Seekers after God Part 10

Generally speaking, the view which Epictetus took of life is always simple, and always consistent; it is a view which gave him consolation among life's troubles, and strength to display some of its n.o.blest virtues, and it may be summed up in the following pa.s.sages of his famous _Manual_:--

"Remember," he says, "that you are an actor of just such a part as is a.s.signed you by the Poet of the play; of a short part, if the part be short; of a long part, if it be long. Should He wish you to act the part of a beggar, take care to act it naturally and n.o.bly; and the same if it be the part of a lame man, or a ruler, or a private man; for _this_ is in your power, to act well the part a.s.signed to you; but to _choose_ that part is the function of another."

"Let not these considerations afflict you: 'I shall live despised, and the merest n.o.body;' for if dishonour be an evil, you cannot be involved in evil any more than you can be involved in baseness through any one else's means. Is it then at all _your_ business to be a leading man, or to be entertained at a banquet? By no means. How then can it be a dishonor not to be so? And how will you be a mere n.o.body, since it is your duty to be somebody only in those circ.u.mstances which are in your own power, in which you may be a person of the greatest importance?"

"Honour, precedence, confidence," he argues in another pa.s.sage, "whether they be good things or evil things, are at any rate things for which their own definite price must be paid. Lettuces are sold for a penny, and if you want your lettuce you must pay your penny; and similarly, if you want to be asked out to a person's house, you must pay the price which he demands for asking people, whether the coin he requires be praise or attention; but if you do not give these, do not expect the other. Have you then gained nothing in lieu of your supper? Indeed you have; you have escaped praising a person whom you did not want to praise, and you have escaped the necessity of tolerating the upstart impertinence of his menials."

Some parts of this last thought have been so beautifully expressed by the American poet Lowell that I will conclude this chapter in his words:

"Earth hath her price for what earth gives us; The beggar is tax'd for a corner to die in; The priest hath his fee who comes and shrieves us; We bargain for the graves we lie in: At the devil's mart are all things sold, Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold, For a cap and bells our lives we pay.

Bubbles we earn with our whole soul's tasking, '_Tis only G.o.d that is given away, 'Tis only heaven may be had for the asking_."

CHAPTER II.

LIFE AND VIEWS OF EPICTETUS _(continued)_.

Whether any of these great thoughts would have suggested themselves _spontaneously_ to Epictetus--whether there was an inborn wisdom and n.o.bleness in the mind of this slave which would have enabled him to elaborate such views from his own consciousness, we cannot tell; they do not, however, express _his_ sentiments only, but belong in fact to the moral teaching of the great Stoic school, in the doctrines of which he had received instruction.

It may sound strange to the reader that one situated as Epictetus was should yet have had a regular tutor to train him in Stoic doctrines.

That such should have been the case appears at first sight inconsistent with the cruelty with which he was treated, but it is a fact which is capable of easy explanation. In times of universal luxury and display--in times when a sort of surface-refinement is found among all the wealthy--some sort of respect is always paid to intellectual eminence, and intellectual amus.e.m.e.nts are cultivated as well as those of a coa.r.s.er character. Hence a rich Roman liked to have people of literary culture among his slaves; he liked to have people at hand who would get him any information which he might desire about books, who could act as his amanuenses, who could even correct and supply information for his original compositions. Such learned slaves formed part of every large establishment, and among them were usually to be found some who bore, if they did not particularly merit, the t.i.tle of "philosophers." These men--many of whom are described as having been mere impostors, ostentatious pedants, or ignorant hypocrites--acted somewhat like domestic chaplains in the houses of their patrons. They gratified an amateur taste for wisdom, and helped to while away in comparative innocence the hours which their masters might otherwise have spent in la.s.situde or sleep. It was no more to the credit of Epaphroditus that he wished to have a philosophic slave, than it is to the credit of an illiterate millionaire in modern times that he likes to have works of high art in his drawing-room, and books of reference in his well-furnished library.

