Kitap 1
25
Do you decide between these opinions; but do not let it be with depression and anxiety, and the assumption that you are miserable, for no one compels you to that. Is there smoke in my house? If it be moderate, I will stay; if very great, I will go out. For you must always remember, and hold to this, that the door is open. You are forbidden to live at Nicopolis. Then I will not live there. Nor at Athens. Well, nor at Athens. Nor at Rome. Nor at Rome. But you shall live at Gyaros.An island in the Aegean Sea, to which the Romans used to banish criminals.—C. I will live there. But suppose that living at Gyaros seems to me like living in a great smoke. I can then retire where no one can forbid me to live, for it is an abode open to all, and put off my last garment, this poor body of mine; beyond this, no one has any power over me.
25
Thus Demetrius said to Nero: You sentence me to death; and Nature you. If I prize my body first, I have surrendered myself as a slave; if my estate, the same; for I at once betray where I am vulnerable. Just as when a reptile pulls in his head, I bid you strike that part of him which he guards; and be you assured, that wherever you show a desire to guard yourself. there your master will attack you. Remember but this, and whom will you any longer flatter or fear?
25
But I want to sit where the senators do.
25
Do not you see, that by this you incommode and torment yourself?
25
Why, how else shall I see the show in the Amphitheatre advantageously?
