothing has fallen out but what might have been anticipated; and yet

this manner of speaking has some little consolation in it, though I

apprehend not a great deal. Therefore those unlooked-for things have

not so much force as to give rise to all our grief; the blow perhaps

may fall the heavier, but whatever happens does not appear the greater

on that account. No, it is the fact of its having happened lately, and

not of its having befallen us unexpectedly, that makes it seem the

greater. There are two ways, then, of discerning the truth, not only of

things that seem evil, but of those that have the appearance of good.

For we either inquire into the nature of the thing, of what

description, and magnitude, and importance it is--as sometimes with

regard to poverty, the burden of which we may lighten when by our

disputations we show how few things nature requires, and of what a

trifling kind they are--or, without any subtle arguing, we refer them

to examples, as here we instance a Socrates, there a Diogenes, and then

again that line in Cæcilius,

Wisdom is oft conceal'd in mean attire.

For as poverty is of equal weight with all, what reason can be given

why what was borne by Fabricius should be spoken of by any one else as

unsupportable when it falls upon themselves? Of a piece with this is

that other way of comforting, which consists in pointing out that

nothing has happened but what is common to human nature; for this

argument doth not only inform us what human nature is, but implies that

all things are tolerable which others have borne and are bearing.

XXIV. Is poverty the subject? They tell you of many who have submitted

to it with patience. Is it the contempt of honors? They acquaint you

with some who never enjoyed any, and were the happier for it; and of

those who have preferred a private retired life to public employment,

mentioning their names with respect; they tell you of the verse[40] of

that most powerful king who praises an old man, and pronounces him

happy because he was unknown to fame and seemed likely to arrive at the

hour of death in obscurity and without notice. Thus, too, they have

examples for those who are deprived of their children: they who are

under any great grief are comforted by instances of like affliction;

and thus the endurance of every misfortune is rendered more easy by the

fact of others having undergone the same, and the fate of others causes

what has happened to appear less important than it has been previously

thought, and reflection thus discovers to us how much opinion had

imposed on us. And this is what the Telamon declares, "I, when my son

was born," etc.; and thus Theseus, "I on my future misery did dwell;"

and Anaxagoras, "I knew my son was mortal." All these men, by

frequently reflecting on human affairs, had discovered that they were

by no means to be estimated by the opinion of the multitude; and,

indeed, it seems to me to be pretty much the same case with those who

consider beforehand as with those who derive their remedies from time,

excepting that a kind of reason cures the one, and the other remedy is

provided by nature; by which we discover (and this contains the whole

marrow of the matter) that what was imagined to be the greatest evil is

by no means so great as to defeat the happiness of life. And the effect

of this is, that the blow is greater by reason of its not having been

foreseen, and not, as they suppose, that when similar misfortunes

befall two different people, that man only is affected with grief whom

this calamity has befallen unexpectedly. So that some persons, under

the oppression of grief, are said to have borne it actually worse for

hearing of this common condition of man, that we are born under such

conditions as render it impossible for a man to be exempt from all

evil.

XXV. For this reason Carneades, as I see our friend Antiochus writes,

used to blame Chrysippus for commending these verses of Euripides:

Man, doom'd to care, to pain, disease, and strife,

Walks his short journey thro' the vale of life:

Watchful attends the cradle and the grave,

And passing generations longs to save:

Last, dies himself: yet wherefore should we mourn?

For man must to his kindred dust return;

Submit to the destroying hand of fate,

As ripen'd ears the harvest-sickle wait.[41]

He would not allow a speech of this kind to avail at all to the cure of

our grief, for he said it was a lamentable case itself that we were

fallen into the hands of such a cruel fate; and that a speech like

that, preaching up comfort from the misfortunes of another, was a

comfort adapted only to those of a malevolent disposition. But to me it

appears far otherwise; for the necessity of bearing what is the common

condition of humanity forbids your resisting the will of the Gods, and

reminds you that you are a man, which reflection greatly alleviates

grief; and the enumeration of these examples is not produced with a

view to please those of a malevolent disposition, but in order that any

one in affliction may be induced to bear what he observes many others

have previously borne with tranquillity and moderation. For they who

are falling to pieces, and cannot hold together through the greatness

of their grief, should be supported by all kinds of assistance. From

whence Chrysippus thinks that grief is called [Greek: lypê], as it were

[Greek: lysis], that is to say, a dissolution of the whole man--the

whole of which I think may be pulled up by the roots by explaining, as

I said at the beginning, the cause of grief; for it is nothing else but

an opinion and judgment formed of a present acute evil. And thus any

bodily pain, let it be ever so grievous, may be endurable where any

hopes are proposed of some considerable good; and we receive such

consolation from a virtuous and illustrious life that they who lead

such lives are seldom attacked by grief, or but slightly affected by

it.

XXVI. But as besides this opinion of great evil there is this other

added also--that we ought to lament what has happened, that it is right

so to do, and part of our duty, then is brought about that terrible

disorder of mind, grief. And it is to this opinion that we owe all

those various and horrid kinds of lamentation, that neglect of our

persons, that womanish tearing of our cheeks, that striking on our

thighs, breasts, and heads. Thus Agamemnon, in Homer and in Accius,

Tears in his grief his uncomb'd locks;[42]

from whence comes that pleasant saying of Bion, that the foolish king

in his sorrow tore away the hairs of his head, imagining that his grief

would be alleviated by baldness. But men do all these things from being

persuaded that they ought to do so. And thus Æschines inveighs against

Demosthenes for sacrificing within seven days after the death of his

daughter. But with what eloquence, with what fluency, does he attack

him! what sentiments does he collect! what words does he hurl against

him! You may see by this that an orator may do anything; but nobody

would approve of such license if it were not that we have an idea

innate in our minds that every good man ought to lament the loss of a

relation as bitterly as possible. And it is owing to this that some

men, when in sorrow, betake themselves to deserts, as Homer says of

Bellerophon:

Distracted in his mind,

Forsook by heaven, forsaking human kind,

Wide o'er the Aleïan field he chose to stray,

A long, forlorn, uncomfortable way![43]

And thus Niobe is feigned to have been turned into stone, from her

never speaking, I suppose, in her grief. But they imagine Hecuba to

have been converted into a bitch, from her rage and bitterness of mind.

There are others who love to converse with solitude itself when in

grief, as the nurse in Ennius,

Fain would I to the heavens find earth relate

Medea's ceaseless woes and cruel fate.[44]

XXVII. Now all these things are done in grief, from a persuasion of

their truth and propriety and necessity; and it is plain that those who

behave thus do so from a conviction of its being their duty; for should

these mourners by chance drop their grief, and either act or speak for

a moment in a more calm or cheerful manner, they presently check

themselves and return to their lamentations again, and blame themselves

for having been guilty of any intermissions from their grief; and

parents and masters generally correct children not by words only, but

by blows, if they show any levity by either word or deed when the

family is under affliction, and, as it were, oblige them to be

sorrowful. What! does it not appear, when you have ceased to mourn, and

have discovered that your grief has been ineffectual, that the whole of

that mourning was voluntary on your part? What does that man say in

Terence who punishes himself, the Self-tormentor?

I think I do my son less harm, O Chremes,

As long as I myself am miserable.

He determines to be miserable: and can any one determine on anything

against his will?

I well might think that I deserved all evil.

He would think he deserved any misfortune were he otherwise than

miserable! Therefore, you see, the evil is in opinion, not in nature.

How is it when some things do of themselves prevent your grieving at

them? as in Homer, so many died and were buried daily that they had not

leisure to grieve: where you find these lines--

The great, the bold, by thousands daily fall,

And endless were the grief to weep for all.

Eternal sorrows what avails to shed?

Greece honors not with solemn fasts the dead:

Enough when death demands the brave to pay

The tribute of a melancholy day.

One chief with patience to the grave resign'd,

Our care devolves on others left behind.[45]

Therefore it is in our own power to lay aside grief upon occasion; and

is there any opportunity (seeing the thing is in our own power) that we

should let slip of getting rid of care and grief? It was plain that the

friends of Cnæus Pompeius, when they saw him fainting under his wounds,

at the very moment of that most miserable and bitter sight were under

great uneasiness how they themselves, surrounded by the enemy as they

were, should escape, and were employed in nothing but encouraging the

rowers and aiding their escape; but when they reached Tyre, they began

to grieve and lament over him. Therefore, as fear with them, prevailed

over grief, cannot reason and true philosophy have the same effect with

a wise man?

XXVIII. But what is there more effectual to dispel grief than the

discovery that it answers no purpose, and has been undergone to no

account? Therefore, if we can get rid of it, we need never have been

subject to it. It must be acknowledged, then, that men take up grief

wilfully and knowingly; and this appears from the patience of those

who, after they have been exercised in afflictions and are better able

to bear whatever befalls them, suppose themselves hardened against

fortune; as that person in Euripides,

Had this the first essay of fortune been,

And I no storms thro' all my life had seen,

Wild as a colt I'd broke from reason's sway;

But frequent griefs have taught me to obey.[46]

As, then, the frequent bearing of misery makes grief the lighter, we

must necessarily perceive that the cause and original of it does not

lie in the calamity itself. Your principal philosophers, or lovers of

wisdom, though they have not yet arrived at perfect wisdom, are not

they sensible that they are in the greatest evil? For they are foolish,

and foolishness is the greatest of all evils, and yet they lament not.

How shall we account for this? Because opinion is not fixed upon that

kind of evil, it is not our opinion that it is right, meet, and our

duty to be uneasy because we are not all wise men. Whereas this opinion

is strongly affixed to that uneasiness where mourning is concerned,

which is the greatest of all grief. Therefore Aristotle, when he blames

some ancient philosophers for imagining that by their genius they had

brought philosophy to the highest perfection, says, they must be either

extremely foolish or extremely vain; but that he himself could see that

great improvements had been made therein in a few years, and that

philosophy would in a little time arrive at perfection. And

Theophrastus is reported to have reproached nature at his death for

giving to stags and crows so long a life, which was of no use to them,

but allowing only so short a span to men, to whom length of days would

have been of the greatest use; for if the life of man could have been

lengthened, it would have been able to provide itself with all kinds of

learning, and with arts in the greatest perfection. He lamented,

therefore, that he was dying just when he had begun to discover these.

What! does not every grave and distinguished philosopher acknowledge

himself ignorant of many things, and confess that there are many things

which he must learn over and over again? And yet, though these men are

sensible that they are standing still in the very midway of folly, than

which nothing can be worse, they are under no great affliction, because

no opinion that it is their duty to lament is ever mingled with this

knowledge. What shall we say of those who think it unbecoming in a man

to grieve? among whom we may reckon Q. Maximus, when he buried his son

that had been consul, and L. Paulus, who lost two sons within a few

days of one another. Of the same opinion was M. Cato, who lost his son

just after he had been elected prætor, and many others, whose names I

have collected in my book on Consolation. Now what made these men so

easy, but their persuasion that grief and lamentation was not becoming

in a man? Therefore, as some give themselves up to grief from an

opinion that it is right so to do, they refrained themselves, from an

opinion that it was discreditable; from which we may infer that grief

is owing more to opinion than nature.

XXIX. It may be said, on the other side, Who is so mad as to grieve of

his own accord? Pain proceeds from nature, which you must submit to,

say they, agreeably to what even your own Crantor teaches, for it

presses and gains upon you unavoidably, and cannot possibly be

resisted. So that the very same Oileus, in Sophocles, who had before

comforted Telamon on the death of Ajax, on hearing of the death of his

own son, is broken-hearted. On this alteration of his mind we have

these lines:

Show me the man so well by wisdom taught

That what he charges to another's fault,

When like affliction doth himself betide,

True to his own wise counsel will abide.[47]

Now, when they urge these things, their endeavor is to prove that

nature is absolutely and wholly irresistible; and yet the same people

allow that we take greater grief on ourselves than nature requires.

What madness is it, then, in us to require the same from others? But

there are many reasons for our taking grief on us. The first is from

the opinion of some evil, on the discovery and certainty of which grief

comes of course. Besides, many people are persuaded that they are doing

something very acceptable to the dead when they lament bitterly over

them. To these may be added a kind of womanish superstition, in

imagining that when they have been stricken by the afflictions sent by

the Gods, to acknowledge themselves afflicted and humbled by them is

the readiest way of appeasing them. But most men appear to be unaware

what contradictions these things are full of. They commend those who

die calmly, but they blame those who can bear the loss of another with

the same calmness, as if it were possible that it should be true, as is

occasionally said in love speeches, that any one can love another more

than himself. There is, indeed, something excellent in this, and, if

you examine it, something no less just than true, that we love those

who ought to be most dear to us as well as we love ourselves; but to

love them more than ourselves is absolutely impossible; nor is it

desirable in friendship that I should love my friend more than myself,

or that he should love me so; for this would occasion much confusion in

life, and break in upon all the duties of it.

XXX. But we will speak of this another time: at present it is

sufficient not to attribute our misery to the loss of our friends, nor

to love them more than, if they themselves could be sensible of our

conduct, they would approve of, or at least not more than we do

ourselves. Now as to what they say, that some are not at all appeased

by our consolations; and, moreover, as to what they add, that the

comforters themselves acknowledge they are miserable when fortune

varies the attack and falls on them--in both these cases the solution

is easy: for the fault here is not in nature, but in our own folly; and

much may be said against folly. But men who do not admit of consolation

seem to bespeak misery for themselves; and they who cannot bear their

misfortunes with that temper which they recommend to others are not

more faulty in this particular than most other persons; for we see that

covetous men find fault with others who are covetous, as do the

vainglorious with those who appear too wholly devoted to the pursuit of

glory. For it is the peculiar characteristic of folly to perceive the

vices of others, but to forget its own. But since we find that grief is

removed by length of time, we have the greatest proof that the strength

of it depends not merely on time, but on the daily consideration of it.

For if the cause continues the same, and the man be the same, how can

there be any alteration in the grief, if there is no change in what

occasioned the grief, nor in him who grieves? Therefore it is from

daily reflecting that there is no real evil in the circumstance for

which you grieve, and not from the length of time, that you procure a

remedy for your grief.

XXXI. Here some people talk of moderate grief; but if such be natural,

what occasion is there for consolation? for nature herself will

determine, the measure of it: but if it depends on and is caused by

opinion, the whole opinion should be destroyed. I think that it has

been sufficiently said, that grief arises from an opinion of some

present evil, which includes this belief, that it is incumbent on us to

grieve. To this definition Zeno has added, very justly, that the

opinion of this present evil should be recent. Now this word recent

they explain thus: those are not the only recent things which happened

a little while ago; but as long as there shall be any force, or vigor,

or freshness in that imagined evil, so long it is entitled to the name

of recent. Take the case of Artemisia, the wife of Mausolus, King of

Caria, who made that noble sepulchre at Halicarnassus; while she lived,

she lived in grief, and died of it, being worn out by it, for that

opinion was always recent with her: but you cannot call that recent

which has already begun to decay through time. Now the duty of a

comforter is, to remove grief entirely, to quiet it, or draw it off as

much as you can, or else to keep it under, and prevent its spreading

any further, and to divert one's attention to other matters. There are

some who think, with Cleanthes, that the only duty of a comforter is to

prove that what one is lamenting is by no means an evil. Others, as the

Peripatetics, prefer urging that the evil is not great. Others, with

Epicurus, seek to divert your attention from the evil to good: some

think it sufficient to show that nothing has happened but what you had

reason to expect; and this is the practice of the Cyrenaics. But

Chrysippus thinks that the main thing in comforting is, to remove the

opinion from the person who is grieving, that to grieve is his bounden

duty. There are others who bring together all these various kinds of

consolations, for people are differently affected; as I have done

myself in my book on Consolation; for as my own mind was much

disordered, I have attempted in that book to discover every method of

cure. But the proper season is as much to be attended to in the cure of

the mind as of the body; as Prometheus in Æschylus, on its being said

to him,

I think, Prometheus, you this tenet hold,

That all men's reason should their rage control?

answers,

Yes, when one reason properly applies;

Ill-timed advice will make the storm but rise.[48]

XXXII. But the principal medicine to be applied in consolation is, to

maintain either that it is no evil at all, or a very inconsiderable

one: the next best to that is, to speak of the common condition of

life, having a view, if possible, to the state of the person whom you

comfort particularly. The third is, that it is folly to wear one's self

out with grief which can avail nothing. For the comfort of Cleanthes is

suitable only for a wise man, who is in no need of any comfort at all;

for could you persuade one in grief that nothing is an evil but what is

base, you would not only cure him of grief, but folly. But the time for

such precepts is not well chosen. Besides, Cleanthes does not seem to

me sufficiently aware that affliction may very often proceed from that

very thing which he himself allows to be the greatest misfortune. For

what shall we say? When Socrates had convinced Alcibiades, as we are

told, that he had no distinctive qualifications as a man different from

other people, and that, in fact, there was no difference between him,

though a man of the highest rank, and a porter; and when Alcibiades

became uneasy at this, and entreated Socrates, with tears in his eyes,

to make him a man of virtue, and to cure him of that mean position;

what shall we say to this, Cleanthes? Was there no evil in what

afflicted Alcibiades thus? What strange things does Lycon say? who,

making light of grief, says that it arises from trifles, from things

that affect our fortune or bodies, not from the evils of the mind.

What, then? did not the grief of Alcibiades proceed from the defects

and evils of the mind? I have already said enough of Epicurus's

consolation.

XXXIII. Nor is that consolation much to be relied on, though it is

frequently practised, and sometimes has some effect, namely, "That you

are not alone in this." It has its effect, as I said, but not always,

nor with every person, for some reject it; but much depends on the

application of it; for you ought rather to show, not how men in general

have been affected with such evils, but how men of sense have borne

them. As to Chrysippus's method, it is certainly founded in truth; but

it is difficult to apply it in time of distress. It is a work of no

small difficulty to persuade a person in affliction that he grieves

merely because he thinks it right so to do. Certainly, then, as in

pleadings we do not state all cases alike (if I may adopt the language

of lawyers for a moment), but adapt what we have to say to the time, to

the nature of the subject under debate, and to the person; so, too, in

alleviating grief, regard should be had to what kind of cure the party

to be comforted can admit of. But, somehow or other, we have rambled

from what you originally proposed. For your question was concerning a

wise man, with whom nothing can have the appearance of evil that is not

dishonorable; or at least, anything else would seem so small an evil

that by his wisdom he would so overmatch it as to make it wholly

disappear; and such a man makes no addition to his grief through

opinion, and never conceives it right to torment himself above measure,

nor to wear himself out with grief, which is the meanest thing

imaginable. Reason, however, it seems, has demonstrated (though it was

not directly our object at the moment to inquire whether anything can

be called an evil except what is base) that it is in our power to

discern that all the evil which there is in affliction has nothing

natural in it, but is contracted by our own voluntary judgment of it,

and the error of opinion.

XXXIV. But the kind of affliction of which I have treated is that which

is the greatest; in order that when we have once got rid of that, it

may appear a business of less consequence to look after remedies for

the others. For there are certain things which are usually said about

poverty; and also certain statements ordinarily applied to retired and

undistinguished life. There are particular treatises on banishment, on

the ruin of one's country, on slavery, on weakness, on blindness, and

on every incident that can come under the name of an evil. The Greeks

divide these into different treatises and distinct books; but they do

it for the sake of employment: not but that all such discussions are

full of entertainment. And yet, as physicians, in curing the whole

body, attend to even the most insignificant part of the body which is

at all disordered, so does philosophy act, after it has removed grief

in general; still, if any other deficiency exists--should poverty bite,

should ignominy sting, should banishment bring a dark cloud over us, or

should any of those things which I have just mentioned appear, there is

for each its appropriate consolation, which you shall hear whenever you

please. But we must have recourse again to the same original principle,

that a wise man is free from all sorrow, because it is vain, because it

answers no purpose, because it is not founded in nature, but on opinion

and prejudice, and is engendered by a kind of invitation to grieve,

when once men have imagined that it is their duty to do so. When, then,

we have subtracted what is altogether voluntary, that mournful

uneasiness will be removed; yet some little anxiety, some slight

pricking, will still remain. They may indeed call this natural,

provided they give it not that horrid, solemn, melancholy name of

grief, which can by no means consist with wisdom. But how various and

how bitter are the roots of grief! Whatever they are, I propose, after

having felled the trunk, to destroy them all; even if it should be

necessary, by allotting a separate dissertation to each, for I have

leisure enough to do so, whatever time it may take up. But the

principle of every uneasiness is the same, though they may appear under

different names. For envy is an uneasiness; so are emulation,

detraction, anguish, sorrow, sadness, tribulation, lamentation,

vexation, grief, trouble, affliction, and despair. The Stoics define

all these different feelings; and all those words which I have

mentioned belong to different things, and do not, as they seem, express

the same ideas; but they are to a certain extent distinct, as I shall

make appear perhaps in another place. These are those fibres of the

roots which, as I said at first, must be traced back and cut off and

destroyed, so that not one shall remain. You say it is a great and

difficult undertaking: who denies it? But what is there of any

excellency which has not its difficulty? Yet philosophy undertakes to

effect it, provided we admit its superintendence. But enough of this.

The other books, whenever you please, shall be ready for you here or

anywhere else.

* * * * *

BOOK IV.

On other perturbations of the mind.

I. I have often wondered, Brutus, on many occasions, at the ingenuity

and virtues of our countrymen; but nothing has surprised me more than

their development in those studies, which, though they came somewhat

late to us, have been transported into this city from Greece. For the

system of auspices, and religious ceremonies, and courts of justice,

and appeals to the people, the senate, the establishment of an army of

cavalry and infantry, and the whole military discipline, were

instituted as early as the foundation of the city by royal authority,

partly too by laws, not without the assistance of the Gods. Then with

what a surprising and incredible progress did our ancestors advance

towards all kind of excellence, when once the republic was freed from

the regal power! Not that this is a proper occasion to treat of the

manners and customs of our ancestors, or of the discipline and

constitution of the city; for I have elsewhere, particularly in the six

books I wrote on the Republic, given a sufficiently accurate account of

them. But while I am on this subject, and considering the study of

philosophy, I meet with many reasons to imagine that those studies were

brought to us from abroad, and not merely imported, but preserved and

improved; for they had Pythagoras, a man of consummate wisdom and

nobleness of character, in a manner, before their eyes, who was in

Italy at the time that Lucius Brutus, the illustrious founder of your

nobility, delivered his country from tyranny. As the doctrine of

Pythagoras spread itself on all sides, it seems probable to me that it

reached this city; and this is not only probable of itself, but it does

really appear to have been the case from many remains of it. For who

can imagine that, when it flourished so much in that part of Italy

which was called Magna Græcia, and in some of the largest and most

powerful cities, in which, first the name of Pythagoras, and then that

of those men who were afterward his followers, was in so high esteem;

who can imagine, I say, that our people could shut their ears to what

was said by such learned men? Besides, it is even my opinion that it

was the great esteem in which the Pythagoreans were held, that gave

rise to that opinion among those who came after him, that King Numa was

a Pythagorean. For, being acquainted with the doctrine and principles

of Pythagoras, and having heard from their ancestors that this king was

a very wise and just man, and not being able to distinguish accurately

between times and periods that were so remote, they inferred, from his

being so eminent for his wisdom, that he had been a pupil of

Pythagoras.

II. So far we proceed on conjecture. As to the vestiges of the

Pythagoreans, though I might collect many, I shall use but a few;

because they have no connection with our present purpose. For, as it is

reported to have been a custom with them to deliver certain precepts in

a more abstruse manner in verse, and to bring their minds from severe

thought to a more composed state by songs and musical instruments; so

Cato, a writer of the very highest authority, says in his Origins, that

it was customary with our ancestors for the guests at their

entertainments, every one in his turn, to celebrate the praises and

virtues of illustrious men in song to the sound of the flute; from

whence it is clear that poems and songs were then composed for the

voice. And, indeed, it is also clear that poetry was in fashion from

the laws of the Twelve Tables, wherein it is provided that no song

should be made to the injury of another. Another argument of the

erudition of those times is, that they played on instruments before the

shrines of their Gods, and at the entertainments of their magistrates;

but that custom was peculiar to the sect I am speaking of. To me,

indeed, that poem of Appius Cæcus, which Panætius commends so much in a

certain letter of his which is addressed to Quintus Tubero, has all the

marks of a Pythagorean author. We have many things derived from the

Pythagoreans in our customs, which I pass over, that we may not seem to

have learned that elsewhere which we look upon ourselves as the

inventors of. But to return to our purpose. How many great poets as

well as orators have sprung up among us! and in what a short time! so

that it is evident that our people could arrive at any learning as soon

as they had an inclination for it. But of other studies I shall speak

elsewhere if there is occasion, as I have already often done.

III. The study of philosophy is certainly of long standing with us; but

yet I do not find that I can give you the names of any philosopher

before the age of Lælius and Scipio, in whose younger days we find that

Diogenes the Stoic, and Carneades the Academic, were sent as

ambassadors by the Athenians to our senate. And as these had never been

concerned in public affairs, and one of them was a Cyrenean, the other

a Babylonian, they certainly would never have been forced from their

studies, nor chosen for that employment, unless the study of philosophy

had been in vogue with some of the great men at that time; who, though

they might employ their pens on other subjects--some on civil law,

others on oratory, others on the history of former times--yet promoted

this most extensive of all arts, the principle of living well, even

more by their life than by their writings. So that of that true and

elegant philosophy (which was derived from Socrates, and is still

preserved by the Peripatetics and by the Stoics, though they express

themselves differently in their disputes with the Academics) there are

few or no Latin records; whether this proceeds from the importance of

the thing itself, or from men's being otherwise employed, or from their

concluding that the capacity of the people was not equal to the

apprehension of them. But, during this silence, C. Amafinius arose and

took upon himself to speak; on the publishing of whose writings the

people were moved, and enlisted themselves chiefly under this sect,

either because the doctrine was more easily understood, or because they

were invited thereto by the pleasing thoughts of amusement, or that,

because there was nothing better, they laid hold of what was offered

them. And after Amafinius, when many of the same sentiments had written

much about them, the Pythagoreans spread over all Italy: but that these

doctrines should be so easily understood and approved of by the

unlearned is a great proof that they were not written with any great

subtlety, and they think their establishment to be owing to this.

IV. But let every one defend his own opinion, for every one is at

liberty to choose what he likes: I shall keep to my old custom; and,

being under no restraint from the laws of any particular school, which

in philosophy every one must necessarily confine himself to, I shall

always inquire what has the most probability in every question, and

this system, which I have often practised on other occasions, I have

adhered closely to in my Tusculan Disputations. Therefore, as I have

acquainted you with the disputations of the three former days, this

book shall conclude the discussion of the fourth day. When we had come

down into the Academy, as we had done the former days, the business was

carried on thus:

_M._ Let any one say, who pleases, what he would wish to have

discussed.

_A._ I do not think a wise man can possibly be free from every

perturbation of mind.

_M._ He seemed by yesterday's discourse to be free from grief; unless

you agreed with us only to avoid taking up time.

_A._ Not at all on that account, for I was extremely satisfied with

your discourse.

_M._ You do not think, then, that a wise man is subject to grief?

_A._ No, by no means.

_M._ But if that cannot disorder the mind of a wise man, nothing else

can. For what--can such a man be disturbed by fear? Fear proceeds from

the same things when absent which occasion grief when present. Take

away grief, then, and you remove fear.

The two remaining perturbations are, a joy elate above measure, and

lust; and if a wise man is not subject to these, his mind will be

always at rest.

_A._ I am entirely of that opinion.

_M._ Which, then, shall we do? Shall I immediately crowd all my sails?

or shall I make use of my oars, as if I were just endeavoring to get

clear of the harbor?

_A._ What is it that you mean, for I do not exactly comprehend you?

V. _M._ Because, Chrysippus and the Stoics, when they discuss the

perturbations of the mind, make great part of their debate to consist

in definitions and distinctions; while they employ but few words on the

subject of curing the mind, and preventing it from being disordered.

Whereas the Peripatetics bring a great many things to promote the cure

of it, but have no regard to their thorny partitions and definitions.

My question, then, was, whether I should instantly unfold the sails of

my eloquence, or be content for a while to make less way with the oars

of logic?

_A._ Let it be so; for by the employment of both these means the

subject of our inquiry will be more thoroughly discussed.

_M._ It is certainly the better way; and should anything be too

obscure, you may examine that afterward.

_A._ I will do so; but those very obscure points you will, as usual,

deliver with more clearness than the Greeks.

_M._ I will, indeed, endeavor to do so; but it well requires great

attention, lest, by losing one word, the whole should escape you. What

the Greeks call [Greek: pathê] we choose to name perturbations (or

disorders) rather than diseases; in explaining which, I shall follow,

first, that very old description of Pythagoras, and afterward that of

Plato; for they both divide the mind into two parts, and make one of

these partake of reason, and the other they represent without it. In

that which partakes of reason they place tranquillity, that is to say,

a placid and undisturbed constancy; to the other they assign the turbid

motions of anger and desire, which are contrary and opposite to reason.

Let this, then, be our principle, the spring of all our reasonings. But

notwithstanding, I shall use the partitions and definitions of the

Stoics in describing these perturbations; who seem to me to have shown

very great acuteness on this question.

