hink
of ourselves.

[A] The verse of Empedocles is corrupt in Antoninus. It has
been restored by Peyron from a Turin manuscript, thus:--

[Greek: Sphairos kykloteres monie perigethei gaion.]

[B] iii. 4.

5. How can it be that the gods, after having arranged all things well
and benevolently for mankind, have overlooked this alone, that some men,
and very good men, and men who, as we may say, have had most communion
with the divinity, and through pious acts and religious observances have
been most intimate with the divinity, when they have once died should
never exist again, but should be completely extinguished?

But if this is so, be assured that if it ought to have been otherwise,
the gods would have done it. For if it were just, it would also be
possible; and if it were according to nature, nature would have had it
so. But because it is not so, if in fact it is not so, be thou convinced
that it ought not to have been so: for thou seest even of thyself that
in this inquiry thou art disputing with the Deity; and we should not
thus dispute with the gods, unless they were most excellent and most
just; but if this is so, they would not have allowed anything in the
ordering of the universe to be neglected unjustly and irrationally.

6. Practise thyself even in the things which thou despairest of
accomplishing. For even the left hand, which is ineffectual for all
other things for want of practice, holds the bridle more vigorously than
the right hand; for it has been practised in this.

7. Consider in what condition both in body and soul a man should be when
he is overtaken by death; and consider the shortness of life, the
boundless abyss of time past and future, the feebleness of all matter.

8. Contemplate the formative principles [forms] of things bare of their
coverings; the purposes of actions; consider what pain is, what pleasure
is, and death, and fame; who is to himself the cause of his uneasiness;
how no man is hindered by another; that everything is opinion.

9. In the application of thy principles thou must be like the
pancratiast, not like the gladiator; for the gladiator lets fall the
sword which he uses and is killed; but the other always has his hand,
and needs to do nothing else than use it.

10. See what things are in themselves, dividing them into matter, form,
and purpose.

11. What a power man has to do nothing except what God will approve, and
to accept all that God may