The Discourses of Epictetus
Epictetus · ancient · 118k words
The lectures of Epictetus, taken down by his pupil Arrian and circulated, Arrian insists, without revision — the Stoic classroom preserved live. Across four surviving books a freed slave turned teacher harangues, mocks, and coaxes his students toward the one thing he holds to be in their power: the use they make of their own impressions. Where the Enchiridion distils the doctrine, the Discourses show it being argued, and remain the fullest record of how a Stoic actually taught.
Contents
Book I
- Of the things which are in our power, and not in our power5 min
- How a man on every occasion can maintain his proper character6 min
- How a man should proceed from the principle of god being the father of all men to the rest1 min
- Of progress or improvement5 min
- Against the academics2 min
- Of Providence7 min
- Of the use of sophistical arguments and hypothetical and the like5 min
- That the faculties are not safe to the uninstructed2 min
- How from the fact that we are akin to God a man may proceed to the consequences6 min
- Against those who eagerly seek preferment at Rome2 min
- Of natural affection7 min
- Of contentment6 min
- How everything may be done acceptably to the gods1 min
- That the deity oversees all things3 min
- What philosophy promises1 min
- Of Providence3 min
- That the logical art is necessary4 min
- That we ought not to be angry with the errors (faults) of others4 min
- How we should behave to tyrants5 min
- About reason, how it contemplates itself3 min
- Against those who wish to be admired1 min
- On praecognitions4 min
- Against Epicurus1 min
- How we should struggle with circumstances3 min
- On the same5 min
- What is the law of life3 min
- In how many ways appearances exist, and what aids we should provide against them4 min
- That we ought not to be angry with men; and what are the small and the great things among men6 min
- On constancy (or firmness)11 min
- What we ought to have ready in difficult circumstances1 min
Book II
- That confidence (courage) is not inconsistent with caution8 min
- Of tranquillity (freedom from perturbation)4 min
- To those who recommend persons to philosophers1 min
- Against a person who had once been detected in adultery2 min
- How magnanimity is consistent with care6 min
- Of indifference5 min
- How we ought to use divination2 min
- What is the nature (ἡ οὐσία) of the Good6 min
- That when we cannot fulfil that which the character of a man promises, we assume the character of a philosopher4 min
- How we may discover the duties of life from names5 min
- What the beginning of philosophy is4 min
- Of disputation or discussion4 min
- On anxiety (solicitude)5 min
- To Naso5 min
- To or against those who obstinately persist in what they have determined3 min
- That we do not strive to use our opinions about good and evil9 min
- How we must adapt preconceptions to particular cases8 min
- How we should struggle against appearances5 min
- Against those who embrace philosophical opinions only in words7 min
- Against the Epicureans and Academics8 min
- Of inconsistency5 min
- On friendship8 min
- On the power of speaking10 min
- To (or against) a person who was one of those who were not valued (esteemed) by him6 min
- That logic is necessary1 min
- What is the property of error2 min
Book III
- Of finery in dress10 min
- In what a man ought to be exercised who has made proficiency; and that we neglect the chief things4 min
- What is the matter on which a good man should be employed, and in what we ought chiefly to practise ourselves4 min
- Against a person who showed his partizanship in an unseemly way in a theatre3 min
- Against those who on account of sickness go away home4 min
- Miscellaneous2 min
- To the administrator of the free cities who was an Epicurean7 min
- How we must exercise ourselves against appearances (φαντασίας)2 min
- To a certain rhetorician who was going up to Rome on a suit5 min
- In what manner we ought to bear sickness4 min
- Certain miscellaneous matters1 min
- About exercise4 min
- What solitude is, and what kind of person a solitary man is5 min
- Certain miscellaneous matters2 min
- That we ought to proceed with circumspection to every thing3 min
- That we ought with caution to enter into familiar intercourse with men3 min
- On Providence1 min
- That we ought not to be disturbed by any news2 min
- What is the condition of a common kind of man and of a philosopher1 min
- That we can derive advantage from all external things4 min
- Against those who readily come to the profession of sophists5 min
- About Cynism23 min
- To those who read and discuss for the sake of ostentation8 min
- That we ought not to be moved by a desire of those things which are not in our power26 min
- To those who fall off (desist) from their purpose2 min
- To those who fear want8 min
Book IV
- About freedom39 min
- On familiar intimacy2 min
- What things we should exchange for other things2 min
- To those who are desirous of passing life in tranquillity11 min
- Against the quarrelsome and ferocious8 min
- Against those who lament over being pitied9 min
- On freedom from fear10 min
- Against those who hastily rush into the use of the philosophic dress9 min
- To a person who had been changed to a character of shamelessness4 min
- What things we ought to despise, and what things we ought to value7 min
- About purity (cleanliness)8 min
- On attention4 min
- Against or to those who readily tell their own affairs5 min