VI. Zeno's definition, then, is this: "A perturbation" (which he calls

a [Greek: pathos]) "is a commotion of the mind repugnant to reason, and

against nature." Some of them define it even more briefly, saying that

a perturbation is a somewhat too vehement appetite; but by too vehement

they mean an appetite that recedes further from the constancy of

nature. But they would have the divisions of perturbations to arise

from two imagined goods, and from two imagined evils; and thus they

become four: from the good proceed lust and joy--joy having reference

to some present good, and lust to some future one. They suppose fear

and grief to proceed from evils: fear from something future, grief from

something present; for whatever things are dreaded as approaching

always occasion grief when present. But joy and lust depend on the

opinion of good; as lust, being inflamed and provoked, is carried on

eagerly towards what has the appearance of good; and joy is transported

and exults on obtaining what was desired: for we naturally pursue those

things that have the appearance of good, and avoid the contrary.

Wherefore, as soon as anything that has the appearance of good presents

itself, nature incites us to endeavor to obtain it. Now, where this

strong desire is consistent and founded on prudence, it is by the

Stoics called [Greek: boulêsis], and the name which we give it is

volition; and this they allow to none but their wise man, and define it

thus: Volition is a reasonable desire; but whatever is incited too

violently in opposition to reason, that is a lust, or an unbridled

desire, which is discoverable in all fools. And, therefore, when we are

affected so as to be placed in any good condition, we are moved in two

ways; for when the mind is moved in a placid and calm motion,

consistent with reason, that is called joy; but when it exults with a

vain, wanton exultation, or immoderate joy, then that feeling may be

called immoderate ecstasy or transport, which they define to be an

elation of the mind without reason. And as we naturally desire good

things, so in like manner we naturally seek to avoid what is evil; and

this avoidance of which, if conducted in accordance with reason, is

called caution; and this the wise man alone is supposed to have: but

that caution which is not under the guidance of reason, but is attended

with a base and low dejection, is called fear. Fear is, therefore,

caution destitute of reason. But a wise man is not affected by any

present evil; while the grief of a fool proceeds from being affected

with an imaginary evil, by which his mind is contracted and sunk, since

it is not under the dominion of reason. This, then, is the first

definition, which makes grief to consist in a shrinking of the mind

contrary to the dictates of reason. Thus, there are four perturbations,

and but three calm rational emotions; for grief has no exact opposite.

VII. But they insist upon it that all perturbations depend on opinion

and judgment; therefore they define them more strictly, in order not

only the better to show how blamable they are, but to discover how much

they are in our power. Grief, then, is a recent opinion of some present

evil, in which it seems to be right that the mind should shrink and be

dejected. Joy is a recent opinion of a present good, in which it seems

to be right that the mind should be elated. Fear is an opinion of an

impending evil which we apprehend will be intolerable. Lust is an

opinion of a good to come, which would be of advantage were it already

come, and present with us. But however I have named the judgments and

opinions of perturbations, their meaning is, not that merely the

perturbations consist in them, but that the effects likewise of these

perturbations do so; as grief occasions a kind of painful pricking, and

fear engenders a recoil or sudden abandonment of the mind, joy gives

rise to a profuse mirth, while lust is the parent of an unbridled habit

of coveting. But that imagination, which I have included in all the

above definitions, they would have to consist in assenting without

warrantable grounds. Now, every perturbation has many subordinate parts

annexed to it of the same kind. Grief is attended with enviousness

(_invidentia_)--I use that word for instruction's sake, though it is

not so common; because envy (_invidia_) takes in not only the person

who envies, but the person, too, who is envied--emulation, detraction,

pity, vexation, mourning, sadness, tribulation, sorrow, lamentation,

solicitude, disquiet of mind, pain, despair, and many other similar

feelings are so too. Under fear are comprehended sloth, shame, terror,

cowardice, fainting, confusion, astonishment. In pleasure they

comprehend malevolence--that is, pleased at another's

misfortune--delight, boastfulness, and the like. To lust they associate

anger, fury, hatred, enmity, discord, wants, desire, and other feelings

of that kind.

But they define these in this manner:

VIII. Enviousness (_invidentia_), they say, is a grief arising from the

prosperous circumstances of another, which are in no degree injurious

to the person who envies; for where any one grieves at the prosperity

of another, by which he is injured, such a one is not properly said to

envy--as when Agamemnon grieves at Hector's success; but where any one,

who is in no way hurt by the prosperity of another, is in pain at his

success, such a one envies indeed. Now the name "emulation" is taken in

a double sense, so that the same word may stand for praise and

dispraise: for the imitation of virtue is called emulation (however,

that sense of it I shall have no occasion for here, for that carries

praise with it); but emulation is also a term applied to grief at

another's enjoying what I desired to have, and am without. Detraction

(and I mean by that, jealousy) is a grief even at another's enjoying

what I had a great inclination for. Pity is a grief at the misery of

another who suffers wrongfully; for no one is moved by pity at the

punishment of a parricide or of a betrayer of his country. Vexation is

a pressing grief. Mourning is a grief at the bitter death of one who

was dear to you. Sadness is a grief attended with tears. Tribulation is

a painful grief. Sorrow, an excruciating grief. Lamentation, a grief

where we loudly bewail ourselves. Solicitude, a pensive grief. Trouble,

a continued grief. Affliction, a grief that harasses the body. Despair,

a grief that excludes all hope of better things to come. But those

feelings which are included under fear, they define thus: There is

sloth, which is a dread of some ensuing labor; shame and terror, which

affect the body--hence blushing attends shame; a paleness, and tremor,

and chattering of the teeth attend terror--cowardice, which is an

apprehension of some approaching evil; dread, a fear that unhinges the

mind, whence comes that line of Ennius,

Then dread discharged all wisdom from my mind;

fainting is the associate and constant attendant on dread; confusion, a

fear that drives away all thought; alarm, a continued fear.

IX. The different species into which they divide pleasure come under

this description; so that malevolence is a pleasure in the misfortunes

of another, without any advantage to yourself; delight, a pleasure that

soothes the mind by agreeable impressions on the ear. What is said of

the ear may be applied to the sight, to the touch, smell, and taste.

All feelings of this kind are a sort of melting pleasure that dissolves

the mind. Boastfulness is a pleasure that consists in making an

appearance, and setting off yourself with insolence.--The subordinate

species of lust they define in this manner: Anger is a lust of

punishing any one who, as we imagine, has injured us without cause.

Heat is anger just forming and beginning to exist, which the Greeks

call [Greek: thymôsis]. Hatred is a settled anger. Enmity is anger

waiting for an opportunity of revenge. Discord is a sharper anger

conceived deeply in the mind and heart. Want an insatiable lust. Regret

is when one eagerly wishes to see a person who is absent. Now here they

have a distinction; so that with them regret is a lust conceived on

hearing of certain things reported of some one, or of many, which the

Greeks call [Greek: katêgorêmata], or predicaments; as that they are in

possession of riches and honors: but want is a lust for those very

honors and riches. But these definers make intemperance the fountain of

all these perturbations; which is an absolute revolt from the mind and

right reason--a state so averse to all rules of reason that the

appetites of the mind can by no means be governed and restrained. As,

therefore, temperance appeases these desires, making them obey right

reason, and maintains the well-weighed judgments of the mind, so

intemperance, which is in opposition to this, inflames, confounds, and

puts every state of the mind into a violent motion. Thus, grief and

fear, and every other perturbation of the mind, have their rise from

intemperance.

X. Just as distempers and sickness are bred in the body from the

corruption of the blood, and the too great abundance of phlegm and

bile, so the mind is deprived of its health, and disordered with

sickness, from a confusion of depraved opinions that are in opposition

to one another. From these perturbations arise, first, diseases, which

they call [Greek: nosêmata]; and also those feelings which are in

opposition to these diseases, and which admit certain faulty distastes

or loathings; then come sicknesses, which are called [Greek:

arrhôstêmata] by the Stoics, and these two have their opposite

aversions. Here the Stoics, especially Chrysippus, give themselves

unnecessary trouble to show the analogy which the diseases of the mind

have to those of the body: but, overlooking all that they say as of

little consequence, I shall treat only of the thing itself. Let us,

then, understand perturbation to imply a restlessness from the variety

and confusion of contradictory opinions; and that when this heat and

disturbance of the mind is of any standing, and has taken up its

residence, as it were, in the veins and marrow, then commence diseases

and sickness, and those aversions which are in opposition to these

diseases and sicknesses.

XI. What I say here may be distinguished in thought, though they are in

fact the same; inasmuch as they both have their rise from lust and joy.

For should money be the object of our desire, and should we not

instantly apply to reason, as if it were a kind of Socratic medicine to

heal this desire, the evil glides into our veins, and cleaves to our

bowels, and from thence proceeds a distemper or sickness, which, when

it is of any continuance, is incurable, and the name of this disease is

covetousness. It is the same with other diseases; as the desire of

glory, a passion for women, to which the Greeks give the name of

[Greek: philogyneia]: and thus all other diseases and sicknesses are

generated. But those feelings which are the contrary of these are

supposed to have fear for their foundation, as a hatred of women, such

as is displayed in the Woman-hater of Atilius; or the hatred of the

whole human species, as Timon is reported to have done, whom they call

the Misanthrope. Of the same kind is inhospitality. And all these

diseases proceed from a certain dread of such things as they hate and

avoid. But they define sickness of mind to be an overweening opinion,

and that fixed and deeply implanted in the heart, of something as very

desirable which is by no means so. What proceeds from aversion, they

define thus: a vehement idea of something to be avoided, deeply

implanted, and inherent in our minds, when there is no reason for

avoiding it; and this kind of opinion is a deliberate belief that one

understands things of which one is wholly ignorant. Now, sickness of

the mind has all these subordinate divisions: avarice, ambition,

fondness for women, obstinacy, gluttony, drunkenness, covetousness, and

other similar vices. But avarice is a violent opinion about money, as

if it were vehemently to be desired and sought after, which opinion is

deeply implanted and inherent in our minds; and the definition of all

the other similar feelings resembles these. But the definitions of

aversions are of this sort: inhospitality is a vehement opinion, deeply

implanted and inherent in your mind, that you should avoid a stranger.

Thus, too, the hatred of women, like that felt by Hippolytus, is

defined; and the hatred of the human species like that displayed by

Timon.

XII. But to come to the analogy of the state of body and mind, which I

shall sometimes make use of, though more sparingly than the Stoics.

Some men are more inclined to particular disorders than others; and,

therefore, we say that some people are rheumatic, others dropsical, not

because they are so at present, but because they are often so: some are

inclined to fear, others to some other perturbation. Thus in some there

is a continual anxiety, owing to which they are anxious; in some a

hastiness of temper, which differs from anger, as anxiety differs from

anguish: for all are not anxious who are sometimes vexed, nor are they

who are anxious always uneasy in that manner: as there is a difference

between being drunk and drunkenness; and it is one thing to be a lover,

another to be given to women. And this disposition of particular people

to particular disorders is very common: for it relates to all

perturbations; it appears in many vices, though it has no name. Some

are, therefore, said to be envious, malevolent, spiteful, fearful,

pitiful, from a propensity to those perturbations, not from their being

always carried away by them. Now this propensity to these particular

disorders may be called a sickness from analogy with the body; meaning,

that is to say, nothing more than a propensity towards sickness. But

with regard to whatever is good, as some are more inclined to different

good qualities than others, we may call this a facility or tendency:

this tendency to evil is a proclivity or inclination to falling; but

where anything is neither good nor bad, it may have the former name.

XIII. Even as there may be, with respect to the body, a disease, a

sickness, and a defect, so it is with the mind. They call that a

disease where the whole body is corrupted; they call that sickness

where a disease is attended with a weakness, and that a defect where

the parts of the body are not well compacted together; from whence it

follows that the members are misshapen, crooked, and deformed. So that

these two, a disease and sickness, proceed from a violent concussion

and perturbation of the health of the whole body; but a defect

discovers itself even when the body is in perfect health. But a disease

of the mind is distinguishable only in thought from a sickness. But a

viciousness is a habit or affection discordant and inconsistent with

itself through life. Thus it happens that, in the one case, a disease

and sickness may arise from a corruption of opinions; in the other

case, the consequence may be inconstancy and inconsistency. For every

vice of the mind does not imply a disunion of parts; as is the case

with those who are not far from being wise men. With them there is that

affection which is inconsistent with itself while it is foolish; but it

is not distorted, nor depraved. But diseases and sicknesses are parts

of viciousness; but it is a question whether perturbations are parts of

the same, for vices are permanent affections: perturbations are such as

are restless; so that they cannot be parts of permanent ones. As there

is some analogy between the nature of the body and mind in evil, so is

there in good; for the distinctions of the body are beauty, strength,

health, firmness, quickness of motion: the same may be said of the

mind. The body is said to be in a good state when all those things on

which health depends are consistent: the same may be said of the mind

when its judgments and opinions are not at variance with one another.

And this union is the virtue of the mind, which, according to some

people, is temperance itself; others make it consist in an obedience to

the precepts of temperance, and a compliance with them, not allowing it

to be any distinct species of itself. But, be it one or the other, it

is to be found only in a wise man. But there is a certain soundness of

mind, which even a fool may have, when the perturbation of his mind is

removed by the care and management of his physicians. And as what is

called beauty arises from an exact proportion of the limbs, together

with a certain sweetness of complexion, so the beauty of the mind

consists in an equality and constancy of opinions and judgments, joined

to a certain firmness and stability, pursuing virtue, or containing

within itself the very essence of virtue. Besides, we give the very

same names to the faculties of the mind as we do to the powers of the

body, the nerves, and other powers of action. Thus the velocity of the

body is called swiftness: a praise which we ascribe to the mind, from

its running over in its thoughts so many things in so short a time.

XIV. Herein, indeed, the mind and body are unlike: that though the mind

when in perfect health may be visited by sickness, as the body may, yet

the body may be disordered without our fault; the mind cannot. For all

the disorders and perturbations of the mind proceed from a neglect of

reason; these disorders, therefore, are confined to men: the beasts are

not subject to such perturbations, though they act sometimes as if they

had reason. There is a difference, too, between ingenious and dull men;

the ingenious, like the Corinthian brass, which is long before it

receives rust, are longer before they fall into these perturbations,

and are recovered sooner: the case is different with the dull. Nor does

the mind of an ingenious man fall into every kind of perturbation, for

it never yields to any that are brutish and savage; and some of their

perturbations have at first even the appearance of humanity, as mercy,

grief, and fear. But the sicknesses and diseases of the mind are

thought to be harder to eradicate than those leading vices which are in

opposition to virtues; for vices may be removed, though the diseases of

the mind should continue, which diseases are not cured with that

expedition with which vices are removed. I have now acquainted you with

the arguments which the Stoics put forth with such exactness; which

they call logic, from their close arguing: and since my discourse has

got clear of these rocks, I will proceed with the remainder of it,

provided I have been sufficiently clear in what I have already said,

considering the obscurity of the subject I have treated.

_A._ Clear enough; but should there be occasion for a more exact

inquiry, I shall take another opportunity of asking you. I expect you

now to hoist your sails, as you just now called them, and proceed on

your course.

XV. _M._ Since I have spoken before of virtue in other places, and

shall often have occasion to speak again (for a great many questions

that relate to life and manners arise from the spring of virtue); and

since, as I say, virtue consists in a settled and uniform affection of

mind, making those persons praiseworthy who are possessed of her, she

herself also, independent of anything else, without regard to any

advantage, must be praiseworthy; for from her proceed good

inclinations, opinions, actions, and the whole of right reason; though

virtue may be defined in a few words to be right reason itself. The

opposite to this is viciousness (for so I choose to translate what the

Greeks call [Greek: kakia], rather than by perverseness; for

perverseness is the name of a particular vice; but viciousness includes

all), from whence arise those perturbations which, as I just now said,

are turbid and violent motions of the mind, repugnant to reason, and

enemies in a high degree to the peace of the mind and a tranquil life,

for they introduce piercing and anxious cares, and afflict and

debilitate the mind through fear; they violently inflame our hearts

with exaggerated appetite, which is in reality an impotence of mind,

utterly irreconcilable with temperance and moderation, which we

sometimes call desire, and sometimes lust, and which, should it even

attain the object of its wishes, immediately becomes so elated that it

loses all its resolution, and knows not what to pursue; so that he was

in the right who said "that exaggerated pleasure was the very greatest

of mistakes." Virtue, then, alone can effect the cure of these evils.

XVI. For what is not only more miserable, but more base and sordid,

than a man afflicted, weakened, and oppressed with grief? And little

short of this misery is one who dreads some approaching evil, and who,

through faintheartedness, is under continual suspense. The poets, to

express the greatness of this evil, imagine a stone to hang over the

head of Tantalus, as a punishment for his wickedness, his pride, and

his boasting. And this is the common punishment of folly; for there

hangs over the head of every one whose mind revolts from reason some

similar fear. And as these perturbations of the mind, grief and fear,

are of a most wasting nature, so those two others, though of a more

merry cast (I mean lust, which is always coveting something with

eagerness, and empty mirth, which is an exulting joy), differ very

little from madness. Hence you may understand what sort of person he is

whom we call at one time moderate, at another modest or temperate, at

another constant and virtuous; while sometimes we include all these

names in the word frugality, as the crown of all; for if that word did

not include all virtues, it would never have been proverbial to say

that a frugal man does everything rightly. But when the Stoics apply

this saying to their wise man, they seem to exalt him too much, and to

speak of him with too much admiration.

XVII. Whoever, then, through moderation and constancy, is at rest in

his mind, and in calm possession of himself, so as neither to pine with

care, nor be dejected with fear, nor to be inflamed with desire,

coveting something greedily, nor relaxed by extravagant mirth--such a

man is that identical wise man whom we are inquiring for: he is the

happy man, to whom nothing in this life seems intolerable enough to

depress him; nothing exquisite enough to transport him unduly. For what

is there in this life that can appear great to him who has acquainted

himself with eternity and the utmost extent of the universe? For what

is there in human knowledge, or the short span of this life, that can

appear great to a wise man? whose mind is always so upon its guard that

nothing can befall him which is unforeseen, nothing which is

unexpected, nothing, in short, which is new. Such a man takes so exact

a survey on all sides of him, that he always knows the proper place and

spot to live in free from all the troubles and annoyances of life, and

encounters every accident that fortune can bring upon him with a

becoming calmness. Whoever conducts himself in this manner will be free

from grief, and from every other perturbation; and a mind free from

these feelings renders men completely happy; whereas a mind disordered

and drawn off from right and unerring reason loses at once, not only

its resolution, but its health.--Therefore the thoughts and

declarations of the Peripatetics are soft and effeminate, for they say

that the mind must necessarily be agitated, but at the same time they

lay down certain bounds beyond which that agitation is not to proceed.

And do you set bounds to vice? or is it no vice to disobey reason? Does

not reason sufficiently declare that there is no real good which you

should desire too ardently, or the possession of which you should allow

to transport you? and that there is no evil that should be able to

overwhelm you, or the suspicion of which should distract you? and that

all these things assume too melancholy or too cheerful an appearance

through our own error? But if fools find this error lessened by time,

so that, though the cause remains the same, they are not affected, in

the same manner, after some time, as they were at first, why, surely a

wise man ought not to be influenced at all by it. But what are those

degrees by which we are to limit it? Let us fix these degrees in grief,

a difficult subject, and one much canvassed.--Fannius writes that P.

Rutilius took it much to heart that his brother was refused the

consulship; but he seems to have been too much affected by this

disappointment, for it was the occasion of his death: he ought,

therefore, to have borne it with more moderation. But let us suppose

that while he was bearing this with moderation, the death of his

children had intervened; here would have started a fresh grief, which,

admitting it to be moderate in itself, yet still must have been a great

addition to the other. Now, to these let us add some acute pains of

body, the loss of his fortune, blindness, banishment. Supposing, then,

each separate misfortune to occasion a separate additional grief, the

whole would be too great to be supportable.

XVIII. The man who attempts to set bounds to vice acts like one who

should throw himself headlong from Leucate, persuaded that he could

stop himself whenever he pleased. Now, as that is impossible, so a

perturbed and disordered mind cannot restrain itself, and stop where it

pleases. Certainly whatever is bad in its increase is bad in its birth.

Now grief and all other perturbations are doubtless baneful in their

progress, and have, therefore, no small share of evil at the beginning;

for they go on of themselves when once they depart from reason, for

every weakness is self-indulgent, and indiscreetly launches out, and

does not know where to stop. So that it makes no difference whether you

approve of moderate perturbations of mind, or of moderate injustice,

moderate cowardice, and moderate intemperance; for whoever prescribes

bounds to vice admits a part of it, which, as it is odious of itself,

becomes the more so as it stands on slippery ground, and, being once

set forward, glides on headlong, and cannot by any means be stopped.

XIX. Why should I say more? Why should I add that the Peripatetics say

that these perturbations, which we insist upon it should be extirpated,

are not only natural, but were given to men by nature for a good

purpose? They usually talk in this manner. In the first place, they say

much in praise of anger; they call it the whetstone of courage, and

they say that angry men exert themselves most against an enemy or

against a bad citizen: that those reasons are of little weight which

are the motives of men who think thus, as--it is a just war; it becomes

us to fight for our laws, our liberties, our country: they will allow

no force to these arguments unless our courage is warmed by anger.--Nor

do they confine their argument to warriors; but their opinion is that

no one can issue any rigid commands without some bitterness and anger.

In short, they have no notion of an orator either accusing or even

defending a client without he is spurred on by anger. And though this

anger should not be real, still they think his words and gestures ought

to wear the appearance of it, so that the action of the orator may

excite the anger of his hearer. And they deny that any man has ever

been seen who does not know what it is to be angry; and they name what

we call lenity by the bad appellation of indolence. Nor do they commend

only this lust (for anger is, as I defined it above, the lust of

revenge), but they maintain that kind of lust or desire to be given us

by nature for very good purposes, saying that no one can execute

anything well but what he is in earnest about. Themistocles used to

walk in the public places in the night because he could not sleep; and

when asked the reason, his answer was, that Miltiades's trophies kept

him awake. Who has not heard how Demosthenes used to watch, who said

that it gave him pain if any mechanic was up in a morning at his work

before him? Lastly, they urge that some of the greatest philosophers

would never have made that progress in their studies without some

ardent desire spurring them on.--We are informed that Pythagoras,

Democritus, and Plato visited the remotest parts of the world; for they

thought that they ought to go wherever anything was to be learned. Now,

it is not conceivable that these things could be effected by anything

but by the greatest ardor of mind.

XX. They say that even grief, which we have already said ought to be

avoided as a monstrous and fierce beast, was appointed by nature, not

without some good purpose, in order that men should lament when they

had committed a fault, well knowing they had exposed themselves to

correction, rebuke, and ignominy; for they think that those who can

bear ignominy and infamy without pain have acquired a complete impunity

for all sorts of crimes; for with them reproach is a stronger check

than conscience. From whence we have that scene in Afranius borrowed

from common life; for when the abandoned son saith, "Wretched that I

am!" the severe father replies,

Let him but grieve, no matter what the cause.

And they say the other divisions of sorrow have their use; that pity

incites us to hasten to the assistance of others, and to alleviate the

calamities of men who have undeservedly fallen into them; that even

envy and detraction are not without their use, as when a man sees that

another person has attained what he cannot, or observes another to be

equally successful with himself; that he who should take away fear

would take away all industry in life, which those men exert in the

greatest degree who are afraid of the laws and of the magistrates, who

dread poverty, ignominy, death, and pain. But while they argue thus,

they allow indeed of these feelings being retrenched, though they deny

that they either can or should be plucked up by the roots; so that

their opinion is that mediocrity is best in everything. When they

reason in this manner, what think you--is what they say worth attending

to or not?

_A._ I think it is. I wait, therefore, to hear what you will say in

reply to them.

XXI. _M._ Perhaps I may find something to say; but I will make this

observation first: do you take notice with what modesty the Academics

behave themselves? for they speak plainly to the purpose. The

Peripatetics are answered by the Stoics; they have my leave to fight it

out, who think myself no otherwise concerned than to inquire for what

may seem to be most probable. Our present business is, then, to see if

we can meet with anything in this question which is the probable, for

beyond such approximation to truth as that human nature cannot proceed.

The definition of a perturbation, as Zeno, I think, has rightly

determined it, is thus: That a perturbation is a commotion of the mind

against nature, in opposition to right reason; or, more briefly, thus,

that a perturbation is a somewhat too vehement appetite; and when he

says somewhat too vehement, he means such as is at a greater distance

from the constant course of nature. What can I say to these

definitions? The greater part of them we have from those who dispute

with sagacity and acuteness: some of them expressions, indeed, such as

the "ardors of the mind," and "the whetstones of virtue," savoring of

the pomp of rhetoricians. As to the question, if a brave man can

maintain his courage without becoming angry, it may be questioned with

regard to the gladiators; though we often observe much resolution even

in them: they meet, converse, they make objections and demands, they

agree about terms, so that they seem calm rather than angry. But let us

admit a man of the name of Placideianus, who was one of that trade, to

be in such a mind, as Lucilius relates of him,

If for his blood you thirst, the task be mine;

His laurels at my feet he shall resign;

Not but I know, before I reach his heart,

First on myself a wound he will impart.

I hate the man; enraged I fight, and straight

In action we had been, but that I wait

Till each his sword had fitted to his hand.

My rage I scarce can keep within command.

XXII. But we see Ajax in Homer advancing to meet Hector in battle

cheerfully, without any of this boisterous wrath. For he had no sooner

taken up his arms than the first step which he made inspired his

associates with joy, his enemies with fear; so that even Hector, as he

is represented by Homer,[49] trembling, condemned himself for having

challenged him to fight. Yet these heroes conversed together, calmly

and quietly, before they engaged; nor did they show any anger or

outrageous behavior during the combat. Nor do I imagine that Torquatus,

the first who obtained this surname, was in a rage when he plundered

the Gaul of his collar; or that Marcellus's courage at Clastidium was

only owing to his anger. I could almost swear that Africanus, with whom

we are better acquainted, from our recollection of him being more

recent, was noways inflamed by anger when he covered Alienus Pelignus

with his shield, and drove his sword into the enemy's breast. There may

be some doubt of L. Brutus, whether he was not influenced by

extraordinary hatred of the tyrant, so as to attack Aruns with more

than usual rashness; for I observe that they mutually killed each other

in close fight. Why, then, do you call in the assistance of anger?

Would courage, unless it began to get furious, lose its energy? What!

do you imagine that Hercules, whom the very courage which you would try

to represent as anger raised to heaven, was angry when he engaged the

Erymanthian boar, or the Nemæan lion? Or was Theseus in a passion when

he seized on the horns of the Marathonian bull? Take care how you make

courage to depend in the least on rage. For anger is altogether

irrational, and that is not courage which is void of reason.

XXIII. We ought to hold all things here in contempt; death is to be

looked on with indifference; pains and labors must be considered as

easily supportable. And when these sentiments are established on

judgment and conviction, then will that stout and firm courage take

place; unless you attribute to anger whatever is done with vehemence,

alacrity, and spirit. To me, indeed, that very Scipio[50] who was chief

priest, that favorer of the saying of the Stoics, "That no private man

could be a wise man," does not seem to be angry with Tiberius Gracchus,

even when he left the consul in a hesitating frame of mind, and, though

a private man himself, commanded, with the authority of a consul, that

all who meant well to the republic should follow him. I do not know

whether I have done anything in the republic that has the appearance of

courage; but if I have, I certainly did not do it in wrath. Doth

anything come nearer madness than anger? And indeed Ennius has well

defined it as the beginning of madness. The changing color, the

alteration of our voice, the look of our eyes, our manner of fetching

our breath, the little command we have over our words and actions, how

little do all these things indicate a sound mind! What can make a worse

appearance than Homer's Achilles, or Agamemnon, during the quarrel? And

as to Ajax, anger drove him into downright madness, and was the

occasion of his death. Courage, therefore, does not want the assistance

of anger; it is sufficiently provided, armed, and prepared of itself.

We may as well say that drunkenness or madness is of service to

courage, because those who are mad or drunk often do a great many

things with unusual vehemence. Ajax was always brave; but still he was

most brave when he was in that state of frenzy:

The greatest feat that Ajax e'er achieved

Was, when his single arm the Greeks relieved.

Quitting the field; urged on by rising rage,

Forced the declining troops again t'engage.

Shall we say, then, that madness has its use?

XXIV. Examine the definitions of courage: you will find it does not

require the assistance of passion. Courage is, then, an affection of

mind that endures all things, being itself in proper subjection to the

highest of all laws; or it may be called a firm maintenance of judgment

in supporting or repelling everything that has a formidable appearance,

or a knowledge of what is formidable or otherwise, and maintaining

invariably a stable judgment of all such things, so as to bear them or

despise them; or, in fewer words, according to Chrysippus (for the

above definitions are Sphærus's, a man of the first ability as a

layer-down of definitions, as the Stoics think. But they are all pretty

much alike: they give us only common notions, some one way, and some

another). But what is Chrysippus's definition? Fortitude, says he, is

the knowledge of all things that are bearable, or an affection of the

mind which bears and supports everything in obedience to the chief law

of reason without fear. Now, though we should attack these men in the

same manner as Carneades used to do, I fear they are the only real

philosophers; for which of these definitions is there which does not

explain that obscure and intricate notion of courage which every man

conceives within himself? And when it is thus explained, what can a

warrior, a commander, or an orator want more? And no one can think that

they will be unable to behave themselves courageously without anger.

