which is good or evil?
as concerning pain, pleasure, and the causes of both; concerning honour,
and dishonour, concerning life and death? thus and thus. Now if it be
no wonder that a man should have such and such opinions, how can it be
a wonder that he should do such and such things? I will remember then,
that he cannot but do as he doth, holding those opinions that he doth.
Remember, that as it is a shame for any man to wonder that a fig tree
should bear figs, so also to wonder that the world should bear anything,
whatsoever it is which in the ordinary course of nature it may bear.
To a physician also and to a pilot it is a shame either for the one to
wonder, that such and such a one should have an ague; or for the other,
that the winds should prove Contrary.

XIV. Remember, that to change thy mind upon occasion, and to follow him
that is able to rectify thee, is equally ingenuous, as to find out at
the first, what is right and just, without help. For of thee nothing is
required, ti, is beyond the extent of thine own deliberation and jun.
merit, and of thine own understanding.

XV. If it were thine act and in thine own power, wouldest thou do
it? If it were not, whom dost tin accuse? the atoms, or the Gods? For to
do either, the part of a mad man. Thou must therefore blame nobody, but
if it be in thy power, redress what is amiss; if it be not, to what end
is it to complain? For nothing should be done but to some certain end.

XVI. Whatsoever dieth and falleth, however and wheresoever it die
and fall, it cannot fall out of the world, here it have its abode
and change, here also shall it have its dissolution into its proper
elements. The same are the world's elements, and the elements of which
thou dost consist. And they when they are changed, they murmur not; why
shouldest thou?

XVII. Whatsoever is, was made for something: as a horse, a vine. Why
wonderest thou? The sun itself will say of itself, I was made for
something; and so hath every god its proper function. What then were
then made for? to disport and delight thyself? See how even common sense
and reason cannot brook it.

XVIII. Nature hath its end as well in the end and final consummation of
anything that is, as in the begin-nine and continuation of it.

XIX. As one that tosseth up a ball. And what is a ball the better, if
the motion of it be upwards; or the worse if it be downwards; or if it
chance to fall upon the ground? So for the bubble; if it conti