Accordingly, since Epictetus must have been singularly useless for all physical purposes, and since his thoughtfulness and intelligence could not fail to command attention, his master determined to make him useful in the only way possible, and sent him to Caius Musonius Rufus to be trained in the doctrines of the Stoic philosophy.

Musonius was the son of a Roman knight. His learning and eloquence, no less than his keen appreciation of Stoic truths, had so deeply kindled the suspicions of Nero, that he banished him to the rocky little island of Gyaros, on the charge of his having been concerned in Piso's conspiracy. He returned to Rome after the suicide of Nero, and lived in great distinction and respect, so that he was allowed to remain in the city when the Emperor Vespasian banished all the other philosophers of any eminence.

The works of Musonius have not come down to us, but a few notices of him, which are scattered in the _Discourses_ of his greater pupil, show us what kind of man he was. The following anecdotes will show that he was a philosopher of the strictest school.

Speaking of the value of logic as a means of training the reason, Epictetus antic.i.p.ates the objection that, after all, a mere error in reasoning is no very serious fault. He points out that it _is_ a fault, and that is sufficient. "I too," he says, "once made this very remark to Rufus when he rebuked me for not discovering the suppressed premiss in some syllogism. 'What!' said I, 'have I then set the Capitol on fire, that you rebuke me thus?' 'Slave!' he answered, 'what has the Capitol to do with it? Is there no _other_ fault then short of setting the Capitol on fire? Yes! to use one's own mere fancies rashly, at random, anyhow; not to follow an argument, or a demonstration, or a sophism; not, in short, to see what makes for oneself or not, in questioning and answering--is none of these things a fault?'"

Sometimes he used to test the Stoical endurance of his pupil by pointing out the indignities and tortures which his master might at any moment inflict upon him; and when Epictetus answered that, after all, such treatment was what man _had_ borne, and therefore _could_ bear, he would reply approvingly that every man's destiny was in his own hands; that he need lack nothing from any one else; that, since he could derive from himself magnanimity and n.o.bility of soul, he might despise the notion of receiving lands or money or office. "But," he continued, "when any one is cowardly or mean, one ought obviously in writing letters about such a person to speak of him as a corpse, and to say, 'Favour us with the corpse and blood of So-and-so,' For? in fact, such a man _is_ a mere corpse, and nothing more; for if he were anything more, he would have perceived that no man ever suffers any real misfortunes by another's means." I do not know whether Mr. Ruskin is a student of Epictetus, but he, among others, has forcibly expressed the same truth. "My friends, do you remember that old Scythian custom, when the head of a house died?

How he was dressed in his finest dress, and set in his chariot, and carried about to his friends' houses; and each of them placed him at his table's head, and all feasted in his presence? Suppose it were offered to you, in plain words, as it _is_ offered to you in dire facts, that you should gain this Scythian honour gradually, while you yet thought yourself alive.... Would you take the offer verbally made by the death-angel? Would the meanest among us take it, think you? Yet practically and verily we grasp at it, every one of us, in a measure; many of us grasp at it in the fulness of horror."

The way in which Musonius treated would-be pupils much resembled the plan adopted by Socrates. "It is not easy," says Epictetus, "to train effeminate youths, any more than it is easy to take up whey with a hook.

But those of fine nature, even if you discourage them, desire instruction all the more. For which reason Rufus often discouraged pupils, using this as a criterion of fine and of common natures; for he used to say, that just as a stone, even if you fling it into the air, will fall down to the earth by its own gravitating force, so also a n.o.ble nature, in proportion as it is repulsed, in that proportion tends more in its own natural direction." As Emerson says,--

"Yet on the nimble air benign Speed nimbler messages, That waft the breath of grace divine To hearts in sloth and ease.

So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is G.o.d to man, When Duty whispers low, 'THOU MUST,'

The youth replies, 'I CAN.'"

One more trait of the character of Musonius will show how deeply Epictetus respected him, and how much good he derived from him. In his _Discourse on Ostentation_, Epictetus says that Rufus was in the habit of remarking to his pupils, "If you have leisure to praise me, I can have done you no good." "He used indeed so to address us that each one of us, sitting there, thought that some one had been privately telling tales against _him_ in particular, so completely did Rufus seize hold of his characteristics, so vividly did he portray our individual faults."

