Volume 1 - Discourses - Books I - II - College of Stoic Philosophers

BOOK I. xviii. 16-22our losses and our pains have to do only with thethings which we possess.""But the tyrant will chain What? Your"leg."But he will cut off What? Yourneck. What, then, will he neither chain nor cut off?Your moral purpose. This iswhy the ancients gaveus the injunction,, "Know thyself." What follows,then ?Why, by the Gods, that one ought to practisein small things, and beginning with them pass on toC(the greater. I have a head-ache." Well;, do notsay "Alas!" ce l have an ear-ache." Do not say" Alas !"And I am not saying that it is not permissibleto groan, only do not groan in the centre of yourbeings,And ifyour slave is slow in bringing yourbandage, do not cry out and make a wry face andsay, "Everybody hates me." Why, who would nothate such a person? For the future put your confidencein these doctrines and walk about erect, free,not putting your confidence in the size of your body,like ail athlete for ; you ought not to be invincible1in the way an ass is invincible.Who, then,, is the invincible man ? He whomnothing that is outside the sphere of his moralpurpose can dismay.I then proceed to consider thecircumstances one by one, as I would do in the caseof the athlete." This fellow has won the firstround. What, then, will he do in the second ?What if it be scorching hot ? And what will he doat Olympia?" It is the same way with the caseunder consideration. If you put a bit of silver coinin a man's way, he will despise it. Yes, but ifyouput a bit of a wench in his way, what then ? Or if it bein the dark, what then? Or ifyou throw a bit ofreputation in his way, what then ? Or abuse, what127