A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus with the EncheiridionEpictetus
Philosophy
A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus with the Encheiridion
Epictetus
Philosophy -- Early works to 1800
Did you hear this when you were with the philosophers? did you learn
this? do you not know that human life is a warfare? that one man must
keep watch, another must go out as a spy, and a third must fight? and
it is not possible that all should be in one place, nor is it better
that it should be so. But you neglecting to do the commands of the
general complain when anything more hard than usual is imposed on you,
and you do not observe what you make the army become as far as it is in
your power; that if all imitate you, no man will dig a trench, no man
will put a rampart round, nor keep watch, nor expose himself to danger,
but will appear to be useless for the purposes of an army. Again, in a
vessel if you go as a sailor, keep to one place and stick to it. And if
you are ordered to climb the mast, refuse; if to run to the head of the
ship, refuse; and what master of a ship will endure you? and will he
not pitch you overboard as a useless thing, an impediment only and bad
example to the other sailors? And so it is here also: every man’s life
is a kind of warfare, and it is long and diversified. You must observe
the duty of a soldier and do every thing at the nod of the general; if
it is possible, divining what his wishes are; for there is no
resemblance between that general and this, neither in strength nor in
superiority of character. Know you not that a good man does nothing for
the sake of appearance, but for the sake of doing right? What advantage
is it then to him to have done right? And what advantage is it to a man
who writes the name of Dion to write it as he ought? The advantage is
to have written it. Is there no reward then? Do you seek a reward for a
good man greater than doing what is good and just? At Olympia you wish
for nothing more, but it seems to you enough to be crowned at the
games. Does it seem to you so small and worthless a thing to be good
and happy? For these purposes being introduced by the gods into this
city (the world), and it being now your duty to undertake the work of a
man, do you still want nurses also and a mamma, and do foolish women by
their weeping move you and make you effeminate? Will you thus never
cease to be a foolish child? know you not that he who does the acts of
a child, the older he is, the more ridiculous he is?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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