Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow CHAPTER XIII.: HOW EVERYTHING MAY BE PERFORMED TO THE DIVINE ACCEPTANCE. - The Works of Epictetus. Consisting of His Discourses, in Four Books, The Enchiridion, and Fragments

Return to Title Page for The Works of Epictetus. Consisting of His Discourses, in Four Books, The Enchiridion, and Fragments

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Philosophy

CHAPTER XIII.: HOW EVERYTHING MAY BE PERFORMED TO THE DIVINE ACCEPTANCE. - Epictetus, The Works of Epictetus. Consisting of His Discourses, in Four Books, The Enchiridion, and Fragments [100 AD]

Edition used:

The Works of Epictetus. Consisting of His Discourses, in Four Books, The Enchiridion, and Fragments. A Translation from the Greek based on that of Elizabeth Carter, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1865).

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


CHAPTER XIII.

HOW EVERYTHING MAY BE PERFORMED TO THE DIVINE ACCEPTANCE.

WHEN a person inquired, how any one might eat to the divine acceptance; if he eats with justice, said Epictetus, and with gratitude, and fairly, and temperately, and decently, must he not also eat to the divine acceptance? And if you call for hot water, and your servant does not hear you; or, if he does, brings it only warm; or perhaps is not to be found at home; then to abstain from anger or petulance, is not this to the divine acceptance?

“But how, then, can one bear such things?”

O slavish man! will you not bear with your own brother, who has God for his Father, as being a son from the same stock, and of the same high descent? But, if you chance to be placed in some superior station, will you presently set yourself up for a tyrant? Will you not remember what you are, and over whom you bear rule? That they are by nature your relations, your brothers; that they are the offspring of God?

“But I have them by right of purchase, and not they me.”

Do you see what it is you regard? Your regards look downward towards the earth, and what is lower than earth, and towards the unjust laws of men long dead; but up towards the divine laws you never turn your eyes.