Simplicius: Commentary on Epictetus' Enchiridion 29-60

If you resolve to make wisdom and virtue the study and business of your life, you must be sure to arm yourself beforehand, against all the inconveniences and discouragements, that are likely to attend this resolution. Imagine, that you shall meet with many scoffs, and much derision; and that people will upbraid you with turning philosopher all on the sudden; and ask in scorn, What is the meaning of all this affected gravity, and these disdainful looks? But be not you affected, or supercilious, only stick close to whatever you are in your judgment convinced is virtuous and becoming; and consider this as your proper station, assigned you by God, which you must not quit upon any terms. And remember, that if you persevere in goodness, those very men, who derided you at first, will afterwards turn your admirers. But if you give way to their reproaches, and are vanquished by them, you will then render yourself doubly, and most deservedly, ridiculous.

Comment.

The former advice extended to all mankind in general, and concerned them as men; there he had very largely dissuaded them from engaging in the affairs of the world, and all the disquiets and superstitious fears about them; in consideration, that these are remote and foreign, out of our reach and disposal; and, that a man must look at home for all that is properly good or evil; this being the peculiar prerogative of a rational and free agent, that all its happiness and misery depends upon itself alone. But now he takes another method, and addresses himself particularly to such, as have made some advances in wisdom and goodness, and are affected with a real love and desire of it. And here his first care is, to secure the approaches, and first efforts of such a desire, by giving timely warning of the difficulties it may probably encounter, lest the surprise of any sudden and unforeseen opposition should disturb the mind, and break its measures.

Now nothing is more usual, than for men to take it ill, when any of their companions leave a way of living, to which they have been long accustomed. And the method they take for expressing such resentments, is, sometimes by exposing and ridiculing them, that so the world may think their own courses, at least as good, as those they use with such rude insolence and contempt: and this is commonly the treatment men who take better courses meet with, from their old cronies and intimate acquaintances. Sometimes they do it, by reproaching them with arrogance and pride, and valuing themselves upon their philosophy, more than they ought to do. And this proceeds partly from anger, and partly from envy, and a malicious desire to obstruct their farther progress.

And indeed, this spiteful dealing does but too often meet with its desired success; for many persons are overcome with these reproaches, and desert their post, and relapse into their former follies, merely to deliver themselves from such teasing. Some of these derisions are expressed in contemptuous looks and gestures, and they are properly mockeries. Others do not content themselves with apish figures and ill language, but run men upon precipices, draw both those that would fain be good, and all that take their part, and assist them in so necessary a reformation, into real difficulties, and great dangers. And if this were done by strangers only, it would be something more tolerable; but their own friends and relations have oftentimes the greatest hand in it. These do it upon an idle pretence, that a philosophical retirement renders men useless, and lost to the world; and others do it, partly out of envy against a life, so infinitely more happy and commendable than their own; and partly out of a resentment, that this will make them, and their way of conversation despised, by those that have exchanged it for a better.

Nor must it be dissembled, that there is sometimes too just ground for the latter of these reasons; for we very often see men, whose good dispositions and happy temper incline them to wisdom and virtue, (while they are not arrived to any mastery or perfection in it, but only big with the hope of attaining to it in time) exalted with self-conceit, and full of disdain, as if they only had all perfection, and other people none at all. When, in truth, this mighty opinion proceeds only from want of discretion and judgment, and is the most undeniable evidence against such men, that they really have not that, which they with so much confidence pretend to. For there is not in the whole world anything more inconsistent with wisdom and virtue, than a haughty supercilious carriage, and that swelling vanity, which disdains and neglects that excellent and most divine rule of Knowing one’s Self: a rule, which is in truth, the sum and substance of all philosophy, the first principle, and the last and highest precept in it.

When men behave themselves with so much pride and ostentation, the world thinks the character of philosophers suits very ill with them. For this exaltation does not proceed from any true gallantry or greatness of soul, but it is a vain tumor, which draws ill-humors to it from within, and swells to an unnatural bulk; an excrescence, which causes deformity, and proceeds from some disease. Whereas true greatness and strength of mind, like that of the body, results from a good disposition of the parts, is distributed equally and regularly through the whole mass, and preserves a due temper, and mutual good assistance, between the parts within, and those without.

Against this distemper he cautions all that make philosophy their study, as against a thing detested by all mankind, and that which gives a just provocation to malice, and exposes a man to all the mischievous effects of it. But when all due care hath been taken to get clear of this folly; then a man ought to harden himself against all scoffs and reproaches, with the consideration of the dignity of human nature, and what is decent and agreeable to so excellent a being; and then to persevere in the choice of virtue, in despite of all opposition to the contrary; and in a full persuasion, that these good resolutions and desires are the motions and impulses of a divine power. For, in truth, philosophy is the noblest and most valuable blessing, that ever God bestowed upon mankind.

The excellence of the thing is confessed by these very scoffers themselves; who, when they reproach us with pretending to an accomplishment above us, do at the same time express the high esteem they have for it; and by not allowing any man to profess himself a philosopher on a sudden, they expose indeed the arrogance and forwardness of the persons who presume to do so; but then withal they acknowledge this to be an attainment, which requires much time, and great application. Now these very men, who resent the vanity of bold pretenders with so much indignation, and express their honor of philosophy that way, will discern the beauty and majesty of it much better, and admire it ten thousand time more, when they behold its effects, in the modest conversation of one who constantly improves, and perseveres in being resolutely and obstinately virtuous, in despite of all the scoffs and discouragements, by which they attempted, in vain, to draw him off. But the man, that yields tamely to their reproaches, and upon that account, desists from his good purposes, and compounds for his quiet by returning to his former courses, renders himself doubly ridiculous. The jests and scorn, which passed upon such a one at first, were what he had really no concern in; but the reproach must return all upon the authors themselves, and none of their aspersions would stick, so long as he proceeded in a generous neglect of them, and by degrees was preparing to change their scorn into admiration and esteem. But the suffering oneself to be vanquished by their malice, does not only justify their first insolence, by quitting our former pretensions, and falling so low, after looking so high; (thus vainly attempting to reconcile philosophy with a mean and sordid temper;) but it also provokes contempt upon another account; that of being subdued by such base and despicable enemies, and letting a senseless fear, or a malicious jest, beat one off from that post of virtue, which God and wisdom had assigned to him. Most justly therefore does this poor spirited wretch deserve a double portion of scorn; the scorn of wise and good men, after having submitted to that of fools and knaves; which could have done him no harm at all, in case he had persisted in his duty; but returns upon him with double force, and is rendered most reasonable and due, by his own inconstancy and desertion.

Theses considerations are abundantly sufficient, to inspire any mind, not utterly sunk into feebleness and effeminacy, with generous resolutions to persevere in goodness, and hold out against all manner of opposition. And in this there is one very considerable advantage, that even our passions commence good dispositions, and the natural ambition every man hath after honor and fame, becomes upon this occasion an assistant to virtue: it adds strength and vigor to reason, and is refined and exalted by it. For thus we come to a true notion of honor; we covet it no longer for its own sake, nor are proud of it, upon the account of the persons who pay the respect, and so place our happiness upon something without us: but we value it, as a mark and testimony of real virtue and desert. And therefore the honor, which a man ought to be satisfied with, is by no means that, which comes from the applause of the rabble, and an unthinking part of the world, who often mistake men and their characters; but that which is founded upon the commendation of the wise and the good. For these know how to discern between persons, and their respective merits; and the testimony of such is what may be depended upon, without any danger of being led into false judgments by it.

If you ever happen to accommodate yourself to the humors of the world, for the sake of reputation and applause, take notice, that this is below a philosopher. And therefore content yourself upon all occasions, with really being what you would be thought. But if you will needs be thought so too, deserve your own good opinion, and that will be sufficient.

Comment.

We were told before, that, when once a man’s judgment is convinced of his duty, he ought constantly to persevere in it; to look upon this, as the particular post, and character, which providence hath appointed him to fill; that, however men may run down goodness for a while, yet the resolute and brave break through all that; and in time, gain the admiration of their enemies and deriders; but the tame and the fickle, who sink under the reproaches of ill men, draw down a just scorn, and a double shame upon themselves. Now to all this he adds, that, for a man to forsake his principles, and consult, not so much his own judgment, as the humor of the world, thereby to render himself acceptable to others; is a weakness, of which a philosopher must not be guilty: it being a fixed rule to all such, that their only care ought to be, to recommend themselves to their own consciences, and to Almighty God.

Therefore, says he, content yourself with being a philosopher; which is but another name for a good man. But if the being so alone seems too little; and you desire, that your light should shine, and that your virtue should be known and observed, (as indeed it is the nature of goodness, to discover its beauties and shed its luster; and a man can with better confidence take satisfaction in his own virtues, when they are conspicuous and acknowledged;) then, says he, do not fix your eye upon the world, nor be solicitous to please the multitude; for these are but very incompetent judges of such matters; but rather strive to approve yourself to your own breast, and let the sense and consciousness of your own virtue satisfy you. For a man who hath attained to some good measure of philosophy, (and such a one, you must observe Epictetus applies himself to at present) will be sure, both to act consistently with his principles, while he makes it his business to approve himself to his own conscience; and he will also secure a more discerning and impartial judge of his actions, when they are to be tried by his own reason, than if he appealed to the judgment of the world.

And here it may be proper to take notice, how different this advice is from something which was said before; all which, in truth, depends upon the difference of the persons concerned in it. There he addressed his discourse to a young beginner; one but just entering upon the study of philosophy; and to him the counsel thought fit to be given, was Do not affect to be thought wise: because persons in his circumstances, are strangely fond of fame and applause, transported beyond measure with noise and empty breath, and not only too credulously vain upon the false judgments of others, but unqualified, as yet, to pass any true judgment upon themselves. But at present he hath a good proficient to deal with, one better disposed to act upon principle, and to follow the dictates of his own reason: and therefore to such a one his advice is, That he would content himself with being what he should be; but if he will needs be thought so too, he is now in a condition to make a just estimate of himself, and therefore may be satisfied with his own approbation.

This seems to be the true importance of the chapter: though possibly there may be another very convenient sense of it too. For this great man, very probably, designed it as a necessary caution also. (As indeed he generally takes care to prevent any misconstructions, to which his expressions may be liable.) Now by saying in the former chapter, That those who expose virtue at first, will afterwards admire the resolute and constant in it; but the men who yielded to those reproaches deserve to be doubly scorned; he might be thought to propound the opinion and esteem of the world, as the principal motive to goodness; and therefore here he retracts that, and takes off all such suspicions, by calling away the soul from the pursuit of fame and reputation abroad, as that which is apt to corrupt her principles, and make a man more industrious to please others than himself. And in opposition to this, he would have a man gain his own approbation; for the judgment of a wise man makes of himself, is less subject to partiality, and prejudice, and vanity, and of greater use in the encouragement it gives to virtue, than that of the world can possibly be. For the being approved and commended by wise and good judges, is the most satisfactory and convincing evidence, that a man is truly virtuous. Now the person, to whom Epictetus speaks in this place, is supposed to be such a judge; and upon this presumption I imagine it is, that he says in the close of the chapter, Do but deserve your own good opinion, and that is enough in all conscience.

Never perplex yourself with anxious thoughts like these: I shall lead a wretched obscure life, without any name or notice taken of me. For if you suppose (as this complaint evidently does) that obscurity and disrespect is an evil; consider that it is no more in the power of any but yourself to bring any evil upon you, than it is to bring any baseness or dishonesty upon you. But besides, pray consider, was it any part of your proper business, to be chosen into a place of command, or to be admitted to, or caressed at, public entertainments? You must allow it was not. Where is the disrespect then? And what just reflection can it be upon you, if you are not? Besides, why should you say, you shall be despised, and have no name or notice taken of you, when your business lies wholly in matters at the disposal of your own will, and for which consequently you have it in your own power, to make yourself as valuable as you please? But your friends will be never the better for you. What do you call being never the better? You will not furnish them with money, nor have interest enough to give them the privileges of citizens of Rome. And why should you trouble yourself for this? Who told you, that this was ever incumbent upon you; or one of those things in your own power, which you ought to look upon as a duty? Or how can it be expected, you should bestow that upon another, which you are not possessed of yourself? But you friends will answer, Pray get it then, that you may impart to us. Yes, I will, with all my heart, provided you can direct me, how I may attain these things, and at the same time preserve my integrity, my modesty, and true greatness of soul, inviolate. But if you desire me to part with my own real good, that I may procure you some imaginary good only; this is the greatest injustice, and the greatest folly imaginable. And which of these do you esteem the more valuable: money, or a true, virtuous, and modest friend? Therefore it would better become you to assist my virtue, than to expect such things from me, as cannot be had, but at the expense of that. But it will be objected again, that your country receives no advantages from you. What advantages do you mean? You will not build public porticoes or baths, nor exchanges? And what if you do not? Does your country expect to be furnished with arms from a shoemaker, or shoes from a smith? Surely, if everyone does it service in his own way, this is all that can in reason be required. And shall you then be thought to have done it no service if you make an honest and good patriot? Surely not. You are very far from being an useless member of the commonwealth, when you do so. Well, but what rank then, what place, (you’ll say) shall you but have in the commonwealth? Why truly, even just such a one, as is consistent with your integrity and modesty. But if once you part with these, upon a pretence of promoting the public good; know that you are less capable of serving your country when you are grown knavish and impudent.

Comment.

When men apply themselves to the study and practice of virtue, and are convinced, that nothing so well deserves their care, as the improvement of their minds; many difficulties offer themselves, to shake these resolutions. And, as men differ in their circumstances, so these objections present themselves differently, both to disquiet their own thoughts, and to evacuate the good advice of others. To young beginners, whose minds have not yet purged off the dross of the world, such mean and sordid reflections as these are apt to step in: If I neglect my business and estate, I and my family shall starve; and except I take the trouble of punishing my servant, my indulgence will be his ruin. But to them, who have made any considerable progress, those objections appear despicable and low; they are above such trifling considerations, and while they are doing their duty, can trust providence for a provision. But then at the same time, they are concerned for the discharge of all those good offices, which may be expected from them; and think, that both the intrinsic goodness of the thing, and the honor attending it, will abundantly justify such a concern. For their desires are generous and noble; they aim at nothing else but true honor; they decline infamy and obscurity, and propose to themselves the advantage of their friends, and the service of their country: and from these topics, they start some objections, which Epictetus here undertakes to examine, and to refute particularly.

First of all, he applies himself to that general one of obscurity or disgrace; that if a man retires from the gainful employments and business of the world, or quits his practice at the bar,

Where eloquence acquires a just and lasting fame,

(as Homer observes;) it must be his hard fate to be buried alive, without any respect paid, or notice taken of him.

Now this objection Epictetus takes off most effectually, by the following syllogisms: Disgrace is an evil, and evil as well as good is something within our own power. But whatever is so, no other but ourselves, can bring upon us. Therefore when any man is really in disgrace, this is in, and by, and from himself, whether others disrespect him, or whether they do not. So then the disgrace from others, is what we have no just cause to fear, nor indeed ought it to pass for disgrace in our opinion, if disgrace be allowed to be evil; for then it must by consequence be our own act and deed.

This is the sum of the argument. And now if you please, let us examine the several propositions whereof it consists. First of all, disgrace or obscurity, (says he) is an evil: now if honor be (as all men sure will allow it to be) a good; disgrace, and anything that is dishonorable, must needs be evil: for if it were good, it would cease to be dishonorable, and be valued and esteemed. But, besides the consent of all mankind in this notion of honor; this very thing proves it to be good, that it is what we account most properly to belong to the best persons and things. For honor is attributed to God, to blessed spirits, and to the most excellent of the sons of men, as their strict and just due, as the best acknowledgement we can pay, for their merit and goodness. So that dishonor must needs be an evil upon this account also; for, where one contrary belongs to one extreme, the other contrary will belong to the distant extreme; and this is the case of honor and dishonor, with regard to good and evil.

The next thing to be proved would be, that this is a thing wholly in our own power; but this, I presume, is done already. For there hath been so much said in the former part of this treatise, to show, that all the good and evil, properly so called, possible to fall upon rational and free agents, must needs depend upon the liberty of their own choice: and, that nothing which does not fall within a man’s own disposal, can in true and strict speaking, be called good or evil; that it is to be hoped, there is no need of repeating those arguments any more. But now, if disgrace, and want of honor, be our own act; what depends upon none, and comes from none but ourselves, when we lie under it; a man may absolutely despise and neglect the world, without incurring any real dishonor upon that account. You will say indeed, this excludes him from places of dignity and respect; that it hinders him from making a figure and interest in his own country; that he sits at home, and eats in private. But then I must ask you again, whether the office of a Lord Mayor, or a Member of Parliament, whether the city feasts, or the caresses of the world, are things in our own disposal, and such as any man can give himself when he pleases: you must grant me they are not. Now from thence I infer, that no man is really unhappy for the want of them; and consequently that obscurity, and want of public honor, of which these are alleged as the discouraging inconveniences, is no evil or unhappiness neither.

Now, as to the meaning of what follows, there seems to be some difficulty in that short sentence, It is no more in the power of any but yourself, to bring any evil upon you, than it is to bring vileness or dishonesty upon you. For this, not being in the power of any other person to bring any evil upon a man, seems to be urged from a proof more evident than it itself; and the insinuation here is, that, as the decency of an action is more easily discerned, than the real and intrinsic goodness; (for it is by its comeliness and beauty, that virtue recommends itself, and invites us to its embraces, and engages our affection,) so also the vileness and dishonestly is more visible than the immorality and evil. Now vileness or turpitude is properly applied to an undue use of pleasures and sensual delights; and this abuse can be the effect of no other thing but choice, because the indulging those pleasures is purely our own act. It is therefore no more in the power of any other person, to bring evil upon a man, than to bring vileness or dishonest upon him; and evil it is plain he cannot; for a man has no more power to engage us in vice, than he has, to engage us in base and unbecoming practices, and evil, both of crime and misery, is as much in his own free disposal, as turpitude and dishonesty: so that, if a man cannot be brought into this latter by another, and if he can no more be brought into evil, than into that; it follows, that he cannot be brought into evil at all by another.

But possibly the place may be clearer, and a more full and expedient sense found out, if we transpose that negative particle, that so the sentence may run thus: It is impossible for any person to be made miserable by any other; nay, much more so, than to be made vile and base by him; and thus the strength and stress of the whole argument, will lie upon that note of comparison. And this conjecture, as well as the whole interpretation grounded upon it, seems to carry a great deal of truth, if we attend to the notions, upon which the masters of reason and oratory proceed in these matters; for they define honest and turpitude, by that which is praise or blame-worthy, and so make decency and vileness to depend upon the judgment of the world. But of things profitable or hurtful, and good and evil, they give us a very different account; for these, they tell us, have a distinguishing character founded in nature, and are not so precarious, as to depend on the opinions or determinations of men. Now according to this notion, which allows so much to the commendations of men, and makes dishonest to consist in the condemnation and dislike of the world, he says, a man must admit, that it is at least as impossible for another to bring evil upon him as it is to bring dishonesty. And if, (as was proved before,) this cannot be done, much less can that; and so the conclusion is still the same, viz. That it is utterly impossible to be done at all.

But then again, what occasion, (says he) is there for that complaint of living without any name or notice taken of you? Is there no way of becoming eminent, but by appearing in some office of authority, and being advanced to the administration of public business? Alas! poor man, you have forgotten, it seems, that this is not the field, where human good and evil, the proper and peculiar happiness or misery of our nature, is to be contended for. The desires and aversions of your mind, the actions of your life, and in a word, the management of your freedom, and what is left to its disposal, these are the lists which you must enter, for that prize: and this is a combat, in which if you behave yourself gallantly, and act, as uncorrupt nature and right reason would direct, you may render yourself highly valuable and conspicuous. Why then do you complain of obscurity and contempt, when you have the post of honor within yourself, and may become as signal and eminent in it, as you please? Why indeed? But, because you have not yet unlearned the folly, of placing your happiness in foreign and external advantages, such as it is a necessary qualification of everyone, who would be a philosopher in good earnest, to neglect and despise.

Well, but allowing, (say the objector) that I may signalize myself never so much; yet still this is but a private satisfaction; it gives me no credit or influence in the world, and my friends are never the better for my merit. This now is a pretence, calculated for one, who hath made some competent proficiency in wisdom and virtue, it argues the man to have got above all sordid seekings of his own interest, and to value the world and its advantages no longer for the sake of himself, but in kindness to his friends. The assisting of them he looks upon, as a good and gallant action; and therefore allows himself in the pursuit of wealth, and power, and interest, to prevent his being a useless and unprofitable part of the creation, and to render the good he hath, as diffusive as may be.

This objection too, Epictetus removes by two arguments: the first proceeds upon the distinction of things within our own power; the other urges, that a man who retains his virtue and fidelity, and all the good qualities, that create and preserve a true friendship, is more serviceable and beneficial to his friends, than if he should enrich or promote them, when the power of doing so was purchased, at the expense of those good qualities.

From the distinction of things in our power, he argues that riches, and honors, and preferments, are none of those, which nature hath left within the disposal of our own wills: if therefore it happens at any time, that a wise and good man be possessed of these advantages, let him impart to others liberally; nay, let him esteem the opportunity of doing good, a greater kindness to himself, than to the person who receives it from him. But if it be not his fortune to be placed in such circumstances; this is no reflection upon his virtue, or any disparagement to his kindness and good intentions. He is not one whit the worse man in himself, nor the less a friend to others. For (as Epictetus says) what madness is it to expect that a man should give that to us, which he is not possessed of himself?

But pray get these things, say your friends, that we may partake of them with you. Yes, with all my heart, if I can get them, and not lose my self. Do but order matters so, that I may still retain my fidelity and my innocence, and not bring any aspersion upon the characters I pretend to, viz. Those of a friend and a philosopher; and when you have thus smoothed the way, give your directions, and I will not fail to follow them. Now by this answer our author seems plainly to allow a liberty, both of endeavoring to improve an estate, and to embrace public offices and honors; provided those riches and honors may be acquired and enjoyed, without being engaged in anything inconsistent with virtue, or unbecoming our character. But if this be an impossible condition, as it too often proves; if the corruption of the world be such, that a man, who makes it his business to acquire these advantages, does at the same time bring himself under a manifest hazard, if not a fatal necessity, of parting with something that is a greater and more substantial good; a good more properly his, in exchange for them: then, what do those friends who importune a man to make them do so too; what do they, I say, but desire, that he would part with a happiness that is real and his own: (that is the good of his rational soul,) to procure them a happiness which is but imaginary, and cannot be truly called their own, though they had it? For the advantages they are so eager for, have no relation to the rational mind, in which the very essence and nature of a man consists, (and consequently all the happiness he is capable of, considered as a man, must needs depend upon that,) but they are the object of meaner appetites.

This therefore is the most unequal dealing, and the greatest folly imaginable: they deal unequally, because they transgress the laws of true friendship: (for the Pythagoreans, you know, made friendship to consist in equality.) and nothing can be more unfair, than for me to engage a friend in some great hazard, and expose him to certain and extreme misery, and all this, only to satisfy some unreasonable desire of my own. The folly of it is double; for who but fools, would be so barbarous, as to impose such an unreasonable trial of his kindness, upon an intimate acquaintance, and particular friend? And who but such, could be so blind, as not to discern the mighty difference, between the loss their friend would sustain, by gratifying their requests, and the gain themselves should reap, in case he did so? He sacrifices his all: forfeits his greatest, his own peculiar happiness, to purchase that for them, which is not, cannot be their proper happiness; and is so far from being a great good, that it very often proves to be none at all in the event, but a great and sore evil.

But besides all this, there may still a another very good reason be given, why he should call such men foolish and senseless; and that is, their esteeming money to be of greater and more valuable consideration to them, than the modesty and fidelity of a friend. And to this purpose, he proceeds to show, that a person thus qualified, is so far from being unserviceable to his friends, that he is really much more useful and beneficial, than even they, who feed them with the dross they so much admire.

For if among servants, those who are honest and respectful, recommend themselves more to the esteem of their masters, than others who are of quicker parts, and more dexterous in the business of their trade; sure the reason holds much stronger, why a faithful and virtuous friend should have the preference, infinitely before what the world calls a gainful one: and that preference they will have, in the opinion of all wise men. For we feel the benefit of these upon every occasion; they give us the sweets of good conversation, and the assistance of seasonable advice; they are a perpetual guard upon whatever we esteem most dear, and a sure relief in dangers and distresses; they are physicians in our diseases, and (as if life were too short a space for so much goodness to exercise itself in) we find our account in such friends, even after death: and, upon all occasions there is a perpetual good correspondence, a mutual agreement between the giver and the receiver of favors; no discord in the whole course of their lives, but constant consent and perfect harmony of souls. Those therefore, that are friends indeed, will contribute their utmost endeavors, towards the preserving the virtue and fidelity of their friends; nay, they will find themselves obliged to it, in tenderness to their interest; and cannot be guilty of so great an absurdity, as to desire anything for their own sakes, which must turn at last so infinitely to their prejudice, by robbing their friend of his honesty, and rendering him incapable of doing them any further service.

Thus also that other argument might be answered; and the observing what is in a man’s own power, and properly belongs to him to do, would serve to refute what follows. For, who ever told you, that it was a duty incumbent upon you, or a thing in your own power and choice, to procure porticoes and pubic buildings, for the benefit of your country? To this may be replied again, as it was in the case of your friends; who can be expected to bestow that upon others, which he never had himself? And if to this it be rejoined, get them yourself, that you may have it in your own power to give to your country; what was said before, will serve every jot as well, upon this occasion too. But these considerations he hath left in general, for us to apply, as we see requisite; and hath supplied us with another clear and full answer, much more pertinent, and particular to the matter in hand.

What need this trouble you (says he)? Is it your concern, to provide cloisters and exchanges for your country? The Smith does not think it his business to supply his country with shoes, but with arms; and the Shoemaker does not think himself obliged to furnish out arms, but leather and shoes. And sure every commonwealth is served in best order, and to most advantage, when every one attends strictly to the proper business of his calling, and does not intermeddle with the concerns of other people; but takes care to do his own part, and interrupts nobody else in the discharge of his.

Well, but what is my part then, says the philosopher, and wherein will it be expected, that I should contribute to the public good? The seeming force of this question he obviates most excellently, by appealing to the man’s own judgment in another; What! says he, if you have been the means of making a good man, have not you been beneficial to your country? Is not this a piece of service, of much greater consequence, than the profits every mean artificer brings to the public? This would be the advantage, and this the thanks and honor due to you, for making yourself an honest man and a good subject: but if your wisdom and virtue have a kindly influence upon others too; if your instructions and your example from them into the same good principles, you are then a public blessing, and more beneficial still, in proportion to the numbers you have an influence upon.

And now you desire to know, what rank or office shall be assigned you, and would fain be, like the general in the army, or the magistrate of the city, or the artificer in the shop, who know their respective trusts, and have some station or business, military or civil, which they can properly call their own. To this the author replies in general terms, you may have any that will fall to your share, only with this provision, that it be consistent with virtue and honesty: but if you make shipwreck of these, while you pretend to venture for monuments and stately buildings; it is great odds, but you lose your magnificence, at the same time that your modesty and fidelity is cast away. And, I pray, whether of the two is the greater grace to a commonwealth? A city well stored with true and good men, or adorned with sumptuous halls and splendid palaces?

But, to come nearer to the question, what place or esteem is due to a philosopher, or what regard should the state have to him? Surely men should be esteemed, according to the dignity and value of their work. And, by this rule, the philosopher may claim precedence, as a former and maker of men; one who frames and moulds them into virtuous persons, and useful honest subjects. The matter he hath to work upon, is, himself and others; and the pains he is at about them, is, to refine and purify their nature, and exalt them to a life of reason and virtue. He is indeed, and ought to be respected, as a common father and master, a corrector of errors, and counselor and assistant in goodness; he is liberal of his care, makes every other man’s benefit and improvement his endeavor and concern, and hath a hand in all the good that is done. He adds to the enjoyments of the prosperous, by congratulating and rejoicing with them; and lightens the burden of the wretched, by ministering seasonable comforts; and himself bearing a part in their afflictions. In one word, he will do all those things, that are possible, or can be expected, to be done, by one who thinks no part of the world exempt from his care, but feels in himself a constant desire, and kind intention, to promote the good of all mankind.

Now, if this general employment does not satisfy, but you would needs have this wondrous man fastened down to some one particular profession; in a wise and well-constituted government, this person would be chosen their head, because his eminence and usefulness must needs give him the preference before others. And indeed, his qualifications, if we consider them particularly, seem to deserve no less. His prudence, so much superior to the common sheep, capacitates him for a shepherd to the flock. His learning and wisdom entitle him to the degree of a senator or privy-counselor. And if he had applied himself at all to that sort of discipline, none can be fitter to command an army, because he must needs excel both in true courage and regular conduct. Thus Socrates gained immortal renown, by his bravery at the battle of Delium; and cast, as we are told, so universal an awe into his enemies, that they all stood amazed at his courage; and he made good his retreat single, through a whole body of them, without their daring to fall upon him. So likewise Xenophon brought off that great body of Greeks, and had his praises celebrated in the Olympic Games, for so noble an achievement.

This, I say, would be the case, this the respect paid to a philosopher, in a wise and well-constituted government. But we must take notice, that wicked and licentious states do quite the contrary: they are most inauspicious places to dwell in, and have destructive effects upon the minds of men; they stifle and quench that light, which heaven hath given us; cast a blemish upon the best employments, discourage the most useful sciences, disregard the persons, and obstruct the good influence of them, who teach us by their doctrines, and lead us by their examples. And, where so much wicked industry is used to damp the luster of virtue, that place must be confessed very improper, either for men to lay the first foundations of wisdom and a good life in, or to improve and confirm themselves in, after such good beginnings. But then we must observe withal, that, if in the midst of such perverse conversation, someone be found of a happier complexion than the rest; one, whose soul a particular good genius hath made proof against all corruption; the greater such a one’s difficulties are, and the more trials his virtue is exercised with, the more perfect and illustrious it will appear, and shed abroad its rays with greater advantage, in the midst of so much darkness. So true it is, that all the traverses of fortune, and this vast variety of accidents in human life, contribute exceedingly to the increase of virtue; and that both prosperity and adversity work together for the good of those men, who have the wisdom to choose things with judgment, and to manage them with dexterity.

It is possible, you observe some other person more caressed than yourself; invited to entertainments, when you are left out; saluted before are taken any notice of; thought more proper to advise with, and his counsel followed rather than yours. But are these respects paid him good things, or are they evil? If they deserve to be esteemed good, this ought to be a matter of joy to you, that that person is happy in them: but if they be evil, how unreasonable it is to be troubled, that they have not fallen to your own share? Besides, consider, I pray, that it is not possible, you should have those civilities paid to you in the same degree that others have; because the profession you have taken upon you, will not suffer you to do the same things to deserve them that others do. And how can it be expected, that he, who thinks the trouble of waiting at a great man’s levee below him, should have the same interest, with one that constantly pays his morning devotions there? Or he, that only minds his own business, with another that is eternally cringing, and fawning, and wriggling himself into a lord’s train; or he, that will not strain a point to commend him; with a parasite, that is ever blowing him up with his own praise, indulging all his vices, and admiring his follies and his nonsense. At this rate, you are a very unjust, and a most unreasonable man; for you expect to receive that gratis, which is really set to sale, and cannot be obtained without paying the price. For instance now, and to use a very familiar one, you inquire in the market, how lettuce go and are told, they are a half-penny apiece. Suppose now, another person bids, and pays, and takes them; and you will neither bid, nor pay, and go without them: is there any wrong done? Or hath the buyer a better bargain than you? He parted with his money, and hath the salad; you have no salad indeed, but you have kept your money. Just so it is in the case before us. You were not invited to a great man’s table; the reason is, because you did not buy the invitation. Pay the price, and you may have it; but that price, is commendation and flattery. If therefore you think the thing for your advantage, it is set to sale, and you know the market rates. But if you expect it should come without making payments, you are very unreasonable. And if it be thought too dear, then sure you have no reason to complain; for, though you have not his lordship’s dinner, yet you have something as good in the room of it; for you have the satisfaction of keeping the price in your own hand still; that is, of not commending a man against truth and conscience.

Comment.

