In all that I have said, my dear friend, do not think that I have directed my argument against the Stoa, or that I have some special hatred for the Stoics. No, it applied to all alike. I should have said the same to you if you had chosen the school of Plato or Aristotle and condemned the rest without a trial. As it is, you have given pride of place to the Stoics, and so the argument has seemed to be directed against the Stoa, although it had no particular grudge against it.

You are right. I am going away to do just that—to make a change—of dress as well. You will soon see me without this big, shaggy beard. I shall not punish my daily life, but all will be liberty and freedom. Perhaps I shall even put on purple, to show everybody that I’ve no part in that nonsense now. Could I but spew out all that I have heard from them! I can tell you that I would not flinch from drinking hellebore, for the opposite reason to Chrysippus—to remember their doctrines no more. So it is no small favour that I owe you, Lycinus: you came and pulled me out when I was being carried away by a rough, turbid torrent, giving myself to it and going with the stream. You were a “God from the machine,” as in the play. I think I might well shave my head like free men who are saved from shipwreck, to give thanks for salvation today now that I have had so heavy a mist shaken off my eyes. If in the future I ever meet a philosopher while I am walking on the road, even by chance, I will turn round and get out of his way as if he were a mad dog.