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What Would Stoics Do

Epictetus · c. 50 – c. 135 CE

Discourses

Translation by George Long (1877) · 390 passages · 95 sections

Epictetus's informal lectures, written down by his student Arrian — blunt, funny, practical talks on what is and is not in our power, on judgements, freedom, and how to face hardship and other people.

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Contents

Book I

  1. Chapter 1Of the Things Which Are in Our Power, and Not in Our Power7 passages
  2. Chapter 2How a Man on Every Occasion Can Maintain His Proper Character8 passages
  3. Chapter 3How a Man Should Proceed from the Principle of God Being the Father of All Men to the Rest2 passages
  4. Chapter 4Of Progress or Improvement5 passages
  5. Chapter 5Against the Academics2 passages
  6. Chapter 6Of Providence4 passages
  7. Chapter 7Of the Use of Sophistical Arguments and Hypothetical and the Like4 passages
  8. Chapter 8That the Faculties Are Not Safe to the Uninstructed3 passages
  9. Chapter 9How from the Fact That We Are Akin to God a Man May Proceed to the Consequences6 passages
  10. Chapter 10Against Those Who Eagerly Seek Preferment at Rome2 passages
  11. Chapter 11Of Natural Affection4 passages
  12. Chapter 12Of Contentment5 passages
  13. Chapter 13How Everything May Be Done Acceptably to the Gods1 passage
  14. Chapter 14That the Deity Oversees All Things2 passages
  15. Chapter 15What Philosophy Promises2 passages
  16. Chapter 16Of Providence4 passages
  17. Chapter 17That the Logical Art Is Necessary3 passages
  18. Chapter 18That We Ought Not to Be Angry with the Errors (Faults) of Others4 passages
  19. Chapter 19How We Should Behave to Tyrants5 passages
  20. Chapter 20About Reason, How It Contemplates Itself2 passages
  21. Chapter 21Against Those Who Wish to Be Admired1 passage
  22. Chapter 22On Precognitions4 passages
  23. Chapter 23Against Epicurus1 passage
  24. Chapter 24How We Should Struggle with Circumstances4 passages
  25. Chapter 25On the Same6 passages
  26. Chapter 26What Is the Law of Life3 passages
  27. Chapter 27In How Many Ways Appearances Exist, and What Aids We Should Provide Against Them4 passages
  28. Chapter 28That We Ought Not to Be Angry with Men; and What Are the Small and the Great Things Among Men5 passages
  29. Chapter 29On Constancy (Or Firmness)12 passages
  30. Chapter 30What We Ought to Have Ready in Difficult Circumstances1 passage

Book II

  1. Chapter 1That Confidence (Courage) Is Not Inconsistent with Caution5 passages
  2. Chapter 2Of Tranquillity (Freedom from Perturbation)5 passages
  3. Chapter 3To Those Who Recommend Persons to Philosophers1 passage
  4. Chapter 4Against a Person Who Had Once Been Detected in Adultery2 passages
  5. Chapter 5How Magnanimity Is Consistent with Care5 passages
  6. Chapter 6Of Indifference3 passages
  7. Chapter 7How We Ought to Use Divination3 passages
  8. Chapter 8What Is the Nature (Ἡ Οὐσία) of the Good2 passages
  9. Chapter 9That When We Cannot Fulfil That Which the Character of a Man Promises, We Assume the Character of a Philosopher2 passages
  10. Chapter 10How We May Discover the Duties of Life from Names3 passages
  11. Chapter 11What the Beginning of Philosophy Is3 passages
  12. Chapter 12Of Disputation or Discussion2 passages
  13. Chapter 13On Anxiety (Solicitude)2 passages
  14. Chapter 14To Naso4 passages
  15. Chapter 15To or Against Those Who Obstinately Persist in What They Have Determined2 passages
  16. Chapter 16That We Do Not Strive to Use Our Opinions About Good and Evil6 passages
  17. Chapter 17How We Must Adapt Preconceptions to Particular Cases8 passages
  18. Chapter 18How We Should Struggle Against Appearances5 passages
  19. Chapter 19Against Those Who Embrace Philosophical Opinions Only in Words5 passages
  20. Chapter 20Against the Epicureans and Academics6 passages
  21. Chapter 21Of Inconsistency3 passages
  22. Chapter 22On Friendship6 passages
  23. Chapter 23On the Power of Speaking8 passages
  24. Chapter 24To (Or Against) a Person Who Was One of Those Who Were Not Valued (Esteemed) by Him5 passages
  25. Chapter 25That Logic Is Necessary1 passage
  26. Chapter 26What Is the Property of Error2 passages

