Axiochus

of this life, are now no more, and therefore death now toucheth them not: for thou art not yet dead, neither if thou decease, shall it concern thee, for thou shalt then have no more. Therefore, most vain is that sorrow which Axiochus maketh, for the thing which neither is present, nor shall ever touch Axiochus himself. And even as foolish is it, as if one should complain and be afraid of Scylla a legendary sea monster, or the Centaures mythological creatures, half-man and half-horse, which were monsters of Poets' brood, which neither now belong to thee, nor to thy life's end shall appertain. For fear is conceived of such things as be; but of such things as be not, what fear can there be?

Truly Socrates, you have fetched these things out of the rich and most abundant storehouse of your wonderful wisdom. And thereof riseth that your mildness and lightness of speech, which you use to allure the minds of young men to virtue. But the loss of these worldly commodities doth not a little vex and disquiet my mind; albeit these reasons, which now to my great good liking you have alleged, seem to me much more allowable than those which late you used; for my mind is not carried away with error through the enticement of your words, but