Departure of Odysseus from the Land of the Phaeacians by Claude Lorrain

Departure of Odysseus from the Land of the Phaeacians (1646) by Claude Lorrain

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"P.Herc 463 consists of sixteen fragments, more of less incomplete [...] Fragment 13 presents the well-known contrast between participation in public life, represented by an Apollophanes, perhaps the Stoic, and the blessed isolation of the contemplative life in a secure harbor, far from the tumult of political struggle. Here is the text of the fragment:

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'. . . And inspired before the same loud clamor, some will strive with the effort of Apollophanes to advance wonderfully to the podium, but others, having landed in [philosophy's harbor] and with hopes offered them that "not even the venerable flame of Zeus would be able to prevent them taking the highest point of the citadel" a life that is happy, afterwards, in spite of opposing winds. . . .'" (David Armstrong, Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans, 38)