grew.

49. Be like the promontory against which the waves continually break, but
it stands firm and tames the fury of the water around it.

Unhappy am I because this has happened to me? Not so, but happy am I,
though this has happened to me, because I continue free from pain,
neither crushed by the present nor fearing the future. For such a thing
as this might have happened to every man; but every man would not have
continued free from pain on such an occasion. Why then is that rather a
misfortune than this a good fortune? And dost thou in all cases call that
a man's misfortune which is not a deviation from man's nature? And does a
thing seem to thee to be a deviation from man's nature, when it is not
contrary to the will of man's nature? Well, thou knowest the will of
nature. Will then this which has happened prevent thee from being just,
magnanimous, temperate, prudent, secure against inconsiderate opinions
and falsehood; will it prevent thee from having modesty, freedom, and
everything else, by the presence of which man's nature obtains all that
is its own? Remember too on every occasion which leads thee to vexation
to apply this principle: not that this is a misfortune, but that to bear
it nobly is good fortune.

50. It is a vulgar, but still a useful help towards contempt of death, to
pass in review those who have tenaciously stuck to life. What more then
have they gained than those who have died early? Certainly they lie in
their tombs somewhere at last, Cadicianus, Fabius, Julianus, Lepidus, or
any one else like them, who have carried out many to be buried, and then
were carried out themselves. Altogether the interval is small [between
birth and death]; and consider with how much trouble, and in company with
what sort of people, and in what a feeble body this interval is