BOOK I. XXIV. 3-10
man to wrestle with. And now we are sending you to Rome as a scout, to spy out the land.[1] But no one sends a coward as a scout, that, if he merely hears a noise and sees a shadow anywhere, he may come running back in terror and report "The enemy is already upon us." So now also, if you should come and tell us, "The state of things at Rome is fearful; terrible is death, terrible is exile, terrible is reviling, terrible is poverty; flee, sirs, the enemy is upon us!" 5we shall say to you, "Away, prophesy to yourself! Our one mistake was that we sent a man like you as a scout."
Diogenes, who before you was sent forth as a scout, has brought us back a different report. He says, "Death is not an evil, since it is not dishonourable"; he says, "Ill repute is a noise made by madmen." And what a report this scout has made us about toil and about pleasure and about poverty! He says, "To be naked is better than any scarlet robe; and to sleep on the bare ground," he says, "is the softest couch." And he offers as a proof of each statement his own courage, his tranquillity, his freedom, and finally his body, radiant with health and hardened. "There is no enemy near," says he; "all is full of peace." How so, Diogenes? "Why, look!" says he, "I have not been struck with any missile, have I, or received any wound? I have not fled from anyone, have I?" 10This is what it means to be a proper scout, but you return and tell us one thing after another. Will you not
- ↑ Domitian had banished the philosophers from Rome; the young man is, therefore, being sent from Nicopolis to learn what is going on there that might be of interest to the cause of philosophy.
