THE APOKARTERON

In 2017, a new wave of texts was recovered from the Herculaneum. By far the most
significant find was Hegesias of Cyrene’s notorious work, the Apokarteron, ‘The Man Who
Starves Himself to Death,’ or translating the sense of the participle more accurately, ‘He
Who Wills Himself into Nothingness.’ Cicero’s summary of this text in Tusc. 1.34 is now
found to be largely accurate: the dialogue features a starving man that is found by his
friends, who attempt to dissuade him from death (Cicero wrongly reports that they are
momentarily successful in stopping him from dying); in retaliation, he offers them a
justification for his suicide. Cicero merely says that the man details the miseries of life,
but in fact the main character uses a cost-benefit analysis to determine whether one
should opt for life or death, going for the latter. This is supplemented by the
consideration that committing suicide exempts the victim from unpredictable evils, and
that suffering has the final arbitration in all matters, regardless of any transient pleasures
enjoyed.
Fortunately for modern scholars, the Epicurean who owned the library kept this text in
duplicate, so that virtually any lacunae found in one scroll could be filled by the other.
Perhaps from this very text, Hegesias was forbidden from teaching at Alexandria, whose
doctrines supposedly influenced, in a Wertherian fashion, the deaths of several
impressionable students. But for the first time in many centuries, Hegesias’ dialogue can
be read again, both in the original and in translation. It is perhaps ironic that for a
dialogue on death, the Apokarteron is now the only Greek philosophical dialogue that
survives from the Hellenistic period!

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Apokarteron: How you managed to find me, my friends, I don’t know;1 but I am
enormously impressed by your daring. That you managed to scale this
steep cliff-face, and for the sake of an old wretch like me! I am unworthy
of your friendship.
Clearchus: How can you have stayed here for so long? No shade, no vegetation,
water—there is no more barren a place anywhere, not even at the very tip
of a Scythian mountain.
Bion: You mustn’t reproach yourself any further, dear chap, as you surely don’t
have any more energy to spare, nor indeed is there much left of you to
reproach now. We have been searching for you for so many days now, and
we have been living in fear for you for many more.
Clearchus: You look like death! I can’t believe you would have acted so foolishly in
coming here, with no provisions! Eat this bread, or I will force it down
your throat myself.
Apokarteron: Clearchus, you are a good man, but ignorant. I have not sought this place
to spend for a short while alone, but picked the wrong spot—no, I have
come here to die, to resist the will.
Bion: Take Clearchus’ bread, my friend! We will bring you back to the city, and
we can provide you with everything that you need. Please do not hurt us
anymore, by doing this to yourself. Why, don’t you feel hunger gnawing at
your belly? Don’t you feel ravenous desire, just at the mere suggestion of
food? I admit that we could not stock anything more appetising, given our
long journey, but it has still kept well. I can even break it up for you, if you
are feeling too weak.
Apokarteron: You are as generous as ever, Bion, but I shouldn’t I decline? You tell me
that I am hungry, do you not?
Bion: Of course.
Apokarteron: And hunger is a kind of madness, if indeed it is something that can ‘gnaw,’
as you say, at one’s belly and drive one to think obsessively about food? If
one feels this way so intensely, isn’t this madness? One should not give
into madness.
Bion: I do not agree there, friend.
Apokarteron: How so?
Bion: Why, I suppose hunger is not a madness, but rather a sort of divine
message from a god to allow men to save themselves. Imagine if we could
not feel terrible, all-consuming pain in reaction to being to being burnt by a

