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

to be in life also. Is health a good thing, and is sickness a bad thing? No, man. But what is it? To be healthy, and healthy in a right way, is good: to be healthy in a bad way is bad; so that it is possible to gain advantage even from sickness, I declare. For is it not possible to gain advantage even from death, and is it not possible to gain advantage from mutilation? Do you think that Menoeceus gained little by death?518 Could a man who says so, gain so much as Menoeceus gained? Come, man, did he not maintain the character of being a lover of his country, a man of great mind, faithful, generous? And if he had continued to live, would he not have lost all these things? would he not have gained the opposite? would he not have gained the name of coward, ignoble, a hater of his country, a man who feared death?519 Well, do you think that he gained little by dying? I suppose not. But did the father of Admetus520 gain much by prolonging his life so ignobly and miserably? Did he not die afterwards? Cease, I adjure you by the gods, to admire material things. Cease to make yourselves slaves, first of things, then, on account of things, slaves of those who are able to give them or take them away.

Can advantage then be derived from these things? From all; and from him who abuses you. Wherein does the man who exercises before the combat profit the athlete? Very greatly. This man becomes my exerciser before the combat: he exercises me in endurance, in keeping my temper, in mildness. You say no: but he, who lays hold of my neck and disciplines my loins and shoulders, does me good; and the exercise master (the aliptes, or oiler) does right when he says: Raise him up with both hands, and the heavier he (ἐκεῖνος) is, so much the more is my advantage.521 But if a man exercises me in keeping my temper, does he not do me good?⁠—This is not knowing how to gain an advantage from men. Is my neighbour bad? Bad to himself, but good to me: he exercises my good disposition, my moderation. Is my father bad? Bad to himself, but to me good. This is the rod of Hermes: touch with it what you please, as the saying is, and it will be of gold. I say not so: but bring what you please, and I will make it good.522 Bring disease, bring death, bring poverty, bring abuse, bring trial on capital charges: all these things through the rod of Hermes shall be made profitable. “What will you do with death?” Why, what else than that it shall do you honor, or that it shall show you by act through it,523 what a man is who follows the will of nature? “What will you do with disease?” I will show its nature, I will be conspicuous in it, I will be firm, I will be happy, I will not flatter the physician, I will not wish to die. “What else do you seek?” Whatever you shall give me, I will make it happy, fortunate, honored, a thing which a man shall seek.

You say “No: but take care that you do not fall sick: it is a bad thing.” This is the same as if you should say, “Take care that you never receive the impression (appearance) that three are four: that is bad.” Man, how is it bad? If I think about it as I ought, how shall it then do me any damage? and shall it not even do me good? If then I think about poverty as I ought to do, about disease, about not having office,524 is not that enough for me? will it not be an advantage? How then ought I any longer to look to seek evil and good in externals? What happens? these doctrines are maintained here, but no man carries them away home; but immediately everyone is at war with his slave, with his neighbours, with those who have sneered at him, with those who have ridiculed him. Good luck to Lesbius,525 who daily proves that I know nothing.

XXI Against Those Who Readily Come to the Profession of Sophists

They who have taken up bare theorems (θεωρήματα) immediately wish to vomit them forth, as persons whose stomach is diseased do with food. First digest the thing, then do not vomit it up thus; if you do not digest it, the thing becomes truly an emetic, a crude food and unfit to eat. But after digestion show us some change in your ruling faculty, as athletes show in their shoulders by what they have been exercised and what they have eaten; as those who have taken up certain arts show by what they have learned. The carpenter does not come and say, “Hear me talk about the carpenter’s art,” but having undertaken to build a house, he makes it, and proves that he knows the art. You also ought to do something of the kind: eat like a man, drink like a man, dress, marry, beget children, do the office of a citizen, endure abuse, bear with an unreasonable brother, bear with your father, bear with your son, neighbour, companion.526 Show us these things that we may see that you have in truth learned something from the philosophers. You say, “No; but come and hear me read (philosophical) commentaries.” Go away, and seek somebody to vomit them on. (He replies) “And indeed I will expound to you the writings of Chrysippus as no other man can: I will explain his text most clearly: I will add also, if I can, the vehemence of Antipater and Archedemus.”