A dark saying. One of the most corrupted lines in the book: Εἰ δύνασαι ὀξὺ βλέπειν, βλέπε κρίνων, φησί, σοφωτάτοις — literally "if you can see sharply — look, judging, he says, most wisely (or: among the wisest)." The "he says" (φησί) marks a quotation, but whose voice is not named; the text is probably truncated or has absorbed a gloss. The kernel is still legible: sharpness of sight (ὀξὺ βλέπειν) must pass into sharpness of judgment (κρίνειν) — to see is not enough; one must rightly judge what is seen. Rogovin renders it interpretively: "prove the keenness of your sight in deed, by discerning the most intricate thing."

Who is "he"? The standard critical edition (Farquharson, Oxford 1944) frankly grants that the text is corrupt and the meaning and origin of the saying unknown. Whom φησί introduces is not established; among cautious guesses: by content (sight → judgment — the core of the discipline of assent) and by Marcus's habit of quoting an unnamed "philosopher," the likeliest is Epictetus (so Rogovin reads it: "says the philosopher"); yet φησί in Marcus often introduces a verse, and σοφωτάτοις looks like a mangled verse-ending — in which case it is a poetic gnome, not a philosopher; nor can an absorbed marginal gloss be ruled out. There is no secure attribution — we leave it as "the unnamed philosopher."

Sight and judgment. In content the line belongs to the discipline of assent: a "sharp eye" without right judgment (κρίσις) is useless, for assent is given not to the impression but to its appraisal (cf. 8.36 — to circumscribe the impression; 8.26 — the discernment of plausible impressions). There are no term-lemmata in the text; the textual crux is noted. The governing discipline is assent (to see — and to judge rightly).