1 Plat. Ap. 17a.

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 candle in our sleep. If the god had not sent the message, how many would
die in vain? If you feel hungry, it is the gods telling you to save yourself.
This is not madness but on the contrary according to reason.
Apokarteron: ‘According to reason?’ Very well, I will see if you can be persuaded yet. If a
person loses their wits, and commits a crime, like a deranged Agave,2
would you not say they are under the vice of madness?
Bion: Certainly.
Apokarteron: Well then! Are there not times where hunger achieves the very same effect?
What of the story of Erysichthon of Thessaly, the famed king? When he
upset Demeter, goddess of the grain, the goddess conspired with her sister
to punish the king, by filling him with insatiable hunger, of the very kind
you have just described. The king would eat and eat, but nothing would
satisfy him; to fund his endless banquets, he ended up having to sell not
only his possessions but his very own daughter! If this inhumanity wasn’t a
crime enough, he finally ate himself.3 Not out of anything else, not ill-will,
not ignorance, but hunger itself. How can this not be, then, a kind of
madness, if it can make a man sell his daughter into slavery, and eat his
own body?
Bion: I understand you now; yes, it is a kind of madness. But it is nonetheless a
madness from the gods that can be used for good or ill. Doubtless many
crimes have been done in the name of hunger—from theft to far worse
evils—but the madness can be cured by acting rightly, or having your
friends act rightly by you, according to reason. If you are suffering any
madness right now, on account of your hunger, you can cure it without
acting in a manner that you would not normally.
Clearchus: I am convinced the man is mad, although not with hunger.
Apokarteron: I understand you now, Bion; but I must not give into any sort of madness,
if I had it.
Bion: It is not giving in to accept a cure when it is offered, my friend; you are
committing a crime against the gods by refusing the bread we now offer
you. Please, in the name of piety and friendship—and your own life, by
Heracles!—accept Clearchus’ bread. If you are mad with hunger, you
should take what is offered to you.

2 Eur. Bacch. 1124ff.

3 Ov. Met. 8.738; Callim. Hymn 6.34ff.

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Apokarteron: ‘If,’ as the Laconians say.4 Bion, it is a wonderful truth about humans that
there is nothing that they cannot soon learn to bear with equanimity. I will
not pretend that I did not suffer in the first few days, but after some time I
realised that I was no longer feeling pain, for it dulls over time. In fact, I
have gone past the threshold of becoming mad with hunger, and if you
were to feed me with bread, Bion, I would in fact be more prone to
suffering this some time again. What you would give me is not the cure to
a disease I hardly possess to begin with, but the disease itself!
Clearchus: Thus he reasons, not to eat bread plainly offered to him! You can play
these games of refutation all you like, but why must you pretend that they
have any real import? You are dying, you fool, and not even an old man.
At least take some water, by Zeus. Here.
Apokarteron: I have an annoying habit that I must act in accordance with the argument,
Clearchus. So I will again decline your water. After all, as we have just
established, is not water another sort of nourishment?
Clearchus: Why, obviously.
Apokarteron: And nourishment a prelude to more hunger?
Clearchus: If we are to be pedantic, of course it is.
Apokarteron: And hunger is a sort of madness?
Clearchus: In its more extreme form, perhaps.
Apokarteron: Extreme, indeed! But Clearchus, if I am completely unhinged from the
desire to eat and drink, that I should never feel the faintest tinge of
madness to sate my appetite ever again, I should never dare risk to involve
myself with these matters ever again. Leave your bread and water aside,
gentlemen, as I no longer wish to be mad myself.
Clearchus: You simply trade one madness for another. I cannot believe this, that you
abide by these arguments. I regret playing this game with you. Come now:
at least if you eat and drink, you fool, you can remain with us. Better to be
slightly mad than dead.
Apokarteron: On this very point we differ, Clearchus. But I do appreciate that you have
put your goods away, so that we can talk civilly on these matters without
me having to fear that I will be engorged with bread that I could hardly
now digest!
Bion: If Clearchus comes across as forceful, please do not think any less of him.
Why it is just as he said—you are not even an old man! You have so many
more years of life to pursue, and it is a terrible waste to take your leave

