Wrongdoing and kinship

He who acts unjustly acts impiously. For since universal nature has made rational beings for one another's sake, so that they help one another according to their deserts, but in no way harm one another, whoever transgresses her will is plainly guilty of impiety toward the highest divinity. And whoever lies is also guilty of impiety toward that same divinity; for universal nature is the nature of the things that are, and things that are stand in relation to everything that comes into being. Further, this universal nature is also named truth, and is the prime cause of all things that are true. So whoever lies intentionally is guilty of impiety, since by deceiving he commits injustice; and whoever lies unintentionally is guilty too, insofar as he is at odds with universal nature, and insofar as he disturbs its order by fighting against the nature of the world. For he fights against it who is driven of himself toward what is contrary to truth—he had received powers from nature, and through neglect of them is no longer able to distinguish falsehood from truth. And indeed, whoever pursues pleasure as good and avoids pain as evil is guilty of impiety. For such a man must inevitably often find fault with universal nature, claiming that it assigns things to the bad and the good contrary to their deserts—because often the bad enjoy pleasure and have the means to it, while the good are given pain and what causes it. And further, whoever fears pain will sometimes also fear things that are bound to happen in the world, and this too is impiety. And whoever pursues pleasure will not hold back from injustice, and this is plainly impiety. Now with respect to the things toward which universal nature is equally disposed—for it would not have made both unless it were equally disposed toward both—those who wish to follow nature should be of the same mind as it, equally disposed. So with respect to pain and pleasure, death and life, honor and dishonor, which universal nature employs equally, whoever is not equally disposed toward them is plainly acting impiously. And I say universal nature employs them equally rather than saying that they fall alike, by a kind of chance, on those produced in one continuous series and those who come after by virtue of a certain original movement of Providence—according to which it moved from a certain beginning to this ordering of things, having conceived certain principles of what was to be, and having fixed the powers productive of beings, of changes, and of such successions.

It would be a man's happiest lot to leave mankind without ever having tasted lying, hypocrisy, luxury, or pride. But to breathe out one's life once a man has had enough of these things is the next best voyage, as the saying goes. Have you settled down to live with vice, and has experience still not driven you to flee this plague? For the destruction of the understanding is a plague—far more a plague, in fact, than any such corruption or change in the air surrounding us. That corruption is a plague to living creatures so far as they are creatures; but this other is a plague to human beings so far as they are human.

Don't look down on death, but be well content with it, since it too is one of the things nature wills. For just as it is natural to be young and grow old, to increase and reach maturity, to grow teeth and a beard and gray hair, to beget, to be pregnant, to give birth, and to undergo all the other natural processes that life's seasons bring, so too is dissolution. It fits a thoughtful person, then, to be neither careless nor impatient nor contemptuous toward death, but to wait for it as one of nature's operations. Just as you now wait for the moment your wife's child will come from her womb, so wait for the moment your soul will fall out of this covering. But if you also want an ordinary sort of comfort that will reach your heart, you will be reconciled to death most easily by observing the things you are about to leave, and the characters of those with whom your soul will no longer be mixed. For it's not at all right to be offended by these people—rather it's your duty to care for them and bear with them gently—yet you should still remember that your departure will not be from men who share your principles. For that is the only thing, if anything, that could pull us the other way and attach us to life: being allowed to live among those who share our principles. But as it is, you see how much trouble comes from the discord of those living together, so that you might well say, Come quickly, death, before I too forget myself.

Whoever does wrong does wrong against himself. Whoever acts unjustly acts unjustly against himself, because he makes himself bad.

A man often acts unjustly by not doing a certain thing, not only by doing it.

Your present judgment grounded in understanding, your present action directed to the common good, and your present disposition of contentment with everything that happens—that's enough.

Wipe out impression; check impulse; extinguish appetite; keep the ruling faculty in its own power.

Among animals without reason, one life is distributed; among rational animals, one intelligent soul is distributed—just as there is one earth for all earthy things, and we all see by one light and breathe one air, all of us who have sight and all who have life.

All things that share in something common move toward what is of the same kind as themselves. Everything earthy turns toward the earth, everything liquid flows together, everything airy does the same, so that they need something to keep them apart, and the application of force. Fire indeed moves upward because of elemental fire, but it is so ready to be kindled together with any fire here below that even any fairly dry substance ignites easily, because it has less mixed into it that resists ignition. So too everything that shares in the common intelligent nature moves likewise toward what is akin to it, or even more so. For the more something surpasses other things, the readier it is to mingle and fuse with what is akin to it. So among animals without reason we find swarms of bees, herds of cattle, the rearing of young birds, and, in a way, forms of love; for even in animals there are souls, and the power drawing them together shows itself there to a higher degree than has ever been seen in plants or stones or trees. But among rational animals there are political communities, friendships, families, gatherings of people, and in wars, treaties and truces. And among things still higher, even when separated from one another, a kind of unity exists, as among the stars. So the ascent to a higher degree can produce sympathy even among things set apart. Now see what actually happens: only intelligent animals have now forgotten this mutual desire and inclination, and only among them is the tendency to flow together no longer seen. Yet even though men strive to avoid this union, they are caught and held by it, for their nature is too strong for them—and you'll see this is so if you just observe. You will sooner find some earthy thing touching no other earthy thing than a man wholly cut off from other men.