On the Life of a Man occupied with Affairs of State, or on Joseph (76-80)

for he would not in the least regard the brilliant position or the accredited good fortune of his patient, nor whether he is of noble birth or of large fortune, nor whether he is the most renowned monarch or tyrant of all his contemporaries, but would attend to one object alone, that, namely, of preserving his health to the best of his power. And if it should be necessary to use excision or cautery, he, though a subject, or as some might say a slave, would cut or burn his governor or his master.

But I, who have got for my patient not one man but a whole city sick with those more grievous diseases which the kindred desires have brought upon it, what ought I to do? Shall I, abandoning all idea of what will be of general advantage to the whole state seek to please the ears of this or that man with an ungentleman-like and thoroughly slavish flattery? I would rather choose to die than to speak merely with the object of gratifying the ear, and to conceal the truth, disregarding all thought of what is really advantageous.

"Now then," as the tragedian says: "Now then let fire, let biting steel come on; Burn, scorch my flesh, and glut your appetite Drinking my dark, warm blood; for here I swear Sooner shall those bright stars which deck the heaven Descend beneath the earth, the earth itself Soar upwards to the sky, than servile words Of flattery creep from out my mouth to thee."

But the people, when it is the master, cannot endure a statesman of so masculine a spirit, and one who keeps so completely aloof from the passions, from pleasure, from fear,

Having now discussed this matter at sufficient length, let us see what follows next. The young man, having been calumniated to his master by his master’s wife, who was in love with him, and who had invented against him the accusation to which she herself was liable, is not allowed to make any defence, but is led away to prison. And while he was in the prison he displayed such exceeding virtue that even the most abandoned persons there marvelled and were amazed, and looked upon it as an alleviation of their calamities to have found such a man as the averter of evil from them.