4 Plut. De. Garr. 17.

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 now. As Pythagoras says, you ought to remain at your post until the god
discharges you—so why disobey?5 When an old man kills himself, perhaps
he is justified in doing so, and the gods will look upon his act favourably,
especially indeed if he was escaping from truly unavoidable pains after a
long and fruitful life. He has exited from his post at the right time. But you,
friend, are no Socrates; not aged seventy, and poised to drink the hemlock
after so many years. It is a waste.
Apokarteron: If I am to understand you correctly, Bion, you say that the remaining years
a man could live has value, like a horse or a couch has value? For if
something can be wasted, we imply it had a value to begin with, that was
not put to the use it was rightly esteemed for.
Bion: Yes, certainly the years ahead of us have value.
Apokarteron: Well, then: do we own our remaining years?
Bion: Yes, of course! They are not years that can be put to any other.
Apokarteron: Do we not have the right to destroy things of value that we own, if we are
its sole possessors?
Bion: By Zeus, what an argument you have put forward! I must take a step back,
I think.
Apokarteron: Where?
Bion: When I said that you are the possessor of your remaining years. This is not
true, for your remaining years are in fact a possession of the gods. I agree
that it is our right to destroy what we own ourselves, if we so desire. But
we cannot destroy our remaining years, or those of others, as they are a
valuable commodity that is ultimately a possession of the gods, and we are
merely a trustee, that cannot fail to fulfil our basic obligation to keep this
possession as intact as we are able.6
Apokarteron: We should then, by your reasoning, only live for as many years as the gods
have allotted to us.
Bion: Certainly.
Apokarteron: That if I were to take my life before my time, before my ‘black hair turns
white,’ as the poets say,7 I am going against what the gods have allotted
me?

5 Plat. Phaed. 6; Cic. Somn. Scip. 3, Tusc. 1.20, Sen. 73.

6This argument recalls Plato’s argument against suicide in Phd. 62b-65a, although Hegesias does not it leave it
unchallenged.
7 Sapph. fr. 58.4.

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Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: Does this apply to adding time, and not merely taking?
Bion: I don’t understand what you mean.
Apokarteron: If you saw a man about to be crushed by a large hailstone, and pushed him
out of the way, have you not interfered with his fate? Have you not
wronged the gods, by giving this man more than his allotted time?
Bion: By Zeus, no! No, I would say not: for you are not stealing from the gods
any valuables, but rather giving them more out of your own generosity.
Apokarteron: But aren’t the gods self-sufficient?
Bion: Certainly.
Apokarteron: Then why would you need to give them more years of a mortal, when the
gods have already allotted him an amount in ample supply? They have
already decided what is fitting, and you should not add more. It is as if you
see a man pulling around a crate, and out of foolish generosity you add
more weight to his load. You are still disrespecting his property by
interfering with it, even if you are not stealing from him. Thus it is an
affront to the gods to save a man’s life!
Bion: By Zeus, perhaps it was fate that makes one save a man, but when one kills
oneself it is not fate but rather a man acting against fate.
Apokarteron: And by what marker are we to discern one from the other? If I kill myself
to escape from madness and want, perhaps it was fate that allowed me
this? That the gods allotted me this fate, but nominated me myself to bring
about the end of my days?
Bion: Perhaps, on some occasions, the gods command a man to kill himself, or
another, and it is in accordance with their fate and therefore pious. But by
Zeus, have the gods told you to do this?
Apokarteron: I have heard nothing from the gods, Bion, but neither have I heard from
them that I am taking from them what is not mine. For in truth, Bion, how
can one know whether something is according to fate, or acting against
fate? When are we are acting against fate, and thus affronting the gods?
Bion: When it is wrong.
Apokarteron: And what is wrong is when one acts against fate?
Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: I am at a loss, Bion, for it seems that we have trapped ourselves in a circle.
If something is wrong, it is against fate; if it is against fate, it is wrong.
Because I have not been told by the gods that what I am doing is against

