"As many ways as there are stars in heaven; but the stars have their
say in the matter! None can kill a man until his destiny says yes to
it. Not even a doctor," he added, chuckling. "Otherwise the doctors
would have killed me long ago with jealousy! A man dies when his inner
man grows sick and weary of him. Then a pin-prick does it, or a sudden
terror. Until that time comes you may break his skull, and do not more
than spoil his temper! As a philosopher I have learned two things:
respect many, but trust few. But as a doctor I have learned only one
thing for certain: that no man actually dies until his soul is tired of
him."

"Whose soul should grow sick sooner than that of Commodus?" asked
Sextus.

"Not if his soul is evil and delights in evil--as his does!" Galen
retorted. "If he should turn virtuous, then perhaps, yes. But in that
case we should wish him to live, although his soul would prefer the
contrary and leave him to die by the first form of death that should
appear--in spite of all the doctors and the guards and tasters of the
royal food."

"Some one should convert him then!" said Sextus. "Cornificia, can't
Marcia make a Christian of him; Christians pretend to oppose all the
infamies he practises. It would be a merry joke to have a Christian
emperor, who died because his soul was sick of him! It would be a
choice jest--he being the one who has encouraged Christianity by
reversing all Marcus Aurelius' wise precautions against their seditious
blasphemy!"

"You speak fanatically, but you have touched the heart of the problem,"