Discourses and Selected Writings

by Epictetus

  [7] In love and friendship you are also inconsistent, are you not? I mean, money, pleasure and the rest you sometimes take to be good, at other times bad. Isn’t it the same with people? Don’t you regard the same ones as good and bad at varying times? Sometimes they’re your friend, later your enemy; and you sing their praises only later to run them down.

  ‘Yes, I admit to that too.’

  [8] So, do you think that you can be the friend of someone if you hold the wrong opinion about them?

  ‘Naturally, no.’

  What if your opinion of them is subject to change∗ – can your relations be warm?

  ‘No again.’

  And if you alternate praise of them with disparagement?

  ‘No, not then either.’

  [9] All right, no doubt you have seen dogs playing with, and fawning before, each other, and thought, ‘Nothing could be friendlier.’ But just throw some meat in the middle, and then you’ll know what friendship amounts to. [10] Put a piece of real estate in the centre between you and your son, and you’ll know how impatient he is to bury you, and how even you are wishing your son were dead. Then you say, ‘Some child I raised – he’s been planning my funeral for years.’ [11] Place a pretty girl in the middle, and the old man falls for her as hard as the boy. Or dangle some honour or another before the two of you. If you have to risk your life you’ll repeat the words of Admetus’ father: ‘You want to see the light, don’t you imagine your father does too?’77 [12] Don’t you think he loved his son when the boy was small, suffered when he was sick, and could be heard saying, ‘If only I could be sick in his place’? But, faced with a genuine choice, they have only insults to exchange, as you see. [13] Eteocles and Polyneices – didn’t they share the same mother and father? They were reared together, lived, drank, slept together and often exchanged an intimate kiss. Anyone seeing them would almost certainly have mocked the philosophers with their notorious views on friendship.78 [14] Yet when the question came up between them of who would be king, it was like meat thrown before a pack of dogs. Here is what they said:

  ‘Where before the tower do you intend to stand?’

  ‘What business is that of yours?’

  ‘I want to be directly opposite so that I can kill you personally.’

  ‘And I am seized by the same desire.’79

  They even petition the gods for that favour.

  [15] It is a universal law – have no illusions – that every creature alive is attached to nothing so much as to its own self-interest. Whatever threatens to stand in the way of that -be it brother, father, child or sweetheart – he will hate, curse and prosecute, [16] because he is naturally disposed to favour primarily his own interest. This is his father, his brother, his relations, his country and his god. [17] If we believe the gods to be hostile to our individual interest, then we are as ready to turn on them as on the others, knocking their statues over and burning down their temples. Witness Alexander, who ordered the shrines of Asclepius torched after his beloved80 died.

  [18] The upshot is that if you identify self-interest with piety, honesty, country, parents and friends, then they are all secure. But separate them, and friends, family, country and morality itself all come to nothing, outweighed by self-interest. [19] Wherever ‘me’ and ‘mine’ are, that’s where every creature necessarily tends. If we locate them in the body, then the body will be the dominant force in our lives. If it’s in our faculty of will, then that will dominate. Likewise with externals. [20] But only if I identify with my will can I be someone’s friend – or son, or father – in the true sense, because only then will my self-interest be served by remaining loyal, honest, patient, tolerant and supportive, and by maintaining my social relations. [21] If I put myself one place, and put honour anywhere else, the consequence will be to strengthen the view of Epicurus, as set forth in his declaration that ‘Honour is nothing, and if it does exist, it is only what is generally approved.’81

  [22] Ignorance of this made the Athenians turn on the Spartans, and the Thebans on both; made the Persian king invade Greece and the Macedonians invade both; and now the Romans have been induced to turn against the Getae. Going further back, it was the cause of the Trojan War. [23] Paris was Menelaus’ guest, and anyone who saw how well they treated each other would have laughed at anyone who said they weren’t friends. But between the two a bit of temptation was thrown in the form of a beautiful woman, and over that there arose war.

  [24] So now if you see friends, or brothers, who appear to be of like mind, don’t draw any conclusions about their friendship right away, even if they swear oaths and say that neither can live one without the other. [25] A bad person’s character cannot be trusted, it’s weak and indecisive, easily won over by different impressions at different times. [26] Don’t make the common mistake of only asking, ‘Do they share parents?’, or, ‘Did they grow up together?’, or, ‘Did they attend the same school?’ Just ask whether they put their self-interest in externals or in moral choice. [27] If it’s in externals, you cannot call them friends, any more than you can call them trustworthy, consistent, courageous or free. You cannot even call them human beings, if you think about it. [28] Because it is no human frame of mind that makes people snap at others and insult them, or take to the marketplace the way bandits take to the desert or mountains,∗ and behave like bandits in court; or that turns them into depraved lechers and adulterers; or is responsible for all other crimes that people commit against each other.

  Their only cause is the frame of mind that sets the self and its interests anywhere except in the realm of choice. [29] But if you hear of people who are sincere in identifying virtue with choice and the use of impressions, don’t bother with whether they are members of the same family, or friends who’ve run together a long time; knowing this is enough to say with confidence that they are friends, just as it’s enough to judge them fair and reliable. [30] For where else is friendship found if not with fairness, reliability and respect for virtue only?