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 fate, I cannot assume that I am in fact acting wrongly, stealing from them
what is not mine, when I could in fact be carrying out their designs with
perfect timeliness.
Bion: It is perhaps a difficult matter, as you say.
Apokarteron: But I remember something, that perhaps we can draw upon to address
this. Did we not agree that the gods are self-sufficient?
Bion: We did agree to this.
Apokarteron: And are they not self-sufficient, not just at one time or another, but always,
‘according to the ordering of time?’8
Bion: Always.
Apokarteron: Well then, Bion. We must ask ourselves how we can steal from something
that is always self-sufficient. If the gods possess goods in perpetual
abundance, we cannot take anything from them if they already have
everything they need! If they are self-sufficient in an unchanging manner,
their needed valuables are stable in quantity, so we take nothing, and in fact
it is impossible to take from them anything. If I were to die, then, I could
not even excite the admiration of Hermes, let alone the wrath of any god!
As I do not take anything from them.
Bion: Heracles, that is surely false. Perhaps it should be thought of this way: that
the gods may have all they need, but they have surplus goods that it is
nevertheless wrong to take. If you were to leave us, friend, you would take
away from the gods a great and valuable thing.
Apokarteron: I see now. The allotted years a man has remaining in his life are a luxury
item of the gods, like murex dye or Indian incense, or even things of
greater rarity still, like a tall golden statue led by the finest elephants?9
Bion: Perhaps that is the case.
Apokarteron: And given that there are many men, the gods possess these luxuries in
abundance?
Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: And if one possesses such items in abundance, and one does not need
them, are they any less valuable?
Bion: No, by Zeus! The gods find our lives valuable, and care about us.

8 DK 12B1.

9 A likely reference to the Ptolemaic parade of Dionysus: Ath. 196-203.

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Apokarteron: If we care about someone, then we suffer if they are gone?
Bion: Certainly, as we are soon to suffer now, if you don’t oblige us.
Apokarteron: And if we are negatively affected, a need is being frustrated, however
small?
Bion: Certainly.
Apokarteron: Then if the gods care about us, even if we are mere luxury items, in a sense
they still need us.
Bion: Yes, the gods need us.
Apokarteron: Then the gods are not self-sufficient, going against what we said before,
and therefore we have acted wrongly against ourselves!
Bion: Alas, I am at a loss, and I must admit to my ignorance. I do not know how
the gods wish you to spend the rest of your days, friend; and perhaps it is
impossible to know these matters, unless one were to send one of us a
dream.
Apokarteron: I confess that I feel the same way—I do not know what fate the gods have
allotted me, and whether I act against them or carry out their designs. Not
only in abstaining from food and drink, as I do now, but even before then,
if I am to be honest with you.
Clearchus: This must stop, all this talk of the gods. Save your dialectic-wrangling for
the streets of Alexandria, you childish man, when you have fed and
watered. Perhaps for the moment we cannot divine the intentions of the
gods, regarding your fate—but we could bring you back to the city
nonetheless and arrange for an oracle, and conduct the sacrifices, and
indeed any necessary observances that could get an answer. I can easily
arrange all of this, and I could approach Ptolemy himself and he would
listen to us. In fact, I am prepared to take the risk, that if we are to be
punished by the gods for interfering with your fate, by keeping you alive
unseasonably for a few more days, I am prepared to take the blame before
all, by Zeus; I only hope that the gods should take into account that I was
only waiting for their answer. Please eat my bread, I do not want to beg;
and we can seek counsel from the gods at a later hour.
Bion: See now, you are making even Clearchus weep! You mustn’t be so hard-
hearted towards us; even if you weary of life, you still have people around
you that need you—regardless of the gods, we are certainly not self-
sufficient. Come now, we can’t lead you back to the city until you’ve had
something to eat and drink—the gods will allow it!
Apokarteron: What do they allow, Bion? By our argument, we have established very little,
for determining how we should now act. Therefore, how I am I to be

