CHAPTER IV.
THE "MANUAL" AND "FRAGMENTS" OF EPICTETUS.
It is nearly certain that Epictetus never committed any of his doctrines to writing. Like his great exemplar. Socrates, he contented himself with oral instruction, and the bulk of what has come down to us in his name consists in the Discourses reproduced for us by his pupil Arrian. It was the ambition of Arrian "to be to Epictetus what Xenophon had been to Socrates," that is, to hand down to posterity a noble and faithful picture of the manner in which his master had lived and taught. With this view, he wrote four books on Epictetus,--a life, which is now unhappily lost; a book of conversation or "table talk," which is also lost; and two books which have come down to us, viz. the Discourses and the Manual. It is from these two invaluable books, and from a good many isolated fragments, that we are enabled to judge what was the practical morality of Stoicism, as expounded by the holy and upright slave.
The Manual is a kind of abstract of Epictetus's ethical principles, which, with many additional illustrations and with more expansion, are also explained in the Discourses. Both books were so popular that by their means Arrian first came into conspicuous notice, and ultimately attained the highest eminence and rank. The Manual was to antiquity what the Imitatio of Thomas à Kempis was to later times, and what Woodhead's Whole Duty of Man or Wilberforce's Practical View of Christianity have been to large sections of modern Englishmen. It was a clear, succinct, and practical statement of common daily duties, and the principles upon which they rest. Expressed in a manner entirely simple and unornate, its popularity was wholly due to the moral elevation of the thoughts which it expressed. Epictetus did not aim at style; his one aim was to excite his hearers to virtue, and Arrian tells us that in this endeavour he created a deep impression by his manner and voice. It is interesting to know that the Manual was widely accepted among Christians no less than among Pagans, and that, so late as the fifth century, paraphrases were written of it for Christian use. No systematic treatise of morals so simply beautiful was ever composed, and to this day the best Christian may study it, not with interest only, but with real advantage. It is like the voice of the Sybil, which, uttering things simple, and unperfumed, and unadorned, by God's grace reacheth through innumerable years. We proceed to give a short sketch of its contents.
Epictetus began by laying down the broad comprehensive statement that there are some things which are in our power, and depend upon ourselves; other things which are beyond our power, and wholly independent of us. The things which are in our power are our opinions, our aims, our desires, our aversions--in a word, our actions. The things beyond our power are bodily accidents, possessions, fame, rank, and whatever lies beyond the sphere of our actions. To the former of these classes of things our whole attention must be confined. In that region we may be noble, unperturbed, and free; in the other we shall be dependent, frustrated, querulous, miserable. Both classes cannot be successfully attended to; they are antagonistic, antipathetic; we cannot serve God and Mammon.
Now, if we take a right view of all these things which in no way depend on ourselves we shall regard them as mere semblances--as shadows which are to be distinguished from the true substance. We shall not look upon them as fit subjects for aversion or desire. Sin and cruelty, and falsehood we may hate, because we can avoid them if we will; but we must look upon sickness, and poverty, and death as things which are not fit subjects for our avoidance, because they lie wholly beyond our control.
This, then,--endurance of the inevitable, avoidance of the evil--is the keynote of the Epictetean philosophy. It has been summed up in the three words, [Greek: Anechou kai apechou], "sustine et abstine," "Bear and forbear,"--bear whatever God assigns to you, abstain from that which He forbids.
The earlier part of the Manual is devoted to practical advice which may enable men to endure nobly. For instance, "If there be anything," says Epictetus, "which you highly value or tenderly love, estimate at the same time its true nature. Is it some possession? remember that it may be destroyed. Is it wife or child? remember that they may die." "Death," says an epitaph in Chester Cathedral--
"Death, the great monitor, comes oft to prove,
'Tis dust we dote on, when 'tis man we love."