to
follow then: if it be great, the comfort is that it must be short; if
it be of long continuance, then it must be supportable. What, then? Do
those grandiloquent gentlemen state anything better than Epicurus in
opposition to these two things which distress us the most? And as to
other things, do not Epicurus and the rest of the philosophers seem
sufficiently prepared? Who is there who does not dread poverty? And yet
no true philosopher ever can dread it.

XXXII. But with how little is this man himself satisfied! No one has
said more on frugality. For when a man is far removed from those things
which occasion a desire of money, from love, ambition, or other daily
extravagance, why should he be fond of money, or concern himself at all
about it? Could the Scythian Anacharsis[69] disregard money, and shall
not our philosophers be able to do so? We are informed of an epistle of
his in these words: "Anacharsis to Hanno, greeting. My clothing is the
same as that with which the Scythians cover themselves; the hardness of
my feet supplies the want of shoes; the ground is my bed, hunger my
sauce, my food milk, cheese, and flesh. So you may come to me as to a
man in want of nothing. But as to those presents you take so much
pleasure in, you may dispose of them to your own citizens, or to the
immortal Gods." And almost all philosophers, of all schools, excepting
those who are warped from right reason by a vicious disposition, might
have been of this same opinion. Socrates, when on one occasion he saw a
great quantity of gold and silver carried in a procession, cried out,
"How many things are there which I do not want!" Xenocrates, when some
ambassadors from Alexander had brought him fifty talents, which was a
very large sum of money in those times, especially at Athens, carried
the ambassadors to sup in the Academy, and placed just a sufficiency
before them, without any apparatus. When they asked him, the next day,
to whom he wished the money which they had for him to be paid: "What!"
said he, "did you not perceive by our slight repast of yesterday that I
had no occasion for money?" But when he perceived that they were
somewhat dejected, he accepted of thirty minas, that he might not seem
to treat with disrespect the king's generosity. But Diogenes took a
greater liberty, like a Cynic, when Alexander asked him if he wanted
anything: "Just at present," said he, "I wish that you would stand a
little out of the line between me and t