The safety of life is this, to examine everything all through, what it is itself, what is its material, what the formal part; with all thy soul to do justice and to say the truth.
What remains except to enjoy life by joining one good thing to another so as not to leave even the smallest intervals between?
There is one light of the sun, though it is interrupted by walls, mountains, and other things infinite.
There is one common substance, though it is distributed among countless bodies which have their several qualities.
There is one soul, though it is distributed among infinite natures and individual circumscriptions [or individuals].
There is one intelligent soul, though it seems to be divided.
Now in the things which have been mentioned all the other parts, such as those which are air and matter, are without sensation and have no fellowship: and yet even these parts the intelligent principle holds together, and the gravitation towards the same.
But intellect in a peculiar manner tends to that which is of the same kin, and combines with it, and the feeling for communion is not interrupted.
What dost thou wish? to continue to exist? Well, dost thou wish to have sensation? movement? growth? and then again to cease to grow? to use thy speech? to think? What is there of all these things which seems to thee worth desiring?