BOOK IV
their power of life and death, as though themselves immortal; and how many entire cities are, if I may use the expression, dead,[1] Helice and Pompeii and Herculaneum, and others without number.
Turn also to all, one after another, that come within thine own knowledge. One closed a friend's eyes and was then himself laid out, and the friend who closed his,[2] he too was laid out—and all this in a few short years. In a word, fail not to note how short-lived are all mortal things, and how paltry―yesterday a little mucus, [3] to-morrow a mummy or burnt ash. Pass then through this tiny span of time in accordance with Nature, and come to thy journey's end with a good grace, just as an olive falls when it is fully ripe, praising the earth that bare it and grateful to the tree that gave it growth.
49. Be like a headland of rock on which the waves break incessantly; but it stands fast and around it the seething of the waters sinks to rest.
Ah, unlucky am I, that this has befallen me! Nay, but rather, lucky am I, that though this has befallen me, yet am I still unhurt, neither crushed by the present nor dreading the future. For something of the kind could have befallen everyone, but everyone would not have remained unhurt in spite of it. Why then count that rather a misfortune than this a good fortune? And in any case dost thou reckon that a misfortune for a man which is not an aberration from his nature? And wouldst thou have that to be an aberration from a man's nature, which does not contravene the will of his nature! What then? This will thou hast learnt to know. Does what has befallen thee hinder thee one whit from being just,