This discourse seems to be a continuation of the former; proceeding to obviate some objections still behind, such as seem all to arise from the same habit and disposition of mind. For, when a man hath turned all his thoughts and care upon his own improvement, and hath disengaged himself from the world, and its encumbrances; when he hath arrived to that largeness and sufficiency of soul, as to despise riches, and honor, and popularity; when he thinks it unbecoming his character, to court the countenance of great persons, by all the means arts and obsequious attendance of slaves and sycophants; there will, in all likelihood, follow this inconvenience upon it, that he shall be slighted and disregarded himself, many of his equals and inferiors shall be invited home to entertainments, shall be more particularly addressed to in public places, and receive all outward marks of respect; nay many less capable of advising than he, shall be admitted into the secretes of families, and consulted in all their affairs of importance, while this person, so much their superior in worth and wisdom, is industriously neglected.

Now all the seeming hardship, that appears in such usage, Epictetus might, if he had thought fit, have taken off in one word, by remitting us to his usual distinction, of the things that are, and that are not, within the compass of our own choice: for, if those things that conduce to our real happiness be at our own disposal, and the things here mentioned are not so; then ought we not to suppose our happiness at all to consist in them. But this solution of the difficulty he takes no notice of here; partly because it is general, and applicable to many other cases as well as this, and partly, as presuming it abundantly enlarged upon, and that his reader was sufficiently perfect in it before. That therefore, which he chooses to insist upon, is something, that comes up closer to the matter in hand; and proves, that the inconveniences here alleged minister an occasion of much greater advantage, to those, who have the wisdom to make a right use of them.

To this purpose, he tells us, that the instances in which men of inferior qualifications have the preference and respect, before those, who have made a strict philosophical life their choice, must be either good or evil. If you please, to make the division perfect, I will take the confidence to add, or indifferent; for in truth, there are a great many things of this middle sort. But then it must be confessed too, that those which are indifferent, can neither be called honorable nor dishonorable. And for that reason, the author seems not to have thought this branch worth any room in his division. Well, we will say then, according to him, that they are all in one of the extremes, either good or evil: now if they be good, (says he) this ought by no means be a matter of discontent to you. But quite contrary, it should add to your joy and satisfaction, that another person is happy in them. For this calls for the exercise of a very exalted and philosophical virtue; that of wishing well to all mankind, and rejoicing in the prosperity of others.

And here we shall do well to observe, what a mighty good he makes this seeming evil to contain, and how prodigious an honor this disrespect derives upon us. For this indeed is the very quality of the mind, which brings us to the truest and nearest resemblance of God, which is the greatest happiness, any of his creatures can possibly attain to. For God is himself of absolute and unbounded power, being indeed the only source of all the limited powers communicated to any other beings. And as his power is infinitely great, so his will is infinitely good. For hence it comes to pass, that he would have all things good, and not anything evil, so far as that can be. And because his will can intend nothing but what his power is able to accomplish, therefore he does really make all things good; and this he does not niggardly and grudgingly, but communicates to every creature of his own goodness, in as large proportions, as the condition of each creature is capable of enjoying it.

Now the soul of man, ‘tis true , does not resemble God, in infinite and uncontrollable power, for this is a perfection of the divine nature, which our constitution cannot receive; and besides, there are many degrees of intermediate beings, which, though much inferior to God, are yet much superior to us in point of power. But still in the other part of his excellence, he hath condescended to make us like himself, and given us the honor of a will free and unbounded, a will capable of extending its good wishes, and kind inclinations to all the world, provided we have but the grace to make this good use of it. It is therefore an instance of his wonderful wisdom, and adorable goodness, that he hath made this to be his image and similitude in our souls; because this is the true and proper principle of all operation and action. And though the soul cannot punctually make all things good, as God can, and does; yet it goes as far as it can in making them so; and for the rest, it does it part, by wishing that good, which it cannot give them. For that is perfect and true volition, when the person willing, exerts his whole strength, and all the faculties assist and concur with it; for we have the absolute disposal of our own minds, and so the wishing well to all mankind, is what any man may do, if he please. And indeed a truly good man goes farther than all this; he wishes the prosperity of all men whatsoever; and he stops not there, but extends his kindness to creatures of different species, to brutes, to plants, to even inanimate things; in a word, to all that make up this great body of the world, of which himself is a part. ‘Tis true, he cannot make those wishes effectual to all, because as I said, the willing is a perfection given us by nature, but the power of effecting it is not. For this requires the cooperation of many other causes, the permission of the gods, and the concurrence of several agents, which we cannot command. And hence it is, that all our virtue consists in our will; the merit of all our actions is measured by that; and that all the happiness and misery of our lives is made to depend upon the good or ill use of it. And thus you have the force of this argument, proceeding upon a supposition that these things are good.

But if on the other hand, the respects denied to the philosopher, and paid to others, be evil; here can be no ground of dissatisfaction, but a fresh occasion of joy: not upon his account indeed who hath them, but upon your own, who have them not. At this rate, the good man can never be melancholy at the want of these things, nor look upon it as any disparagement to his person, or diminution of his happiness, but is sure to be pleased, let the event be what it will; that is, either for the good success of others, if it be good; or for his own escape, if it be evil. And thus all angry resentments are taken off, in point of interest and advantage; for though we allow these things to conduce to our happiness, yet it is a much greater happiness, to aspire after a resemblance of the divine perfections, which the missing of them gives men an opportunity to do; and if they rather tend to make us miserable, then the being without them is not so properly a want, as a deliverance.

After this he proceeds to two other topics, the possibility of obtaining them, and the reasonableness of expecting them. From the former of these he argues thus. It is not to be imagined, that one who never makes his court, should have the same privileges, with one who is eternally laboring to ingratiate himself. This labor must consist of all the ceremonious fopperies, and servile submissions imaginable; the waiting at the great man’s rising, expecting his coming out, cringing and bowing in the streets, the court, and all places of public concourse; the commending all he does, though never so base, and admiring all he says though never so senseless. And therefore, for a philosopher, and a man of honor and truth, who cannot submit to these unworthy methods of insinuating himself, to meet with the same countenance, and marks of kindness, which those who prostitute themselves at this rate for them; is, as the world goes, absolutely impossible.

Nay, it is not only unreasonable upon that account to expect them, but in point of justice too. It argues a man greedy and insatiable, when he expects his meal, and yet will not consent to pay his ordinary. It is desiring to invade another’s right, and engross to yourself, what he hath already bought and paid for: for though he left no money under his plate, yet he gave that purchase, which you would have thought much too dear. And consequently (as he shows by that instance of the lettuce,) you who went without the dinner, have as good a bargain at least, as he that was admitted to it: he had the varieties indeed, but then you have your liberty; you did not enslave yourself so far, as to laugh at his lordship’s dull jests, nor to commend what your better sense could not like, nor bear the affected coldness of his welcome, nor the tedious attendance in his anti-chamber. In short, you were not the subject of his haughty negligence, and stiff formality, nor the jest of his saucy servants. Now all this you must have been content with, to have dined with his greatness. If you expect it upon easier terms, you are mistaken, for it will come no cheaper; and if you expect it, without paying as others do, it argues you greedy, and an unfair tradesman. And this character is not consistent with that of a good man; so that you must change your temper, and be more moderate in your expectances of this kind.

We cannot be at a loss, what the condition of things is by nature, what her laws and methods, nor how men ought to deport themselves, with regard to them: for these are things so plain, that all the world, at one time or other, are universally agreed about them. For instance, if a neighbor’s child happens to break a glass, we presently answer, that this is a very common accident. Now the application fit to be made from hence is, that, when one of our own happens to be broken, we should no more think it extraordinary, nor suffer it to give us any greater disturbance, than when it was another man’s case. And this trivial example, should prepare us for bearing casualties of greater consequence, with the like temper. When any of our acquaintances buries a child, or a wife, everybody is ready to mitigate the loss, with the reflection, that all men are mortal, and this is what all men have therefore reason to expect. But when the misfortune comes home to ourselves, then we give a loose to our passions, and indulge our lamentations and bitter complaints. Now these things ought quite otherwise to awaken the same considerations; and it is but reasonable, that what we thought a good argument to moderate the resentments of other people should be applied with the same efficacy, to restrain the excesses of our own.

Comment.

There are some notions concerning the nature of things, in which all mankind consent; and not any one considering person ever pretended to contest or contradict them. Such are these that follow: that whatever is good; is profitable, and whatever is truly profitable, is good: that all things are carried by a natural propensity to the desire of good; that equal things are neither less nor more than one another: that twice two makes four; and these notions are such as right reason hath recommended and riveted into our minds, such as long experience hath confirmed, and such as carry an exact agreement with the truth and nature of things.

But when we descend from these general truths, to the particular ideas and doctrines of single persons, there we very often find ourselves mistaken. And these erroneous opinions are of different sorts. Some of them deceive us, by too credulous a dependence upon the report of our senses, as when we pronounce the circumference of the moon, to be as large as that of the sun, because it appears so to the naked eye. Some we are prepossessed in favor of, by inclining too much to our sensual inclinations; as when we say, that all pleasure is good. Some are owing to the admitting of arguments before they are well weighed; as those, which advance the belief of the world being made by two principles, and that the soul is corporeal. Now these are what men argue differently upon, and they are so far from being always true, that many times the truth lies on the contrary side of the question. And it can never be safe for us to depend upon such particular assumptions, for the knowledge of that true state of things, which Epictetus means here, by the condition, the laws, and the methods of nature.

But nothing can be a more pregnant proof, how exceedingly fickle and unfaithful particular opinions are, and how firm and unalterable those general and acknowledged ones, than the variety of behavior, in one and the same case. For let any accident happen to a man’s self, and he is quite another person, transported with the vehemence of his concern, and all his reason proves too feeble to support it. But when the very same misfortune happens to another, there is none of this disorder; he then looks upon it as it really is, considers it calmly and coolly, without passion or prejudice, and passes the same judgement upon it with the rest of the world who have no partial affection, or particular concern to pervert them; but regard only truth, and the clear reason of the thing.

This he illustrates by a very trivial instance, that of breaking a glass: which when done by a neighbor’s child or servant, we are apt presently to excuse, by putting in mind, how exceedingly common this is: that it is what happens every day; that, considering how little a thing throws a child down, how often they let things drop out of their hands, and withal, of how exceedingly brittle the matter of the vessel is made, that the least blow in the world dashes it to pieces, it is rather to be wondered, that such things happen no oftener: thus we say, when our discourse is sober and dispassionate. But when one of our own is broken, then we rage and storm, as if some new thing had happened to us. And yet in all reason, the same consideration of the accident being so usual, ought to offer itself to our minds, then too, and with the same success.

Now this (says he) you may, if you please apply to matters of greater importance: when any of our acquaintances buries his wife or his child, who is there, that does not presently say, this is every man’s case? And the reason of it is, because they pass this reflection, from the common principles in their own minds, and the plain constant course of nature, which they find agreeable to them. For to die, there is a necessity unavoidable; ‘tis the very condition of human nature; to be man, and not subject to this fate, would imply a contradiction. And yet for all this, when such a loss happens in a man’s own family, what groans, what tears, what loud exclamations, what wild extravagances of passion do immediately follow? Nay, how hard is it to persuade men that there is not a justifiable cause for all this, or that any other person living ever suffered such an affliction before? Now, why should not such a one recollect how he felt himself affected, when he saw his neighbor in such excesses, and how wisely he could tell him then, that he mistook his own case? That death was inevitable, and nothing more frequent; and that there was nothing in the accident itself, which could create all this disorder, but it was owing entirely to his own mistaken apprehensions and the violent passions of his own mind, which showed him the thing in a false light?

Now indeed there are two reasons why we should be thus partial and passionate in our own case: one is, the exceeding fondness, and tender sympathy, between the rational soul, and the mortal body; which considering that this part must die, is much more close and moving, than in reason it ought to be. The other is, that though we know and are satisfied, that die we must, yet we do not care to think of it; and so these two dear friends live together, as if they we never to part. Now there is nothing that gives man so much disturbance and confusion, as the being surprised with any accident; for, whatever we have foreseen, and made familiar to our thoughts by long expectation, never gives us those violent disturbances.

This I take to be sufficiently plain, from what we see in our behavior afterwards. For even those that are most intemperate in their grief, yet within a little while, when they come to be used to the being without what they lament the loss of, return to themselves and their reason again, and all is quiet and easy, as if no such misfortune had ever happened. Then they can suggest to their own composed thoughts, what at first they could not endure to hear, that this is no more than we see daily come to pass; that other people are liable to it, and have born it as well as they; that the condition of our nature is mortal, and most absurd it is to suppose any man can be exempt from the common fate of his nature; that our friends are only gone a little way before, in the beaten road, which all our forefathers have trodden, and in which we ourselves shall shortly follow them.

Now if this separation, when a little time and custom hath rendered it familiar, becomes so very supportable, after the thing hath happened; I would fain know, what reason can be alleged, why the making such a separation familiar to us beforehand, by frequent thoughts, and perpetual expectations of it, should not enable us to bear it with great evenness of temper, whenever it shall happen. For surely the true cause of all immoderate concern upon these occasions, is that we do not represent these things to our own thoughts, nor accustom ourselves to them so effectually, as we might and ought to do. And the reason of this again seems to be, that the generality of people have their minds fastened down to their fortunes; and all their imaginations formed, according to the model of their present condition. Hence it is, that the prosperous man is always gay and big, as depending upon the continuance of his happiness, and never dreaming of any possible change in his affairs. And thus people also under unhappy circumstances, are as commonly dispirited and diffident, and can entertain little thought of a deliverance, and better days. But another cause, which contributes to this fault as much as the former, is the unreasonable fondness of these things, which men lament the loss of so tenderly: they perfectly dote upon them, while they have them; and cannot therefore admit any thought so uneasy as that of parting with them; for no man alive cares to dwell long upon meditations which are troublesome and afflicting to him. This fondness is the thing we should guard ourselves against, as least cut off all the excesses of it, by reflecting seriously what we are ourselves, and what that is, which we so passionately admire. We should consider, that it is what we cannot call our own; and that, though we could, yet it is so imperfect a bliss, as to cloy and weary us with long enjoyment. Our kindness therefore should be reduced, and brought within such proportions as are consistent with decency and moderation: and in all our conversation, it will be great prudence to abstain from all expressions and discourse, and especially from all such actions in our behavior, as tend to endear these things the more, and serve in truth for no other end, than to cherish our own folly, and make our passions more exorbitant and ungovernable.

As no man sets up a mark, with a design to shoot beside it: so neither hath the Maker of the World formed in it any such real being, as evil.

Comment.

The disputes, which are wont to arise concerning the nature and origin of evil, have by being unskillfully managed, proved occasion of grievous impiety towards God, subverted the very foundation of virtue and good manners, and perplexed many unwary persons, with several dangerous scruples and inextricable difficulties.

First, as to that opinion, which makes evil a first principle, and will have two common principles, a good and a bad one, from whence all things whatsoever derive their being, it is attended with a thousand prodigious absurdities. For, whence should this power of being a principle, which is one, and is imparted to both these contraries in common, whence I say, should it come? Or how should one and the same cause give it to them both? And how is it possible, that these two should be contraries unless they be ranked under one common genus. For we must distinguish between diversity and contrariety; that which is white, cannot be termed contrary to that which is hot or cold; but contraries are properly those things that are most distant from one another, yet still under the same common genus. White then and black, are contraries, because both bear relation to the genus of color; for they are both colors alike. And hot and cold are contraries, for they likewise meet under the genus of tactile qualities. And this is reason enough to show, that contraries cannot possibly be first principles, because there must have been some common genus antecedent to them, or they could not be contraries: and farther, because one must needs have a being, before many; for each of those many beings must subsist, by virtue of its essence, communicated from that first being, otherwise nothing could ever have been at all.

Again, some single original being there must needs have been, which must have been a foundation for particular properties, and from which those properties must have been distributed among the many. For, from the divine original good, all good things whatsoever proceed; and in like manner all truth, from the same divine fountain of truth. So that, though there be several principles of several properties, yet still these all are comprehended in, and resolved into, one principle at last; and that, not some subordinate and particular one, as these are in their own kind only; but a principle from whence all the rest spring. One that transcends, connects, contains them all, and communicates to each of them its causal and productive power, with such limitations and abatements, as their respective natures require. So exceedingly irrational and absurd it is, to think of advancing two principles of all things, or to suppose it possible that there should be more than one.

Besides, they that will have this universe to proceed from two principles, are driven by their own tenets into a thousand wild inconsistencies. They tell us, one of these principles is good, and the other evil; they call the good one God, but yet at the same time, they do not allow him to be the universal cause: they cannot worship him as almighty, for indeed they have clipped the wings of his omnipotence, and are so far from ascribing all power to him, that they divide it into halves, or to speak more properly they call him the source of goodness, and spring of light, and yet deny, that all things receive light and goodness from him.

Now what horrid blasphemies, what opprobrious reflections does this doctrine cast upon the majesty of God? They represent him as a feeble and a fearful being, uneasy with continual apprehensions, that evil will invade his territories. And, to ease himself of these fears, and buy off his enemy, contrary to all justice, and honor, and interest, casting some souls away, (which are so many parts and parcels of himself, and never merited by any offence of theirs to be thus delivered up,) that so, by parting with these, he may compound for the rest of the good ones with him. Like some general in distress, who, when the enemy attacks him, sacrifices one part of his army, to gain an opportunity of bringing off the other. For the sense of what they say amounts to thus much, though it be not expressed in the very same words. Now he that delivered up these souls, or commanded them to be delivered up in this barbarous manner, had sure forgot, or at least did not duly consider, what miseries those wretched spirits must endure, when in the hands of that evil principle. For (according to them) they are burnt, and fried, and tormented all manner of ways; and this too, notwithstanding they were never guilty of any fault, but are still parts of God himself. And at last they tell us, that, if any such souls happen to apostatize, and degenerate into sin, they never recover themselves; nor are from thenceforth in any possibility of returning to good, but continue inseparably united to evil forever. (Only here it is fit we take notice what souls these are, and how they thus degenerate; for they do not admit their crimes to be adultery or murder, or any of the grossest and most flagitious enormities of a dissolute and wicked conversation, but only the denying of two principles, an evil and a good one.) In the meanwhile, this God, it seems is left maimed and imperfect, by the loss of so many of his parts; he is stupid and senseless too, (in their hypothesis I mean, so far be it from me to entertain so irreverent a thought) for he understands nothing at all, either of his own interest, or the nature of evil: if he did; what dread could he be under, or how should evil enter into any part of that province which good possesses; since their natures are so very distant and irreconcilable, that they cannot run into each other, but their bounds are fixed, and immovable barriers set between them from all eternity?

For this they say too. But who, in the name of wonder, set these bounds and barriers? Did chance? Then it seems they make chance a common principle too. Did any other being which had authority over both these, and prescribed to them as itself thought fit? Then it seems that had a subsistence, before they made the world. But how could that be done before the creation? For the division they make is like this upon Earth; they assign the eastern, western, and northern regions to good, and reserve only the south for evil.

Afterwards they go on, and fancy, that evil hath five apartments, like so many dens or caverns; and here they tell us of woods, and all manner of animals, such as frequent both sea and land; that these are at eternal war with one another; and though they are said to be immortal, as being originally good, yet they pretend at the same time, that they are devoured by their five-formed monster.

Now then, since these distinct regions have been set out, as you see, from the beginning of the world at least; and each assigned and accommodated to its peculiar inhabitant; I would fain be satisfied, which way evil should make an incursion into the dominions of good. Or, if we should suppose this possible, yet could it be done however, and still these two remain contrary to one another? May we not as well say, that white may be black, and yet retain its whiteness still; and that light can admit darkness, and still be light, as that perfect evil can make approaches to perfect good, and still continue perfect evil? And, if this impossibility be evident and unavoidable, what occasion is there to describe God as they do, committing an act of so much unnecessary fear, and folly, and injustice, as is the casting away souls to evil for his own security, and ever since, laboring to no purpose (for so they will needs have it too) to redeem these souls from misery? A design never to be effected, because, as I observed before, some of them have lapsed, and so must abide under the dominion of evil to all eternity: and all this they will not allow the good to have had any knowledge or foresight of, though with the same breath they pretend, that the evil principle knew perfectly well what number of souls would fall into his hands, and laid his stratagems accordingly.

Their scheme certainly had been much better contrived, had they represented the good principle, as always employed and taken up with the contemplation of itself, and not engaged it in perpetual war, with an enemy never to be vanquished or destroyed. For they make evil to be no less eternal and immortal, than good. And this indeed is a considerable objection, and a just reproach to their whole system, that eternal existence, and incorruptible duration, no beginning, and no end, are allowed to evil, as well as to good. And when these glorious attributes are given to that which we cannot but detest, what difference is there left, or what can we say more in honor of that, which we cannot but love and admire?

Let us now proceed, if you please, to take a short view of the account they give, concerning the creation of the world. Pillars then there are, they tell us, not like those of the poet,

Which this vast globe of Earth and Heaven sustain,

(for they scorn, that any poetical fictions, or the least fabulous circumstance, should be allowed a place in their philosophy;) but (as one of their greatest masters hath informed us) of solid unhewn stone, and twelve windows, one of which is constantly opened every hour.

But their marvelous wisdom is not more eminently seen in any one instance, than the account they pretend to give of eclipses. They tell us, that when in framing of the world the evils that were in conjunction together gave great disturbance, by their jostling and disorderly motions, the luminaries drew certain veils before them, to shelter them from the ill influences of that disorder; and, that eclipses are nothing else, but the sun and moon hiding themselves still behind those veils, upon some extraordinary and threatening emergencies.

Then again, how odd and unaccountable is it, that, of so many heavenly bodies which give light to the world, they should hold only the two great ones in veneration, and condemn all the rest; assigning the Sun and Moon to the good principle, but putting all the stars into the possession of the evil, and deriving them from a bad cause?

The light of the moon they do not agree to be borrowed from the Sun, but think it a collection or constellation of souls, which she draws up, like so many vapors from the Earth, between change and full; and then translates them by degrees into the sun, from the full to the next New Moon.

In short, they have a world of extravagant fancies, which do not so much as deserve to be reckoned among fables. And yet they are by no means content to have them looked upon as fabulous, nor do they use them as figures or hieroglyphics, so as to signify something else of more substantial goodness, but will needs have them believed to be strictly and literally true. Thus the image they give us of evil, is a monster, compounded of five several creatures; a lion, a fish, an eagle, and some other two things, I do not well remember what; but all these, together, are supposed to make a very ravenous and formidable composition.

Such abominable impiety against God are these notions and principles chargeable with; and yet (which is still more amazing) the persons, who advance them, profess to take sanctuary in these opinions, out of a more than common respect, and a profounder reverence to the divine perfections, than the rest of the world (as they think) express. They could not bear the imputing any evil to God; and, to avoid this inconvenience, they have found out a particular principle and cause of all evil; a principle equal in honor and power to the good, or rather indeed superior and more potent than He. For in all the attempts made hitherto, to corrupt the world, and render it miserable, evil seems plainly to have got the better. For they represent evil upon all occasions taking advantage against good, and contriving all manner of ways not to let it go. This is constantly the bold and daring aggressor; while good, in the meanwhile, gives way to, and mingles itself with evil, would fain compound the matter, and, for anything that yet appears, hath discovered nothing in its whole management, but fear, and folly, and injustice. Thus, while they abhor to call God the cause of evil, they make him nothing but evil in the most exquisite degree; and (according to that vulgar proverb) leap out of the frying pan into the fire.

But, besides these vile profanations of the majesty of God, this system of philosophy does, as much as in it lies, tears up the very roots of all virtue and moral instruction, by destroying and utterly taking away all that liberty of choice, which God and nature hath given us. For, besides those attributes of eternity and immortality, it does also ascribe to this principle of evil a compulsive power over our wills; and that, so very absolute and strong, that it is not only out of our own disposal, whether we will commit wickedness or not, but such as even God himself is not able to control or overpower. In the meanwhile it must be confessed, that this is a very idle and extravagant imagination: for, if our souls are violently thrust and born down into murder or adultery, or any other that are reputed the most grievous crimes, and commit these, merely by the impulse of some stronger power, without any consent or voluntary concurrence of their own, then are they clear of all guilt. And this is a matter so evident and acknowledged, that all laws both divine and human, acquit persons in cases of violence, and such a force as they could not resist, and where it is plain they acted against their will. And indeed there is not, nor can be any sin at all in such actions, where the minds of men are supposed to have no concern, but to proceed upon necessity and constraint, and such as could not be resisted by them.

Now if these wise philosophers, while they were at a loss, where to fix the true cause of these things, considered as evils, bethought themselves of this remedy, and set up such a principle of evil, as you have heard, to resolve the difficulty; they have done their own business effectually, and, by a very pleasant blunder, overturned their whole scheme at once. For, if it follows likewise, (upon the supposal of such a constraint put upon the wills of men by that principle) that nothing they do is any longer evil, then observe, how pleasant a conclusion they have brought their matters to: for the consequence lies plainly thus, if their be such a thing as a principle of evil, then there is no such thing as evil in the world; and if there be no such thing as evil, then there cannot possibly be any such thing as a principle of evil; and so upon the whole matter, they have left themselves neither a principle of evil, nor any evil at all.

Since therefore this is discovered to be but a rotten foundation; if any, conscious of its weakness, shall presume to affirm, that God is the author of evil as well as good, the falsehood and impiety of this assertion will ask but little time and pains to evince it. For how indeed can we suppose it possible, that that opinion should be true, which casts such unworthy aspersions upon him, who is the author and giver of all truth?

And first, which way can one conceive, that God, whose very essence is perfect and immutable goodness, should produce evil out of himself? For, since evil and good are contrary to each other, as our adversaries themselves grant, how can we imagine one contrary to be the production of another?

Besides, he that produces anything out of himself, does it, by being the cause of its existing, by having the cause within himself, and by having some likeness to it in his own nature; and so, if you respect him as the cause, the producing, and the produced, are in some degree the same. So that the promoters of this opinion seem not to have attended to the manifest dishonor they put upon God, by making him not only the cause and author of evil, but to be the first and original evil in his own nature.

Since therefore there is no such thing as a common principle of evil, and since God is not the author and cause of it, what account shall we give of its coming into the world? For it is impossible anything should have a beginning, without a cause. And the best course we can take for this will be, first to explain what we mean by evil, and then to inquire into its origin; for the causes of things will very hardly be found, till their natures are first known.

Now as to that evil, which they suppose, who profess to believe a common principle of evil, and many of those who dispute this question understand, we may be bold to pronounce, that there is no such thing in nature. For they pretend, that this evil hath a positive subsistence of its own, as good hath; that it hath a power equal to good, and contrary to it; that its essence is incompatible with that of good, and will no more endure any mixture with it, than white will with black, or hot with cold. But if there were any such real and substantial evil, like the substance of a man, or a horse, or any other species, which really and actually subsists; it must needs have some sort of perfection in proportion to its nature; and a particular form, which makes it what it is, and distinguishes it from all other beings. Now every form, considered as such, is good and not evil, because it is endued with the perfections peculiar to its nature. And indeed they are so sensible of this, as to make that evil of theirs desire good, and embrace and court it, and receive advantage by it, and love to partake of it, and use all possible diligence not to part from it. And how very ridiculous an attempt is it, to impose upon us a thing which does all this, for a being simply and absolutely evil?

But then, if we consider in the next place, that evil, by the commission whereof men are dominated wicked, and are punished by God and man for contracting the guilt of it; this is purely accidental, and hath no real essence of its own: for we find that it both is, and ceases to be, without the destruction of the subject, which is the very distinguishing character of an accident; and likewise, it never subsists, but by inheritance in some subject: for, what evil of this kind was there ever in the abstract, without being the evil, that is, the crime, of some person who committed it? And so in like manner, moral good, which is the true opposite of evil, in this sense is merely an accident too.

Only herein they differ, that good is that quality of its subject, by which it is rendered agreeable to nature, and attains its proper perfection. But evil is the depravation or indisposition of its subject, by which it swerves and departs from nature, and loses or falls short of its natural perfection, that is, of good. For, if evil were the right disposition, and natural perfection of the form to which it belongs, then would it by this means change its name and its nature, and commence good. So that from hence we may conclude against any primary nature and positive subsistence of evil; for it is not in nature as good is, but is only an additional thing superinduced upon good, the privation of, and fall from it.

Just thus we may conceive sickness, with regard to health; and the vices of the mind, with respect to virtue. And as the walking strong and upright is the designed and primary action of an animal, and the end which it proposes to itself when it moves; but stumbling or halting is an accident beside the purpose, and happens through some defect, and missing the intended aim; being a motion, not of nature’s making, nor agreeable to her operations; directly so we may affirm of evil, when compared to its opposite good. And, though these be contraries, as white and black are, yet no man can maintain, that they do equally subsist, or are equipollent to one another, as white and black are in a physical consideration. For these do both subsist alike, and neither of them can pretend to a greater perfection in nature, than the other; and consequently, one is not the mere privation of the other. For, a privation is properly a defect or kind of false step in nature, whereby the original form is not fully come up to, as limping is in a man’s gate. But now each of those colors hath its form entire, and as much of what nature intended should belong to it, as its contrary. Whereas, in the case before us, one of the extremes is agreeable to nature, and the other contrary to it; and that which is contrary to nature, is an accidental addition to that part which is agreeable to it; for good was first, and then evil; not evil first, and afterwards good. As no man can say, that missing the mark was antecedent to the hitting of it; nor sickness before health; but quite otherwise. For it was the archer’s primitive design to hit the mark, and he shot on purpose that he might do so. Thus also it was the original intent of nature, to give us sound health, and a good constitution; for, the preservation and continuance of the creature, was the very end she proposed to herself in forming it. And, in general terms, whatever any action is directed to, that is the proper end of it. But now the missing the mark happens afterwards by accident, when the operation does not succeed as it ought, nor attain the end at first proposed, but hits upon something else, some disappointment instead of it. Now then this disappointment, which comes in afterwards and by the by, may very truly be said to be additional, and accidental to the original purpose of hitting the mark; but that purpose can with no good propriety of speech be called so, with regard to that, which happened afterwards, besides and against the man’s purpose.

If then all things naturally desire good, and every thing of any kind, acts with a prospect of, or in order to, some real, or some seeming good; it is manifest, that the obtaining some good is the primary end of all operations whatsoever. Sometimes indeed it happens, that evil steps in between; when the desire is fixed upon some object not really and truly good, but such in outward appearance only, and which hath an allay and mixture of evil with it. Thus when a man in pursuit of pleasures, or greedy of wealth, turns a robber, or a pirate; his desire, in this case, is principally fixed upon the seeming good; and that is the spring, upon which all these actions move; but, as matters stand, he is forced to take the good and the bad together. For no man alive was yet so unnaturally profligate, as to be guilty of lewdness for lewdness sake; or to rob any man merely for the sake of stealing; or indeed, disposed to any manner of evil, purely for the satisfaction of doing evil. Because it is past all doubt, that evil, considered and apprehended as evil, can never be the object of any man’s desire. For if it were the principal and original cause of those things which proceed from it, then would it be the end of all such things: as an end it would be desirable to them, as good. For good and desirable are terms reciprocal and convertible; and consequently, at this rate, it would become good, and cease to be evil.

‘Tis most certainly true then, that all things whatsoever do desire and pursue their own advantage; not all, their true and real advantage indeed; but all their seeming benefit, and such as they at that time take for the true, and best. For no man is willingly deceived; no man chooses a falsehood before truth, nor shadows before substances, who knows and is sensible of the difference between them, when he does it. But this misfortune happens generally, from a blind admiration of some apparent good, which so dazzles our eyes, that either we do not at all discover the evil it is attended with, or if we do discern that, yet we see the thing through false optics, such as magnify the good, and lessen the evil to the eye. Now it is a frequent and a reasonable choice, when we are content to take a greater good with the encumbrance of a less evil: as for instance, when we suffer an incision, or a cupping, and account the evil of these pains much too little, to counterbalance the good there is, in that health which they restore to us.

Once more yet. That all things desire good, is farther plain from hence; that, supposing evil to have a real being, and a power of acting, whatever it did, would be for its own advantage, that is, in other words, for its own good. And thus much they who ascribe a being and operation to it confess; for they pretend, that it pursues after good, would fain detain it, and uses all possible endeavors not to let it go. And if evil be the object of no desire, then it is not any primary and designed nature. But, since the condition of it is, in all particulars, according to the description here given of it; it is most truly said, to be an accidental and additional thing, superinduced to something that did subsist before, but to have no subsistence of its own.

