of those who think that that end of goods which we call the extreme or chief good, is susceptible of growth, they may also think that one man can be wiser than another; and, in like manner then, one man may sin more, or act more rightly than another. But such an assertion is not allowable to us, who do not think the end of goods susceptible of growth. For as men who have been submerged under the water, cannot breathe any more because they are at no great depth below the surface, (though they may on this account be able at times to emerge,) than if they were at the bottom, nor can the puppy who is nearly old enough to see, as yet see any more than one who is but this moment born; so the man who has made some progress towards the approach to virtue, is no less in a state of misery than he who has made no such advance at all. XV. I am aware that all this seems very strange. But as unquestionably the previous propositions are true and uncontrovertible, and as these others are in harmony with, and are the direct consequences of them; we cannot question their truth also. But although some people deny that either virtues or vices are susceptible of growth, still they believe that each of them is in some degree diffused, and as it were extended. But Diogenes thinks that riches have not only such power, that they are, as it were, guides to pleasure and to good health, but that they even contain them: but that they have not the same power with regard to virtue, or to the other arts to which money may indeed be a guide, but which it cannot contain. Therefore, if pleasure or if good health be among the goods, riches also must be classed among the goods; but if wisdom be a good, it does not follow that we are also to call riches a good; nor can that which is classed among the goods be contained by anything which is not placed in the same classification. And on that account, because the knowledge and comprehension of those things by which arts are produced, excite a desire for them, as riches are not among the goods, therefore no art can be contained in riches. But if we grant this to be true with respect to arts, still it is not to follow that the same rule holds good with respect to virtue; because virtue requires a great deal of meditation and practice, and this is not always the case with arts; and also because virtue embraces the stability, firmness, and consistency of the entire life; and we do not see that the same is the case with arts.