versal divine mind. Moreover, the arguments were conclusive to me, which Socrates delivered on the last day of his life concerning the immortality of the soul, he who was pronounced by the oracle of Apollo the wisest of all men. But why say more? I have thus persuaded myself, such is my belief: that since such is the activity of our souls, so tenacious their memory of things past, and their sagacity regarding things future, -so many arts, so many sciences, so many discoveries, that the nature which comprises these qualities cannot be mortal; and since the mind is ever in action and has no source of motion, because it moves itself, I believe that it never will find any end of motion, because it never will part from itself; and that since the nature of the soul is uncompounded, and has not in itself any admixture heterogeneous and dissimilar to itself, I maintain that it cannot undergo dissolution; and if this be not possible, it cannot perish; and it is a strong argument, that men know very many things before they are born, since when mere boys, while they are learning difficult subjects, they so quickly catch up numberless ideas, that they seem not to be learning them then for the first time, but to remember them, and to be calling them to recollection. Thus did our Plato argue. Moreover, in Xenophon, Cyrus the elder, on his deathbed, discourses thus: "Never imagine, O my dearest sons, that when I have departed from you, I shall exist nowhere, or cease to be: for while I was with you you never saw my soul; though you concluded from the actions which I performed that it was in this body. Believe, therefore, that it still exists, though you will see nothing of it. Nor, in truth, would the honors of illustrious men continue after death, if their own spirits did not make us preserve a longer remembrance of them. I could never, indeed, be persuaded that souls, while they were in mortal bodies, lived; and when they had quitted them, perished; nor, in truth, that the soul became senseless when it made its escape from a senseless body; but that it then became wise when freed from every corporeal admixture, it had become pure and genuine. Besides, when the constitution of man is broken up by death, it is clear whither each of its other parts depart; for they all return to the source from whence they sprang; whereas the soul alone, neither shows itself when it is with us, nor when it departs. Further, you see there is nothing so like death as sleep. Yet the souls of persons asleep especially manifest their divine nature; for when they are disengaged and free, they foresee many future events. From which we conclude in what state they will be when they shall have altogether released themselves from the fetters of the body. Wherefore, if this is the case, regard me as a god, but if the soul is destined to perish along with the body, yet you, reverencing the gods, who oversee and control all this beautiful system, will affectionately and sacredly preserve my memory." Such were the dying words of Cyrus. Let me, if you please, revert to my own views. No one will ever persuade me that either your father, Paulus, or two grandfathers, Paulus and Africanus, or the father of Africanus, or his uncle, or the many distinguished men whom it is unnecessary to recount, aimed at such great exploits as might reach to the recollection of posterity, had they not perceived in their mind that posterity belonged to them. Do you suppose, to boast a little of myself, after the manner of old men, that I should have undergone such great toils, by day and night, at home and in service, had I thought to limit my glory by the same bounds as my life? Would it not have been far better to pass an easy and quiet life without any toil or struggle? But I know not how my soul, stretching upwards, has ever looked forward to posterity, as if, when it had departed from life, then at last it would begin to live. And, indeed, unless this were the case, that souls were immortal, the souls of the noblest of men would not aspire above all things to an immortality of glory. Why need I adduce that the wisest man ever dies with the greatest equanimity, the most foolish with the least? Does it not seem to you that the soul, which sees more and further, sees that it is passing to a better state, while that body, whose vision is duller, does not see it? I, indeed, am transported with eagerness to see your fathers, whom I have respected and loved: nor in truth is it those only I desire to meet whom I myself have known; but those also of whom I have heard or read, and have myself written. Whither, indeed, as I proceed, no one assuredly should easily force me back, nor, as they did with Pelias, cook me again to youth. For if any god should III.-20 grant me, that from this period of life I should become a child again and cry in the cradle, I should earnestly refuse it: nor in truth should I like, after having run, as it were, my course, to be called back to the starting-place from the goal. For what comfort has life? What trouble has it not, rather? But grant that it has; yet it assuredly has either satiety or limitation (of its pleasures). For I am not disposed to lament the loss of life, which many men, and those learned men too, have often done; neither do I regret that I have lived, since I have lived in such a way that I conceive I was not born in vain: and from this life I depart as from a temporary lodging, not as from a home. For nature has assigned it to us as an inn to sojourn in, not a place of habitation. Oh, glorious day! when I shall depart to that divine company and assemblage of spirits, and quit this troubled and polluted scene. For I shall go not only to those great men of whom I have spoken before, but also to my son Cato, than whom never was better man born, nor more distinguished for pious affection; whose body was burned by me, whereas, on the contrary, it was fitting that mine should be burned by him. But his soul not deserting me, but oft looking back, no doubt departed to those regions whither it saw that I myself was destined to come. Which, though a distress to me, I seemed patiently to endure: not that I bore it with indifference, but I comforted myself with the recollection that the separation and distance between us would not continue long. For these reasons, O Scipio (since you said that you with Lælius were accustomed to wonder at this), old age is tolerable to me, and not only not irksome, but even delightful. And if I am wrong in this, that I believe the souls of men to be immortal, I willingly delude myself: nor do I desire that this mistake, in which I take pleasure, should be wrested from me as long as I live; but if I, when dead, shall have no consciousness, as some narrow-minded philosophers imagine, I do not fear lest dead philosophers should ridicule this my delusion. But if we are not destined to be immortal, yet it is a desirable thing for a man to expire at his fit time. For, as nature prescribes a boundary to all other things, so does she also to life. Now old age is the consummation of life, just as of a play; from the fatigue of which we ought to escape, especially when satiety is superadded. This is what I had to say on the subject of old age; to which may you arrive! that, after having experienced the truth of those statements which you have heard from me, you may be enabled to give them your approbation. CLEANTHES CLEANTHES, a pupil of Zeno, and one of the founders of the Stoic philosophy. Born at Assos, 331 B.C.; died 232 B.C., of voluntary starvation. His "Hymn to Zeus" is one of the world's classics. HYMN TO ZEUS O UNDER various sacred Names ador'd! When through the Void thy dreadful Thunders sound, Ruling that Reason which thro' All convey'd Informs this gen'ral Mass, Thou reign'st ador'd, For nor in Earth, nor earth-encircling Floods, Is ought perform'd without thy Aid divine; So blending Good with Evil, Fair with Foul, Those radiant Beams, by whose all-piercing Flame That honor'd with a Portion of thy Light We may essay thy Goodness to requite And hymn thy glorious Works with ceaseless Praise, |