Discourses 4.1 ¶10 — Epictetus

Epictetus, Discourses 4.1 ¶10

“Must I then not desire health?” By no means, nor anything else that belongs to another: for what is not in your power to acquire or to keep when you please, this belongs to another. Keep then far from it not only your hands, but more than that, even your desires. If you do not, you have surrendered yourself as a slave; you have subjected your neck, if you admire anything not your own, to everything that is dependent on the power of others and perishable, to which you have conceived a liking.—“Is not my hand my own?”—It is a part of your own body; but it is by nature earth, subject to hindrance, compulsion, and the slave of everything which is stronger. And why do I say your hand? You ought to possess your whole body as a poor ass loaded, as long as it is possible, as long as you are allowed. But if there be a press, and a soldier should lay hold of it, let it go, do not resist, nor murmur; if you do, you will receive blows, and nevertheless you will also lose the ass. But when you ought to feel thus with respect to the body, consider what remains to be done about all the rest which is provided for the sake of the body. When the body is an ass, all the other things are bits belonging to the ass: packsaddles, shoes, barley, fodder. Let these also go: get rid of them quicker and more readily than of the ass.