CHARON
And although they are like that, Hermes, you see what they do and how ambitious they are, vying with each other for offices, honours, and possessions, all of which they must leave behind them and come down to us with but a single obol. As we are ina high place, would you like me to call out in a great voice and urge them to desist from their vain labours and live always with death before their eyes, saying: “Vain creatures, why have you set your hearts on these things? Cease toiling, for your lives will not endure forever. Nothing that is in honour here is eternal, nor can a man take anything with him when he dies; nay, it is inevitable that he depart naked, and that his house and his land and his money go first to one and then to another, changing their owners.” If I should call to them out of a commanding place and say all this and more, do you not think that they would be greatly assisted in life and made saner by far?