Such was the man under whose teaching Epictetus grew to maturity, and it was evidently a teaching which was wise and n.o.ble, even if it were somewhat chilling and austere. It formed an epoch in the slave's life; it remoulded his entire character; it was to him the source of blessings so inestimable in their value that it is doubtful whether they were counter-balanced by all the miseries of poverty, slavery, and contempt.

He would probably have admitted that it was _better_ for him to have been sold into cruel slavery, than it would have been to grow up in freedom, obscurity, and ignorance in his native Hierapolis. So that Epictetus might have found, and did find, in his own person, an additional argument in favour of Divine Providence: an additional proof that G.o.d is kind and merciful to all men; an additional intensity of conviction that, if our lots on earth are not equal, they are at least dominated by a principle of justice and of wisdom, and each man, on the whole, may gain that which is best for him, and that which most honestly and most heartily he desires. Epictetus reminds us again and again that we may have many, if not all, such advantages as the world has to offer, _if we are willing to pay the price by which they are obtained_. But if that price be a mean or a wicked one, and if we should scorn ourselves were we ever tempted to pay it, then we must not even cast one longing look of regret towards things which can only be got by that which we deliberately refuse to give. Every good and just man may gain, if not happiness, then something higher than happiness. Let no one regard this as a mere phrase, for it is capable of a most distinct and definite meaning. There are certain things which all men desire, and which all men would _gladly_, if they could _lawfully_ and _innocently_ obtain. These things are health, wealth, ease, comfort, influence, honour, freedom from opposition and from pain; and yet, if you were to place all these blessings on the one side, and on the other side to place poverty, and disease, and anguish, and trouble, and contempt,--yet, if on _this_ side also you were to place truth and justice, and a sense that, however densely the clouds may gather about our life, the light of G.o.d will be visible beyond them, all the n.o.blest men who ever lived would choose, as without hesitation they always have chosen, the _latter_ destiny. It is not that they like failure, but they prefer failure to falsity; it is not that they love persecution, but they prefer persecution to meanness; it is not that they relish opposition, but they welcome opposition rather than guilty acquiescence; it is not that they do not shrink from agony, but they would not escape agony by crime. The selfishness of Dives in his purple is to them less enviable than the innocence of Lazarus in rags; they would be chained with John in prison rather than loll with Herod at the feast; they would fight with beasts with Paul in the arena rather than be steeped in the foul luxury of Nero on the throne. It is not happiness, but it is something higher than happiness; it is stillness, it is a.s.surance, it is satisfaction, it is peace; the world can neither understand it, nor give it, nor take it away,--it is something indescribable--it is the gift of G.o.d.

"The fallacy" of being surprised at wickedness in prosperity, and righteousness in misery, "can only lie," says Mr. Froude, in words which would have delighted Epictetus, and which would express the inmost spirit of his philosophy, "in the supposed _right_ to happiness....

Happiness is not what we are to look for. Our place is to be true to the best we know, to seek that, and do that; and if by 'virtue is its own reward' be meant that the good man cares only to continue good, desiring nothing more, then it is a true and a n.o.ble saying.... Let us do right, and then whether happiness come, or unhappiness, it is no very mighty matter. If it come, life will be sweet; if it do not come, life will be bitter--bitter, not sweet, and yet to be borne.... The well-being of our souls depends only on what we _are_; and n.o.bleness of character is nothing else but _steady love of good, and steady scorn of evil_....

Only to those who have the heart to say, 'We can do without selfish enjoyment: it is not what we ask or desire,' is there no secret. Man will have what he desires, and will find what is really best for him, exactly as he honestly seeks for it. _Happiness may fly away, pleasure pall or cease to be obtainable, wealth decay, friends fail or prove unkind; but the power to serve G.o.d never fails, and the love of Him is never rejected_."

CHAPTER III.

