A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus with the Encheiridion
of that country and is commanded by him who administers it. Therefore
see what Diogenes himself says and writes: “For this reason,” he says,
“Diogenes, it is in your power to speak both with the King of the
Persians and with Archidamus the King of the Lacedaemonians, as you
please.” Was it because he was born of free parents? I suppose all the
Athenians and all the Lacedaemonians, because they were born of slaves,
could not talk with them (these kings) as they wished, but feared and
paid court to them. Why then does he say that it is in his power?
Because I do not consider the poor body to be my own, because I want
nothing, because law is everything to me, and nothing else is. These
were the things which permitted him to be free.
Think of these things, these opinions, these words; look to these
examples, if you would be free, if you desire the thing according to
its worth. And what is the wonder if you buy so great a thing at the
price of things so many and so great? For the sake of this which is
called liberty, some hang themselves, others throw themselves down
precipices, and sometimes even whole cities have perished; and will you
not for the sake of the true and unassailable and secure liberty give
back to God when he demands them the things which he has given? Will
you not, as Plato says, study not to die only, but also to endure
torture, and exile, and scourging, and, in a word, to give up all which
is not your own? If you will not, you will be a slave among slaves,
even if you be ten thousand times a consul; and if you make your way up
to the palace (Cæsar’s residence), you will no less be a slave; and you
will feel that perhaps philosophers utter words which are contrary to
common opinion (paradoxes), as Cleanthes also said, but not words
contrary to reason. For you will know by experience that the words are
true, and that there is no profit from the things which are valued and
eagerly sought to those who have obtained them; and to those who have
not yet obtained them there is an imagination ([Greek: phantasia]),
that when these things are come, all that is good will come with them;
then, when they are come, the feverish feeling is the same, the tossing
to and fro is the same, the satiety, the desire of things, which are
not present; for freedom is acquired not by the full possession of the
things which are desired, but by removing the desire. And that you may
know that this is true, as you have labored for those things, so
transfer your labor to these: be vigilant for the purpose of acquiring
an opinion which will make you free; pay court to a philosopher instead
of to a rich old man; be seen about a philosopher’s doors; you will not
disgrace yourself by being seen; you will not go away empty nor without
profit, if you go to the philosopher as you ought, and if not (if you
do not succeed), try at least; the trial (attempt) is not disgraceful.
ON FAMILIAR INTIMACY.—To this matter before all you must attend, that
you be never so closely connected with any of your former intimates or
friends as to come down to the same acts as he does. If you do not
observe this rule, you will ruin yourself. But if the thought arises in
your mind, “I shall seem disobliging to him and he will not have the
same feeling towards me,” remember that nothing is done without cost,
nor is it possible for a man if he does not do the same things to be
the same man that he was. Choose then which of the two you will have,
to be equally loved by those by whom you were formerly loved, being the
same with your former self; or, being superior, not to obtain from your
friends the same that you did before.
WHAT THINGS WE SHOULD EXCHANGE FOR OTHER THINGS.—Keep this thought in
readiness, when you lose anything external, what you acquire in place
of it; and if it be worth more, never say, I have had a loss; neither
if you have got a horse in place of an ass, or an ox in place of a
sheep, nor a good action in place of a bit of money, nor in place of
idle talk such tranquillity as befits a man, nor in place of lewd talk
if you have acquired modesty. If you remember this, you will always
maintain your character such as it ought to be. But if you do not,
consider that the times of opportunity are perishing, and that whatever
pains you take about yourself, you are going to waste them all and
overturn them. And it needs only a few things for the loss and
overturning of all—namely, a small deviation from reason. For the
steerer of a ship to upset it, he has no need of the same means as he
has need of for saving it; but if he turns it a little to the wind, it
is lost; and if he does not do this purposely, but has been neglecting
his duty a little, the ship is lost. Something of the kind happens in
this case also; if you only fall a nodding a little, all that you have
up to this time collected is gone. Attend therefore to the appearances
of things, and watch over them; for that which you have to preserve is
no small matter, but it is modesty and fidelity and constancy, freedom
from the affects, a state of mind undisturbed, freedom from fear,
tranquillity, in a word liberty. For what will you sell these things?
See what is the value of the things which you will obtain in exchange
for these.—But shall I not obtain any such thing for it?—See, and if
you do in return get that, see what you receive in place of it. I
possess decency, he possesses a tribuneship: he possesses a prætorship,
I possess modesty. But I do not make acclamations where it is not
becoming: I will not stand up where I ought not; for I am free, and a
friend of God. and so I obey him willingly. But I must not claim (seek)
anything else, neither body nor possession, nor magistracy, nor good
report, nor in fact anything. For he (God) does not allow me to claim
(seek) them, for if he had chosen, he would have made them good for me;
but he has not done so, and for this reason I cannot transgress his
commands. Preserve that which is your own good in everything; and as to
every other thing, as it is permitted, and so far as to behave
consistently with reason in respect to them, content with this only. If
you do not, you will be unfortunate, you will fail in all things, you
will be hindered, you will be impeded. These are the laws which have
been sent from thence (from God); these are the orders. Of these laws a
man ought to be an expositor, to these he ought to submit, not to those
of Masurius and Cassius.
