BOOK II. XIV. 1-8
CHAPTER XIV
To Naso
Once when a certain Roman citizen[1] accompanied by his son had come in and was listening to one of his readings, Epictetus said: This is the style of my teaching, and then lapsed into silence. But when the other requested to know what came next, he replied: Instruction in the technique of any art is boring to the layman who has had no experience in it. Now the products of the arts show immediately their use towards the purpose for which they are made, and most of them possess also a certain attractiveness and charm. For example, to stand by and watch the process by which a shoemaker learns his trade is, indeed, not pleasant, yet the shoe is useful and not an unpleasant thing to look at either. 5And the process of education in the case of a carpenter is especially tiresome to the layman who happens to be watching, but the work which the carpenter does shows the use of his art. You will find the same much more true in the case of music; for if you are standing by when someone is taking a lesson, the process of instruction will strike you as the most unpleasant of all, yet the results of music are sweet and pleasing to the ear of the layman.
So also in our own case, we picture the work of the philosopher to be something like this: He should bring his own will into harmony with what happens, so that neither anything that happens happens against our will, nor anything that fails to happen fails to happen when we wish it to happen. The result of this for those who have so ordered the work
- ↑ Apparently named Naso, to judge from the title to this chapter. A Julius Naso, the son of a man of letters, is mentioned not infrequently in the correspondence of the younger Pliny. See Prosop. Imp. Romani, II. p. 202, no. 293.
