Page:Discourses of Epictetus volume 2 Oldfather 1928.djvu/337

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BOOK IV. IV. 33-39

are entirely under the control of others. Nay, the word of Cleanthes is ready at hand,

Lead thou me on, O Zeus, and Destiny.^[1]

Will ye have me go to Rome? I go to Rome. To Gyara? I go to Gyara.^[2] To Athens? I go to Athens. To prison? I go to prison. ³⁵If but once you say, "Oh, when may a man go to Athens?" you are lost. This wish, if unfulfilled, must necessarily make you unfortunate; if fulfilled, vain and puffed up over the wrong kind of thing; again, if you are hindered, you suffer a misfortune, falling into what you do not wish. Give up, then, all these things. "Athens is beautiful." But happiness is much more beautiful, tranquillity, freedom from turmoil, having your own affairs under no man's control. "There is turmoil in Rome, and salutations." But serenity is worth all the annoyances. If, then, the time for these things has come, why not get rid of your aversion for them: Why must you needs bear burdens like a belaboured donkey? Otherwise, I would have you see that you must be ever the slave of the man who is able to secure your release, to the man who is able to hinder you in everything,^[3] and you must serve him as an Evil Genius.^[4]

There is but one way to serenity (keep this

↑ From a celebrated hymn. See on II. 23, 42.
↑ An island used as a place of exile. See on I. 25, 19.
↑ There may be here an allusion (before Lucian and Apuleius) to the theme of a (bewitched) ass trying to escape from being an ass, and constantly being hindered. In the famous romance the ass is certainly often enough overloaded and soundly cudgelled.
↑ For this rare spirit of folk-lore, see Aristophanes, Equites, 111-12, where he is called the Δαίμων Κακοδαίμων. His counterpart is the much commoner Ἀγαθὸς Δαίμων. The Evil Genius, though seldom referred to (and in fact ignored by many, if not all the standard works of reference, I believe), is presupposed by the association of the Κακοδαιμονισταί (Lysias, frag. 53, 2, Thalheim), and by the very word κακοδαίμων itself. For similar devil-worship, cf. I. 19, 6, of the God Fever.

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[1] From a celebrated hymn. See on II. 23, 42.

[2] An island used as a place of exile. See on I. 25, 19.

[3] There may be here an allusion (before Lucian and Apuleius) to the theme of a (bewitched) ass trying to escape from being an ass, and constantly being hindered. In the famous romance the ass is certainly often enough overloaded and soundly cudgelled.

[4] For this rare spirit of folk-lore, see Aristophanes, Equites, 111-12, where he is called the Δαίμων Κακοδαίμων. His counterpart is the much commoner Ἀγαθὸς Δαίμων. The Evil Genius, though seldom referred to (and in fact ignored by many, if not all the standard works of reference, I believe), is presupposed by the association of the Κακοδαιμονισταί (Lysias, frag. 53, 2, Thalheim), and by the very word κακοδαίμων itself. For similar devil-worship, cf. I. 19, 6, of the God Fever.

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