from life, not in passion, but with simplicity and freedom and modesty,
after doing this one [laudable] thing at least in thy life, to have gone
out of it thus. In order, however, to the remembrance of these names, it
will greatly help thee if thou rememberest the gods, and that they wish
not to be flattered, but wish all reasonable beings to be made like
themselves; and if thou rememberest that what does the work of a fig-tree
is a fig-tree, and that what does the work of a dog is a dog, and that
what does the work of a bee is a bee, and that what does the work of a
man is a man.

9. Mimi, war, astonishment, torpor, slavery, will daily wipe out those
holy principles of thine. How many things without studying nature dost
thou imagine, and how many dost thou neglect? But it is thy duty so to
look on and so to do everything, that at the same time the power of
dealing with circumstances is perfected, and the contemplative faculty is
exercised, and the confidence which comes from the knowledge of each
several thing is maintained without showing it, but yet not concealed.
For when wilt thou enjoy simplicity, when gravity, and when the knowledge
of every several thing, both what it is in substance, and what place it
has in the universe, and how long it is formed to exist, and of what
things it is compounded, and to whom it can belong, and who are able both
to give it and take it away?

10. A spider is proud when it has caught a fly, and another when he has
caught a poor hare, and another when he has taken a little fish in a net,
and another when he has taken wild boars, and another when he has taken
bears, and another when he has taken Sarmatians. Are not these robbers,
if thou examinest their opinions?

11. Acquire the contemplative way of seeing how all things change into