Confined my arms, unable to contest;
Entreating only that in pity Jove
Would take my life, and this cursed plague remove.
But endless ages past unheard my moan,
Sooner shall drops dissolve this very stone.[32]

And therefore it scarcely seems possible to avoid calling a man who is
suffering, miserable; and if he is miserable, then pain is an evil.

XI. _A._ Hitherto you are on my side; I will see to that by-and-by;
and, in the mean while, whence are those verses? I do not remember
them.

_M._ I will inform you, for you are in the right to ask. Do you see
that I have much leisure?

_A._ What, then?

_M._ I imagine, when you were at Athens, you attended frequently at the
schools of the philosophers.

_A._ Yes, and with great pleasure.

_M._ You observed, then, that though none of them at that time were
very eloquent, yet they used to mix verses with their harangues.

_A._ Yes, and particularly Dionysius the Stoic used to employ a great
many.

_M._ You say right; but they were quoted without any appropriateness or