Plutarch's Morals
wealth is ephemeral and insecure; I know that those who gave power can
take it away again; I know that my wife is good, but still a woman; and
that my friend, since a human being, is by nature a changeable animal,
to use Plato's expression." For such a prepared frame of mind, if
anything happens unwished for but not unexpected, not admitting of such
phrases as "I shouldn't have dreamed of it," or "I expected quite a
different lot," or "I didn't look for this," abates the violent[753]
beatings and palpitations of the heart, and quickly causes wild unrest
to subside. Carneades indeed reminds us that in great matters the
unexpected makes the sum total of grief and dejection. Certainly the
kingdom of Macedonia was many times smaller than the Roman Empire, but
when Perseus lost Macedonia, he not only himself bewailed his wretched
fate, but seemed to all men the most unfortunate and unlucky of mankind;
yet AEmilius who conquered him, though he had to give up to another the
command both by land and sea, yet was crowned, and offered sacrifice,
and was justly esteemed happy. For he knew that he had taken a command
which he would have to give up, but Perseus lost his kingdom without
expecting it. Well also has the poet[754] shown the power of anything
that happens unexpectedly. For Odysseus wept bitterly at the death of
his dog, but was not so moved when he sat by his wife who wept, for in
the latter case he had come fully determined to keep his emotion under
the control of reason, whereas in the former it was against his
expectation, and therefore fell upon him as a sudden blow.
Sec. XVII. And since generally speaking some things which happen against
our will pain and trouble us by their very nature, while in the case of
most we accustom ourselves and learn to be disgusted with them from
fancy, it is not unprofitable to counteract this to have ever ready that
line of Menander,
"You suffer no dread thing but in your fancy."
For what, if they touch you neither in soul nor body, are such things to
you as the low birth of your father, or the adultery of your wife, or
the loss of some prize or precedence, since even by their absence a man
is not prevented from being in excellent condition both of body and
soul. And with respect to the things that seem to pain us by their very
nature, as sickness, and anxieties, and the deaths of friends and
children, we should remember, that line of Euripides,
"Alas! and why alas? we only suffer
What mortals must expect."
For no argument has so much weight with emotion when it is borne down
with grief, as that which reminds it of the common and natural necessity
to which man is exposed owing to the body, the only handle which he
gives to fortune, for in his most important and influential part[755] he
is secure against external things. When Demetrius captured Megara, he
asked Stilpo if any of his things had been plundered, and Stilpo
answered, "I saw nobody carrying off anything of mine."[756] And so when
fortune has plundered us and stripped us of everything else, we have
that within ourselves
"Which the Achaeans ne'er could rob us of."[757]
So that we ought not altogether to abase and lower nature, as if she had
no strength or stability against fortune; but on the contrary, knowing
that the rotten and perishable part of man, wherein alone he lies open
to fortune, is small, while we ourselves are masters of the better part,
wherein are situated our greatest blessings, as good opinions and
teaching and virtuous precepts, all which things cannot be abstracted
from us or perish, we ought to look on the future with invincible
courage, and say to fortune, as Socrates is supposed to have said to his
accusers Anytus and Melitus before the jury, "Anytus and Melitus can
kill me, but they cannot hurt me." For fortune can afflict us with
disease, take away our money, calumniate us to the people or king, but
cannot make a good and brave and high-souled man bad and cowardly and
low and ignoble and envious, nor take away that disposition of mind,
whose constant presence is of more use for the conduct of life than the
presence of a pilot at sea. For the pilot cannot make calm the wild wave
or wind, nor can he find a haven at his need wherever he wishes, nor can
he await his fate with confidence and without trembling, but as long as
he has not despaired, but uses his skill, he scuds before the gale,
"lowering his big sail, till his lower mast is only just above the sea
dark as Erebus," and sits at the helm trembling and quaking. But the
disposition of a wise man gives calm even to the body, mostly cutting
off the causes of diseases by temperance and plain living and moderate
exercise; but if some beginning of trouble arise from without, as we
avoid a sunken rock, so he passes by it with furled sail, as Asclepiades
puts it; but if some unexpected and tremendous gale come upon him and
prove too much for him, the harbour is at hand, and he can swim away
from the body, as from a leaky boat.
Sec. XVIII. For it is the fear of death, and not the desire of life, that
makes the foolish person to hang to the body, clinging to it, as
Odysseus did to the fig-tree from fear of Charybdis that lay below,
"Where the wind neither let him stay, or sail,"
so that he was displeased at this, and afraid of that. But he who
understands somehow or other the nature of the soul, and reflects that
the change it will undergo at death will be either to something better
or at least not worse, he has in his fearlessness of death no small help
to ease of mind in life. For to one who can enjoy life when virtue and
what is congenial to him have the upper hand, and that can fearlessly
depart from life, when uncongenial and unnatural things are in the
ascendant, with the words on his lips,
"The deity shall free me, when I will,"[758]
what can we imagine could befall such a man as this that would vex him
and wear him and harass him? For he who said, "I have anticipated you, O
fortune, and cut off all your loopholes to get at me," did not trust to
bolts or keys or walls, but to determination and reason, which are
within the power of all persons that choose. And we ought not to despair
or disbelieve any of these sayings, but admiring them and emulating them
and being enthusiastic about them, we ought to try and test ourselves in
smaller matters with a view to greater, not avoiding or rejecting that
self-examination, nor sheltering ourselves under the remark, "Perhaps
nothing will be more difficult." For inertia[759] and softness are
generated by that self-indulgence which ever occupies itself only with
the easiest tasks, and flees from the disagreeable to what is most
pleasant. But the soul that accustoms itself to face steadily sickness
and grief and exile, and calls in reason to its help in each case, will
find in what appears so sore and dreadful much that is false, empty, and
rotten, as reason will show in each case.