Well (says the objector) I allow what you say. We will suppose, that evil is only an accident, a defect, a privation of good, and an additional disappointment of the first and original intent of nature. And what of all this? How are we advanced in the question before us? For let this be what, or after what manner you please, still it must have some cause: otherwise, how, in the name of wonder, did it ever find the way into the world? How then will you get out of this maze? You allow God to be the cause of all things; you must grant that evil hath some cause; and yet you tell me, that god is infinitely good, and so cannot be that cause.

This objection hath been already considered, and spoken to, both at the beginning of the book, where we explained this author’s distinction of the things in, and not in our own power; and also in the comment upon the XII chapter, upon occasion of those words, trouble not yourself with wishing, that things may be just as you would have them, &c. But however I will speak to it once more here too, and that briefly, as follows.

God, who is the source and original cause of all goodness, did not only produce the highest and most excellent things, such as are good in themselves; nor only those that are of a rank something inferior to these, and of a middle nature; but the extremes too, such as are capable of falling, and apt to be perverted from that which is agreeable to nature, to that which we call evil. Thus; as, after those incorruptible bodies, which are always regular in their motions, and immutably good, others were created subject to change and decay; so likewise it was with souls. The same order was observed with these too; for after them which were unalterably fixed in good, others were produced liable to be seduced from it. And this was done, both for the greater illustration of the wise and mighty creator’s glory; that the riches of his goodness might be the more clearly seen, in producing good things of all sorts, as many as were capable of subsisting; and also, that the universe might be full and perfect, when beings of all kinds, and all proportions, were contained in it. (For this is a perfection, to want nothing of any kind.) And likewise, to vindicate the highest and the middle sort, which never decline or deviate from their goodness, from that contempt, which always falls upon the lowest of any sort; and such these had been, if the corruptible and mortal things had not been created, and supported the other’s dignity, by their own want of it.

And corruptible they must be. For it could never be, that while the first, and the middle sort of bodies continued as they are; some immutable, both as to their nature and their operation; others immutable indeed, as to their substance, but mutable in their motion; it could not be, I say, that the lowest and sublunary bodies should ever hold out, while the violent revolutions of the heavenly ones were perpetually changing their substance, and putting them into unnatural disorders.

For these reasons certainly, and perhaps for a great many others more important than these, which are secrets too dark and deep for us, these sublunary bodies were made, and this region of mortality, where the pervertible good hath its residence. For there was a necessity, that the lowest sort of good should have a being too; and such is that, which is liable to change and depravation. Hence also, there is no such thing as evil in the regions above us; for the nature of evil, being nothing else but a corruption of the meanest and most feeble good, can only subsist, where that mean and mutable good resides. For this reason the soul, which, considered by herself, is a generous and immutable being, is tainted with no evil, while alone in a state of separation. But being so contrived by nature, as to dwell in this lower world, and being intimately united to mortal bodies, (for so the good providence of our great father and creator hath ordered it, making these souls a link to tie the spiritual and material world together, joining the extremes by the common brands of life,) it seems to bear a part in all those distempers and decays, which evil subjects our bodies to, by disturbing their natural habit and frame. Though indeed I cannot think this to be evil, strictly speaking, but rather good; since the effect of it is so: for thus, the simple elements, of which these bodies are compounded, come to be set free from a great confinement, and severed from other parts of matter of a different constitution, with which they were interwoven and entangled before; and so, getting loose from the perpetual combat between contrary qualities, are restored to their proper places, and their primitive mass again, in order to acquire new life and vigor.

And if this proceeding be the occasion of perpetual change, yet neither is that evil; because everything is resolved at last, into what it was at the beginning. For water, though evaporated into air, yet is by degrees congealed into water again; and so, even particular beings lose nothing by those vicissitudes.

But that, which ought to be a consideration of greater moment, is, that the dissolution of compound bodies, and the mutual change of simple ones into each other, contributes to the advantage of the universe in general, by making the corruption of one thing to become the rise and birth of another. By this perpetual round it is, that matter and motion have been sustained all this while. Now it is obvious to any observing man, that both nature and art, (as was urged heretofore,) do frequently neglect a singe part, when the detriment of that in particular, may conduce to the good of the whole. The former does it, as often as our rheums, and ulcerous humors, are thrown off from the vitals, and turned into sores or swellings in any of the extreme parts; and art imitates this method of nature, as often as a limb is seared, or lopped off, for the preservation of the body: so that upon the whole matter, these shocks and corruptions of bodies deserve rather to be esteemed good than evil; and the cause of them, the cause of good and not evil events. For those sublunary bodies, which are simples, suffer no injury, because they are subject to no decay or destruction: and for the evil which the parts seem to undergo, this hath been shown to have more good than evil in it, both in simples and compounds, even when considered in itself; but, if taken with respect to the benefit which other creatures reap by it, then it is manifestly good. So that the distempers and decays of bodies, take them which way you will, are not evil, but produce great good.

But if any one shall be scrupulous upon this occasion, and quarrel with our calling that good, which is confessed to be no better than a perverting of the course of nature; let not this nice caviler take upon him however to call it evil, in the gross sense, and common acceptation of the word; by which we understand something, utterly repugnant and irreconcilable to good. But let him call rather it a necessity or hardship; as not desirable for its own sake, but having some tendency, and contributing, to that which is so: for, were it simply and absolutely evil, it could never be an instrument of good to us. Now that which I mean by necessary, though it have not charms enough of its own to recommend it, yet does it deserve to be accounted good, for leading us to that which is good; and that which can become a proper object of our choice, under any circumstance, is so far forth good. Thus we choose incisions, and burnings, and amputations; nay, we are content to pay dear for them, and acknowledge ourselves obliged, both by the prescription, and the painful operation; all which were most ridiculous to be done, if we thought these things evil. And yet I own, this is but a qualified and inferior good, not strictly and properly so, but only in a second and subordinate sense: yet so, that the creator of these things is by no means the cause of evil, but a necessary and meaner good, though a good still; for such we ought to esteem it, since it is derived from the same universal fountain of goodness, though embased with some allays and abatements. And thus much, I hope, may be thought sufficient, in vindication of the nature and cause of that evil, which bodies are concerned in.

Nothing indeed can so truly be called evil, as the lapses and vices of the soul of man. And of these too, much hath been said before; but however we will resume the discourse on this occasion, and inquire afresh, both into the nature and cause of them.

And here we shall do well to take notice, that the souls of a more excellent nature, which dwell in the regions above us, are immutably fixed in goodness, and wholly unacquainted with any evil. There are also the souls of brutes, of a baser alloy than ours, and standing in the middle as it were, between the vegetative souls of plants, and our rational ones. These, so far forth as they are corporeal, are liable to that evil, to which bodies are subject; but so far as concerns their appetites and inclinations, they bear some resemblance to the human. And the evil, they are in this respect obnoxious to, is in proportion the same; so that one of these will be sufficiently explained, by giving an account of the other.

Now the human soul is in a middle station, between the souls above, and those below. It partakes of the qualities of both; of those more excellent ones, in the sublimity of its nature, and the excellence of its understanding: of the brutal and inferior ones, by its strict affinity to the body and animal life. Of both these it is the common band, by its vital union with the body; and by its habitual freedom, it assimilates itself sometimes to the one sort, and sometimes to the other of these natures. So long as it dwells above, and entertains itself with noble and divine speculations, it preserves its innocence, and is fixed in goodness; but when it begins to flag and droop, when it sinks down from that blissful life, and grovels in the filth of the world, which by nature it is equally apt to do, then it falls into all manner of evil. So that its own voluntary depression of itself into this region of corruption and mortality, is the true beginning, and proper cause, of all its misery and mischief. For, though the soul be of an amphibious disposition, yet it is not forced either upwards or downwards; but acts purely by an internal principle of its own, and is in perfect liberty. Nor ought this to seem incredible, in an agent which nature hath made free; since even those brutes that are amphibious, dwell sometimes in the water and sometimes upon dry ground, without being determined to either, any otherwise than by their own inclination.

Now when the soul debases herself to the world, and enters into a near intimacy with the corruptible body, and esteems this to be the other constituent of human nature; then it leads the life of brutes, and exerts itself in such operations only, as they are capable of. Its intellectual part degenerates into sense and imagination, and its affections into anger and concupiscence. By these the wretched mortal attains to knowledge, just of the same pitch with that of other animals; such as puts him upon seeking fresh supplies for a body continually wasting, and upon continuing the world by posterity, to fill the place of one who must shortly leave it; and upon making the best provision he can, for his own preservation and defense in the meanwhile. For these cares are what no mortal would have, were he not endued with sensual faculties and passions. For what man, who is anything nice and considering, would endure to spend so many days and years upon the support of this body, (when the burden of the whole matter comes to no more, than always filling, and always emptying) if sensual inclinations did not whet his appetite? Or who could undergo the tedious fatigue by which succession is kept up, if vehement desires did not perpetually kindle new flames, and the prospect of posterity makes us more easy to warmed by them? These arguments have been in some measure insisted on before, and I take them to be abundantly clear in this point; that, though our passions and appetites be the cause of moral evil, yet they are extremely beneficial to the creatures, in which nature hath implanted them; as being necessary to their constitution, and giving a relish to some of the most indispensable actions of life. Upon all which accounts, even these cannot with any justice be called evil; nor God who infused them, the cause of evil.

But the truth of the matter is this: the soul is by nature superior to this body, and this animal life, and hath a commanding power over them put into her hands. This dignity and power so long as she preserves, keeping her subjects under, and at their due distance; while she uses the body as her instrument, and converts all its functions to her own use and benefit, so long all is well, and there is no danger of evil. But when once she forgets, that the divine image is stamped upon her; when she lays by the ensigns of government, and gives away the reins out of her own hands; when she sinks down into the dregs of flesh and sense, (by preferring the impetuous temptations of pleasure, before the mild and gentle persuasions of reason,) and enters into a strict union with the brutish part; then reason acts against its own principles, divest itself of its despotic power, and basely submits to be governed by its slave. And this confusion in the soul is the root of all evil; an evil, not owing to the more excellent and rational part, while it maintains its own station; nor to the inferior or sensual, while that keeps within its due bounds; but to the inverting of these, the violent usurpation of the one, and the tame submission of the other; that is, the perverse choice of degenerating into body and matter, rather than forming oneself after the similitude of the excellent spirits above us. But still all this, as I said, is choice, and not constraint; it is still liberty, though liberty abused.

And here I would bespeak the reader’s attention a little, to weigh the reasons I am about to give, why choice and volition must needs be the soul’s own act and deed, an internal motion of ours, and not the effect of any compulsion from without. I have already urged the clearness of this truth at large, and that the soul only is concerned, and acts purely upon the principles of her own native freedom, in the choice of the worse, no less than of the better part. Thus much I apprehend to have been plainly proved, from the example of Almighty God himself; the determinations of all wise laws, and well constituted governments, and the judgement of sober and knowing men; who all agree in this, that the merits of men are to be measured not by the fact itself, or the events of things, but by the will and intention of the person. And accordingly their rewards and punishments, their censures and their commendations, are all proportioned to the intention; because this alone is entirely in a man’s own power, and consequently, it is the only thing he can be accountable for. From hence it comes to pass, that whatever is done by constraint and irresistible force, though the crime be never so grievous, is yet pardoned or acquitted, and the guilt imputed, not to the party that did it, but to the person that forced him to the doing of it. For he who used that force, did it voluntarily; but he who was born down by it, had no will of his own concerned in the fact, but became the mere instrument of effecting it, against the inclination of his own mind.

Since then our own choice is the cause of evil; and since that choice is the soul’s voluntary act, owing to no manner of compulsion, but its own internal motion, what can we charge evil upon, so justly as upon the soul? But yet, though the soul be the cause of evil, it is not the cause of it, considered as evil; for nothing ever is, or can be chosen, under that notion. But evil disguises itself, and deludes us with an appearance of good; and when we choose that seeming good, we take at the same time the real evil concealed under it. And thus much in effect was said before too.

And now, having thus discovered the true origin of evil, it is fit we proclaim to all the world, that God is not chargeable with any sin; because it is not he, but the soul which produces evil, and that freely and willingly too: for, were the soul under any constraint to do amiss, then, I allow, there would be a colorable pretence to lay the blame on God, who had suffered her to lie under so fatal a necessity and had not left her free to rescue and save herself: (Though, in truth, upon this presumption, nothing that the soul was forced to do, could be strictly evil.) But now, since the soul is left to herself, and acts purely by her own free choice, she must be content to bear all the blame.

If it shall be farther objected, that all this does not yet acquit Almighty God; for that it is still his act, to allow men this liberty, and leave them to themselves; and that he ought not to permit them in the choice of evil. Then we are to consider, that one of these two things must have been the consequence of such a proceeding: either first, that, after he had given man a rational soul, capable of choosing sometimes good, and sometimes evil, he must have chained up his will, and made it impossible for him to choose anything but good; or else, that the soul ought never to have had this indifference at all, but to have been so framed at first, that the choice of evil should have been naturally impossible. One of these two things the objector must say, or he says nothing at all to the purpose.

Now the former of these is manifestly absurd; for to what purpose was the will left free and undetermined either way, if the determining itself one way, was afterwards to be debarred it? This would have been utterly to take away the power of choosing; for choice and necessity are things inconsistent; and where the mind is so tied up, that it can choose but one thing, there (properly speaking) it can choose nothing.

As to the latter, it must be remembered in the first place, that no evil is ever chosen, when the mind apprehends it to be evil: but the objector seems to think, it were very convenient to have this freedom of the will, which is so absolute in the determining of itself sometimes to real good, and sometimes to that which deceives it with a false appearance of being so, quite taken away: imagining it to be no good, to be sure, and perhaps some great evil: but alas! he does not consider, how many things there are in the world, accounted exceedingly good, which yet are not really in any degree comparable to this freedom of the will. For in truth, there is no thing, no privilege, in this lower world, so desirable. And there is nobody so stupid and lost, as to wish, that he were a brute, or a plant, rather than a man. And therefore, since God displayed the abundance of his goodness and power, in giving perfections inferior to this; how inconsistent would it have been with that bounty of his, not to have bestowed this most excellent privilege upon mankind?

Besides, (as hath been intimated formerly,) take away this undetermined propension of the soul, by which it inclines itself to good or evil, and you undermine the very foundation of all virtue, and in effect destroy the nature of man. For if you suppose it impossible to be perverted to vice, you have no longer any such thing as justice, or temperance, or any other virtue, left in the observing moral duties. This state of purity may be the excellence of an angel, or a God; but impeccable and indefectible goodness can never be the virtue of a man. From whence it is plain, that there was a necessity of leaving the soul in a capacity, of being corrupted, and of committing all that evil consequent to such depravation, because otherwise a gap would have been left in the creation. There could have been no medium between the blessed spirits above, and brutes below; no such thing as human nature, or human virtue in the world.

So then we allow, that this self-determining power, by which men are depraved, is a thing of God’s own creation and appointment; and yet we consider withal, how necessary this is to the order and beauty of the universe, and how many good effects it hath. In other respects, we can by no means admit, that God should be traduced as the cause and author of evil upon this account. When a surgeon lays on a drawing plaster to ripen a swelling, or cuts or sears any part of our bodies, or lops off a limb, no man thinks he takes these methods to make his patient worse, but better; because reason tells us, that men, in such circumstances, are never to be cured by less painful applications. Thus the divine justice, in his deserved vengeance, suffers the passions of the soul to rage and swell so high, because he knows the condition of our distemper; and that the smarting sometimes under the wild suggestions of our own furious appetites, is the only way to bring us to a better sense of our extravagance, and to recover us of our frenzy.

‘Tis thus, we suffer little children to burn their fingers, that we may deter them from playing with fire. And for the same reasons, many wise educators of youth, do not think themselves obliged to be always thwarting the inclinations of those under their charge; but sometimes connive at their follies, and give them a loose: there being no way so effectual for the purging of these passions, as to let them sometimes be indulged, that so the persons may be cloyed, and nauseate, and grow sick of them. And in these cases, it cannot be said, that either those parents and governors, or the justice of God, is the cause of evil, but rather of good, because all this is done with a virtuous intent. For whatever tends to the reformation of manners, or confirming the habits of virtue, may be as reasonably called virtuous, as those thing that are done, in order to the recovery and continuance of health, may be called wholesome. For actions do principally take their denomination and quality, from the end to which they are directed. So that, although God were in some measure the cause of this necessity we are in, of deviating from goodness; yet moral evil cannot be justly laid at his door. But how far he is really the cause of our reflection from our duty, I shall now think, it becomes me to inquire.

God does not by any power, or immediate act of his own, cause that aversion from good, which the soul is guilty of, when it sins; but he only gave her such a power, that she might turn herself to evil; that so such a species of free agents might fill a void space in the universe, and many good effects might follow, which, without such an aversion, could never have been brought about. God indeed is truly and properly the cause of this liberty of our wills; but then this is a happiness and a privilege, infinitely to be preferred above whatever else the world thinks most valuable; and the operation of it consists in receiving impressions, and determining itself thereupon, not from any constraint, but by its own mere pleasure.

Now, that a nature thus qualified is good, I cannot suppose there needs any proof; we have the confession of our adversaries themselves to strengthen us in the belief of it. For even they, who set up a principle of evil, declare they do it, because they cannot think God the author of evil; and these very men do not only acknowledge the soul to be of his forming, but they talk big, and pretend that it is a part of his very essence; and yet, notwithstanding all this, they own it capable of being vitiated, but so as to be vitiated by itself only. For this is the manifest consequence of their other tenets; that it depends upon our own choice, whether we will overcome evil, or be overcome by it; that the vanquished in this combat are very justly punished, and the victors largely and deservedly rewarded. Now the truth is, when they talk at this rate, they do not well consider, how directly these notions contradict that irresistible necessity to sin, which they elsewhere make the soul to lie under. But however, whether the soul be depraved by its own foolish choice, or whether by some fatal violence upon it from without, still the being naturally capable of such depravation, is agreed on all hands; for both sides confess it to be actually depraved, which it could never be, without a natural capacity of being so. Therefore they tell us, the first original good is never tainted with evil, because his nature is above it, and inconsistent with any such defect; as are also the other goodnesses, in the next degree of perfection to him, such as in their cant are called the Mother of Life, the Creator, and the Aeones. So then these men acknowledge the depravable condition of the soul; they profess God to be the maker of it, and to have set it in this condition: and yet it is plain they think the nature of the soul depravable, as it is good, and not evil; because at the same time that they ascribe this freedom of the will to God, they are yet superstitiously fearful of ascribing any evil to him. And this I think may very well suffice, for the nature and origin of evil.

Let us now apply ourselves to consider the passage before us, and observe, how artificially Epictetus hath comprised in a very few words, the substance of those arguments, which we have here drawn out to so great a length. For in regard the choice of good, and the refusing of evil, are the object and ground of all moral instructions whatsoever, it was proper for him to show, that the nature of evil was something very odd, and out of course. In some sense it has a being, and in some sense it is denied to have any; it has no existence of its own, and yet it is a sort of supernumerary, and a very untoward addition to nature. In the meanwhile, this shows, that we ought not to make it our choice, because nature never made it hers; and whenever it got into the world, it was never brought in by design, but came in by chance. No man ever proposed it, as the end of any action; no artificer ever drew his model for it: the mason proposes the house he is building, and the carpenter the door he is plaining, for his end; but neither the one, nor the other, ever works, only that he may work ill.

Epictetus’ argument then lies in the following syllogism that evil is the missing of the mark: for what nature hath given a real and a designed existence to is the mark; and the compassing of that, is the hitting of the mark. Now, if what nature really made and designed, be not the missing of the mark, (as it is not, but the hitting it indeed) and if evil be the missing of the mark, then it is plain that evil can be none of those things, which have a real and a designed existence.

Now, that evil is properly the missing of the mark, is plain, from what hath been spoken to this point already. For, suppose a man makes pleasure his mark, he aims at it as a good and desirable thing; he lets fly accordingly, his imaginations I mean, which indeed fly swifter than any arrow out of a bow. But if he does not attain the good he desires, but shoots wide, or short of it; ‘tis plain this man is worsted, and hath missed the mark. And again, that something, to which nature designed and gave a being, is constantly the mark every man aims at, and the obtaining those things, the hitting of his mark, is no less evident from the instances I gave, of the mason and the carpenter.

Now, when the author says there is no such real being as evil in the world; you are to understand, that nature never formed or designed any such thing: and then, if you please, you may take his minor proposition singly by itself, which consists of those words, As no man sets up a mark with a design to shoot beside it. (for this intimates that evil is a missing of one’s aim,) without mentioning the major; which implies, that the principal design, and real work of nature, is never the missing, but the hitting of the mark; and so add the conclusion, which is this, therefore evil is none of the principal designs, or real works of nature.

It may likewise be put all together into one single hypothetical proposition thus: If no man sets up a mark on purpose to shoot beside it, then there is no such real being as evil in the world. For if there were such a thing, then it would be proposed, as the end or product of action. But evil is never proposed as a thing to be produced or obtained, but as a thing to be declined; for evil is always the object of our refusal and aversion. So that at this rate, it would follow, that there is a mark set up, only that it may not be hit; which is contrary to common sense, and the practice of all mankind. And therefore there can be no such thing in nature as evil, because evil is not capable of being the end of any action in nature.

If anyone should take upon him to expose your body to be abused by every man you meet, you would resent it as an insupportable insolence and affront. And ought you not then to be much ashamed of yourself, for enslaving and exposing your mind to everyone who is disposed to take the advantage? For so indeed you do, when you put it in the power of every malicious tongue, to disturb the inward peace and order of your breast. For this reason, before you attempt anything, weigh diligently with yourself, the several difficulties it is likely to be encumbered with, the circumstances preliminary to, and consequent upon it. For unless you come well settled with this consideration, you will afterward be discouraged; and what you began with eagerness and vigor, you will desist from with cowardice and shame.

Comment.

The thing Epictetus drives at, is very much illustrated by the comparisons he uses here, setting ourselves in opposition to others, and the soul to the body. For, to be injured by ones own self is much worse than if it were done by another. If we are apt to resent an unkindness, when coming from a friend, with much more impatience, than the same thing from a common man; because, the considerations of intimate acquaintance, and former obligations step in, and heighten the provocation, by telling us we had reason to expect better usage; how much more is the injustice aggravated, when a man does anything to his own prejudice? And again, if the affronts and injuries done to the body, are so deeply resented; how much more tender ought we to be, when the soul is injured and abused?

Again, if we think it an insupportable insolence in any other person, to expose our body to abuses, when yet his affronting or not affronting us after this manner is a thing not in our own power; and if the exposing our minds to be abused by the next man we meet, by suffering ourselves to be disordered at the calumnies of every malicious railer, be a thing which depends purely upon our own choice, whether it shall be done or not; then we ought to be ashamed upon a double account: first, for taking a thing ill, which was not in our power to help, and which too, when done, was not strictly evil to us; and then, for exposing our own selves, to that which is a real evil, and that evil so much the worse, because such a one, as it was in our power to prevent.

Now upon this occasion he changes his expression, and does not call it indignation, but shame. For the injuries which come upon us from another hand, we receive with resentments of anger; but those that we ourselves are guilty of, we reflect upon with shame and remorse. And surely there is much greater reason for doing so, when we ourselves have been guilty of injuring ourselves; especially, when these injures need not have befallen us, indeed could not have done so, but by our own choice. And this is the proper notion of shame: the being out of countenance at the folly and foulness of our own voluntary miscarriages. And what can more deserve a blush, than the not discerning the mighty difference there is, between the several branches of so lively a comparison as this? And when one does discern it, what can be more scandalous, than not to act accordingly?

You are extremely desirous to win the Olympic crown. I wish the same for myself too; and look upon it as an immortal honor. But not so fast: consider the preparation necessary to such an undertaking, and the accidents likely to follow upon it; and then let me hear you say you’ll attempt it. You must be confined to a strict regimen; must be crammed with meat when you have no appetite; must abstain wholly from boiled meats; must exercise, whether you be disposed to it or not, whether it be hot or cold; must drink nothing but what is warm, nor any wine, but in such proportions as shall be thought proper for you. In a word, you must resign yourself up to your governor, with as absolute an obedience, as you would to a physician. When all this hardship is mastered, you have all the chances of combat to go through still. And here it is many a man’s fortune to break an arm, or put out a leg, to be thrown by his adversary, and get nothing but a mouthful of dust for his pains; and, as it may happen, to be lashed and beaten, and become the jest and scorn of the spectators. Lay all these things together; and then, perhaps, your courage may be cooled. But if upon considering them well, you nevertheless retain your resolution; then are you fit to set about the pursuit of what you so much desire. Otherwise you will come off like little children, who in their sports act sometimes wrestlers, and sometimes fiddlers; now they are fencers, and play prizes; then they turn trumpeters, and go to war; and by and by build a stage and act plays. Just so we shall have you, one while an Olympic fighter, and another a gladiator; by and by an orator, and after that a philosopher; but nothing long, except a ridiculous whistler, a mere ape, mimicking all you see, and venturing at all professions, but sticking to none. And all this is occasioned, by your taking things upon you hand over head, without being seasoned and duly prepared for them; but either with a rash heat, or fickle inclination. Thus it is with many people, when they see an eminent philosopher, or hear him quoted with admiration and respect (as, how excellently did Socrates write on such a subject! sure no man was ever like him,) nothing will serve their turn, but these hotspurs must needs be philosophers too, and each of them does not doubt, but he shall make a Socrates in time.

Now I advise thee, friend, first of all to consider perfectly the nature of the thing thou would’st undertake, and then thy own qualifications for it, whether this be what thou art cut out for, or not. Examine thy limbs, and thy sinews; every man is not built for the Olympic exercises. Do you imagine, when you apply yourself to philosophy, that you can be allowed to live at the same rate you do now? To indulge your appetite, and be as nice in all you eat and drink? Alas? You must prepare for want of sleep, for hard labor, for absence from your family and your friends, for contempt and insolence from your inferiors, and to have others, less worthy, put over your head in preferments, countenanced more than you in courts of justice, and respected more in conversation. Sit down now, and ask yourself, if the prize be worth all these pains. Whether you can be content, at so dear a rate to purchase an equal temper, a quiet mind, perfect freedom, and unmovable constancy. If you think the price set upon these things too high, leave them for some other purchaser, and do not expose yourself, like those ridiculous boys I mentioned, by being a philosopher this hour, and a tax collector the next; a school master today, and a statesman tomorrow. These things are not for your credit. In short, you have but one man to make and you may make him either a good or a bad one. You must either make yourself, or the world your care. In a word, you must be either a fool, or a philosopher.

It may be said, generally speaking, that the quality of the persons we converse with, and the mutual relations they bear, are the true standard of a man’s duty and behavior towards them. Thus my duty to a father is to assist and take care of him; to support his age and his infirmities; to yield to him, and pay him service and respect upon all occasions, and to receive both his reproofs and his chastisements, with patience and submission. But you’ll say, he is a rigorous and unnatural father. What is that to the purpose? You are to remember, this obligation to duty, does not arise from the consideration of his goodness, but from the relation he bears to us: no failings of his can make him cease to be a father. And consequently none can absolve you from the obedience of a son. Your brother hath done you an injury; but do not suppose, that this dispenses with the kindness you owe him: you are still to observe what becomes you; not to imitate what mis-became him. Besides, nobody can do you a real injury, without your own concurrence: you are not one whit the worse, unless you think yourself so. After this manner it will be easy to discover, what is fit for you upon all occasions. For it is but considering yourself under the several qualities, of a neighbor, or a subject, or a civil magistrate, or a military officer, and you will soon discern, what behavior is proper from, or to, a person, in each of these stations respectively.

Comment.

The duty of a man is properly that which it becomes him to do upon every occasion, and the rendering to everyone what is fit to be expected from him. This is more peculiarly called the work of justice, taken in a sense so comprehensive, as to include all manner of virtue. For the word is sometimes restrained to one particular virtue, distinguished from rest; and sometimes enlarged and extended to them all. Now it is the business of justice to give everyone his due: upon which account all institutions, both moral and political, have this for their proper object. There is private justice, with regard to a man’s own mind, and this assigns to every part of the soul what belongs to it; and there is the public justice of a country, which distributes to every member of the commonwealth, according to his dignity and deserts. Having therefore instructed his young philosophers, as you see before (which precepts have indeed some reference to this kind of duty too) he proceeds here to direct him, how he may discover what it is, and discharge it upon all occasions: and what others have been very prolix and voluminous upon, (as particularly Nicolaus Damascenus) he hath here reduced into a very narrow compass, and laid before us with wonderful energy and clearness.

Now the duty of a man, if you will branch it out into its several heads, concerns his behavior, first, towards men, and, in general, to all his equals. Then, to those beings that are above him. Thirdly, to those below him: and, lastly, to his own self. Each of these heads have distinct rules and measures; the principal whereof Epictetus treats of, beginning in this chapter with our duty to one another.

To this purpose he gives us a convenient intimation, how we may find out what is properly our duty; and that this differs, according to the several posts, in which men stand to one another. There is one kind of deportment due to a father, and another to a son; one to our own countryman, and another to a stranger; one to a friend, or a benefactor, and another to an enemy who hath injured us. And the reason of this is, because the relation I bear to a father, as the person to whom, next under God, I owe my being, and the comforts of it, differs from that which I bear to a son, whom I am to consider, not as a cause, but as an effect, of myself; and to look upon him, as one to whom I have communicated part of my own substance. So that in all these cases, the first thing we have to do, is, to inquire into the quality and relation of the person, and then to suit our demeanor accordingly.

Now this relation (generally speaking) is the order of things, or the mutual regard they have to one another. And this may be the effect of necessity and nature, or of choice; it may have respect either to similitude or dissimilitude; either to proximity, or to distance. For this relation is a sort of common band of the persons concerned in it; which links them so together, that, though they be distinct in other respects, yet they cannot be absolutely disjoined, but must continue to have an interest in each other. For which reason it is, that relatives are said to belong to one another.

Now the natural order and respect, which proceeds upon proximity, joins sometimes equals, as brothers; and here both the denominations and the duty of each party is the same; for both are brothers: and so likewise it is in other like cases. Both are equals, both are cousins, both are countrymen. There is also a natural respect, which implies distance, and this regards people of different birth and countries; and likewise proceeds upon the like names, and the like duties, as of one stranger, or foreigner, to another. And this is a respect inferring distance, because, as that which expressed nearness of blood and family brought them closer together, so this which denies such a nearness, does in that very idea set them father asunder. This however is a general rule, that in all cases, where both parties are upon the level, and go by the same names, there they owe the same duties too, and that, whether the term by which the relation is expressed, implies proximity, or distance.

Again, there is also a mutual respect found in nature, where a disparity is implied; as, between father and son: for here the expectances are not the same, as between brothers they were said to be, nor are the denominations, as there, the same. This then is a natural regard, which joins people upon unequal terms; and this inequality is the same in proportion, as in a cause and its effect. There is another relation too of disparity between things which seem contraries, as between the right side and the left; for these have a mutual respect to each other, and yet that

depends upon a kind of local contrariety. There is likewise a disjunctive relation in nature, which is between disparates too, as things of last year and this year; for this shows an inequality in time.

The relation upon choice, which implies proximity, and lies between equals, is that of friends; and that which implies distance, or the disjunctive, is that of enemies. For even enemies are under a voluntary relation to one another; and these relations lying between equals, have (as I observed before) the same names, and are obliged to the same duties. This voluntary relation lies sometimes in disparity too, as between master and scholar, considered as the cause and effect; between the buyer and the seller, as contradistinguished from each other. The disjunctive relations of this kind which carry a disparity, are the fleer and the pursuer; for these men are under a voluntary and an unequal relation to one another, though this be such a one, as implies distance and disjunction too.

The relation between husband and wife, seems to be something betwixt that by nature, and that by choice, for in truth it is partly one, and partly the other, and infers a disparity both of name and duty. But that of neighbors, which is a kind of intermediate relation too, hath an equality in duty, and the same title. Between the person in authority, and him under it, there is some kind of natural relation (for nature intended, in all her productions, that the better should govern the worse.) It depends partly upon choice too, as when by some common agreement the wealthy bear rule, and the meaner people submit to it; and it is a mixture of both these, when instead of wealth and power, the wisest are advance to the chair of consent.