What! do not even the Stoics, who maintain that all fools are mad, make

the same inferences? for, take away perturbations, especially a

hastiness of temper, and they will appear to talk very absurdly. But

what they assert is this: they say that all fools are mad, as all

dunghills stink; not that they always do so, but stir them, and you

will perceive it. And in like manner, a warm-tempered man is not always

in a passion; but provoke him, and you will see him run mad. Now, that

very warlike anger, which is of such service in war, what is the use of

it to him when he is at home with his wife, children, and family? Is

there, then, anything that a disturbed mind can do better than one

which is calm and steady? Or can any one be angry without a

perturbation of mind? Our people, then, were in the right, who, as all

vices depend on our manners, and nothing is worse than a passionate

disposition, called angry men the only morose men.[51]

XXV. Anger is in no wise becoming in an orator, though it is not amiss

to affect it. Do you imagine that I am angry when in pleading I use any

extraordinary vehemence and sharpness? What! when I write out my

speeches after all is over and past, am I then angry while writing? Or

do you think Æsopus was ever angry when he acted, or Accius was so when

he wrote? Those men, indeed, act very well, but the orator acts better

than the player, provided he be really an orator; but, then, they carry

it on without passion, and with a composed mind. But what wantonness is

it to commend lust! You produce Themistocles and Demosthenes; to these

you add Pythagoras, Democritus, and Plato. What! do you then call

studies lust? But these studies of the most excellent and admirable

things, such as those were which you bring forward on all occasions,

ought to be composed and tranquil; and what kind of philosophers are

they who commend grief, than which nothing is more detestable? Afranius

has said much to this purpose:

Let him but grieve, no matter what the cause.

But he spoke this of a debauched and dissolute youth. But we are

inquiring into the conduct of a constant and wise man. We may even

allow a centurion or standard-bearer to be angry, or any others, whom,

not to explain too far the mysteries of the rhetoricians, I shall not

mention here; for to touch the passions, where reason cannot be come

at, may have its use; but my inquiry, as I often repeat, is about a

wise man.

XXVI. But even envy, detraction, pity, have their use. Why should you

pity rather than assist, if it is in your power to do so? Is it because

you cannot be liberal without pity? We should not take sorrows on

ourselves upon another's account; but we ought to relieve others of

their grief if we can. But to detract from another's reputation, or to

rival him with that vicious emulation which resembles an enmity, of

what use can that conduct be? Now, envy implies being uneasy at

another's good because one does not enjoy it one's self; but detraction

is the being uneasy at another's good, merely because he enjoys it. How

can it be right that you should voluntarily grieve, rather than take

the trouble of acquiring what you want to have? for it is madness in

the highest degree to desire to be the only one that has any particular

happiness. But who can with correctness speak in praise of a mediocrity

of evils? Can any one in whom there is lust or desire be otherwise than

libidinous or desirous? or can a man who is occupied by anger avoid

being angry? or can one who is exposed to any vexation escape being

vexed? or if he is under the influence of fear, must he not be fearful?

Do we look, then, on the libidinous, the angry, the anxious, and the

timid man, as persons of wisdom, of excellence? of which I could speak

very copiously and diffusely, but I wish to be as concise as possible.

And so I will merely say that wisdom is an acquaintance with all divine

and human affairs, and a knowledge of the cause of everything. Hence it

is that it imitates what is divine, and looks upon all human concerns

as inferior to virtue. Did you, then, say that it was your opinion that

such a man was as naturally liable to perturbation as the sea is

exposed to winds? What is there that can discompose such gravity and

constancy? Anything sudden or unforeseen? How can anything of this kind

befall one to whom nothing is sudden and unforeseen that can happen to

man? Now, as to their saying that redundancies should be pared off, and

only what is natural remain, what, I pray you, can be natural which may

be too exuberant?

XXVII. All these assertions proceed from the roots of errors, which

must be entirely plucked up and destroyed, not pared and amputated. But

as I suspect that your inquiry is not so much respecting the wise man

as concerning yourself (for you allow that he is free from all

perturbations, and you would willingly be so too yourself), let us see

what remedies there are which may be applied by philosophy to the

diseases of the mind. There is certainly some remedy; nor has nature

been so unkind to the human race as to have discovered so many things

salutary to the body, and none which are medicinal to the mind. She has

even been kinder to the mind than to the body; inasmuch as you must

seek abroad for the assistance which the body requires, while the mind

has all that it requires within itself. But in proportion as the

excellency of the mind is of a higher and more divine nature, the more

diligence does it require; and therefore reason, when it is well

applied, discovers what is best, but when it is neglected, it becomes

involved in many errors. I shall apply, then, all my discourse to you;

for though you pretend to be inquiring about the wise man, your inquiry

may possibly be about yourself. Various, then, are the cures of those

perturbations which I have expounded, for every disorder is not to be

appeased the same way. One medicine must be applied to the man who

mourns, another to the pitiful, another to the person who envies; for

there is this difference to be maintained in all the four

perturbations: we are to consider whether our discourse had better be

directed to perturbations in general, which are a contempt of reason,

or a somewhat too vehement appetite; or whether it would be better

applied to particular descriptions, as, for instance, to fear, lust,

and the rest, and whether it appears preferable to endeavor to remove

that which has occasioned the grief, or rather to attempt wholly to

eradicate every kind of grief. As, should any one grieve that he is

poor, the question is, Would you maintain poverty to be no evil, or

would you contend that a man ought not to grieve at anything? Certainly

this last is the best course; for should you not convince him with

regard to poverty, you must allow him to grieve; but if you remove

grief by particular arguments, such as I used yesterday, the evil of

poverty is in some manner removed.

XXVIII. But any perturbation of the mind of this sort may be, as it

were, wiped away by the method of appeasing the mind, if you succeed in

showing that there is no good in that which has given rise to joy and

lust, nor any evil in that which has occasioned fear or grief. But

certainly the most effectual cure is to be achieved by showing that all

perturbations are of themselves vicious, and have nothing natural or

necessary in them. As we see, grief itself is easily softened when we

charge those who grieve with weakness and an effeminate mind; or when

we commend the gravity and constancy of those who bear calmly whatever

befalls them here, as accidents to which all men are liable; and,

indeed, this is generally the feeling of those who look on these as

real evils, but yet think they should be borne with resignation. One

imagines pleasure to be a good, another money; and yet the one may be

called off from intemperance, the other from covetousness. The other

method and address, which, at the same time that it removes the false

opinion, withdraws the disorder, has more subtlety in it; but it seldom

succeeds, and is not applicable to vulgar minds, for there are some

diseases which that medicine can by no means remove. For, should any

one be uneasy because he is without virtue, without courage, destitute

of a sense of duty or honesty, his anxiety proceeds from a real evil;

and yet we must apply another method of cure to him, and such a one as

all the philosophers, however they may differ about other things, agree

in. For they must necessarily agree in this, that commotions of the

mind in opposition to right reason are vicious; and that even admitting

those things to be evils which occasion fear or grief, and those to be

goods which provoke desire or joy, yet that very commotion itself is

vicious; for we mean by the expressions magnanimous and brave, one who

is resolute, sedate, grave, and superior to everything in this life;

but one who either grieves, or fears, or covets, or is transported with

passion, cannot come under that denomination; for these things are

consistent only with those who look on the things of this world as

things with which their minds are unequal to contend.

XXIX. Wherefore, as I before said, the philosophers have all one method

of cure, so that we need say nothing about what sort of thing that is

which disturbs the mind, but we must speak only concerning the

perturbation itself. Thus, first, with regard to desire itself, when

the business is only to remove that, the inquiry is not to be, whether

that thing be good or evil which provokes lust, but the lust itself is

to be removed; so that whether whatever is honest is the chief good, or

whether it consists in pleasure, or in both these things together, or

in the other three kinds of goods, yet should there be in any one too

vehement an appetite for even virtue itself, the whole discourse should

be directed to the deterring him from that vehemence. But human nature,

when placed in a conspicuous point of view, gives us every argument for

appeasing the mind, and, to make this the more distinct, the laws and

conditions of life should be explained in our discourse. Therefore, it

was not without reason that Socrates is reported, when Euripides was

exhibiting his play called Orestes, to have repeated the first three

verses of that tragedy--

What tragic story men can mournful tell,

Whate'er from fate or from the gods befell,

That human nature can support--[52]

But, in order to persuade those to whom any misfortune has happened

that they can and ought to bear it, it is very useful to set before

them an enumeration of other persons who have borne similar calamities.

Indeed, the method of appeasing grief was explained in my dispute of

yesterday, and in my book on Consolation, which I wrote in the midst of

my own grief; for I was not myself so wise a man as to be insensible to

grief, and I used this, notwithstanding Chrysippus's advice to the

contrary, who is against applying a medicine to the agitations of the

mind while they are fresh; but I did it, and committed a violence on

nature, that the greatness of my grief might give way to the greatness

of the medicine.

XXX. But fear borders upon grief, of which I have already said enough;

but I must say a little more on that. Now, as grief proceeds from what

is present, so does fear from future evil; so that some have said that

fear is a certain part of grief: others have called fear the harbinger

of trouble, which, as it were, introduces the ensuing evil. Now, the

reasons that make what is present supportable, make what is to come

very contemptible; for, with regard to both, we should take care to do

nothing low or grovelling, soft or effeminate, mean or abject. But,

notwithstanding we should speak of the inconstancy, imbecility, and

levity of fear itself, yet it is of very great service to speak

contemptuously of those very things of which we are afraid. So that it

fell out very well, whether it was by accident or design, that I

disputed the first and second day on death and pain--the two things

that are the most dreaded: now, if what I then said was approved of, we

are in a great degree freed from fear. And this is sufficient, as far

as regards the opinion of evils.

XXXI. Proceed we now to what are goods--that is to say, to joy and

desire. To me, indeed, one thing alone seems to embrace the question of

all that relates to the perturbations of the mind--the fact, namely,

that all perturbations are in our own power; that they are taken up

upon opinion, and are voluntary. This error, then, must be got rid of;

this opinion must be removed; and, as with regard to imagined evils, we

are to make them more supportable, so with respect to goods, we are to

lessen the violent effects of those things which are called great and

joyous. But one thing is to be observed, that equally relates both to

good and evil: that, should it be difficult to persuade any one that

none of those things which disturb the mind are to be looked on as good

or evil, yet a different cure is to be applied to different feelings;

and the malevolent person is to be corrected by one way of reasoning,

the lover by another, the anxious man by another, and the fearful by

another: and it would be easy for any one who pursues the best approved

method of reasoning, with regard to good and evil, to maintain that no

fool can be affected with joy, as he never can have anything good. But,

at present, my discourse proceeds upon the common received notions.

Let, then, honors, riches, pleasures, and the rest be the very good

things which they are imagined to be; yet a too elevated and exulting

joy on the possession of them is unbecoming; just as, though it might

be allowable to laugh, to giggle would be indecent. Thus, a mind

enlarged by joy is as blamable as a contraction of it by grief; and

eager longing is a sign of as much levity in desiring as immoderate joy

is in possessing; and, as those who are too dejected are said to be

effeminate, so they who are too elated with joy are properly called

volatile; and as feeling envy is a part of grief, and the being pleased

with another's misfortune is a kind of joy, both these feelings are

usually corrected by showing the wildness and insensibility of them:

and as it becomes a man to be cautious, but it is unbecoming in him to

be fearful, so to be pleased is proper, but to be joyful improper. I

have, in order that I might be the better understood, distinguished

pleasure from joy. I have already said above, that a contraction of the

mind can never be right, but that an elation of it may; for the joy of

Hector in Nævius is one thing--

'Tis joy indeed to hear my praises sung

By you, who are the theme of honor's tongue--

but that of the character in Trabea another: "The kind procuress,

allured by my money, will observe my nod, will watch my desires, and

study my will. If I but move the door with my little finger, instantly

it flies open; and if Chrysis should unexpectedly discover me, she will

run with joy to meet me, and throw herself into my arms."

Now he will tell you how excellent he thinks this:

Not even fortune herself is so fortunate.

XXXII. Any one who attends the least to the subject will be convinced

how unbecoming this joy is. And as they are very shameful who are

immoderately delighted with the enjoyment of venereal pleasures, so are

they very scandalous who lust vehemently after them. And all that which

is commonly called love (and, believe me, I can find out no other name

to call it by) is of such a trivial nature that nothing, I think, is to

be compared to it: of which Cæcilius says,

I hold the man of every sense bereaved

Who grants not Love to be of Gods the chief:

Whose mighty power whate'er is good effects,

Who gives to each his beauty and defects:

Hence, health and sickness; wit and folly, hence,

The God that love and hatred doth dispense!

An excellent corrector of life this same poetry, which thinks that

love, the promoter of debauchery and vanity, should have a place in the

council of the Gods! I am speaking of comedy, which could not subsist

at all without our approving of these debaucheries. But what said that

chief of the Argonauts in tragedy?

My life I owe to honor less than love.

What, then, are we to say of this love of Medea?--what a train of

miseries did it occasion! And yet the same woman has the assurance to

say to her father, in another poet, that she had a husband

Dearer by love than ever fathers were.

XXXIII. However, we may allow the poets to trifle, in whose fables we

see Jupiter himself engaged in these debaucheries: but let us apply to

the masters of virtue--the philosophers who deny love to be anything

carnal; and in this they differ from Epicurus, who, I think, is not

much mistaken. For what is that love of friendship? How comes it that

no one is in love with a deformed young man, or a handsome old one? I

am of opinion that this love of men had its rise from the Gymnastics of

the Greeks, where these kinds of loves are admissible and permitted;

therefore Ennius spoke well:

The censure of this crime to those is due

Who naked bodies first exposed to view.

Now, supposing them chaste, which I think is hardly possible, they are

uneasy and distressed, and the more so because they contain and refrain

themselves. But, to pass over the love of women, where nature has

allowed more liberty, who can misunderstand the poets in their rape of

Ganymede, or not apprehend what Laius says, and what he desires, in

Euripides? Lastly, what have the principal poets and the most learned

men published of themselves in their poems and songs? What doth Alcæus,

who was distinguished in his own republic for his bravery, write on the

love of young men? And as for Anacreon's poetry, it is wholly on love.

But Ibycus of Rhegium appears, from his writings, to have had this love

stronger on him than all the rest.

XXXIV. Now we see that the loves of all these writers were entirely

libidinous. There have arisen also some among us philosophers (and

Plato is at the head of them, whom Dicæarchus blames not without

reason) who have countenanced love. The Stoics, in truth, say, not only

that their wise man may be a lover, but they even define love itself as

an endeavor to originate friendship out of the appearance of beauty.

Now, provided there is any one in the nature of things without desire,

without care, without a sigh, such a one may be a lover; for he is free

from all lust: but I have nothing to say to him, as it is lust of which

I am now speaking. But should there be any love--as there certainly

is--which is but little, or perhaps not at all, short of madness, such

as his is in the Leucadia--

Should there be any God whose care I am--

it is incumbent on all the Gods to see that he enjoys his amorous

pleasure.

Wretch that I am!

Nothing is more true, and he says very appropriately,

What, are you sane, who at this rate lament?

He seems even to his friends to be out of his senses: then how tragical

he becomes!

Thy aid, divine Apollo, I implore,

And thine, dread ruler of the wat'ry store!

Oh! all ye winds, assist me!

He thinks that the whole world ought to apply itself to help his love:

he excludes Venus alone, as unkind to him.

Thy aid, O Venus, why should I invoke?

He thinks Venus too much employed in her own lust to have regard to

anything else, as if he himself had not said and committed these

shameful things from lust.

XXXV. Now, the cure for one who is affected in this manner is to show

how light, how contemptible, how very trifling he is in what he

desires; how he may turn his affections to another object, or

accomplish his desires by some other means; or else to persuade him

that he may entirely disregard it: sometimes he is to be led away to

objects of another kind, to study, business, or other different

engagements and concerns: very often the cure is effected by change of

place, as sick people, that have not recovered their strength, are

benefited by change of air. Some people think an old love may be driven

out by a new one, as one nail drives out another: but, above all

things, the man thus afflicted should be advised what madness love is:

for of all the perturbations of the mind, there is not one which is

more vehement; for (without charging it with rapes, debaucheries,

adultery, or even incest, the baseness of any of these being very

blamable; not, I say, to mention these) the very perturbation of the

mind in love is base of itself, for, to pass over all its acts of

downright madness, what weakness do not those very things which are

looked upon as indifferent argue?

Affronts and jealousies, jars, squabbles, wars,

Then peace again. The man who seeks to fix

These restless feelings, and to subjugate

Them to some regular law, is just as wise

As one who'd try to lay down rules by which

Men should go mad.[53]

Now, is not this inconstancy and mutability of mind enough to deter any

one by its own deformity? We are to demonstrate, as was said of every

perturbation, that there are no such feelings which do not consist

entirely of opinion and judgment, and are not owing to ourselves. For

if love were natural, all would be in love, and always so, and all love

the same object; nor would one be deterred by shame, another by

reflection, another by satiety.

XXXVI. Anger, too, when it disturbs the mind any time, leaves no room

to doubt its being madness: by the instigation of which we see such

contention as this between brothers:

Where was there ever impudence like thine?

Who on thy malice ever could refine?[54]

You know what follows: for abuses are thrown out by these brothers with

great bitterness in every other verse; so that you may easily know them

for the sons of Atreus, of that Atreus who invented a new punishment

for his brother:

I who his cruel heart to gall am bent,

Some new, unheard-of torment must invent.

Now, what were these inventions? Hear Thyestes:

My impious brother fain would have me eat

My children, and thus serves them up for meat.

To what length now will not anger go? even as far as madness. Therefore

we say, properly enough, that angry men have given up their power, that

is, they are out of the power of advice, reason, and understanding; for

these ought to have power over the whole mind. Now, you should put

those out of the way whom they endeavor to attack till they have

recollected themselves; but what does recollection here imply but

getting together again the dispersed parts of their mind into their

proper place? or else you must beg and entreat them, if they have the

means of revenge, to defer it to another opportunity, till their anger

cools. But the expression of cooling implies, certainly, that there was

a heat raised in their minds in opposition to reason; from which

consideration that saying of Archytas is commended, who being somewhat

provoked at his steward, "How would I have treated you," said he, "if I

had not been in a passion?"

XXXVII. Where, then, are they who say that anger has its use? Can

madness be of any use? But still it is natural. Can anything be natural

that is against reason? or how is it, if anger is natural, that one

person is more inclined to anger than another? or that the lust of

revenge should cease before it has revenged itself? or that any one

should repent of what he had done in a passion? as we see that

Alexander the king did, who could scarcely keep his hands from himself,

when he had killed his favorite Clytus, so great was his compunction.

Now who that is acquainted with these instances can doubt that this

motion of the mind is altogether in opinion and voluntary? for who can

doubt that disorders of the mind, such as covetousness and a desire of

glory, arise from a great estimation of those things by which the mind

is disordered? from whence we may understand that every perturbation of

the mind is founded in opinion. And if boldness--that is to say, a firm

assurance of mind--is a kind of knowledge and serious opinion not

hastily taken up, then diffidence is a fear of an expected and

impending evil; and if hope is an expectation of good, fear must, of

course, be an expectation of evil. Thus fear and other perturbations

are evils. Therefore, as constancy proceeds from knowledge, so does

perturbation from error. Now, they who are said to be naturally

inclined to anger, or to pity, or to envy, or to any feeling of this

kind, their minds are constitutionally, as it were, in bad health; yet

they are curable, as the disposition of Socrates is said to have been;

for when Zopyrus, who professed to know the character of every one from

his person, had heaped a great many vices on him in a public assembly,

he was laughed at by others, who could perceive no such vices in

Socrates; but Socrates kept him in countenance by declaring that such

vices were natural to him, but that he had got the better of them by

his reason. Therefore, as any one who has the appearance of the best

constitution may yet appear to be naturally rather inclined to some

particular disorder, so different minds may be more particularly

inclined to different diseases. But as to those men who are said to be

vicious, not by nature, but their own fault, their vices proceed from

wrong opinions of good and bad things, so that one is more prone than

another to different motions and perturbations. But, just as it is in

the case of the body, an inveterate disease is harder to be got rid of

than a sudden disorder; and it is more easy to cure a fresh tumor in

the eyes than to remove a defluxion of any continuance.

XXXVIII. But as the cause of perturbations is now discovered, for all

of them arise from the judgment or opinion, or volition, I shall put an

end to this discourse. But we ought to be assured, since the boundaries

of good and evil are now discovered, as far as they are discoverable by

man, that nothing can be desired of philosophy greater or more useful

than the discussions which we have held these four days. For besides

instilling a contempt of death, and relieving pain so as to enable men

to bear it, we have added the appeasing of grief, than which there is

no greater evil to man. For though every perturbation of mind is

grievous, and differs but little from madness, yet we are used to say

of others when they are under any perturbation, as of fear, joy, or

desire, that they are agitated and disturbed; but of those who give

themselves up to grief, that they are miserable, afflicted, wretched,

unhappy. So that it doth not seem to be by accident, but with reason

proposed by you, that I should discuss grief, and the other

perturbations separately; for there lies the spring and head of all our

miseries; but the cure of grief, and of other disorders, is one and the

same in that they are all voluntary, and founded on opinion; we take

them on ourselves because it seems right so to do. Philosophy

undertakes to eradicate this error, as the root of all our evils: let

us therefore surrender ourselves to be instructed by it, and suffer

ourselves to be cured; for while these evils have possession of us, we

not only cannot be happy, but cannot be right in our minds. We must

either deny that reason can effect anything, while, on the other hand,

nothing can be done right without reason, or else, since philosophy

depends on the deductions of reason, we must seek from her, if we would

be good or happy, every help and assistance for living well and

happily.

BOOK V.

WHETHER VIRTUE ALONE BE SUFFICIENT FOR A HAPPY LIFE.

I. This fifth day, Brutus, shall put an end to our Tusculan

Disputations: on which day we discussed your favorite subject. For I

perceive from that book which you wrote for me with the greatest

accuracy, as well as from your frequent conversation, that you are

clearly of this opinion, that virtue is of itself sufficient for a

happy life: and though it may be difficult to prove this, on account of

the many various strokes of fortune, yet it is a truth of such a nature

that we should endeavor to facilitate the proof of it. For among all

the topics of philosophy, there is not one of more dignity or

importance. For as the first philosophers must have had some inducement

to neglect everything for the search of the best state of life: surely,

the inducement must have been the hope of living happily, which

impelled them to devote so much care and pains to that study. Now, if

virtue was discovered and carried to perfection by them, and if virtue

is a sufficient security for a happy life, who can avoid thinking the

work of philosophizing excellently recommended by them, and undertaken

by me? But if virtue, as being subject to such various and uncertain

accidents, were but the slave of fortune, and were not of sufficient

ability to support herself, I am afraid that it would seem desirable

rather to offer up prayers, than to rely on our own confidence in

virtue as the foundation for our hope of a happy life. And, indeed,

when I reflect on those troubles with which I have been so severely

exercised by fortune, I begin to distrust this opinion; and sometimes

even to dread the weakness and frailty of human nature, for I am afraid

lest, when nature had given us infirm bodies, and had joined to them

incurable diseases and intolerable pains, she perhaps also gave us

minds participating in these bodily pains, and harassed also with

troubles and uneasinesses, peculiarly their own. But here I correct

myself for forming my judgment of the power of virtue more from the

weakness of others, or of myself perhaps, than from virtue itself: for

she herself (provided there is such a thing as virtue; and your uncle

Brutus has removed all doubt of it) has everything that can befall

mankind in subjection to her; and by disregarding such things, she is

far removed from being at all concerned at human accidents; and, being

free from every imperfection, she thinks that nothing which is external

to herself can concern her. But we, who increase every approaching evil

by our fear, and every present one by our grief, choose rather to

condemn the nature of things than our own errors.

II. But the amendment of this fault, and of all our other vices and

offences, is to be sought for in philosophy: and as my own inclination

and desire led me, from my earliest youth upward, to seek her

protection, so, under my present misfortunes, I have had recourse to

the same port from whence I set out, after having been tossed by a

violent tempest. O Philosophy, thou guide of life! thou discoverer of

virtue and expeller of vices! what had not only I myself, but the whole

life of man, been without you? To you it is that we owe the origin of

cities; you it was who called together the dispersed race of men into

social life; you united them together, first, by placing them near one

another, then by marriages, and lastly, by the communication of speech

and languages. You have been the inventress of laws; you have been our

instructress in morals and discipline; to you we fly for refuge; from

you we implore assistance; and as I formerly submitted to you in a

great degree, so now I surrender up myself entirely to you. For one day

spent well, and agreeably to your precepts, is preferable to an

eternity of error. Whose assistance, then, can be of more service to me

than yours, when you have bestowed on us tranquillity of life, and

removed the fear of death? But Philosophy is so far from being praised

as much as she has deserved by mankind, that she is wholly neglected by

most men, and actually evil spoken of by many. Can any person speak ill

of the parent of life, and dare to pollute himself thus with parricide,

and be so impiously ungrateful as to accuse her whom he ought to

reverence, even were he less able to appreciate the advantages which he

might derive from her? But this error, I imagine, and this darkness has

spread itself over the minds of ignorant men, from their not being able

to look so far back, and from their not imagining that those men by

whom human life was first improved were philosophers; for though we see

philosophy to have been of long standing, yet the name must be

acknowledged to be but modern.

III. But, indeed, who can dispute the antiquity of philosophy, either

in fact or name? For it acquired this excellent name from the ancients,

by the knowledge of the origin and causes of everything, both divine

and human. Thus those seven [Greek: Sophoi], as they were considered

and called by the Greeks, have always been esteemed and called wise men

by us; and thus Lycurgus many ages before, in whose time, before the

building of this city, Homer is said to have lived, as well as Ulysses

and Nestor in the heroic ages, are all handed down to us by tradition

as having really been what they were called, wise men; nor would it

have been said that Atlas supported the heavens, or that Prometheus was

bound to Caucasus, nor would Cepheus, with his wife, his son-in-law,

and his daughter have been enrolled among the constellations, but that

their more than human knowledge of the heavenly bodies had transferred

their names into an erroneous fable. From whence all who occupied

themselves in the contemplation of nature were both considered and

called wise men; and that name of theirs continued to the age of

Pythagoras, who is reported to have gone to Phlius, as we find it

stated by Heraclides Ponticus, a very learned man, and a pupil of

Plato, and to have discoursed very learnedly and copiously on certain

subjects with Leon, prince of the Phliasii; and when Leon, admiring his

ingenuity and eloquence, asked him what art he particularly professed,

his answer was, that he was acquainted with no art, but that he was a

philosopher. Leon, surprised at the novelty of the name, inquired what

he meant by the name of philosopher, and in what philosophers differed

from other men; on which Pythagoras replied, "That the life of man

seemed to him to resemble those games which were celebrated with the

greatest possible variety of sports and the general concourse of all

Greece. For as in those games there were some persons whose object was

glory and the honor of a crown, to be attained by the performance of

bodily exercises, so others were led thither by the gain of buying and

selling, and mere views of profit; but there was likewise one class of

persons, and they were by far the best, whose aim was neither applause

nor profit, but who came merely as spectators through curiosity, to

observe what was done, and to see in what manner things were carried on

there. And thus, said he, we come from another life and nature unto

this one, just as men come out of some other city, to some much

frequented mart; some being slaves to glory, others to money; and there

are some few who, taking no account of anything else, earnestly look

into the nature of things; and these men call themselves studious of

wisdom, that is, philosophers: and as there it is the most reputable

occupation of all to be a looker-on without making any acquisition, so

in life, the contemplating things, and acquainting one's self with

them, greatly exceeds every other pursuit of life."

IV. Nor was Pythagoras the inventor only of the name, but he enlarged

also the thing itself, and, when he came into Italy after this

conversation at Phlius, he adorned that Greece, which is called Great

Greece, both privately and publicly, with the most excellent

institutions and arts; but of his school and system I shall, perhaps,

find another opportunity to speak. But numbers and motions, and the

beginning and end of all things, were the subjects of the ancient

philosophy down to Socrates, who was a pupil of Archelaus, who had been

the disciple of Anaxagoras. These made diligent inquiry into the

magnitude of the stars, their distances, courses, and all that relates

to the heavens. But Socrates was the first who brought down philosophy

from the heavens, placed it in cities, introduced it into families, and

obliged it to examine into life and morals, and good and evil. And his

different methods of discussing questions, together with the variety of

his topics, and the greatness of his abilities, being immortalized by

the memory and writings of Plato, gave rise to many sects of

philosophers of different sentiments, of all which I have principally

adhered to that one which, in my opinion, Socrates himself followed;

and argue so as to conceal my own opinion, while I deliver others from

their errors, and so discover what has the greatest appearance of

probability in every question. And the custom Carneades adopted with

great copiousness and acuteness, and I myself have often given in to it

on many occasions elsewhere, and in this manner, too, I disputed

lately, in my Tusculan villa; indeed, I have sent you a book of the

four former days' discussions; but the fifth day, when we had seated

ourselves as before, what we were to dispute on was proposed thus:

V. _A._ I do not think virtue can possibly be sufficient for a happy

life.

