Letters 14.8

When you travelled to Sicily, you crossed the Straits. The reckless pilot scorned the blustering South Wind,—the wind which roughens the Sicilian Sea and forces it into choppy currents; he sought not the shore on the left, but the strand hard by the place where Charybdis throws the seas into confusion. Your more careful pilot, however, questions those who know the locality as to the tides and the meaning of the clouds; he holds his course far from that region notorious for its swirling waters. Our wise man does the same; he shuns a strong man who may be injurious to him, making a point of not seeming to avoid him, because an important part of one’s safety lies in not seeking safety openly; for what one avoids, one condemns.

Seneca, Letters to Lucilius 14.8, translated by Richard Mott Gummere