Status Updates From The Roman History: The Reig...

Finally he declared, “I found Rome built of clay: I leave it to you in marble.” In this saying he was not referring literally to the state of the buildings, but rather to the strength of the empire. And when he asked them for some applause, as comic actors do at the end of a mime, he was in fact mocking very aptly the whole life of man.

…and for a similar reason I warn you to be on your guard against them. Because you have had experience of good and honorable men such as Areius and Athenodorus, you should not believe that all the others who profess to be philosophers are like them. There are men who make this vocation a screen, and use jt to work untold harm, both upon communities and upon individuals.

You should, on no account, therefore, permit anyone to be an atheist or a sorcerer. Soothsaying, it is true, is a necessary art… But the practitioners of magic should be forbidden to carry on their craft. For such men, who occasionally speak the truth, but for the most part deal in falsehoods, often incite many of their followers to attempt revolutions. The same also applies to many who claim to be philosophers…

…is it not just that they should share equally in all other respects as well, and is it not best that they receive no distinctions save in account of merit?

Equality before the law is an auspicious concept and works very well in practice. Where we have two men to whom heredity has allotted the same kind of nature, who belong to the same race as one another, have grown up under the same institutions, have been trained under similar laws, and contribute in equal degree to one another the service of their bodies and minds to the country…