Book III

  1. Chapter 1Of Finery in Dress5 passages
  2. Chapter 2In What a Man Ought to Be Exercised Who Has Made Proficiency; and That We Neglect the Chief Things4 passages
  3. Chapter 3What Is the Matter on Which a Good Man Should Be Employed, and in What We Ought Chiefly to Practice Ourselves4 passages
  4. Chapter 4Against a Person Who Showed His Partisanship in an Unseemly Way in a Theatre1 passage
  5. Chapter 5Against Those Who on Account of Sickness Go Away Home3 passages
  6. Chapter 6Miscellaneous3 passages
  7. Chapter 7To the Administrator of the Free Cities Who Was an Epicurean4 passages
  8. Chapter 8How We Must Exercise Ourselves Against Appearances (Φαντασίας)2 passages
  9. Chapter 9To a Certain Rhetorician Who Was Going Up to Rome on a Suit2 passages
  10. Chapter 10In What Manner We Ought to Bear Sickness2 passages
  11. Chapter 11Certain Miscellaneous Matters1 passage
  12. Chapter 12About Exercise3 passages
  13. Chapter 13What Solitude Is, and What Kind of Person a Solitary Man Is4 passages
  14. Chapter 14Certain Miscellaneous Matters3 passages
  15. Chapter 15That We Ought to Proceed with Circumspection to Everything3 passages
  16. Chapter 16That We Ought with Caution to Enter Into Familiar Intercourse with Men2 passages
  17. Chapter 17On Providence2 passages
  18. Chapter 18That We Ought Not to Be Disturbed by Any News1 passage
  19. Chapter 19What Is the Condition of a Common Kind of Man and of a Philosopher1 passage
  20. Chapter 20That We Can Derive Advantage from All External Things3 passages
  21. Chapter 21Against Those Who Readily Come to the Profession of Sophists2 passages
  22. Chapter 22About Cynism18 passages
  23. Chapter 23To Those Who Read and Discuss for the Sake of Ostentation6 passages
  24. Chapter 24That We Ought Not to Be Moved by a Desire of Those Things Which Are Not in Our Power12 passages
  25. Chapter 25To Those Who Fall Off (Desist) from Their Purpose2 passages
  26. Chapter 26To Those Who Fear Want7 passages

Book IV

  1. Chapter 1About Freedom22 passages
  2. Chapter 2On Familiar Intimacy1 passage
  3. Chapter 3What Things We Should Exchange for Other Things1 passage
  4. Chapter 4To Those Who Are Desirous of Passing Life in Tranquillity8 passages
  5. Chapter 5Against the Quarrelsome and Ferocious4 passages
  6. Chapter 6Against Those Who Lament Over Being Pitied6 passages
  7. Chapter 7On Freedom from Fear6 passages
  8. Chapter 8Against Those Who Hastily Rush Into the Use of the Philosophic Dress6 passages
  9. Chapter 9To a Person Who Had Been Changed to a Character of Shamelessness3 passages
  10. Chapter 10What Things We Ought to Despise, and What Things We Ought to Value4 passages
  11. Chapter 11About Purity (Cleanliness)6 passages
  12. Chapter 12On Attention4 passages
  13. Chapter 13Against or to Those Who Readily Tell Their Own Affairs4 passages

Source and licence

Edition
The Discourses of Epictetus; with the Encheiridion and Fragments, translated by George Long (1877)
Status
Tier A: Public domain in the UK and the US. Translator died 1879: public domain in the UK and the US.
Attribution
Epictetus, Discourses (as recorded by Arrian), tr. George Long (1877). Text: Standard Ebooks (CC0).
Digital text
Standard Ebooks (opens in a new tab) · CC0 1.0 (Standard Ebooks dedicates its own contributions to the public domain)

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