  [31] ‘But she has looked after me for such a long time; did she not love me?’

  ‘How do you know, stupid, if she hasn’t looked after you the way she polishes her shoes, say, or tends to her farm animals? How do you know she won’t discard you like a broken glass once your value as a utensil is used up?’

  [32] ‘But she’s also my wife, and we have lived together for years.’

  ‘And Eriphyle, how long was she with Amphiaraus, the mother, too, of his many children? But a necklace came between them.82 [33] And by “necklace”, I mean her whole attitude toward externals. That was the inhuman factor that destroyed their love, and would not permit the woman to remain a wife, or the mother to remain a mother.† [34] If any of you are serious about being a friend, rid yourself of such attitudes, condemn them and drive them out of your mind. [35] That way, you won’t be hard on yourself, or be forever fighting, second-guessing and tormenting yourself. [36] And then you will be in a condition to befriend others – forming easy and natural relationships with like-minded people, but capable too of treating unenlightened souls with sympathy and indulgence, remembering that they are ignorant or mistaken about what’s most important. Never be harsh, remember Plato’s dictum: ‘Every soul is deprived of the truth against its will.’83

  [37] If you don’t get rid of these attitudes, however, you may do all the things friends typically do together, like drink, board, and travel, you can even have the same ancestry – but so can snakes. They can never be friends, though, and neither can you, as long as you hold on to these hateful and inhuman judgements.

  II 23 On the art of expression

  [1] Everyone would read with greater ease and pleasure a book written in a legible hand. And so it is with a speech: everyone would listen with greater ease to one composed in well-wrought and well-organized prose. [2] So we must not say that there is no such thing as a faculty of expression. That would mark us out as lazy as well as ungrateful – ungrateful, because it scorns God’s gifts, just the same as
if one were to deny the value of the power of sight, of hearing, or of speech itself.

  [3] Was it for nothing that God gave you eyes and endowed them with breath so keen and refined that it spans the distance to objects, and assumes their shape?84 [4] Do you know of any messenger that’s as fast or accurate? And was it for nothing that he made the air between responsive and elastic enough to permit vision to pass through it? And what of light, without which the rest would be useless – was it for nothing that he created that too?

  [5] So don’t be ungrateful for these gifts, but at the same time don’t forget that there are others superior to them. Give thanks to God for sight, for hearing, for life itself and the means provided to support it, like grain, wine and oil. [6] But remember that he has given you something superior to all these, the faculty intended to use them, to test them, and to judge their relative worth. [7] After all, what is it that determines in the case of each of these faculties what value to assign them? You’ve never heard sight speak up for itself, or hearing∗; both have been appointed to be slaves and subordinates to the faculty of using impressions. [8] What other faculty do you consult to learn what each thing is worth? What faculty can be superior to this one, which employs the others in a subordinate capacity, testing and passing judgement on each? [9] None of the others knows what it is or what it is worth, when it should or should not be used. What faculty is responsible for opening and closing the eyes, depending on whether or not it judges a thing worthy of being seen? Sight itself? No, it is the will. What opens or stops our ears, [10] making us either receptive to a speech or unmoved by it? Not hearing; it is the will and the will alone.

  [11] Well now; the will looks around and finds itself in the company of faculties that are deaf and blind, incapable of looking after anything except the business that they were appointed to care for under will’s own direction. Only the will is discerning enough to look after them, in proportion to their value, and supervise itself at the same time. Realizing this, is the will likely to declare anything other than itself supreme? An eye, when open, has no option but to see. [12] The decision whether to look at a particular man’s wife, however, and how, belongs to the will. [13] And the determination whether to trust what someone says, and then, if we trust them, whether we should be angered by it – that also belongs to the will.

  [14] This faculty of expression and arranging words – if it really is a faculty – does nothing more than dress up and organize words on a given topic, the way a hairdresser arranges hair. [15] But whether to speak at all or remain silent, and then, if the former, whether it is better to speak this way or that, and if this is or is not appropriate – in short, determining the right time and utility for every speech – all these are the province of the will. So don’t expect it to come forward and vote for anything but itself.

  [16] ‘But what if all this is true, and the subordinate element can still be superior to what it serves, as, for instance, the horse to the rider, the dog to the hunter, the instrument to the musician, or a subject to his king?’ Look, what puts the other faculties to use? The will. What administers all of them? [17] Then, what destroys the person as a whole, sometimes by hunger, sometimes by hanging, sometimes by jumping off a cliff? The will. [18] Is there anything in the human sphere, then, that takes precedence? How can anything subject to obstruction be stronger than something that is not? [19] Now both the will and externals are fitted by nature to obstruct the power of sight, as well as speech and hearing. But what can obstruct the will? Nothing external; only the will can turn back on, and obstruct, itself. Which is why virtue and vice apply to it and it alone.

