, or authority, or power, or
glory, to no purpose. For they have acquired no pleasures, by the hope of
enjoying which it was that they were inflamed to undertake so many great
labours. There are others, of little and narrow minds, either always
despairing of everything, or else malcontent, envious, ill-tempered,
churlish, calumnious, and morose; others devoted to amatory pleasures,
others petulant, others audacious, wanton, intemperate, or idle, never
continuing in the same opinion; on which account there is never any
interruption to the annoyances to which their life is exposed.

Therefore, there is no fool who is happy, and no wise man who is not. And
we put this much more forcibly and truly than the Stoics: for they assert
that there is no good whatever, but some imaginary shadow which they call
{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER KAPPA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMDA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, a name showy rather than substantial; and they insist upon it,
that virtue relying on this principle of honour stands in need of no
pleasure, and is content with its own resources as adequate to secure a
happy life.

XIX. However, these assertions may be to a certain extent made not only
without our objecting to them, but even with our concurrence and
agreement. For in this way the wise man is represented by Epicurus as
always happy. He has limited desires; he disregards death; he has a true
opinion concerning the immortal Gods without any fear; he does not
hesitate, if it is better for him, to depart from life. Being prepared in
this manner, and armed with these principles, he is always in the
enjoyment of pleasure; nor is there any period when he does not feel more
pleasure than pain. For he remembers the past with gratitude, and he
enjoys the present so as to notice how important and how delightful the
joys which it supplies are; nor does he depend on future good, but he
waits for that and enjoys the present; and is as far removed as possible
from those vices which I have enumerated; and when he compares the life of
fools to his own he feels great pleasure. And pain, if any does attack
him, has never such power that the wise man has not more to rejoice at
than to be grieved at.

But Epicurus does admirably in saying that fortune has but little power
over the wise man, and that the greatest and most important