Enchiridion 4, and part of Keith Seddon's commentary on it

Enchiridion 4, and part of Keith Seddon's commentary on it

"4. When you are on the point of putting your hand to some undertaking, remind yourself what the nature of that undertaking is. If you are going out of the house to bathe, put before your mind what happens at a public bath—those who splash you with water, those who jostle against you, those who vilify you and rob you. And thus you will set about your undertaking more securely if at the outset you say to yourself, "I want to take a bath, and, at the same time, to keep my moral purpose in harmony with nature." And so do in every undertaking. For thus, if anything happens to hinder you in your bathing, you will be ready to say, "Oh, well, this was not the only thing that I wanted, but I wanted also to keep my moral purpose in harmony with nature; and I shall not so keep it if I am vexed at what is going on" (Epictetus, Enchiridion 4; Oldfather).


"The worst thing that can happen is that we fall prey to the passions
and become angry, frustrated and irritated; that is the only harm we
need ever fear. So when we face irritation, disappointments and failures,
such as what happened at the baths, we should be able quite
spontaneously to affirm that what we prefer is for our undertakings to
succeed, but what we want is for affairs to transpire as Zeus wills, even if
this frustrates our preferences, and for our moral characters to maintain
a disposition unaffected by passion (apatheia), distress (alupia), fear
(aphobia), and troubles (ataraxia), and therefore free (eleutheros;
Discourses 4.3.8). All we have to do to achieve this state of mind is to use
our impressions properly, and upon hearing an insult, or seeing that our
clothes have gone, to immediately and automatically refuse to assent to
the judgement that anything bad is at hand, for it is not" (Seddon, pg. 51)

Keith Seddon (2005). Epictetus' Handbook and the Tablet of Cebes

Enchiridion 5, and part of Keith Seddon's commentary on it