  [20] Now let’s see so great a faculty, the one put in charge of all the rest, come forward and say that the flesh is the element that rules over everything. Such a claim to prominence would be intolerable even from the flesh itself. [21] Come, Epicurus, which part of you was it that was responsible for making such a pronouncement? Which part authored works on The End, on Physics, and on The Criterion of Truth? Which part let your beard grow long?85 Or described yourself, at the hour of death, ‘as passing a most happy day, which also happens to be our last’? [22] Was it flesh – or the will? Only madness could get you to acknowledge any faculty of greater authority than the will. Or are you really that deaf and blind?

  [23] Does this mean that our other faculties should be despised? Of course not. We certainly do not say that there is nothing to be used or gained apart from the will; that is stupid, besides being impious and ungrateful to God. Each thing must be given its due. [24] Even a donkey has some utility, only not as much as an ox. There is some use in a dog, but not as much as in a slave. There is use in slaves, but not so much as in free citizens. There is use in them, too, but not so much as in the people who rule over them. [25] If some things are of greater value, however, that does not mean we should slight the contribution of the others. The faculty of expression has its utility, even if it is less than the power of the will. [26] So let no one suppose that, in saying this, I am suggesting that you should be careless of how you express yourself, any more than you should neglect your eyes, ears, hands, feet, clothes or shoes. [27] But if I’m asked to name the greatest element of all, what am I to say? The faculty of speech? I cannot. It is the faculty of the will, when rightly applied, [28] since it controls speech as well as every other faculty, great and small. It is by putting this right that a good person becomes good; when its purpose fails, he turns bad. [29] It determines whether we are to know happiness or not, and whether we will be on hostile or amicable terms with our neighbours. Simply put – ignore it and unhappiness results, give it your attention and your happiness is assured. [30] Yet to try to efface the faculty of eloquence and say that there is no such thing, this really betrays a kind of cowardice, besides ingratitude toward those who have given it. [31] It seems to me that someone with such an attitude is afraid that, if a faculty of expression does exist, we won’t be able to ignore it. [32] It’s like people who pretend that there is no difference between ugliness and beauty. Seeing Thersites, then, affected people the same as seeing Achilles; and Helen made no greater impression than the sight of the average woman? [33] That, too, is an ignorant and boorish attitude, characteristic of people with no power of discernment; they’re afraid that if they begin to notice the difference, right away they’ll lose control and fall under the sway of beauty altogether. [34] The important thing is this: allow everyone their particular gift or talent, but step back and look at what it’s worth. Then come to recognition of the faculty that rules them. Make that the object of your avid pursuit and relegate the others to a secondary role, while still giving them what attention you can spare. [35] Take the eyes: they demand attention, but not because they are of primary importance, but for the sake of what actually is; because the ruling faculty cannot function as nature intended it unless it makes judicious use of the eyes, in making choice among particulars.

  [36] But here’s what happens: people act like a traveller headed for home who stops at an inn and, finding it comfortable, decides to remain there. [37] You’ve lost sight of your goal, man. You were supposed to drive through the inn, not park there.

  ‘But it’s nice here.’

  Look, there are plenty of nice inns in addition to that one, plenty of nice resorts∗ – [38] but they are only way stations. Your goal was different: to return to your native community, help insure the safety of the citizenry, then turn your attention to acting the part of a citizen yourself.86 Get married, raise children, and be prepared to hold the usual public offices. [39] You see, you didn’t come with the option of choosing one of those pleasanter places; you are meant to live and go about your business in the place where you were born and made citizen.

  Well, something analogous goes on in our school here. [40] Since you can’t make progress towards your ideal without the benefit of teaching based on the spoken word, and since the same goes for purifying the will and correcting the power of using impressions; and since communicating our principal d
octrines requires the use of careful diction, and a certain variety and forcefulness of style, [41] some students become captivated by all these things and don’t want to proceed further. One is captivated by diction, another by deductive or equivocal arguments, someone else by yet another ‘inn’ of this kind; and there they stay and rot as if seduced by the Sirens.

  [42] Your objective, my friend, was to see to it that you make natural use of whatever impressions come your way; that you do not fail in your desires, or have experiences you don’t want; that you never be unfortunate or unhappy, but free, unrestricted and unrestrained; in sympathy with God’s rule, which you submit to cheerfully; at odds with no one, no one’s accuser; able in all sincerity to speak Cleanthes’ line:

  ‘Lead me, Zeus, lead me, Destiny.’87

  [43] But though this is the goal you’re given, next thing you know a turn of phrase catches your fancy, or certain abstract propositions, and there you call halt and decide to pitch camp. You’ve forgotten all about your obligations back home, announcing, ‘It’s pleasant here.’ Well, who says otherwise? But pleasant as a way station, as an inn. [44] What’s to keep you from speaking like Demosthenes88 and still being unhappy? Or analysing arguments like Chrysippus while still uneasy, still subject to envy and irritation – still distressed and downhearted, in other words? Nothing. [45] So, you see, those inns were not without value,∗ but your goal lay elsewhere.

  [46] When I say this to some people, they imagine that I am denouncing rhetoric, or care in the presentation of principles. But I’m not one of those who denounce it, only the obsessive devotion to it, and making it the focus of one’s hopes and expectations. [47] If someone who advocates this view does his listeners a disservice, then set me down as one of the offenders. When I see that one thing is supreme and most important, I cannot say that something else is, just to make you happy.