_Ly_. But is there indeed Happiness up there--and worth all the pains? How
can you tell? You have never been up yourself.

_Her_. I trust my master's word; and he knows well; is he not on the
topmost height?

_Ly_. Oh, do tell me what he says about it; what is Happiness like?
wealth, glory, pleasures incomparable?

_Her_. Hush, friend! all these have nought to do with the Virtuous
life.

_Ly_. Well, if these will not do, what _are_ the good things he offers to
those who carry their course right through?

_Her_. Wisdom, courage, true beauty, justice, full and firm knowledge of
all things as they are; but wealth and glory and pleasure and all bodily
things--these a man strips off and abandons before he mounts up, like
Heracles burning on Mount Oeta before deification; he too cast off
whatever of the human he had from his mother, and soared up to the Gods
with his divine part pure and unalloyed, sifted by the fire. Even so those
I speak of are purged by the philosophic fire of all that deluded men
count admirable, and reaching the summit have Happiness with never a
thought of wealth and glory and pleasure--except to smile at any who count
them more than phantoms.

_Ly_. By Heracles (and his death on Oeta), they quit themselves like
men, and have their reward, it seems. But there is one thing I should
like to know: are they allowed to come down from their elevation