BOOK I. XXIV. 17-XXV. 4
Slave, where are your crowns, where your diadem? Do your guards avail you not at all? When, therefore, you approach one of those great men, remember all this—that you are approaching a tragic character, not the actor, but Oedipus himself. "Nay, but so-and-so is blessed; for he has many companions to walk with." So have I; I fall in line with the multitude and have many companions to walk with. 20But, to sum it all up: remember that the door has been thrown open. Do not become a greater coward than the children, but just as they say, "I won't play any longer," when the thing does not please them, so do you also, when things seem to you to have reached that stage, merely say, "I won't play any longer," and take your departure; but if you stay, stop lamenting.
CHAPTER XXV
Upon the same theme
If all this is true and we are not silly nor merely playing a part when we say, "Man's good and man's evil lies in moral choice, and all other things are nothing to us," why are we still distressed and afraid? Over the things that we seriously care for no one has authority; and the things over which other men have authority do not concern us. What kind of thing have we left to discuss?—"Nay, give me directions."[1]—What directions shall I give you? Has not Zeus given you directions? Has he not given you that which is your own, unhindered and unrestrained, while that which is not your own is subject to hindrance and restraint? What direc-
- ↑ That is, rules of conduct which will guide the inquirer in dealing with these two classes of things.