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 compelled to act one way or another, if the will of the gods is uncertain? It
could be against fate simply to take me from my place, and to feed me a
single of crumb of bread. No, I will not be persuaded to eat or starve, not
by the gods, but only if it accords with reason; for I have had no counsels
from the gods on how to act.
Clearchus: Then forget the oracles, the sacrifices, everything to do with the gods! I
cannot understand you. We have come here to save you, and I don’t know
how you can lie down in the sand here and ignore our tears. Don’t you feel
sick with yourself? Doesn’t it hurt you to see us like this? Surely your soul
is in torment.
Bion: Clearchus, we shouldn’t do this to the man.
Clearchus: You are surely in great pain.
Apokarteron: Yes. I have known you both for many years, and despite the affairs of the
city getting in the way of our meetings of late, I have loved you both
greatly. I have always appreciated that the both of you have taken the time
away from the temples and the archives at the Museion, to talk to wretched
me. To see you both so abject, hunched over and drenched in sand and
tears, is greatly distressing to me.
Clearchus: Then why do you continue to refuse us?
Apokarteron: I refuse you, because although it pains me greatly to make you suffer now,
I undergo less evils now than if I were to live.
Clearchus: And how can you know that, when you know nothing about the will of the
gods, and are out of your wits? You could only decide your fate more
rationally, surely, if you joined us back at the city. Isn’t that a more
philosophical way to bear your toils?
Apokarteron: Certainly not, as I am soon near the end, and still wide awake.
Clearchus: Awake, but not sane by any means! I still don’t know why you wish to die.
But whatever is troubling you, can be addressed. I promise you—to the
bitter end we will assist you in whatever grievances you face.
Apokarteron: You are setting yourself an impossible task, gentlemen, that not even the
gods could hope to remedy. What are you really proposing? That it is
possible to make a man happy?
Clearchus: I will not answer any more questions like this.
Bion: But of course! It is possible to make a man happy, and we will do this
much for you. Whatever it is that troubles you—as Clearchus said—we will
do anything. He will make the sacrifices, and I will ransack the library to
solve any difficulty you endure, so you only need to tell us what it is.

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Apokarteron: But is making a man happy the same as remedying evils that he suffers?
Bion: I would say so, of course! A man without troubles is a happy man.
Apokarteron: So a man that does not suffer is happy?
Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: So that a man who chooses death over life will not suffer?
Bion: Why, how could you know that you will suffer more in the future,
compared to the suffering you experience right now? That is surely
presumptuous on your behalf.
Apokarteron: Is it presumptuous, dear Bion? The choice is a clear one, and can be
illustrated with ease. Is it not true that I know how much pain I suffer
now? Isn’t it what I know most immediately, of all the things I know?
Bion: What do you mean?
Apokarteron: If I grieve for the loss of a loved one, or suffer from the bite of a viper, or
waste away from a disease, I could not be mistaken that I am feeling pain
of some kind, that differs from other pains.
Bion: Certainly.
Apokarteron: Thus I know the kind of suffering that I am undergoing.
Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: Therefore, if I were to die in several days or more, I should expect more of
the same? That is to say, I should expect pain from the suffering of others,
or perhaps again the pangs of hunger and thirst?
Bion: It is true, although the nature of pain could wax and wane, and that you
could not predict with any precision whatsoever.
Apokarteron: But we must conclude that, although I may be uncertain about the precise
intensity of my pain, or its duration, I am generally acquainted with its
nature. And its variations will be subject to vague boundaries that I can
anticipate, if I carry out my actions correctly.
Bion: I suppose so.
Apokarteron: Then we are comparing this state of reasonable certainty, one that is short
and predictable, to an indefinite future of many possibilities, a future that
could extend into many years, increasing further the likelihood of suffering
exponentially. The difference is between buying an item at once and
knowing how much silver you have lost (or at least to an approximate
figure), and blindly pouring your coins down a well for many hours at a
time and at an unknown rate, hoping you have not squandered too much
of it. It is true that I cannot predict the future, but given that there are

