n: to consider what you
are yourself, and wherein your Good and Evil consists.

XXV

A man asked me to write to Rome on his behalf who, as most people
thought, had met with misfortune; for having been before wealthy and
distinguished, he had afterwards lost all and was living here. So I
wrote about him in a humble style. He however on reading the letter
returned it to me, with the words: "I asked for your help, not for your
pity. No evil has happened unto me."

XXVI

True instruction is this:--to learn to wish that each thing should come
to pass as it does. And how does it come to pass? As the Disposer has
disposed it. Now He has disposed that there should be summer and winter,
and plenty and dearth, and vice and virtue, and all such opposites, for
the harmony of the whole.

XXVII

Have this thought ever present with thee, when thou losest any outward
thing, what thou gainest in its stead; and if this be the more precious,
say not, I have suffered loss.

XXVIII

Concerning the Gods, there are who deny the very existence of the
Godhead; others say that it exists, but neither bestirs nor concerns
itself nor has forethought for anything. A third party attribute to it
existence and forethought, but only for great and heavenly matters, not
for anything that is on earth. A fourth party admit things on earth as
well as in heaven, but only in general, and not with respect to each
individual. A fifth, of whom were Ulysses and Socrates are those that
cry:--

I move not without Thy knowledge!

XXIX

Considering all these things, the good and true man submits his
judgement to Him that administers the Universe, even as good citizens to
the law of the State. And he that is being instructed should come thus
minded:--How may I in all things follow the Gods; and, How may I rest
satisfied with the Divine Administration; and, How may I become free?
For he is free for whom all things come to pass according to his will,
and whom none can hinder. What then, is freedom madness? God forbid. For
madness and freedom exist not together.

"But I wish all that I desire to come to pass and in the manner that I
desire."

--You are mad, you are beside yourself. Know you not that Freedom is a
glorious thing and of great worth? But that what I desired at random I
should wish at random to come to pass, so far from being noble, may well
be exceeding base.

XXX

You must know that it is no easy thi