Delphi Complete Works of Epictetus (Illustrated) (Delphi Ancient Classics Book 86)

by Epictetus

  For who that has conceived and is big with such great judgements is not aware of his own equipment, and does not hasten to act in accordance with them? Why, a bull is not ignorant of his own nature and equipment, when some wild beast appears, nor does he hang back for someone to encourage him; neither does a dog, when he sees some wild animal; and shall I, if I have the equipment of a good man, hang back, so that you may encourage me to do what is my own proper work? But as yet I do not have the equipment, believe me. Why, then, do you wish to have me wither away before my time, as you yourself have withered?

  CHAPTER IX

  To the man who had become shameless

  Whenever you see another person holding office, set over against this the fact that you possess the ability to get along without office; whenever you see another person wealthy, see what you have instead. For if you have nothing instead, you are wretched; but if you are capable of feeling no need of wealth, know that you are better off, and have something worth far more than wealth. Another has a comely wife, you the ability not to yearn for a comely wife. Is all this small in your eyes? Yet how much would these men give, who are rich and hold office, and live with beautiful women, to be able to despise wealth and offices, and these very same women whom they passionately love and win? Do you not know what kind of thing the thirst of a man in fever is? It is quite unlike that of a man in health. The latter drinks and his thirst is gone, but the other gets a momentary satisfaction, and then becomes nauseated, turns the water into bile, throws up, has a pain in his bowels, and suffers more violent thirst than before. A similar thing it is to be rich and have strong desire, to hold office and have strong desire, to sleep by the side of a beautiful woman and have strong desire; jealousy is added to one’s lot, fear of loss, disgraceful words, disgraceful thoughts, unseemly deeds.

  And what do I lose? says somebody. — Man, you used to be modest, and are no longer so; have you lost nothing? Instead of Chrysippus and Zeno you now read Aristeides and Evenus; have you lost nothing? Instead of Socrates and Diogenes you have come to admire the man who is able to corrupt and seduce the largest number of women. You wish to be handsome and make yourself up, though you are not handsome, and you wish to make a show of gay attire, so as to attract the women, and you think yourself blessed if perchance you light upon some trivial perfume. But formerly you used never even to think of any of these things, but only where you might find decent speech, a worthy man, a noble thought. Therefore you used to sleep as a man, to go forth as a man, to wear the clothes of a man, to utter the discourse that was suitable for a good man; and after all that do you still say, “I have lost nothing”? And is it nothing but small change that men lose in this way? Is not self-respect lost, is not decency lost? Or is it impossible that the loss of these things counts for anything? To you, indeed, the loss of none of these things, perhaps, seems any longer serious; but there once was a time when you thought it the only serious loss and harm, when you were in great anxiety lest anyone should dislodge you from these good words and deeds.

  Behold, you have been dislodged, though by no one else but yourself. Fight against yourself, vindicate yourself for decency, for respect, for freedom. If anyone ever told you about me that someone was forcing me to commit adultery, to wear clothes like yours, or to perfume myself, would you not have gone and murdered the man who was so maltreating me? And now, therefore, are you not willing to come to your own rescue? Yet how much easier is the work of rescue in the latter case! It is not necessary to kill somebody, put him in bonds, or assault him; you do not have to come out into the market-place, but only to talk to yourself, the man most likely to be persuaded, to whom no one is more persuasive than yourself. And first of all condemn what you are doing; then, when you have passed your condemnation, do not despair of yourself, nor act like the spiritless people who, when once they have given in, surrender themselves completely, and are swept off by the current, as it were, but learn how the gymnastic trainer of boys acts. The boy he is training is thrown; “get up,” he says, “and wrestle again, till you get strong.” React in some such way yourself, for I would have you know that there is nothing more easily prevailed upon than a human soul. You have but to will a thing and it has happened, the reform has been made; as, on the other hand, you have but to drop into a doze and all is lost. For it is within you that both destruction and deliverance lie. — But what good do I get after all that? — And what greater good than this are you looking for? Instead of shameless, you will be self-respecting; instead of faithless, faithful; instead of dissolute, self-controlled. If you are looking for anything else greater than these things, go ahead and do what you are doing; not even a god can any longer save you.

  CHAPTER X

  What ought we to despise and on what place a high value?

  Men find all their difficulties in externals, their perplexities in externals. “What shall I do? How is it to take place? How is it to turn out? I am afraid that this will befall me, or that.” All these are the expressions of men who concern themselves with the things that lie outside the sphere of the moral purpose. For who says, “How am I to avoid giving assent to the false? How am I to refuse to swerve aside from the true?”? If a man is so gifted by nature as to be in great anxiety about these things, I shall remind him, “Why are you in great anxiety? It is under your own control; rest secure. Do not be in a hurry to give your assent before applying the rule of nature.”

