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

BOOK II. xxni. 21-27that caused you to let your beard grow long? 1that wrote as it was dying: "We are spendingwhat is our last and at the same time a happyday?" 2 Was it the flesh or the moral purpose?Come, do you confess that you have somethingsuperior to the flesh, and you are not insane, either ?Are you, in all truth, so blind and deaf?Well, what then? Does a man despise hisother faculties? Far from it! Does a man saythere is no use or advancement save in the facultyof moral purpose? Far from it ! That is unintelligent,impious, ungrateful towards God. Nay,but assigning its true value to each thing.he isFor there issome use in an ass, but not as much as there is inan ox ;there is use also in a dog, but not as muchas there is in a slave ;there is use also in a slave,but not as much as there is in your fellow-citizens ;there is use also in these, but not as much as thereis in the magistrates. Yet because some things aresuperior we ought not to despise the use which theothers give. There is a certain value also in thefaculty of eloquence, but it is not as great as thatof the faculty of moral purpose. When, therefore,I say this, let no one suppose that I am bidding youneglect speech, any more than I bid you neglecteyes, or ears, or hands, or feet, or dress, or shoes.But ifyou ask me,