LIFE AND VIEWS OF EPICTETUS (_continued._)

Of the life of Epictetus, as distinct from his opinions, there is unfortunately little more to be told. The life of

"That halting slave, who in Nicopolis Taught Arrian, when Vespasian's brutal son Cleared Rome of what most shamed him,"

is not an eventful life, and the conditions which surrounded it are very circ.u.mscribed. Great men, it has been observed, have often the shortest biographies; their real life is in their books.

At some period of his life, but how or when we do not know, Epictetus was manumitted by his master, and was henceforward regarded by the world as free. Probably the change made little or no difference in his life.

If it saved him from a certain amount of brutality, if it gave him more uninterrupted leisure, it probably did not in the slightest degree modify the hards.h.i.+ps of his existence, and may have caused him some little anxiety as to the means of procuring the necessaries of life. He, of all men, would have attached the least importance to the external conditions under which he lived; he always regarded them as falling under the category of things which lay beyond the sphere of his own influence, and therefore as things with which he had nothing to do. Even in his most oppressed days, he considered himself, by the grace of heaven, to be more free--free in a far truer and higher sense--than thousands of those who owed allegiance to no master's will. Whether he had saved any small sum of money, or whether his needs were supplied by the many who loved and honoured him, we do not know. He was a man who was content with the barest necessaries of life, and we may be sure that he would have refused to be indebted to any one for more than these.

It is probable that he never married. This may have been due to that shade of indifference to the female character of which we detect traces here and there in his writings. In one pa.s.sage he complains that women seemed to think of nothing but admiration and getting married; and, in another, he observes, almost with a sneer, that the Roman ladies were fond of Plato's _Republic_ because he allowed some very liberal marriage regulations. We can only infer from these pa.s.sages that he had been very unfortunate in the specimens of women with whom he had been thrown. The Roman ladies of his time were certainly not models of character; he was not likely to fall in with very exalted females among the slaves of Epaphroditus or the ladies of his family, and he had probably never known the love of a sister or a mother's care. He did not, however, go the length of condemning marriage altogether; on the contrary, he blames the philosophers who did so. But it is equally obvious that he approves of celibacy as a "counsel of perfection," and indeed his views on the subject have so close and remarkable a resemblance to those of St. Paul that our readers will be interested in seeing them side by side.

In 1 Cor. vii. St. Paul, after speaking of the n.o.bleness of virginity, proceeds, nevertheless, to sanction matrimony as in itself a hallowed and honourable estate. It was not given to all, he says, to abide even as he was, and therefore marriage should be adopted as a sacred and indissoluble bond. Still, without being sure that he has any divine sanction for what he is about to say, he considers celibacy good "for the present distress," and warns those that marry that they "shall have trouble in the flesh." For marriage involves a direct multiplication of the cares of the flesh: "He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord: but he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.... And this I speak for your own profit, not that I may cast a snare upon you, _but for that which is comely, and that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction_."

It is clear, then, that St. Paul regarded virginity as a "counsel of perfection," and Epictetus uses respecting it almost identically the same language. Marriage was perfectly permissible in his view, but it was much better for a Cynic (i.e. for all who carried out most fully their philosophical obligations) to remain single: "Since the condition of things is such as it now is, as though we were on the eve of battle, _ought not the Cynio to be entirely without distraction_" [the Greek word being the very same as that used by St. Paul] "_for the service of G.o.d_? ought he not to be able to move about among mankind free from the entanglement of private relations.h.i.+ps or domestic duties, which if he neglect he will no longer preserve the character of a wise and good man, and which if he observe he will lose the function of a messenger, and sentinel, and herald of the G.o.ds?" Epictetus proceeds to point out that if he is married he can no longer look after the spiritual interests of all with whom he is thrown in contact, and no longer maintain the rigid independence of all luxuries which marked the genuine philosopher. He _must_, for instance, have a bath for his child, provisions for his wife's ailments, and clothes for his little ones, and money to buy them satchels and pens, and cribs and cups; and hence a general increase of furniture, and all sorts of undignified distractions, which Epictetus enumerates with an almost amusing manifestation of disgust. It is true (he admits) that Crates, a celebrated cynic, was married, but it was to a lady as self-denying as himself, and to one who had given up wealth and friends to share hards.h.i.+p and poverty with him. And, if Epictetus does not venture to say in so many words that Crates in this matter made a mistake, he takes pains to point out that the circ.u.mstances were far too exceptional to be accepted as a precedent for the imitation of others.

