The Enchiridion

The Library of Liberal Arts
                     OSKAR PIEST, _General Editor_
                             [NUMBER EIGHT]


                               EPICTETUS
                            The Enchiridion




                            The Enchiridion
                                   By
                               EPICTETUS


                             Translated by
                          THOMAS W. HIGGINSON

                        With an Introduction by
                             ALBERT SALOMON
                        _Professor of Sociology
                    New School for Social Research_


                         THE LIBERAL ARTS PRESS
                                NEW YORK


                            COPYRIGHT, 1948
                      THE LIBERAL ARTS PRESS, INC.

                     First Edition, _October, 1948_
                               Reprinted
                    _December, 1950_; _August, 1954_
                    Second Edition, _November, 1955_

         Published at 153 West 72nd Street, New York 23, N. Y.
                Printed in the United States of America




                                CONTENTS


  Note on the Text
  Introduction
  Selected Bibliography
  The Enchiridion




                            NOTE ON THE TEXT


The text of the second edition is a reprint of the first edition except
for a few minor corrections in style, punctuation, and spelling, which
have been revised to conform to current American usage.

The editorial staff of the publishers has added a few explanatory notes
which are set in brackets and marked “Ed.”

                                                                    O.P.




                              INTRODUCTION


The little book by Epictetus called _Enchiridion_ or “manual” has played
a disproportionately large role in the rise of modern attitudes and
modern philosophy. As soon as it had been translated into the vernacular
languages, it became a bestseller among independent intellectuals, among
anti-Christian thinkers, and among philosophers of a subjective cast.
Montaigne had a copy of the _Enchiridion_ among his books. Pascal
violently rejected the megalomaniac pride of the Stoic philosopher.
Frederick the Great carried the book with him on all campaigns. It was a
source of inspiration and encouragement to Anthony, Earl of Shaftesbury,
in the serious illness which ended only in his death; many pages of his
diaries contain passages copied from the _Enchiridion_. It has been
studied and widely quoted by Scottish philosophers like Francis
Hutcheson, Adam Smith, and Adam Ferguson who valued Stoic moral
philosophy for its reconciliation of social dependency and personal
independence.

That there was a rebirth of Stoicism in the centuries of rebirth which
marked the emergence of the modern age was not mere chance.
Philosophical, moral, and social conditions of the time united to cause
it. Roman Stoicism had been developed in times of despotism as a
philosophy of lonely and courageous souls who had recognized the
redeeming power of philosophical reason in all the moral and social
purposes of life. Philosophy as a way of life makes men free. It is the
last ditch stand of liberty in a world of servitude. Many elements in the
new age led to thought which had structural affinity with Roman Stoicism.
Modern times had created the independent thinker, the free intellectual
in a secular civilization. Modern times had destroyed medieval liberties
and had established the new despotism of the absolute state supported by
ecclesiastical authority. Modern philosophies continued the basic trend
in Stoicism in making the subjective consciousness the foundation of
philosophy. The Stoic emphasis on moral problems was also appealing in an
era of rapid transition when all the values which had previously been
taken for granted were questioned and reconsidered.

While it is interesting to observe how varied were the effects produced
by this small volume, this epitome of the Stoic system of moral
philosophy, these effects seem still more remarkable when we consider
that it was not intended to be a philosophical treatise on Stoicism for
students. It was, rather, to be a guide for the advanced student of
Stoicism to show him the best roads toward the goal of becoming a true
philosopher. Thus Epictetus and his _Enchiridion_ have a unique position
in Roman Stoicism. Seneca and Marcus Aurelius had selected Stoic
philosophy as the most adequate system for expressing their existential
problems of independence, solitude, and history. In this enterprise,
Seneca made tremendous strides toward the insights of social psychology
as a by-product of his consciousness of decadence (in this he was close
to Nietzsche), but he was not primarily concerned with the unity of the
Stoic system. Marcus Aurelius changed the philosophical doctrine into the
regimen of the lonesome ruler.