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Page 62
16. Not in passivity but in activity lie the evil and the good of the
rational social animal, just as his virtue and his vice lie not in
passivity but in activity.[A]
[A] Virtutis omnis laus in actione consistit.--_Cicero_, De
Off., 1. 6.
17. For the stone which has been thrown up it is no evil to come down,
nor indeed any good to have been carried up (viii. 20).
18. Penetrate inwards into men's leading principles, and thou wilt see
what judges thou art afraid of, and what kind of judges they are of
themselves.
19. All things are changing: and thou thyself art in continuous mutation
and in a manner in continuous destruction, and the whole universe too.
20. It is thy duty to leave another man's wrongful act there where it is
(vii. 29; ix. 38).
21. Termination of activity, cessation from movement and opinion, and
in a sense their death, is no evil. Turn thy thoughts now to the
consideration of thy life, thy life as a child, as a youth, thy manhood,
thy old age, for in these also every change was a death. Is this
anything to fear? Turn thy thoughts now to thy life under thy
grandfather, then to thy life under thy mother, then to thy life under
thy father; and as thou findest many other differences and changes and
terminations, ask thyself, Is this anything to fear? In like manner,
then, neither are the termination and cessation and change of thy whole
life a thing to be afraid of.
[Illustration: THE FORUM]
22. Hasten [to examine] thy own ruling faculty and that of the universe
and that of thy neighbor: thy own, that thou mayst make it just: and
that of the universe, that thou mayst remember of what thou art a part;
and that of thy neighbor, that thou mayst know whether he has acted
ignorantly or with knowledge, and thou mayst also consider that his
ruling faculty is akin to thine.
23. As thou thyself art a component part of a social system, so let
every act of thine be a component part of social life. Whatever act of
thine then has no reference either immediately or remotely to a social
end, this tears asunder thy life, and does not allow it to be one, and
it is of the nature of a mutiny, just as when in a popular assembly a
man acting by himself stands apart from the general agreement.
24. Quarrels of little children and their sports, and poor spirits
carrying about dead bodies [such is everything]; and so what is
exhibited in the representation of the mansions of the dead[A] strikes
our eyes more clearly.
[A] [Greek: to t�s Nekuias] may be, as Gataker conjectures, a
dramatic representation of the state of the dead. Schultz
supposes that it may be also a reference to the [Greek: Nekuia]
of the Odyssey (lib. xi.).
25. Examine into the quality of the form of an object, and detach it
altogether from its material part, and then contemplate it; then
determine the time, the longest which a thing of this peculiar form is
naturally made to endure.
26. Thou hast endured infinite troubles through not being contented with
thy ruling faculty when it does the things which it is constituted by
nature to do. But enough + [of this].
27. When another blames thee or hates thee, or when men say about thee
anything injurious, approach their poor souls, penetrate within, and see
what kind of men they are. Thou wilt discover that there is no reason to
take any trouble that these men may have this or that opinion about
thee. However, thou must be well disposed towards them, for by nature
they are friends. And the gods too aid them in all ways, by dreams, by
signs, towards the attainment of those things on which they set a value.+
28. The periodic movements of the universe are the same, up and down
from age to age. And either the universal intelligence puts itself in
motion for every separate effect, and if this is so, be thou content
with that which is the result of its activity; or it puts itself in
motion once, and everything else comes by way of sequence[A] in a
manner; or indivisible elements are the origin of all things.--In a
word, if there is a god, all is well; and if chance rules, do not thou
also be governed by it (vi. 44; vii. 75).
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