"But," inquires the interlocutor, "how then is the world to get on?" The question seems quite to disturb the bachelor equanimity of Epictetus; it makes him use language of the strongest and most energetic contempt: and it is only when he trenches on this subject that he ever seems to lose the n.o.bility and grace, the "sweetness and light," which are the general characteristic of his utterances. In spite of his complete self-mastery he was evidently a man of strong feelings, and with a natural tendency to express them strongly. "Heaven bless us," he exclaims in reply, "are _they_ greater benefactors of mankind who bring into the world two or three evilly-squalling brats,[63] or those who, to the best of their power, keep a beneficent eye on the lives, and habits, and tendencies of all mankind? Were the Thebans who had large families more useful to their country than the childless Epaminondas; or was Homer less useful to mankind than Priam with his fifty good-for-nothing sons?... Why, sir, the true cynic is a father to all men; all men are his sons and all women his daughters; he has a bond of union, a lien of affection with them all." (_Dissert_. iii. 22.)

[Footnote 63: [Greek: kakorrugcha paidia]. Another reading is [Greek: kokorugcha], which M. Martha renders, "_Marmots a vilain pet.i.t museau_!"

It is evident that Epictetus did not like children, which makes his subsequently mentioned compa.s.sion to the poor neglected child still more creditable to him.]

The whole character of Epictetus is sufficient to prove that he would only do what he considered _most_ desirable and most exalted; and pa.s.sages like these, the extreme asperity of which I have necessarily, softened down, are, I think, decisive in favour of the tradition which p.r.o.nounces him to have been unmarried.

We are told that he lived in a cottage of the simplest and even meanest description: it neither needed nor possessed a fastening of any kind, for within it there was no furniture except a lamp and the poor straw pallet on which he slept. About his lamp there was current in antiquity a famous story, to which he himself alludes. As a piece of unwonted luxury he had purchased a little iron lamp, which burned in front of the images of his household deities. It was the only possession which he had, and a thief stole it. "He will be finely disappointed when he comes again," quietly observed Epictetus. "for he will only find an earthenware lamp next time." At his death the little earthenware lamp was bought by some genuine hero-wors.h.i.+pper for 3,000 drachmas. "The purchaser hoped," says the satirical Lucian, "that if he read philosophy at night by that lamp, he would at once acquire in dreams the wisdom of the admirable old man who once possessed it."

But, in spite of his deep poverty, it must not be supposed that there was anything eccentric or ostentatious in the life of Epictetus. On the contrary, his writings abound in directions as to the proper bearing of a philosopher in life. He warns his students that they may have ridicule to endure. Not only did the little boys in the streets, the _gamins_ of Rome, appear to consider a philosopher "fair game," and think it fine fun to mimic his gestures and pull his beard, but he had to undergo the sneers of much more dignified people. "If," says Epictetus, "you want to know how the Romans regard philosophers, listen. Maelius, who had the highest philosophic reputation among them, once when I was present, happened to get into a great rage with his people, and as though he had received an intolerable injury, exclaimed, 'I _cannot_ endure it; you are killing me; why, you'll make me _like him_! pointing to me,"

evidently as if Epictetus were the merest insect in existence. And, again he says in the _Manual_. "If you wish to be a philosopher, prepare yourself to be thoroughly laughed at since many will certainly sneer and jeer at you, and will say, 'He has come back to us as a philosopher all of a sudden,' and 'Where in the world did he get this superciliousness?'