Sec. XIX. And yet many shudder at that line of Menander,
"No one can say, I shall not suffer this or that,"
being ignorant how much it helps us to freedom from grief to practise to
be able to look fortune in the face with our eyes open, and not to
entertain fine and soft fancies, like one reared in the shade on many
hopes that always yield and never resist. We can, however, answer
Menander's line,
"No one can say, I shall not suffer this or that,"
for a man can say, "I will not do this or that, I will not lie, I will
not play the rogue, I will not cheat, I will not scheme." For this is in
our power, and is no small but great help to ease of mind. As on the
contrary
"The consciousness of having done ill deeds,"[760]
like a sore in the flesh, leaves in the mind a regret which ever wounds
it and pricks it. For reason banishes all other griefs, but itself
creates regret when the soul is vexed with shame and self-tormented. For
as those who shudder in ague-fits or burn in fevers feel more trouble
and distress than those who externally suffer the same from cold or
heat, so the grief is lighter which comes externally from chance, but
that lament,
"None is to blame for this but I myself,"
coming from within on one's own misdeeds, intensifies one's bitterness
by the shame felt. And so neither costly house, nor quantity of gold,
nor pride of race, nor weighty office, nor grace of language, nor
eloquence, impart so much calm and serenity to life, as a soul pure from
evil acts and desires, having an imperturbable and undefiled character
as the source of its life; whence good actions flow, producing an
enthusiastic and cheerful energy accompanied by loftiness of thought,
and a memory sweeter and more lasting than that hope which Pindar says
is the support of old age. Censers do not, as Carneades said, after they
are emptied, long retain their sweet smell; but in the mind of the wise
man good actions always leave a fresh and fragrant memory, by which joy
is watered and flourishes, and despises those who wail over life and
abuse it as a region of ills, or as a place of exile for souls in this
world.
Sec. XX. I am very taken with Diogenes' remark to a stranger at Lacedaemon,
who was dressing with much display for a feast, "Does not a good man
consider every day a feast?" And a very great feast too, if we live
soberly. For the world is a most holy and divine temple, into which man
is introduced at his birth, not to behold motionless images made by
hands, but those things (to use the language of Plato) which the divine
mind has exhibited as the visible representations of invisible things,
having innate in them the principle of life and motion, as the sun moon
and stars, and rivers ever flowing with fresh water, and the earth
affording maintenance to plants and animals. Seeing then that life is
the most complete initiation into all these things, it ought to be full
of ease of mind and joy; not as most people wait for the festivals of
Cronos[761] and Dionysus and the Panathenaea and other similar days, that
they may joy and refresh themselves with bought laughter, paying actors
and dancers for the same. On such occasions indeed we sit silently and
decorously, for no one wails when he is initiated, or groans when he
beholds the Pythian games, or when he is drinking at the festival of
Cronos:[761] but men shame the festivals which the deity supplies us
with and initiates us in, passing most of their time in lamentation and
heaviness of heart and distressing anxiety. And though men delight in
the pleasing notes of musical instruments, and in the songs of birds,
and behold with joy the animals playing and frisking, and on the
contrary are distressed when they roar and howl and look savage; yet in
regard to their own life, when they see it without smiles and dejected,
and ever oppressed and afflicted by the most wretched sorrows and toils
and unending cares, they do not think of trying to procure alleviation
and ease. How is this? Nay, they will not even listen to others'
exhortation, which would enable them to acquiesce in the present without
repining, and to remember the past with thankfulness, and to meet the
future hopefully and cheerfully without fear or suspicion.
[711] Or cheerfulness, or tranquillity of mind. Jeremy
Taylor has largely borrowed again from this treatise in
his "Holy Living," ch. ii. Sec. 6, "Of Contentedness in all
Estates and Accidents."
[712] Reading with Salmasius [Greek: kaltios patrikios].
[713] "Locus Xenophontis est Cyropaed.," l. i. p.
52.--_Reiske._
[714] Euripides, "Orestes," 258.
[715] So Wyttenbach, Duebner. Vulgo [Greek:
anaisthesias--aponia.]
[716] "Works and Days," 519.
[717] "Odyssey," i. 191, 192.
[718] I read [Greek: katepheian].
[719] "Iliad," i. 488-492.