We must break the knot of our obligations, how strong soever, and hereafter love this or that, but espouse nothing but ourselves:  that is to say, let the remainder be our own, but not so joined and so close as not to be forced away without flaying us or tearing out part of our whole.  The greatest thing in the world is for a man to know that he is his own.  ’Tis time to wean ourselves from society when we can no longer add anything to it; he who is not in a condition to lend must forbid himself to borrow.  Our forces begin to fail us; let us call them in and concentrate them in and for ourselves.  He that can cast off within himself and resolve the offices of friendship and company, let him do it.  In this decay of nature which renders him useless, burdensome, and importunate to others, let him take care not to be useless, burdensome, and importunate to himself.  Let him soothe and caress himself, and above all things be sure to govern himself with reverence to his reason and conscience to that degree as to be ashamed to make a false step in their presence: 

“Rarum est enim, ut satis se quisque vereatur.”

     ["For ’tis rarely seen that men have respect and reverence enough
     for themselves.”—­Quintilian, x. 7.]

Socrates says that boys are to cause themselves to be instructed, men to exercise themselves in well-doing, and old men to retire from all civil and military employments, living at their own discretion, without the obligation to any office.  There are some complexions more proper for these precepts of retirement than others.  Such as are of a soft and dull apprehension, and of a tender will and affection, not readily to be subdued or employed, whereof I am one, both by natural condition and by reflection, will sooner incline to this advice than active and busy souls, which embrace:  all, engage in all, are hot upon everything, which offer, present, and give themselves up to every occasion.  We are to use these accidental and extraneous commodities, so far as they are pleasant to us, but by no means to lay our principal foundation there; ’tis no true one; neither nature nor reason allows it so to be.  Why therefore should we, contrary to their laws, enslave our own contentment to the power of another?  To anticipate also the accidents of fortune, to deprive ourselves of the conveniences we have in our own power, as several have done upon the account of devotion, and some philosophers by reasoning; to be one’s own servant, to lie hard, to put out our own eyes, to throw our wealth into the river, to go in search of grief; these, by the misery of this life, aiming at bliss in another; those by laying themselves low to avoid the danger of falling:  all such are acts of an excessive virtue.  The stoutest and most resolute natures render even their seclusion glorious and exemplary: 

                    “Tuta et parvula laudo,
          Quum res deficiunt, satis inter vilia fortis
          Verum, ubi quid melius contingit et unctius, idem
          Hos sapere et solos aio bene vivere, quorum
          Conspicitur nitidis fundata pecunia villis.”