ndeed, says so absolutely; but what
he says amounts to the same thing. Can I, then, find fault with him,
after having allowed that pains of the body are evils, that the ruin of
a man's fortunes is an evil, if he should say that every good man is
not happy, when all those things which he reckons as evils may befall a
good man? The same Theophrastus is found fault with by all the books
and schools of the philosophers for commending that sentence in his
Callisthenes,

Fortune, not wisdom, rules the life of man.

They say never did philosopher assert anything so languid. They are
right, indeed, in that; but I do not apprehend anything could be more
consistent, for if there are so many good things that depend on the
body, and so many foreign to it that depend on chance and fortune, is
it inconsistent to say that fortune, which governs everything, both
what is foreign and what belongs to the body, has greater power than
counsel. Or would we rather imitate Epicurus? who is often excellent in
many things which he speaks, but quite indifferent how consistent he
may be, or how much to the purpose he is speaking. He commends spare
diet, and in that he speaks as a philosopher; but it is for Socrates or
Antisthenes to say so, and not for one who confines all good to
pleasure. He denies that any one can live pleasantly unless he lives
honestly, wisely, and justly. Nothing is more dignified than this
assertion, nothing more becoming a philosopher, had he not measured
this very expression of living honestly, justly, and wisely by
pleasure. What could be better than to assert that fortune interferes
but little with a wise man? But does he talk thus, who, after he has
said that pain is the greatest evil, or the only evil, might himself be
afflicted with the sharpest pains all over his body, even at the time
he is vaunting himself the most against fortune? And this very thing,
too, Metrodorus has said, but in better language: "I have anticipated
you, Fortune; I have caught you, and cut off every access, so that you
cannot possibly reach me." This would be excellent in the mouth of
Aristo the Chian, or Zeno the Stoic, who held nothing to be an evil but
what was base; but for you, Metrodorus, to anticipate the approaches of
fortune, who confine all that is good to your bowels and marrow--for
you to say so, who define the chief good by a strong constitution of
body, and well-assured hope of its continuance--for you to cut off
every acc