there's not a man in the world most blest than you—
there never has been, never will be one.
Time was, when you were alive, we Argive
honored you as a god, and now down here, I see,
you lord it over the dead in all your power.
So grieve no more at dying, great Achilles.'
I reassured the ghost, but he broke out, protesting,
'No winning words about death to me, shining Odysseus!
By god, I'd rather slave on earth for another man—
some dirt-poor tenant farmer who scrapes to keep alive—
than rule down here over all the breathless dead.'”
The Odyssey
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