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029 - XXVIII That We Ought Not to Be Angry with Men and What are the Small and the Great Things Among Men · Discourses of Epictetus

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  Speaker 1: Section twenty eight of Discourses of Epictetus by Epictetus, translated
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  Speaker 1: by George Long. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: Read by Christine Rutger, October sixteenth, twenty twenty one. That
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  Speaker 1: we ought not to be angry with men? And what
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  Speaker 1: are the small and the great things among men? What
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  Speaker 1: is the cause of assenting to anything? The fact that
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  Speaker 1: it appears to be true? It is not possible, then,
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  Speaker 1: to assent to that which appears not to be true.
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  Speaker 1: Why because this is the nature of the understanding, to
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  Speaker 1: incline to the true, to be dissatisfied with the false.
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  Speaker 1: And it matters uncertain to withhold assent. What is the
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  Speaker 1: proof of this? Imagine persuade yourself if you can that
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  Speaker 1: it is now night, It is not possible, take away
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  Speaker 1: your persuasion that it is day. It is not possible
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  Speaker 1: persuade yourself or take away your persuasion that the stars
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  Speaker 1: are even in number. It is impossible. When then a
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  Speaker 1: man assents to that which is false, be assured that
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  Speaker 1: he did not intend to assent to it as false.
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  Speaker 1: For every soul is unwillingly deprived of the truth, as
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  Speaker 1: Plato says. But the falsity seemed to him to be true. Well,
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  Speaker 1: in acts, what have we of the like kind as
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  Speaker 1: we have here? Truth or falsehood? We have the fit
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  Speaker 1: and the not fit, duty and not duty, the profitable
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  Speaker 1: and the unprofitable, that which is suitable to a person,
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  Speaker 1: and that which is not, And whatever is like these
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  Speaker 1: can then a man think that a thing is useful
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  Speaker 1: to him, and not choose it? He cannot, how says Medea,
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  Speaker 1: tis true, I know what evil I shall do, But
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  Speaker 1: passion overpowers the better counsel. She thought that to indulge
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  Speaker 1: her passion and take vengeance on her husband was more
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  Speaker 1: profitable than to spare her children. It was so, but
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  Speaker 1: she was deceived. Show her plainly that she is deceived,
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  Speaker 1: and she will not do it. But so long as
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  Speaker 1: you do not show it, what can she follow except
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  Speaker 1: that which appears to herself her opinion, nothing else. Why then,
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  Speaker 1: are you angry with the unhappy woman that she has
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  Speaker 1: been bewildered about the most important things and is become
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  Speaker 1: a viper instead of a human creature. And why not
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  Speaker 1: if it is possible? Rather pity as we pity the
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  Speaker 1: blind and the lame, So those who are blinded and
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  Speaker 1: maimed in the faculties which are supreme. Whoever then clearly
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  Speaker 1: remembers this, that to man, the measure of every act
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  Speaker 1: is the appearance, the opinion, whether the thing appears good
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  Speaker 1: or bad. If good, he is free from blame. If bad,
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  Speaker 1: he suffers the penalty. For it is impossible that he
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  Speaker 1: who is deceived can be one person, and he who
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  Speaker 1: suffers another person. Whoever remembers this will not be angry
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  Speaker 1: with any man, will not be vexed by any man,
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  Speaker 1: will not revile or blame any man, nor hate nor
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  Speaker 1: quarrel with any man. So then all these great and
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  Speaker 1: dreadful deeds have this origin in the appearance opinion. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: this origin, and no other. The Iliad is nothing else
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  Speaker 1: than appearance and the use of appearances. It appeared to
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  Speaker 1: Alexander to carry off the wife of Menelaus. It appeared
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  Speaker 1: to Helene to follow him. If then it had appeared
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  Speaker 1: to Menelaus to feel that it was again to be
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  Speaker 1: deprived of such a wife, what would have had Not
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  Speaker 1: only would the Iliad have been lost, but the Odyssey
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  Speaker 1: also on so small a matter, then did such great
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  Speaker 1: things depend? But what do you mean by such great things?
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  Speaker 1: Wars and civil commotions, and the destruction of many men
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  Speaker 1: in cities. And what great matter is this? Is it nothing?