  Again, if a man is in great anxiety about desire, for fear lest it become incomplete and miss its mark, or about aversion, for fear lest it fall into what it would avoid, I shall first give him a kiss of congratulation, because he has got rid of what the rest of mankind are excited about, and their fears, and has turned his serious thought to his own true business in the realm where he himself is. And after that I shall say to him, “If you do not wish to desire without failing to get, or to avoid without falling into the object of your aversion, desire none of those things which are not your own, and avoid none of those things which are not under your control. If not, you are of necessity bound to fail in achieving your desires, and to fall into what you would avoid.” Where is there any difficulty in that case? What room is there to ask, “How is it to take place?” and “How is it to turn out?” and to say, “I am afraid that this will befall me, or that”?

  Is not the future outside the sphere of the moral purpose now? — Yes. — And is not the true nature of the good and evil inside the sphere of the moral purpose? — Yes. — Are you permitted, then, to make a natural use of every outcome? No one can prevent you, can he? — No one. — Therefore, say no longer to me, “How is it to take place?”’ Because, whatever takes place, you will turn it to good purpose, and the outcome will be a blessing for you. Or what would Heracles have been had he said “How am I to prevent a great lion from appearing, or a great boar, or savage men?”? And what do you care for that? If a great boar appears, the struggle in which you are to engage will be greater; if evil men appear, you will clear the world of evil men. — But if I die in so doing? — You will die as a good man, bringing to fulfilment a noble action. Why, since you have to die in any event, you must be found doing something or other — farming, or digging, or engaged in commerce, or holding a consulship, or suffering with dyspepsia or dysentery. What is it, then, you wish to be doing when death finds you? I for my part should wish it to be some work that befits a man, something beneficent, that promotes the common welfare, or is noble. But if I cannot be found doing such great things as these, I should like at least to be engaged upon that which is free from hindrance, that which is given me to to do, and that is, correcting myself, as I strive to perfect the faculty which deals with the external impressions, labouring to achieve calm, while yet giving to each of my human relationships its due; and, if I am so fortunate, striving to attain to the third field of study, that which has to do with security in the formation of judgements.

  If death finds me occupied with these matters, it is enough for me if I can lift up my hands unto G
od, and say, “The faculties which I received from Thee to enable me to understand Thy governance and to follow it, these I have not neglected; I have not dishonoured Thee as far as in me lay. Behold how I have dealt with my senses, behold how I have dealt with my preconceptions. Have I ever blamed Thee? Have I been discontented with any of these things which happen, or wished it to have been otherwise? Have I at all violated my relationships with others? For that Thou didst beget me I am grateful; for what Thou hast given I am grateful also. The length of time for which I have had the use of Thy gifts is enough for me. Take them back again and assign them to what place Thou wilt, for they were all Thine, and Thou gavest them me.” Is it not enough for a man to take his departure from the world in this state of mind? And what among all the kinds of life is superior to this, or more seemly than his who is so minded, and what kind of end is more fortunate?

  But that this may take place a man must accept no small troubles, and must miss no small things. You cannot wish for a consulship and at the same time wish for this; you cannot have set your heart upon having lands and this too; you cannot at the same time be solicitous for your paltry slaves and yourself too. But if you wish for any one of the things that are not your own, what is your own is lost. This is the nature of the matter: Nothing is done except for a price. And why be surprised? If you wish to be consul you must keep vigils, run around, kiss men’s hands, rot away at other men’s doors, say and do many slavish things, send presents to many persons, and guest-gifts to some people every day. And what is the outcome of it all? Twelve bundles of rods, and the privilege of sitting three or four times on the tribune, and giving games in the Circus, and lunches in little baskets. Or else let someone show me what there is in it beyond this. For calm, then, for peace of mind, for sleeping when you are asleep, and being awake when you are awake, for fearing nothing, for being in great anxiety about nothing, are you unwilling to spend anything, to make any exertion? But if something that belongs to you be lost while you are engaged in these affairs, or be spent to no purpose, or someone else get what you ought to have got, are you going to be vexed immediately at what has happened? Will you not balance off what you are getting in return for what, how much in return for how much? Nay, do you wish to get such valuable things for nothing? And how can you? “One serious business with another.”

  You cannot be continually giving attention to both externals and your own governing principle. But if you want the former, let the latter go; otherwise you will have neither the latter nor the former, being drawn in both directions. If you want the latter, you must let the former go. The oil will be spilled, my paltry furniture will perish, but I shall be calm. There will be a fire when I am not at home, and my books will perish, yet I shall deal with my external impressions according to nature. But I shall have nothing to eat. If I am so badly off as all that, death is my harbour. And this is the harbour of all men, even death, and this their refuge. That is why no one of the things that befall us in our life is difficult. Whenever you wish, you walk out of the house, and are no longer bothered by the smoke. Why, then, are you consumed with anxiety? Why do you keep vigils? And why do you not forthwith reckon up where your good and your evil lie, and say, “They are both under my control; no man can either rob me of the one, or plunge me in the other against my will? Why, then, do I not throw myself down and snore? What is mine is sate. What is not mine shall be the concern of whoever gets it, according to the terms upon which it may be given by Him who has authority over it. Who am I to wish that what is not mine should be either thus or so? For it has not been given me to make a choice among these things, has it? For no one has made me an administrator of them, has he? I am satisfied with the things over which I have authority. These I ought to treat so that they may become as beautiful as possible, but everything else as their master may desire.”

