Encheiridion — Epictetus

160 Gbe Discourses of Bpfctetus and conversation ; and now you sit and weep because you do not see the same persons and do not live in the same places. Indeed you deserve this, to be more wretched than crows and ravens who have the power of flying where they please and changing their nests for others, and crossing the seas without lamenting or regretting their former condition. Yes, but this happens to them because they are irrational creatures.

Was reason then given to us by the gods for the purpose of unhappiness and misery, that we may pass our lives in wretchedness and lamentation ? Must all persons be immortal and must no man go abroad, and must we ourselves not go abroad, but remain rooted like plants ; and if any of our familiar friends goes abroad, must we sit and weep ; and on the contrary, when he returns, must we dance and clap our hands like children ?

But my mother laments when she does not see me. Why has she not learned these principles? and I do not say this, that we should not take care that she may not lament, but I say that we ought not to desire in every way what is not our own. And the sorrow of another is another's sorrow ; but my sorrow is my own.

I then will stop my own sorrow by every means, for it is in my power ; and the sorrow of another I will endeavor to stop as far as I can ; but I

Gbe Discourses of Bpictetus i6t will not attempt to do it by every means ; for if I do, I shall be fighting against God, I shall be opposing Zeus and shall be placing myself against him in the administration of the universe ; and the reward (the punishment) of this fighting against God and of this disobedience not only will the children of my children pay, but I also shall myself, both by day and by night, startled by dreams, perturbed, trembling at every piece of news, and having my tranquillity depending on the letters of others.

Some person has arrived from Rome. I only hope there is no harm. But what harm can happen to you, where you are not ? From Hellas (Greece) some one is come ; I hope that there is no harm. In this way every place may be the cause of misfortune to you. Is it not enough for you to be unfortunate there where you are, and must you be so even beyond sea, and by the report of letters? Is this the way in which your affairs are in a state of security?

Well then suppose that my friends have died in the places which are far from me. What else have they suffered than that which is the condition of mortals ? Or how are you desirous at the same time to live to old age, and at the same time not to see the death of any person whom you love? Know you not that in the course of a lonp time many and various kinds II

162 Zbe Discourses of Bpictetus of things must happen ; that a fever shall overpower one, a robber another, and a third a tyrant ?

Such is the condition of things around us, such are those who live with us in the world ; cold and heat, and unsuitable ways of living, and journeys by land, and voyages by sea, and winds, and various circumstances which surround us, destroy one man, and banish another, and throw one upon an embassy and another into an army.

Sit down then in a nutter at all these things, lamenting, unhappy, unfortunate, dependent on another, and dependent not on one or two, but on ten thousands upon ten thousands.

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