Tusculan Disputations 2 ¶48 — Cicero (on the Stoics)

Cicero (on the Stoics), Tusculan Disputations 2 ¶48

Pacuvius is better in this than Sophocles, for in the one Ulysses bemoans his wounds too vehemently—for the very people who carried him after he was wounded, though his grief was moderate, yet, considering the dignity of the man, did not scruple to say, And thou, Ulysses, long to war inured, Thy wounds, though great, too feebly hast endured. The wise poet understood that custom was no contemptible instructor how to bear pain. But the same hero complains with more decency, though in great pain: Assist, support me, never leave me so; Unbind my wounds, oh! execrable woe! He begins to give way, but instantly checks himself: Away! begone! but cover first the sore; For your rude hands but make my pains the more. Do you observe how he constrains himself? not that his bodily pains were less, but because he checks the anguish of his mind. Therefore, in the conclusion of the Niptrae, he blames others, even when he himself is dying: Complaints of fortune may become the man, None but a woman will thus weeping stand. And so that soft place in his soul obeys his reason, just as an abashed soldier does his stern commander.