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  Speaker 1: But what great matter is the death of many oxen
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  Speaker 1: and many sheep, and many nests of swallows or storks
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  Speaker 1: being burnt or destroyed? Are these things then, like those
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  Speaker 1: very like bodies of men are destroyed, and the bodies
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  Speaker 1: of oxen and sheep, the dwellings of men are burnt,
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  Speaker 1: and the nests of storks. What is there in this
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  Speaker 1: great or dreadful? Or show me what is the difference
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  Speaker 1: between a man's house and a stork's nest, as far
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  Speaker 1: as each is a dwelling, except that the man builds
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  Speaker 1: his little house of beams and time ales and bricks,
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  Speaker 1: and the stork builds them of sticks and mud. Are
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  Speaker 1: a stork and a man? Then? Like things? What say you?
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  Speaker 1: In body? They are very much alike. Does a man
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  Speaker 1: then differ in no respect from a stork? Don't suppose
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  Speaker 1: that I say so? But there is no difference in
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  Speaker 1: these matters which I have mentioned in What then is
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  Speaker 1: the difference? Seek and you'll find that there is a
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  Speaker 1: difference in another matter? See whether it is not in
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  Speaker 1: a man the understanding of what he does see if
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  Speaker 1: it is not in social community, in fidelity, in modesty,
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  Speaker 1: in steadfastness, in intelligence, Where then is the great good
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  Speaker 1: and evil in men? It is where the difference is.
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  Speaker 1: If the difference is preserved and remains fenced round, and
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  Speaker 1: neither modesty is destroyed, nor fidelity, nor intelligence, then the
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  Speaker 1: man is also present. But if any of these things
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  Speaker 1: is destroyed and stormed like a city, then the man
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  Speaker 1: too perishes. And in this consists the great things. Alexander,
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  Speaker 1: you say, sustained great damage when the Hellenes invaded, and
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  Speaker 1: when they ravaged Troy, and when his brothers perished, by
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  Speaker 1: no means, For no man is damaged by an action
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  Speaker 1: which is not his own. But what happened at that
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  Speaker 1: time was only the destruction of Stork's nests. Now, the
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  Speaker 1: ruin of Alexander was when he lost the character of modesty, fidelity,
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  Speaker 1: regard to hospitality, and to decency. When was Achilles ruined?
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  Speaker 1: Was it when Patroclus died? Not so? But it happened
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  Speaker 1: when he began to get angry, when he wept for
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  Speaker 1: a girl, when he forgot that he was at Troy
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  Speaker 1: not to get mistresses but to fight. These things are
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  Speaker 1: the ruin of men. This is being besieged. This is
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  Speaker 1: the destruction of cities when right opinions are destroyed, when
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  Speaker 1: they are corrupted, When then women are carried off, when
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  Speaker 1: children are made captives, and when the men are killed.
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  Speaker 1: Are these not evils? How is it then that you
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  Speaker 1: add to the facts these opinions. Explain this to me? Also,
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  Speaker 1: I shall not do that. But how is it that
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  Speaker 1: you say that these are not evils? Let us come
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  Speaker 1: to the rules, produce the precognitions prolepses. For it is
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  Speaker 1: because this is neglected that we cannot sufficiently wonder at
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  Speaker 1: what men do. When we intend to judge of weights,
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  Speaker 1: we do not judge by guests. Where we intend to
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  Speaker 1: judge of straight and crooked, we do not judge by guests.
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  Speaker 1: In all cases where it is our interest to know
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  Speaker 1: what is true in any matter, Never will any man
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  Speaker 1: among us do anything by guests. But in things which
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  Speaker 1: depend on the first and on the only cause of
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  Speaker 1: doing right and wrong, of happiness or unhappiness, of being
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  Speaker 1: unfortunate or fortunate, there only we are inconsiderate and rash.
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  Speaker 1: There is then nothing like scales, balance, nothing like a rule.
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  Speaker 1: But some appearance is presented and straightway, I act according
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  Speaker 1: to it? Must I then suppose that I am superior
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  Speaker 1: to Achilles or Agamemnon, so that they, by following appearances
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  Speaker 1: due and suffer so many evils? And shall not the
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  Speaker 1: appearance be sufficient for me? And what tragedy has any other?
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  Speaker 1: Beginning the Atreus of Euripides, What is it an appearance?
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  Speaker 1: The Oedipus of Sophocles, what is it an appearance? The
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  Speaker 1: phoenix and appearance? The Hippolitus an appearance? What kind of man, then,
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  Speaker 1: do you suppose him to be who pays no regard
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  Speaker 1: to this matter? And what is the name of those
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  Speaker 1: who follow every appearance? They are called madmen? Do we
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  Speaker 1: then act at all differently? End of Book one, Section
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  Speaker 1: twenty eight