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 many years that would have been ahead of me, I should expect some losses
of great intensity, and I would not wish to gamble my losses when I can
control them here and now.
Bion: It troubles me to admit, but it is true that you can control your sufferings
now, than if you were to allow yourself to live into the future. But, my
friend, perhaps Clearchus and I have been focusing on the wrong things,
and you have been focusing on the wrong things. For isn’t it true that,
although we are uncertain about what evils will face us in the future, not
only can we equip ourselves with wisdom to endure these evils, but we can
be blessed with great pleasures too?
Apokarteron: No man denies that there are pleasures, certainly.
Bion: Indeed! So why must we focus on avoiding unpredictable pains, when
there are unpredictable pleasures too? As Pindar says, with every year we
don’t know what fate will bring,10 and no one would contradict him, but
why should this dampen our spirits? I am reminded of this truth every day,
even in sour times. I have told you before, but again I remind you. Years
after my father died—much your elder, as you know—I came to discover
that he was a gifted poet. When my carpenter thumped open my courtyard
wall, he found there a basket of poetry books that my father had written to
my mother over some thirty years. It was only through the pain of losing
my father that I could truly experience the pleasure of meeting him again,
through words I had never heard him write before. Is that odd? Perhaps it
is a curious example, but I only mean to say that good fortune can arise
from many circumstances, and can even appear after a great loss.
Apokarteron: So, then: you felt pleasure when you read your father’s poetry.
Bion: Yes, I did.
Apokarteron: And you felt pain when your father died.
Bion: Of course.
Apokarteron: But your pleasure was not in equal intensity to your pain?
Bion: No, by Zeus! The pain was far greater; and I fear that I will experience the
same pain again, should we lose you forever.
Apokarteron: And that is precisely the problem at hand, Bion, and why I do not consider
pleasure a serious object of inquiry when we are considering how we are to
act in the future. After all: if we were to make a decision, of which things
we could control, would we not focus on the most intense matters at hand,
and everything else only secondly?

10 Paraphrasing Pyth. 10.63.

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Bion: Naturally.
Apokarteron: For this reason we must consider pain and not pleasure when we assess the
choices we are to make in the future, as one is clearly more vivid than the
other. I remember you the day your father died—you looked as you do
now, but worse, and this grief was far more intense than any brief
moments of recollecting his waking moments, which would have had to
approximate a state of Corybantic ecstasy to equal your earlier grief. In
truth, Bion, the difference in intensity between pleasure and pain is the
difference between a lion taking pleasure in eating a gazelle, and the pain of
the gazelle being eaten. Unless it is otherwise, and the lion is indeed in
ecstasy?
Bion: Perhaps not. Although doubtless there are some intense pleasures that we
have not mentioned.
Apokarteron: Very well, let us grant that there are intense pleasures. How are these
experiences recalled, once they are gone?
Bion: Some things are remembered fondly.
Apokarteron: But what impression does one obtain from the whole, from what part?
Bion: What do you mean?
Apokarteron: When one has an experience that is divided into a beginning, a middle, and
an end, and one reaches the end, which part is most vivid in perception to
the observer?
Bion: Why the end, as the other two parts have faded into memory, by
comparison.
Apokarteron: And do not all things wither? Youth, beauty, and all things treasured?
Bion: Of course.
Apokarteron: And doesn’t our impression of these things mostly correspond to the final
part of any given event recollected, that even remembering a late relative,
or a lost lover, or any other cherished thing now gone, can only produce
bittersweet emotions at best?
Bion: Yes, I suppose.
Apokarteron: Then loss has the final word on all our pleasures?
Bion: Yes.
Apokarteron: And loss produces pain.
Bion: Naturally.