Now do not you be supercilious, but cling to the things which appear best to you in such a manner as though you were conscious of having been appointed by G.o.d to this position." Again in the little discourse _On the Desire of Admiration_, he warns the philosopher "_not to walk as if he had swallowed a poker_" or to care for the applause of those mult.i.tudes whom he holds to be immersed in error. For all display, and pretence, and hypocrisy, and Pharisaism, and boasting, and mere fruitless book-learning he seems to have felt a genuine and profound contempt. Recommendations to simplicity of conduct, courtesy of manner, and moderation of language were among his practical precepts. It is refres.h.i.+ng, too, to know that with the strongest and manliest good sense, he entirely repudiated that dog-like brutality of behaviour, and repulsive eccentricity of self-neglect, which characterised not a few of the Cynic leaders. He expressly argues that the Cynic should be a man of ready tact, and attractive presence; and there is something of almost indignant energy in his words when he urges upon a pupil the plain duty of scrupulous cleanliness. In this respect our friends the Hermits would not quite have satisfied him, although he might possibly have pardoned them on the plea that they abode in desert solitudes, since he bids those who neglect the due care of their bodies to live "either in the wilderness or alone."

Late in life Epictetus increased his establishment by taking in an old woman as a servant. The cause of his doing so shows an almost Christian tenderness of character. According to the hideous custom of infanticide which prevailed in the pagan world, a man with whom Epictetus was acquainted exposed his infant son to perish. Epictetus in pity took the child home to save its life, and the services of a female were necessary to supply its wants. Such kindness and self-denial were all the more admirable because pity, like all other deep emotions, was regarded by the Stoics in the light rather of a vice than of a virtue. In this respect, however, both Seneca and Epictetus, and to a still greater extent Marcus Aurelius, were gloriously false to the rigidity of the school to which they professed to belong. We see with delight that one of the _Discourses_ of Epictetus was _On the Tenderness and Forbearance due to Sinners_; and he abounds in exhortations to forbearance in judging others. In one of his _Fragments_ he tells the following anecdote:--A person who had seen a poor s.h.i.+p-wrecked and almost dying pirate took pity on him, carried him home, gave him clothes, and furnished him with all the necessaries of life. Somebody reproached him for doing good to the wicked--"I have honoured," he replied, "not the man, but humanity in his person."

But one fact more is known in the life of Epictetus, Domitian, the younger son of Vespasian, succeeded his far n.o.bler brother the Emperor t.i.tus; and in the course of his reign a decree was pa.s.sed which banished all the philosophers from Italy. Epictetus was not exempted from this unjust and absurd decree. That he bore it with equanimity may be inferred from the approval with which he tells an anecdote about Agrippinus, who while his cause was being tried in the Senate went on with all his usual avocations, and on being informed on his return from bathing that he had been condemned, quietly asked, "To death or banishment?" "To banishment," said the messenger. "Is my property confiscated?" "No," "Very well, then let us go as far as Aricia" (about sixteen miles from Rome), "and dine there."

There was a certain cla.s.s of philosophers whose external mark and whose sole claim to distinction rested in the length of their beards; and when the decree of Domitian was pa.s.sed these gentleman contented themselves with shaving. Epictetus alludes to this in his second _Discourse_, "Come, Epictetus, shave off your beard," he imagines some one to say to him. "If I am a philosopher I will not," he replies. "Then I will take off your head." "By all means, if that will do you any good."

He went to Nicopolis, a town of Epirus, which had been built by Augustus in commemoration of his victory at Actium. Whether he ever revisited Rome is uncertain, but it is probable that he did so, for we know that he enjoyed the friends.h.i.+p of several eminent philosophers and statesmen, and was esteemed and honoured by the Emperor Hadrian himself. He is said to have lived to a good old age, surrounded by affectionate and eager disciples, and to have died with the same n.o.ble simplicity which had marked his life. The date of his death is as little known as that of his birth. It only remains to give a sketch of those thoughts which, poor though he was, and despised, and a slave, yet made him "dear to the immortals."

CHAPTER IV.

THE "MANUAL" AND "FRAGMENTS" OF EPICTETUS.