these things then like
those? Very like. Bodies of men are destroyed, and the bodies of oxen
and sheep; the dwellings of men are burnt, and the nests of storks. What
is there in this great or dreadful? Or show me what is the difference
between a man's house and a stork's nest, as far as each is a dwelling;
except that man builds his little houses of beams and tiles and bricks,
and the stork builds them of sticks and mud. Are a stork and a man then
like things? What say you? In body they are very much alike.

Does a man then differ in no respect from a stork? Don't suppose that I
say so; but there is no difference in these matters (which I have
mentioned). In what then is the difference? Seek and you will find that
there is a difference in another matter. See whether it is not in a man
the understanding of what he does, see if it is not in social community,
in fidelity, in modesty, in steadfastness, in intelligence. Where then
is the great good and evil in men? It is where the difference is. If the
difference is preserved and remains fenced round, and neither modesty is
destroyed, nor fidelity, nor intelligence, then the man also is
preserved; but if any of these things is destroyed and stormed like a
city, then the man too perishes: and in this consist the great things.
Alexander, you say, sustained great damage then when the Hellenes
invaded and when they ravaged Troy, and when his brothers perished. By
no means; for no man is damaged by an action which is not his own; but
what happened at that time was only the destruction of stork's nests.
Now the ruin of Alexander was when he lost the character of modesty,
fidelity, regard to hospitality, and to decency. When was Achilles
ruined? Was it when Patroclus died? Not so. But it happened when he
began to be angry, when he wept for a girl, when he forgot that he was
at Troy not to get mistresses, but to fight. These things are the ruin
of men, this is being besieged, this is the destruction of cities, when
right opinions are destroyed, when they are corrupted.

* * * * *

ON CONSTANCY (OR FIRMNESS).--The being (nature) of the good is a certain
will; the being of the bad is a certain kind of will. What, then, are
externals? Materials for the will, about which the will being conversant
shall obtain its own good or evil. How shall it obtain the good? If it
does not admire (over-value) the materials; for the opinions about the
materials, if the