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Apokarteron: And that impression which has the final word is that which is felt most
intensely?
Bion: I cannot deny it.
Apokarteron: Then pain is primary in all things, by virtue of time itself, in its intensity,
and one must avoid pain while one can.
Bion: But surely, friend, even though it is true that suffering leaves its stamp on
all things, in the end, some things possess such power that they are
ultimately of greater benefit to us?
Apokarteron: What pleasure can you think of, that does this?
Bion: Well, besides more short-term pleasures, there is the euphoria one
experiences of love.
Apokarteron: I see, the love that fades with youth. And how does that compare to the
long-term suffering of losing a lover, or indeed never winning their love to
begin with? Again, is it not this toil that is experienced the most intensely
in life overall, given it occurs last in time?
Bion: Why, that is a question I would prefer to never answer, having never been
loved.
Apokarteron: But when you spoke to me earlier of losing the daughter of Menelaus, you
could nonetheless agree to the length and intensity of the suffering
involved, and how it coloured your perception of your memories of her,
and the world afterwards. For the worse.
Bion: Yes, I could hardly disagree.
Apokarteron: And this particular kind of suffering could be endured at any day, and
could recur, or modify itself into new forms, at any time.
Bion: By Zeus, I can only hope it does not.
Apokarteron: Why hope—a feeble emotion—when one can dictate how much pain one
can endure, with near-certainty? I conclude: if we are to assess whether we
ought to pursue life or death, we should consider the overall measure of
pain we must endure, above all, to allow us to control how much pain we
should receive accordingly. And the example you have produced—the
sense of loss over someone loved—shows that the overall measure of pain
exceeds that of pleasure in intensity, as the order of time dictates this.
Again, how does it feel, Bion, to lose someone? Do I lie, or understate the
pain of loss? Do your initial feelings of hope remain untarnished by the
events that proceeded it?
Bion: I would rather not say.

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Clearchus: He is not wrong, but it does not serve the overall argument well. It is true
that there is no greater pain than loss, and in its intensity the suffering it
brings about has no rival in pleasure. As you say, loss has the final word
when a loved one is gone, whoever it may be, and almost cancels out all
prior joys, so potent is grief. Yet that is precisely why we need you to stay
with us, and you are wrong to detain us with these arguments, and refuse
our bread and water. Why not remain here?
Apokarteron: I cannot.
Clearchus: Merely to avoid pain for yourself? What about our pain, from this sense of
loss you have argued is so strong? You will inflict this upon us?
Apokarteron: What you decide to do with your pains is not my affair—for I am only
weighing up for myself the best course of action, which is to avoid pain in
its entirety. Some men may choose to endure life, knowing these
arguments, but I cannot help but see them as suffering from their own sort
of madness. No, I will knock on the Gates of Hades as I choose, rather
than suffer this any longer. What better fate is reserved for the philosopher
than avoidance of pain? Was it not Thales that said to Solon that we
should avoid marriage and family, so that we could avoid suffering the pain
of losing them?11 Was it not Plato that saw all philosophy as a preparation
for death?12 You tell me that I do not bear my life philosophically; but for a
philosopher, I see nothing else that can sensibly be done. Pains are to be
avoided, as they simply dominate pleasure, both in intensity and through
the passage of time. And so I must take my leave.
Clearchus: I will soon lose my temper, if you continue this charade. You are so weak,
that I will drag you back myself! … What now, Bion?
Bion: Give me the bread, Clearchus. And the water. But keep that amount to
yourself.
Apokarteron: To the crocodiles below! Why, now there is only food and drink enough
for one of us, Clearchus, so take your leave. You have suffered enough, for
today, when you should prepare yourself for the evils that you may face
tomorrow.

11 Plut. Sol. 5-7. Although Thales apparently had an adopted son, according to 7.2-3.
12 Recalling Phd. 63e-65a, although Plato would object to its allusion here.

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