oncerning "the wise man that knows nothing of his being so," who
does not confess? For good, when present, being sensible and having a
great difference from evil, is it not most absurd, that he who is of
bad become good should be ignorant of it, and not perceive virtue when
present, but think that vice is still within him? For either none who
has all virtues can be ignorant and doubt of his having them; or the
difference of virtue from vice, of happiness from misery, and of a most
honest life from a most shameful one, is little and altogether difficult
to be discerned, if he who has taken the one in exchange for the other
does not perceive it.

He has written one volume of lives divided into four books; in the
fourth of these he says, that a wise man meddles with no business but
his own, and is employed about his own affairs. His words are these:
"For I am of opinion, that a prudent man shuns affairs, meddles little,
and at the same time minds his own occasions; civil persons being both
minders of their own affairs and meddlers with little else." He has said
almost the same in his book of Things eligible for Themselves, in these
very words: "For indeed a quiet life seems to have in it a certain
security and freedom from danger, though there are not very many who
can comprehend it." It is manifest that he does not much dissent from
Epicurus, who takes away Providence that he may leave God in repose.
But the same Chrysippus in his First Book of Lives says, that a wise man
willingly takes upon him a kingdom, making his profit by it; and if he
cannot reign himself, will dwell with a king, and go to the wars with
a king like Hydanthyrsus the Scythian or Leucon the Pontic. But I will
here also set down his very discourse, that we may see whether, as from
the treble and the base strings there arises a symphony in music, so
the life of a man who chooses quietness and meddling with little accords
with him who, upon any necessity, rides along with the Scythians and
manages the affairs of the tyrants in the Bosphorus: "For that a wise
man will both go to the wars and live with potentates, we will again
consider this hereafter; some indeed upon the like arguments not so much
as suspecting this, and we for semblable reasons admitting it." And
a little after: "Not only with those who have proceeded well, and are
become proficients in discipline and good manners, as with Leucon and
Hydanthyrsus."

Some there are who blame Callisthene