TO THOSE WHO ARE DESIROUS OF PASSING LIFE IN TRANQUILLITY.—Remember
that not only the desire of power and of riches makes us mean and
subject to others, but even the desire of tranquillity, and of leisure,
and of travelling abroad, and of learning. For, to speak plainly,
whatever the external thing may be, the value which we set upon it
places us in subjection to others. What then is the difference between
desiring to be a senator or not desiring to be one; what is the
difference between desiring power or being content with a private
station; what is the difference between saying, I am unhappy, I have
nothing to do, but I am bound to my books as a corpse; or saying, I am
unhappy, I have no leisure for reading? For as salutations and power
are things external and independent of the will, so is a book. For what
purpose do you choose to read? Tell me. For if you only direct your
purpose to being amused or learning something, you are a silly fellow
and incapable of enduring labor. But if you refer reading to the proper
end, what else is this than a tranquil and happy life ([Greek:
eusoia])? But if reading does not secure for you a happy and tranquil
life, what is the use of it? But it does secure this, the man replies,
and for this reason I am vexed that I am deprived of it.—And what is
this tranquil and happy life, which any man can impede, I do not say
Cæsar or Cæsar’s friend, but a crow, a piper, a fever, and thirty
thousand other things? But a tranquil and happy life contains nothing
so sure as continuity and freedom from obstacle. Now I am called to do
something: I will go then with the purpose of observing the measures
(rules) which I must keep, of acting with modesty, steadiness, without
desire and aversion to things external; and then that I may attend to
men, what they say, how they are moved; and this not with any bad
disposition, or that I may have something to blame or to ridicule; but
I turn to myself, and ask if I also commit the same faults. How then
shall I cease to commit them? Formerly I also acted wrong, but now I do
not: thanks to God.
What then is the reason of this? The reason is that we have never read
for this purpose, we have never written for this purpose, so that we
may in our actions use in a way conformable to nature the appearances
presented to us; but we terminate in this, in learning what is said,
and in being able to expound it to another, in resolving a syllogism,
and in handling the hypothetical syllogism. For this reason where our
study (purpose) is, there alone is the impediment. Would you have by
all means the things which are not in your power? Be prevented then, be
hindered, fail in your purpose. But if we read what is written about
action (efforts, [Greek: hormae]), not that we may see what is said
about action, but that we may act well; if we read what is said about
desire and aversion (avoiding things), in order that we may neither
fail in our desires, nor fall into that which we try to avoid; if we
read what is said about duty (officium), in order that remembering the
relations (of things to one another) we may do nothing irrationally nor
contrary to these relations; we should not be vexed, in being hindered
as to our readings, but we should be satisfied with doing the acts
which are conformable (to the relations), and we should be reckoning
not what so far we have been accustomed to reckon: To-day I have read
so many verses, I have written so many; but (we should say), To-day I
have employed my action as it is taught by the philosophers; I have not
employed my desire; I have used avoidance ([Greek: echchlisei]) only
with respect to things which are within the power of my will; I have
not been afraid of such a person, I have not been prevailed upon by the
entreaties of another; I have exercised my patience, my abstinence, my
co-operation with others; and so we should thank God for what we ought
to thank him.
There is only one way to happiness, and let this rule be ready both in
the morning and during the day and by night: the rule is not to look
towards things which are out of the power of our will, to think that
nothing is our own, to give up all things to the Divinity, to Fortune;
to make them the superintendents of these things, whom Zeus also has
made so; for a man to observe that only which is his own, that which
cannot be hindered; and when we read, to refer our reading to this
only, and our writing and our listening. For this reason I cannot call
the man industrious, if I hear this only, that he reads and writes; and
even if a man adds that he reads all night, I cannot say so, if he
knows not to what he should refer his reading. For neither do you say
that a man is industrious if he keeps awake for a girl, nor do I. But
if he does it (reads and writes) for reputation, I say that he is a
lover of reputation. And if he does it for money, I say that he is a
lover of money, not a lover of labor; and if he does it through love of
learning, I say that he is a lover of learning. But if he refers his
labor to his own ruling power that he may keep it in a state
conformable to nature and pass his life in that state, then only do I
say that he is industrious. For never commend a man on account of these
things which are common to all, but on account of his opinions