d ivory?--Nay, show me, one of you, a human soul,
desiring to be of one mind with God, no more to lay blame on God or man,
to suffer nothing to disappoint, nothing to cross him, to yield neither
to anger, envy, nor jealousy--in a word, why disguise the matter? one
that from a man would fan become a God; one that while still imprisoned
in this dead body makes fellowship with God his aim. Show me him!--Ah,
you cannot! Then why mock yourselves and delude others? why stalk about
tricked out in other men's attire, thieves and robbers that you are of
names and things to which you can show no title!

LXXIX

If you have assumed a character beyond your strength, you have both
played a poor figure in that, and neglected one that is within your
powers.

LXXX

Fellow, you have come to blows at home with a slave: you have turned the
household upside down, and thrown the neighbourhood into confusion; and
do you come to me then with airs of assumed modesty--do you sit down
like a sage and criticise my explanation of the readings, and whatever
idle babble you say has come into my head? Have you come full of envy,
and dejected because nothing is sent you from home; and while the
discussion is going on, do you sit brooding on nothing but how your
father or your brother are disposed towards you:--"What are they saying
about me there? at this moment they imagine I am making progress and
saying, He will return perfectly omniscient! I wish I could become
omniscient before I return; but that would be very troublesome. No one
sends me anything--the baths at Nicopolis are dirty; things are wretched
at home and wretched here." And then they say, "Nobody is any the better
for the School."--Who comes to the School with a sincere wish to learn:
to submit his principles to correction and himself to treatment? Who, to
gain a sense of his wants? Why then be surprised if you carry home from
the School exactly what you bring into it?

LXXXI

"Epictetus, I have often come desiring to hear you speak, and you have
never given me any answer; now if possible, I entreat you, say something
to me."

"Is there, do you think," replied Epictetus, "an art of speaking as
of other things, if it is to be done skilfully and with profit to the
hearer?"

"Yes."

"And are all profited by what they hear, or only some among them? So
that it seems there is an art of hearing as well as of speaking. . . .
To make a statue needs skill: to view a s