epress him; nothing
exquisite enough to transport him unduly. For what is there in this life
that can appear great to him, who has acquainted himself with eternity,
and the utmost extent of the universe? For what is there in human
knowledge, or the short span of this life, that can appear great to a wise
man? whose mind is always so upon its guard, that nothing can befal him
which is unforeseen, nothing which is unexpected, nothing, in short, which
is new. Such a man takes so exact a survey on all sides of him, that he
always knows the proper place and spot to live in free from all the
troubles and annoyances of life, and encounters every accident that
fortune can bring upon him with a becoming calmness. Whoever conducts
himself in this manner, will be free from grief, and from every other
perturbation: and a mind free from these feelings renders men completely
happy: whereas a mind disordered and drawn off from right and unerring
reason, loses at once, not only its resolution, but its health.--Therefore
the thoughts and declarations of the Peripatetics are soft and effeminate,
for they say that the mind must necessarily be agitated, but at the same
time they lay down certain bounds beyond which that agitation is not to
proceed. And do you set bounds to vice? or is it novice to disobey reason?
does not reason sufficiently declare, that there is no real good which you
should desire too ardently, or the possession of which you should allow to
transport you: and that there is no evil that should be able to overwhelm
you, or the suspicion of which should distract you? and that all these
things assume too melancholy or too cheerful an appearance through our own
error? But if fools find this error lessened by time, so that, though the
cause remains the same, they are not affected in the same manner, after
some time, as they were at first; why surely a wise man ought not to be
influenced at all by it. But what are those degrees by which we are to
limit it? Let us fix these degrees in grief, a difficult subject, and one
much canvassed.--Fannius writes that P. Rutilius took it much to heart,
that his brother was refused the consulship: but he seems to have been too
much affected by this disappointment; for it was the occasion of his
death: he ought, therefore, to have borne it with more moderation. But let
us suppose, that whilst he was bearing this with moderation, the death of
his children had intervened; here would have started