Golden Sayings   

fault with his lot! Them that will take part in the Feast he
needeth--that will lift their voices with the restm that men may
applaud the more, and exalt the Great Assembly in hymns and songs
of praise. But the wretched and the fearful He will not be
displeased to see absent from it: for when they were present,
they did not behave as at a Feast, nor fulfil their proper
office; but moaned as though in pain, and found fault with their
fate, their fortune and their companions; insensible to what had
fallen to their lot, insensible to the powers they had received
for a very different purpose--the powers of Magnanimity, Nobility
of Heart, of Fortitude, or Freedom!

CXLI

Art thou then free? a man may say. So help me heaven, I long
and pray for freedom! But I cannot look my masters boldly in the
face; I still value the poor body; I still set much store on its
preservation whole and sound.
But I can point thee out a free man, that thou mayest be no
more in search of an example. Diogenes was free. How so? Not
because he was of free parentage (for that, indeed, was not the
case), but because he was himself free. He had cast away every
handle whereby slavery might lay hold of him to enslave him, nor
was it possible for any to approach and take hold of him to
enslave him. All things sat loose upon him--all things were to
him attached by but slender ties. Hadst thou siezed upon his
possessions, he would rather have let them go than have followed
thee for them--aye, had it been even a limb, or mayhap his whole
body; and in like manner, relatives, friends, and country. For he
knew whence they came--from whose hands and on what terms he had
received them. His true forefathers, the Gods, his true Country,
he never would have abandoned; nor would he have yielded to any
man in obedience and submission to the one nor in cheerfully
dying for the other. For he was ever mindful that everything that
comes to pass has its source and origin there; being indeed
brought about for the weal of that his true Country, and directed
by Him in whose governance it is.

CXLII

Ponder on this--on these convictions, on these words: fix
thine eyes on these examples, if thou wouldst be free, if thou
hast thine heart set upon the matter according to its worth. And
what marvel if thou purchase so great a thing at so great and
high a price? For the sake of this that men deem liberty, some
hang themselves, others cast themselves down from the rock; aye,
time has been when whole cities came utterly to an end: while for
the sake of Freedom that is true, and sure, and unassailable,
dost thou grudge to God what He gave, when He claims it? Wilt
thou not study, as Plato saith, to endure, not death alone, but