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[5]
Wherefore, if you are accustomed to marvel at
my wisdom—and would that it were worthy of your
estimate and of my cognomen1 —I am wise because
I follow Nature as the best of guides and obey her as
a god; and since she has fitly planned the other
acts of life's drama, it is not likely that she has
[p. 15]
neglected the final act as if she were a careless playwright. And yet there had to be something final,
and—as in the case of orchard fruits and crops
of grain in the process of ripening which comes with
time—something shrivelled, as it were, and prone
to fall. But this state the wise man should endure
with resignation. For what is warring against the
gods, as the giants did, other than fighting against
Nature?
1 Cato was called sapiens, Cic. Lael. 2. 6.
Cicero: De Senectute De Amicitia De Divinatione. With An English Translation. William Armistead Falconer. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1923.
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