Ch. 9
How from the fact that we are akin to God a man may proceed to the consequences.
IF the things are true which are said by the philosophers
about the kinship between God and man, what else remains for men to do than what Socrates did? Never in
reply to the question, to what country you belong, say
that you are an Athenian or a Corinthian, but that you
are a citizen of the world (κόσμιος).64 For why do you
say that you are an Athenian, and why do you not
say that you belong to the small nook only into which
your poor body was cast at birth? Is it not plain that
you call yourself an Athenian or Corinthian from the
place which has a greater authority and comprises not
only that small nook itself and all your family, but
even the whole country from which the stock of your
progenitors is derived down to you? He then who
has observed with intelligence the administration of the
world, and has learned that the greatest and supreme and
the most comprehensive community is that which is composed of men and God, and that from God have descended
the seeds not only to my father and grandfather, but to
all beings which are generated on the earth and are produced, and particularly to rational beingsfor these only
are by their nature formed to have communion with God,
being by means of reason conjoined with him65 why
[p. 31]
should not such a man call himself a citizen of the world,
why not a son of God,66 and why should he be afraid of
anything which happens among men? Is kinship with
Caesar (the emperor) or with any other of the powerful
in Rome sufficient to enable us to live in safety, and above (
contempt and without any fear at all? and to have God
for your maker (ποιητήν), and father and guardian, shall
not this release us from sorrows and fears?
But a man may say, Whence shall I get bread to eat
when I have nothing?
And how do slaves, and runaways, on what do they rely
when they leave their masters? Do they rely on their
lands or slaves, or their vessels of silver? They rely on
nothing but themselves; and food does not fail them.67
And shall it be necessary for one among us who is a
philosopher to travel into foreign parts, and trust to and
rely on others, and not to take care of himself, and shall
he be inferior to irrational animals and more cowardly,
each of which being self-sufficient, neither fails to get
its proper food, nor to find a suitable way of living, and
one conformable to nature?
[p. 32]
I indeed think that the old man68 ought to be sitting
here, not to contrive how you may have no mean thoughts
nor mean and ignoble talk about yourselves, but to take
care that there be not among us any young men of such a
mind, that when they have recognised their kinship to
God, and that we are fettered by these bonds, the body,
I mean, and its possessions, and whatever else on account
of them is necessary to us for the economy and commerce
of life, they should intend to throw off these things as if
they were burdens painful and intolerable, and to depart
to their kinsmen. But this is the labour that your
teacher and instructor ought to be employed upon, if he
really were what he should be. You should come to him
and say, Epictetus, we can no longer endure being
bound to this poor body, and feeding it and giving it
drink, and rest, and cleaning it, and for the sake of the
body complying with the wishes of these and of those.69
Are not these things indifferent and nothing to us; and
is not death no evil? And are we not in a manner
kinsmen of God, and did we not come from him? Allow
us to depart to the place from which we came; allow us
to be released at last from these bonds by which we are
bound and weighed down. Here there are robbers and
thieves and courts of justice, and those who are named
tyrants, and think that they have some power over us by
means of the body and its possessions. Permit us to show
them that they have no power over any man. And I on
my part would say, Friends, wait for God: when He
shall give the signal70 and release you from this service,
then go to Him; but for the present endure to dwell in
this place where He has put you: short indeed is this
time of your dwelling here, and easy to bear for those
who are so disposed: for what tyrant or what thief, or
[p. 33]
what courts of justice, are formidable to those who have
thus considered as things of no value the body and the
possessions of the body? Wait then, do not depart
without a reason.
Something like this ought to be said by the teacher to
ingenuous youths. But now what happens? The teacher
is a lifeless body, and you are lifeless bodies. When you
have been well filled to-day, you sit down and lament
about the morrow, how you shall get something to eat.
Wretch, if you have it, you will have it; if you have it
not, you will depart from life. The door is open.71 Why
do you grieve? where does there remain any room for
tears? and where is there occasion for flattery? why shall
one man envy another? why should a man admire the
rich or the powerful, even if they be both very strong and
of violent temper? for what will they do to us? We shall
not care for that which they can do; and what we do
care for, that they cannot do. How did Socrates behave
with respect to these matters? Why, in what other way
than a man ought to do who was convinced that he was
a kinsman of the gods? If you say to me now, said
Socrates to his judges,72 we will acquit you on the condition that you no longer discourse in the way in which
you have hitherto discoursed, nor trouble either our young
or our old men, I shall answer, you make yourselves
ridiculous by thinking that, if one of our commanders has
appointed me to a certain post, it is my duty to keep and
maintain it, and to resolve to die a thousand times rather
than desert it; but if God has put us in any place and
way of life, we ought to desert it. Socrates speaks like a
[p. 34]
mar who is really a kinsman of the gods. But we think
about ourselves, as if we were only stomachs, and intestines, and shameful parts; we fear, we desire; we flatter
those who are able to help us in these matters, and we
fear them also.
A man asked me to write to Rome about him, a man
who, as most people thought, had been unfortunate, for
formerly he was a man of rank and rich, but had been
stripped of all, and was living here. I wrote on his
behalf in a submissive manner; but when he had read the
letter, he gave it back to me and said, I wished for your
help, not your pity: no evil has happened to me.
Thus also Musonius Rufus, in order to try me, used to
say: This and this will befall you from your master;
and when I replied that these were things which happen
in the ordinary course of human affairs. Why then,
said he, should I ask him for anything when I can
obtain it from you? For, in fact, what a man has from
himself, it is superfluous and foolish to receive from
another?73 s Shall I then, who am able to receive from
myself greatness of soul and a generous spirit, receive
from you land and money or a magisterial office? I hope
not: I will not be so ignorant about my own possessions.
But when a man is cowardly and mean, what else must
be done for him than to write letters as you would about
a corpse.74 Please to grant us the body of a certain person
and a sextarius of poor blood. For such a person is, in
fact, a carcase and a sextarius (a certain quantity) of
blood, and nothing more. But if he were anything more,
lie would know that one man is not miserable through the
means of another.
[p. 35]
