LIX THE MORAL 103 



the arrows of fortune, for her missiles are hurled 

 on us from every side, but in order to bear them 

 with resolution and constancy. Unvanquished we 

 may be, unassailed we cannot be, though meantime 

 the hope sometimes insinuates itself that even this is 

 possible. How ? you exclaim. Despise death and 3 

 then everything that leads to death is despised, be 

 it war or shipwreck, or the jaws of wild beasts, 

 or the weight of roofs rushing down with sudden 

 fall. What more can they do than part the body 

 from the soul ? And this parting no care can 

 shun, no good fortune can remove, no power can 

 prevent. Other features in human lot are variously 4 

 assigned ; to death s call all are alike subject. 

 Whether heaven is propitious or wrathful, die we 

 must. 



Let courage be derived from our very despair. 

 The most cowardly of animals which nature has 

 created for flight, if they find no way of escape 

 open to them, show fight with their unwarlike 

 body. In fact, no foe is more deadly than one into 

 whom a tight corner has put courage. Far more 

 violent resistance is offered to death through 

 necessity than through valour. A desperate soul 5 

 shows as much daring as a courageous, probably 

 more. Let us assume that, so far as concerns death, 

 we are given over to it ; and so we are. The fact 

 is so, Lucilius ; we are all destined to death. All 

 this nation that you see, all the people you can 

 anywhere suppose to exist, will some day soon 

 be recalled by nature to the grave. There is no 

 question of the fact, only of the day. Sooner or 

 later we must all go to the one place. Well, then, 6 

 does not he seem to you the most fearful and silliest 

 of men who by great entreaty seeks to delay death ? 



