Our school regard him both as Father Liber and as Hercules and as Mercury — Father Liber, because he is the father of all things, he who first discovered the seminal power that is able to subserve life through pleasure; Hercules, because his power is invincible, and, whenever it shall have grown weary with fulfilling its works, shall return into primal fire7; Mercury, because to him belong reason and number and order and knowledge. In whatever direction you turn, you will see God coming to meet you; nothing is void of him, he himself fills all his work. For this reason, O most ungrateful of mortals, it is futile for you to say that you are indebted, not to God, but to Nature, for there is no Nature without God, nor God without Nature, but both are the same thing, they differ only in their function. If, having received a gift from Seneca, you were to say that you were indebted to Annaeus or to Lucius,8 you would be changing, not your creditor, but his name, for, whether you designated him by his first, his second, or his third name, he would nevertheless be the same person. So, if you like, speak of Nature, Fate, Fortune, but all these are names of the same God, who uses his power in various ways. And justice, honesty,9 prudence, courage, temperance are the good qualities of only one mind; if you take pleasure in any of these, you take pleasure in that mind.