_M._ But my friend Brutus thinks so, whose judgment, with submission, I

greatly prefer to yours.

_A._ I make no doubt of it; but your regard for him is not the business

now: the question is now, what is the real character of that quality of

which I have declared my opinion. I wish you to dispute on that.

_M._ What! do you deny that virtue can possibly be sufficient for a

happy life?

_A._ It is what I entirely deny.

_M._ What! is not virtue sufficient to enable us to live as we ought,

honestly, commendably, or, in fine, to live well?

_A._ Certainly sufficient.

_M._ Can you, then, help calling any one miserable who lives ill? or

will you deny that any one who you allow lives well must inevitably

live happily?

_A._ Why may I not? for a man may be upright in his life, honest,

praiseworthy, even in the midst of torments, and therefore live well.

Provided you understand what I mean by well; for when I say well, I

mean with constancy, and dignity, and wisdom, and courage; for a man

may display all these qualities on the rack; but yet the rack is

inconsistent with a happy life.

_M._ What, then? is your happy life left on the outside of the prison,

while constancy, dignity, wisdom, and the other virtues, are

surrendered up to the executioner, and bear punishment and pain without

reluctance?

_A._ You must look out for something new if you would do any good.

These things have very little effect on me, not merely from their being

common, but principally because, like certain light wines that will not

bear water, these arguments of the Stoics are pleasanter to taste than

to swallow. As when that assemblage of virtues is committed to the

rack, it raises so reverend a spectacle before our eyes that happiness

seems to hasten on towards them, and not to suffer them to be deserted

by her. But when you take your attention off from this picture and

these images of the virtues to the truth and the reality, what remains

without disguise is, the question whether any one can be happy in

torment? Wherefore let us now examine that point, and not be under any

apprehensions, lest the virtues should expostulate, and complain that

they are forsaken by happiness. For if prudence is connected with every

virtue, then prudence itself discovers this, that all good men are not

therefore happy; and she recollects many things of Marcus Atilius[55],

Quintus Cæpio[56], Marcus Aquilius[57]; and prudence herself, if these

representations are more agreeable to you than the things themselves,

restrains happiness when it is endeavoring to throw itself into

torments, and denies that it has any connection with pain and torture.

VI. _M._ I can easily bear with your behaving in this manner, though it

is not fair in you to prescribe to me how you would have me carry on

this discussion. But I ask you if I have effected anything or nothing

in the preceding days?

_A._ Yes; something was done, some little matter indeed.

_M._ But if that is the case, this question is settled, and almost put

an end to.

_A._ How so?

_M._ Because turbulent motions and violent agitations of the mind, when

it is raised and elated by a rash impulse, getting the better of

reason, leave no room for a happy life. For who that fears either pain

or death, the one of which is always present, the other always

impending, can be otherwise than miserable? Now, supposing the same

person--which is often the case--to be afraid of poverty, ignominy,

infamy, or weakness, or blindness, or, lastly, slavery, which doth not

only befall individual men, but often even the most powerful nations;

now can any one under the apprehension of these evils be happy? What

shall we say of him who not only dreads these evils as impending, but

actually feels and bears them at present? Let us unite in the same

person banishment, mourning, the loss of children; now, how can any one

who is broken down and rendered sick in body and mind by such

affliction be otherwise than very miserable indeed? What reason, again,

can there be why a man should not rightly enough be called miserable

whom we see inflamed and raging with lust, coveting everything with an

insatiable desire, and, in proportion as he derives more pleasure from

anything, thirsting the more violently after them? And as to a man

vainly elated, exulting with an empty joy, and boasting of himself

without reason, is not he so much the more miserable in proportion as

he thinks himself happier? Therefore, as these men are miserable, so,

on the other hand, those are happy who are alarmed by no fears, wasted

by no griefs, provoked by no lusts, melted by no languid pleasures that

arise from vain and exulting joys. We look on the sea as calm when not

the least breath of air disturbs its waves; and, in like manner, the

placid and quiet state of the mind is discovered when unmoved by any

perturbation. Now, if there be any one who holds the power of fortune,

and everything human, everything that can possibly befall any man, as

supportable, so as to be out of the reach of fear or anxiety, and if

such a man covets nothing, and is lifted up by no vain joy of mind,

what can prevent his being happy? And if these are the effects of

virtue, why cannot virtue itself make men happy?

VII. _A._ But the other of these two propositions is undeniable, that

they who are under no apprehensions, who are noways uneasy, who covet

nothing, who are lifted up by no vain joy, are happy: and therefore I

grant you that. But as for the other, that is not now in a fit state

for discussion; for it has been proved by your former arguments that a

wise man is free from every perturbation of mind.

_M._ Doubtless, then, the dispute is over; for the question appears to

have been entirely exhausted.

_A._ I think, indeed, that that is almost the case.

_M._ But yet that is more usually the case with the mathematicians than

philosophers. For when the geometricians teach anything, if what they

have before taught relates to their present subject, they take that for

granted which has been already proved, and explain only what they had

not written on before. But the philosophers, whatever subject they have

in hand, get together everything that relates to it, notwithstanding

they may have dilated on it somewhere else. Were not that the case, why

should the Stoics say so much on that question, Whether virtue was

abundantly sufficient to a happy life? when it would have been answer

enough that they had before taught that nothing was good but what was

honorable; for, as this had been proved, the consequence must be that

virtue was sufficient to a happy life; and each premise may be made to

follow from the admission of the other, so that if it be admitted that

virtue is sufficient to secure a happy life, it may also be inferred

that nothing is good except what is honorable. They, however, do not

proceed in this manner; for they would separate books about what is

honorable, and what is the chief good; and when they have demonstrated

from the one that virtue has power enough to make life happy, yet they

treat this point separately; for everything, and especially a subject

of such great consequence, should be supported by arguments and

exhortations which belong to that alone. For you should have a care how

you imagine philosophy to have uttered anything more noble, or that she

has promised anything more fruitful or of greater consequence, for,

good Gods! doth she not engage that she will render him who submits to

her laws so accomplished as to be always armed against fortune, and to

have every assurance within himself of living well and happily--that he

shall, in short, be forever happy? But let us see what she will

perform? In the mean while, I look upon it as a great thing that she

has even made such a promise. For Xerxes, who was loaded with all the

rewards and gifts of fortune, not satisfied with his armies of horse

and foot, nor the multitude of his ships, nor his infinite treasure of

gold, offered a reward to any one who could find out a new pleasure;

and yet, when it was discovered, he was not satisfied with it; nor can

there ever be an end to lust. I wish we could engage any one by a

reward to produce something the better to establish us in this belief.

VIII. _A._ I wish that, indeed, myself; but I want a little

information. For I allow that in what you have stated the one

proposition is the consequence of the other; that as, if what is

honorable be the only good, it must follow that a happy life is the

effect of virtue: so that if a happy life consists in virtue, nothing

can be good but virtue. But your friend Brutus, on the authority of

Aristo and Antiochus, does not see this; for he thinks the case would

be the same even if there were anything good besides virtue.

_M._ What, then? do you imagine that I am going to argue against

Brutus?

_A._ You may do what you please; for it is not for me to prescribe what

you shall do.

_M._ How these things agree together shall be examined somewhere else;

for I frequently discussed that point with Antiochus, and lately with

Aristo, when, during the period of my command as general, I was lodging

with him at Athens. For to me it seemed that no one could possibly be

happy under any evil; but a wise man might be afflicted with evil, if

there are any things arising from body or fortune deserving the name of

evils. These things were said, which Antiochus has inserted in his

books in many places--that virtue itself was sufficient to make life

happy, but yet not perfectly happy; and that many things derive their

names from the predominant portion of them, though they do not include

everything, as strength, health, riches, honor, and glory: which

qualities are determined by their kind, not their number. Thus a happy

life is so called from its being so in a great degree, even though it

should fall short in some point. To clear this up is not absolutely

necessary at present, though it seems to be said without any great

consistency; for I cannot imagine what is wanting to one that is happy

to make him happier, for if anything be wanting to him, he cannot be so

much as happy; and as to what they say, that everything is named and

estimated from its predominant portion, that may be admitted in some

things. But when they allow three kinds of evils--when any one is

oppressed with every imaginable evil of two kinds, being afflicted with

adverse fortune, and having at the same time his body worn out and

harassed with all sorts of pains--shall we say that such a one is but

little short of a happy life, to say nothing about the happiest

possible life?

IX. This is the point which Theophrastus was unable to maintain; for

after he had once laid down the position that stripes, torments,

tortures, the ruin of one's country, banishment, the loss of children,

had great influence on men's living miserably and unhappily, he durst

not any longer use any high and lofty expressions when he was so low

and abject in his opinion. How right he was is not the question; he

certainly was consistent. Therefore, I am not for objecting to

consequences where the premises are admitted. But this most elegant and

learned of all the philosophers is not taken to task very severely when

he asserts his three kinds of good; but he is attacked by every one for

that book which he wrote on a happy life, in which book he has many

arguments why one who is tortured and racked cannot be happy. For in

that book he is supposed to say that a man who is placed on the wheel

(that is a kind of torture in use among the Greeks) cannot attain to a

completely happy life. He nowhere, indeed, says so absolutely; but what

he says amounts to the same thing. Can I, then, find fault with him,

after having allowed that pains of the body are evils, that the ruin of

a man's fortunes is an evil, if he should say that every good man is

not happy, when all those things which he reckons as evils may befall a

good man? The same Theophrastus is found fault with by all the books

and schools of the philosophers for commending that sentence in his

Callisthenes,

Fortune, not wisdom, rules the life of man.

They say never did philosopher assert anything so languid. They are

right, indeed, in that; but I do not apprehend anything could be more

consistent, for if there are so many good things that depend on the

body, and so many foreign to it that depend on chance and fortune, is

it inconsistent to say that fortune, which governs everything, both

what is foreign and what belongs to the body, has greater power than

counsel. Or would we rather imitate Epicurus? who is often excellent in

many things which he speaks, but quite indifferent how consistent he

may be, or how much to the purpose he is speaking. He commends spare

diet, and in that he speaks as a philosopher; but it is for Socrates or

Antisthenes to say so, and not for one who confines all good to

pleasure. He denies that any one can live pleasantly unless he lives

honestly, wisely, and justly. Nothing is more dignified than this

assertion, nothing more becoming a philosopher, had he not measured

this very expression of living honestly, justly, and wisely by

pleasure. What could be better than to assert that fortune interferes

but little with a wise man? But does he talk thus, who, after he has

said that pain is the greatest evil, or the only evil, might himself be

afflicted with the sharpest pains all over his body, even at the time

he is vaunting himself the most against fortune? And this very thing,

too, Metrodorus has said, but in better language: "I have anticipated

you, Fortune; I have caught you, and cut off every access, so that you

cannot possibly reach me." This would be excellent in the mouth of

Aristo the Chian, or Zeno the Stoic, who held nothing to be an evil but

what was base; but for you, Metrodorus, to anticipate the approaches of

fortune, who confine all that is good to your bowels and marrow--for

you to say so, who define the chief good by a strong constitution of

body, and well-assured hope of its continuance--for you to cut off

every access of fortune! Why, you may instantly be deprived of that

good. Yet the simple are taken with these propositions, and a vast

crowd is led away by such sentences to become their followers.

X. But it is the duty of one who would argue accurately to consider not

what is said, but what is said consistently. As in that very opinion

which we have adopted in this discussion, namely, that every good man

is always happy, it is clear what I mean by good men: I call those both

wise and good men who are provided and adorned with every virtue. Let

us see, then, who are to be called happy. I imagine, indeed, that those

men are to be called so who are possessed of good without any alloy of

evil; nor is there any other notion connected with the word that

expresses happiness but an absolute enjoyment of good without any evil.

Virtue cannot attain this, if there is anything good besides itself.

For a crowd of evils would present themselves, if we were to allow

poverty, obscurity, humility, solitude, the loss of friends, acute

pains of the body, the loss of health, weakness, blindness, the ruin of

one's country, banishment, slavery, to be evils; for a wise man may be

afflicted by all these evils, numerous and important as they are, and

many others also may be added, for they are brought on by chance, which

may attack a wise man; but if these things are evils, who can maintain

that a wise man is always happy when all these evils may light on him

at the same time? I therefore do not easily agree with my friend

Brutus, nor with our common masters, nor those ancient ones, Aristotle,

Speusippus, Xenocrates, Polemon, who reckon all that I have mentioned

above as evils, and yet they say that a wise man is always happy; nor

can I allow them, because they are charmed with this beautiful and

illustrious title, which would very well become Pythagoras, Socrates,

and Plato, to persuade my mind that strength, health, beauty, riches,

honors, power, with the beauty of which they are ravished, are

contemptible, and that all those things which are the opposites of

these are not to be regarded. Then might they declare openly, with a

loud voice, that neither the attacks of fortune, nor the opinion of the

multitude, nor pain, nor poverty, occasions them any apprehensions; and

that they have everything within themselves, and that there is nothing

whatever which they consider as good but what is within their own

power. Nor can I by any means allow the same person who falls into the

vulgar opinion of good and evil to make use of these expressions, which

can only become a great and exalted man. Struck with which glory, up

starts Epicurus, who, with submission to the Gods, thinks a wise man

always happy. He is much charmed with the dignity of this opinion, but

he never would have owned that, had he attended to himself; for what is

there more inconsistent than for one who could say that pain was the

greatest or the only evil to think also that a wise man can possibly

say in the midst of his torture, How sweet is this! We are not,

therefore, to form our judgment of philosophers from detached

sentences, but from their consistency with themselves, and their

ordinary manner of talking.

XI. _A._ You compel me to be of your opinion; but have a care that you

are not inconsistent yourself.

_M._ In what respect?

_A._ Because I have lately read your fourth book on Good and Evil: and

in that you appeared to me, while disputing against Cato, to be

endeavoring to show, which in my opinion means to prove, that Zeno and

the Peripatetics differ only about some new words; but if we allow

that, what reason can there be, if it follows from the arguments of

Zeno that virtue contains all that is necessary to a happy life, that

the Peripatetics should not be at liberty to say the same? For, in my

opinion, regard should be had to the thing, not to words.

_M._ What! you would convict me from my own words, and bring against me

what I had said or written elsewhere. You may act in that manner with

those who dispute by established rules. We live from hand to mouth, and

say anything that strikes our mind with probability, so that we are the

only people who are really at liberty. But, since I just now spoke of

consistency, I do not think the inquiry in this place is, if the

opinion of Zeno and his pupil Aristo be true that nothing is good but

what is honorable; but, admitting that, then, whether the whole of a

happy life can be rested on virtue alone. Wherefore, if we certainly

grant Brutus this, that a wise man is always happy, how consistent he

is, is his own business; for who, indeed, is more worthy than himself

of the glory of that opinion? Still, we may maintain that such a man is

more happy than any one else.

XII. Though Zeno the Cittiæan, a stranger and an inconsiderable coiner

of words, appears to have insinuated himself into the old philosophy;

still, the prevalence of this opinion is due to the authority of Plato,

who often makes use of this expression, "That nothing but virtue can be

entitled to the name of good," agreeably to what Socrates says in

Plato's Gorgias; for it is there related that when some one asked him

if he did not think Archelaus the son of Perdiccas, who was then looked

upon as a most fortunate person, a very happy man, "I do not know,"

replied he, "for I never conversed with him." "What! is there no other

way you can know it by?" "None at all." "You cannot, then, pronounce of

the great king of the Persians whether he is happy or not?" "How can I,

when I do not know how learned or how good a man he is?" "What! do you

imagine that a happy life depends on that?" "My opinion entirely is,

that good men are happy, and the wicked miserable." "Is Archelaus,

then, miserable?" "Certainly, if unjust." Now, does it not appear to

you that he is here placing the whole of a happy life in virtue alone?

But what does the same man say in his funeral oration? "For," saith he,

"whoever has everything that relates to a happy life so entirely

dependent on himself as not to be connected with the good or bad

fortune of another, and not to be affected by, or made in any degree

uncertain by, what befalls another; and whoever is such a one has

acquired the best rule of living; he is that moderate, that brave, that

wise man, who submits to the gain and loss of everything, and

especially of his children, and obeys that old precept; for he will

never be too joyful or too sad, because he depends entirely upon

himself."

XIII. From Plato, therefore, all my discourse shall be deduced, as if

from some sacred and hallowed fountain. Whence can I, then, more

properly begin than from Nature, the parent of all? For whatsoever she

produces (I am not speaking only of animals, but even of those things

which have sprung from the earth in such a manner as to rest on their

own roots) she designed it to be perfect in its respective kind. So

that among trees and vines, and those lower plants and trees which

cannot advance themselves high above the earth, some are evergreen,

others are stripped of their leaves in winter, and, warmed by the

spring season, put them out afresh, and there are none of them but what

are so quickened by a certain interior motion, and their own seeds

enclosed in every one, so as to yield flowers, fruit, or berries, that

all may have every perfection that belongs to it; provided no violence

prevents it. But the force of Nature itself may be more easily

discovered in animals, as she has bestowed sense on them. For some

animals she has taught to swim, and designed to be inhabitants of the

water; others she has enabled to fly, and has willed that they should

enjoy the boundless air; some others she has made to creep, others to

walk. Again, of these very animals, some are solitary, some gregarious,

some wild, others tame, some hidden and buried beneath the earth, and

every one of these maintains the law of nature, confining itself to

what was bestowed on it, and unable to change its manner of life. And

as every animal has from nature something that distinguishes it, which

every one maintains and never quits; so man has something far more

excellent, though everything is said to be excellent by comparison. But

the human mind, being derived from the divine reason, can be compared

with nothing but with the Deity itself, if I may be allowed the

expression. This, then, if it is improved, and when its perception is

so preserved as not to be blinded by errors, becomes a perfect

understanding, that is to say, absolute reason, which is the very same

as virtue. And if everything is happy which wants nothing, and is

complete and perfect in its kind, and that is the peculiar lot of

virtue, certainly all who are possessed of virtue are happy. And in

this I agree with Brutus, and also with Aristotle, Xenocrates,

Speusippus, Polemon.

XIV. To me such are the only men who appear completely happy; for what

can he want to a complete happy life who relies on his own good

qualities, or how can he be happy who does not rely on them? But he who

makes a threefold division of goods must necessarily be diffident, for

how can he depend on having a sound body, or that his fortune shall

continue? But no one can be happy without an immovable, fixed, and

permanent good. What, then, is this opinion of theirs? So that I think

that saying of the Spartan may be applied to them, who, on some

merchant's boasting before him that he had despatched ships to every

maritime coast, replied that a fortune which depended on ropes was not

very desirable. Can there be any doubt that whatever may be lost cannot

be properly classed in the number of those things which complete a

happy life? for of all that constitutes a happy life, nothing will

admit of withering, or growing old, or wearing out, or decaying; for

whoever is apprehensive of any loss of these things cannot be happy:

the happy man should be safe, well fenced, well fortified, out of the

reach of all annoyance, not like a man under trifling apprehensions,

but free from all such. As he is not called innocent who but slightly

offends, but he who offends not at all, so it is he alone who is to be

considered without fear who is free from all fear, not he who is but in

little fear. For what else is courage but an affection of mind that is

ready to undergo perils, and patient in the endurance of pain and labor

without any alloy of fear? Now, this certainly could not be the case if

there were anything else good but what depended on honesty alone. But

how can any one be in possession of that desirable and much-coveted

security (for I now call a freedom from anxiety a security, on which

freedom a happy life depends) who has, or may have, a multitude of

evils attending him? How can he be brave and undaunted, and hold

everything as trifles which can befall a man? for so a wise man should

do, unless he be one who thinks that everything depends on himself.

Could the Lacedæmonians without this, when Philip threatened to prevent

all their attempts, have asked him if he could prevent their killing

themselves? Is it not easier, then, to find one man of such a spirit as

we are inquiring after, than to meet with a whole city of such men?

Now, if to this courage I am speaking of we add temperance, that it may

govern all our feelings and agitations, what can be wanting to complete

his happiness who is secured by his courage from uneasiness and fear,

and is prevented from immoderate desires and immoderate insolence of

joy by temperance? I could easily show that virtue is able to produce

these effects, but that I have explained on the foregoing days.

XV. But as the perturbations of the mind make life miserable, and

tranquillity renders it happy; and as these perturbations are of two

sorts, grief and fear, proceeding from imagined evils, and as

immoderate joy and lust arise from a mistake about what is good, and as

all these feelings are in opposition to reason and counsel; when you

see a man at ease, quite free and disengaged from such troublesome

commotions, which are so much at variance with one another, can you

hesitate to pronounce such a one a happy man? Now, the wise man is

always in such a disposition; therefore the wise man is always happy.

Besides, every good is pleasant; whatever is pleasant may be boasted

and talked of; whatever may be boasted of is glorious; but whatever is

glorious is certainly laudable, and whatever is laudable doubtless,

also, honorable: whatever, then, is good is honorable (but the things

which they reckon as goods they themselves do not call honorable);

therefore what is honorable alone is good. Hence it follows that a

happy life is comprised in honesty alone. Such things, then, are not to

be called or considered goods, when a man may enjoy an abundance of

them, and yet be most miserable. Is there any doubt but that a man who

enjoys the best health, and who has strength and beauty, and his senses

flourishing in their utmost quickness and perfection--suppose him

likewise, if you please, nimble and active, nay, give him riches,

honors, authority, power, glory--now, I say, should this person, who is

in possession of all these, be unjust, intemperate, timid, stupid, or

an idiot--could you hesitate to call such a one miserable? What, then,

are those goods in the possession of which you may be very miserable?

Let us see if a happy life is not made up of parts of the same nature,

as a heap implies a quantity of grain of the same kind. And if this be

once admitted, happiness must be compounded of different good things,

which alone are honorable; if there is any mixture of things of another

sort with these, nothing honorable can proceed from such a composition:

now, take away honesty, and how can you imagine anything happy? For

whatever is good is desirable on that account; whatever is desirable

must certainly be approved of; whatever you approve of must be looked

on as acceptable and welcome. You must consequently impute dignity to

this; and if so, it must necessarily be laudable: therefore, everything

that is laudable is good. Hence it follows that what is honorable is

the only good. And should we not look upon it in this light, there will

be a great many things which we must call good.

XVI. I forbear to mention riches, which, as any one, let him be ever so

unworthy, may have them, I do not reckon among goods; for what is good

is not attainable by all. I pass over notoriety and popular fame,

raised by the united voice of knaves and fools. Even things which are

absolute nothings may be called goods; such as white teeth, handsome

eyes, a good complexion, and what was commended by Euryclea, when she

was washing Ulysses's feet, the softness of his skin and the mildness

of his discourse. If you look on these as goods, what greater encomiums

can the gravity of a philosopher be entitled to than the wild opinion

of the vulgar and the thoughtless crowd? The Stoics give the name of

excellent and choice to what the others call good: they call them so,

indeed; but they do not allow them to complete a happy life. But these

others think that there is no life happy without them; or, admitting it

to be happy, they deny it to be the most happy. But our opinion is,

that it is the most happy; and we prove it from that conclusion of

Socrates. For thus that author of philosophy argued: that as the

disposition of a man's mind is, so is the man; such as the man is, such

will be his discourse; his actions will correspond with his discourse,

and his life with his actions. But the disposition of a good man's mind

is laudable; the life, therefore, of a good man is laudable; it is

honorable, therefore, because laudable; the unavoidable conclusion from

which is that the life of good men is happy. For, good Gods! did I not

make it appear, by my former arguments--or was I only amusing myself

and killing time in what I then said?--that the mind of a wise man was

always free from every hasty motion which I call a perturbation, and

that the most undisturbed peace always reigned in his breast? A man,

then, who is temperate and consistent, free from fear or grief, and

uninfluenced by any immoderate joy or desire, cannot be otherwise than

happy; but a wise man is always so, therefore he is always happy.

Moreover, how can a good man avoid referring all his actions and all

his feelings to the one standard of whether or not it is laudable? But

he does refer everything to the object of living happily: it follows,

then, that a happy life is laudable; but nothing is laudable without

virtue: a happy life, then, is the consequence of virtue. And this is

the unavoidable conclusion to be drawn from these arguments.

XVII. A wicked life has nothing which we ought to speak of or glory in;

nor has that life which is neither happy nor miserable. But there is a

kind of life that admits of being spoken of, and gloried in, and

boasted of, as Epaminondas saith,

The wings of Sparta's pride my counsels clipp'd.

And Africanus boasts,

Who, from beyond Mæotis to the place

Where the sun rises, deeds like mine can trace?

If, then, there is such a thing as a happy life, it is to be gloried

in, spoken of, and commended by the person who enjoys it; for there is

nothing excepting that which can be spoken of or gloried in; and when

that is once admitted, you know what follows. Now, unless an honorable

life is a happy life, there must, of course, be something preferable to

a happy life; for that which is honorable all men will certainly grant

to be preferable to anything else. And thus there will be something

better than a happy life: but what can be more absurd than such an

assertion? What! when they grant vice to be effectual to the rendering

life miserable, must they not admit that there is a corresponding power

in virtue to make life happy? For contraries follow from contraries.

And here I ask what weight they think there is in the balance of

Critolaus, who having put the goods of the mind into one scale, and the

goods of the body and other external advantages into the other, thought

the goods of the mind outweighed the others so far that they would

require the whole earth and sea to equalize the scale.

XVIII. What hinders Critolaus, then, or that gravest of philosophers,

Xenocrates (who raises virtue so high, and who lessens and depreciates

everything else), from not only placing a happy life, but the happiest

possible life, in virtue? And, indeed, if this were not the case,

virtue would be absolutely lost. For whoever is subject to grief must

necessarily be subject to fear too, for fear is an uneasy apprehension

of future grief; and whoever is subject to fear is liable to dread,

timidity, consternation, cowardice. Therefore, such a person may, some

time or other, be defeated, and not think himself concerned with that

precept of Atreus,

And let men so conduct themselves in life,

As to be always strangers to defeat.

But such a man, as I have said, will be defeated; and not only

defeated, but made a slave of. But we would have virtue always free,

always invincible; and were it not so, there would be an end of virtue.

But if virtue has in herself all that is necessary for a good life, she

is certainly sufficient for happiness: virtue is certainly sufficient,

too, for our living with courage; if with courage, then with a

magnanimous spirit, and indeed so as never to be under any fear, and

thus to be always invincible. Hence it follows that there can be

nothing to be repented of, no wants, no lets or hinderances. Thus all

things will be prosperous, perfect, and as you would have them, and,

consequently, happy; but virtue is sufficient for living with courage,

and therefore virtue is able by herself to make life happy. For as

folly, even when possessed of what it desires, never thinks it has

acquired enough, so wisdom is always satisfied with the present, and

never repents on her own account.

XIX. Look but on the single consulship of Lælius, and that, too, after

having been set aside (though when a wise and good man like him is

outvoted, the people are disappointed of a good consul, rather than be

disappointed by a vain people); but the point is, would you prefer,

were it in your power, to be once such a consul as Lælius, or be

elected four times, like Cinna? I have no doubt in the world what

answer you will make, and it is on that account I put the question to

you.

I would not ask every one this question; for some one perhaps might

answer that he would not only prefer four consulates to one, but even

one day of Cinna's life to whole ages of many famous men. Lælius would

have suffered had he but touched any one with his finger; but Cinna

ordered the head of his colleague consul, Cn. Octavius, to be struck

off; and put to death P. Crassus[58], and L. Cæsar[59], those excellent

men, so renowned both at home and abroad; and even M. Antonius[60], the

greatest orator whom I ever heard; and C. Cæsar, who seems to me to

have been the pattern of humanity, politeness, sweetness of temper, and

wit. Could he, then, be happy who occasioned the death of these men? So

far from it, that he seems to be miserable, not only for having

performed these actions, but also for acting in such a manner that it

was lawful for him to do it, though it is unlawful for any one to do

wicked actions; but this proceeds from inaccuracy, of speech, for we

call whatever a man is allowed to do lawful. Was not Marius happier, I

pray you, when he shared the glory of the victory gained over the

Cimbrians with his colleague Catulus (who was almost another Lælius;

for I look upon the two men as very like one another), than when,

conqueror in the civil war, he in a passion answered the friends of

Catulus, who were interceding for him, "Let him die?" And this answer

he gave, not once only, but often. But in such a case, he was happier

who submitted to that barbarous decree than he who issued it. And it is

better to receive an injury than to do one; and so it was better to

advance a little to meet that death that was making its approaches, as

Catulus did, than, like Marius, to sully the glory of six consulships,

and disgrace his latter days, by the death of such a man.

