nsive meaning: for all
abstinence, all innocency (which the Greeks have no ordinary name for,
though they might use the word [Greek: ablabeia], for innocency is that
disposition of mind which would offend no one) and several other
virtues are comprehended under frugality; but if this quality were of
less importance, and confined in as small a compass as some imagine,
the surname of Piso[36] would not have been in so great esteem. But as
we allow him not the name of a frugal man (_frugi_), who either quits
his post through fear, which is cowardice; or who reserves to his own
use what was privately committed to his keeping, which is injustice; or
who fails in his military undertakings through rashness, which is
folly--for that reason the word frugality takes in these three virtues
of fortitude, justice, and prudence, though it is indeed common to all
virtues, for they are all connected and knit together. Let us allow,
then, frugality itself to be another and fourth virtue; for its
peculiar property seems to be, to govern and appease all tendencies to
too eager a desire after anything, to restrain lust, and to preserve a
decent steadiness in everything. The vice in contrast to this is called
prodigality (_nequitia_). Frugality, I imagine, is derived from the
word _fruge_, the best thing which the earth produces; _nequitia_ is
derived (though this is perhaps rather more strained; still, let us try
it; we shall only be thought to have been trifling if there is nothing
in what we say) from the fact of everything being to no purpose
(_nequicquam_) in such a man; from which circumstance he is called also
_Nihil_, nothing. Whoever is frugal, then, or, if it is more agreeable
to you, whoever is moderate and temperate, such a one must of course be
consistent; whoever is consistent, must be quiet; the quiet man must be
free from all perturbation, therefore from grief likewise: and these
are the properties of a wise man; therefore a wise man must be free
from grief.

IX. So that Dionysius of Heraclea is right when, upon this complaint of
Achilles in Homer,

Well hast thou spoke, but at the tyrant's name
My rage rekindles, and my soul's in flame:
'Tis just resentment, and becomes the brave,
Disgraced, dishonor'd like the vilest slave[37]--

he reasons thus: Is the hand as it should be, when it is affected with
a swelling? or is it possible for any other member of the body, when
swollen or enlarged, to be in any ot