And now that this rough imperfect draught hath been laid before us, the several relations men bear to one another, it will concern us to consider, in which we, and the persons we converse with, stand, and to take our measures from thence. But with this caution, that we still answer our character, whether they make good theirs, or not; and especially where nature hath made the relation, and prescribed the duty. For, where it is only founded in choice, there the good man who discharges his own part, hath it in his power to untie the knot when he will, and let the relation fall asunder: that is, he can withdraw his affection and acquaintance from an unworthy friend; and he can melt down a spiteful man with good offices, and cease to be an enemy. For the same free choice which contracted the relation, can as easily dissolve it too: but the relations founded in nature are eternal, and no act of our own will can ever make them cease.

So that if a friend uses us ill, and becomes an enemy; he hath broken the bond that linked us together, and has released us from all that was due to him upon the account of friendship, because he hath ceased to be our friend, and has chosen to be our enemy, but if a father behaves himself viciously, or unnaturally, the case is much otherwise: neither his rigor nor his vices can make him cease to be a father, because these are only the effects of his own choice; but the relation between us in not founded in choice, but in nature; and the obligation lies to him as a father, not as a good, or a kind father; so that though he be not such, yet our duty continues the same. We are bound still to pay him all manner of duty, awful observance, and tender concern; to consider him, as the means made use of by God, to bring us into the world; to remember, that his provident care and tenderness sustained the being he gave us; and that our preservation, as well as our production, is in a great measure owning to him. Children should always look upon themselves as debtors to their parents, and pay back all their kindness, with much gratitude and large interest: they should give most ready obedience to all their commands, except such as tend to the detriment of the soul; and in these cases their compliance is dispensed with, because they are under a higher engagement to the Father of Spirits, and must not displease him at any rate. Any yet upon these occasions too, they should endeavor to give as little offence as is possible; and, though their refusal may and ought to be resolute, yet modesty must temper their zeal, and contrive that it may be respectful too.

In all other matters, we are to serve them with our utmost power, both in our bodies and our goods: for if the persons and the possessions of slaves are at the absolute disposal of those, whom fortune and purchase have made their master; how much more ought ours to be at the command of them, whom nature made the cause of our very being? For this reason, we ought to submit to their correction, with much more easiness and patience, than servants do to their master; and if to their blows, then certainly rather still to their reproaches and hard usage. The ancient Romans had a law, (grounded it seems, upon the dignity of this relation, upon the absolute right it gave, the infinite trouble parents are at for the sake of their children, the unlimited subjection due to them, presuming favorably withal of the natural affection of parents) which gave the parents a power, if they pleased, to sell their children; and which, if they killed them, called them to no account for it. And the times of yet greater antiquity bore so great a reverence to parents, as almost to venture to call them gods: but finding some check from the incommunicable devotion due to the divine nature, they called their parents brothers, hereby intimating, what profound respect belonged to their parents themselves, when even their collateral relations were complemented with the name of something divine in them.

Now indeed in the discharge of our duty to parents, the first and principal motive is the equity of the thing, and the acting as becomes men who make pretensions to wisdom and virtue, which this is most highly agreeable to: and after this, we should represent to ourselves the divine justice and vengeance, which is very likely to punish us in our own kind. And we have a great deal of reason to expect, that we shall hereafter find the same measure from our children, which we give our parents now.

So again, if a brother deals unjustly with you, let it be your part to answer all the particulars of the relation between you, and to make good that covenant, which nature hath ratified and made unalterable: for though the world be a wide place, yet you can have no other parents, nor brethren, nor kinsmen, but those you have. And therefore, since you must take them upon content, and there is no remedy; behave yourself, as though you have made them your own choice. Consider too, that his behavior towards you, is not in your own power to determine; but yours towards him is. You should not therefore so much regard his actions, which you cannot help, nor are in any degree responsible for, as what is agreeable to your own duty, and fit for you to do; because in this consists all the real advantage and prejudice that can happen to you. He can do you no harm, let him design never so much; provided you do but depend upon your own self for your good and evil: but if you ramble abroad, and expect to find it there, you are the worse then indeed, not by your brother’s malice, but your own mistakes, and by placing happiness and misery in things without you. Add to all this, the advantage of winning him over by good usage. For if your forbearance, and meekness, and affection, can render him not only your brother, but your friend; these two relations meeting in one, and joining forces, will make the union wonderful close and strong.

Now the duties we owe to our masters, and teachers, whose business it is to instruct us in wisdom and virtue, are much of the same nature with those due to parents: though in some respects, I confess, the obligation seems to be greater in the case before us; for these persons nourish and train up, not our bodies, but, which is much more considerable, our souls, that is, our very selves. They do it too upon a different principle; not constrained to it by nature and necessity, like our parents; and by such an instinct, as brutes obey no less than men; but they do it out of free choice, and a desire to promote goodness and virtue. And this makes a near approach to, and is a lively resemblance of, the divine bounty; which takes compassion upon sunk and lapsed souls, is perpetually retrieving them from their misery, and restoring them to the bliss they have lost.

Now these observances must needs be peculiarly due to our instructors, because we ought to look upon their instructions, as coming out of the mouth of God himself; and consequently we should submit to them, without troubling ourselves to find out peevish cavils and frivolous exceptions against them. For certainly, it is not easy to conceive, how he, whose end and profession it is, to inform us in true wisdom and goodness, should impose anything upon us, but what tends to the furthering so excellent a design. But now, if our parents take the pains to teach us, and thus to the engagement of being our parents, that other be added of being our teachers too, then we are to pay them all that observance and respect, which can be challenged upon both these accounts. We must then look upon them, as the very image of God; reverence them as the formers of our souls, as well as of our bodies; and like God, the causes, to which not our being only, but also our well-being ought to be ascribed.

The next thing that offers itself is the duty of friends. And this I shall treat with all the clearness, yet all the brevity, so weighty and useful a subject will bear. The first thing to be regarded here is the choice of friends: the next, how to use and keep those we have chosen: and upon these things all the benefits of friendship depend.

The first thing we should look at in our choice of friends, is likeness of temper and disposition. For there are several humors, which though very good when single, yet will make ill music, when brought together. The sour, and phlegmatic, and cold temper, will suit but ill with the brisk and sanguine; and yet each of these alone, each well coupled, may be excellent persons. The next consideration is, how the person whom we make choice of, hath behaved himself to his other friends before. A third rule, which is indeed of such moment, that it may be justly thought to include all, is to observe whether he be a man governed by his passions, or his reason. When this is done, we shall find it very proper to examine into his inclinations, and see which way the bent and bias of his soul lies; whether they draw him to goodness and virtue, and such actions and enjoyments as are commendable, and befitting a man of piety and honor; or whether to vile and unmanly pleasures, and such as none but shameless fellows and scoundrels abandon themselves to. We shall do well to observe farther, whether these desires and inclinations be tractable and gentle, such as are fit to be spoken with, and ready to harken to reason; or whether they be violent and unpersuadable, such as mind nothing but their own gratification, and are deaf to all arguments which would draw them off from it: for men of such passions are always hot and peremptory, and by no means fit to make friends of. Those also that are fond of the world, and expect their happiness anywhere but from their own minds, are very improper to fix upon; for they dote upon riches, or mistresses, or preferments; and in all things of a communicable nature, they carve to themselves too largely, and are desirous to engross the whole; so destroying that equality, which friendship either supposes or introduces. This in riches, and such instances, is plain beyond a doubt; and the vain-glorious discovers it as evidently in the desires of reputation and applause.

Now it is the peculiar excellence of those things which tend to the soul’s good, that the possessor hath them entirely to himself, even when he imparts them to others. They are not diminished, but augmented, by communication. For they are excited and kindled in the breasts of the persons on whom we bestow them; and the farther they spread, the more and larger they grow. So that the light of truth and virtue takes fire by conversation, as a match does by the mutual attrition of flint and steel, which kindles by the sparks that drop from it, but loses none of the virtue it gives away.

Again, when friends make true good their end, and right reason their rule, they are sure never to differ in point of interest; for they judge of advantage by the same common standard. Now when they are thus agreed in one measure, and judge of pleasure and profit, and the contraries to these alike; they have secured themselves against the most dangerous and usual bane of friendship. For without a perfect agreement in these matters, disputes and quarrels are always unavoidable. And so much for the choice of our friends.

As for our behavior to the friends thus chosen, that, in one word, must make reason and equity its constant rule. Upon this account we must never do anything to our friends, which we would not be perfectly satisfied with, when done by them to us. Whatever kindnesses they receive from us must be extenuated, and thought moderately of; but whatever obligations we receive from them must be very highly esteemed and rated above their just value. The course directly contrary to this must be observed in failings and miscarriages: theirs must be lessened and excused, our own aggravated and severely condemned. We must think nothing so strictly our own, as that a friend should not have an equal, or rather indeed a greater, share or right in it. And upon all occasions we should give them precedence and respect; and we should do it willingly and cheerfully; as considering, that their honors devolve upon us, and that a friend, according to the proverb, is a man’s second self.

But since, after all our nicest circumspection and care, it is impossible for us to continue men, and not give some occasion of offence; this point is to be managed very tenderly. A friend in good earnest, ought especially to guard this breach; and to reprove what is done amiss with great temper and softness, in obedience to that old and truly golden rule,

Lose not a friend on every slight pretence;
Ready to pardon, slow to take offence.

That so you may admit him to a perfect and firm reconciliation; and deliver him from the remorse of his own mind, by leaving no ground of jealousy, that he hath not still the same place in you affection and esteem.

It is also certain, that our kindness and concern ought not to be confined to our friend alone, but extend to his relations and acquaintances, and those, whose affairs and successes he thinks himself interested in. We should be as ready to serve them upon his account, as he would be to do it on his own. Our concern and affection ought not to be restrained to place neither; but we should have the same, and upon some accounts, a more tender regard to our friend in his absence, than we think ourselves obliged to express, when he is present with us. An eminent instance whereof I could give, from my personal experience in a friend of my own. And, to conclude all; when once we have made a prudent choice, and laid the foundations of friendship in an agreeable humor, and tried constancy, and virtuous dispositions, the affections, which naturally follow upon such powerful attractives, will not fail to conduct us in the right method of conversation, and in all the duties and good offices, that can be expected, as testimonies and endearments of friendship, will follow of course.

Now what a blessing friendship is, how rich a treasure, and how fruitful in the advantages of life, is a subject worthy of a long and studied discourse; but at present I shall content myself with a few particulars only, and such as occur to my present thoughts.

First then; every friend hath two souls, and two bodies; and it is as plain from the foregoing rules, that he must needs have two estates: if then a man have several such friends, his advantages grow upon him still more, and he is multiplied into more souls, and bodies, and estates, in proportion to the number of his friends. In the study of wisdom and nature, souls thus united have an infinite advantage; and the light of truth displays itself much more early and fully to them. Nor have they less in the exercise of virtue, by mutual conferences, and joint endeavors: these bring their improvements into one common bank, from whence every man supplies his own occasions, and easily grows rich at the public stock. Besides, such united perfection will find a more than ordinary blessing and encouragement from heaven, they are secure of prudent and seasonable advice in all their difficulties; their motions will be regular and well weighed; and their successes more probable, as having more heads to contrive, and more hands to act, than those can, who stand alone, and must encounter fortune singly. When such a man is abroad from his family and acquaintances, that absence, and all want of him is made good to them by his friend; in him he is present while living, and living when dead.

These are some of the advantages. And the pleasures of friendship are not less than the profits of it. For what delight can be compared to that sensible joy, which runs through all our spirits at the sight of a friend? What charms do we find in his person? What music in his discourse? What an engaging gracefulness in all his actions? The confidence we repose in him, is above what any ties of blood and nature can give our nearest relations a title to; and our minds are more at ease, and more secure in his fidelity, than any degree of wealth or power can make them. Of which Alexander the Great gave a very pregnant instance, who, we are told, when he was asked where his vast treasures lay, pointed to his friends, and said, Those were they.

A friend is likewise the best instructor, and the best corrector that can be. For reproof is least offensive, when coming from such a hand; nor is there any person, whose observation keeps us in equal awe, or whose censure we fear so much, if it hath been our misfortune to fail in point of duty. Our prosperous fortunes, and all the gayeties of heart we feel upon them, grow double by communication, but are flat and insipid without a friend to partake of the pleasure: and all our afflictions are disarmed, and their force broken, when a friend takes off part of the burden, by his tender sympathies, and seasonable comforts.

Friendship indeed is the best school for training a man up in all manner of virtue and prudence, and to learn the world in. This forms him for conversation, and fits his soul for all possible accidents and encounters: it teaches him civility, and meekness, and truth. For one makes no difficulty of giving precedence to a friend; nor takes offence at every slip or imperfection of his; and accustoms oneself to open his mind freely, and to speak his thoughts without any trick or reserve. Here we find a strange inclination to be grateful, and just, in returning favors; and the pleasure of doing them is upon no occasion so great, nor so generously put in practice, as in the case of a friend. No man will run so many risks, nor expose his person so freely to prevent another’s danger, as he: for a true friend scorns to decline any difficulty, and is ready to rescue his friend, though at the expense of his own life. Could an army be levied of such men, they would rout double their number, by their united force, and firm resolutions not to desert one another. These are the qualifications, that fit a man for the world, and the exercise of them among friends is easy, and pleasant: whatever seems harsh at first, is softened by affection, and by degrees a man will find himself a master, capable of acquitting himself as he ought in all points, as occasions are offered. First to his friends; and, when practice with them hath perfected him, then to all mankind.

This farther consideration is likewise worth our notice, that friendship ties all other relations closer, and binds them faster upon us. It endears us to those whom God and nature have commanded us to love; it sweetens and recommends their company, and inclines us to do all that is expected from us, with cheerfulness and satisfaction. For unless brothers, and children, and husbands, and wives, be friends too, and have a particular kindness and regard for one another; though they may, with much ado, follow Epictetus in his direction, and discharge the several offices belonging to their particular station, yet all their performances will come hard and strained. There will be nothing of pleasure and alacrity, to whet their duty, and give it a relish; but all is looked upon as a burden and a slavery, the effect of necessity, not choice; done, not because they would, but because they must do it; and not so much to oblige the receiver, as to avoid guilt and reproach.

Now the true reason, why this relation of a friend is more sacred and engaging than any other, seems to be, that is not our fate, but our choice. Our natural relations we were born to; but, where we ourselves tie the knot, it is generally stronger than where nature does it: because, of all the endowments of the soul, that of reason and liberty seems to be the highest, and that, by which we make the nearest approach to the perfections of that Great One, in and by whom all things are united.

These are some of the excellent and marvelous effects of friendship, and such human considerations as abundantly recommend it: but the most valuable, and truly divine recommendations are still behind. Is, that the union of souls by an innocent and sincere friendship is the noblest contemplation, and the liveliest image, of our union with God himself. And indeed we cannot here upon Earth aspire to any better and more intimate conjunction, with him, and those blessed spirits, who are ever in perfect harmony and concord. It was not therefore without excellent reason, that Pythagoras and his followers gave the preference to friendship above all other virtues; and called it, the very chain and complement of them all. For in truth, if any one virtue be wanting, friendship will not dwell there. For how can we suppose an unjust, or an intemperate, or debauched man, or a coward, capable of friendship? And an obstinate perverse fool is so, less than any of them. No, no, this treasure is too rich, too refined, for such sordid wretches. A man therefore that pretends to friendship, must aspire to as high a degree of perfection, as the frailties of human nature will admit; he must work off the dross of sensual and brutish passions, purify and sublimate his mind, and then he is qualified to seek a mate in friendship; and when he hath found such another as himself, he must hold him close to his heart, as his dearer and better half.

If I have been tedious upon this subject, the reader will be kind, in imputing it to so good a cause, as my zeal for friendship; to which it were a most desirable thing to see some few at least pay that regard, which it deserves. And indeed a few instances would be some comfort in this miserable age; when the vices and vileness of mankind seem to have banished it almost quite out of the world. But it is now high time to come off from this long digression, and return to that, which this chapter directs us to; which is, to examine something more briefly, those other relations, which Epictetus here hath thought fit to make express mention of.

After having told us, that the consideration of several qualities and relations is the best rule of their respective duties, he proceeds to instance in that of a good citizen, or patriot: for this too gives us a sort of affinity to all our fellow citizens, or subjects. The country represents our parents; and all who are born in it, who are comprehended within its privileges, and live under its laws, are in some sense brethren; and a manifest relation (though more distant, I confess, than any hitherto insisted upon) there is between all the natives of it. The likeness of dispositions shows such a relation to be of nature’s making; and this is very often observable in people, not only of the same city or corporation, but extends itself to those of the same nation too. Our behavior therefore to all such ought to resemble that to our kindred; and all imaginable care should be taken for their improvement; for in this we shall consult our own benefit also, and feel the advantages, of living among honest and virtuous people; of being supplied in all our necessities, and assisted in all our distresses; and of providing husbands, and fathers, for all our orphans and widows: for every man is capable of lending a helping hand, though not every man in the same way: one may be a friend with his money; another by his authority; a third by his interest and acquaintance, or good advice; a fourth by his labor and pains; and those, who have nothing else in their power, may be serviceable by their pity and compassion.

Now if a man be both a fellow citizen and a neighbor, this renders the relation something nearer still. For, as the state we were born in, and the family we are descended from, are not the gifts of a blind undistinguishing chance; so are we to look upon that particular habitation, and part of the same city where we dwell, to be assigned us by a wise providence. So that those of our countrymen, who dwell nearest to us, are upon that account allied more closely still. And whatever has been specified as duties to the one, are so, and indeed more so, to the other, as we have opportunities of paying, and they of receiving them. Therefore we are to rejoice in their successes, and be heartily concerned for their misfortunes; and when any of them are sick or indisposed, we must endeavor to be serviceable to them, as if they were a part of our own family. In all our conversation abroad, we should make it appear to the world, that, while our neighbor hath no designs but what is honest and fair, we will stand by him to our utmost; and we should think it a shameful reflection, that he should upon any occasion ask or receive a kindness from them that dwell at a greater distance, which it was in the power of us, his next neighbors, to have done for him.

There is also a sort of relation between us, and foreigners, who come to spend some time in our country; a relation, of which God is the author, who hath declared, that he bears a particular regard to strangers. The good offices therefore, due upon this account, ought very punctually to be discharged; both in respect to the Almighty, who hath taken such persons into his protection; and also, to exercise and enlarge our good nature, which ought not to be confined within the narrow bounds of our own acquaintance or country, but must stretch its concern over the whole world, and look upon itself, as a debtor to all mankind. There is also another very weighty reason still behind; which is, that this will give us confidence, when we present our addresses before the God of Strangers; and we may with a better grace ask and expect that assistance from him, which we have given to them without grudging. For such is his condescension, that he allows us to look upon all our endeavors and actions of kindness, as so many loans to himself; and he will be sure to repay them with large usury, and more to the creditor’s advantage, than any of the most generous of the sons of men.

Above all things, we must take special care never to injure or oppress a stranger; but quite contrary, to give him our countenance, and help, and rescue him, if it be possible, from the injustice of any other that shall attempt it. For God hath charged his providence with a peculiar care of such; because they are more exposed and destitute of human help; and he, who hath promised to protect them more eminently, will be sure to revenge their wrongs more severely. It is fit too, that those who can do it, be assisting to them in the dispatch of the affairs they come about, and furnish them with what conveniences they stand in need of; that they be particularly tender of them in cases of sickness; and, when the ends of their journey are satisfied, contribute all possible endeavors, towards facilitating their return home again.

Epictetus tells us moreover, that a private soldier ought to consider his own, and his commander’s post, and from thence inform himself, what is due to his superior offices. Now in such a case, it is not enough, that their orders be obeyed, but it is necessary, that they should be executed speedily; because, in time of action, many favorable opportunities present themselves, which if not presently snatched, are lost forever. And they must be executed with bravery and resolution too; because the fortune of the field may depend upon such obedience. A private soldier is likewise obliged to expose his own person for the safety of his commander, because such a one’s life is of infinite consequence. If a single soldier falls, there is no great advantage gained, nor does this loss change the face of affairs; but if a general falls, though the soldiers under him were victorious before, yet their spirits sink immediately, their order is broken, and everyone makes the best of his way to save himself, as sheep without a shepherd run before wolves. So that indeed, not only the success of the day, but the fate of whole countries and kingdoms is often brought into extreme hazard, by the loss of one eminent commander; of which Xenophon hath left us an example, in the account he gives of what happened upon the death of Cyrus.

It is no less evident, that there is also a relation, between civil magistrates, and the persons under their jurisdiction, and several duties which follow from that relation. And here, if men do not bear the empty name of governors, but are really what they are called, all ready obedience is due to them; all honors and respect, as to persons, next under God, the authors of our peace and happiness, and greatest benefactors to the public. For good governors make this the study and business of their lives; they set about it zealously and heartily, and omit no care, which may any way conduce to the benefit of the state. What Hyppocrites said of the physicians, is much more eminently true of princes; they do not torment themselves to no purpose with the calamities of other people, (and Epictetus advises they should not,) but they sacrifice themselves and all their quiet to care and trouble; they neglect their own private affairs and families, and must be content with perpetual vexations and interruptions, and the loss of many opportunities, which might be improved to very wise and virtuous purposes.

Upon all these accounts, and to make them some amends, every man is bound, not only to be obedient, but, so far as in him lies, to ease them, and to bear a part of their burden; to be active and vigorous in their support and defense, as looking upon their dangers to affect the state in common, and threaten the whole constitution.

And, if these governors be such, as do by no means answer their character, nor take the care they ought; though we are not bound to vindicate their errors, or their wickedness, yet, even in such cases, we are obliged to pay them all that is due to the dignity of their post; we must show them all fit deference and respect, and comply with their commands, as far as with a good conscience we may.

But it is very fit I should now apply myself to the following chapters, and not quit my first design; which was to explain Epictetus, and not to run out into unnecessary enlargements, upon the several relations men stand into each other; for otherwise, while I teach my reader his duty, he will be apt to suspect, that I have forgotten my own.

Take notice, that the principal and most important duty in religion is to possess your mind with just and becoming notions of the gods; to believe that there are such supreme beings, and that they govern and dispose all the affairs of the world with a just and good providence. And, in agreement to such a persuasion, to dispose yourself for a ready and reverential obedience, and a perfect acquiescence in all their dispensations: and this submission is to be the effect of choice, and not constraint; as considering, that all events are ordered by a most wise and excellent mind: for this is the only principle, which can secure you from a querulous temper, and prevent all the impious murmurings of men, who imagine themselves neglected, and their merits overlooked by a partial deity. Now for attaining to the good disposition I have been describing, there is but one possible method; viz. To disregard the things of the world, and be fully satisfied, that there is no happiness or misery in any other thing, but what nature hath put within your own power and choice. For, so long as you suppose any external enjoyments capable of making you happy, or the want of them, miserable, you must unavoidably blame the disposer of them, as oft as you meet with any disappointment in your hopes, or fall into any calamity you fear. This is a principle fixed in all creatures by nature, and nothing can change or remove it, to run away from all that seems hurtful and destructive, and to have an aversion for the causes of these things to us. So is it likewise, to pursue and court the contrary, and love and admire the persons we owe our good to: nor can a man take pleasure in the supposed author of mischief, any more than in the mischief itself. Hence it is, that sons complain of their fathers, and reproach them for not letting them into a greater share of their estates, in which they place their happiness. Hence Polynices and Eteocles engaged in that unnatural war, because they placed their happiness in a crown. Hence the husbandman cries out against God, when the season is unkind; and the merchant repines at storms, and losses at sea; and masters of families, at the death of their beloved wives and children. Now no man can have religion, without mixing some prospect of advantage with it; nor can we heartily serve and adore a Being, of whose justice and kindness we have no a good opinion. So that, by making it our business to regulate our desires and our aversions, and direct them to worthy and proper objects; we do at the same time most effectually secure our piety. It is necessary also, that you should offer sacrifices, and conform to the custom of your country in the exercise of religion; and that all things of this kind be performed with sincerity and devotion; and not slovenly and carelessly, but with a decent application and respect; and that your offerings be, according to your ability, so tempered, as neither to betray an unwillingness or sordid grudging in one extreme, nor to run out into the other of profuseness and ostentation.

Comment.

After the duties expected from us to our equals, that is, of men to one another; he proceeds now to instruct us, what we owe to our superiors; viz. Those of a nature more excellent than our own. And in all disquisitions of this kind, it is a very convenient method, to begin with those things that are nearest and most familiar to us, and so by degrees ascend to those above, and at a greater distance from us.

Now these duties are likewise discovered, by taking a just view of the relation between the gods and us; and that is such a one, as effects bear to their highest and first cause.

If then they are to be considered under this notion; it is evident, that they stand not in any need of our services, nor can we add to their happiness or perfection. Our duties consequently, and the intent of them, are only such, as may express our subjection, and procure us a more free access and intercourse with them: for this is the only method of keeping up the relation to the first and highest causes. The instances of this subjection due from us, are honor and reverence, and adoration, a voluntary submission to all they do, and a perfect acquiescence in all events ordered by them; as being fully satisfied, that they are the appointments of absolute wisdom and infinite goodness.

These are such qualifications, as we must attain to, by rectifying the ideas of our minds, and reforming the errors of our lives. The ideas of our minds must be rectified, by entertaining no thoughts of the gods, but what are worthy of them, and becoming us: as, that they are the first cause of all things: that they dispose of all events, and concern themselves in the government of the world; and that all their government, and all their disposals, are wise, and just, and good. For if a man be of the opinion, that there is no God; or if he allows his existence, but denies his providence; or if he allow both of these, but thinks that God, and that providence, defective in his counsels, or unjust in his distributions; such a one can never pay him true honor and hearty adoration, or submit with a resigned and contented spirit, to the various accidents of human life, as if all were ordered for the best.

Again; it is likewise necessary, that the life and conversation of men be so disposed, as to express this persuasion of a wise and good providence by not flying out into peevish murmurings and complaints, or thinking that Almighty God hath done us wrong in any of his dispensations. But this is a temper we can never attain to, so long as we expect happiness, and dread misery, from anything but ourselves. The management of our own will must be our only care; and all our desires and aversions restrained to the objects of choice; and then we need never be disappointed in our hopes, nor surprised by our fears. But this must needs happen to all who place their happiness and misery, in the enjoyment, or the want, of any external advantages; and such disappointments and surprises will necessarily carry them to a detestation of that, which they look upon as the cause of such misfortunes: and they will very hardly refrain from speaking ill of that power, which might have prevented their misery, but took no care to do it. For every creature naturally desires good, and abhors evil; and therefore not only the things themselves, but the causes of them, are shunned and hated, courted and admired, in proportion as they really are, or as we apprehend them to be, good or evil. There is no such thing in nature, nor can there be, as that a man should take delight in, and bear a true affection to, the person, whom he looks upon to have done him some real injury or hurt, any more than he can be fond of that hurt or injury itself. And since all good naturally attracts love and desire, and all evil provokes aversion, we must needs be affected alike, both to the things themselves, and the causes of them to us.

Nay though we be mistaken in our notions of good and evil, yet that we shall proceed according to our apprehensions of these things, as if they we really so, and cannot restrain ourselves from hating and reviling the authors of our calamity, or the deceivers of our hope, he proves from hence; that the strictest ties of nature, and duty, and affection, are generally found to feeble engagements, to keep men in temper, or moderate their resentments. Thus we see greedy and impatient children perpetually railing at their fathers, for keeping them out of their estates, which they account their good; or for inflicting some severities upon them which they think evil; as when they chastise their follies, or deny them their liberty. Thus the two sons of Oedipus, Polynices and Eteocles, forgetting that they were brothers, quarreled, and killed one another, for the crown in which they were rivals. Thus the farmer, when his seedtime or his harvest happens ill; if it rains too much, or too little, or if any other cross accident comes to his crop, presently rails and murmurs against the gods: or if he has the modesty to hold his tongue, yet he is sure to fret and curse inwardly. Thus mariners, when they want a fair wind; even though they are bound to different ports, and must sail with different winds, one perhaps wished for a northern, another for a southerly gale, and the same cannot serve or please them all; yet they swear and rant at providence, as if it were obliged to take care of them only, and neglect all those, whose business requires, it should blow in the quarter where it does. So likewise merchants are never content. When they are to buy, they would have great plenty, and a low market; but when it is their turn to sell, then they wish for scarcity, and a rising price: and if either of these happen otherwise, they grow discontented, and accuse providence. And in general, when men bury their wives, or children, or have something very dear taken from them, or fall into some disaster they feared, they grow angry at the Disposer of these events. For we are naturally inclined to honor and respect the persons who oblige and gratify us; and, as nothing excites these resentments in us so soon, or so powerfully, as our own advantage; so nothing gives such an effectual disgust, and so irreconcilable a disrespect, as the apprehension, that any person hath contributed to our loss and disadvantage.

A man therefore in taking care to fix his desires and his aversions upon the right objects, does at the same time secure his piety and reverence towards God. For this man’s hopes are always answered, his fears always vanish into nothing; because he neither hopes nor fears anything out of his own power; he is consequently always pleased, and under no temptations to accuse providence, for anything that can possibly happen to him. But the man that gives his desires a loose, and expects his fate from external accidents, is a slave to all the world: he lies at the mercy of every man’s opinion, of health and sickness, poverty and riches, life and death, victories and defeats; nay, even the wind and the rain, the hail and the meteors, and, in short, every cause and every effect in nature, is his master. For, except every one of these fall out just according to his mind, his desires must be frustrated, and his fears accomplished. What a weathercock of a man is this; how uneasy and unsettled his life! How tedious and troublesome must he be to himself! How dissatisfied in his breast, and how impious in his reflections upon providence! So that in short, no one circumstance is wanting, which can conduce to the rendering such a one miserable.

Having thus laid the foundations of religion, in true notions of the divine nature, in a contented submission to all events, and in a firm persuasion of a wise and good providence, disposing them as we see; and, having moreover shown the necessity of despising the world, and depending upon our own will and the objects of it, for all the happiness and misery we are capable of; he proceeds now to direct us, what methods we should take, to express our reverence and honor for the gods. Some of those that are generally practiced, and become universal, it is highly probable, that God Himself instituted, declaring (as some histories inform us He did) what services would be most acceptable to Him; and this, with a gracious design of bringing us better acquainted with Himself, and likewise to sanctify and enlarge our enjoyments, that our offerings might invite His blessings and His bounty, and, for giving back a little, we might receive the more.

As therefore we hold ourselves bound, in the first place, to set apart that soul which we received from Him, to His service; and to consecrate this by refined and holy thoughts, by worthy and reverent ideas of His majesty, and a regular uncorrupt life; so it should be our next care, to purify and dedicate this body too, which came to us from the same hand; and carefully to wash away all the seen or hidden blemishes and pollutions, which it may have contracted. When the soul and its instrument are thus clear from all their stains, let us come decently clothed into His presence, and there devote a part of what God in His bounty hath conferred upon us, to His use and service. For it is highly reasonable and just, that a part should be given back to Him, from whom we receive the whole: not that He needs, or is the better for it: (nor is He so indeed, either for the holiness of our lives, or the reverent and worthy ideas we have of Him: and so this objection, if it were a good one, would lie equally against all piety in general) but it is for our own advantage; for, when we have thus qualified ourselves for His benign influences, He communicates Himself to us, in such proportions as we are capable and worthy of. So do the offerings we devote out of our fortunes, when recommended by a pure conscience and a good life, derive down the blessing and goodness of God upon our estates, and procures us signal testimonies of the power and efficacy of His providence. One man hath found them the instruments of a marvelous recovery from some epilepsy, or other incurable distemper; another of calming boisterous winds and seas; besides the divine favor and illumination, which the votaries often acquire by such religious services. But if there were none of these advantageous effects to follow, yet it must be confessed a most equitable thing, and a decent expression of gratitude, to pay back these acknowledgements, to the Giver of all we enjoy: how much more then, when the parting with so small a proportion sanctifies and consecrates the whole, and ensures His favor and assistance in our undertakings?