XX. Dionysius exercised his tyranny over the Syracusans thirty-eight

years, being but twenty-five years old when he seized on the

government. How beautiful and how wealthy a city did he oppress with

slavery! And yet we have it from good authority that he was remarkably

temperate in his manner of living, that he was very active and

energetic in carrying on business, but naturally mischievous and

unjust; from which description every one who diligently inquires into

truth must inevitably see that he was very miserable. Neither did he

attain what he so greatly desired, even when he was persuaded that he

had unlimited power; for, notwithstanding he was of a good family and

reputable parents (though that is contested by some authors), and had a

very large acquaintance of intimate friends and relations, and also

some youths attached to him by ties of love after the fashion of the

Greeks, he could not trust any one of them, but committed the guard of

his person to slaves, whom he had selected from rich men's families and

made free, and to strangers and barbarians. And thus, through an unjust

desire of governing, he in a manner shut himself up in a prison.

Besides, he would not trust his throat to a barber, but had his

daughters taught to shave; so that these royal virgins were forced to

descend to the base and slavish employment of shaving the head and

beard of their father. Nor would he trust even them, when they were

grown up, with a razor; but contrived how they might burn off the hair

of his head and beard with red-hot nutshells. And as to his two wives,

Aristomache, his countrywoman, and Doris of Locris, he never visited

them at night before everything had been well searched and examined.

And as he had surrounded the place where his bed was with a broad

ditch, and made a way over it with a wooden bridge, he drew that bridge

over after shutting his bedchamber door. And as he did not dare to

stand on the ordinary pulpits from which they usually harangued the

people, he generally addressed them from a high tower. And it is said

that when he was disposed to play at ball--for he delighted much in

it--and had pulled off his clothes, he used to give his sword into the

keeping of a young man whom he was very fond of. On this, one of his

intimates said pleasantly, "You certainly trust your life with him;"

and as the young man happened to smile at this, he ordered them both to

be slain, the one for showing how he might be taken off, the other for

approving of what had been said by smiling. But he was so concerned at

what he had done that nothing affected him more during his whole life;

for he had slain one to whom he was extremely partial. Thus do weak

men's desires pull them different ways, and while they indulge one,

they act counter to another.

XXI. This tyrant, however, showed himself how happy he really was; for

once, when Damocles, one of his flatterers, was dilating in

conversation on his forces, his wealth, the greatness of his power, the

plenty he enjoyed, the grandeur of his royal palaces, and maintaining

that no one was ever happier, "Have you an inclination," said he,

"Damocles, as this kind of life pleases you, to have a taste of it

yourself, and to make a trial of the good fortune that attends me?" And

when he said that he should like it extremely, Dionysius ordered him to

be laid on a bed of gold with the most beautiful covering, embroidered

and wrought with the most exquisite work, and he dressed out a great

many sideboards with silver and embossed gold. He then ordered some

youths, distinguished for their handsome persons, to wait at his table,

and to observe his nod, in order to serve him with what he wanted.

There were ointments and garlands; perfumes were burned; tables

provided with the most exquisite meats. Damocles thought himself very

happy. In the midst of this apparatus, Dionysius ordered a bright sword

to be let down from the ceiling, suspended by a single horse-hair, so

as to hang over the head of that happy man. After which he neither cast

his eye on those handsome waiters, nor on the well-wrought plate; nor

touched any of the provisions: presently the garlands fell to pieces.

At last he entreated the tyrant to give him leave to go, for that now

he had no desire to be happy[61]. Does not Dionysius, then, seem to

have declared there can be no happiness for one who is under constant

apprehensions? But it was not now in his power to return to justice,

and restore his citizens their rights and privileges; for, by the

indiscretion of youth, he had engaged in so many wrong steps and

committed such extravagances, that, had he attempted to have returned

to a right way of thinking, he must have endangered his life.

XXII. Yet, how desirous he was of friendship, though at the same time

he dreaded the treachery of friends, appears from the story of those

two Pythagoreans: one of these had been security for his friend, who

was condemned to die; the other, to release his security, presented

himself at the time appointed for his dying: "I wish," said Dionysius,"

you would admit me as the third in your friendship." What misery was it

for him to be deprived of acquaintance, of company at his table, and of

the freedom of conversation! especially for one who was a man of

learning, and from his childhood acquainted with liberal arts, very

fond of music, and himself a tragic poet--how good a one is not to the

purpose, for I know not how it is, but in this way, more than any

other, every one thinks his own performances excellent. I never as yet

knew any poet (and I was very intimate with Aquinius), who did not

appear to himself to be very admirable. The case is this: you are

pleased with your own works; I like mine. But to return to Dionysius.

He debarred himself from all civil and polite conversation, and spent

his life among fugitives, bondmen, and barbarians; for he was persuaded

that no one could be his friend who was worthy of liberty, or had the

least desire of being free.

XXIII. Shall I not, then, prefer the life of Plato and Archytas,

manifestly wise and learned men, to his, than which nothing can

possibly be more horrid, or miserable, or detestable?

I will present you with an humble and obscure mathematician of the same

city, called Archimedes, who lived many years after; whose tomb,

overgrown with shrubs and briers, I in my quæstorship discovered, when

the Syracusans knew nothing of it, and even denied that there was any

such thing remaining; for I remembered some verses, which I had been

informed were engraved on his monument, and these set forth that on the

top of the tomb there was placed a sphere with a cylinder. When I had

carefully examined all the monuments (for there are a great many tombs

at the gate Achradinæ), I observed a small column standing out a little

above the briers, with the figure of a sphere and a cylinder upon it;

whereupon I immediately said to the Syracusans--for there were some of

their principal men with me there--that I imagined that was what I was

inquiring for. Several men, being sent in with scythes, cleared the

way, and made an opening for us. When we could get at it, and were come

near to the front of the pedestal, I found the inscription, though the

latter parts of all the verses were effaced almost half away. Thus one

of the noblest cities of Greece, and one which at one time likewise had

been very celebrated for learning, had known nothing of the monument of

its greatest genius, if it had not been discovered to them by a native

of Arpinum. But to return to the subject from which I have been

digressing. Who is there in the least degree acquainted with the Muses,

that is, with liberal knowledge, or that deals at all in learning, who

would not choose to be this mathematician rather than that tyrant? If

we look into their methods of living and their employments, we shall

find the mind of the one strengthened and improved with tracing the

deductions of reason, amused with his own ingenuity, which is the one

most delicious food of the mind; the thoughts of the other engaged in

continual murders and injuries, in constant fears by night and by day.

Now imagine a Democritus, a Pythagoras, and an Anaxagoras; what

kingdom, what riches, would you prefer to their studies and amusements?

For you must necessarily look for that excellence which we are seeking

for in that which is the most perfect part of man; but what is there

better in man than a sagacious and good mind? The enjoyment, therefore,

of that good which proceeds from that sagacious mind can alone make us

happy; but virtue is the good of the mind: it follows, therefore, that

a happy life depends on virtue. Hence proceed all things that are

beautiful, honorable, and excellent, as I said above (but this point

must, I think, be treated of more at large), and they are well stored

with joys. For, as it is clear that a happy life consists in perpetual

and unexhausted pleasures, it follows, too, that a happy life must

arise from honesty.

XXIV. But that what I propose to demonstrate to you may not rest on

mere words only, I must set before you the picture of something, as it

were, living and moving in the world, that may dispose us more for the

improvement of the understanding and real knowledge. Let us, then,

pitch upon some man perfectly acquainted with the most excellent arts;

let us present him for awhile to our own thoughts, and figure him to

our own imaginations. In the first place, he must necessarily be of an

extraordinary capacity; for virtue is not easily connected with dull

minds. Secondly, he must have a great desire of discovering truth, from

whence will arise that threefold production of the mind; one of which

depends on knowing things, and explaining nature; the other, in

defining what we ought to desire and what to avoid; the third, in

judging of consequences and impossibilities, in which consists both

subtlety in disputing and also clearness of judgment. Now, with what

pleasure must the mind of a wise man be affected which continually

dwells in the midst of such cares and occupations as these, when he

views the revolutions and motions of the whole world, and sees those

innumerable stars in the heavens, which, though fixed in their places,

have yet one motion in common with the whole universe, and observes the

seven other stars, some higher, some lower, each maintaining their own

course, while their motions, though wandering, have certain defined and

appointed spaces to run through! the sight of which doubtless urged and

encouraged those ancient philosophers to exercise their investigating

spirit on many other things. Hence arose an inquiry after the

beginnings, and, as it were, seeds from which all things were produced

and composed; what was the origin of every kind of thing, whether

animate or inanimate, articulately speaking or mute; what occasioned

their beginning and end, and by what alteration and change one thing

was converted into another; whence the earth originated, and by what

weights it was balanced; by what caverns the seas were supplied; by

what gravity all things being carried down tend always to the middle of

the world, which in any round body is the lowest place.

XXV. A mind employed on such subjects, and which night and day

contemplates them, contains in itself that precept of the Delphic God,

so as to "know itself," and to perceive its connection with the divine

reason, from whence it is filled with an insatiable joy. For

reflections on the power and nature of the Gods raise in us a desire of

imitating their eternity. Nor does the mind, that sees the necessary

dependences and connections that one cause has with another, think it

possible that it should be itself confined to the shortness of this

life. Those causes, though they proceed from eternity to eternity, are

governed by reason and understanding. And he who beholds them and

examines them, or rather he whose view takes in all the parts and

boundaries of things, with what tranquillity of mind does he look on

all human affairs, and on all that is nearer him! Hence proceeds the

knowledge of virtue; hence arise the kinds and species of virtues;

hence are discovered those things which nature regards as the bounds

and extremities of good and evil; by this it is discovered to what all

duties ought to be referred, and which is the most eligible manner of

life. And when these and similar points have been investigated, the

principal consequence which is deduced from them, and that which is our

main object in this discussion, is the establishment of the point, that

virtue is of itself sufficient to a happy life.

The third qualification of our wise man is the next to be considered,

which goes through and spreads itself over every part of wisdom; it is

that whereby we define each particular thing, distinguish the genus

from its species, connect consequences, draw just conclusions, and

distinguish truth from falsehood, which is the very art and science of

disputing; which is not only of the greatest use in the examination of

what passes in the world, but is likewise the most rational

entertainment, and that which is most becoming to true wisdom. Such are

its effects in retirement. Now, let our wise man be considered as

protecting the republic; what can be more excellent than such a

character? By his prudence he will discover the true interests of his

fellow-citizens; by his justice he will be prevented from applying what

belongs to the public to his own use; and, in short, he will be ever

governed by all the virtues, which are many and various. To these let

us add the advantage of his friendships; in which the learned reckon

not only a natural harmony and agreement of sentiments throughout the

conduct of life, but the utmost pleasure and satisfaction in conversing

and passing our time constantly with one another. What can be wanting

to such a life as this to make it more happy than it is? Fortune

herself must yield to a life stored with such joys. Now, if it be a

happiness to rejoice in such goods of the mind, that is to say, in such

virtues, and if all wise men enjoy thoroughly these pleasures, it must

necessarily be granted that all such are happy.

XXVI. _A._ What, when in torments and on the rack?

_M._ Do you imagine I am speaking of him as laid on roses and violets?

Is it allowable even for Epicurus (who only puts on the appearance of

being a philosopher, and who himself assumed that name for himself) to

say (though, as matters stand, I commend him for his saying) that a

wise man might at all times cry out, though he be burned, tortured, cut

to pieces, "How little I regard it!" Shall this be said by one who

defines all evil as pain, and measures every good by pleasure; who

could ridicule whatever we call either honorable or base, and could

declare of us that we were employed about words, and uttering mere

empty sounds; and that nothing is to be regarded by us but as it is

perceived to be smooth or rough by the body? What! shall such a man as

this, as I said, whose understanding is little superior to the beasts',

be at liberty to forget himself; and not only to despise fortune, when

the whole of his good and evil is in the power of fortune, but to say

that he is happy in the most racking torture, when he had actually

declared pain to be not only the greatest evil, but the only one? Nor

did he take any trouble to provide himself with those remedies which

might have enabled him to bear pain, such as firmness of mind, a shame

of doing anything base, exercise, and the habit of patience, precepts

of courage, and a manly hardiness; but he says that he supports himself

on the single recollection of past pleasures, as if any one, when the

weather was so hot as that he was scarcely able to bear it, should

comfort himself by recollecting that he was once in my country,

Arpinum, where he was surrounded on every side by cooling streams. For

I do not apprehend how past pleasures can allay present evils. But when

he says that a wise man is always happy who would have no right to say

so if he were consistent with himself, what may they not do who allow

nothing to be desirable, nothing to be looked on as good but what is

honorable? Let, then, the Peripatetics and Old Academics follow my

example, and at length leave off muttering to themselves; and openly

and with a clear voice let them be bold to say that a happy life may

not be inconsistent with the agonies of Phalaris's bull.

XXVII. But to dismiss the subtleties of the Stoics, which I am sensible

I have employed more than was necessary, let us admit of three kinds of

goods; and let them really be kinds of goods, provided no regard is had

to the body and to external circumstances, as entitled to the

appellation of good in any other sense than because we are obliged to

use them: but let those other divine goods spread themselves far in

every direction, and reach the very heavens. Why, then, may I not call

him happy, nay, the happiest of men, who has attained them? Shall a

wise man be afraid of pain? which is, indeed, the greatest enemy to our

opinion. For I am persuaded that we are prepared and fortified

sufficiently, by the disputations of the foregoing days, against our

own death or that of our friends, against grief, and the other

perturbations of the mind. But pain seems to be the sharpest adversary

of virtue; that it is which menaces us with burning torches; that it is

which threatens to crush our fortitude, and greatness of mind, and

patience. Shall virtue, then, yield to this? Shall the happy life of a

wise and consistent man succumb to this? Good. Gods! how base would

this be! Spartan boys will bear to have their bodies torn by rods

without uttering a groan. I myself have seen at Lacedæmon troops of

young men, with incredible earnestness contending together with their

hands and feet, with their teeth and nails, nay, even ready to expire,

rather than own themselves conquered. Is any country of barbarians more

uncivilized or desolate than India? Yet they have among them some that

are held for wise men, who never wear any clothes all their life long,

and who bear the snow of Caucasus, and the piercing cold of winter,

without any pain; and who if they come in contact with fire endure

being burned without a groan. The women, too, in India, on the death of

their husbands have a regular contest, and apply to the judge to have

it determined which of them was best beloved by him; for it is

customary there for one man to have many wives. She in whose favor it

is determined exults greatly, and being attended by her relations, is

laid on the funeral pile with her husband; the others, who are

postponed, walk away very much dejected. Custom can never be superior

to nature, for nature is never to be got the better of. But our minds

are infected by sloth and idleness, and luxury, and languor, and

indolence: we have enervated them by opinions and bad customs. Who is

there who is unacquainted with the customs of the Egyptians? Their

minds being tainted by pernicious opinions, they are ready to bear any

torture rather than hurt an ibis, a snake, a cat, a dog, or a

crocodile; and should any one inadvertently have hurt any of these

animals, he will submit to any punishment. I am speaking of men only.

As to the beasts, do they not bear cold and hunger, running about in

woods, and on mountains and deserts? Will they not fight for their

young ones till they are wounded? Are they afraid of any attacks or

blows? I mention not what the ambitious will suffer for honor's sake,

or those who are desirous of praise on account of glory, or lovers to

gratify their lust. Life is full of such instances.

XXVIII. But let us not dwell too much on these questions, but rather

let us return to our subject. I say, and say again, that happiness will

submit even to be tormented; and that in pursuit of justice, and

temperance, and still more especially and principally fortitude, and

greatness of soul, and patience, it will not stop short at sight of the

executioner; and when all other virtues proceed calmly to the torture,

that one will never halt, as I said, on the outside and threshold of

the prison; for what can be baser, what can carry a worse appearance,

than to be left alone, separated from those beautiful attendants? Not,

however, that this is by any means possible; for neither can the

virtues hold together without happiness, nor happiness without the

virtues; so that they will not suffer her to desert them, but will

carry her along with them, to whatever torments, to whatever pain they

are led. For it is the peculiar quality of a wise man to do nothing

that he may repent of, nothing against his inclination, but always to

act nobly, with constancy, gravity, and honesty; to depend on nothing

as certainty; to wonder at nothing, when it falls out, as if it

appeared strange and unexpected to him; to be independent of every one,

and abide by his own opinion. For my part, I cannot form an idea of

anything happier than this. The conclusion of the Stoics is indeed

easy; for since they are persuaded that the end of good is to live

agreeably to nature, and to be consistent with that--as a wise man

should do so, not only because it is his duty, but because it is in his

power--it must, of course, follow that whoever has the chief good in

his power has his happiness so too. And thus the life of a wise man is

always happy. You have here what I think may be confidently said of a

happy life; and as things now stand, very truly also, unless you can

advance something better.

XXIX. _A._ Indeed I cannot; but I should be glad to prevail on you,

unless it is troublesome (as you are under no confinement from

obligations to any particular sect, but gather from all of them

whatever strikes you most as having the appearance of probability), as

you just now seemed to advise the Peripatetics and the Old Academy

boldly to speak out without reserve, "that wise men are always the

happiest"--I should be glad to hear how you think it consistent for

them to say so, when you have said so much against that opinion, and

the conclusions of the Stoics.

_M._ I will make use, then, of that liberty which no one has the

privilege of using in philosophy but those of our school, whose

discourses determine nothing, but take in everything, leaving them

unsupported by the authority of any particular person, to be judged of

by others, according to their weight. And as you seem desirous of

knowing how it is that, notwithstanding the different opinions of

philosophers with regard to the ends of goods, virtue has still

sufficient security for the effecting of a happy life--which security,

as we are informed, Carneades used indeed to dispute against; but he

disputed as against the Stoics, whose opinions he combated with great

zeal and vehemence. I, however, shall handle the question with more

temper; for if the Stoics have rightly settled the _ends_ of goods, the

affair is at an end; for a wise man must necessarily be always happy.

But let us examine, if we can, the particular opinions of the others,

that so this excellent decision, if I may so call it, in favor of a

happy life, may be agreeable to the opinions and discipline of all.

XXX. These, then, are the opinions, as I think, that are held and

defended--the first four are simple ones: "that nothing is good but

what is honest," according to the Stoics; "nothing good but pleasure,"

as Epicurus maintains; "nothing good but a freedom from pain," as

Hieronymus[62] asserts; "nothing good but an enjoyment of the

principal, or all, or the greatest goods of nature," as Carneades

maintained against the Stoics--these are simple, the others are mixed

propositions. Then there are three kinds of goods: the greatest being

those of the mind; the next best those of the body; the third are

external goods, as the Peripatetics call them, and the Old Academics

differ very little from them. Dinomachus[63] and Callipho[64] have

coupled pleasure with honesty; but Diodorus[65] the Peripatetic has

joined indolence to honesty. These are the opinions that have some

footing; for those of Aristo,[66] Pyrrho,[67] Herillus,[68] and of some

others, are quite out of date. Now let us see what weight these men

have in them, excepting the Stoics, whose opinion I think I have

sufficiently defended; and indeed I have explained what the

Peripatetics have to say; excepting that Theophrastus, and those who

followed him, dread and abhor pain in too weak a manner. The others may

go on to exaggerate the gravity and dignity of virtue, as usual; and

then, after they have extolled it to the skies, with the usual

extravagance of good orators, it is easy to reduce the other topics to

nothing by comparison, and to hold them up to contempt. They who think

that praise deserves to be sought after, even at the expense of pain,

are not at liberty to deny those men to be happy who have obtained it.

Though they may be under some evils, yet this name of happy has a very

wide application.

XXXI. For even as trading is said to be lucrative, and farming

advantageous, not because the one never meets with any loss, nor the

other with any damage from the inclemency of the weather, but because

they succeed in general; so life may be properly called happy, not from

its being entirely made up of good things, but because it abounds with

these to a great and considerable degree. By this way of reasoning,

then, a happy life may attend virtue even to the moment of execution;

nay, may descend with her into Phalaris's bull, according to Aristotle,

Xenocrates, Speusippus, Polemon; and will not be gained over by any

allurements to forsake her. Of the same opinion will Calliphon and

Diodorus be; for they are both of them such friends to virtue as to

think that all things should be discarded and far removed that are

incompatible with it. The rest seem to be more hampered with these

doctrines, but yet they get clear of them; such as Epicurus,

Hieronymus, and whoever else thinks it worth while to defend the

deserted Carneades: for there is not one of them who does not think the

mind to be judge of those goods, and able sufficiently to instruct him

how to despise what has the appearance only of good or evil. For what

seems to you to be the case with Epicurus is the case also with

Hieronymus and Carneades, and, indeed, with all the rest of them; for

who is there who is not sufficiently prepared against death and pain? I

will begin, with your leave, with him whom we call soft and voluptuous.

What! does he seem, to you to be afraid of death or pain when he calls

the day of his death happy; and who, when he is afflicted by the

greatest pains, silences them all by recollecting arguments of his own

discovering? And this is not done in such a manner as to give room for

imagining that he talks thus wildly from some sudden impulse; but his

opinion of death is, that on the dissolution of the animal all sense is

lost; and what is deprived of sense is, as he thinks, what we have no

concern at all with. And as to pain, too, he has certain rules to

follow then: if it be great, the comfort is that it must be short; if

it be of long continuance, then it must be supportable. What, then? Do

those grandiloquent gentlemen state anything better than Epicurus in

opposition to these two things which distress us the most? And as to

other things, do not Epicurus and the rest of the philosophers seem

sufficiently prepared? Who is there who does not dread poverty? And yet

no true philosopher ever can dread it.

XXXII. But with how little is this man himself satisfied! No one has

said more on frugality. For when a man is far removed from those things

which occasion a desire of money, from love, ambition, or other daily

extravagance, why should he be fond of money, or concern himself at all

about it? Could the Scythian Anacharsis[69] disregard money, and shall

not our philosophers be able to do so? We are informed of an epistle of

his in these words: "Anacharsis to Hanno, greeting. My clothing is the

same as that with which the Scythians cover themselves; the hardness of

my feet supplies the want of shoes; the ground is my bed, hunger my

sauce, my food milk, cheese, and flesh. So you may come to me as to a

man in want of nothing. But as to those presents you take so much

pleasure in, you may dispose of them to your own citizens, or to the

immortal Gods." And almost all philosophers, of all schools, excepting

those who are warped from right reason by a vicious disposition, might

have been of this same opinion. Socrates, when on one occasion he saw a

great quantity of gold and silver carried in a procession, cried out,

"How many things are there which I do not want!" Xenocrates, when some

ambassadors from Alexander had brought him fifty talents, which was a

very large sum of money in those times, especially at Athens, carried

the ambassadors to sup in the Academy, and placed just a sufficiency

before them, without any apparatus. When they asked him, the next day,

to whom he wished the money which they had for him to be paid: "What!"

said he, "did you not perceive by our slight repast of yesterday that I

had no occasion for money?" But when he perceived that they were

somewhat dejected, he accepted of thirty minas, that he might not seem

to treat with disrespect the king's generosity. But Diogenes took a

greater liberty, like a Cynic, when Alexander asked him if he wanted

anything: "Just at present," said he, "I wish that you would stand a

little out of the line between me and the sun," for Alexander was

hindering him from sunning himself. And, indeed, this very man used to

maintain how much he surpassed the Persian king in his manner of life

and fortune; for that he himself was in want of nothing, while the

other never had enough; and that he had no inclination for those

pleasures of which the other could never get enough to satisfy himself;

and that the other could never obtain his.

XXXIII. You see, I imagine, how Epicurus has divided his kinds of

desires, not very acutely perhaps, but yet usefully: saying that they

are "partly natural and necessary; partly natural, but not necessary;

partly neither. That those which are necessary may be supplied almost

for nothing; for that the things which nature requires are easily

obtained." As to the second kind of desires, his opinion is that any

one may easily either enjoy or go without them. And with regard to the

third, since they are utterly frivolous, being neither allied to

necessity nor nature, he thinks that they should be entirely rooted

out. On this topic a great many arguments are adduced by the

Epicureans; and those pleasures which they do not despise in a body,

they disparage one by one, and seem rather for lessening the number of

them; for as to wanton pleasures, on which subject they say a great

deal, these, say they, are easy, common, and within any one's reach;

and they think that if nature requires them, they are not to be

estimated by birth, condition, or rank, but by shape, age, and person:

and that it is by no means difficult to refrain from them, should

health, duty, or reputation require it; but that pleasures of this kind

may be desirable, where they are attended with no inconvenience, but

can never be of any use. And the assertions which Epicurus makes with

respect to the whole of pleasure are such as show his opinion to be

that pleasure is always desirable, and to be pursued merely because it

is pleasure; and for the same reason pain is to be avoided, because it

is pain. So that a wise man will always adopt such a system of

counterbalancing as to do himself the justice to avoid pleasure, should

pain ensue from it in too great a proportion; and will submit to pain,

provided the effects of it are to produce a greater pleasure: so that

all pleasurable things, though the corporeal senses are the judges of

them, are still to be referred to the mind, on which account the body

rejoices while it perceives a present pleasure; but that the mind not

only perceives the present as well as the body, but foresees it while

it is coming, and even when it is past will not let it quite slip away.

So that a wise man enjoys a continual series of pleasures, uniting the

expectation of future pleasure to the recollection of what he has

already tasted. The like notions are applied by them to high living;

and the magnificence and expensiveness of entertainments are

deprecated, because nature is satisfied at a small expense.

XXXIV. For who does not see this, that an appetite is the best sauce?

When Darius, in his flight from the enemy, had drunk some water which

was muddy and tainted with dead bodies, he declared that he had never

drunk anything more pleasant; the fact was, that he had never drunk

before when he was thirsty. Nor had Ptolemy ever eaten when he was

hungry; for as he was travelling over Egypt, his company not keeping up

with him, he had some coarse bread presented him in a cottage, upon

which he said, "Nothing ever seemed to him pleasanter than that bread."

They relate, too, of Socrates, that, once when he was walking very fast

till the evening, on his being asked why he did so, his reply was that

he was purchasing an appetite by walking, that he might sup the better.

And do we not see what the Lacedæmonians provide in their Phiditia?

where the tyrant Dionysius supped, but told them he did not at all like

that black broth, which was their principal dish; on which he who

dressed it said, "It was no wonder, for it wanted seasoning." Dionysius

asked what that seasoning was; to which it was replied, "Fatigue in

hunting, sweating, a race on the banks of Eurotas, hunger and thirst,"

for these are the seasonings to the Lacedæmonian banquets. And this may

not only be conceived from the custom of men, but from the beasts, who

are satisfied with anything that is thrown before them, provided it is

not unnatural, and they seek no farther. Some entire cities, taught by

custom, delight in parsimony, as I said but just now of the

Lacedæmonians. Xenophon has given an account of the Persian diet, who

never, as he saith, use anything but cresses with their bread; not but

that, should nature require anything more agreeable, many things might

be easily supplied by the ground, and plants in great abundance, and of

incomparable sweetness. Add to this strength and health, as the

consequence of this abstemious way of living. Now, compare with this

those who sweat and belch, being crammed with eating, like fatted oxen;

then will you perceive that they who pursue pleasure most attain it

least; and that the pleasure of eating lies not in satiety, but

appetite.

XXXV. They report of Timotheus, a famous man at Athens, and the head of

the city, that having supped with Plato, and being extremely delighted

with his entertainment, on seeing him the next day, he said, "Your

suppers are not only agreeable while I partake of them, but the next

day also." Besides, the understanding is impaired when we are full with

overeating and drinking. There is an excellent epistle of Plato to

Dion's relations, in which there occurs as nearly as possible these

words: "When I came there, that happy life so much talked of, devoted

to Italian and Syracusan entertainments, was noways agreeable to me; to

be crammed twice a day, and never to have the night to yourself, and

the other things which are the accompaniments of this kind of life, by

which a man will never be made the wiser, but will be rendered much

less temperate; for it must be an extraordinary disposition that can be

temperate in such circumstances." How, then, can a life be pleasant

without prudence and temperance? Hence you discover the mistake of

Sardanapalus, the wealthiest king of the Assyrians, who ordered it to

be engraved on his tomb,

I still have what in food I did exhaust;

But what I left, though excellent, is lost.

"What less than this," says Aristotle, "could be inscribed on the tomb,

not of a king, but an ox?" He said that he possessed those things when

dead, which, in his lifetime, he could have no longer than while he was

enjoying them. Why, then, are riches desired? And wherein doth poverty

prevent us from being happy? In the want, I imagine, of statues,

pictures, and diversions. But if any one is delighted with these

things, have not the poor people the enjoyment of them more than they

who are the owners of them in the greatest abundance? For we have great

numbers of them displayed publicly in our city. And whatever store of

them private people have, they cannot have a great number, and they but

seldom see them, only when they go to their country seats; and some of

them must be stung to the heart when they consider how they came by

them. The day would fail me, should I be inclined to defend the cause

of poverty. The thing is manifest; and nature daily informs us how few

things there are, and how trifling they are, of which she really stands

in need.

