iculous not
to inquire of the body what it has suffered, nor of the mind if it is
any the worse for what has happened, but to employ external sympathizers
to teach us what our grief is.

Sec. II. Therefore let us examine alone by ourselves the weight of our
misfortunes, as if they were burdens. For the body is weighed down by
the burden of what presses on it, but the soul often adds to the real
load a burden of its own. A stone is naturally hard, and ice naturally
cold, but they do not receive these properties and impressions from
without; whereas with regard to exile and loss of reputation or honours,
as also with regard to their opposites, as crowns and office and
position, it is not their own intrinsic nature but our opinion of them
that is the gauge of their real joy or sorrow, so that each person makes
them for himself light or heavy, easy to bear or hard to bear. When
Polynices was asked

"What is't to be an exile? Is it grievous?"

he replied to the question,

"Most grievous, and in deed worse than in word."[913]

Compare with this the language of Alcman, as the poet has represented
him in the following lines. "Sardis, my father's ancient home, had I had
the fortune to be reared in thee, I should have been dressed in gold as
a priest of Cybele,[914] and beaten the fine drums; but as it is my name
is Alcman, and I am a citizen of Sparta, and I have learned to write
Greek poetry, which makes me greater than the tyrants Dascyles or
Gyges." Thus the very same thing one man's opinion makes good, like
current coin, and another's bad and injurious.

Sec. III. But let it be granted that exile is, as many say and sing, a
grievous thing. So some food is bitter, and sharp, and biting to the
taste, yet by an admixture with it of sweet and agreeable food we take
away its unpleasantness. There are also some colours unpleasant to look
at, that quite confuse and dazzle us by their intensity and excessive
force. If then we can relieve this by a mixture of shadow, or by
diverting the eye to green or some agreeable colour, so too can we deal
with misfortunes, mixing up with them the advantages and pleasant things
we still enjoy, as wealth, or friends, or leisure, and no deficiency in
what is necessary for our subsistence. For I do not think that there are
many natives of Sardis who would not choose your fortune even with
exile, and be content to live as you do in a strange land, rather than,
like snails who have no other