Discourses by Epictetus (good books to read for beginners txt) 📕

See book II chapter XII at 15. ↩

See Xenophon, Memorabilia, ii 2, ↩

The word στρατηγῆσαι may be translated either way. ↩

See book IV chapter I at 77, and the use of θαυμάζειν. ↩

See book II chapter X at 14; book IV chapter I at 120. So Plato says (Laws vi), that a man who has had right education is wont to be the most divine and the tamest of animals. (John Upton.)

On the doing wrong to another, see Plato’s Crito, and book IV chapter I at 167. ↩

See book III chapter I at 40. ↩

Like Hercules and Diogenes. See book III chapter XII at 2. ↩

The allusion is to a passage (a fragment) in the Cresphontes of Euripides translated by Cicero into Latin Iambics (Tusculan Disputations i 48):

ἔδει γὰρ ἡμᾶς σύλλογον ποιουμένους
τὸν φύντα φρηνεῖν εἰς ὅσ᾽ ἔρχεται κάκα.
τὸν δ᾽αὖ φανόντα καὶ πόνων πεπαυμένον
χαίροντας, εὐφημοῦντας ἐκπέμπειν δόμων.

Herodotus (The Histories v. 4) says of the Trausi, a Thracian tribe: “when a child is born, the relatives sit round it and lament over all the evils which it must suffer on coming into the world and enumerate all the calamities of mankind: but when one dies, they hide him in the earth with rejoicing and pleasure, reckoning all the evils from which he is now released and in possession of all happiness.” ↩

The word is πανδοκεῖον, which Johann Schweighäuser says that he does not understand. He supposes the word to be corrupt; unless we take it to mean the inn in which a man lives who has no home. I do not understand the word here. ↩

See the note of Johann Schweighäuser on the word τετράσσαρον in the text. ↩

This does not mean, it is said, that Nero issued counterfeit coins, for there are extant many coins of Nero which both in form and in the purity of the metal are complete. A learned numismatist, Francis Wise, fellow of Trinity College Oxford, in a letter to John Upton, says that he can discover no reason for Nero’s coins being rejected in commercial dealings after his death except the fact of the tyrant having been declared by the Senate to be an enemy to the Commonwealth. (Suetonius, Nero, chapter 49.) When Domitian was murdered, the Senate ordered his busts to be taken down, as the French now do after a revolution, and all memorials of him to be destroyed (Suetonius, Domitian, chapter 23). Dion also reports (LX) that when Caligula was murdered, it was ordered that all the brass coin which bore his image should be melted, and, I suppose, coined again. There is more on this subject in Wise’s letter.

I do not believe that genuine coins would be refused in commercial dealings for the reasons which Wise gives, at least not refused in parts distant from Rome. Perhaps Epictetus means that some people would not touch the coins of the detestable Nero. ↩

He says τὸ κήρινον, which Elizabeth Carter translates “a piece of wax.” Perhaps it means “a piece of wax in the form of an apple.” ↩

The word is ἐπιφύησονται, the form of which is not Greek. Johann Schweighäuser has no remark on it, and he translates the word by “adorientur.” The form ought to be ἐπιφύσονται. See Stephens’ Lexicon on the word ἐπιφύομαι. Probably the word is corrupted. ↩

Elizabeth Carter renders φοβερόν by “formidable,” and in the Latin translation it is rendered “formidabilem,” but that cannot be the meaning of the word here. ↩

Eteocles and Polynices were the sons of the unfortunate Oedipus, who quarrelled about the kingship of Thebes and killed one another. This quarrel is the subject of the Seven Against Thebes of Aeschylus and the Phoenissae of Euripides. See note 400. ↩

“Every man in everything he does naturally acts upon the forethought and apprehension of avoiding evil or obtaining good.” Bishop Butler, Analogy, Chapter 2. The bishop’s “naturally” is the φύσις of Epictetus. ↩

Socrates’ wife Xanthippe is charged by her eldest son Lamprocles with being so ill-tempered as to be past all endurance (Xenophon, Memorabilia ii 2, 7). Xenophon in this chapter has reported the conversation of Socrates with his son on this matter.

Diogenes Laërtius (Lives ii) tells the story of Xanthippe pouring water on the head of Socrates, and dirty water, as Seneca says (De Constantia, chapter 18). Aelian (Varia Historia xi 12) reports that Alcibiades sent Socrates a large and good cake, which Xanthippe trampled under her feet. Socrates only laughed and said, “Well then, you will not have your share of it.” The philosopher showed that his philosophy was practical by enduring the torment of a very ill-tempered wife, one of the greatest calamities that can happen to a man, and the trouble of an undutiful son. ↩

This is one of the wisest and noblest expressions of Epictetus. ↩

See Aristophanes, The Peace, line 1188 (John Upton):

πολλὰ γὰρ δὴ μ᾽ ἠδίκησαν
ὄντες οἴκοι μὲν λέοντες,
ἐν μάχῃ δ᾽ ἀλώπεκες.

↩

Here it is implied that there are things which God cannot do. Perhaps he means that as God has given man certain powers of will and therefore of action,