XXXVI. Let us inquire, then, if obscurity, the want of power, or even

the being unpopular, can prevent a wise man from being happy. Observe

if popular favor, and this glory which they are so fond of, be not

attended with more uneasiness than pleasure. Our friend Demosthenes was

certainly very weak in declaring himself pleased with the whisper of a

woman who was carrying water, as is the custom in Greece, and who

whispered to another, "That is he--that is Demosthenes." What could be

weaker than this? and yet what an orator he was! But although he had

learned to speak to others, he had conversed but little with himself.

We may perceive, therefore, that popular glory is not desirable of

itself; nor is obscurity to be dreaded. "I came to Athens," saith

Democritus, "and there was no one there that knew me:" this was a

moderate and grave man who could glory in his obscurity. Shall

musicians compose their tunes to their own tastes? and shall a

philosopher, master of a much better art, seek to ascertain, not what

is most true, but what will please the people? Can anything be more

absurd than to despise the vulgar as mere unpolished mechanics, taken

singly, and to think them of consequence when collected into a body?

These wise men would contemn our ambitious pursuits and our vanities,

and would reject all the honors which the people could voluntarily

offer to them; but we know not how to despise them till we begin to

repent of having accepted them. There is an anecdote related by

Heraclitus, the natural philosopher, of Hermodorus, the chief of the

Ephesians, that he said "that all the Ephesians ought to be punished

with death for saying, when they had expelled Hermodorus out of their

city, that they would have no one among them better than another; but

that if there were any such, he might go elsewhere to some other

people." Is not this the case with the people everywhere? Do they not

hate every virtue that distinguishes itself? What! was not Aristides (I

had rather instance in the Greeks than ourselves) banished his country

for being eminently just? What troubles, then, are they free from who

have no connection whatever with the people? What is more agreeable

than a learned retirement? I speak of that learning which makes us

acquainted with the boundless extent of nature and the universe, and

which even while we remain in this world discovers to us both heaven,

earth, and sea.

XXXVII. If, then, honor and riches have no value, what is there else to

be afraid of? Banishment, I suppose; which is looked on as the greatest

evil. Now, if the evil of banishment proceeds not from ourselves, but

from the froward disposition of the people, I have just now declared

how contemptible it is. But if to leave one's country be miserable, the

provinces are full of miserable men, very few of the settlers in which

ever return to their country again. But exiles are deprived of their

property! What, then! has there not been enough said on bearing

poverty? But with regard to banishment, if we examine the nature of

things, not the ignominy of the name, how little does it differ from

constant travelling! in which some of the most famous philosophers have

spent their whole life, as Xenocrates, Crantor, Arcesilas, Lacydes,

Aristotle, Theophrastus, Zeno, Cleanthes, Chrysippus, Antipater,

Carneades, Panætius, Clitomachus, Philo, Antiochus, Posidonius, and

innumerable others, who from their first setting-out never returned

home again. Now, what ignominy can a wise man be affected with (for it

is of such a one that I am speaking) who can be guilty of nothing which

deserves it? for there is no occasion to comfort one who is banished

for his deserts. Lastly, they can easily reconcile themselves to every

accident who measure all their objects and pursuits in life by the

standard of pleasure; so that in whatever place that is supplied, there

they may live happily. Thus what Teucer said may be applied to every

case:

"Wherever I am happy is my country."

Socrates, indeed, when he was asked where he belonged to, replied, "The

world;" for he looked upon himself as a citizen and inhabitant of the

whole world. How was it with T. Altibutius? Did he not follow his

philosophical studies with the greatest satisfaction at Athens,

although he was banished? which, however, would not have happened to

him if he had obeyed the laws of Epicurus and lived peaceably in the

republic. In what was Epicurus happier, living in his own country, than

Metrodorus, who lived at Athens? Or did Plato's happiness exceed that

of Xenocrates, or Polemo, or Arcesilas? Or is that city to be valued

much that banishes all her good and wise men? Demaratus, the father of

our King Tarquin, not being able to bear the tyrant Cypselus, fled from

Corinth to Tarquinii, settled there, and had children. Was it, then, an

unwise act in him to prefer the liberty of banishment to slavery at

home?

XXXVIII. Besides the emotions of the mind, all griefs and anxieties are

assuaged by forgetting them, and turning our thoughts to pleasure.

Therefore, it was not without reason that Epicurus presumed to say that

a wise man abounds with good things, because he may always have his

pleasures; from whence it follows, as he thinks, that that point is

gained which is the subject of our present inquiry, that a wise man is

always happy. What! though he should be deprived of the senses of

seeing and hearing? Yes; for he holds those things very cheap. For, in

the first place, what are the pleasures of which we are deprived by

that dreadful thing, blindness? For though they allow other pleasures

to be confined to the senses, yet the things which are perceived by the

sight do not depend wholly on the pleasure the eyes receive; as is the

case when we taste, smell, touch, or hear; for, in respect of all these

senses, the organs themselves are the seat of pleasure; but it is not

so with the eyes. For it is the mind which is entertained by what we

see; but the mind may be entertained in many ways, even though we could

not see at all. I am speaking of a learned and a wise man, with whom to

think is to live. But thinking in the case of a wise man does not

altogether require the use of his eyes in his investigations; for if

night does not strip him of his happiness, why should blindness, which

resembles night, have that effect? For the reply of Antipater the

Cyrenaic to some women who bewailed his being blind, though it is a

little too obscene, is not without its significance. "What do you

mean?" saith he; "do you think the night can furnish no pleasure?" And

we find by his magistracies and his actions that old Appius,[70] too,

who was blind for many years, was not prevented from doing whatever was

required of him with respect either to the republic or his own affairs.

It is said that C. Drusus's house was crowded with clients. When they

whose business it was could not see how to conduct themselves, they

applied to a blind guide.

XXXIX. When I was a boy, Cn. Aufidius, a blind man, who had served the

office of prætor, not only gave his opinion in the Senate, and was

ready to assist his friends, but wrote a Greek history, and had a

considerable acquaintance with literature. Diodorus the Stoic was

blind, and lived many years at my house. He, indeed, which is scarcely

credible, besides applying himself more than usual to philosophy, and

playing on the flute, agreeably to the custom of the Pythagoreans, and

having books read to him night and day, in all which he did not want

eyes, contrived to teach geometry, which, one would think, could hardly

be done without the assistance of eyes, telling his scholars how and

where to draw every line. They relate of Asclepiades, a native of

Eretria, and no obscure philosopher, when some one asked him what

inconvenience he suffered from his blindness, that his reply was, "He

was at the expense of another servant." So that, as the most extreme

poverty may be borne if you please, as is daily the case with some in

Greece, so blindness may easily be borne, provided you have the support

of good health in other respects. Democritus was so blind he could not

distinguish white from black; but he knew the difference between good

and evil, just and unjust, honorable and base, the useful and useless,

great and small. Thus one may live happily without distinguishing

colors; but without acquainting yourself with things, you cannot; and

this man was of opinion that the intense application of the mind was

taken off by the objects that presented themselves to the eye; and

while others often could not see what was before their feet, he

travelled through all infinity. It is reported also that Homer[71] was

blind, but we observe his painting as well as his poetry. What country,

what coast, what part of Greece, what military attacks, what

dispositions of battle, what array, what ship, what motions of men and

animals, can be mentioned which he has not described in such a manner

as to enable us to see what he could not see himself? What, then! can

we imagine that Homer, or any other learned man, has ever been in want

of pleasure and entertainment for his mind? Were it not so, would

Anaxagoras, or this very Democritus, have left their estates and

patrimonies, and given themselves up to the pursuit of acquiring this

divine pleasure? It is thus that the poets who have represented

Tiresias the Augur as a wise man and blind never exhibit him as

bewailing his blindness. And Homer, too, after he had described

Polyphemus as a monster and a wild man, represents him talking with his

ram, and speaking of his good fortune, inasmuch as he could go wherever

he pleased and touch what he would. And so far he was right, for that

Cyclops was a being of not much more understanding than his ram.

XL. Now, as to the evil of being deaf. M. Crassus was a little thick of

hearing; but it was more uneasiness to him that he heard himself ill

spoken of, though, in my opinion, he did not deserve it. Our Epicureans

cannot understand Greek, nor the Greeks Latin: now, they are deaf

reciprocally as to each other's language, and we are all truly deaf

with regard to those innumerable languages which we do not understand.

They do not hear the voice of the harper; but, then, they do not hear

the grating of a saw when it is setting, or the grunting of a hog when

his throat is being cut, nor the roaring of the sea when they are

desirous of rest. And if they should chance to be fond of singing, they

ought, in the first place, to consider that many wise men lived happily

before music was discovered; besides, they may have more pleasure in

reading verses than in hearing them sung. Then, as I before referred

the blind to the pleasures of hearing, so I may the deaf to the

pleasures of sight: moreover, whoever can converse with himself doth

not need the conversation of another. But suppose all these misfortunes

to meet in one person: suppose him blind and deaf--let him be afflicted

with the sharpest pains of body, which, in the first place, generally

of themselves make an end of him; still, should they continue so long,

and the pain be so exquisite, that we should be unable to assign any

reason for our being so afflicted--still, why, good Gods! should we be

under any difficulty? For there is a retreat at hand: death is that

retreat--a shelter where we shall forever be insensible. Theodorus said

to Lysimachus, who threatened him with death, "It is a great matter,

indeed, for you to have acquired the power of a Spanish fly!" When

Perses entreated Paulus not to lead him in triumph, "That is a matter

which you have in your own power," said Paulus. I said many things

about death in our first day's disputation, when death was the subject;

and not a little the next day, when I treated of pain; which things if

you recollect, there can be no danger of your looking upon death as

undesirable, or, at least, it will not be dreadful.

That custom which is common among the Grecians at their banquets

should, in my opinion, be observed in life: Drink, say they, or leave

the company; and rightly enough; for a guest should either enjoy the

pleasure of drinking with others, or else not stay till he meets with

affronts from those that are in liquor. Thus, those injuries of fortune

which you cannot bear you should flee from.

XLI. This is the very same which is said by Epicurus and Hieronymus.

Now, if those philosophers, whose opinion it is that virtue has no

power of itself, and who say that the conduct which we denominate

honorable and laudable is really nothing, and is only an empty

circumstance set off with an unmeaning sound, can nevertheless maintain

that a wise man is always happy, what, think you, may be done by the

Socratic and Platonic philosophers? Some of these allow such

superiority to the goods of the mind as quite to eclipse what concerns

the body and all external circumstances. But others do not admit these

to be goods; they make everything depend on the mind: whose disputes

Carneades used, as a sort of honorary arbitrator, to determine. For, as

what seemed goods to the Peripatetics were allowed to be advantages by

the Stoics, and as the Peripatetics allowed no more to riches, good

health; and other things of that sort than the Stoics, when these

things were considered according to their reality, and not by mere

names, his opinion was that there was no ground for disagreeing.

Therefore, let the philosophers of other schools see how they can

establish this point also. It is very agreeable to me that they make

some professions worthy of being uttered by the mouth of a philosopher

with regard to a wise man's having always the means of living happily.

XLII. But as we are to depart in the morning, let us remember these

five days' discussions; though, indeed, I think I shall commit them to

writing: for how can I better employ the leisure which I have, of

whatever kind it is, and whatever it be owing to? And I will send these

five books also to my friend Brutus, by whom I was not only incited to

write on philosophy, but, I may say, provoked. And by so doing it is

not easy to say what service I may be of to others. At all events, in

my own various and acute afflictions, which surround me on all sides, I

cannot find any better comfort for myself.

THE NATURE OF THE GODS.

* * * * *

BOOK I.

I. There are many things in philosophy, my dear Brutus, which are not

as yet fully explained to us, and particularly (as you very well know)

that most obscure and difficult question concerning the Nature of the

Gods, so extremely necessary both towards a knowledge of the human mind

and the practice of true religion: concerning which the opinions of men

are so various, and so different from each other, as to lead strongly

to the inference that ignorance[72] is the cause, or origin, of

philosophy, and that the Academic philosophers have been prudent in

refusing their assent to things uncertain: for what is more unbecoming

to a wise man than to judge rashly? or what rashness is so unworthy of

the gravity and stability of a philosopher as either to maintain false

opinions, or, without the least hesitation, to support and defend what

he has not thoroughly examined and does not clearly comprehend?

In the question now before us, the greater part of mankind have united

to acknowledge that which is most probable, and which we are all by

nature led to suppose, namely, that there are Gods. Protagoras[73]

doubted whether there were any. Diagoras the Melian and Theodorus of

Cyrene entirely believed there were no such beings. But they who have

affirmed that there are Gods, have expressed such a variety of

sentiments on the subject, and the disagreement between them is so

great, that it would be tiresome to enumerate their opinions; for they

give us many statements respecting the forms of the Gods, and their

places of abode, and the employment of their lives. And these are

matters on which the philosophers differ with the most exceeding

earnestness. But the most considerable part of the dispute is, whether

they are wholly inactive, totally unemployed, and free from all care

and administration of affairs; or, on the contrary, whether all things

were made and constituted by them from the beginning; and whether they

will continue to be actuated and governed by them to eternity. This is

one of the greatest points in debate; and unless this is decided,

mankind must necessarily remain in the greatest of errors, and ignorant

of what is most important to be known.

II. For there are some philosophers, both ancient and modern, who have

conceived that the Gods take not the least cognizance of human affairs.

But if their doctrine be true, of what avail is piety, sanctity, or

religion? for these are feelings and marks of devotion which are

offered to the Gods by men with uprightness and holiness, on the ground

that men are the objects of the attention of the Gods, and that many

benefits are conferred by the immortal Gods on the human race. But if

the Gods have neither the power nor the inclination to help us; if they

take no care of us, and pay no regard to our actions; and if there is

no single advantage which can possibly accrue to the life of man; then

what reason can we have to pay any adoration, or any honors, or to

prefer any prayers to them? Piety, like the other virtues, cannot have

any connection with vain show or dissimulation; and without piety,

neither sanctity nor religion can be supported; the total subversion of

which must be attended with great confusion and disturbance in life.

I do not even know, if we cast off piety towards the Gods, but that

faith, and all the associations of human life, and that most excellent

of all virtues, justice, may perish with it.

There are other philosophers, and those, too, very great and

illustrious men, who conceive the whole world to be directed and

governed by the will and wisdom of the Gods; nor do they stop here, but

conceive likewise that the Deities consult and provide for the

preservation of mankind. For they think that the fruits, and the

produce of the earth, and the seasons, and the variety of weather, and

the change of climates, by which all the productions of the earth are

brought to maturity, are designed by the immortal Gods for the use of

man. They instance many other things, which shall be related in these

books; and which would almost induce us to believe that the immortal

Gods had made them all expressly and solely for the benefit and

advantage of men. Against these opinions Carneades has advanced so much

that what he has said should excite a desire in men who are not

naturally slothful to search after truth; for there is no subject on

which the learned as well as the unlearned differ so strenuously as in

this; and since their opinions are so various, and so repugnant one to

another, it is possible that none of them may be, and absolutely

impossible that more than one should be, right.

III. Now, in a cause like this, I may be able to pacify well-meaning

opposers, and to confute invidious censurers, so as to induce the

latter to repent of their unreasonable contradiction, and the former to

be glad to learn; for they who admonish one in a friendly spirit should

be instructed, they who attack one like enemies should be repelled. But

I observe that the several books which I have lately published[74] have

occasioned much noise and various discourse about them; some people

wondering what the reason has been why I have applied myself so

suddenly to the study of philosophy, and others desirous of knowing

what my opinion is on such subjects. I likewise perceive that many

people wonder at my following that philosophy[75] chiefly which seems

to take away the light, and to bury and envelop things in a kind of

artificial night, and that I should so unexpectedly have taken up the

defence of a school that has been long neglected and forsaken. But it

is a mistake to suppose that this application to philosophical studies

has been sudden on my part. I have applied myself to them from my

youth, at no small expense of time and trouble; and I have been in the

habit of philosophizing a great deal when I least seemed to think about

it; for the truth of which I appeal to my orations, which are filled

with quotations from philosophers, and to my intimacy with those very

learned men who frequented my house and conversed daily with me,

particularly Diodorus, Philo, Antiochus, and Posidonius,[76] under whom

I was bred; and if all the precepts of philosophy are to have reference

to the conduct of life, I am inclined to think that I have advanced,

both in public and private affairs, only such principles as may be

supported by reason and authority.

IV. But if any one should ask what has induced me, in the decline of

life, to write on these subjects, nothing is more easily answered; for

when I found myself entirely disengaged from business, and the

commonwealth reduced to the necessity of being governed by the

direction and care of one man,[77] I thought it becoming, for the sake

of the public, to instruct my countrymen in philosophy, and that it

would be of importance, and much to the honor and commendation of our

city, to have such great and excellent subjects introduced in the Latin

tongue. I the less repent of my undertaking, since I plainly see that I

have excited in many a desire, not only of learning, but of writing;

for we have had several Romans well grounded in the learning of the

Greeks who were unable to communicate to their countrymen what they had

learned, because they looked upon it as impossible to express that in

Latin which they had received from the Greeks. In this point I think I

have succeeded so well that what I have done is not, even in

copiousness of expression, inferior to that language.

Another inducement to it was a melancholy disposition of mind, and the

great and heavy oppression of fortune that was upon me; from which, if

I could have found any surer remedy, I would not have sought relief in

this pursuit. But I could procure ease by no means better than by not

only applying myself to books, but by devoting myself to the

examination of the whole body of philosophy. And every part and branch

of this is readily discovered when every question is propounded in

writing; for there is such an admirable continuation and series of

things that each seems connected with the other, and all appear linked

together and united.

V. Now, those men who desire to know my own private opinion on every

particular subject have more curiosity than is necessary. For the force

of reason in disputation is to be sought after rather than authority,

since the authority of the teacher is often a disadvantage to those who

are willing to learn; as they refuse to use their own judgment, and

rely implicitly on him whom they make choice of for a preceptor. Nor

could I ever approve this custom of the Pythagoreans, who, when they

affirmed anything in disputation, and were asked why it was so, used to

give this answer: "He himself has said it;" and this "he himself," it

seems, was Pythagoras. Such was the force of prejudice and opinion that

his authority was to prevail even without argument or reason.

They who wonder at my being a follower of this sect in particular may

find a satisfactory answer in my four books of Academical Questions.

But I deny that I have undertaken the protection of what is neglected

and forsaken; for the opinions of men do not die with them, though they

may perhaps want the author's explanation. This manner of

philosophizing, of disputing all things and assuming nothing certainly,

was begun by Socrates, revived by Arcesilaus, confirmed by Carneades,

and has descended, with all its power, even to the present age; but I

am informed that it is now almost exploded even in Greece. However, I

do not impute that to any fault in the institution of the Academy, but

to the negligence of mankind. If it is difficult to know all the

doctrines of any one sect, how much more is it to know those of every

sect! which, however, must necessarily be known to those who resolve,

for the sake of discovering truth, to dispute for or against all

philosophers without partiality.

I do not profess myself to be master of this difficult and noble

faculty; but I do assert that I have endeavored to make myself so; and

it is impossible that they who choose this manner of philosophizing

should not meet at least with something worthy their pursuit. I have

spoken more fully on this head in another place. But as some are too

slow of apprehension, and some too careless, men stand in perpetual

need of caution. For we are not people who believe that there is

nothing whatever which is true; but we say that some falsehoods are so

blended with all truths, and have so great a resemblance to them, that

there is no certain rule for judging of or assenting to propositions;

from which this maxim also follows, that many things are probable,

which, though they are not evident to the senses, have still so

persuasive and beautiful an aspect that a wise man chooses to direct

his conduct by them.

VI. Now, to free myself from the reproach of partiality, I propose to

lay before you the opinions of various philosophers concerning the

nature of the Gods, by which means all men may judge which of them are

consistent with truth; and if all agree together, or if any one shall

be found to have discovered what may be absolutely called truth, I will

then give up the Academy as vain and arrogant. So I may cry out, in the

words of Statius, in the Synephebi,

Ye Gods, I call upon, require, pray, beseech, entreat, and

implore the attention of my countrymen all, both young and

old;

yet not on so trifling an occasion as when the person in the play

complains that,

In this city we have discovered a most flagrant iniquity:

here is a professed courtesan, who refuses money from her

lover;

but that they may attend, know, and consider what sentiments they ought

to preserve concerning religion, piety, sanctity, ceremonies, faith,

oaths, temples, shrines, and solemn sacrifices; what they ought to

think of the auspices over which I preside;[78] for all these have

relation to the present question. The manifest disagreement among the

most learned on this subject creates doubts in those who imagine they

have some certain knowledge of the subject.

Which fact I have often taken notice of elsewhere, and I did so more

especially at the discussion that was held at my friend C. Cotta's

concerning the immortal Gods, and which was carried on with the

greatest care, accuracy, and precision; for coming to him at the time

of the Latin holidays,[79] according to his own invitation and message

from him, I found him sitting in his study,[80] and in a discourse with

C. Velleius, the senator, who was then reputed by the Epicureans the

ablest of our countrymen. Q. Lucilius Balbus was likewise there, a

great proficient in the doctrine of the Stoics, and esteemed equal to

the most eminent of the Greeks in that part of knowledge. As soon as

Cotta saw me, You are come, says he, very seasonably; for I am having a

dispute with Velleius on an important subject, which, considering the

nature of your studies, is not improper for you to join in.

VII. Indeed, says I, I think I am come very seasonably, as you say; for

here are three chiefs of three principal sects met together. If M.

Piso[81] was present, no sect of philosophy that is in any esteem would

want an advocate. If Antiochus's book, replies Cotta, which he lately

sent to Balbus, says true, you have no occasion to wish for your friend

Piso; for Antiochus is of the opinion that the Stoics do not differ

from the Peripatetics in fact, though they do in words; and I should be

glad to know what you think of that book, Balbus. I? says he. I wonder

that Antiochus, a man of the clearest apprehension, should not see what

a vast difference there is between the Stoics, who distinguish the

honest and the profitable, not only in name, but absolutely in kind,

and the Peripatetics, who blend the honest with the profitable in such

a manner that they differ only in degrees and proportion, and not in

kind. This is not a little difference in words, but a great one in

things; but of this hereafter. Now, if you think fit, let us return to

what we began with.

With all my heart, says Cotta. But that this visitor (looking at me),

who is just come in, may not be ignorant of what we are upon, I will

inform him that we were discoursing on the nature of the Gods;

concerning which, as it is a subject that always appeared very obscure

to me, I prevailed on Velleius to give us the sentiments of Epicurus.

Therefore, continues he, if it is not troublesome, Velleius, repeat

what you have already stated to us. I will, says he, though this

new-comer will be no advocate for me, but for you; for you have both,

adds he, with a smile, learned from the same Philo to be certain of

nothing.[82] What we have learned from him, replied I, Cotta will

discover; but I would not have you think I am come as an assistant to

him, but as an auditor, with an impartial and unbiassed mind, and not

bound by any obligation to defend any particular principle, whether I

like or dislike it.

VIII. After this, Velleius, with the confidence peculiar to his sect,

dreading nothing so much as to seem to doubt of anything, began as if

he had just then descended from the council of the Gods, and Epicurus's

intervals of worlds. Do not attend, says he, to these idle and

imaginary tales; nor to the operator and builder of the World, the God

of Plato's Timæus; nor to the old prophetic dame, the [Greek: Pronoia]

of the Stoics, which the Latins call Providence; nor to that round,

that burning, revolving deity, the World, endowed with sense and

understanding; the prodigies and wonders, not of inquisitive

philosophers, but of dreamers!

For with what eyes of the mind was your Plato able to see that

workhouse of such stupendous toil, in which he makes the world to be

modelled and built by God? What materials, what tools, what bars, what

machines, what servants, were employed in so vast a work? How could the

air, fire, water, and earth pay obedience and submit to the will of the

architect? From whence arose those five forms,[83] of which the rest

were composed, so aptly contributing to frame the mind and produce the

senses? It is tedious to go through all, as they are of such a sort

that they look more like things to be desired than to be discovered.

But, what is more remarkable, he gives us a world which has been not

only created, but, if I may so say, in a manner formed with hands, and

yet he says it is eternal. Do you conceive him to have the least skill

in natural philosophy who is capable of thinking anything to be

everlasting that had a beginning? For what can possibly ever have been

put together which cannot be dissolved again? Or what is there that had

a beginning which will not have an end? If your Providence, Lucilius,

is the same as Plato's God, I ask you, as before, who were the

assistants, what were the engines, what was the plan and preparation of

the whole work? If it is not the same, then why did she make the world

mortal, and not everlasting, like Plato's God?

IX. But I would demand of you both, why these world-builders started up

so suddenly, and lay dormant for so many ages? For we are not to

conclude that, if there was no world, there were therefore no ages. I

do not now speak of such ages as are finished by a certain number of

days and nights in annual courses; for I acknowledge that those could

not be without the revolution of the world; but there was a certain

eternity from infinite time, not measured by any circumscription of

seasons; but how that was in space we cannot understand, because we

cannot possibly have even the slightest idea of time before time was. I

desire, therefore, to know, Balbus, why this Providence of yours was

idle for such an immense space of time? Did she avoid labor? But that

could have no effect on the Deity; nor could there be any labor, since

all nature, air, fire, earth, and water would obey the divine essence.

What was it that incited the Deity to act the part of an ædile, to

illuminate and decorate the world? If it was in order that God might be

the better accommodated in his habitation, then he must have been

dwelling an infinite length of time before in darkness as in a dungeon.

But do we imagine that he was afterward delighted with that variety

with which we see the heaven and earth adorned? What entertainment

could that be to the Deity? If it was any, he would not have been

without it so long.

Or were these things made, as you almost assert, by God for the sake of

men? Was it for the wise? If so, then this great design was adopted for

the sake of a very small number. Or for the sake of fools? First of

all, there was no reason why God should consult the advantage of the

wicked; and, further, what could be his object in doing so, since all

fools are, without doubt, the most miserable of men, chiefly because

they are fools? For what can we pronounce more deplorable than folly?

Besides, there are many inconveniences in life which the wise can learn

to think lightly of by dwelling rather on the advantages which they

receive; but which fools are unable to avoid when they are coming, or

to bear when they are come.

X. They who affirm the world to be an animated and intelligent being

have by no means discovered the nature of the mind, nor are able to

conceive in what form that essence can exist; but of that I shall speak

more hereafter. At present I must express my surprise at the weakness

of those who endeavor to make it out to be not only animated and

immortal, but likewise happy, and round, because Plato says that is the

most beautiful form; whereas I think a cylinder, a square, a cone, or a

pyramid more beautiful. But what life do they attribute to that round

Deity? Truly it is a being whirled about with a celerity to which

nothing can be even conceived by the imagination as equal; nor can I

imagine how a settled mind and happy life can consist in such motion,

the least degree of which would be troublesome to us. Why, therefore,

should it not be considered troublesome also to the Deity? For the

earth itself, as it is part of the world, is part also of the Deity. We

see vast tracts of land barren and uninhabitable; some, because they

are scorched by the too near approach of the sun; others, because they

are bound up with frost and snow, through the great distance which the

sun is from them. Therefore, if the world is a Deity, as these are

parts of the world, some of the Deity's limbs must be said to be

scorched, and some frozen.

These are your doctrines, Lucilius; but what those of others are I will

endeavor to ascertain by tracing them back from the earliest of ancient

philosophers. Thales the Milesian, who first inquired after such

subjects, asserted water to be the origin of things, and that God was

that mind which formed all things from water. If the Gods can exist

without corporeal sense, and if there can be a mind without a body, why

did he annex a mind to water?

It was Anaximander's opinion that the Gods were born; that after a

great length of time they died; and that they are innumerable worlds.

But what conception can we possibly have of a Deity who is not eternal?

Anaximenes, after him, taught that the air is God, and that he was

generated, and that he is immense, infinite, and always in motion; as

if air, which has no form, could possibly be God; for the Deity must

necessarily be not only of some form or other, but of the most

beautiful form. Besides, is not everything that had a beginning subject

to mortality?

XI. Anaxagoras, who received his learning from Anaximenes, was the

first who affirmed the system and disposition of all things to be

contrived and perfected by the power and reason of an infinite mind; in

which infinity he did not perceive that there could be no conjunction

of sense and motion, nor any sense in the least degree, where nature

herself could feel no impulse. If he would have this mind to be a sort

of animal, then there must be some more internal principle from whence

that animal should receive its appellation. But what can be more

internal than the mind? Let it, therefore, be clothed with an external

body. But this is not agreeable to his doctrine; but we are utterly

unable to conceive how a pure simple mind can exist without any

substance annexed to it.

Alcmæon of Crotona, in attributing a divinity to the sun, the moon, and

the rest of the stars, and also to the mind, did not perceive that he

was ascribing immortality to mortal beings.

Pythagoras, who supposed the Deity to be one soul, mixing with and

pervading all nature, from which our souls are taken, did not consider

that the Deity himself must, in consequence of this doctrine, be maimed

and torn with the rending every human soul from it; nor that, when the

human mind is afflicted (as is the case in many instances), that part

of the Deity must likewise be afflicted, which cannot be. If the human

mind were a Deity, how could it be ignorant of any thing? Besides, how

could that Deity, if it is nothing but soul, be mixed with, or infused

into, the world?

