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 this subject? none; but you will tell us of Helen and Priam, and the island of Calypso which never was and never will be. And in this matter indeed it is of no great importance if you retain the story, but have formed no opinion of your own. But in matters of morality (Ethic) this happens to us much more than in these things of which we are speaking.

Speak to me about good and evil. Listen:

Of things some are good, some are bad, and others are indifferent. The good then are the virtues and the things which partake of the virtues: the bad are the vices, and the things which partake of them; and the indifferent are the things which lie between the virtues and the vices, wealth, health, life, death, pleasure, pain. Whence do you know this? Hellanicus says it in his Egyptian history; for what difference does it make to say this, or to say that Diogenes has it in his Ethic, or Chrysippus or Cleanthes? Have you then examined any of these things and formed an opinion of your own? Show how you are used to behave in a storm on shipboard? Do you remember this division (distinction of things), when the sail rattles and a man, who knows nothing of times and seasons, stands by you when you are screaming and says, Tell me, I ask you by the Gods, what you were saying just now, Is it a vice to suffer shipwreck: does it participate in vice? Will you not take up a stick and lay it on his head? What have we to do with you, man? we are perishing and you come