Now, as to the kind and the manner of these oblations, he would have us determined by the custom of our country. For there is this mighty difference, among others, between God and us; He is present at all times, and in all places, and equally disposed to exert His power, and communicate His influences, the whole world over. But we are confined within a narrow compass. We, as men, are but one of the many species which God hath created, and of the many, who partake of the same nature, have applied ourselves to one profession and way of life, out of many. Our habitations are distinct and confined to one little spot of this vast globe; and so we partake in of the divine goodness, some in one place and time, and some in another. Thus there are countries opposite to us, whose night is our day, and climates so distant, that it is winter in one, and summer in another, at the same time. So likewise fruits and animals are peculiar to some countries, and do not grow or breed in others; the divine bounty imparting itself to all the world, and every creature in it, though to different parts of the world, in different manners. As therefore the particular manifestations of God are suited to several places, and professions, and seasons, and modes; so in the choice of victims and acknowledgments, each person and country observe what is peculiar to them, and proper for their circumstances. And, when by common consent solemn festivals are celebrated as they ought to be, for the honor and worship of God, a more extraordinary effect of the divine favor and influence is frequently seen upon these occasions; as miraculous cures, strange and useful predictions, and the like. Such remarkable efficacy do we find, and so much more signal testimonies of the divine presence and aid may we observe, at one time above another. And the same success is no less observable, in the proper choice and accommodation of the places in which we worship, the supplications we us, the ceremonies we conform to, and the oblations we present.

Now all the religious performances, by which we would express our honor for God, ought, he says, to be attended with holiness and Sincerity, and not done in a slovenly and sordid manner. For it is by no means fit, that any impure thing should presume, or be admitted, to make its approach to the purest and most perfect being: and any mixture which adulterates what is pure and sincere, does at the same time pollute and stain it. Therefore nothing of this kind is to be done slovenly and sordidly; for that is Epictetus’ meaning; and the word he makes use of to express it, signifies such dust and nastiness, as is contracted from lying upon a dirty floor. Nor must we behave ourselves loosely and negligently, so as, through idleness and inadvertency, to leave out, or change, or to confound the order of any part of our worship. For, as words are not the same, if you leave out, or put in, or invert the course of the letters; nor sentences the same, if you confound the words they consist of, so the neglects and wanderings of a loose worship check the divine influences, and render all our devotions flat and feeble; as, on the contrary, a wise and steady zeal is the best recommendation of our prayers, and gives them such energy and force, as never returns empty. And what is there indeed of so great consequence, or of so strict obligation, as to be able to rouse a man into thought, and dispose him to warmth and attention, if the presence of God, and His solemn approaches to so awful a majesty, have not the power to do it? Hence it is, that we are advised to address ourselves with reverence and fear; for nothing is more offensive, than a saucy irreligious boldness. And the greater veneration we hold all things in, which bear any relation to God and his worship, the more advantage we shall receive from them, and, by humbling ourselves before the throne of God, we take the most effectual method to be truly exalted.

But, fearing some wrong interpretation upon what he had said; and supposing, that, by forbidding men to be cold and sordid, he intimates, that they should, upon all occasions, come up to the utmost, or rather strain a point, and go beyond their power, therefore he prevents that mistake in the close of the chapter. And indeed, if moderation be a virtue, it cannot show itself anywhere to more advantage, than in the business of religion: the very end whereof is to reduce all things to their just proportions, and keep them within due bounds. Besides, nothing tends more to the preserving of religion, and keeping up the constant practice of it, than for men to proceed in the same even course, with as few alterations as the thing is capable of; for custom and frequent repetition make men perfect and easy: but whatever is excessive and upon the stretch, we can never be reconciled to, so as to make it our daily business.

Farther yet, the men that strain themselves to be profuse in their sacrifices, or any other way to exceed what others do, and what their own circumstances will bear, seem to do it out of a very mean and mistaken principle: for this looks, as if God were to be bribed in their favor, and the value of the present laid an obligation upon Him: whereas, alas! all these things are done, not for His sake, but our own; and the first fruits, which we consecrate to Him, are designed for no other than decent acknowledgments of his liberality, and a small return out of what He hath been pleased to give us.

Thus have I trod in the steps of this excellent man, and done him what right I could, in the paraphrase and explanation of the chapter now before us. But because in the beginning he touches upon three points concerning the divine nature, and these so fundamentally necessary, that all positive laws, and all moral institutions, do presuppose the belief and acknowledgment of them; and since some perverse and refractory men have nevertheless the confidence to oppose them; we will so far comply with their obstinacy, though most unreasonable, as to prove the truth of these three points, viz. That there is a divine nature and power; that the world is governed by it; and, that the providence by which it is so governed, is just and good in all its dispensations. The importunity of these men is so much the greater, and our trouble of refuting it will be the less; because, not mankind only, but brutes and plants, and every creature in the world, do according to their capacity, all declare their relation to God. Men indeed do so the most of any, because they are early instructed by their parents. Religion grows up with them from their cradle; and the ideas common to their species take root in, and carry a great sway with them. For the barbarous as well as the civilized countries, and that in all ages of the world too, though they have differed exceedingly in other opinions, yet have ever agreed universally in this, that there is a God. I know of no exception to this rule, except those Acrotheites, of whom Theophrastus gives an account, that they owned no deity; but, as a punishment of their atheism, the earth opened and swallowed them up. Besides them, we meet with no people, and but very few single persons, who ever pretended to disown this; not above two or three, from the beginning of the world to this day.

But yet so it is, that a great many do not duly attend to these universally received notions; partly because they take them upon trust, without considering or understanding the arguments upon which they are grounded: and partly, from some difficulties in providence, such as the misfortunes and afflictions of some very good, and the prosperity of some exceedingly wicked men, which are apt to raise in them the same scruple, with that in the Tragedian,

Pardon ye power, if yet such powers there be; For sure that doubt is modest, when we see Triumphant vice, and injured piety.

Now such persons as these would soon be convinced, if they did but follow Epictetus’ method, and not imagine, that either the happiness or misery of a man can depend upon external accidents, or indeed upon anything else, but the freedom and use of his own will. For at this rate it will not be possible for any good men to be wretched, or any vicious one happy. And now, if you please, we will consider those propositions, which are barely laid down by Epictetus, and try to prove the truth of them, by such arguments as are proper, and occur to my present thoughts.

The first step I shall make in this argument, is to consider the name, by which we call this being, and what the word God signifies. And here we must observe, that the Greek word Theos was applied to the stars, and other celestial bodies; which therefore were so called from Thea, which signifies to run, and had that appellation given them for the swiftness of their motion. But this title was afterward extended to incorporeal causes, and intellectual beings; and more peculiarly to the first cause and being of all things. So that by this name we understand the original of the universe, the first, and principal, and intellectual cause of everything. For, whatever hath any existence, must either be derived from some determinate cause, or it must subsist by chance, and mechanical necessity. But whatever subsists after this manner, hath neither any particular efficient cause, nor is itself the final cause of it own production; for both these qualifications are absolutely inconsistent with the nature of fortuitous beings, and indeed no less so, is the following any constant rule and regular method in the production of them.

Now it is obvious to any considering person, that the works of nature, and of choice, are a final cause to the doer, and the existence of them is proposed, as that which answers his design. Thus the husbandman plants, and sows his ground, in prospect of the corn, and the trees, that will grow upon it. Thus the coition of all animals proposes to itself the continuation of the species. And in all the progress of these productions, there is a constant order, and fixed course observed; some operations which are proper to the beginning, others to the promoting, and others to the perfecting this work, each performed constantly in their proper place. The seeds of plants are first cast into the ground, then moistened and impregnated there, then they take root and sprout, they shoot up in straw, or branches, and so on, till at last they blossom, and bud, and bring fruit to maturity. So likewise that of animals is cherished and enlarged, and formed into an embryo; which receiving vital nourishment and convenient growth, is at a stated time brought to a just perfection, and then comes to the birth. But still in these, and in all other cases of the like nature, there is the same chain of causes; and these generally keep their fixed times and measures.

Now, if all the productions of nature, and all the effects of choice, have some particular cause to which they owe their being; if the existence of these things be the final cause of their production; and if the same order and a regular method be constantly and duly observed in the producing them the natural and necessary result of this argument is, that all the works of nature and of choice, that is, all things in this whole world, which have any real existence, are not the effects of chance, or mechanism, but are owing to some particular positive cause. And, since these causes must needs be antecedent to their effects, if they be such, as had a beginning themselves, they must be owing to some others who had a being antecedent to theirs; and so we may trace them up, till at last we come to causes which had no beginning at all. And these being eternal, are most truly and properly said to exist, as having never not been, not owing their subsistence to any external cause, but solely to the inherent perfections of their own nature. So that the first and eternal causes of things must needs be self-existent, or something more noble and excellent than self-existent, as the following discourse will convince you.

The same argument holds as strong with regard to motion too. For if we trace this up to its beginning, we shall find, that those bodies which made the first impressions, were either such as moved by an internal power and principle of their own; or such as were fixed themselves, and had no share in the motion they impressed upon others. For whatever is moved mechanically, is moved by something else; and that again by some other thing; and so on forever: but such an account as this of motion in infinitum, is neither possible to be, nor to be conceived. For at this rate, if there were no beginning of motion, the only consequence from hence must needs be, that there would be no mover, nor any moved bodies at all: and if we will allow any beginning, as allow it we must, that first mover must be either endued with a principle of self motion, or it must have no motion at all. But the latter of these it cannot be neither; for this is evident in all motion, that fixed bodies are so far from communicating motion to those bodies which have it not, that on the contrary they check and stop it in those that have, and dispose them always to continue in the same state and posture, without any manner of alteration. So that free and spontaneous motion must at last be resolved to be the first cause of mechanical. Now the things concerned in mechanical motion, are such as are subject to generation and corruption, to augmentation and diminution, and to any sort of alteration, whether that refers to the qualities of the things themselves, or whether to their local distances and situations. For whatever is produced could never produce itself; because then it must have had a being before it was produced, and so begin to be, both before and after itself. And whatever receives increase is not augmented by itself; for augmentation is nothing else, but the addition of something which it had not before. So again, whatever is altered, is altered by some other thing, and not from itself; for alteration is properly the introducing of a contrary quality. So likewise local motion cannot be from the body moving; for since all motions are subject to the rules I have here laid down, and generation, corruption, augmentation, and alteration, are all but so many effects of motion; it is plain this must be derived from something else, and could not set itself on going.

Those things therefore, which in the course of nature are superior to these productions, and the causes of necessary motion, must needs be capable of moving themselves. For, if we should suppose but one minute’s perfect repose, nothing would ever move again, except some free self-moving agent that began the dance. For whatever is once fixed, is disposed to continue so to all eternity; and what ever moves mechanically must wait the leisure of some other body, and cannot stir, till it receives the impression, and is put into action.

Now whatever the first principles of things are, it is necessary that they should be of a simple nature. For all mixed bodies are compounded of simples, and consequently the ingredients must have a priority in nature, before the composition made of them. Let us then consider some of the grossest and most obvious bodies; and so by degrees ascend higher, to try at last, whether it be possible for us to conceive body to be such a principle, as reason will tell us the first principles of all things must needs have been; or whether it will not be impossible to conceive, that these bodies which we see move and subsist, should ever have had that motion and that existence from themselves.

Whatever moves itself, is called self-moving; either because one part of it is active, and the other passive in this motion; or else, because the whole is active, and the whole passive. Now if we imagine one part to communicate, and the other only to receive the impression; still the same question will return, as to that part which begins the motion; whether this be done from a principle of its own, or from any external impulse; and so up, till at last you must be forced to stop at something, which must be acknowledged an entire moving, and entire moved.

The same is to be said of self-existence too. For whatever is originally and properly, must be an entire existence, and the some and entire cause of its own existence: and whatever is so, must be indivisible, and without parts. For whatever consists of parts, and is capable of being divided, could never unite its whole self to its whole self, so as to be entirely moving, and entirely moved; entirely subsisting, and yet the entire cause of so subsisting at the same time.

Again: it is no less impossible, that any bodies should be of a simple nature; for they must of necessity consist of matter, and form, and several other properties, which go to the completing their nature; such as magnitude, and figure, and color, and sundry other qualities, which are not original and causal species themselves, but only participations of these, produced in some matter without form, which partakes of them. For, where these original forms lie, there everything is in its true essence and perfection, and there is no need of any matter unformed to receive them. But, when those originals are communicated, then there must of necessity be some matter to receive them, which, till it hath done it, is itself void of form. Since then the first principle of things are incorporeal and indivisible; since their nature must be simple, and that they are properly efficient causes; since their existence and their motion must be entirely from themselves; and since it hath been shown, that bodies are not in any degree capable of these qualifications; it must needs, I think be concluded, that body could not be the first principle, nor the universe owing to any such original.

Where then shall we find such a self-moving agent, as infuses motion into the necessary ones, and may be considered as a cause with respect to them? This surely must be something which moves from an internal principle. But still, if this motion from within were derived from something else, and not from itself; we should not call this an internal motion, but an external impulse, as we do in bodies. For if I by a staff that is in my hand move a stone, though both my staff and my hand contribute to that motion more immediately, yet I myself am the true and proper cause of it. What shall we say then moves bodies from within? What indeed but the soul? For animated bodies are moved from an internal principle, and all bodies so moved are animates. If then it be the soul, which gives an internal motion to bodies; and if this internal mover be self-moving; it remains, that the soul is a free and spontaneous mover, the cause of productions and beginning of motions, containing in herself the several patterns, and measures, and forms, according to which those productions and motions are modeled and proportioned. For, if the constituent forms are not in bodies originally, but derived immediately from some free agent; then certainly the soul is the efficient cause, and assigns to each body its particular form. Now these forms in the soul, are exceedingly pure and untainted: as for example: beauty in the body of an animal consists in the flesh, and skin, and vessels, and blood, which make and fill up this mass. Now it does indeed, to the best of its power, temper and adorn these things; but at the same time it is sullied and changed by them, and sinks into their deformity. But beauty in the soul is free from all these allays, and is, not only the image and representation of beauty, but pure, substantial, unblemished, original beauty; not graceful in one place, and not in another, but perfectly and all over so. From whence it comes to pass, that, when the soul contemplates its own or another soul’s beauty, all bodily graces lose their charms, and appear despicable and deformed in comparison. And this instance hints to us the purity of all other original forms, as they are in the soul.

Now it is very plain, that as there are different bodies moved by these souls, so there are likewise different sorts of souls which move them; some of these are celestial, and others sublunary: for it were intolerable absurdity to suppose, that bodies less refined, and inferior in dignity and duration, should have life, and souls, and that those above should want both. It is therefore in this case with souls, as with bodies, the heavenly ones are the causes of the sublunary ones. And indeed the soul is a noble and most excellent being, especially the heavenly one, advanced by nature to the first prerogative of being a principle, though not the first and highest in the order of causes. For, though the self-moving and self-existent being, is superior to those, whose whole motion and existence is derived from something else; yet still even this is capable of being considered in a double capacity, as active and passive, as a cause and an effect; and it is plain, that simples must have been before compounds, and one before two.

Again: though this self-moving agent depends upon no other for its motion, yet motion it hath; and motion infers mutation: not an essential change indeed, but such as respects it operations; and neither are these motions local and corporeal, (for in that respect it is immovable) but spiritual, and peculiar to the soul; such as we call consideration, and debate, and discerning, and opinion; and, according as she is moved by these motions, she impresses corporeal ones upon the body.

Now whatever this change be, yet that, which is mutable in any kind or proportion, must have something before it absolutely immutable, that so those things, which are mutable, may still be preserved so. For all motion and mutation, both in the higher and our lower regions, proceed from the impression made by the first cause. But since all things undergo such various changes, and since great motions are violent; how come the heavenly bodies to continue so much the same, in their constitution, their manner of moving, the center about which they roul, their mutual order and position? And whence is it, that, though the sublunary ones undergo more visible and sequent alterations, yet still there is a perpetual restitution and constant return to their first form? Thus we observe it plainly, in elements, and seasons, and plants, and animals: for, though these do not continue to be numerically the same, as celestial bodies do; yet they go round in a circle, till at last they return to the point from whence they set out at first. Thus fire is converted into air, air condensed into water, water into earth, and then earth rarified into fire again. So the year brings us, first into spring, then to summer, after that autumn, and at last winter thaws into spring again. So again, wheat is turned into the stem, then the blade, after that the ear, and so ripe wheat again. So from man proceeds first the seminal principle, after that the formation, and vital nourishment; and this at last comes to be man again. Now I would ask anyone, since motion is of itself always violent, and always tending to change, how it comes to pass, that the same species, and the same course and constitution of nature is so exactly preserved? Certainly this must needs be the effect of some superior cause, which is itself immovable, and immutable, and remains forever in all points exactly the same. For even in mental motions, that agent which is uncertain in his motions, and acts sometimes with ease, and freedom, and speed; and sometimes slowly, and with difficulty, must needs have some other mind antecedent to it; one, whose essence and operations are always the same, who brings all things to pass in an instant, and at pleasure: and no man need be told, how much such a being as this, which is fixed and unchangeable, not only as to his own nature and essence, but as to his influence too, is more excellent than that, which is still in motion, and liable to change, though that motion be from itself alone. And reason will convince us, that those beings which are most noble and excellent, must needs have had an existence before those which are indigent and depending.

Now we shall do well, according to this rule, to ascend the whole scale of causes in our thoughts, and try whether we are able to find any principle more excellent, than what is already fixed upon; and if we can do so, then to drive that still higher, till we come to rest at last in the loftiest and most majestic notions that we are capable of entertaining. And this is a course we may boldly take: nor is there any fear of going to far, or overshooting the mark, by conceiving any ideas too great, and above the dignity of this first cause. For alas! the boldest flights our minds can aspire to, are to low and feeble; so far from surmounting, that they fall infinitely short of, His divine perfections. This contemplation upon God, as it is the most excellent, so it is the only one, in which we are sure not to be guilty of any excess, or overvaluing the object. And, when we have taken all imaginable pains to collect all the ideas that are great, and venerable, and holy, and independent, and productive of good; all these names, and all these perfections put together, do yet give us but a very poor and imperfect notion of Him; only He is graciously pleased to pardon and except these, because it is not in the power of human nature, to admit any higher and better.

When therefore our consideration hath carried us from self-moving beings up to that which is immovable, and absolutely immutable, always the same in its essence, its power, and its operations; fixed forever in a vast eternity, out of which time, and all the motions that measure it, are taken and derive their being; there we may contemplate the primitive causes, of much greater antiquity than those we observed in the self-moving agent; and there we shall see them lie in all their perfections, immovable, eternal, entire, united to each other; so as that each should be all by virtue of this intimate conjunction, and yet the intellectual differences between them should remain distinct and unconfused. For what account can be given of so many different forms in the world, but only, that the great God and creator of the world produces these, as He thinks fit to separate and distinguish the causes of them in His own mind? which yet we must not suppose to make such actual and incommunicable differences between the originals, as we observe between the copies of them here. Nor are the distinctions of the differing sorts of souls the same with those of bodies. Each of the eight heavens we see, and the constellations peculiar to them, are a part of the whole heaven taken together; a full and integral part, and yet each hath its essence, and influences, and operations, proper to itself. So likewise the forms of sublunary, as well as celestial bodies, which are always the same, as that of a man, a horse, a vine, a fig tree; each of these are perfect and full; though not in individuals, as the heavenly bodies are; yet according to the various species, with which they fill the world, and by the essential differences, which distinguish them from one another. Just thus it is with those more simple and intellectual considerations, of which these forms are compounded, such as essence, motion, repose, identity, beauty, truth, proportion, and all those other metaphysical qualities, belonging to the composition of bodies; each of which is perfect in its own kind, and hath a distinct form of its own, and many differences peculiar to itself only. And if this be the cause in so many inferior beings, how much more perfect and entire shall everything subsist in the great Soul of the world? These are the spontaneous causes of the bodies here below, and all their differences lie united there. According to this pattern all things here are formed; but that pattern is abundantly more perfect, and pure, and exact, than any of its resemblances. Much more perfect still then are these divine and intellectual forms, than any corporeal ones, of which they are the great originals. For these are united, not by any mutual contact, or continuity of matter, or bodily mixture; but by the coalition of indivisible forms. And this union, being such as still preserves the distinctions between them clear and unconfused, makes each of them perfect in itself, and qualifies it to be the common principle and root of all the forms of its own likeness and kind, from the highest to the lowest.

Now the several distinct principles of this derive their causal power and dignity, from some one superior principle. For it is plain, that many could not exist without an antecedent cause. For which reason each of many is one, but not such a one, as was before those many. For the one of many is a part of that number, and is distinguished from the rest by some particular qualifications, which give him a being apart to himself : but the one before the many was the cause of those many; He comprehended them all within Himself, existed before them, is the cause of causes, the first principle of all principles, and the God of Gods; for thus all the world, by the mere dictates of nature, have agreed to call and to adore Him.

He is likewise the supreme and original goodness. For all effects have a natural desire and tendency to the respective properties of their first cause. Now that, which all things desire, is good; and consequently the first cause must be the original, and the supreme good. So likewise He must be the original and supreme power: for every cause hath the highest power in its own kind, and consequently the first cause of all must needs exceed them all in power, and have all of every kind. He must needs be endued with perfect knowledge too; for how can we imagine Him ignorant of anything which Himself hath made? It is no less evident too from hence, that the world, and all things, were produced by Him without any difficulty at all. Thus, by considering particulars, we are at last arrived to a general demonstration; and from the parts have learnt the whole, (for indeed we had no other way of coming to the knowledge of it, but by its parts; the whole itself is too vast for our comprehension, and our understandings are so feeble, as often to mistake a very small part for the whole) and the result of the argument is this, that, as all things and causes are derived at last from one cause; so they ought to pay all manner of honor and adoration to that cause. For this is the stem and root of them all; and therefore it is not an empty name only, but there is a similitude in nature too, by which every cause is allied to this universal one. For the very power and privilege of being causes, and the honor that is due to them, when compared with their effects, is the free gift of this supreme cause, to all the inferior and particular ones.

Now if any man think it too great an honor of these lower and limited ones to be called causes, or principles, as well as that original and general one; it must be owned in the first place, that there is some color for this scruple, because this seems to argue an equality of causal power. But then this may easily be remedied, by calling these barely causes, and that the first and universal cause. And though it be true, that each particular principle is a first and general one, with respect to others of less extent and power contained under it; (as there is one principle of gracefulness with regard to the body, another with regard to that of the mind, and a third of gracefulness in general, which comprehends them both;) yet in truth, and strict propriety of speech, none is the first principle, but that which hath not other before or above it; and so likewise we may, and do, say by way of eminence, the first and supreme cause, the first and supreme God, and the first and supreme good.

Moreover we must take notice, that this first cause, which is above and before all things, cannot possibly have any proper name, and such as may give us an adequate idea of His nature. For every name is given for distinction’s sake, and to express something peculiar; but since all distinguishing properties whatever flow from, and are in, Him; all we can do, is to sum up the most valuable perfections of His creatures, and then ascribe them to Him. For this reason, as I hinted at the beginning of this discourse, the Greeks made choice of a name for God, derived from the heavenly bodies, and the swiftness of their motion. And thus we style him holy, and just, and merciful, and good, and lord, and omnipotent; and sometimes take the confidence to use such appellations, as we think applicable to some of the sons of men.

And thus much shall suffice at present for the first of the three points before us; which pretends to show, that there are first causes of things, and that God is the truly first and original of them all. And, though I have passed over several steps, which might have been taken in running from effects to their causes, and would perhaps have made the demonstration more gradual and complete; yet I must be content to enlarge no farther, as being duly sensible, that some persons will think what is already done a great deal too much; and that these excursions are by no means agreeable to my first design, which was to give as compendious an illustration as I could, to this manual of Epictetus.

The next assertion to be proved is, that this God governs and disposes all things by His providence. Which, though it be, I presume, largely demonstrated upon several occasions in the foregoing chapters, shall yet be allowed a particular consideration in this place. For some people are ready enough to acknowledge the being, and the perfection of God; they acquiesce in His power, and goodness, and wisdom; but, as for the affairs of the world, these they do not suppose Him to regard at all, nor to be in the least concerned for them; as being too little and low, and in no degree deserving His care. And indeed the greatest temptation to this opinion they frankly own to be ministered, by the very unequal distribution of things here below, and the monstrous irregularities, which the government of the world seems chargeable withal. They observe some exceedingly wicked men high in power and preferments, their estates plentiful and growing, their health sound and uninterrupted; and thus they continue a prosperous and pleasant life, to extreme old age, go down to their graves gently and peaceably, and frequently leave their posterity heirs of their good fortune, and transmit their ill-gotten wealth to succeeding generations. In the mean while, many persons, as eminently virtuous and good, are miserably oppressed by the insolence and barbarity of those wicked great ones; and yet for all this injustice, no vengeance, so far as we can observe, overtakes the oppressor, no is there any comfort or reward, to support the sufferer. These, as was hinted before, are the speculations, which give men the confidence to dispute against God. Some have been so far emboldened by them, as to deny his very being; but others, in compliance with the universal consent of mankind, and the natural intimations we have of Him, are content to allow His nature and perfections, but can by no means allow His providence. Especially, when it happens to be their own case, and their particular misfortunes have given an edge to the objection, and made it enter deeper and more sensibly. For then they can by no means be persuaded, that so great an inequality can be consistent with providence; or that God can interest Himself in the management of the world, and yet do a thing so unworthy His justice, and so contrary to His nature, as to suffer insulting wickedness to pass unpunished, and injured virtue to perish unredressed.

Now the first return I shall make to this objection, shall be in more general terms, by desiring the person who proposes it, to answer me to the several parts of this disjunctive argument.

If there be a God, and not a providence, then the reason must be, either want of knowledge, and a due sense, that these things ought to be His care; or, if He knows that they ought, and yet does not make them so; then this must proceed, either from want of power, or want of will. For the want of power there may be two causes assigned; either, that the burden and difficulty of governing the world is so great, that God is not able punctually to discharge it; or else, that these are matters so very mean and inconsiderable, that they escape His notice, and are not worth His care and observation. If the sufficiency of His power be granted, and the want of will be insisted upon, this may likewise be imputed to two reasons: either, that He indulges His own ease, and will not take the pains; or else, as was argued before, that these matters are of so mean consideration, that though He could attend to the most minute circumstances of them, if He so pleased; yet He does not do it, as thinking it more becoming the greatness of His majesty, to slight and overlook them.

This disjunctive argument being thus proposed in the general, the several branches of it may be replied to, as follows: that, admitting God to be such a being, as hath been here described, perfect in wisdom and knowledge, absolute and uncontrollable in power, and of goodness incomprehensible; and withal, the original cause and author of all things, produced from and by Himself; and so these so many parcels (as it were) of His own divinity; it is not possible, first, He should be ignorant, that the products of His own nature, and the works of His own hands, require His care: for this were to represent Him more insensible, than the wildest and most stupid of all brute beasts (since even these express a very tender regard for the creatures, to whom they give birth and being.) It is as absurd every whit to say, in the next place, that this is a care too weighty, and above His power and comprehension: for how is it possible to conceive an effect, greater and stronger than the cause, to which it entirely owes its production? And no less so, thirdly, to allege, that these matters are neglected, because too little and low to fall within His observation. For surely, had they been so despicable, He would never have created them at all. The want of will is no more the occasion of such a neglect, than the want of power. To suppose this care omitted, only for the indulging His own ease, and to avoid the interruption of His pleasures, would be to fix upon Him the infirmities and passions of men; nay, and such as are peculiar to the worst and most profligate of men too. For not only human reason, but natural instinct, infuses an anxious tenderness into brutes, such as suffers them to decline no pains, for the provision and support of their offspring. Now can we in any reason imagine such want of will, from a consideration of the vileness of these things; since nothing certainly is contemptible in His eyes who created it; and whatever He thought worthy the honor of receiving its existence from Him, He cannot think unworthy of His protection and care. So that, when you have made the most of this argument that it can possibly bear, still every part meets you with some intolerable absurdity; and no one of these considerations, nor all them put together, can ever induce a man, who believes that God created all these things, to think, that He does not now inspect and concern Himself for His own productions.

But now, after this general consideration, I shall apply myself more particularly to those, who either do really, or would seem to, entertain a due sense of the divine majesty; and in pretended honor to that, disparage and lower the affairs of human life, as things below His notice, and such as it would be an unbecoming condescension, a debasing of Himself, to express any care or concern for.

And here I must take leave to vindicate the honor of human nature; by telling the objectors, that mankind and their affairs are no such small and contemptible matters, as they have thought fit to represent them. For, in the first place, man is not only an animal, but a rational creature too; his soul is of exceeding dignity and value, capable of wisdom, and, which is more, of religion; and qualified for advancing the honor of God, above any other creature whatsoever. There is no manner of ground then for so wild a supposition, as, that God should undervalue and disregard so very considerable a part of the creation; nor are the actions and affairs of men to be thought despicable neither, since they are the results of a thinking mind.

But withal I must add, that they, who thus lessen mankind, furnish us with another argument in behalf of providence, and cut themselves off from taking any advantage of that part of the objection, which would suppose these things to exceed the power of God. For the more you disparage mankind, the more easy still you confess it to take care of them. The senses, ‘tis true, discern greater objects with more ease than smaller (as we find plain by the proportion of those that affect our sight, and the loudness of those that strike our ears) but the faculties of the mind and body, quite contrary, bear small trials, and master them much more easily and speedily, than greater. A pound weight is carried with less pains than a hundred, and a half acre of ground ploughed sooner and easier than an acre; so that, by parity of reason, the less mankind is represented, the less troublesome you make the government and care of them to be.

Again: they who deny, that providence descends to every little nicety (as they call it) do yet acknowledge a superintendence over the whole world in general. But what providence is that, which takes care of the whole, and not of its parts? At this rate, we shall imagine the Almighty God to come behind what almost every art and science among men pretends to. For the physician, whose profession obliges him to study the distempers and the cure of the whole body, does not think himself at liberty to neglect the several parts; and the same may be said of the master of a family, the commander of an army, and the civil magistrate in a state. Which way indeed is it possible to preserve the whole from ruin, but by consulting the safety of the parts, of which it is compounded? Far be it therefore from us to imagine, that Almighty God should betray that want of skill and industry, which feeble men attain to. He takes care of the whole, and the several parts of it, at the same time, and with the same trouble. And this most wisely, for the sake of the parts themselves, in a great measure; but much more, with a design to promote the good of the whole. Whereas, we poor unthinking mortals are often tempted to impatience, by particular and private misfortunes, not duly considering, how far these contribute to the benefit of the whole.

Now if any man shall imagine the disposal of human affairs to be a business of great intricacy, and trouble, and confusion; and consequently that it must needs perplex the Almighty, distract His mind, and disturb His happiness: this person must be taught to make a difference, between the frailties of a man and the perfections of a God. For it is plain, all this objection in built upon a vain imagination, that God is such a supervisor as one of us; and that He is under the same necessity of attending every part of his charge distinctly, and proceeding by single and subsequent actions; so that, while He is employed in one affair, it is not possible for Him to apply His mind to anything else.

Methinks it were easy for such a person to reflect, how lawgivers and princes manage themselves upon these occasions. They ordain wise and convenient laws, and assign particularly, what rewards shall be given to merit and virtue; what punishments inflicted upon vice and disobedience; what satisfaction made for injuries, and the like. And these laws they contrive so, as to extend even to the smallest matters, so far as they can foresee and provide against them. When this is done, they do not give themselves the trouble of watching and prying into every corner; they live and enjoy their ease as they used to do; and the care they take of the state is not seen in perpetual confusion and disquiet of heart, but in the establishment and observation of these wholesome constitutions. Now, if men can have so general an influence, and so effectual too, without personal anxiety; much more must we confess it possible for God. He founded the world, and formed every creature in it, and fixed wise laws for the government of them all: He considered, that our actions are such as are proper to souls; that there is a great mixture of virtue and vice in them, and, according as each person exceeds in the one or the other of these, He allots his punishment, and his portion. Some He places more commodiously, and others less so; and ranks us according to our deserts; those that have done well, with good, and those that have done ill, with worse souls; and hath determined too, what each of these shall do to one another, and suffer from one another. Now herein is the justice of God vindicated, that the fundamental cause of all these different fates, is absolutely left to our own disposal. For it is in our power, what sort of persons we will be; and we may make ourselves such as we choose, and resolved to be, by the native liberty of our minds, and by having virtue and vice properly and entirely the object of our own choice. And besides this, God hath appointed over men particular guardian spirits, which nicely observe the smallest actions, and are exact in such retributions, as each man’s behavior deserves.