Then Xenophanes, who said that everything in the world which had any

existence, with the addition of intellect, was God, is as liable to

exception as the rest, especially in relation to the infinity of it, in

which there can be nothing sentient, nothing composite.

Parmenides formed a conceit to himself of something circular like a

crown. (He names it Stephane.) It is an orb of constant light and heat

around the heavens; this he calls God; in which there is no room to

imagine any divine form or sense. And he uttered many other absurdities

on the same subject; for he ascribed a divinity to war, to discord, to

lust, and other passions of the same kind, which are destroyed by

disease, or sleep, or oblivion, or age. The same honor he gives to the

stars; but I shall forbear making any objections to his system here,

having already done it in another place.

XII. Empedocles, who erred in many things, is most grossly mistaken in

his notion of the Gods. He lays down four natures[84] as divine, from

which he thinks that all things were made. Yet it is evident that they

have a beginning, that they decay, and that they are void of all sense.

Protagoras did not seem to have any idea of the real nature of the

Gods; for he acknowledged that he was altogether ignorant whether there

are or are not any, or what they are.

What shall I say of Democritus, who classes our images of objects, and

their orbs, in the number of the Gods; as he does that principle

through which those images appear and have their influence? He deifies

likewise our knowledge and understanding. Is he not involved in a very

great error? And because nothing continues always in the same state, he

denies that anything is everlasting, does he not thereby entirely

destroy the Deity, and make it impossible to form any opinion of him?

Diogenes of Apollonia looks upon the air to be a Deity. But what sense

can the air have? or what divine form can be attributed to it?

It would be tedious to show the uncertainty of Plato's opinion; for, in

his Timæus, he denies the propriety of asserting that there is one

great father or creator of the world; and, in his book of Laws, he

thinks we ought not to make too strict an inquiry into the nature of

the Deity. And as for his statement when he asserts that God is a being

without any body--what the Greeks call [Greek: asômatos]--it is

certainly quite unintelligible how that theory can possibly be true;

for such a God must then necessarily be destitute of sense, prudence,

and pleasure; all which things are comprehended in our notion of the

Gods. He likewise asserts in his Timæus, and in his Laws, that the

world, the heavens, the stars, the mind, and those Gods which are

delivered down to us from our ancestors, constitute the Deity. These

opinions, taken separately, are apparently false; and, together, are

directly inconsistent with each other.

Xenophon has committed almost the same mistakes, but in fewer words. In

those sayings which he has related of Socrates, he introduces him

disputing the lawfulness of inquiring into the form of the Deity, and

makes him assert the sun and the mind to be Deities: he represents him

likewise as affirming the being of one God only, and at another time of

many; which are errors of almost the same kind which I before took

notice of in Plato.

XIII. Antisthenes, in his book called the Natural Philosopher, says

that there are many national and one natural Deity; but by this saying

he destroys the power and nature of the Gods. Speusippus is not much

less in the wrong; who, following his uncle Plato, says that a certain

incorporeal power governs everything; by which he endeavors to root out

of our minds the knowledge of the Gods.

Aristotle, in his third book of Philosophy, confounds many things

together, as the rest have done; but he does not differ from his master

Plato. At one time he attributes all divinity to the mind, at another

he asserts that the world is God. Soon afterward he makes some other

essence preside over the world, and gives it those faculties by which,

with certain revolutions, he may govern and preserve the motion of it.

Then he asserts the heat of the firmament to be God; not perceiving the

firmament to be part of the world, which in another place he had

described as God. How can that divine sense of the firmament be

preserved in so rapid a motion? And where do the multitude of Gods

dwell, if heaven itself is a Deity? But when this philosopher says that

God is without a body, he makes him an irrational and insensible being.

Besides, how can the world move itself, if it wants a body? Or how, if

it is in perpetual self-motion, can it be easy and happy?

Xenocrates, his fellow-pupil, does not appear much wiser on this head,

for in his books concerning the nature of the Gods no divine form is

described; but he says the number of them is eight. Five are moving

planets;[85] the sixth is contained in all the fixed stars; which,

dispersed, are so many several members, but, considered together, are

one single Deity; the seventh is the sun; and the eighth the moon. But

in what sense they can possibly be happy is not easy to be understood.

From the same school of Plato, Heraclides of Pontus stuffed his books

with puerile tales. Sometimes he thinks the world a Deity, at other

times the mind. He attributes divinity likewise to the wandering stars.

He deprives the Deity of sense, and makes his form mutable; and, in the

same book again, he makes earth and heaven Deities.

The unsteadiness of Theophrastus is equally intolerable. At one time he

attributes a divine prerogative to the mind; at another, to the

firmament; at another, to the stars and celestial constellations.

Nor is his disciple Strato, who is called the naturalist, any more

worthy to be regarded; for he thinks that the divine power is diffused

through nature, which is the cause of birth, increase, and diminution,

but that it has no sense nor form.

XIV. Zeno (to come to your sect, Balbus) thinks the law of nature to be

the divinity, and that it has the power to force us to what is right,

and to restrain us from what is wrong. How this law can be an animated

being I cannot conceive; but that God is so we would certainly

maintain. The same person says, in another place, that the sky is God;

but can we possibly conceive that God is a being insensible, deaf to

our prayers, our wishes, and our vows, and wholly unconnected with us?

In other books he thinks there is a certain rational essence pervading

all nature, indued with divine efficacy. He attributes the same power

to the stars, to the years, to the months, and to the seasons. In his

interpretation of Hesiod's Theogony,[86] he entirely destroys the

established notions of the Gods; for he excludes Jupiter, Juno, and

Vesta, and those esteemed divine, from the number of them; but his

doctrine is that these are names which by some kind of allusion are

given to mute and inanimate beings. The sentiments of his disciple

Aristo are not less erroneous. He thought it impossible to conceive the

form of the Deity, and asserts that the Gods are destitute of sense;

and he is entirely dubious whether the Deity is an animated being or

not.

Cleanthes, who next comes under my notice, a disciple of Zeno at the

same time with Aristo, in one place says that the world is God; in

another, he attributes divinity to the mind and spirit of universal

nature; then he asserts that the most remote, the highest, the

all-surrounding, the all-enclosing and embracing heat, which is called

the sky, is most certainly the Deity. In the books he wrote against

pleasure, in which he seems to be raving, he imagines the Gods to have

a certain form and shape; then he ascribes all divinity to the stars;

and, lastly, he thinks nothing more divine than reason. So that this

God, whom we know mentally and in the speculations of our minds, from

which traces we receive our impression, has at last actually no visible

form at all.

XV. Persæus, another disciple of Zeno, says that they who have made

discoveries advantageous to the life of man should be esteemed as Gods;

and the very things, he says, which are healthful and beneficial have

derived their names from those of the Gods; so that he thinks it not

sufficient to call them the discoveries of Gods, but he urges that they

themselves should be deemed divine. What can be more absurd than to

ascribe divine honors to sordid and deformed things; or to place among

the Gods men who are dead and mixed with the dust, to whose memory all

the respect that could be paid would be but mourning for their loss?

Chrysippus, who is looked upon as the most subtle interpreter of the

dreams of the Stoics, has mustered up a numerous band of unknown Gods;

and so unknown that we are not able to form any idea about them, though

our mind seems capable of framing any image to itself in its thoughts.

For he says that the divine power is placed in reason, and in the

spirit and mind of universal nature; that the world, with a universal

effusion of its spirit, is God; that the superior part of that spirit,

which is the mind and reason, is the great principle of nature,

containing and preserving the chain of all things; that the divinity is

the power of fate, and the necessity of future events. He deifies fire

also, and what I before called the ethereal spirit, and those elements

which naturally proceed from it--water, earth, and air. He attributes

divinity to the sun, moon, stars, and universal space, the grand

container of all things, and to those men likewise who have obtained

immortality. He maintains the sky to be what men call Jupiter; the air,

which pervades the sea, to be Neptune; and the earth, Ceres. In like

manner he goes through the names of the other Deities. He says that

Jupiter is that immutable and eternal law which guides and directs us

in our manners; and this he calls fatal necessity, the everlasting

verity of future events. But none of these are of such a nature as to

seem to carry any indication of divine virtue in them. These are the

doctrines contained in his first book of the Nature of the Gods. In the

second, he endeavors to accommodate the fables of Orpheus, Musæus,

Hesiod, and Homer to what he has advanced in the first, in order that

the most ancient poets, who never dreamed of these things, may seem to

have been Stoics. Diogenes the Babylonian was a follower of the

doctrine of Chrysippus; and in that book which he wrote, entitled "A

Treatise concerning Minerva," he separates the account of Jupiter's

bringing-forth, and the birth of that virgin, from the fabulous, and

reduces it to a natural construction.

XVI. Thus far have I been rather exposing the dreams of dotards than

giving the opinions of philosophers. Not much more absurd than these

are the fables of the poets, who owe all their power of doing harm to

the sweetness of their language; who have represented the Gods as

enraged with anger and inflamed with lust; who have brought before our

eyes their wars, battles, combats, wounds; their hatreds, dissensions,

discords, births, deaths, complaints, and lamentations; their

indulgences in all kinds of intemperance; their adulteries; their

chains; their amours with mortals, and mortals begotten by immortals.

To these idle and ridiculous flights of the poets we may add the

prodigious stories invented by the Magi, and by the Egyptians also,

which were of the same nature, together with the extravagant notions of

the multitude at all times, who, from total ignorance of the truth, are

always fluctuating in uncertainty.

Now, whoever reflects on the rashness and absurdity of these tenets

must inevitably entertain the highest respect and veneration for

Epicurus, and perhaps even rank him in the number of those beings who

are the subject of this dispute; for he alone first founded the idea of

the existence of the Gods on the impression which nature herself hath

made on the minds of all men. For what nation, what people are there,

who have not, without any learning, a natural idea, or prenotion, of a

Deity? Epicurus calls this [Greek: prolêpsis]; that is, an antecedent

conception of the fact in the mind, without which nothing can be

understood, inquired after, or discoursed on; the force and advantage

of which reasoning we receive from that celestial volume of Epicurus

concerning the Rule and Judgment of Things.

XVII. Here, then, you see the foundation of this question clearly laid;

for since it is the constant and universal opinion of mankind,

independent of education, custom, or law, that there are Gods, it must

necessarily follow that this knowledge is implanted in our minds, or,

rather, innate in us. That opinion respecting which there is a general

agreement in universal nature must infallibly be true; therefore it

must be allowed that there are Gods; for in this we have the

concurrence, not only of almost all philosophers, but likewise of the

ignorant and illiterate. It must be also confessed that the point is

established that we have naturally this idea, as I said before, or

prenotion, of the existence of the Gods. As new things require new

names, so that prenotion was called [Greek: prolêpsis] by Epicurus; an

appellation never used before. On the same principle of reasoning, we

think that the Gods are happy and immortal; for that nature which hath

assured us that there are Gods has likewise imprinted in our minds the

knowledge of their immortality and felicity; and if so, what Epicurus

hath declared in these words is true: "That which is eternally happy

cannot be burdened with any labor itself, nor can it impose any labor

on another; nor can it be influenced by resentment or favor: because

things which are liable to such feelings must be weak and frail." We

have said enough to prove that we should worship the Gods with piety,

and without superstition, if that were the only question.

For the superior and excellent nature of the Gods requires a pious

adoration from men, because it is possessed of immortality and the most

exalted felicity; for whatever excels has a right to veneration, and

all fear of the power and anger of the Gods should be banished; for we

must understand that anger and affection are inconsistent with the

nature of a happy and immortal being. These apprehensions being

removed, no dread of the superior powers remains. To confirm this

opinion, our curiosity leads us to inquire into the form and life and

action of the intellect and spirit of the Deity.

XVIII. With regard to his form, we are directed partly by nature and

partly by reason. All men are told by nature that none but a human form

can be ascribed to the Gods; for under what other image did it ever

appear to any one either sleeping or waking? and, without having

recourse to our first notions,[87] reason itself declares the same; for

as it is easy to conceive that the most excellent nature, either

because of its happiness or immortality, should be the most beautiful,

what composition of limbs, what conformation of lineaments, what form,

what aspect, can be more beautiful than the human? Your sect, Lucilius

(not like my friend Cotta, who sometimes says one thing and sometimes

another), when they represent the divine art and workmanship in the

human body, are used to describe how very completely each member is

formed, not only for convenience, but also for beauty. Therefore, if

the human form excels that of all other animal beings, as God himself

is an animated being, he must surely be of that form which is the most

beautiful. Besides, the Gods are granted to be perfectly happy; and

nobody can be happy without virtue, nor can virtue exist where reason

is not; and reason can reside in none but the human form; the Gods,

therefore, must be acknowledged to be of human form; yet that form is

not body, but something like body; nor does it contain any blood, but

something like blood. Though these distinctions were more acutely

devised and more artfully expressed by Epicurus than any common

capacity can comprehend; yet, depending on your understanding, I shall

be more brief on the subject than otherwise I should be. Epicurus, who

not only discovered and understood the occult and almost hidden secrets

of nature, but explained them with ease, teaches that the power and

nature of the Gods is not to be discerned by the senses, but by the

mind; nor are they to be considered as bodies of any solidity, or

reducible to number, like those things which, because of their

firmness, he calls [Greek: Steremnia];[88] but as images, perceived by

similitude and transition. As infinite kinds of those images result

from innumerable individuals, and centre in the Gods, our minds and

understanding are directed towards and fixed with the greatest delight

on them, in order to comprehend what that happy and eternal essence is.

XIX. Surely the mighty power of the Infinite Being is most worthy our

great and earnest contemplation; the nature of which we must

necessarily understand to be such that everything in it is made to

correspond completely to some other answering part. This is called by

Epicurus [Greek: isonomia]; that is to say, an equal distribution or

even disposition of things. From hence he draws this inference, that,

as there is such a vast multitude of mortals, there cannot be a less

number of immortals; and if those which perish are innumerable, those

which are preserved ought also to be countless. Your sect, Balbus,

frequently ask us how the Gods live, and how they pass their time?

Their life is the most happy, and the most abounding with all kinds of

blessings, which can be conceived. They do nothing. They are

embarrassed with no business; nor do they perform any work. They

rejoice in the possession of their own wisdom and virtue. They are

satisfied that they shall ever enjoy the fulness of eternal pleasures.

XX. Such a Deity may properly be called happy; but yours is a most

laborious God. For let us suppose the world a Deity--what can be a more

uneasy state than, without the least cessation, to be whirled about the

axle-tree of heaven with a surprising celerity? But nothing can be

happy that is not at ease. Or let us suppose a Deity residing in the

world, who directs and governs it, who preserves the courses of the

stars, the changes of the seasons, and the vicissitudes and orders of

things, surveying the earth and the sea, and accommodating them to the

advantage and necessities of man. Truly this Deity is embarrassed with

a very troublesome and laborious office. We make a happy life to

consist in a tranquillity of mind, a perfect freedom from care, and an

exemption from all employment. The philosopher from whom we received

all our knowledge has taught us that the world was made by nature; that

there was no occasion for a workhouse to frame it in; and that, though

you deny the possibility of such a work without divine skill, it is so

easy to her, that she has made, does make, and will make innumerable

worlds. But, because you do not conceive that nature is able to produce

such effects without some rational aid, you are forced, like the tragic

poets, when you cannot wind up your argument in any other way, to have

recourse to a Deity, whose assistance you would not seek, if you could

view that vast and unbounded magnitude of regions in all parts; where

the mind, extending and spreading itself, travels so far and wide that

it can find no end, no extremity to stop at. In this immensity of

breadth, length, and height, a most boundless company of innumerable

atoms are fluttering about, which, notwithstanding the interposition of

a void space, meet and cohere, and continue clinging to one another;

and by this union these modifications and forms of things arise, which,

in your opinions, could not possibly be made without the help of

bellows and anvils. Thus you have imposed on us an eternal master, whom

we must dread day and night. For who can be free from fear of a Deity

who foresees, regards, and takes notice of everything; one who thinks

all things his own; a curious, ever-busy God?

Hence first arose your [Greek: Heimarmenê], as you call it, your fatal

necessity; so that, whatever happens, you affirm that it flows from an

eternal chain and continuance of causes. Of what value is this

philosophy, which, like old women and illiterate men, attributes

everything to fate? Then follows your [Greek: mantikê], in Latin called

_divinatio_, divination; which, if we would listen to you, would plunge

us into such superstition that we should fall down and worship your

inspectors into sacrifices, your augurs, your soothsayers, your

prophets, and your fortune-tellers.

Epicurus having freed us from these terrors and restored us to liberty,

we have no dread of those beings whom we have reason to think entirely

free from all trouble themselves, and who do not impose any on others.

We pay our adoration, indeed, with piety and reverence to that essence

which is above all excellence and perfection. But I fear my zeal for

this doctrine has made me too prolix. However, I could not easily leave

so eminent and important a subject unfinished, though I must confess I

should rather endeavor to hear than speak so long.

XXI. Cotta, with his usual courtesy, then began. Velleius, says he,

were it not for something which you have advanced, I should have

remained silent; for I have often observed, as I did just now upon

hearing you, that I cannot so easily conceive why a proposition is true

as why it is false. Should you ask me what I take the nature of the

Gods to be, I should perhaps make no answer. But if you should ask

whether I think it to be of that nature which you have described, I

should answer that I was as far as possible from agreeing with you.

However, before I enter on the subject of your discourse and what you

have advanced upon it, I will give you my opinion of yourself. Your

intimate friend, L. Crassus, has been often heard by me to say that you

were beyond all question superior to all our learned Romans; and that

few Epicureans in Greece were to be compared to you. But as I knew what

a wonderful esteem he had for you, I imagined that might make him the

more lavish in commendation of you. Now, however, though I do not

choose to praise any one when present, yet I must confess that I think

you have delivered your thoughts clearly on an obscure and very

intricate subject; that you are not only copious in your sentiments,

but more elegant in your language than your sect generally are. When I

was at Athens, I went often to hear Zeno, by the advice of Philo, who

used to call him the chief of the Epicureans; partly, probably, in

order to judge more easily how completely those principles could be

refuted after I had heard them stated by the most learned of the

Epicureans. And, indeed, he did not speak in any ordinary manner; but,

like you, with clearness, gravity, and elegance; yet what frequently

gave me great uneasiness when I heard him, as it did while I attended

to you, was to see so excellent a genius falling into such frivolous

(excuse my freedom), not to say foolish, doctrines. However, I shall

not at present offer anything better; for, as I said before, we can in

most subjects, especially in physics, sooner discover what is not true

than what is.

XXII. If you should ask me what God is, or what his character and

nature are, I should follow the example of Simonides, who, when Hiero

the tyrant proposed the same question to him, desired a day to consider

of it. When he required his answer the next day, Simonides begged two

days more; and as he kept constantly desiring double the number which

he had required before instead of giving his answer, Hiero, with

surprise, asked him his meaning in doing so: "Because," says he, "the

longer I meditate on it, the more obscure it appears to me." Simonides,

who was not only a delightful poet, but reputed a wise and learned man

in other branches of knowledge, found, I suppose, so many acute and

refined arguments occurring to him, that he was doubtful which was the

truest, and therefore despaired of discovering any truth.

But does your Epicurus (for I had rather contend with him than with

you) say anything that is worthy the name of philosophy, or even of

common-sense?

In the question concerning the nature of the Gods, his first inquiry

is, whether there are Gods or not. It would be dangerous, I believe, to

take the negative side before a public auditory; but it is very safe in

a discourse of this kind, and in this company. I, who am a priest, and

who think that religions and ceremonies ought sacredly to be

maintained, am certainly desirous to have the existence of the Gods,

which is the principal point in debate, not only fixed in opinion, but

proved to a demonstration; for many notions flow into and disturb the

mind which sometimes seem to convince us that there are none. But see

how candidly I will behave to you: as I shall not touch upon those

tenets you hold in common with other philosophers, consequently I shall

not dispute the existence of the Gods, for that doctrine is agreeable

to almost all men, and to myself in particular; but I am still at

liberty to find fault with the reasons you give for it, which I think

are very insufficient.

XXIII. You have said that the general assent of men of all nations and

all degrees is an argument strong enough to induce us to acknowledge

the being of the Gods. This is not only a weak, but a false, argument;

for, first of all, how do you know the opinions of all nations? I

really believe there are many people so savage that they have no

thoughts of a Deity. What think you of Diagoras, who was called the

atheist; and of Theodorus after him? Did not they plainly deny the very

essence of a Deity? Protagoras of Abdera, whom you just now mentioned,

the greatest sophist of his age, was banished by order of the Athenians

from their city and territories, and his books were publicly burned,

because these words were in the beginning of his treatise concerning

the Gods: "I am unable to arrive at any knowledge whether there are, or

are not, any Gods." This treatment of him, I imagine, restrained many

from professing their disbelief of a Deity, since the doubt of it only

could not escape punishment. What shall we say of the sacrilegious, the

impious, and the perjured? If Tubulus Lucius, Lupus, or Carbo the son

of Neptune, as Lucilius says, had believed that there were Gods, would

either of them have carried his perjuries and impieties to such excess?

Your reasoning, therefore, to confirm your assertion is not so

conclusive as you think it is. But as this is the manner in which other

philosophers have argued on the same subject, I will take no further

notice of it at present; I rather choose to proceed to what is properly

your own.

I allow that there are Gods. Instruct me, then, concerning their

origin; inform me where they are, what sort of body, what mind, they

have, and what is their course of life; for these I am desirous of

knowing. You attribute the most absolute power and efficacy to atoms.

Out of them you pretend that everything is made. But there are no

atoms, for there is nothing without body; every place is occupied by

body, therefore there can be no such thing as a vacuum or an atom.

XXIV. I advance these principles of the naturalists without knowing

whether they are true or false; yet they are more like truth than those

statements of yours; for they are the absurdities in which Democritus,

or before him Leucippus, used to indulge, saying that there are certain

light corpuscles--some smooth, some rough, some round, some square,

some crooked and bent as bows--which by a fortuitous concourse made

heaven and earth, without the influence of any natural power. This

opinion, C. Velleius, you have brought down to these our times; and you

would sooner be deprived of the greatest advantages of life than of

that authority; for before you were acquainted with those tenets, you

thought that you ought to profess yourself an Epicurean; so that it was

necessary that you should either embrace these absurdities or lose the

philosophical character which you had taken upon you; and what could

bribe you to renounce the Epicurean opinion? Nothing, you say, can

prevail on you to forsake the truth and the sure means of a happy life.

But is that the truth? for I shall not contest your happy life, which

you think the Deity himself does not enjoy unless he languishes in

idleness. But where is truth? Is it in your innumerable worlds, some of

which are rising, some falling, at every moment of time? Or is it in

your atomical corpuscles, which form such excellent works without the

direction of any natural power or reason? But I was forgetting my

liberality, which I had promised to exert in your case, and exceeding

the bounds which I at first proposed to myself. Granting, then,

everything to be made of atoms, what advantage is that to your

argument? For we are searching after the nature of the Gods; and

allowing them to be made of atoms, they cannot be eternal, because

whatever is made of atoms must have had a beginning: if so, there were

no Gods till there was this beginning; and if the Gods have had a

beginning, they must necessarily have an end, as you have before

contended when you were discussing Plato's world. Where, then, is your

beatitude and immortality, in which two words you say that God is

expressed, the endeavor to prove which reduces you to the greatest

perplexities? For you said that God had no body, but something like

body; and no blood, but something like blood.

XXV. It is a frequent practice among you, when you assert anything that

has no resemblance to truth, and wish to avoid reprehension, to advance

something else which is absolutely and utterly impossible, in order

that it may seem to your adversaries better to grant that point which

has been a matter of doubt than to keep on pertinaciously contradicting

you on every point: like Epicurus, who, when he found that if his atoms

were allowed to descend by their own weight, our actions could not be

in our own power, because their motions would be certain and necessary,

invented an expedient, which escaped Democritus, to avoid necessity. He

says that when the atoms descend by their own weight and gravity, they

move a little obliquely. Surely, to make such an assertion as this is

what one ought more to be ashamed of than the acknowledging ourselves

unable to defend the proposition. His practice is the same against the

logicians, who say that in all propositions in which yes or no is

required, one of them must be true; he was afraid that if this were

granted, then, in such a proposition as "Epicurus will be alive or dead

to-morrow," either one or the other must necessarily be admitted;

therefore he absolutely denied the necessity of yes or no. Can anything

show stupidity in a greater degree? Zeno,[89] being pressed by

Arcesilas, who pronounced all things to be false which are perceived by

the senses, said that some things were false, but not all. Epicurus was

afraid that if any one thing seen should be false, nothing could be

true; and therefore he asserted all the senses to be infallible

directors of truth. Nothing can be more rash than this; for by

endeavoring to repel a light stroke, he receives a heavy blow. On the

subject of the nature of the Gods, he falls into the same errors. While

he would avoid the concretion of individual bodies, lest death and

dissolution should be the consequence, he denies that the Gods have

body, but says they have something like body; and says they have no

blood, but something like blood.

XXVI. It seems an unaccountable thing how one soothsayer can refrain

from laughing when he sees another. It is yet a greater wonder that you

can refrain from laughing among yourselves. It is no body, but

something like body! I could understand this if it were applied to

statues made of wax or clay; but in regard to the Deity, I am not able

to discover what is meant by a quasi-body or quasi-blood. Nor indeed

are you, Velleius, though you will not confess so much. For those

precepts are delivered to you as dictates which Epicurus carelessly

blundered out; for he boasted, as we see in his writings, that he had

no instructor, which I could easily believe without his public

declaration of it, for the same reason that I could believe the master

of a very bad edifice if he were to boast that he had no architect but

himself: for there is nothing of the Academy, nothing of the Lyceum, in

his doctrine; nothing but puerilities. He might have been a pupil of

Xenocrates. O ye immortal Gods, what a teacher was he! And there are

those who believe that he actually was his pupil; but he says

otherwise, and I shall give more credit to his word than to another's.

He confesses that he was a pupil of a certain disciple of Plato, one

Pamphilus, at Samos; for he lived there when he was young, with his

father and his brothers. His father, Neocles, was a farmer in those

parts; but as the farm, I suppose, was not sufficient to maintain him,

he turned school-master; yet Epicurus treats this Platonic philosopher

with wonderful contempt, so fearful was he that it should be thought he

had ever had any instruction. But it is well known he had been a pupil

of Nausiphanes, the follower of Democritus; and since he could not deny

it, he loaded him with insults in abundance. If he never heard a

lecture on these Democritean principles, what lectures did he ever

hear? What is there in Epicurus's physics that is not taken from

Democritus? For though he altered some things, as what I mentioned

before of the oblique motions of the atoms, yet most of his doctrines

are the same; his atoms--his vacuum--his images--infinity of

space--innumerable worlds, their rise and decay--and almost every part

of natural learning that he treats of.

Now, do you understand what is meant by quasi-body and quasi-blood? For

I not only acknowledge that you are a better judge of it than I am, but

I can bear it without envy. If any sentiments, indeed, are communicated

without obscurity, what is there that Velleius can understand and Cotta

not? I know what body is, and what blood is; but I cannot possibly find

out the meaning of quasi-body and quasi-blood. Not that you

intentionally conceal your principles from me, as Pythagoras did his

from those who were not his disciples; or that you are intentionally

obscure, like Heraclitus. But the truth is (which I may venture to say

in this company), you do not understand them yourself.

XXVII. This, I perceive, is what you contend for, that the Gods have a

certain figure that has nothing concrete, nothing solid, nothing of

express substance, nothing prominent in it; but that it is pure,

smooth, and transparent. Let us suppose the same with the Venus of Cos,

which is not a body, but the representation of a body; nor is the red,

which is drawn there and mixed with the white, real blood, but a

certain resemblance of blood; so in Epicurus's Deity there is no real

substance, but the resemblance of substance.

Let me take for granted that which is perfectly unintelligible; then

tell me what are the lineaments and figures of these sketched-out

Deities. Here you have plenty of arguments by which you would show the

Gods to be in human form. The first is, that our minds are so

anticipated and prepossessed, that whenever we think of a Deity the

human shape occurs to us. The next is, that as the divine nature excels

all things, so it ought to be of the most beautiful form, and there is

no form more beautiful than the human; and the third is, that reason

cannot reside in any other shape.

First, let us consider each argument separately. You seem to me to

assume a principle, despotically I may say, that has no manner of

probability in it. Who was ever so blind, in contemplating these

subjects, as not to see that the Gods were represented in human form,

either by the particular advice of wise men, who thought by those means

the more easily to turn the minds of the ignorant from a depravity of

manners to the worship of the Gods; or through superstition, which was

the cause of their believing that when they were paying adoration to

these images they were approaching the Gods themselves. These conceits

were not a little improved by the poets, painters, and artificers; for

it would not have been very easy to represent the Gods planning and

executing any work in another form, and perhaps this opinion arose from

the idea which mankind have of their own beauty. But do not you, who

are so great an adept in physics, see what a soothing flatterer, what a

sort of procuress, nature is to herself? Do you think there is any

creature on the land or in the sea that is not highly delighted with

its own form? If it were not so, why would not a bull become enamored

of a mare, or a horse of a cow? Do you believe an eagle, a lion, or a

dolphin prefers any shape to its own? If nature, therefore, has

instructed us in the same manner, that nothing is more beautiful than

man, what wonder is it that we, for that reason, should imagine the

Gods are of the human form? Do you suppose if beasts were endowed with

reason that every one would not give the prize of beauty to his own

species?

