BOOK XII
of it,[1] and that is in thy power. Efface thy opinion then, as thou mayest do at will, and lo, a great calm! Like a mariner that has turned the headland thou findest all at set-fair and a halcyon sea.[2]
23. Any single form of activity, be it what it may, ceasing in its own due season, suffers no ill because it hath ceased, nor does the agent suffer in that it hath ceased to act.[3] Similarly then if life, that sum total of all our acts, cease in its own good time, it suffers no ill from this very fact, nor is he in an ill plight who has brought this chain of acts to an end in its own due time. The due season and the terminus are fixed by Nature, at times even by our individual nature, as when in old age, but in any case by the Universal Nature, the constant change of whose parts keeps the whole Universe ever youthful[4] and in its prime. All that is advantageous to the Whole is ever fair and in its bloom. The ending of life then is not only no evil to the individual—for it brings him no disgrace,[5] if in fact it be both outside our choice and not inimical to the general weal—but a good, since it is timely for the Universe, bears its share in it and is borne along with it.[6] For then is he, who is borne along on the same path as God, and borne in his judgment towards the same things, indeed a man god-borne.[7]
24. Thou must have these three rules ready for use. Firstly, not to do anything, that thou doest, aimlessly,[8] or otherwise than as Justice herself would have acted; and to realize that all that befalls thee from without is due either to Chance or to Providence,
