But I should like to sit where the Senators sit.  Do you see that you are putting yourself in straits, you are squeezing yourself?  How then shall I see well in any other way in the amphitheatre?  Man, do not be a spectator at all, and you will not be squeezed.  Why do you give yourself trouble?  Or wait a little, and when the spectacle is over, seat yourself in the place reserved for the Senators and sun yourself.  For remember this general truth, that it is we who squeeze ourselves, who put ourselves in straits; that is, our opinions squeeze us and put us in straits.  For what is it to be reviled?  Stand by a stone and revile it, and what will you gain?  If then a man listens like a stone, what profit is there to the reviler?  But if the reviler has as a stepping-stone (or ladder) the weakness of him who is reviled, then he accomplishes something.  Strip him.  What do you mean by him?  Lay hold of his garment, strip it off.  I have insulted you.  Much good may it do you.

This was the practice of Socrates; this was the reason why he always had one face.  But we choose to practise and study anything rather than the means by which we shall be unimpeded and free.  You say:  “Philosophers talk paradoxes.”  But are there no paradoxes in the other arts?  And what is more paradoxical than to puncture a man’s eye in order that he may see?  If any one said this to a man ignorant of the surgical art, would he not ridicule the speaker?  Where is the wonder, then, if in philosophy also many things which are true appear paradoxical to the inexperienced?

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In how many ways appearances exist, and what aids we should provide against them.—­Appearances are to us in four ways.  For either things appear as they are; or they are not, and do not even appear to be; or they are, and do not appear to be; or they are not, and yet appear to be.  Further, in all these cases to form a right judgment (to hit the mark) is the office of an educated man.  But whatever it is that annoys (troubles) us, to that we ought to apply a remedy.  If the sophisms of Pyrrho and of the Academics are what annoys (troubles), we must apply the remedy to them.  If it is the persuasion of appearances, by which some things appear to be good, when they are not good, let us seek a remedy for this.  If it is habit which annoys us, we must try to seek aid against habit.  What aid, then, can we find against habit?  The contrary habit.  You hear the ignorant say:  “That unfortunate person is dead; his father and mother are overpowered with sorrow; he was cut off by an untimely death and in a foreign land.”  Hear the contrary way of speaking.  Tear yourself from these expressions; oppose to one habit the contrary habit; to sophistry oppose reason, and the exercise and discipline of reason; against persuasive (deceitful) appearances we ought to have manifest praecognitions ([Greek:  prolaepseis]), cleared of all impurities and ready to hand.