The Teaching of Epictetus / Being the 'Encheiridion of Epictetus,' with Selections from the 'Dissertations' and 'Fragments'

by Epictetus

CHAPTER XII.

of adornment of the person.

1. A certain young man, a rhetorician, having come to Epictetus with his hair dressed in an unusually elaborate way, and his other attire much adorned, Tell me, said Epictetus, think you not that some dogs are beautiful, and some horses, and so of the other animals?

——“I do think it,” said he.

And men too—are not some beautiful and some ill-favored?

——“How otherwise?”

Whether, then, do we call each of these beautiful for the same reasons and in the same kind, or each for something proper to itself? And you shall see the matter thus: Inasmuch as we observe a dog to be formed by nature for one end, and a horse for another, and, let us say, a nightingale for another, we may in general say, not unreasonably, that each of them is then beautiful when it is excellent according to its own nature; but since the nature of each is different, different also, it seems to me, is the manner of being beautiful in each. Is it not so?

He acknowledged that it was.

Therefore, that which maketh a dog beautiful maketh a horse ill-favored; and that which maketh a horse beautiful, a dog ill-favored; if, indeed, their natures are different?

——“So it seems.”

And that which maketh a beautiful Pancratiast,[1] the same maketh a wrestler not good, and a runner utterly laughable? And he who is beautiful for the Pentathlon is very bad for wrestling?

——“It is so,” he said.

What is it, then, that makes a man beautiful? Is it not that which, in its kind, makes also a dog or a horse beautiful?

——“It is that,” he answered.

What, then, makes a dog beautiful? The presence of the virtue of a dog. And a horse? The presence of the virtue of a horse. And what, then, a man? Is it not also the presence of the virtue of a man? And, O youth, if thou wouldst be beautiful, do thou labor to perfect this, the virtue of a human being. But what is it? Look whom you praise when you praise any without affection—is it the righteous or the unrighteous?

——“The righteous.”

Is it the temperate or the profligate?

——“The temperate.”

Is it the continent or the incontinent?

——“The continent.”

Then making yourself such a one as you praise, you will know that you are making yourself beautiful; but so long as you neglect these things, though you sought out every device to appear beautiful, you must of necessity be ugly.

2. For thou art not flesh and hair, but a Will: if thou keep this beautiful, then wilt thou be beautiful. But so far I dare not tell thee that thou art ugly, for I think thou wilt more easily bear to hear anything else than this. But see what Socrates saith to Alcibiades, the most beautiful and blooming of men: Endeavor, then, to be beautiful; and what saith he? Curl thy locks, and pluck out the hairs of thy legs? God forbid. But Set thy Will in order, cast out evil doctrines.

——“And how then shall we deal with the body?”

As nature made it. Another hath cared for this; commit it to Him.

——“But what? Shall the body then be uncleansed?”

God forbid. But that which thou art and wast made by Nature, cleanse this; let a man be clean as a man, a woman as a woman, a child as a child.

3. For we ought not even by the aspect of the body to scare away the multitude from philosophy; but by his body, as in all other things, a philosopher should show himself cheerful, and free from troubles. Behold, friends, how I have nothing and need nothing; behold how I am homeless and landless, and an exile, if so it chance, and hearthless, and yet I live more free from troubles than all the lordly and the rich. But look on my body, too; ye see that it is not the worse for my hard life. But if one saith this to me, having the countenance and garb of a condemned criminal, what God shall persuade me to approach to philosophy which makes such men as this? God forbid! I would not, were it even to become a sage.

4. I, indeed, by the Gods, had rather a young man in his first movement towards philosophy came to me with his hair curled than disheveled and foul. For a certain impression of the beautiful is to be seen in him, and an aim at what is becoming; and to the thing wherein it seemeth to him to lie, there he applies his art. Thenceforth it only needs to show him its true place, and to say, Young man, thou seekest the beautiful, and thou dost well. Know, then, that it flourishes there where thy Reason is; there seek it where are thy likes and dislikes, thy pursuits and avoidances, for this is what thou hast in thyself of choice and precious, but the body is by nature mud. Why dost thou spend thy labor upon it in vain? for that the body is naught, Time shall certainly teach thee, though it teach thee nothing else. But if one come to me foul and filthy, and a mustache down to the knees, what have I to say to him? with what image or likeness can I draw him on? For with what that is like unto Beauty hath he ever busied himself, so as I may set him on another course, and say, Not here is Beauty, but there? Will you have me tell him, Beauty consists not in being befouled, but in the Reason? For doth he even seek Beauty? hath he any impression of it in his mind? Go, and reason with a hog, that he shall not roll himself in the mud.

5. Behold a youth worthy of love—behold an old man worthy to love, and to be loved in return; to whom one may commit his sons, his daughters, to be taught; to whom young men may come, if it please you—that he may deliver lectures to them on a dunghill! God forbid. Every extravagance arises from something in human nature, but this is near to being one that is not human.