pendent of our will, as if they were good and (or) bad, lie at the bottom of our opinions, we must of necessity pay regard to tyrants; for I wish that men would pay regard to tyrants only, and not also to the bedchamber men.[1] How is it that the man becomes all at once wise, when Caesar has made him superintendent of the close stool? How is it that we say immediately, "Felicion spoke sensibly to me." I wish he were ejected from the bedchamber, that he might again appear to you to be a fool.
Epaphroditus[2] had a shoemaker whom he sold because he was good for nothing. This fellow by some good luck was bought by one of Caesar's men, and became Caesar's shoemaker. You should have seen what respect Epaphroditus paid to him: "How does the good Felicion do, I pray?" Then if any of us asked, What is master. (Epaphroditus) doing?" the answer was, "He is consulting about something with Felicion." Had he not sold the man as good for nothing? Who then made him wise all at once? This is an instance of valuing something else than the things which depend on the will.
Has a man been exalted to the tribuneship? All who meet him offer their congratulations: one kisses his eyes, another the neck, and the slaves kiss his hands.[3] He goes to his house, he finds torches lighted. He ascends the Capitol: he offers a sacrifice on the occasion. Now who ever sacrificed for having had good desires? for having acted conformably to nature? For in fact we thank the gods for those things in which we place our good.[4]
- ↑ Such a man was named in Greek κοιτωνίτης; in Latin "cubicularius," a lord of the bedchamber, as we might say. Seneca, De Constantia Sapientis, c. 14, speaks "of the pride of the nomenclator (the announcer of the name), of the arrogance of the bedchamber man." Even the clerk of the close-stool was an important person. Slaves used to carry this useful domestic vessel on a journey. Horat. Sat. i. 6, 109 (Upton).
- ↑ Once the master of Epictetus (i. 1, 20).
- ↑ Hand-kissing was in those times of tyranny the duty of a slave, not of a free man. This servile practice still exists among men called free.
- ↑ Schweighaeuser says that he has introduced into the text Lord Shaftesbury's emendation, ὅπου. The emendation ὅπου is good, but Schweighaeuser has not put it in his text: he has οἷ τὸ ἀγαθὸν τιθέμεθα. Matthew vi. 21, "for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." So these people show by thanking God, what it is for which they are thankful.