Now in this, the care of God differs from that of men; that His providence did not satisfy itself, to constitute things in good order at the beginning, and afterwards dispense with any father concern about them; nor does it cease from acting, as the lawgiver in the state was supposed to do. For indeed, properly speaking, the goodness of God knows no beginning; nor is there any time when it was not, and when it did not communicate itself, and make all things good from its own exuberant fullness. Nor are we to suppose, that this inspection requires any laborious attendance, as if God were sometimes present, and sometimes absent; for these are such confinements, as bodies and matter only are subject to; whereas He is present at all times, in all places, with, and above, all things. And the providence of this mighty being, thus eternal and omnipresent, and infinitely good, finds no difficulty in expanding itself, and imparting its influences to every creature, as the dignity of their nature, and the deserts of each individual, require. And as the sun sheds his rays of light upon the whole world, and everything partakes of them with different effects: some things are made capable of seeing, others of being seen; some blossom and bud, others are impregnated and multiply; some show black to the eye, and others white; some grow stiff and hard, others are melted and softened; and all this by the same light and the same heat, adapting itself to the several capacities and dispositions of the things upon which it falls: and that too, without any trouble to the sun, or the least interruption to his happiness: so the goodness of God, whose gift and workmanship that very sun is, does most assuredly know how to impart itself to every creature, in such proportions, as the necessities of each require, or the condition of its nature will admit, much more easily, than any creature of the most general influence can do it. And that, without creating any perplexity to almighty God, or giving least disturbance to His bliss, by so extensive a care. For God is not like the works of nature, which are acted upon at the same time they act, and so spend themselves; nor is His goodness any acquired perfection, that it should tire and be exhausted, but it is natural and unbounded. Nor is He confined to one single action at a time, (as we find our feeble minds are) that He should not be able to comprehend or manage so great a variety of affairs, and yet enjoy Himself in the contemplation of that perfect and supreme good, which is infinitely more excellent, and above the world. For, if when the soul of man aspires to perfection, and soars up to God, it be said to converse and dwell on high, and to dispose and govern the world; how much more just and easy is it to believe, that the author and infuser of that soul must needs, without any manner of difficulty or distraction, guide and govern that universe, which Himself has formed.

Now, as to that objection of the amazing inequality in the distribution of the things of this world, I can never yield, that the prosperity of ill men, or the afflictions of the good, are of strength sufficient to shake our belief of providence. For, in the first place, we wholly mistake the matter; and it is a very wrong notion which generally prevails, of wicked men being happy, and good men miserable. If this obtain still with my readers, it is to very little purpose, that such pains have been taken to prove that necessary truth, that the good men is one, who places all human happiness and misery in the freedom of his own mind, and the directing this aright to such objects, as fall within the compass of his own power and choice; and, that he who does so, can never be disappointed in his desires, nor oppressed by his fears; and consequently can never have any unhappiness befall him. For the objectors themselves agree with us in the notion of evil, that it is the disappointment of some desire, or the falling into something that we fear. So that, even according to their own rule, the good man can never be wretched, or lie under any misfortune which can make him unhappy, considered as a man.

On the other side, all men agree in their notions of wicked men, that they pervert the course and design of nature, and do not live as becomes men. They forget the privilege God hath given them, and neglect the use and improvement of that liberty, which is the distinguishing character and prerogative of human nature; they look for happiness from external advantages, such as health, and riches, and honor, and power, and high birth, and sensual enjoyments, and the like; and the want of these they esteem misery: for which reason, all their desires are fixed upon these imaginary good things, and all their fears and aversions upon the contrary evil ones. Now it is not possible for these outward things always to answer a man’s wishes and endeavors; disappointed expectations, and surprising calamities there must and will be; and therefore these men cannot but be unhappy, by the confession of the objectors themselves. And the very persons concerned, if they would but give themselves leave to be serious, and reflect coolly and impartially upon the many accidents of this kind which disquiet them must needs be driven to a sense and acknowledgment of their own misery.

But, if this does not satisfy, because they are plainly prosperous, and succeed above other men, in the advantages and interests of the world; I shall make no scruple to affirm, that these successes do but add to their unhappiness. For they only put them upon greater extravagancies, and are so many fresh temptations to commit more violence, and cast a greater blemish upon human nature. And this, I think, must be admitted for an uncontestable truth, that whatever is contrary to nature and duty, must of necessity be both a fault, and a misfortune.

Now because our auditors are to be dealt with, not only by dry demonstrations, but by moving and gentle persuasions, I shall endeavor to win them over to this opinion, of the only seeming good and evil in all external accidents and advantages, by reminding them of what was said before; that the things we commonly call evil, are not properly so, notwithstanding the troubles and uneasinesses attending them; and that what passes for good in the opinion of the world, is very far from being such, notwithstanding all its outward gaieties and deluding appearances. Sometimes what we call evils, are made use of to excellent purposes; they are either sharp remedies to cure a distempered mind, or wholesome trials to exercise a sound virtue. And what we term good things, are disposed so, as to illustrate the justice of God; and are proportioned to the present occasions, or to the deserts, of the persons on whom they are bestowed, and from whom they are taken away. Thus riches are given to a wise and good man, both for his own ease and comfortable enjoyment, and also to furnish him with larger abilities of doing good, and opportunities to exercise a generous and charitable disposition. But the very same things to the vicious man are sent as a curse, and a punishment: for the covetous and worldly man makes his life a perpetual drudgery and toil; he enslaves himself to anxiety, and anguish, and continual fear; and never enjoys the plenty he hath taken such pains to procure. And this indeed is a most just and a most ingenious revenge upon them, that they should thus prove their own tormenters.

On the other hand, the luxurious and extravagant are poorer than the very beggars in the streets. To many of these their riches are their ruin, by tempting them to excesses, and running them upon dangerous and destructive courses. So that all the advantage they make of them, is but to grow the worse, and set themselves farther off from all such improvements, and such a conversation, as befits the dignity of human nature, and is agreeable to the dictates of reason. Thus health and power, and preferments, very often turn to the prejudice of vicious men. And these are sent, partly in vengeance to scourge them for their past follies, and partly as chastisements to reduce them; that when they have given a swing to their appetites, and gorged themselves with criminal pleasures, they may at last grow sick of them, throw off their ill humors, and become reformed men. For the tenderness of that good providence, which is so assiduous in promoting the true happiness of souls, is not so much to restrain us from the gross and outward acts of sin, and from gratifying our appetites, by fear or any other such curbing passions which use to give check to them; but rather to subdue the appetite itself, and utterly waft and destroy all the evil habits, that had gained upon us by the frequent indulging of it before. The substance of what I have hinted here, was discoursed more largely in some forgoing chapters, (Ch. XIII. and XXXIV.) and there, if the reader thinks fit, he may refresh his memory. And so much for my second argument, in reply to those who deny a providence, and would make us believe, that God hath no hand at all in the government and disposal of thing here below.

And now as the old proverb hath it, The third cup to Jove, and then we have done; for there remains only one objection more to be refuted; which, though it own both God and His providence, yet does not profess itself satisfied with the justice of either, in the government of the world.

They represent Almighty God, as one capable of being perverted and biased with gifts and oblations. And indeed it is a modern, and but too vulgar imagination, that the most greedy extortioner, and the merciless oppressor, who minds nothing but his own interest, and makes, or regards, no difference between right and wrong, if he does but expend a very inconsiderable part of his ill-gotten wealth on pious uses; and distributes a piece of money among those who pretend it is their business to address to the gods, and that they have a secret faculty of inclining their favor; then all shall be well; they may persist in their wickedness securely, and shall never be called to account for it. And some indeed there are, who both entertain these opinions without any judgment, and declare without any due caution, that they think it no reflection upon the goodness of God, that He should connive at the wickedness of men and pass it by patiently.

What answer shall we find now to refute this error? The best course will be to take it in pieces; and, because it refers both to the person that does, and to him that receives the injury, to examine of what consequence this remission and indulgence would be to both, and how each of them are affected and concerned in it.

Now, if it be for the interest and real advantage of the wicked and unjust person, to have his vicious courses connived at, and that no punishment at all should be inflicted for them; then it is possible God may remit and wink at them, because it is most certain, that every good thing, of what kind so ever it be, is derived down from that original source of all goodness, upon His creatures here below. But if this would really be the worst and most destructive of all evils, to have their wickedness thus assisted and encouraged; if impunity would only harden them in vice, and render them but so much more bold and unreclaimable; then how can we admit so absurd a thought, as that God should become accessory to all this mischief, who hath been so largely and clearly proved, to have no hand at all in bringing any of our evils upon us?

Now injustice, and avarice, and intemperance, and injuries, and extravagancies of all sorts, are but so many corruptions and indispositions of the mind; they are contrary to nature, and no better than the diseases and scandals, as well as the vices, of mankind. If God therefore contributes to the growth of these distempers, if he adds to their malignity, and lets them go on till they are past all cure; the misery and corruption will be charged upon Him. But if presents and bribes prevail upon Him to do so; this is something more vile and mercenary, than even the ordinary sort of men, who can boast of no remarkable virtue, will stoop to. For, who of a moderate understanding, and common honesty, will suffer his charge to perish for hire? Will any tolerable physician, when he finds his patient surfeited, for the sake of a good fee, or the intercession either of his friends, or himself, permit him to eat and drink freely of those very things which brought the distemper? nay, which is more, will he not only permit, but procure them, and assist the sick person in that which must prove his certain ruin? So far from it, that if he at all answers the character and duty of his profession, he will let nothing divert him from the most ungrateful remedies, and painful applications, when the state of the distemper requires them. Since then the angry justice of God, and the avenging dispensations of providence, have been so fully shown, to carry in them the nature and design of medicines, to distempered mankind; how can we suppose this great physician of souls, less careful of our recovery, than we think ourselves obliged to be to one another.

But the persons, who are oppressed by injustice, are no less the object of his providence, than those who commit it; and therefore we shall do well to examine a little how this easiness to wicked men, and this assisting and encouraging their villainies, for the sake of their oblations, can be reconciled with his tenderness and care for the innocent sufferers. What opinion must we have of that general, who would suffer himself to be corrupted by the enemy, and deliver up his camp and whole army for reward? Or what shepherd would be so treacherous to his flock? Shepherd did I say? nay, what shepherd’s curs, when they have recovered a part of their flock from the wolves, will sit down contentedly, and see the rest devoured? And then sure this part of the argument needs no farther confutation, than only to reflect, what monstrous impiety that opinion is guilty of, which taxes God with such infidelity, and baseness to His charge, as not men only, but even brute beasts, disdain and abhor.

Indeed if we consider the thing only in the general, it is most irrational to conceive, that the offerings of wicked men should ever prevail upon God, or incline Him to be propitious at all. ‘Tis true, He graciously accepts those of the pious and upright: not for any resect to the gifts themselves, or any occasion he hath for them; but for the sake of the votaries, who, when they thus apply, desire that, not only their minds, but their estates, and all they posses, may be consecrated to His use and service. There is likewise no doubt to be made, but the matter may be so ordered, as even to render the gifts and prayers of wicked men acceptable to Him; that is, provided they come with a purpose of growing better, and beg to be reformed by his punishments, and be ready to submit to the methods of their cure. But if the secret and true intent of their devotions be only to avert His judgment, and to confirm themselves in vice, it is most absurd to suppose, they can ever be well received upon these terms. For, though there was no guilt to be laid to their charge, yet this alone was sufficient to render them abominable in the sight of God, that they suppose Him a base and mercenary being, and hope by bribery to soften his provoked justice, and to buy off their own punishment.

And now I expect to have the question put, from whence this notion of God, pardoning men’s sins, came to be so universally received; and what foundation there is for saying, and believing, as almost everybody does, that prayers, and alms, and the like, have a power to make God flexible and propitious. For sure the world hath not taken all this upon trust; and yet they are much to blame, to lay that stress they do upon it, and to propagate this opinion with so much confidence, if it be unsafe, and impious to be believed, that God forgives wicked men, and passes by their offences, without punishing them, as they have deserved.

In order to satisfy this doubt, we must observe, that, where men are duly sensible of their faults, and heartily penitent for them, these things contribute very much to their conversion, as being decent and proper testimonies of a sincere repentance. The bending of the knees, and bodily prostrations, express the sorrows and submissions of a dejected soul; and the offering up their goods, or laying them out to pious and charitable purposes, such as God peculiarly regards and delights in, proclaims, how entirely their minds, and persons, and all they have are devoted to Him.

For when we are told, that our sins turn God’s face away from us, that He is angry at them, and leaves, or forsakes us, upon the provocation they give Him; these expressions must no be taken in a strict and literal sense. They speak the passions and infirmities of creatures, such as carry no congruity with the divine nature, and its immutable happiness and perfections. But the truth is, we deprave and debase ourselves, by forsaking the dictates of nature and reason; we deface the image of the divinity in our souls, and by our wickedness and folly, fall off, and withdraw ourselves from Him. Not that we can run away from the watchful eye to which all things are present; but we change the manner of its influences upon us, and expose ourselves to a different sort of treatment; for now we have brought a disease upon our souls, and made severity and a harsher providence necessary for our cure.

But, when we recover the soundness and perfection of our nature, and make nearer approaches to God, by restoring that image and character of His divinity in us, which consists in the imitation of His justice, and holiness, and wisdom; we then return, and are admitted to a more easy access. We renew our acquaintance, and contract a sort of fresh affinity with Him. And this return of ours to God, we often express in such terms, as if it were His return to us; just as men at sea, who when their cable is fastened to a rock, while they draw themselves and their vessel to the rock, are so idle as to imagine, that they draw the rock to them. And this is our case; repentance, and devotion, and works of piety and charity, answer exactly to that cable: for these things are the instruments of our conversion, and the best proofs of its being unaffected and real: when we cherish and support, either the persons themselves who have suffered by our oppression, or our insolence, or our slanders; or, if that cannot be, make satisfaction to their families, and relieve those that are in necessity; when we hate injustice, when we decline the conversation of naughty men, and become the companions and friends of the wise and virtuous; and when we are full of indignation against ourselves, and content to turn our own punishers. And if we would be thoroughly reformed indeed, we must persevere in this method, not suffer our resolutions to be fickle and uncertain, or any intermissions to cool our zeal; till we have acted a sufficient revenge upon ourselves, and perfected the design of our amendment. And there is not, there cannot be, any other certain testimony of a sincere and perfect repentance, but only this one, that of forsaking our sins, and doing so no more. Nay, I must add too, the not allowing ourselves in any less or lower degrees of guilt, or complying with the temptations and tendencies toward them. For in this case we must behave ourselves like sailors, who steer their course beyond the point they would make, and bear down towards one side, when they would cross over to the other.

Now as to the efficacy of repentance, whether it be of merit and power enough to restore the soul to its primitive purity; this, I think, can admit of no dispute, when it is considered, that Almighty God does in all his dispensations propose it as His end, and always cleanses and reforms us by this means. For what other account can be given of all the punishments, and those dire effects of His vengeance upon us, both in this, and the next world, but only, that they are designed to change the soul, by the suffering and tortures inflicted upon it; that a sense of her own wretchedness may provoke her to a just detestation of the vices that were the wicked cause of it; and may inflame her with a more fervent love, and impatient desire of virtue? There is indeed something very instructing in affliction, and a strange aptness in the rational soul, to hearken to it, and be taught by it. But a man is never so well disposed to learn, nor makes such quick and sure progress, as when he exercises this discipline upon himself. Because then the very punishment is voluntary, and the improvement is much more likely to be so. And indeed, considering that pleasure and sensual prospects tempt men to offend; the rule of curing disease by their contraries, makes sorrow and pain absolutely necessary, to remove this sickness of the mind, and expel the humors which brought it upon us. And repentance wants no qualifications of this kind; for the truly penitent person chastises himself with the scourge of a guilty conscience; and feels such bitter remorse, and anguish of heart, as are infinitely sharp and stinging, and more inconsolable, than any smart or bodily pain can possibly be.

Thus much in opposition to the third objection against God and religion, which is indeed the worst and most impious of all the three. For it were a much more excusable error, to deny a God and a providence, than to allow both these, and yet advance such incongruous notions concerning Him. Better it were for us and Him both, that He had no being, and no concern in governing the world at all, than that He should be guilty of so much treachery and baseness, as this objection lays to His charge: for this is to be evil, and that is much worse than not to be at all. The reason is evident, because goodness and happiness is superior to existence. It is the principle of being, the cause from whence all things derive it, and the very end for which they have it. For existence itself is what no man would desire, but merely upon the apprehension of its being good; and therefore, whenever we apprehend ourselves in evil circumstances, we naturally wish not to be at all.

If I have here again enlarged beyond the just bounds of a commentary, the importance of the argument will justify me in it. For, in truth, a regular and well grounded devotion towards God, just and becoming apprehensions, concerning the perfections of His nature, the certainty of His providence, and the justice and goodness of all His proceedings with mankind; and, consequent to such a persuasion, a submissive resigned temper, and easy acquiescence under all His dispensations, as the effects of a most excellent wisdom, and such as are always best for us; these are the sum of all human accomplishments, the foundation and the perfection, the first and last step of all moral, and all intellectual virtue. For, though the soul of man be (‘tis confessed) a free agent, and proceeds upon internal principles of good and evil; yet still this liberty and power of determining herself was the particular favor and gift of God; and therefore, while she holds fast by the root, she lives and improves, and attains the perfection God made her capable of. But when she separates herself, and, as it were, disengages, and tears herself off; she grows barren, and withers, and putrefies, till she returns, and is united to the root again, and so recovers her life and perfection once more. Now nothing, but a firm and a vigorous sense of these three points we have been explaining, can ever prevail upon the soul to endeavor such a restoration. For how is it possible to apply to God, when we do not believe that He is? Of what encouragement is the belief of His existence, without a persuasion, that He is concerned for us, and takes notice of us? Least of all should we address to a being, who does inspect and govern our affairs, if we were possessed with an opinion, that all that care and inspection were directed to evil and malicious purposes, and that He waited over us only for misery and mischief.

When you consult the oracle, remember ‘tis only the event that you are ignorant of, and come to be instructed in. But, though you do not know what that shall be particularly, yet philosophy (if you have any) hath already taught you, of what quality and consequence it shall prove to you: for you are satisfied beforehand, that if it be any of the things out of our own power, it must needs be indifferent in its own nature, and neither good nor bad of itself. Therefore, when these occasions call you abroad, leave all your hopes and fears behind you; and do not approach the prophet with such anxious concern, as if you were to hear your doom from his mouth; but behave yourself as becomes a man fully persuaded, that no external accident is anything to you; and that nothing can possibly happen, which may not, by good management, be converted to your advantage, though all the world should endeavor to obstruct it. When therefore you address to the gods, come boldly, as one who asks their advice; and withal, when they have given it, be all compliance; for consider, whose counsel you have asked, and how impious a disrespect it will be, not to follow it. When therefore you apply yourself to the oracle, observe Socrates’ rule to ask no questions, but for what the event is, for this is the only material consideration to be cleared in; they should be matters of great importance and difficulty, and such as are not capable of resolution, by reason, or art, or any human methods. But if you are in dispute, whether you ought to assist your friend in distress, and expose your person for the defense of your country; these are not questions fit to be put, because they answer themselves: for, though the sacrifice be never so inauspicious, though it should portend flight or banishment, loss of limbs, or loss of life, yet still reason and duty will tell you, that, in despite of all these hazards, you must not desert those that have a right to your service and assistance. In this case you need no other determination than that memorable one, which Apollo gave so long since, when he thrust that wretch out of his temple, who suffered his friend to perish for want of help.

Comment.

After having given directions for the understanding and due discharge of our duty to one another, and towards God; the next thing to be done, was to inform us, what we owe to ourselves. But, before this could be methodically undertaken, it was necessary to take notice of a sort of mixed duty, which respects both God and ourselves; and this arises from divination, or the consulting of oracles. To this purpose he divides his discourse into three parts, and tells us, upon what occasions we ought to consult them, with what disposition it should be done, and what use is to be made of their determinations.

He begins with the second of these, thinking it perhaps the first, both in consequence, and in order of nature; and tells us, that the mind should preserve such a firm and even temper upon these occasions, as neither to bring any desires, nor any aversions along with it: for at this rate it would be impossible to come without great anxiety and disorder. If our desires are eager, we shall be afraid of hearing that what we wish will not come to pass; and if our aversions are violent, we shall be in no less concern to be told, that what we fear most, shall certainly happen to us. But the question is, what course we shall take, to throw off these passions, and possess ourselves with that indifference. To this he replies, that the consideration of those things we inquire about, will be able to effect it: for we need only reflect, that they are external accidents, and things out of our power; for no man is so senseless, as to consult an oracle upon the events of those, which his own choice must determine. Who ever inquired at a shrine, whether he ought to regulate his inclinations and aversions, to reduce them within just bounds, or to fix them upon fit and worthy objects? The queries usually put, are quite of another strain; whether a voyage shall be prosperous? Whether it be advisable to marry? Whether the purchasing such a parcel of land would turn to good account? And these, being such things, as we ourselves are not made masters of by nature, ‘tis plain our desires and our aversions ought not to have any concern in the divination. The only thing we want to be satisfied in, is some particular event. This is the soothsayer’s work and out of the compass of our own knowledge: but the quality of that event we know as well as he. For philosophy hath assured us, that none of those matters, which are out of our own power, can be in themselves good or evil; and by consequence none of them proper objects of our inclination or aversion.

Besides, they that are skilled in these mysteries, have a notion, that an extreme passion and concern in the person applying to the oracle, disturbs the whole method of divination, and confounds the omen. So that this calmness will be of advantage in that respect also; and you will escape all immoderate solicitude, when you remember, that, be the accident whatever it will, you have it still in your power to convert it to your own benefit; and the more disastrous, so much the more beneficial still may a prudent management render it to you: and therefore come boldly (says he) and cast aside vain fears, and unnecessary scruples, when you profess to ask counsel of the gods.

From that expression, he takes occasion to inform men, what is their duty to the gods in these cases; namely, that when we have asked their advice, we should be sure to take it: for he that consults God himself, and yet refuses to follow his advice; whom will that man be directed by? And indeed, there is not any more probable or more frequent ground for our stiffness and disobedience, than the prepossessions we lie under, and the strong bias of our own inclinations and aversions. So that from hence we have discovered one advantage more of approaching the deity with a dispassionate and unprejudiced mind; for this will not only deliver us from all those anxieties and fears, so inconvenient and so hazardous upon such occasions; but it will also dispose us exceedingly to a ready compliance, and leave us free to resign ourselves entirely, to be governed by the will and directions of God.

The next inquiry he goes upon, concerns those things, which are the proper objects of divination; and these he declares to be such only, whose end is perfectly dark and unknown: where nothing but the event itself can give us any light; this so purely accidental, that no human prudence, no rules of any particular art, no helps of experience and long observation, can enable us to pronounce what they shall be.

Thus much is agreeable to reason and common sense. For nobody consults an oracle, whether it be fit for a man to eat, or drink, or sleep, because nature teaches us the necessity of these refreshments, and we cannot possibly subsist without them. Nor, whether it be advisable for a man to improve in wisdom, and lead a virtuous life, for every wise and good man sees and feels and advantage of doing so. Nor does he desire the prophet to resolve him, what sort of house he shall build because this is the business of a surveyor, and his schemes and models are drawn by rule and art. Nor does the farmer desire to be satisfied, whether he should sow his corn, or not; for this is a thing absolutely necessary to be done. But he may perhaps inquire, what season, or what parcel of land, or what sort of grain, and which plants will turn to best account; upon a supposal still, (I mean) that experience, or some other natural causes, have not instructed him in these things before. Or a man may reasonably enough ask, if it be proper to undertake such a voyage, especially if the season of the year, or any other circumstances, contribute to the rendering it hazardous for him.

Nor would it be proper to inquire, whether one should go abroad into the market or walk a turn into the fields: for though it be true, that even these trivial undertakings are sometimes attended with very strange and very dismal consequences; yet generally speaking, they fall out just as we intend, and desire they should. And where there is a very high probability, and such as is most commonly answered by the event, there all divination is needless. If it were not so, nothing in the world could be exempt from it; for the best concluding reason, and the surest rules of art, do not always succeed right. Nature sometimes works out of her common course, and choice does frequently mistake, and fall short of what is designed. But still there is no difficulty worthy an oracle in these matters; because we rest satisfied in great probabilities, and are not to be disturbed at the few, the very few exceptions to the contrary. Otherwise we shall be overrun with idle whimsies, and superstitious fears; such as improve every little accident into something terrible and ominous, and would make us utterly inactive, and afraid ever to attempt anything so long as we live.

But here arises a query worth a little consideration. It is, whether the consulting of oracles concerning matters within our own power be wholly disallowed: as for instance; what opinion we ought to entertain of the soul: whether it be mortal or immortal: and, whether we should apply ourselves to such a particular master or not: and the reason of this doubt is, because several of the ancients seem to have consulted the gods about some difficulties in nature; and yet the making such or such a judgment of things is our own proper act; and confessed to be one of those things which come within the compass of our will.

Now I must needs say, with submission, that whatever is attainable by reason and logical demonstration, ought to be learned that way. For this will give us a clear and undoubted perception, and the discovery of effects from their causes is the true scientifical knowledge. It leaves no doubt behind, but satisfies ourselves, and enables us to instruct and convince others. An assurance from divine testimony, that the soul is immortal, may give us a firm belief of the thing, and we should do ill, and unreasonably, in refusing credit to such a testimony; but still this is only faith, and differs very much from science. And if God vouchsafe to communicate to any man the knowledge of natural causes by immediate revelation; this is to be looked upon as an extraordinary favor, a special case, and such as falls not under the common rules of divination, nor to be depended upon from it. For the primary talent, and proper object of this, is only to instruct men in such uncertain events of human actions, as no art or consideration can bring them to any certain knowledge of. And, though some persons have addressed to oracles for mysteries in nature; yet they were but few who did so; and those, none of the most eminent reputation for philosophy neither; but such as contented themselves with credible testimonies, and chose rather to take things upon trust, than to be at the trouble of attaining to a demonstrative evidence. Whereas God seems plainly to have designed this for the soul’s own work; and by infusing into us a principle of liberty and reason, to have left the contemplation of our own nature as one of the subjects most proper to employ our own study and pains. And upon that account, both Epictetus, and Socrates before him, seem to condemn and forbid such questions, as impertinent and superfluous; in regard that the soul is sufficiently qualified to make those discoveries by her own strength.

For the same reason, you see he disapproves of that query, whether a man ought to relieve his friend in distress, or expose his person in defense of his country. Because right reason cries out aloud, that these things must be done; and no hazards can be so formidable, as that the most certain prospect of them should justify our neglecting to do so. To what purpose then do we trouble the gods, for that which hath no difficulty in it; and where we must be lost to all sense, if we be not able to satisfy ourselves? And besides, he gives us an instance, wherein the prophetic god declared his displeasure, against one who came to have this scruple resolved: for that, which our own reason will convince us is fit and necessary to be done, we must set about without more ado; and not raise idle doubts, or frame frivolous excuses, though we are satisfied, that the performance of it would cost us our fortunes, or our lives. This may seem a hardship, but it is backed with this invincible argument, that virtue is our own proper good, and ought to be dearer to us than our bodies, or our estates; which in comparison of our souls, bear but a distant relation to us.

After this argument, intimating, that our duty ought to be discharged, even at the expense of the greatest sufferings and dangers; he introduces a god confirming this opinion by his own practice, and expelling that miscreant out of his temple, who did not relieve his friend, but suffered him to be murdered, that he might save himself. The story in short is thus. Two persons upon the journey to Delphos, were set upon by thieves; while one of these was no farther solicitous than to make his own escape, the other was killed. The survivor continued his travels; and when he came to the oracle, the god rejected his address, expelled him from the temple, and reproached his cowardice and base desertion of his friend, in this following manner:

Do not, presumptuous wretch, these rites profane,
Nor with polluted gifts our altars stain:
Nor prudent fears, and threatening fate pretend;
False to thy god, thy honor, and thy friend.
These claim thy blood in any danger near,
And must condemn that base and guilty fear,
Which of a coward made a treacherous murderer.
Henceforth dare to be just and brave; for know,
He, that declines to ward it, gives the blow.

Now though it is plain, that this person, would he never so fain, yet possibly he might not have been able to save his fellow traveler’s life; yet that uncertainty by no means dispensed with him for not attempting it. His inclination and endeavor should not have been wanting; though that relief he intended had been never so unsuccessful; nay, though it had involved himself in the same fate. That then, which rendered him unworthy to approach the Shrine of Apollo, was the disposition of his mind; which prevailed upon him to betray his friend, and to sacrifice a life which he ought to have defended, in tenderness to that which he ought to have exposed.

And that this is the true state of the case, is no less evident from another instance of two persons, who were likewise beset with thieves. These had got one of them at an advantage; and whilst the other darts at the rogue, he missed his aim, and killed his own friend. When he came to the oracle, he durst not approach, as having blood upon him; but the god justified his action, cleared him of the scruple he lay under, and gave him this following kind invitation.

Approach, brave man, the gods are just and kind;
They only hate a base and murderous mind.
Thy slaughtered friend to us for justice cries,
And his expiring groans have pierced the skies:
Yet not for vengeance, but rewards they sue;
Rewards to courage, and to friendship due.
That zeal, which death and danger did disdain,
A disobedient weapon cannot stain;
Spotless thy hand, and generous thy design,
The guilt, misguiding fates, the glory’s thine.

Now, if by the shedding this blood, he did not only contract no pollution at all; but was more pure, and recommended by it to the acceptance of the deity, because he intended well, though it was his misfortune, that the event was so very tragic, so exceedingly contrary to his intention; then it is very plain, that virtues and vices are not to be measured by success, or by the action themselves; but by their innocent intentions, honest desires, and the sincerity of their own hearts.

One caution I think necessary to be added here, for the better understanding of our author. Is, that we are to consider, what sort of persons these things are addressed to. Now those which I have last explained, and several of those which follow afterwards, are adapted particularly to a middle sort of men: such as are neither utterly ignorant of philosophy, nor absolutely masters of it; but have applied themselves to the study of it for some time, and made tolerable advances towards perfection, though they have not yet attained to it. And this is sufficiently intimated to us, by the frequent repetition of those words, (If you have any philosophy) upon every occasion.

Consider with yourself seriously, what figure is most fit for you to make in the world; and then fix upon a method and rule in order hereunto; which will be sure to observe nicely, both at home alone, and abroad in company.

Let one of your principle rules be silence; and when you discourse, confine yourself to such subjects as are necessary, and express your sense in as few words as you can. But if an opportunity happens, as sometimes perhaps it will, which makes it seasonable for you to start the discourse, let it not be upon any of the common topics of talk, such as plays, horse racing, fencers, fashions, meats, wines, or entertainments; which the generality of the world use to make the subject of their conversation. But above all things take care not to talk of other people; neither to as to censure their conduct, nor to be lavish in their commendation, nor to make invidious comparisons between one and another.

When ever you happen into company, where you have authority and influence enough to do it, try to change the discourse, and bring it to becoming subjects. But if you are among people of another temper, and such as will not endure restraint or reproof, then hold your own tongue.

Comment.

The duties, owing to a man’s self, are the next thing to be learned; and those he begins to treat of here, advising his proficient, (for to such a one he writes now) to make it his first care, to determine with himself, what figure he intends to make, and what part to play upon this theatre of the world. And when once that is done, the next must be, so to model all his actions, as that they may conspire together to the maintaining of that character. This, he tells him, must be kept constantly in view, that his whole behavior may be leveled at it , both in public and in private. By which I suppose he means, that a man should be always consistent with himself, and his life all of a piece; not fluctuating and uncertain, like a troubled sea, which is ever ebbing and flowing, as the winds and tide change. For the circumstances of human life are no less fickle than these; and therefore we must fix ourselves upon a good bottom, that we may be able to stand the shock and the variety of them. Socrates is said to have attained to so great a mastery in this point, that the air of his face was always the same; neither pleasure and prosperity could give him a more serene and gay countenance; nor any of those which the world call calamities, could force him into a dejected and melancholy one. In such perfect agreement was he constantly with himself.

Now of all the expedients proper for this character, the first and most considerable, which he recommends, is a great degree of silence. For the design of all moral instructions is chiefly to confine the soul within her own proper sphere, which is the improvement and contemplation of herself, and to draw her thoughts and affections off from the world, and the sensual appetites and passions, and an inordinate concern for the body. And no one thing contributes more to the effecting of this, than silence. The Pythagoreans, you see, were so sensible of the benefit, that they imposed a five year silence upon all that entered into their discipline; and thought it the most auspicious beginning they could possibly make. For, as the senses, when fixed upon external objects, do carry the mind abroad with them; (a plain intimation whereof we have in that common custom of men shutting their eyes, when they would think with greater attention;) so speech of necessity lets loose the mind, and sets the thoughts to roving; and that much more indeed, than any outward and sensible object. For there the soul only cooperates with the organ, and bears it company; but here she is the first and principal mover, and dictates what the tongue utters. And the only effectual cure for this rambling is to keep it at home, by holding ones peace, and not indulging it in all its effusions.

