“Philosophers do not practice what they preach,” you say. Yet they do practice much that they preach, much that their virtuous minds conceive. For indeed if their actions always matched their words, who would be more happy than they? Meanwhile you have no reason to despise noble words and hearts that are filled with noble thoughts. The pursuit of salutary studies is praiseworthy, even if they have no practical result. What wonder that those who essay the steep path do not mount to the Summit? But if you are a man, look up to those who are attempting great things, even though they fall. The man who measures his effort, not by his own strength, but by the strength of his nature, that aims at high things, and conceives in his heart greater undertakings than could possibly be accomplished even by those endowed with gigantic courage, shows the mark of nobility. The man who has set before himself such ideals as these: “As for me, I shall look upon death or a comedy with the same expression of countenance. As for me, I shall submit to all hardships, no matter how great they be, staying my body by the spirit. As for me, I shall despise riches alike when I have them and when I have them not, being neither cast down if they shall lie elsewhere, nor puffed up if they shall glitter around me. As for me, I shall pay no heed to Fortune, either when she comes or when she goes. As for me, I shall view all lands as my own, my own as belonging to all others. As for me, I shall always live as if I were aware that I had been born for service to others, and on this account I shall render my thanks to Nature; for how could she better have served my interest? She has given me, the individual, to all men and all men to me, the individual. Whatever I may possess, I shall neither hoard as a miser, nor as a spendthrift squander. Nothing shall seem to me so truly my possessions as the gifts I have wisely bestowed. I shall not estimate my benefactions by their number, nor by their size, nor by anything except my estimation of the recipient; never shall what a worthy man receives seem great in my eyes. Nothing shall I ever do for the sake of opinion, everything for the sake of my conscience. Whatever I shall do when I alone am witness I shall count as done beneath the gaze of the Roman people. In eating and drinking my aim shall be to quench the desires of Nature, not to fill and empty my belly. I shall be agreeable to my friends, to my enemies mild and indulgent. I shall give pardon before it is asked, and hasten to grant all honorable requests. I shall know that the whole world is my country, that its rulers are the gods, and that they abide above me and around me, the censors of my words and deeds. And whenever Nature demands back my breath, or my reason releases [36] it, I shall depart, bearing witness that I have loved a good conscience and all good endeavor, that I have been guilty of nothing that impaired the liberty of any man, least of all my own” — the man who shall resolve, shall wish, and shall essay to do these things will be following the path toward the gods — ah! such a man, even if he shall not reach them,
Yet fails in a high emprise. [37]
But as for you, your hatred of virtue and of those who practice it is in no way strange. For sickly lights quail before the sun, and creatures of the night abhor the shining day — they stand aghast at the first signs of dawn, and seek everywhere their lairs, and, finding some hole, hide themselves away from fear of the light. Croak, and ply your wretched tongues in abuse of the good, show your fangs, bite hard; you will break your teeth long before they leave a mark!