Consolation to Helvia, His Mother Chapter 13

Responderi potest: " Quid artificiose ista diducis, quae singula sustineri possunt, conlata non possunt ? Commutatio loci tolerabilis est, si tantum locum mutes ; paupertas tolerabilis est, si ignominia absit, quae vel sola opprimere animos solet." Adversus hunc, quisquis me malorum turba terrebit, his verbis utendum erit : "Si contra unam quamlibet partem fortunae satis tibi roboris est, idem adversus omnis erit. Cum semel animum virtus induravit, undique invulnerabilem praestat. Si avaritia dimisit, vehementissima generis humani pestis, moram tibi ambitio non faciet; si ultimum diem non quasi poenam, sed quasi naturae legem aspicis, ex quo pectore metum mortis eieceris, in id nullius rei timor audebit intrare ; si cogitas libidinem non voluptatis causa homini datam, sed propagandi generis, quem non violaverit hoc secretum et infixum visceribus ipsis exitium, omnis alia cupiditas intactum praeteribit. Non singula vitia ratio sed pariter omnia prosternit; in universum semel vincitur." Ignominia tu putas quemquam sapientem moveri posse, qui omnia in se reposuit, qui ab opinionibus vulgi secessit ? Plus etiam quam ignominia est mors ignominiosa. Socrates tamen eodem illo vultu, quo triginta tyrannos solus aliquando in ordinem redegerat, carcerem intravit ignominiam ipsi loco detracturus ; neque enim poterat carcer videri in quo Socrates erat. Quis usque eo ad conspiciendam veritatem excaecatus est, ut ignominiam putet Marci Catonis fuisse duplicem in petitione praeturae et consulatus repulsam ? Ignominia illa praeturae et consulatus fuit, quibus ex Catone honor habebatur. Nemo ab alio contemnitur, nisi a se ante contemptus est. Humilis et proiectus animus sit isti contumeliae opportunus ; qui vero adversus saevissimos casus se extollit et ea mala, quibus alii opprimuntur, evertit, ipsas miserias infularum loco habet, quando ita adfecti sumus, ut nihil aeque magnam apud nos admirationem occupet quam homo fortiter miser. Ducebatur Athenis ad supplicium Aristides, cui quisquis occurrerat deiciebat oculos et ingemescebat, non tamquam in hominem iustum sed tamquam in ipsam iustitiam animadverteretur; inventus est tamen, qui in faciem eius inspueret. Poterat ob hoc moleste ferre, quod sciebat neminem id ausurum puri oris ; at ille abstersit faciem et subridens ait comitanti se magistratui: " Admone istum, ne postea tam improbe oscitet." Hoc fuit contumeliam ipsi contumeliae facere. Scio quosdam dicere contemptu nihil esse gravius, mortem ipsis potiorem videri. His ego respondebo et* exilium saepe contemptione omni carere. Si magnus vir cecidit, magnus iacuit, non magis illum contemni, quam aedium sacrarum ruinae calcantur, quas religiosi aeque ae stantis adorant.

To this one may answer: “Why do you thus ingeniously divide what can indeed be endured if taken singly, but which all together are overwhelming? Change of place can be borne if nothing more than one’s place be changed: poverty can be borne if it be without disgrace, which is enough to cow our spirits by itself.” If any one were to endeavour to frighten me with the number of my misfortunes, I should answer him as follows: If you have enough strength to resist any one part of your ill-fortune, you will have enough to resist it all. If virtue has once hardened your mind, it renders it impervious to blows from any quarter: if avarice, that greatest pest of the human race, has left it, you will not be troubled by ambition: if you regard the end of your days not as a punishment, but as an ordinance of nature, no fear of anything else will dare to enter the breast which has cast out the fear of death. If you consider sexual passion to have been bestowed on mankind not for the sake of pleasure, but for the continuance of the race, all other desires will pass harmlessly by one who is safe even from this secret plague, implanted in our very bosoms. Reason does not conquers vices one by one, but all together: if reason is defeated, it is utterly defeated once for all. Do you suppose that any wise man, who relies entirely upon himself, who has set himself free from the ideas of the common herd, can be wrought upon by disgrace? A disgraceful death is worse even than disgrace: yet Socrates bore the same expression of countenance with which he had rebuked thirty tyrants, when he entered the prison and thereby took away the infamous character of the place; for the place which contained Socrates could not be regarded as a prison. Was any one ever so blind to the truth as to suppose that Marcus Cato was disgraced by his double defeat in his candidature for the praetorship and the consulship? that disgrace fell on the praetorship and consulship which Cato honoured by his candidature. No one is despised by others unless he be previously despised by himself: a grovelling and abject mind may fall an easy prey to such contempt: but he who stands up against the most cruel misfortunes, and overcomes those evils by which others would have been crushed - such a man, I say, turns his misfortunes into badges of honour, because we are so constituted as to admire nothing so much as a man who bears adversity bravely. At Athens, when Aristides was being led to execution, every one who met him cast down his eyes and groaned, as though not merely a just man but justice herself was being put to death. Yet one man was found who spat in his face: he might have been disturbed at this, since he knew it could only be a foul-mouthed fellow that would have the heart to do so; he, however, wiped his face, and with a smile asked the magistrate who accompanied him to warn that man not to open his mouth so rudely again. To act thus was to treat contumely itself with contempt. I know that some say that there is nothing more terrible than disgrace, and that they would prefer death. To such men I answer that even exile is often accompanied by no disgrace whatever: if a great man falls, he remains a great man after his fall, you can no more suppose that he is disgraced than when people tread upon the walls of a ruined temple, which the pious treat with as much respect as when they were standing.