Not that a universal silence is expected from us. No, nor so high a degree of it, as that the Pythagoreans required. These are too exalted, and, as the world goes, unattainable perfections. But he hath suited himself to our temper, and circumstances, and expects only such, as will consist with our infirmities, and the affairs of the world: therefore he advises us either to be silent, or at least to speak no oftener, and no more, than is necessary; as the answering to what is asked us, or the like. And in mentioning this word necessary, he hath given us a very compendious hint, what subjects we ought to converse upon. Such as specially tend to the promoting of wisdom and virtue, the improvement of the mind, and the necessities of the animal life. For these being but very few, and having something of substance and business in them, not loose, and empty, and impertinent things, and do not confound the mind with levity, nor fill it with wild and extravagant ideas.

He hath also ordered us, even upon these most allowable occasions, to be as brief as conveniently we can. For it is very observable, that those who talk most, generally understand least. There is nothing disposes a man to a multitude of words, so much as slight and superficial notions of the things he is talking of. He does not know what he says, and that is the reason he does not know when to give over. But one who goes to the bottom of things, and hath a clear and true apprehension, will collect himself into a little room, because he will say nothing but what is material, and directly to the point in hand.

But if at any time an occasion of enlarging offers itself, by which I understand speaking, not only when you are provoked to it, but beginning some discourse of your own accord; though there may be a necessity for dispensing with the latter of these rules, and indulging yourself in a larger proportion of talk; yet be sure still to observe the former, and not go out of the road I have directed you. Let your subjects be something of necessity and use; something which may advance the love and practice of virtue, reform the passions, or instruct the understanding. Such as may minister advice to men in difficulties, comfort them under afflictions, assist them in the search of the truth, give them a reverent sense of God, an awful admiration of his divine excellencies, honorable and becoming opinions, of his providence, and of his readiness to help and forward all those in the practice of virtue, who are careful to implore his aid by prayer. But as for the common ridiculous themes, such as fencers, horse races, and the like, or feasts, or fashions, cookery and wines; who eats and drinks, and dresses best, and such stuff; scorn the idle prattle. For these subjects are apt to make a strong impression upon the fancy, and sometimes get within a man’s affections before he is aware; they give a tincture to his appetites, and have a very unhappy influence upon all his conversation: and it is really no unusual thing, for people’s manners to be formed by their discourse.

But above all things, he gives us warning not to entertain ourselves, and our company with talking of other people; neither so as to call their behavior to account, nor to be profuse in their praises, nor free in making comparisons between one man and another. As, that this lady is handsomer than that, or this man braver, or more honest than that, or the like. There is nothing more evident than that this topic does, in a more than ordinary manner, divert the soul from itself, and its own business; for it makes men busy, and curious, and impertinent, extremely inquisitive, and troublesome, where they have nothing to do. But why should this (you’ll say) do so more than any other? And what can our talking of other men have in it, worse than the subjects mentioned before?

To this we may reply, that the person to whom the advice is here directed, being one, who hath made some progress in philosophy, is not so likely to entertain himself with those trivial matters, as with something that relates to mankind, and their affairs and actions. It was therefore convenient to draw him off from those things especially, which his own inclination would most dispose him to; and hence he adds that emphatical caution, But above all things.

Besides, though it be true, that the same affections are stirred in us by both discourses alike, (for we are insensibly drawn in, to love and hate things and men by talking of them) yet there is one peculiar vice in conversation, when we pretend to give characters of other people; which is, that it strangely swells one with vanity, and pride, and contempt of others. For whoever pretends to sit in judgment upon the conduct of others, he does it out of some imagined excellence in himself, which he fancies gives him a right to arraign his neighbors. And besides, any mistake in our judgments of men is more inexcusable, and of infinitely worse consequence, than if we pronounce wrong in those other trifling matters; and therefore we should be very sparing and tender in this point.

To prove the importance of this advice yet more; he proceeds farther, and lays a restraint upon our ears, as well as our tongue. And indeed, with good reason. For our imaginations, and inconvenient desires are cherished, by hearing the subjects, which minister such thoughts, spoken of by others, as well as by speaking of them ourselves. And besides, they, who give themselves these indecent liberties, if some person of gravity and authority sits by, and does not check them, they take advantage of his patience, and grow perfectly careless; they then think they have a privilege of say what they will, and no shame, no sense of decency hath any longer power upon them. Therefore he directs us, to take all the prudent methods we can, of putting a stop to such discourse, and turning it to some other more manly and becoming topic. But, because this is not to be done at all times, nor will every company bear it; therefore (says he) if you are fallen in among men of ill temper, no breeding, or vicious conversation, (for these are the persons he calls people of another kidney) yet at least discountenance them by your silence; and preserve yourself from infection, by withdrawing from their discourse into your own breast.

Laugh but upon few occasions; and when you do, let it not be much, or loud.

Comment.

After the former general precept of an even temper, and uniform behavior; to which, he tells his proficient in philosophy, nothing will more effectually conduce, than a prudent frugality in discourse; the next restraint is put upon the excesses of mirth, which are commonly expressed by laughter. And perhaps by this of joy, he might design, that we should understand him to extend his rules to the contrary extreme of grief too. Now laughter is a sort of evacuation, which the mind gives itself; a kind of vent, which it finds for joy, when it is full and runs over. The very nature and manner of it seems to speak thus much. The swelling of the lungs, the interruptions of breath, the reverberations of the air, and that cackling noise, which resembles the purling of waters, all these betray an extraordinary vehemence, and emotion, in the soul and body both; all confess plainly, that neither of them are then in that sedate and steady temper, which nature and reason find most agreeable. The same inconveniences follow upon the other extreme. For immoderate sorrow, and indulged tears, give as great a shock to a man’s judgment, and consistence with himself. Which indeed is never to be preserved, but by just measures, and a constant moderation in everything.

For this reason it is, that he condemns the laughing upon every occasion, as an argument of insufferable levity. But if there happens anything, which may justly provoke laughter; that we are not absolutely to decline it, for fear we be suspected to want this property of human nature, and appear unreasonably sour and morose; yet at least it must be allowed, that there are very few things in conversation, which will justify much of it. A man that is eternally upon the giggle, shows a mighty defect of judgment, and that every little occasion of mirth is master of his temper, when it thus blows him up into excessive joy. For this reason it ought not to be frequent, nor to continue long at a time. For so I understand his forbidding it to be much. Nor should it be noisy, and violent, and convulsive; but show the evenness and government of the mind, by being modest, and scarce exceeding a smile, which moves the lips a little, yet so as to make no great alteration in the face.

If it be possible, avoid swearing altogether; but if you cannot do that absolutely, yet be sure to decline it as much as you can.

Comment.

The first place in this catalogue of duties, which respects ourselves, was due to the restraining those eruptions and vehemences of passion, which give a disturbance to the quiet of our minds, and render our behavior irregular and inconsistent. The next he assigns to that wherein the honor of God is concerned.

For the very nature of an oath consists in this, that it invokes almighty God as a witness, and introduces him as a mediator, and a bondsman, to undertake for our honesty and truth. Now to make bold with God, upon every trivial occasion, (and few of the affairs of mankind are any better) is to take a very unbecoming freedom, and such as argues great what of reverence for so tremendous a majesty. Respect and duty then ought to make us decline an oath. Even so, as if we can possibly help it, never to bind our souls with so sacred an engagement at all. And a man, that is duly cautious, and tender in these matters, would rather undergo some trouble, or pay some forfeiture, than allow himself the liberty of swearing. But if there be any urgent and unavoidable necessity for doing it; as, if that testimony of my truth be required to rescue my friend, or my relation, from the injuries of an oppressor, or a false accuser; or if my country, and the peace of it command this assurance of my fidelity: in such cases, and other such like, we may take an oath indeed; but then we must be sure not to prostitute our consciences. For, when once we have brought ourselves under so solemn an obligation, and engaged God as a witness and a party in it, no consideration must ever prevail with us, to be unfaithful to our promise, or untrue in our assertions.

Decline all public entertainments, and mixed companies; but if any extraordinary occasion calls you to them, keep a strict guard upon yourself, lest you be infected with rude and vulgar conversation: for know, that though a man be never so clear himself, yet, by frequenting company that are tainted, he will of necessity contract some pollution from them.

Comment.

The former chapter was intended to give us a due and awful regard to God, and to check those liberties, which light thoughts of his majesty are apt to encourage in us. His next design is, to chain up that many headed monster, desire. And, in order hereunto, he prescribes rules, and sets bounds to several instances of it; beginning with those which are most necessary for the sustenance of life; and so proceeding to others, which make provision for the body; till at last he descends to those, which nature is most prone to.

And there was good reason here to give a particular advertisement concerning feasts, and large companies, in regard of the mighty difference observable, between those of philosophers, and those of common men. The eating and drinking part, and all the jollity, which is the end and business of most invitations, men of sense have always looked upon, as the least part of a feast: and their meetings have been designed only for opportunities to improve one another, by mutual conference, wise discourses, assiduous enquiry into the truth, and a free communication of each other’s studies and opinions. This is exceedingly plain, to their immortal honor, from those admirable pieces of Plato, and Xenophon, and Plutarch, and others, called by the name of their Symposia, and are an account of the discourse which passed, when friends met to eat and drink together. But the entertainments of the greatest part of the world propose nothing to themselves, but luxury, and excess, gratifying the palate and sensual appetites: they are not the entertainment of a man, but the cramming and gorging of a brute; and most justly fall under the reproach of an old observation: The table which gives us meat without discourse, is not so properly a table, as a manger.

A good man therefore will be careful how he mingles himself in such meetings, and will decline them as much as is possible. But if any extraordinary occasion draws us abroad, such as a solemn festival, the invitation of a parent, a common meeting of friends or relations, or civility and complaisance, where the thing cannot in good manners be refused; then the next care is, that we keep a strict guard upon ourselves; that we awaken our reason, and call up all our powers, to watch the motions of the mind, and keep her under a severe confinement, for fear she ramble abroad, indulge herself in the diversions of the company, and by degrees degenerate into their follies. For there is a strange contagion in vice; and no disease conveys itself more insensibly, or more fatally, than sensual and brutish inclinations do. Whoever therefore allows himself in the conversation of persons addicted to them, and grows accustomed to their vices, (for that I take to be the meaning of frequenting them) will soon contract their pollutions. His own innocence and purity will not be able to secure him: in these cases, the least touch leaves a tincture behind it. And this indeed is the proper notion of pollution, the soiling of a clean thing with an unclean, and thereby casting a blemish and stain upon it.

Let use and necessity be the rule of all the provisions you make for the body. Choose your meats and drinks, apparel, house, and retinue, of such kinds, and such proportions, as will most conduce to these purposes. But as for all beyond this, which ministers to vanity and luxury, retrench and despise it.

Comment.

The necessary supports and conveniences of the body must first be acquired, and then made use of. But Epictetus hath inverted this order; for he gives us directions for the use of them here, and reserves the procuring of them to be treated of hereafter.

It were a thing perhaps much to be wished, and would make greatly for the honor of human nature, that so noble a being as the rational soul, could be independent, and not stand in need of these outward conveniences. But whatever glories belong to that soul, considered in itself; yet its own immortality will not suffice, in this indigent and precarious state, where it is joined to a mortal and corruptible body, and acts in and by it. Yet still, though this consideration exposes it to some wants; it show us withal, that those wants are not many. For, the body being the instrument of the soul, can need no more, than just so much as will qualify it for service and action. This is the true measure of our expenses upon it, and all beyond, favors of luxury and extravagance. When the carpenter chooses an axe, and sees afterwards, that it be kept in good order, he concerns himself no farther, than to consider the size, and the shape, and the sharpness of the edge: he is not so solicitous to have the helve gilded, nor the handle studded with pearl or diamonds: the reason is, because such costly ornaments would be, not only superfluous, but prejudicial; they would be extremely ridiculous and singular too, and they would be a hindrance to his tools, and render them less fit for the uses they were designed to serve. Just thus ought we to behave ourselves to this body of ours, this instrument of our soul; giving ourselves concern for no supplies, but such as may contribute to the making it of constant use to us.

That which should determine our choice in meats and drinks, should be the consideration, which is most natural, and the most ready at hand; for those are generally the most simple, most easy of digestion, and most wholesome. We are to remember, that the animal life in us must be supported; but, that nature hath not made varieties and quelques choces necessary to this purpose. And therefore we may very well dispense with the niceties of the kitchen and preserving room, and all the arts of studied luxury. For the only business we have to do, is, to repair the decays of a body which is perpetually wasting. And that this may be done at a much easier rate, is very plain, from the examples of those whom necessitous circumstances compel to a plain and coarse diet; who yet generally have more strength, and better health, than those that indulge their palates, and fare sumptuously. This we shall soon be convinced of, if we do but compare country-men with courtiers, servants with their masters, and, in general, poor people with rich. For superfluities and dainty meats do but oppress nature; they are treacherous delights, and carry a kind of secret poison in them. Hence it is, that we see the constitutions of men who live deliciously, so miserably broken; and instead of good nourishment, all their good turns into corruption and ill humors, catarrhs and vapors, and all the wretched consequences of weak stomachs, and undigested fumes.

The health therefore of the body, and the preserving it in a vigorous and active state, should prescribe to us, both for the kind, and the quantity, of our diet. Otherwise we shall be but the worse for the care and expense we are at about it; and, by a very impertinent and mistaken tenderness, shall render this instrument less capable of doing the soul service, and perhaps too, quite break, or wear it out the faster.

Now it is a very great happiness, to have been brought up sparingly, and used to a plain diet from one’s cradle. For by this means there will be no strife between nature and appetite; but that, which is most for the benefit of the body, will be likewise most agreeable to the palate. Such a man lies under no temptation of destroying the one, for the sake of gratifying the other.

The same rule ought to take place in our apparel too: in which Socrates gave himself so little trouble, that we are told, he wore the same clothes, both in winter and summer. Now I can allow a man to indulge himself to degrees of tenderness, which would make him seem a perfect Epicure in comparison of Socrates; and yet I should think he might content himself, with wearing such linen and woolen as our own country affords, and to change these for warmth or coolness, as the seasons of the year shall make it most easy and convenient for him. But for foreign vanities, and fantastic dresses; such as put us upon fishing all the east and western rivers for pearl, and slaying whole forests for furs and ermines, and rifling the India’s for silks, and exchanging substantial gold and silver for the cobwebs of worms; this can be nothing else, but foppery and nonsense, the mark of a profligate mind, and the scandal of an age abandoned to luxury and madness.

So again for our houses. Crates is said to have satisfied himself with a tub, though at the same time he had a very fine wife, which would have given him a fair pretence for a more spacious dwelling. This is a piece of mortification not required at our hands: and Epictetus is well contented, we should have a house, and all conveniences about it; provided that both the proportion and the finishing be contrived for use, and not for pomp and excess. It is fit, there should be a decent apartment for the men, and another for the females of the family; though indeed these distinct apartments are not absolutely necessary either. But to talk of thirty or forty lodging rooms, of inlaid floors, and marble hearths, of carvings, and paintings, and fretwork, and different apartments, suited to the several month of the year; this is not to supply our necessity, but to gratify our curiosity and pride. And it hath this farther inconvenience in it, that a man used to such things, is condemned to a perpetual uneasiness, whenever his own occasions call him to a place where he cannot be equally accommodated; or when the change of his fortunes reduces him to a necessity of parting with those conveniences, which, at the expense of so much labor and treasure, he hath provided for himself. I might add too, and that very seasonably, that a man who hath used himself to take delight in these things, cannot escape the folly and misery of placing his happiness in them; and so will utterly neglect the improvement of his own mind, and forget the true felicity of human nature. And, if by any misfortune (as indeed there are a great many that may contribute to it) he loses these enjoyments; he must consequently be exposed to all the excesses of passion, and an impotent mind, and imagine himself wretched to the very last degree: and yet, to any who esteems things rightly, it will appear, that he was much more unhappy, and had more just occasions of lamenting his own condition, when in the midst of his so-much-admired gaiety and splendor.

The number of our retinue, and use of our servants, are subject to the same limitations; i.e. the occasion we have for them, and the proportion of our estates. For servants should be always kept so, as to have enough of that which is necessary and convenient for them; and yet to be always in employment too: here we must cut the middle way between the two extremes, idleness and indulgence on the one hand, and barbarity and slavery on the other. But as for vast crowds of pages and footmen, such as have nothing to do, but to clear the way in the streets, or to make a great appearance, run before a chair, or hang behind a coach; the masters would do well to consider, that so many attendants are, in plain terms, but so many keepers. And sure there cannot be a greater slavery, than so many eyes continually upon you; to have every motion watched, every discourse overheard, no freedom or privacy left; no retirement safe from observation; and, in a word, nothing done or said, without their knowledge, and saucy censures upon it and you. But, besides the insupportable inconvenience of them in one’s own family, they are often very troublesome and injurious to others. Knavish and vexatious to tradesmen, shirking out of markets and shops, rude and insolent to their betters, guilty of a thousand violences and affronts; and all this, upon a confidence of their own strength; that their master’s authority will protect them, or their fellow servants stand by them in their rogueries, and be able to bear them out against all opposition. By these wicked qualities, and their abominable idleness, they grow lewd and debauched, and are the worst enemies commonly, that their masters have. Who all the while, for the state of keeping these rake-hells about them, are forced to break their own rest, and undergo many hardships, and submit to the mean arts of flattery, and making their court, and become slaves their own selves, and which is worst of all, abandon the rules of wisdom and virtue. But if men will be so fond of a profligate life, the matter is not great, if they pay dear for their vanity, and therefore let them go on, till repentance makes them wiser.

As for the philosopher, who conforms himself to Epictetus’ rules, a very moderate attendance will serve his turn. For his concerns with the world are not likely to be very great; and he will not think himself too good, to do all that he can in his own person, without being troublesome to others. So that, except in cases of sickness, or some business, which he alone cannot possibly dispatch, or retirement from the affairs of the world, to gain leisure for attending to some better employment, he will have very little occasion for a servant. Thus Epictetus is said to have lived a long time all alone; till at last he was forced to hire a nurse, to bring up a poor friend’s child; whose extreme necessity had made him resolved to drop the poor infant, if Epictetus in charity had not taken it home, and maintained it.

After having made particular mention of the necessaries of human life, he exhorts in general to retrench all superfluities; reducing whatever is such, to these two heads, luxury and vanity. For indeed, whenever we exceed the bounds of moderation in any of our expenses, one of these two is always the cause of it. And we are told, that the persons of immortal renown for their wisdom and virtue heretofore, were so extremely nice in this point, and so careful not to indulge themselves in anything but what was absolutely needful; that Diogenes, after having used a long time to carry a wooden dish in his pocket to drink water in, passed by one day, and saw a poor fellow taking up water in the palms of his hands, and so drinking it: whereupon he flung away his dish immediately into the river, and said, he had now no further occasion for it, since it only served for a use, which his hands could as well supply without it.

Abstain from familiarities with women before marriage, as much as possibly you can; at least, if you indulge yourself in any liberties of this kind, be sure to wrong no man’s bed, nor transgress any law. But, how perfect so ever your own chastity may be, let not the conceit of this make you troublesome to others that are more frail; and be not too lavish, either in reproving their failings, nor in commendation of your own virtue.

Comment.

Abstinence from all kinds of bodily pleasure hath this peculiar good effect, that it confirms and invigorates the rational soul; and, by the experience of conquests gained by single acts, encourages it to exert itself in new attempts upon a confidence, that it is able to master the brutish and rebellious appetites. Now the disorders of those appetites are to be subdued two ways; by wafting the habits of them, and keeping from frequent repetitions of their several acts; and by using them to submit to the discipline of reason. But the virtue of continence in the pleasures of the bed, which is a species of the brutal, is so much greater benefit to the soul, and deserves to be more highly esteemed, in proportion as the temptation is stronger, and the conquest more difficult and noble than the rest.

Now, although in this case reason be informed and directed by doctrines of prudence and morality, and also by positive laws, excellently fitted for this purpose; and the impetuous sallies of the brutish inclination are checked, and held in by this means; yet many instances make it plain, that there is another method of dealing with them. The appetites, which lead to all those enjoyments whereof sense is most fond, notwithstanding they are natural to us, and very vehement in their solicitations, may, by good management and custom, be reduced; vanquished by mild and gentle ways, and without any great violence committed upon human nature. Thus we see, persons, who have habituated themselves to fasting and abstemiousness, find no disturbance at all from the craving of their appetites; but quite contrary feel themselves oppressed and indisposed, if they allow themselves to eat, either above their usual quantity, or before their usual hour. And thus we find too, that ambition for the Olympic crown, restrains all inclinations of another kind, while men are dieting for the exercises; though reason and common sense will tell us, that the unreasonable quantity of meat, which they are forced to take, to nourish and strengthen them at such times, must needs raise those desires, and render the solicitations of them more importunate, than otherwise they would be. Now we cannot with any good grace call that invincible, which, for the sake of a sprig of laurel, is vanquished every day. So also both custom and positive law have utterly forbidden, that very near relations should come together; and the inclinations of these persons, though infused into them by nature, are yet almost incapable of being moved towards one another, notwithstanding any the most engaging charms of either party; and whenever they are so, we look upon it as an extreme unhappiness, and particular judgment. The consequence of this I take to be, that the passion, which can very hardly be provoked in one case, might with good care be suppressed in another.

Now that strict chastity, which is here required before marriage, is very reasonable and just upon many accounts; but is particularly so upon this, that the man may be upon equal terms with his wife, and give her the satisfaction of the same unblemished virtue in his own person, which he expects to meet with in hers. But (says he) if some liberties must be taken, yet keep at least within the compass which the law allows: for all beyond that, is impious and abominable; or else the law would not have made a difference, and fenced it in. Besides, it agues great impotence, and an ungovernable mind, to lay all this in common; and is of ill example, and pestilent consequence; for it hardens a man’s self, and emboldens other to slight, not only this, but all laws whatsoever, when once the authority which gave them sanction, is violated.

But how perfect so ever your own chastity may be, let not (says he) the conceit of this make you troublesome to others who have the misfortune of being more frail. And be not too lavish, either in reproving their failings, or in commending your own virtue. This is very prudent and seasonable advice; for such reproaches cannot but be very harsh and grating, from persons with whom we ordinarily converse; since we see, how tenderly human nature can bear reproof, and how very few can endure to be chided, even by those who have a right to do it, by virtue of their post and authority. Now one great reason, why even the softest rebukes are generally so very ill resented, I take to be this; that so long as nobody tells us of our faults, we please ourselves with an opinion, that they are concealed from all the world, and by degrees come to think nothing a fault, which is not known. And this again proceeds from a base principle of hypocrisy and ostentation: which makes the opinion of the world our rule in judging ourselves; and if we can but approve ourselves to other men, we are not much concerned, whether we can do it or not, to the truth; that is, to God, and to our own conscience.

But if the person reproving us, does not only take off the veil from us, but puts it upon himself; and while he is exposing our faults, exalts and proclaims his own virtues; this aggravates the provocation yet more. For at this rate he insults over us like a conqueror, and upbraids our weaknesses, and makes the comparison, only that we may look a great deal less, and serve as foils for his merit. And what can be more unequal than this, that our competitor should be our judge?

Besides, such haughty rebukes, and invidious comparisons, are not only injurious to the person designed to be lessened by them, but even to the author himself. For they swell his mind with pride, and confirm him in his insolence and vainglory; they corrupt all his reproofs, and incline him to correct miscarriages, not so much out of any desire to reform them, as to raise his own reputation by sinking that of others. And he, who hath once discovered such base indirect designs, must never expect to have his reproofs heard with any patience, or to work any good by them. For he gives a man the fairest opportunity in the world to excuse his folly, by laying hold on the odious comparison. And if he can but return this answer, that less is expected from him, he for his part is no philosopher; and therefore his failings are no great matters: he thinks his reprover effectually silenced, and himself sufficiently vindicated.

If you happen to be told at any time, that another person hath spoken ill of you, never trouble yourself to confute the report, or excuse the thing; but rather put all up with this reply; that you have several other faults besides that, and if he had known you more intimately he would have said worse of you.

Comment.

This seems directed more particularly against anger: a passion which never feels itself more easy to be provoked, than upon the news of your being slandered and misrepresented. But besides, it is likewise a check to ambition and vainglory, the two great fomenters of that passion.

But it may very well seem strange, that he should advise us here not to justify ourselves, and make a man the publisher of his own follies and misfortunes, by so frank an acknowledgement, that he hath several other faults besides that particular one laid to his charge. You may call this moderation and temper, but it seems to be a very great extreme, and more affectation than evenness of spirit.

To this objection we may say, that the direction is agreeable enough to the main design of the author in this place; which is, to wean the soul from what she is most fond of, to draw her off from the world, and all that can engage her affections there, and to make the improvement of the mind, and the testimony of ones breast, the sole end and business of life. Now when a man is extremely solicitous to be cleared, and cannot rest satisfied in the approbation of his own conscience, and throw himself upon an appeal to the judgment of God, to whom all hearts are open, and every action known; this man, I say, plainly shows a strong desire to recommend himself to the good opinion of the world. And the effect of such a desire will be, that if he can impose upon the world with false pretences, he will be satisfied with the deceitful appearance of virtue too, and persuade himself of his innocence; because those judges, to whose sentence he refers his actions, think him so, and are able to urge nothing to the contrary. But now; when a man is got above the censure of the world, and scorns to make that a rule for his behavior; he is under no temptation of partiality to himself, but sees his own faults, and stands condemned by the testimony of his own mind against him.

Now the accusing ones own self, and owning other faults, besides what the world lays to our charge, strikes at the very root of ostentation and vainglory. And indeed it is necessary something should do so: for this is a prevailing passion, riveted close into the soul, so intricately fastened and entangled there, that it fixes itself, while we endeavor to pluck it up; for even those actions, wherein we industriously avoid vainglory, are often strongly tinctured with it; and chiefly owning to it.

It hath also one considerable advantage above other passions; which is, that its viciousness and deformity lies concealed longer than any else, and deceives us with a color of virtue, because it is by virtuous actions only that we hope for reputation. Not considering in the meanwhile, that this very courting of applause sullies the most commendable actions, and robs them of all pretension to virtue, because we do not make that our principal end, nor choose the good for its own sake, but for the credit and honor it will derive upon us. For it is plain, the mark we aim at is glory and commendation, and the good we apply ourselves to, is not the effect of choice but necessity. Thus many a man would not be just (for instance) but only that there is no way to get the good opinion of the world without it.

There is this to be said farther in its excuse, that this passion seems to be extremely useful for the qualifying of several others. For we are content to undergo many sharp conflicts with ourselves, and deny several inclinations and enjoyments, upon this account. And, as it is a restraint to our vices, so is it likewise a powerful incentive and spur to virtue; it puts us upon engaging in many difficult encounters, reconciles us to austerities and mortifications, and imposes tasks, which, though performed with great alacrity upon this account, would otherwise seem severe and insupportable punishments.

For this reason, ambition and desire of applause are very significantly termed the inmost garment of the soul, as sticking closest to it of all passions whatsoever; because, when we have stripped ourselves of the rest, yet this is still retained; and in truth the rest, are many times laid aside for the sake of this. At least they appears to be so; for to speak strictly, this is all but appearance, and hypocrisy; nor does this passion in reality make the soul abandon vice; it only puts a restraint upon the outward act, without any effectual reformation of the mind, or correcting the inward motions to wickedness. Thus we find, that those very persons, who, to preserve their reputation, abstain from gross and scandalous lewdness, do yet without any remorse indulge themselves in unseen liberties, and loose imaginations. So that, upon the whole matter, men are not one whit the better, but the worse upon this account. There are not any vicious desires reclaimed by it; and the abstaining from the open gratification of those desires blows men up with a false opinion of virtue, and adds to their vanity ten times more.

It seems, I confess, capable of doing some service to young men, whose passions ride high; by curbing the exorbitancies, which youth, through the heat and rashness of that age, is so exceedingly apt to fly out into. But when those importunate solicitations wear off, and men grow into cooler reason, no quality of the mind can be more dangerous and destructive. For it absolutely ruins all virtue, by seducing the soul to base principles. It makes the opinion of the world the chief end of action, and lays more stress upon recommending oneself to others, than upon the satisfaction and testimony of one’s own conscience. It proposes good to us, as eligible, not for any intrinsic excellence of its own, but for the honor and fame consequent to the doing of it: so that in short we never really choose good; not good I mean, considered as such, because we do not choose it for its own sake.

Nor is this only a dangerous vice, but a most extravagantly ridiculous one too; and such as exposes all who are tainted with it, to one most absurd and inconsistent folly. For men of this temper commonly value themselves, and despise other extremely; and yet at the same time do they court, and flatter, and fear others; and pin all their happiness, and all their expectation, upon those very wretches, whom they think so despicable.

Now nothing can cure this extravagant and slavish passion, so effectually as moderation; an evenness of mind, and a frank acknowledgment of our own faults and failings. And yet even this hath some hazard in it too. For affected humility is the greatest pride, and, without due caution and prudent care, we shall fall into the very danger we would avoid, and become vainglorious, even in the accusations of ourselves. Many men know, that to lessen themselves in their own expressions, is to bespeak the commendation of others by a sly and a surer way. But this temper recommended by Epictetus must be sincere, free from underhand trickings, and indirect ends. And indeed he recommends it upon very good grounds. For it is easy to perceive, that, if fate should so order the matter, as that our virtues and advantages should be known to ourselves alone; and our follies and defects published to all the world; there would presently be an end of all vainglory, and whatever good we do, we should be invited to it for its own sake, when there could be no prospect of applause to tempt us.

It is by no means convenient, that you should frequent the theatres; but if any occasion happens to call you thither, discover no concern but for yourself alone. That is, do not wish the success any other than it is, or that the victory should fall on any person, except him that gains it. For this will keep your mind free and disengaged. Let your behavior there be easy and sedate, not betraying any transport of the mind, by shouting or loud laughter, or long and vehement emotion. So again, when the play is over, do not discourse much of what you saw there, nor enlarge upon things for which you are never the better: for if you do, this plainly implies, that the entertainment hath gotten within you, and that you admired, and were highly pleased with it.

Comment.

The sensual and brutish appetites are not confined to such objects only, as our touch and taste are employed in, but extend themselves likewise to those which entertain our sight and our hearing. And what sort of behavior and disposition will become us with respect to these, he tells us here, by laying down this rule: That it is by no means necessary or convenient to frequent the public theatres. He might have said indeed, that it is absolutely necessary, and highly expedient, not to frequent them: for in truth such places leave a strong infection, and make the whole life of those that use them, to become theatrical, all show and formality.

But there may sometimes an occasion fall out, in which a man cannot, without injury to himself or his character, refuse appearing there; as, either upon some public festival, which the entertainments are designed to honor and make more solemn; or in compliance with the customs of the world; or at the request of friends; (for it looks sour and morose to be singular, and decline the received practices of mankind;) or we may be invited thither, only to make an experiment upon our own selves, as having a mind to be satisfied, what improvements we have made, and how differently we are affected with these matters, at different times. If therefore any of these, or any other reasonable cause, brings us to the theatre, we must be sure to call up all our vigilance; to collect ourselves, and not let our passions get loose; but be solicitous only for the peace and evenness of our mind, and perfectly indifferent where the success of the combat lights. For we are to remember, that all these are things foreign, and without us, and consequently such as our desires and aversions ought by no means to fasten upon.

This inward tranquillity is what Epictetus expects our outward air and behavior should show: that our mien and countenance be settled and composed, yet easy and good natured too; such as may express gravity without sullenness, and mirth without levity: not making ourselves troublesome and ridiculous, either by loud acclamations and applauses at what is well performed; or by bursting out into loud and excessive laughter at any comical passages that come before us; but commending the one sort with judgment and moderation, and approving the other with a silent smile.

