SUDA entry delta 119: (god, demi-god, spirit, fortune, genius)

Each person's fortune.[1] Aristophanes in Wealth [writes]: "fortune does not allow [a slave] to control his
own body as master, but [allows] rather the purchaser [to control it]."[2]
And Sophocles [writes]: "[you are] noble, as [you seem] to one who sees, except for your daimon." That
is, your fortune.[3]
"Nothing is more wretched than he who surveys everything and examines 'what is under the earth', [as]
he says,[4] and seeks out with evidence what is in the souls of his neighbors, but does not perceive
that it is sufficient to be alone with the spirit within himself and to take genuine care of this [spirit]. Care
of it is to keep it pure from passion and frivolity and dissatisfaction with what comes from god and from
men. For what comes from god and men is beneficial to us because of [their] relationship [with us], and
sometimes also in a certain way because of ignorance of good and evil; this blindness is worse than that
which deprives [us] of white and black."[5]

Notes
[1] For this noun see already delta 113; and cf. related words at delta 114, delta 115, delta 116, delta 117,
delta 118.
[2] Aristophanes, Plutus 6-7 (footnote 1), with scholion.
[3] Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus 76 (footnote 2), with scholion.
[4] Homer, Odyssey 11.302.
[5] Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 2.13; quoted again in part at epsiloniota 71.

Keywords: comedy; daily life; definition; economics; epic; ethics; philosophy; religion;
tragedy
Translated by Catharine Roth; edited by David Whitehead and Catharine Roth.
This is the version of the Suda On Line entry created 17 June 2012; the current version, at
http://www.stoa.org/sol-entries/delta/119, may be different.

1
2

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Aristoph.+Pl.+6
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Soph.+OC+76