The Practicing Stoic: A Philosophical User's Manual

by Ward Farnsworth

Now that we have determined the cause of these disturbances of the mind – that they all arise from judgments based on opinion, and by choice – let there be an end to this discussion. Besides, now that the boundaries of good and evil have been discovered so far as they are discoverable by man, we ought to realize that nothing can be hoped from philosophy greater or more useful than what we have been discussing for the last four days. For besides instilling a proper contempt for death, and making pain bearable, we have added the calming of grief, as great as any evil known to mankind. . . . For there is one cure for grief and other ills, and it is the same. They are all matters of opinion, and taken up voluntarily because it seems right to do so. This error, as the root of all evils, philosophy promises to eradicate utterly. Let us therefore devote ourselves to its cultivation and submit to being cured; for so long as these evils possess us, not only can we not be happy, we cannot even be right in our minds. Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 4.38