When the sight is over, there is a farther care to be taken, not to discourse largely upon anything we have been entertained with there; as considering, that these matters contribute not at all to the making a man wiser or better. And since they are in no degree instructive, or reforming; a man ought not to think them worthy to be the subject of his discourse. Now indeed Epictetus’ caution here, of not discoursing much upon things for which we are never the better, may bear different interpretations: for he may either intend it of all things relating to these public entertainments, the successes of the gladiators, and every event which is there presented to us; and that a man cannot possibly be edified, by talking upon such subjects as these: or else he may only cut off some particular parts of our discourse upon these subjects, and advise us, when we do make them the matter of our talk, that we should say no more upon these occasions, than what may some way conduce to the correcting of manners, and making us wiser. And such topics particularly are those, which make observations upon the behavior, and condemn all such indecent and irregular gestures, as plainly discover, that the mind is not in due temper. But to run out, and enlarge extravagantly, upon what hath passed, is a manifest indication, that our minds were too much affected with it; and that it appeared to be a great and just matter of admiration to us. All which is very unworthy a philosopher, and a defect peculiar to little and vulgar souls.

Be not fond of going to everybody’s rehearsals. But when you do, be sure to preserve a grave and sedate temper; yet do not run into the other extreme neither, of rude and unmannerly moroseness.

Comment.

The next thing he gives direction in, is, those public rehearsals, which the pretenders to oratory and poetry use to make, merely for ostentation, and to proclaim their own eloquence. The subjects of these rehearsals were various. Sometimes a panegyrick upon some great prince, or general, or statesman; sometimes they were political harangues; sometimes a fine description of a city, or country; sometimes the discussing a point of law, or the like. Now such as these, which propose nothing farther to themselves than vanity and ostentation, and have no concern with virtue, or anything that is properly ours , he advises us not to be forward in frequenting; nor indeed ever to attend them at all, without some good reason which may justify our coming. For it may very often happen, that this will be expected from you, either as a testimony of your friendship to the composer, or a mark of respect due to the great man, who is his theme; or upon some other account, which civility and good-breeding may make necessary. And these compliances are sometimes of great use, and have good effect; by taking off the edge of that envy and spite, with which all people are naturally persecuted, who recede from the common way of living, and do not do as the world does.

Since then you must in all likelihood be there sometimes, the next point to be gained is a due and decent management of yourself upon these occasions. And this will best be done, by a grave and composed temper; yet not so severe, as to be rude and troublesome. Your gravity must show itself in commending things as they deserve; so as neither to be unseasonable, nor immoderate and lavish in your praise. Your composed temper will keep you orderly and quiet; it will prevent all irregular motion, and loud applause and impertinent interruptions. It will continue the same modest, decent air, without those sudden and vehement alterations, both in body, and mind, and mien, which are but too frequent in such cases. Your easiness must be preserved too all this while, that you may avoid the indecency of being over-thoughtful, and seeming not to attend. By this also you will be kept from a sullen and affected silence; and, when things are well said, will not grudge them their due commendation. It will prevent all peevish censures and malicious criticisms, and that ill-bred roughness, which calls out to the poet, and reproaches him with falsehood and flattery, or a dull thought, or flat and improper expressions. In short, the easiness and complacency expected from you, will consist in such candor and good nature, as seems pleased with the eloquence of the rehearser, and the merit of the person commended, and can congratulate both freely, when they deserve it, without any mixture of envy or detraction.

When you are engaged in business with any person, but especially if he be a man of quality and power, consider with yourself, how Socrates and Zeno would have behaved themselves upon this occasion, and then you will never be at a loss, how to manage your affair with decency, and to advantage.

Comment.

Philosophical persons make their own improvement the main business of their lives, and consequently meddle not with any but themselves; so that they are very seldom troubled with attendance and application to great men. Before persons so unpracticed therefore, he sets Socrates and Zeno for patterns; that by taking measures from their virtues and demeanor, they may be able to manage so nice a point of conversation; and consider, that these excellent persons, when they addressed to authority and greatness, did not put on a stiff formality and dissemble respect; but showed a true and genuine nobleness of soul, agreeable to the tenor of their whole lives. And this too such, as was the result of philosophy and prudence, and not the effect of insolence and vanity: that this kept them in a due moderation and decorum; between a submissive cringing, and a saucy pertness.

The same temper will prevent any such mean and abject awe for the eminence of any man’s station, as should betray us into flattery, and prevail with us to complement their failings, and commend their vices. And yet it will not suffer us to presume upon our own authority and wisdom neither; or so far to forget decency and good manners, as to reproach and rip up those vices, in rude and opprobrious language. It teaches us the softest and most gentle methods of reproof; and advises, first, to allow what they have done well, its due praises, and so to make way for just and necessary rebukes. Thus sweetening the less-palatable part of our discourse, with what we know hath an agreeable relish, as physicians wrap up bitter pills in honey, to make them go down the more glibly. And when we must at last proceed to this most ungrateful good office, it will become us, not to be too rigorous observers, nor too severe interpreters of their actions; as if their deformities were any diversion to us, or we took a malicious joy in finding fault: but to demonstrate, by all our carriage, that reformation is our only end; and to pursue this with a most affectionate zeal, expressing great tenderness, and much trouble and concern, that the luster of their good actions should be thus sullied and eclipsed, by these failings, and blemishes, and rebellious passions.

There is also another topic applicable to this purpose, which I do not doubt but Socrates and Zeno managed with marvelous dexterity and success: which was, to convince people of condition, what a world of inconveniences and troubles greatness was ever encumbered with; and, that the only desirable thing in it, is the power and opportunities of doing good, and making that good diffusive and effectual, above men of a meaner capacity. So that those, who in such a post abandoned themselves to vice, and neglect to improve this advantage, retain the bitter part, and throw away all the sweet; are oppressed with the miseries and the burdensome cares of riches and honor, and lose all the comfort and all the happiness of them.

But all this while it must be remembered, that Socrates and Zeno are proposed to us a patterns, because it is convenient, that we should fix our eyes upon the noblest and most perfect examples, and, so far as we can, aspire by degrees to their perfections. But still we must in matters of practice be content to keep to our own model, and shall acquit ourselves very well, if our actions bear proportion to our condition and character. Nor can it be expected, that a young proficient in philosophy, and one, whom Epictetus supposes still to stand in need of his instruction, should be able, in his behavior and conversation, to proceed just as Socrates and Zeno did. The pretending to personate these great men in all things, would not be imitation, but mimicry; and sit so ill upon such a one, as to make him and what he did ridiculous. How vain an attempt this would prove, we need no other argument, than that account given of Zeno by Antigonus, the successor of Alexander in Syria; who, though he had conversed with several philosophers, yet declared, that he never could so far command himself in company with Zeno, as to conquer his disorder and confusion; and, that the very presence of that man did (what no other could do) damp him with an unusual awe and concern.

And thus Epictetus takes occasion, from directing us what methods are proper to be used in address to, and conference with, men in eminent dignity, to descend to inferior conditions, and give rules for conversation in general.

When your occasions make it necessary to visit a man of quality, reflect with yourself before you go, what may happen to you. Possibly he may not be at home; or if he is, that he will not be spoken with; that the porter may shut the door rudely upon you; that you may wait in the hall among the footmen; that none of them will carry your message to his lord; or, if they do, that you will meet with nothing but scorn and neglect. When you have prepared yourself thus, if you think it worth you while to go upon such terms, do it; and bear whatever happens, as you ought. But do not repine afterwards, and say with yourself, that the business was not worth all this trouble: for that is a reflection unbecoming a philosopher, and shows a vulgar soul, not reconciled sufficiently to the accidents of the world.

Comment.

The advice he gives here, is much of the same nature with what we met with before in the ninth chapter; where he begins thus: In every action you undertake, consider, first, with yourself, and weigh well the nature and circumstances of the thing, &c. Only there indeed he continues and illustrates his discourse, by a very low and familiar instance of bathing; but here he applies it to that much more important one, of application to great men. There is also this other difference between the two passages, that the conclusion and design of his advice there, was to persuade men, not to be too much concerned at things when they had happened, but to keep their temper even, and their reason undisturbed; whereas here his business it to bring men to a prudent forecast, that they may not run on giddily, nor see things by halves; but represent to themselves beforehand, all the possible difficulties and inconveniences, which can rise upon them; that they may take as true an idea of all the discouraging circumstances now, as it is possible for the event to give them afterwards.

For, after we have taken upon us the slavery of waiting upon a great man, and met with these disappointments and cold neglects; we are apt to sit down discontented, and with much remorse to condemn our own folly, and take it exceedingly ill to be treated with so much insolence and scorn, and so unbecoming our quality or desert. Now all that dissatisfaction is owing to one of these two causes; either, that we made a rash and ill choice at first; or else, that these external accidents make too strong and too tender an impression upon us. And both these defects betray a base and a narrow soul; not suitable in any degree to the dignity of a philosopher, who should know how to manage, and how to slight, every accident of this kind: not suffering himself to be imposed upon, like the ignorant vulgar, with the false appearances of things; not mistaking those for matters of consequence, which are, really and in their own nature, mere trifles, and of little or no consideration at all to him.

So that, having in the former chapter instructed us, what decorum is to be observed towards persons of honor and authority, who are content to admit us to some familiarity and free conferences with them, and proposed the prudence of Socrates and Zeno for the standard of our behavior; he prescribes to us here, the rules proper to be followed, where we are received with coldness, and disdain, and rougher usage: that, except where some absolute necessity requires, we should have nothing at all to do with such persons; and when any urgent occasion compels us to choose this attendance, and our business must be followed, though at the expense of all those hardships and affronts; then we should settle and compose our minds before, and not expose ourselves to the misfortune of a surprise, or the weakness of a late repentance, and wish we had never undertaken it, when these things are come upon us.

In familiar conversation with your friends and acquaintances, do not make it your business, to entertain company with tedious narratives of yourself, and your own affairs. Consider, that their resentments and yours are very different upon these occasions. And though the exploits by which you have signalized yourself, the successes you have obtained, the dangers you have encountered, or the afflictions you have undergone, may be a very agreeable story to yourself to tell, yet it will not be equally so for others to hear.

As little will it become you to render yourself the common buffoon, and be always trying to make the company laugh. This is a very nice and ticklish thing; exceedingly apt to degenerate into vice and folly; and (observe it when you will) he that only studies diversion, shall be sure at the same time to lose respect.

Of all kinds of discourse, none is more unsafe, none more despicable, than that, which breaks in upon modesty and good manners. When ever therefore any person in your presence flies out into obscenity, (if so great a liberty can decently be taken) reprove him publicly, and put a stop to the lewd talk. But if that cannot conveniently be done, yet at least do yourself the justice to disapprove it; and, by forbearing to join with him, by blushing for him, and by chiding looks, let all the company see plainly, that you detest his filthy ribaldry.

Comment.

Here he descends from conversing with great persons, to prescribe the measures fit to be taken with those of common quality, such as are of a condition equal, or inferior to our own. The thing we are chiefly concerned to take care of in this case, is the rendering ourselves easy and acceptable to all kinds of company in general; to observe such a prudent medium, as may prevent a stiff and formal distance in one extreme, and keep off such a saucy freedom, as may make us cheap and contemptible in the other. Nay, which is more, we are not only to secure a due respect and value for ourselves, but to consult the interest of those we converse with. And a wise man will not only endeavor to recommend himself, by making his discourse free, and easy, and diverting, but by making it beneficial and improving too.

In order to the learn this art, Epictetus gives us warning of several indecencies, which are apt to prejudice people against you. The first of these is the expatiating upon ourselves, choosing out some of our own performances, or our own hardships, for our constant topic; and running divisions perpetually upon our families, or our fortunes. And this in truth is the most nauseous and tiresome thing in the world. For there is a principle of jealousy in every man, which turns again at all the fulsome commendations of ourselves, and the company presently grows sick of them in their own defense. Nothing is more assuming, and consequently nothing can be more provoking: it argues very little and low thoughts of all mankind besides, when we can with such disdain overlook the rest of the world, and imagine no affairs but our own, worthy to furnish out matter for discourse. Besides, all these extravagant panegyrics upon ourselves, are no better than so many sly invectives against other people; and he, that takes pains to extol his own conduct; only makes an invidious comparison, and always desires to be so understood, as by a side-wind to reproach and condemn that of his neighbor. So that a man full of himself, is a common enemy; no patience can brook him; and consequently nothing can more effectually contribute to render our conversation agreeable and entertaining, than declining to trouble the company with our own affairs. Which hath also this farther advantage too, that it checks the vanity of our temper, abates our love of popular applause, and discovers a true bravery and nobleness of spirit.

His next piece of advice concerns the gay and the facetious part of conversation: and here, in pursuance of his former directions, not to indulge ourselves in long and violent laughter, nor to burst out upon every trivial occasion; he forbids his proficient to be always acting the buffoon, and endeavoring to make the company laugh. And that, for this very good reason, because mirth is a slippery and unfaithful ground; and they who resolve never to want a jest, will easily degenerate into impertinence and folly. For, when a man accommodates himself so far to the humors of the vulgar, as to consult their merriment and diversion; it shows that his soul is of their size and temper, and relishes the same mean unworthy pleasures. Indeed, if there be any difference between them, he that labors to entertain another with such discourse, is the worse, and the greater fool of the two. So that, whoever makes the company merry after this manner, does it at his own expense. For this naturally renders him cheap, and encourages the hearers to be lavish and saucy in their turn too. And there cannot be any more effectual course to lose a man in the reputation of the world, and rob him of all the respect, otherwise due to his quality, or his parts, than to be thus profuse of his wit, and to set up for a common jester.

And yet it must be owned, that diversion is the very soul of conversation; and some wise men have frequently studied to entertain the company with pleasant discourse, to take off the imputation of moroseness and ill-humor. To those there, who upon occasions find it convenient to give a little loose to mirth, he adds this most necessary caution, Always to keep within the bounds of modesty and decency. For all obscene discourse is absolutely inconsistent with the character of a wise and good man; and he, who pretends to any progress in philosophy, will be so far from allowing himself in it, that he must not with patience hear any such thing from another. And therefore Epictetus commands such a one, to reprove these uncomely liberties, provided it can conveniently and properly be done. As for instance; if the person be younger than we, and so our age seems to give us some authority over him; if he be one who hath any remains of modesty left, and we have any reason to hope our rebukes will prove successful; if there be no great distance between his quality, or his estate, and ours; so that he is not too big, or too vain to be reproved. For in these circumstances, you may without any breach of civility do it; and neither the offender nor the company will take it ill, or think you too bold, if they understand themselves at all. But it must be confessed, that this duty is not always practicable; for there are some persons, with whom this liberty cannot be taken. Their age, or their condition, may give what they say a privilege of being passed over. Their temper may render them incapable of animadversion, or their hardened wickedness may have put them past all power of its doing good upon them. And in such cases, the attempt would not only be ridiculous, but might possibly be dangerous too. For no man is obliged to do what does not become him, because another hath done so; nor must our zeal be so warmly pursued, as to break good order, or give the company disturbance, or create ourselves enemies, by such indiscreet and unnecessary corrections. But still there is one remedy left, which must be taken in justice to ourselves; which is, by our silence to refuse the becoming a party; to demonstrate, that we understand what behavior is fit for us; and that we do discreetly disallow those things, which prudence or good manners will not suffer us openly to rebuke.

And here I cannot omit observing, how nice and punctual Epictetus is, in suiting the rules he gives, according to the different circumstances of the case in hand. He had treated before of discourse, concerning the entertainments of the public theatre, the combats of gladiators, horse races, feasts, meats, and wines, and modes, and giving characters of men to their prejudice, or their advantage; and upon all such occasions, he directs us to turn the discourse off to some other more useful subject. But here, it seems, that is not sufficient; for we must not only change, but reprove it too, if that can properly be done. There, if we cannot turn the discourse, we may content ourselves with being silent; but here it is not every silence that will serve the turn: it is necessary, it should be a sort of emphatical and very significant one, such as may distinguish our thoughts, and express a dislike and detestation of what is indecently spoken.

When the idea of any pleasure strikes your imagination, as you must in other cases, so should you in this especially, stand upon your guard, and not suffer yourself to be hurried away with the impetuous torrent. Run not eagerly upon enjoyment, nor improve the thought into action: but take time to consider; and let that time be employed in making a just computation, between the duration of the pleasure, and that of the repentance sure to follow it; and then you will not fail to check your inclinations, and chide yourself for indulging them in any degree at all. Consider farther too, that the denying those inclinations will certainly give you an inward joy; and, instead of being reproached by your own conscience, you shall be comforted and commended by it. But if, upon mature deliberation, the thing you are moved to, appears no way inconvenient, you may gratify your appetite, but you must not let it loose. For even innocent enjoyments require a straight rein, and a steady hand, for fear the impression be too strong and powerful, and the pleasures of sense charm and captivate your reason. And therefore, even in these cases too, represent to yourself the inward complacency of having done well, and wisely; and the triumphs of a good conscience, after subduing temptations.

Comment.

There is not in the whole world anything more pernicious to the soul, than the pleasures of flesh and sense. For these fetter and fasten down the mind; and God, who saw those destructive consequences of them, hath therefore in his infinite wisdom, and marvelous goodness, made all such pleasures of exceedingly short continuance. Thus those of the Epicure last no longer, than just while his meats and drinks lie upon the tongue. When once they are swallowed into the stomach, all the relish of them is lost and gone, and the palate returns to its former habit again. So likewise those pleasures, which sense and is fondest of, and the most exquisitely affected with, continue no longer, than just the time of fruition. When that short moment is once past, the man is as if it had never been at all. It is also very plain, that pleasure is properly the object of the sensitive faculties, and does not extend to the rational soul; for creatures void of sense, are not capable of bodily pleasure.

Nor is this the condition of bodily pleasures only, but of those other satisfactions, which we call so; such as men take in gay clothes, pompous equipage, rich jewels and furniture, large estates, and the like; even those are but very short-lived. For when once the first flush of joy is over, they pall and sink down into nothing; and time, in proportion as it makes them familiar to us, makes them flat and insipid too. But, alas! the case is not the same in the contrary extreme; nor do our griefs for the loss of these things wear off so fast, as our satisfactions of acquiring, or possessing them: these are long and lasting, and very often grow by time. Thus pleasure it seems, of all sorts, but especially such as affects our bodily senses, vanishes very quickly; and well it were for us, if it, and all its effects, went off together: but it leaves a sting behind, wounds the soul, disarms reason; and, if it be indulged to excess, does not stop there either, but many times proves of terrible consequence to the body too. Whereas abstinence from pleasure, and the conquests we gain over it, are of infinite advantage to the soul; they fill it with durable satisfaction, and inspire joys of quite another kind, joys agreeable to reason and uncorrupt nature, such as no guilt pollutes, no mixture or remains of sorrow taint, no time wears away.

Thus much I thought necessary to premise in general, by way of introduction to Epictetus’ advice, which begins in these terms: “When the idea of any pleasure strikes your imagination, as you must in other cases, such as power or riches, or the like; so should you in this of pleasure more especially, stand upon your guard, and not suffer yourself to be hurried away, from thought to act.” Be not too rash and hasty, but allow yourself, as to gain time, and suspend the gratifying of your fancy for a while; employ this time in making a just computation. Weigh first the time of enjoyment well; and afterwards observe, how infinitely this is overbalanced by that of repentance. Think how many sad remembrances, what bitter remorse, what lasting shame, what self-condemning reflections, the being vanquished by this temptation will cost you; and then you will be ashamed to purchase so fugitive a pleasure, with so permanent a misery.

But, that you may have no pretence, no color left for so imprudent an exchange; consider once more the durable advantages of self-denial: the sincere and never-fading satisfactions which result from a lust subdued; the perpetual applauses of a good conscience, and the happiness of being approved by ones own breast: do but cast these things into the scale, and give them their due weight, and then the disparity will be so manifest, that appetite must yield to reason. And if you repeat this again and again, as fit occasions offer themselves; you will by degrees gain a habitual and complete victory, and so absolutely reduce the sensual inclinations, that they will not be in a condition to rebel, or give you any considerable disturbance.

Since then the pleasure lasts no longer than the single instant of action; when once that instant is over, there is no difference between one who hath had this enjoyment, and one who had it not. And hence it is evident, that pleasure can have but very little to recommend it. You will say, perhaps, that the voluptuous person hath the satisfaction of remembrance, and recollecting the delights he enjoyed; which is a kind of bringing them back again, and an acting them over in imagination a second time. But, alas! this is a very poor and lame satisfaction; and we need no other proof of its being so, than those dark and imperfect ideas, which the remembrance of a pleasant dream gives us; for those of a past pleasure are exactly the same, ever whit as feeble and imaginary.

But in regard there are some pleasures no way inconsistent with duty, and right reason; such as those of the marriage-bed, or bathing after a fever and the like; therefore he adds one necessary caution more; that even these pleasures, which may be innocent and convenient in themselves, should yet be so tempered with a prudent restraint, that the gratefulness of them to sense do not overbear our reason. Nor must we so absolutely give ourselves up to the enjoyment, as to be transported with rapture and joy. But even then, when we allow ourselves the fruition, we should check and correct the exuberance of our pleasure, by a seasonable reflection, that reason ought always to be uppermost; and that it is infinitely more becoming and advantageous, to be above sense, than to be a slave to it. For indeed, this is as much more eligible, as the due government of our passions is better, than the living under the tyranny and usurpation of them; as much more noble, as reason is superior to instinct, and the dignity of human nature above that of a brute.

When, upon mature deliberation, you are persuaded a thing is fit to be done, do it boldly; and do not affect privacy in it, or concern yourself at all what impertinent censures or reflections the world will pass upon it. For if the thing be not just and innocent, it ought not to be attempted at all, though never so secretly. And if it be, you do very foolishly to stand in fear of those, who will themselves do ill, in censuring and condemning what you do well.

Comment.

There is not anything for which Epictetus seems more concerned, than that virtue should be chosen for virtue’s sake; that so the good we do might be complete and perfect, when done out of a just sense and value of its own intrinsic worth, without any sordid allays, or indirect ends, such as the opinion of the world, and the desire of applause and reputation particularly. For whoever chooses good upon this account, make this, and not doing well, his ultimate end, that is, indeed, his good.

Now if a man hath consulted his own reason, and is upon good grounds convinced, that such and such a thing ought not to be done; no consideration whatsoever should prevail upon him to do it, because it ought not to be done. Again, if upon a grave and wise debate with himself, he comes to a resolution, that it should be done, and does it in this persuasion; it is most senseless and sneaking to endeavor the concealing of it, from any apprehensions of the constructions other people will put upon it. For if he be right in resolving, they cannot be so, in interpreting it to his disadvantage; and at this rate, a man betrays less honor and regard for a real good, (for such is a wise and virtuous action) than he does for a seeming evil; (for such is a false opinion, and malicious censure.) and indeed, generally speaking, this is the cause of the errors and misapprehensions of the vulgar: which men stand in so much fear of, and are so apt to forego, or at least to disown the practice of virtue, lest they should fall under them.

From hence likewise results another very mischievous effect, which is, that the conclusions and dictates of right reason should be looked upon as evil. For so they plainly are, when men decline and disavow them, since nothing is ever shunned or disclaimed, but under the notion of evil.

Farther yet, there is a third great inconvenience consequent upon taking these mean and indirect methods; which is, that such a man turns deserter to virtue, and runs away from the true standard of all his behavior, viz. The nature of the actions themselves, and the judgment and testimony of his own breast; and gives himself up entirely to be governed by common opinion, expects no happiness but what applause can give him, fears no misery but censure and reproach, and is so bigoted to the world, as utterly to renounce his own reason, and think nothing good or evil, true or false, but what common fame declare to be so.

As this sentence, “It is day, and, it is night,” if you take it apart, is most true; but if you join it together, is absolutely false: so for a man, at a public entertainment, to carve himself the best and greatest share; though if he consider his own body singly, it might be well enough; yet in regard of that common right, which this invitation gives to all that are present, it is most unbecoming and unreasonable. And therefore, when you eat abroad, remember, you are to look farther than the bare satisfying of your own appetite, and to observe all that decency and respect, which is due, both to the company you are joined with, and to the master of the house, that invited you.

Comment.

The Stoics are particularly nice and subtle, in illustrating and arguing from hypothetical syllogisms: and these are of two sorts, one they call disjunctive, the other conjunctive or complex. The disjunctive are such as consist of contradictory parts, so that if one be true, the other must needs be false; and if the one be false the other is certainly true. As for instance; when I say, It is either day or night, but it is night, therefore it is not day. Thus by affirming the one part, you deny the other; and by denying the one, you affirm the other: as when I make my assumption thus; but it is not day, and conclude from thence, therefore it is night; or, but it is not night, therefore it is day. And such a disjunctive proposition as this, whose parts are inconsistent, (as when we say, it is either day or night,) is received as an axiom; that is, as a truth self-evident, such as is plain and agreeable to the common sense and notions of all mankind. For such propositions the Stoics use to call axioms.

Now a complex proposition consists of two parts; but these such, as have a necessary connection with, and dependence upon, one another. So that if one be allowed, the other follows in course; for which occasion they are very properly termed, the antecedent and the consequent. And the condition of these propositions is this; that if you affirm the antecedent, you establish the consequent; but if you deny the consequent, you overthrow the antecedent at the same time. For instance, this is a true conjunction, if it be day, it is not night; because upon this antecedent, it is day, the assumption follows, but if it be day, it is not night; so that putting this into one complex proposition, the antecedent infers the consequent; for thus you proceed, but it is day, therefore it is not night. And so likewise if you deny the consequent, you deny the antecedent also; as if you say, But it is not not night (which is as much as to say that it is, for the two negatives here make one affirmative) therefore it is not day. And this is a case of a conjunctive or complex proposition, and the rule it proceeds upon.

Let us now see, what use Epictetus makes of this, and how he applies it to his present purpose. This proposition, It is either day, or night, in a disjunctive syllogism, he tells us , carries it own evidence along with it, and is incontestably true. But in a conjunctive syllogism the case is much otherwise. For when these two parts are brought into one complex proposition, then to affirm the one, we must deny the other; and the sentence must of necessity run thus, If it be day, it is not night. Now then (says he) as this disjunctive proposition, in a disjunctive syllogism, is most true, because the whole argument depends upon it, and all the stress lies in the opposition of the parts thus disjoined; but in a complex proposition it is most false, for the conjunction is there torn asunder, by the necessary insertion of the negative particle, If it be day, it is not night: so likewise at a public entertainment, however it may be for the advantage of a man’s own body to carve the best for one’s self, and to scramble for the greatest share; yet this is absolutely inconsistent with the equity and common right of human society at all such public meetings. For a man is not here to look upon himself, as a disjunctive, and to act as if he stood single; but to consider himself in conjunction with the rest of the company, and to be guilty of nothing, to break that conjunction, by infringing the privileges which lie in common, and engrossing any such for his own private interest.

When therefore you dine in company (says he) do not regard the craving of your own appetite, nor pick out the choicest part of the dinner to gratify your own palate. But consider, that there is another duty, besides what you owe to your own body; a duty of mutual participation, and assuming nor more, than what you are content to allow to others, who have indeed equal pretensions with your self.

Now nothing can be more manifest, than that by this instance of a feast, Epictetus meant a great deal more than he hath expressed. He intended no doubt, that we should stretch this rule to all the affairs of human life, which concern others as well as ourselves, and to all our commerce and dealings with one another. For all greediness, and grasping at more than belongs to us, loosens and breaks the bonds of human society, which can never be maintained otherwise, than by allowing everybody the share due to him. Of how great efficacy this is towards uniting men together, and making that union durable and strong, besides what common experience teaches us, we have an instance, even in the worst and vilest men. For the very combinations of thieves and public robbers, though these men have cast off all the ties of justice and common honesty, are yet preserved, so long as they keep to the private agreements made among themselves, and are content, that the booty should be divided equally. And sure strict justice must needs cement men very strongly, when even this feeble imitation of it can go so far, in confirming and maintaining a community founded in injustice.

So then, after the various directions and exhortations in the foregoing parts of this book, some of which were designed to excite men to true freedom, some to recommend fortitude, others generosity, and greatness of soul, others prudence, and temperance: this chapter is designed to make men just; and, in order to the effecting this, to remove first of all that greatest obstruction to it, which is avarice, and an inordinate desire of more than in strictness belongs to us.

If you take upon you a character above your capacity, you fall into this twofold inconvenience, first to miscarry in what you have undertaken, and then to lose the opportunity of undertaking something else more proportionable to your ability, in which you might have come off with honor.

Comment.

We are not always to aim at that good, which is most noble and excellent in itself, but that for which we are best qualified, and which is most suitable to our own circumstances. For there never comes any good of extravagant undertakings. So that we shall do well to proceed leisurely, in the choice of the figure we desire to make in the world, and not aspire to things above us. An eminent orator, or a philosopher in a commonwealth; a pilot, or master in a ship; a prince, or public magistrate in a state: these characters look great and gay; but everybody is not cut out for them, and it is much more graceful, for a man to act in a lower station, where he fills his post, and tops his part; than to be in a higher, which he cannot come up to, nor discharge the duties of, with that decency and applause that is expected. Thus a man had better be a good usher, and teach the first grounds of learning well, than an unable master, who cannot finish what is well begun. And it is more desirable to be an honest and prudent manager of a private family, than a bad governor of a city or nation. For, besides the prejudice such persons do themselves, in not coming up to the dignity of a character too lofty for them, (which miscarriage I would have rated, not by the approbation of the censure of the world, but according to the real nature of the character itself) they are unfortunate in another respect. For they have not only come off very scurvily in attempting what they were not fit for; but they have also slipped an opportunity of behaving themselves well, and gaining applause in something else, which they were fit for. For it is in human life, as it is in a playhouse, where the praise is due, not to the part, but to the performance; and he that plays a servant well, is looked upon with more approbation, and reputed a better actor, than he that attempts to play a man of honor, or a prince, and does it ill.

This chapter too seems to have a more immediate regard to equity and justice; for it advises everybody to be content with that part, which providence see fittest for them upon this stage of life; that they should not affect characters above them, nor be desirous of, or dissatisfied with, those that are assigned to other people.

As in walking it is your great care, not to run your foot upon a nail, or to tread awry, and strain your leg; so let it be in all the affairs of human life, not to hurt your mind, or offend your judgment. And this rule, if observed carefully in all your deportments, will be a mighty security to you in your undertakings.

Comment.

The soul of man is injured or wounded two ways: either, when it is pricked with brutish inclinations, and vehement passions, which fasten it to the body: in which it makes some resistance, but yet is overpowered by the prevailing force of passion, and yields at last, though with reluctancy. Or else, when its judgment is perverted, and the bias of sensual objects draws it so strongly, that it does not make any distinctions between its own rational nature, and the other inferior and irrational parts, which are the seat of the passions.

This excellent guide therefore warns us to have a care of both these inconveniences, and to proceed warily in all the affairs of human life, as we do, when we would tread sure in walking. We must decline those brutish appetites, which gall and wound the soul; and fix wholly upon bodily objects, and fasten down the soul to the body much stronger and closer, than any nail can possibly join material things; for they make the mind forget itself, and mistake these affections, and the body they serve, for one and the same substance.

This therefore is analogous to piercing the foot with a nail. But the other misfortune, that of a perverted judgment, he resembles to treading awry, and straining, or putting out a leg; because this error of the mind proceeds from the imagination, that part which is lowest in the soul, as the foot is in the body; and by which it holds correspondence with the corporeal and animal life. And the advice he gives upon this occasion is, that, as we take care to keep our body upright when we walk, so we should be exceedingly cautious and tender of the soul, when it goes abroad, and concerns itself in the affairs of the world; that the faculty of reason, which is predominant in our minds, and the very character and prerogative of human nature, makes no false steps; that it does not forget itself, or its authority; that it be neither giddy though eagerness of desire, and heat of passion, or grow corrupt, and dull, and stupid, through sloth and effeminacy.

And if we did but manage ourselves with the same wariness in our actions, as we do in our steps: if we would but look before us constantly, and be sure to take good footing, this he tells us, would be a mighty security to us in all our undertakings. For, though human nature will be the same still, and all our vigilance cannot set it absolutely above error and frailty; yet the ill consequences of these infirmities would be in a great measure prevented. We might slip, but we should not fall; and the slips we did make, would be but few, and those easily recovered too. For thus we find, that when through some little incogitancy we happen to touch upon a nail, or make a false step; a small recollection will serve the turn, to disengage our foot, before the nail hath run in too deep; and to correct that trip, which was but a slight one, and made before we were aware of it.