Discourses - Book I   

pursued, but whether it is holy to eat pig's flesh or not holy. You
will find this dispute also between Agamemnon and Achilles; for call
them forth. What do you say, Agamemnon ought not that to be done which
is proper and right? "Certainly." Well, what do you say, Achilles?
do you not admit that what is good ought to be done? "I do most
certainly." Adapt your precognitions then to the present matter.
Here the dispute begins. Agamemnon says, "I ought not to give up
Chryseis to her father." Achilles says, "You ought." It is certain
that one of the two makes a wrong adaptation of the precognition of
ought" or "duty." Further, Agamemnon says, "Then if I ought to restore
Chryseis, it is fit that I take his prize from some of you."
Achilles replies, "Would you then take her whom I love?" "Yes, her
whom you love." "Must I then be the only man who goes without a prize?
and must I be the only man who has no prize?" Thus the dispute begins.
What then is education? Education is the learning how to adapt the
natural precognitions to the particular things conformably to
nature; and then to distinguish that of things some are in our
power, but others are not; in our power are will and all acts which
depend on the will; things not in our power are the body, the parts of
the body, possessions, parents, brothers, children, country, and,
generally, all with whom we live in society. In what, then, should
we place the good? To what kind of things shall we adapt it? "To the
things which are in our power?" Is not health then a good thing, and
soundness of limb, and life? and are not children and parents and
country? Who will tolerate you if you deny this?
Let us then transfer the notion of good to these things. is it
possible, then, when a man sustains damage and does not obtain good
things, that he can be happy? "It is not possible." And can he
maintain toward society a proper behavior? He cannot. For I am
naturally formed to look after my own interest. If it is my interest
to have an estate in land, it is my interest also to take it from my
neighbor. If it is my interest to have a garment, it is my interest
also to steal it from the bath. This is the origin of wars, civil
commotions, tyrannies, conspiracies. And how shall I be still able
to maintain my duty toward Zeus? for if I sustain damage and am
unlucky, he takes no care of me; and what is he to me if he allows
me to be in the condition in which I am? I now begin to hate him. Why,
then, do we build temples, why set up statues to Zeus, as well as to
evil demons, such as to Fever; and how is Zeus the Saviour, and how
the Giver of rain, and the Giver of fruits? And in truth if we place
the nature of Good in any such things, all this follows.
What should we do then? This is the inquiry of the true
philosopher who is in labour. "Now I do not see what the Good is nor
the Bad. Am I not mad? Yes." But suppose that I place the good
somewhere among the things which depend on the will: all will laugh at
me. There will come some grey-head wearing many gold rings on his
fingers and he will shake his head and say, "Hear, my child. It is
right that you should philosophize; but you ought to have some
brains also: all this that you are doing is silly. You learn the
syllogism from philosophers; but you know how to act better than