  Does any man who has all this before his eyes keep vigils, and does he “toss hither and thither”? What does he wish, or what does he yearn for? For Patroclus, or Antilochus, or Protesilaus? Why, when did he regard any of his friends as immortal? Yes, and when did he not have before his eyes the fact that on the morrow or the day after either he or his friend must die? “Yes,” he says, “but I had thought he was going to survive me, and bring up my son.” No doubt, but then you were a fool, and were thinking of things that were uncertainties. Why, then, do you not blame yourself, instead of sitting and crying like little girls? “Nay, but he used to set my food before me.” Yes, fool, for then he was alive; and now he cannot. But Automedon will set your food before you, and if Automedon too die, you will find somebody else. If the pot in which your meat used to be boiled gets broken, do you have to die of hunger because you do not have your accustomed pot? Won’t you send out and buy a new one to take its place? He says,

  Ill no greater than this could befall me.

  Why, is this what you call an ill? And then, forbearing to get rid of it, do you blame your mother, because she did not foretell it to you, so that you might continue to lament from that time forth?

  What do you men think? Did not Homer compose this in order for us to see that there is nothing to prevent the persons of highest birth, of greatest strength, of most handsome appearance, from being most miserable and wretched, when they do not hold the right kind of judgements?

  CHAPTER XI

  Of cleanliness

  Some people raise the question whether the social instinct is a necessary element in the nature of man; nevertheless, even these people, as it seems to me, would not question that the instinct of cleanliness is most assuredly a necessary element, and that man is distinguished from the animals by this quality if by anything. When, therefore, we see some other animal cleaning itself, we are in the habit of saying in surprise that it is acting “like a human being.” And again, if one finds fault with some beast, we are in the habit of saying immediately, as though in apology, “Well, of course it isn’t a human being.” So true it is that we consider cleanliness to be a special characteristic of man, deriving it in the first instance from the gods. For since they are by nature pure and undefiled, in so far as men have approached them by virtue of reason, just so far are they attached to purity and cleanliness. But since it is impossible for the nature of men to be altogether pure, seeing that it is composed of such material as it is, the reason which they have received from the gods endeavours to render this material clean as far as is possible.

  Therefore, the prime and highest purity is that which appears in the soul, and the same is true of impurity. But you would not find the same impurity in a soul as you would in a body, and as being soul, what else would you find impure about it than that which makes it dirty for the performance of its own functions? And the functions of a soul are the exercise of choice, of refusal, of desire, of aversion, of preparation, of purpose, and of assent. What, then, can that be which makes the soul dirty and unclean in these functions? Nothing but its erroneous decisions. It follows, therefore, that impurity of a soul consists of bad judgements, and purification consists in creating within it the proper kind of judgements; and a pure soul is the one which has the proper kind of judgements, for this is the only soul which is secure against confusion and pollution in its own functions.

  Now one ought to be eager to achieve, as far as may be, something similar to this in the case of the body also. It was impossible that there should be no discharge of mucus from the nose, since man’s body has been composed as it is; for that reason nature made hands, and the nostrils like tubes to discharge the humours. If, therefore, a man snuffs back these discharges of mucus, I say that he is not acting as a human being should. It was impossible that the feet should not get muddy, nor dirty at all, when they pass through certain such substances; for that reason nature has provided water, for that hands. It was impossible that some impurity from eating should not remain on the teeth; for that reason nature says, “Wash your teeth.” Why? In order that you may be a human being, and not a beast or a pig. It was impossible that something dirty and nee
ding to be cleaned off should not be left on the person from our sweat and the pressure of our clothes; for that reason we have water, oil, hands, a towel, a strigil, nitre, and, on occasion, every other kind of equipnient to cleanse the body. Not so you. But the smith will remove the rust from his iron tool, and will have implements made for this purpose, and you yourself will wash your plate when you are going to eat, unless you are utterly unclean and dirty; but will you not wash nor make clean your poor body? — Why? says someone. — Again I will tell you: First, so as to do what befits a man; and second, so as not to offend those whom you meet. You are doing something of the sort even here, and do not realize it. You think that you are worthy of the smell. Very well, be worthy of it. Do you think, though, that those who sit by your side, those who recline beside you, those who kiss you, are worthy of it too? Bah, go away into a wilderness somewhere or other, a place worthy of you, and live alone, smelling of yourself! For it is only right that you should enjoy your uncleanliness all by yourself But since you are living in a city, what kind of character do you fancy you are exhibiting, to behave so thoughtlessly and inconsiderately? If nature had committed to your care a horse, would you have utterly neglected it? And now I would have you think that your body has been entrusted to you like a horse; wash it, rub it down, make it so that nobody will turn his back on you or move aside. But who does not avoid a dirty fellow that smells and has an unsightly skin, even more than a man bespattered with dung? In this latter case the smell is external and acquired, in the other it comes from slovenliness that is internal, and is characteristic of one who has grown rotten through and through.