XXVIII. Yet, by Hercules (I speak as I think)! though I am fond enough

of myself, I dare not say that I excel in beauty that bull which

carried Europa. For the question here is not concerning our genius and

elocution, but our species and figure. If we could make and assume to

ourselves any form, would you be unwilling to resemble the sea-triton

as he is painted supported swimming on sea-monsters whose bodies are

partly human? Here I touch on a difficult point; for so great is the

force of nature that there is no man who would not choose to be like a

man, nor, indeed, any ant that would not be like an ant. But like what

man? For how few can pretend to beauty! When I was at Athens, the whole

flock of youths afforded scarcely one. You laugh, I see; but what I

tell you is the truth. Nay, to us who, after the examples of ancient

philosophers, delight in boys, defects are often pleasing. Alcæus was

charmed with a wart on a boy's knuckle; but a wart is a blemish on the

body; yet it seemed a beauty to him. Q. Catulus, my friend and

colleague's father, was enamored with your fellow-citizen Roscius, on

whom he wrote these verses:

As once I stood to hail the rising day,

Roscius appearing on the left I spied:

Forgive me, Gods, if I presume to say

The mortal's beauty with th' immortal vied.

Roscius more beautiful than a God! yet he was then, as he now is,

squint-eyed. But what signifies that, if his defects were beauties to

Catulus?

XXIX. I return to the Gods. Can we suppose any of them to be

squint-eyed, or even to have a cast in the eye? Have they any warts?

Are any of them hook-nosed, flap-eared, beetle-browed, or jolt-headed,

as some of us are? Or are they free from imperfections? Let us grant

you that. Are they all alike in the face? For if they are many, then

one must necessarily be more beautiful than another, and then there

must be some Deity not absolutely most beautiful. Or if their faces are

all alike, there would be an Academy[90] in heaven; for if one God does

not differ from another, there is no possibility of knowing or

distinguishing them.

What if your assertion, Velleius, proves absolutely false, that no form

occurs to us, in our contemplations on the Deity, but the human? Will

you, notwithstanding that, persist in the defence of such an absurdity?

Supposing that form occurs to us, as you say it does, and we know

Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, Neptune, Vulcan, Apollo, and the other Deities,

by the countenance which painters and statuaries have given them, and

not only by their countenances, but by their decorations, their age,

and attire; yet the Egyptians, the Syrians, and almost all barbarous

nations,[91] are without such distinctions. You may see a greater

regard paid by them to certain beasts than by us to the most sacred

temples and images of the Gods; for many shrines have been rifled, and

images of the Deities have been carried from their most sacred places

by us; but we never heard that an Egyptian offered any violence to a

crocodile, an ibis, or a cat. What do you think, then? Do not the

Egyptians esteem their sacred bull, their Apis, as a Deity? Yes, by

Hercules! as certainly as you do our protectress Juno, whom you never

behold, even in your dreams, without a goat-skin, a spear, a shield,

and broad sandals. But the Grecian Juno of Argos and the Roman Juno are

not represented in this manner; so that the Grecians, the Lanuvinians,

and we, ascribe different forms to Juno; and our Capitoline Jupiter is

not the same with the Jupiter Ammon of the Africans.

XXX. Therefore, ought not a natural philosopher--that is, an inquirer

into the secrets of nature--to be ashamed of seeking a testimony to

truth from minds prepossessed by custom? According to the rule you have

laid down, it may be said that Jupiter is always bearded, Apollo always

beardless; that Minerva has gray and Neptune azure eyes; and, indeed,

we must then honor that Vulcan at Athens, made by Alcamenes, whose

lameness through his thin robes appears to be no deformity. Shall we,

therefore, receive a lame Deity because we have such an account of him?

Consider, likewise, that the Gods go by what names we give them. Now,

in the first place, they have as many names as men have languages; for

Vulcan is not called Vulcan in Italy, Africa, or Spain, as you are

called Velleius in all countries. Besides, the Gods are innumerable,

though the list of their names is of no great length even in the

records of our priests. Have they no names? You must necessarily

confess, indeed, they have none; for what occasion is there for

different names if their persons are alike?

How much more laudable would it be, Velleius, to acknowledge that you

do not know what you do not know than to follow a man whom you must

despise! Do you think the Deity is like either me or you? You do not

really think he is like either of us. What is to be done, then? Shall I

call the sun, the moon, or the sky a Deity? If so, they are

consequently happy. But what pleasures can they enjoy? And they are

wise too. But how can wisdom reside in such shapes? These are your own

principles. Therefore, if they are not of human form, as I have proved,

and if you cannot persuade yourself that they are of any other, why are

you cautious of denying absolutely the being of any Gods? You dare not

deny it--which is very prudent in you, though here you are not afraid

of the people, but of the Gods themselves. I have known Epicureans who

reverence[92] even the least images of the Gods, though I perceive it

to be the opinion of some that Epicurus, through fear of offending

against the Athenian laws, has allowed a Deity in words and destroyed

him in fact; so in those his select and short sentences, which are

called by you [Greek: kyriai doxai],[93] this, I think, is the first:

"That being which is happy and immortal is not burdened with any labor,

and does not impose any on any one else."

XXXI. In his statement of this sentence, some think that he avoided

speaking clearly on purpose, though it was manifestly without design.

But they judge ill of a man who had not the least art. It is doubtful

whether he means that there is any being happy and immortal, or that if

there is any being happy, he must likewise be immortal. They do not

consider that he speaks here, indeed, ambiguously; but in many other

places both he and Metrodorus explain themselves as clearly as you have

done. But he believed there are Gods; nor have I ever seen any one who

was more exceedingly afraid of what he declared ought to be no objects

of fear, namely, death and the Gods, with the apprehensions of which

the common rank of people are very little affected; but he says that

the minds of all mortals are terrified by them. Many thousands of men

commit robberies in the face of death; others rifle all the temples

they can get into: such as these, no doubt, must be greatly terrified,

the one by the fears of death, and the others by the fear of the Gods.

But since you dare not (for I am now addressing my discourse to

Epicurus himself) absolutely deny the existence of the Gods, what

hinders you from ascribing a divine nature to the sun, the world, or

some eternal mind? I never, says he, saw wisdom and a rational soul in

any but a human form. What! did you ever observe anything like the sun,

the moon, or the five moving planets? The sun, terminating his course

in two extreme parts of one circle,[94] finishes his annual

revolutions. The moon, receiving her light from the sun, completes the

same course in the space of a month.[95] The five planets in the same

circle, some nearer, others more remote from the earth, begin the same

courses together, and finish them in different spaces of time. Did you

ever observe anything like this, Epicurus? So that, according to you,

there can be neither sun, moon, nor stars, because nothing can exist

but what we have touched or seen.[96] What! have you ever seen the

Deity himself? Why else do you believe there is any? If this doctrine

prevails, we must reject all that history relates or reason discovers;

and the people who inhabit inland countries must not believe there is

such a thing as the sea. This is so narrow a way of thinking that if

you had been born in Seriphus, and never had been from out of that

island, where you had frequently been in the habit of seeing little

hares and foxes, you would not, therefore, believe that there are such

beasts as lions and panthers; and if any one should describe an

elephant to you, you would think that he designed to laugh at you.

XXXII. You indeed, Velleius, have concluded your argument, not after

the manner of your own sect, but of the logicians, to which your people

are utter strangers. You have taken it for granted that the Gods are

happy. I allow it. You say that without virtue no one can be happy. I

willingly concur with you in this also. You likewise say that virtue

cannot reside where reason is not. That I must necessarily allow. You

add, moreover, that reason cannot exist but in a human form. Who, do

you think, will admit that? If it were true, what occasion was there to

come so gradually to it? And to what purpose? You might have answered

it on your own authority. I perceive your gradations from happiness to

virtue, and from virtue to reason; but how do you come from reason to

human form? There, indeed, you do not descend by degrees, but

precipitately.

Nor can I conceive why Epicurus should rather say the Gods are like men

than that men are like the Gods. You ask what is the difference; for,

say you, if this is like that, that is like this. I grant it; but this

I assert, that the Gods could not take their form from men; for the

Gods always existed, and never had a beginning, if they are to exist

eternally; but men had a beginning: therefore that form, of which the

immortal Gods are, must have had existence before mankind;

consequently, the Gods should not be said to be of human form, but our

form should be called divine. However, let this be as you will. I now

inquire how this extraordinary good fortune came about; for you deny

that reason had any share in the formation of things. But still, what

was this extraordinary fortune? Whence proceeded that happy concourse

of atoms which gave so sudden a rise to men in the form of Gods? Are we

to suppose the divine seed fell from heaven upon earth, and that men

sprung up in the likeness of their celestial sires? I wish you would

assert it; for I should not be unwilling to acknowledge my relation to

the Gods. But you say nothing like it; no, our resemblance to the Gods,

it seems, was by chance. Must I now seek for arguments to refute this

doctrine seriously? I wish I could as easily discover what is true as I

can overthrow what is false.

XXXIII. You have enumerated with so ready a memory, and so copiously,

the opinions of philosophers, from Thales the Milesian, concerning the

nature of the Gods, that I am surprised to see so much learning in a

Roman. But do you think they were all madmen who thought that a Deity

could by some possibility exist without hands and feet? Does not even

this consideration have weight with you when you consider what is the

use and advantage of limbs in men, and lead you to admit that the Gods

have no need of them? What necessity can there be of feet, without

walking; or of hands, if there is nothing to be grasped? The same may

be asked of the other parts of the body, in which nothing is vain,

nothing useless, nothing superfluous; therefore we may infer that no

art can imitate the skill of nature. Shall the Deity, then, have a

tongue, and not speak--teeth, palate, and jaws, though he will have no

use for them? Shall the members which nature has given to the body for

the sake of generation be useless to the Deity? Nor would the internal

parts be less superfluous than the external. What comeliness is there

in the heart, the lungs, the liver, and the rest of them, abstracted

from their use? I mention these because you place them in the Deity on

account of the beauty of the human form.

Depending on these dreams, not only Epicurus, Metrodorus, and Hermachus

declaimed against Pythagoras, Plato, and Empedocles, but that little

harlot Leontium presumed to write against Theophrastus: indeed, she had

a neat Attic style; but yet, to think of her arguing against

Theophrastus! So much did the garden of Epicurus[97] abound with these

liberties, and, indeed, you are always complaining against them. Zeno

wrangled. Why need I mention Albutius? Nothing could be more elegant or

humane than Phædrus; yet a sharp expression would disgust the old man.

Epicurus treated Aristotle with great contumely. He foully slandered

Phædo, the disciple of Socrates. He pelted Timocrates, the brother of

his companion Metrodorus, with whole volumes, because he disagreed with

him in some trifling point of philosophy. He was ungrateful even to

Democritus, whose follower he was; and his master Nausiphanes, from

whom he learned nothing, had no better treatment from him.

XXXIV. Zeno gave abusive language not only to those who were then

living, as Apollodorus, Syllus, and the rest, but he called Socrates,

who was the father of philosophy, the Attic buffoon, using the Latin

word _Scurra_. He never called Chrysippus by any name but Chesippus.

And you yourself a little before, when you were numbering up a senate,

as we may call them, of philosophers, scrupled not to say that the most

eminent men talked like foolish, visionary dotards. Certainly,

therefore, if they have all erred in regard to the nature of the Gods,

it is to be feared there are no such beings. What you deliver on that

head are all whimsical notions, and not worthy the consideration even

of old women. For you do not seem to be in the least aware what a task

you draw on yourselves, if you should prevail on us to grant that the

same form is common to Gods and men. The Deity would then require the

same trouble in dressing, and the same care of the body, that mankind

does. He must walk, run, lie down, lean, sit, hold, speak, and

discourse. You need not be told the consequence of making the Gods male

and female.

Therefore I cannot sufficiently wonder how this chief of yours came to

entertain these strange opinions. But you constantly insist on the

certainty of this tenet, that the Deity is both happy and immortal.

Supposing he is so, would his happiness be less perfect if he had not

two feet? Or cannot that blessedness or beatitude--call it which you

will (they are both harsh terms, but we must mollify them by use)--can

it not, I say, exist in that sun, or in this world, or in some eternal

mind that has not human shape or limbs? All you say against it is, that

you never saw any happiness in the sun or the world. What, then? Did

you ever see any world but this? No, you will say. Why, therefore, do

you presume to assert that there are not only six hundred thousand

worlds, but that they are innumerable? Reason tells you so. Will not

reason tell you likewise that as, in our inquiries into the most

excellent nature, we find none but the divine nature can be happy and

eternal, so the same divine nature surpasses us in excellence of mind;

and as in mind, so in body? Why, therefore, as we are inferior in all

other respects, should we be equal in form? For human virtue approaches

nearer to the divinity than human form.

XXXV. To return to the subject I was upon. What can be more childish

than to assert that there are no such creatures as are generated in the

Red Sea or in India? The most curious inquirer cannot arrive at the

knowledge of all those creatures which inhabit the earth, sea, fens,

and rivers; and shall we deny the existence of them because we never

saw them? That similitude which you are so very fond of is nothing to

the purpose. Is not a dog like a wolf? And, as Ennius says,

The monkey, filthiest beast, how like to man!

Yet they differ in nature. No beast has more sagacity than an elephant;

yet where can you find any of a larger size? I am speaking here of

beasts. But among men, do we not see a disparity of manners in persons

very much alike, and a similitude of manners in persons unlike? If this

sort of argument were once to prevail, Velleius, observe what it would

lead to. You have laid it down as certain that reason cannot possibly

reside in any but the human form. Another may affirm that it can exist

in none but a terrestrial being; in none but a being that is born, that

grows up, and receives instruction, and that consists of a soul, and an

infirm and perishable body; in short, in none but a mortal man. But if

you decline those opinions, why should a single form disturb you? You

perceive that man is possessed of reason and understanding, with all

the infirmities which I have mentioned interwoven with his being;

abstracted from which, you nevertheless know God, you say, if the

lineaments do but remain. This is not talking considerately, but at a

venture; for surely you did not think what an encumbrance anything

superfluous or useless is, not only in a man, but a tree. How

troublesome it is to have a finger too much! And why so? Because

neither use nor ornament requires more than five; but your Deity has

not only a finger more than he wants, but a head, a neck, shoulders,

sides, a paunch, back, hams, hands, feet, thighs, and legs. Are these

parts necessary to immortality? Are they conducive to the existence of

the Deity? Is the face itself of use? One would rather say so of the

brain, the heart, the lights, and the liver; for these are the seats of

life. The features of the face contribute nothing to the preservation

of it.

XXXVI. You censured those who, beholding those excellent and stupendous

works, the world, and its respective parts--the heaven, the earth, the

seas--and the splendor with which they are adorned; who, contemplating

the sun, moon, and stars; and who, observing the maturity and changes

of the seasons, and vicissitudes of times, inferred from thence that

there must be some excellent and eminent essence that originally made,

and still moves, directs, and governs them. Suppose they should mistake

in their conjecture, yet I see what they aim at. But what is that great

and noble work which appears to you to be the effect of a divine mind,

and from which you conclude that there are Gods? "I have," say you, "a

certain information of a Deity imprinted in my mind." Of a bearded

Jupiter, I suppose, and a helmeted Minerva.

But do you really imagine them to be such? How much better are the

notions of the ignorant vulgar, who not only believe the Deities have

members like ours, but that they make use of them; and therefore they

assign them a bow and arrows, a spear, a shield, a trident, and

lightning; and though they do not behold the actions of the Gods, yet

they cannot entertain a thought of a Deity doing nothing. The Egyptians

(so much ridiculed) held no beasts to be sacred, except on account of

some advantage which they had received from them. The ibis, a very

large bird, with strong legs and a horny long beak, destroys a great

number of serpents. These birds keep Egypt from pestilential diseases

by killing and devouring the flying serpents brought from the deserts

of Lybia by the south-west wind, which prevents the mischief that may

attend their biting while alive, or any infection when dead. I could

speak of the advantage of the ichneumon, the crocodile, and the cat;

but I am unwilling to be tedious; yet I will conclude with observing

that the barbarians paid divine honors to beasts because of the

benefits they received from them; whereas your Gods not only confer no

benefit, but are idle, and do no single act of any description

whatever.

XXXVII. "They have nothing to do," your teacher says. Epicurus truly,

like indolent boys, thinks nothing preferable to idleness; yet those

very boys, when they have a holiday, entertain themselves in some

sportive exercise. But we are to suppose the Deity in such an inactive

state that if he should move we may justly fear he would be no longer

happy. This doctrine divests the Gods of motion and operation; besides,

it encourages men to be lazy, as they are by this taught to believe

that the least labor is incompatible even with divine felicity.

But let it be as you would have it, that the Deity is in the form and

image of a man. Where is his abode? Where is his habitation? Where is

the place where he is to be found? What is his course of life? And what

is it that constitutes the happiness which you assert that he enjoys?

For it seems necessary that a being who is to be happy must use and

enjoy what belongs to him. And with regard to place, even those natures

which are inanimate have each their proper stations assigned to them:

so that the earth is the lowest; then water is next above the earth;

the air is above the water; and fire has the highest situation of all

allotted to it. Some creatures inhabit the earth, some the water, and

some, of an amphibious nature, live in both. There are some, also,

which are thought to be born in fire, and which often appear fluttering

in burning furnaces.

In the first place, therefore, I ask you, Where is the habitation of

your Deity? Secondly, What motive is it that stirs him from his place,

supposing he ever moves? And, lastly, since it is peculiar to animated

beings to have an inclination to something that is agreeable to their

several natures, what is it that the Deity affects, and to what purpose

does he exert the motion of his mind and reason? In short, how is he

happy? how eternal? Whichever of these points you touch upon, I am

afraid you will come lamely off. For there is never a proper end to

reasoning which proceeds on a false foundation; for you asserted

likewise that the form of the Deity is perceptible by the mind, but not

by sense; that it is neither solid, nor invariable in number; that it

is to be discerned by similitude and transition, and that a constant

supply of images is perpetually flowing on from innumerable atoms, on

which our minds are intent; so that we from that conclude that divine

nature to be happy and everlasting.

XXXVIII. What, in the name of those Deities concerning whom we are now

disputing, is the meaning of all this? For if they exist only in

thought, and have no solidity nor substance, what difference can there

be between thinking of a Hippocentaur and thinking of a Deity? Other

philosophers call every such conformation of the mind a vain motion;

but you term it "the approach and entrance of images into the mind."

Thus, when I imagine that I behold T. Gracchus haranguing the people in

the Capitol, and collecting their suffrages concerning M. Octavius, I

call that a vain motion of the mind: but you affirm that the images of

Gracchus and Octavius are present, which are only conveyed to my mind

when they have arrived at the Capitol. The case is the same, you say,

in regard to the Deity, with the frequent representation of which the

mind is so affected that from thence it may be clearly understood that

the Gods[98] are happy and eternal.

Let it be granted that there are images by which the mind is affected,

yet it is only a certain form that occurs; and why must that form be

pronounced happy? why eternal? But what are those images you talk of,

or whence do they proceed? This loose manner of arguing is taken from

Democritus; but he is reproved by many people for it; nor can you

derive any conclusions from it: the whole system is weak and imperfect.

For what can be more improbable than that the images of Homer,

Archilochus, Romulus, Numa, Pythagoras, and Plato should come into my

mind, and yet not in the form in which they existed? How, therefore,

can they be those persons? And whose images are they? Aristotle tells

us that there never was such a person as Orpheus the poet;[99] and it

is said that the verse called Orphic verse was the invention of

Cercops, a Pythagorean; yet Orpheus, that is to say, the image of him,

as you will have it, often runs in my head. What is the reason that I

entertain one idea of the figure of the same person, and you another?

Why do we image to ourselves such things as never had any existence,

and which never can have, such as Scyllas and Chimæras? Why do we frame

ideas of men, countries, and cities which we never saw? How is it that

the very first moment that I choose I can form representations of them

in my mind? How is it that they come to me, even in my sleep, without

being called or sought after?

XXXIX. The whole affair, Velleius, is ridiculous. You do not impose

images on our eyes only, but on our minds. Such is the privilege which

you have assumed of talking nonsense with impunity. But there is, you

say, a transition of images flowing on in great crowds in such a way

that out of many some one at least must be perceived! I should be

ashamed of my incapacity to understand this if you, who assert it,

could comprehend it yourselves; for how do you prove that these images

are continued in uninterrupted motion? Or, if uninterrupted, still how

do you prove them to be eternal? There is a constant supply, you say,

of innumerable atoms. But must they, for that reason, be all eternal?

To elude this, you have recourse to equilibration (for so, with your

leave, I will call your [Greek: Isonomia]),[100] and say that as there

is a sort of nature mortal, so there must also be a sort which is

immortal. By the same rule, as there are men mortal, there are men

immortal; and as some arise from the earth, some must arise from the

water also; and as there are causes which destroy, there must likewise

be causes which preserve. Be it as you say; but let those causes

preserve which have existence themselves. I cannot conceive these your

Gods to have any. But how does all this face of things arise from

atomic corpuscles? Were there any such atoms (as there are not), they

might perhaps impel one another, and be jumbled together in their

motion; but they could never be able to impart form, or figure, or

color, or animation, so that you by no means demonstrate the

immortality of your Deity.

XL. Let us now inquire into his happiness. It is certain that without

virtue there can be no happiness; but virtue consists in action: now

your Deity does nothing; therefore he is void of virtue, and

consequently cannot be happy. What sort of life does he lead? He has a

constant supply, you say, of good things, without any intermixture of

bad. What are those good things? Sensual pleasures, no doubt; for you

know no delight of the mind but what arises from the body, and returns

to it. I do not suppose, Velleius, that you are like some of the

Epicureans, who are ashamed of those expressions of Epicurus,[101] in

which he openly avows that he has no idea of any good separate from

wanton and obscene pleasures, which, without a blush, he names

distinctly. What food, therefore, what drink, what variety of music or

flowers, what kind of pleasures of touch, what odors, will you offer to

the Gods to fill them with pleasures? The poets indeed provide them

with banquets of nectar and ambrosia, and a Hebe or a Ganymede to serve

up the cup. But what is it, Epicurus, that you do for them? For I do

not see from whence your Deity should have those things, nor how he

could use them. Therefore the nature of man is better constituted for a

happy life than the nature of the Gods, because men enjoy various kinds

of pleasures; but you look on all those pleasures as superficial which

delight the senses only by a titillation, as Epicurus calls it. Where

is to be the end of this trifling? Even Philo, who followed the

Academy, could not bear to hear the soft and luscious delights of the

Epicureans despised; for with his admirable memory he perfectly

remembered and used to repeat many sentences of Epicurus in the very

words in which they were written. He likewise used to quote many, which

were more gross, from Metrodorus, the sage colleague of Epicurus, who

blamed his brother Timocrates because he would not allow that

everything which had any reference to a happy life was to be measured

by the belly; nor has he said this once only, but often. You grant what

I say, I perceive; for you know it to be true. I can produce the books,

if you should deny it; but I am not now reproving you for referring all

things to the standard of pleasure: that is another question. What I am

now showing is, that your Gods are destitute of pleasure; and

therefore, according to your own manner of reasoning, they are not

happy.

XLI. But they are free from pain. Is that sufficient for beings who are

supposed to enjoy all good things and the most supreme felicity? The

Deity, they say, is constantly meditating on his own happiness, for he

has no other idea which can possibly occupy his mind. Consider a

little; reflect what a figure the Deity would make if he were to be

idly thinking of nothing through all eternity but "It is very well with

me, and I am happy;" nor do I see why this happy Deity should not fear

being destroyed, since, without any intermission, he is driven and

agitated by an everlasting incursion of atoms, and since images are

constantly floating off from him. Your Deity, therefore, is neither

happy nor eternal.

Epicurus, it seems, has written books concerning sanctity and piety

towards the Gods. But how does he speak on these subjects? You would

say that you were listening to Coruncanius or Scævola, the

high-priests, and not to a man who tore up all religion by the roots,

and who overthrew the temples and altars of the immortal Gods; not,

indeed, with hands, like Xerxes, but with arguments; for what reason is

there for your saying that men ought to worship the Gods, when the Gods

not only do not regard men, but are entirely careless of everything,

and absolutely do nothing at all?

But they are, you say, of so glorious and excellent a nature that a

wise man is induced by their excellence to adore them. Can there be any

glory or excellence in that nature which only contemplates its own

happiness, and neither will do, nor does, nor ever did anything?

Besides, what piety is due to a being from whom you receive nothing? Or

how can you, or any one else, be indebted to him who bestows no

benefits? For piety is only justice towards the Gods; but what right

have they to it, when there is no communication whatever between the

Gods and men? And sanctity is the knowledge of how we ought to worship

them; but I do not understand why they are to be worshipped, if we are

neither to receive nor expect any good from them.

XLII. And why should we worship them from an admiration only of that

nature in which we can behold nothing excellent? and as for that

freedom from superstition, which you are in the habit of boasting of so

much, it is easy to be free from that feeling when you have renounced

all belief in the power of the Gods; unless, indeed, you imagine that

Diagoras or Theodorus, who absolutely denied the being of the Gods,

could possibly be superstitious. I do not suppose that even Protagoras

could, who doubted whether there were Gods or not. The opinions of

these philosophers are not only destructive of superstition, which

arises from a vain fear of the Gods, but of religion also, which

consists in a pious adoration of them.

What think you of those who have asserted that the whole doctrine

concerning the immortal Gods was the invention of politicians, whose

view was to govern that part of the community by religion which reason

could not influence? Are not their opinions subversive of all religion?

Or what religion did Prodicus the Chian leave to men, who held that

everything beneficial to human life should be numbered among the Gods?

Were not they likewise void of religion who taught that the Deities, at

present the object of our prayers and adoration, were valiant,

illustrious, and mighty men who arose to divinity after death?

Euhemerus, whom our Ennius translated, and followed more than other

authors, has particularly advanced this doctrine, and treated of the

deaths and burials of the Gods; can he, then, be said to have confirmed

religion, or, rather, to have totally subverted it? I shall say nothing

of that sacred and august Eleusina, into whose mysteries the most

distant nations were initiated, nor of the solemnities in Samothrace,

or in Lemnos, secretly resorted to by night, and surrounded by thick

and shady groves; which, if they were properly explained, and reduced

to reasonable principles, would rather explain the nature of things

than discover the knowledge of the Gods.

XLIII. Even that great man Democritus, from whose fountains Epicurus

watered his little garden, seems to me to be very inferior to his usual

acuteness when speaking about the nature of the Gods. For at one time

he thinks that there are images endowed with divinity, inherent in the

universality of things; at another, that the principles and minds

contained in the universe are Gods; then he attributes divinity to

animated images, employing themselves in doing us good or harm; and,

lastly, he speaks of certain images of such vast extent that they

encompass the whole outside of the universe; all which opinions are

more worthy of the country[102] of Democritus than of Democritus

himself; for who can frame in his mind any ideas of such images? who

can admire them? who can think they merit a religious adoration?

But Epicurus, when he divests the Gods of the power of doing good,

extirpates all religion from the minds of men; for though he says the

divine nature is the best and the most excellent of all natures, he

will not allow it to be susceptible of any benevolence, by which he

destroys the chief and peculiar attribute of the most perfect being.

For what is better and more excellent than goodness and beneficence? To

refuse your Gods that quality is to say that no man is any object of

their favor, and no Gods either; that they neither love nor esteem any

one; in short, that they not only give themselves no trouble about us,

but even look on each other with the greatest indifference.

XLIV. How much more reasonable is the doctrine of the Stoics, whom you

censure? It is one of their maxims that the wise are friends to the

wise, though unknown to each other; for as nothing is more amiable than

virtue, he who possesses it is worthy our love, to whatever country he

belongs. But what evils do your principles bring, when you make good

actions and benevolence the marks of imbecility! For, not to mention

the power and nature of the Gods, you hold that even men, if they had

no need of mutual assistance, would be neither courteous nor

beneficent. Is there no natural charity in the dispositions of good

men? The very name of love, from which friendship is derived, is dear

to men;[103] and if friendship is to centre in our own advantage only,

without regard to him whom we esteem a friend, it cannot be called

friendship, but a sort of traffic for our own profit. Pastures, lands,

and herds of cattle are valued in the same manner on account of the

profit we gather from them; but charity and friendship expect no

return. How much more reason have we to think that the Gods, who want

nothing, should love each other, and employ themselves about us! If it

were not so, why should we pray to or adore them? Why do the priests

preside over the altars, and the augurs over the auspices? What have we

to ask of the Gods, and why do we prefer our vows to them?

But Epicurus, you say, has written a book concerning sanctity. A

trifling performance by a man whose wit is not so remarkable in it, as

the unrestrained license of writing which he has permitted himself; for

what sanctity can there be if the Gods take no care of human affairs?

Or how can that nature be called animated which neither regards nor

performs anything? Therefore our friend Posidonius has well observed,