On dira peut-être : « Pourquoi séparer subtilement des choses qui isolées sont supportables, et réunies ne le sont plus ? Le changement de lieu peut s’endurer, si l’on ne fait que changer de lieu, la pauvreté de même, si elle n’est pas jointe à l’ignominie qui d’ordinaire brise à elle seule l’énergie de l’âme. » À quiconque voudra m’effrayer par l’accumulation des souffrances j’ai ceci à répondre : « Si tu es assez fort contre un seul des traits de la Fortune, tu le seras contre tous ; dès qu’une fois la vertu a cuirassé notre âme , elle l’a faite invulnérable sur tous les points. Si la passion de l’or, si cette peste du genre humain, la plus furieuse de toutes, t’a quitté, l’ambition ne te retiendra guère. Si tu regardes ton dernier jour non comme un châtiment, mais comme une loi de la nature , si tu as banni de ton cœur la crainte de la mort, aucune terreur n’osera y entrer. Si tu te dis que le penchant aux plaisirs amoureux fut donné à l’homme non pour la volupté, mais pour la propagation de l’espèce, pur des atteintes de ce venin secret et inhérent à nos entrailles, il n’est point d’autre mauvais désir qui ne te respecte. La raison terrasse non pas chaque vice isolément, mais tous les vices ensemble : sa victoire est générale. Crois-tu que l’ignominie puisse jamais émouvoir le sage, pour qui sa conscience est tout, et qui a rompu, avec les préjugés du vulgaire ? Ce qui est pis même que l’ignominie, c’est une mort ignominieuse. Eh bien, vois Socrate : avec le même visage qui jadis, avait seul imposé aux trente tyrans, il entre dans cette prison dont il va ennoblir la honte ; car on ne pouvait voir une prison là où était Socrate. Quel homme serait assez aveugle aux lumières de la vérité pour croire Caton déshonoré par le double refus qu’il subit comme candidat à la préture et au consulat ? C’est la préture, c’est le consulat qui furent déshérités de l’honneur que Caton leur apportait. Le mépris d’autrui n’atteint que l’homme qui déjà se méprise lui-même. Une âme basse, dégradée, donne prise à ces flétrissures ; mais celle qui reste supérieure aux plus rudes disgrâces, qui triomphe des mêmes maux dont les autres sont accablés, celle-là est comme sacrée par sa propre infortune ; car, tel est l’homme : rien ne commande son admiration comme le courage dans le malheur. Lorsque dans Athènes on menait Aristide au supplice, et que sur son passage tous les yeux se baissaient et pleuraient non pas seulement l’homme juste, mais la justice elle-même sacrifiée en lui, il se trouva pourtant un misérable qui lui cracna au visage, affront d’autant plus propre à l’indigner qu’il savait bien qu’une bouche impure pouvait seule se le permettre. Il se contenta de s’essuyer, et dit en souriant au magistrat qui l’accompagnait : « Avertissez cet homme de bâiller désormais avec plus de décence. » C’était faire affront à l’affront lui-même. Je sais qu’au dire de quelques-uns, rien n’est plus accablant que le mépris : ils choisiraient plutôt la mort. Je leur répondrai que l’exil est souvent à couvert de tout mépris. Le grand homme qui tombe reste grand même couché par terre ; il n’est pas, croyez-le, plus méprisé que ces temples dont les ruines sont foulées aux pieds, mais que révèrent les âmes religieuses comme s’ils étaient encore debout . »