Epictetus, The Handbook 48: Right Modesty

. . . It is dangerous too to lapse into foul language; when anything of the kind occurs, rebuke the offender, if the occasion allow, and if not, make it plain to him by your silence, or a blush or a frown, that you are angry at his words.

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

Years ago, I would have rolled my eyes at this advice. I would have been concerned about how a love of formality is simply the appearance of dignity, and really has little do with true character. I am far more open now to what Epictetus says, not because age has made me any wiser, but because experience has taught me how expression that is vulgar, dismissive, or degrading is not only hurtful to others, but reflects a baseness in my own soul.

I am hardly as attuned to technology and social media as are my children, but I have noticed how online communication combines instant efficiency with a certain personal distance. This seems to be a breeding ground for expression that can be both careless and malicious. Though thoughtless speech has surely been with us as long as we have had language, it now seems to bit easier to engage in. Arguments give way to insults, reason to passion, and we can all do it from the comfort of a personal bubble. If we feel offended, we offend right back, and the more base the language the better.

I see the chats that accompany online games, and they would a make a sailor blush. I read conservative news, filled with slurs and the insistence that liberals suffer from a mental illness, and I read liberal news filled with different slurs and the insistence that conservatives are all moral monsters. The question of truth doesn’t seem to enter the picture, because we’re so busy shouting about our indignation and putting others down.

The problem with vulgarity, I think, is not simply that it is saucy or crude, but that it is a slap in the face to the dignity of any person. Reducing someone or something to those two most common forms of foulness, sex and defecation, really does nothing more than consider man as just an animal. 

One might also add the defamation of the Divine. If I am humble enough to believe in what is greater than me, I should never take such an idea, and such words, lightly. If I should choose to make myself the center of all things, then I hardly need to make light of something others happen to respect. 
 

Now I can become all indignant and preachy about such things, but I find it best to just refuse to speak as others do, and to move on to something better. I’m the first too appreciate that extraordinary language is sometimes suited for extraordinary circumstances, but I find it too easy to make vulgarity all too ordinary. In doing so, I’m showing others that I have no respect for them, while also revealing how deeply I have no respect for myself. 

Written in 5/2012

Epictetus, The Handbook 47: Right Respect

. . . Avoid raising men's laughter; for it is a habit that easily slips into vulgarity, and it may well suffice to lessen your neighbor’s respect. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

Laughter is such a wonderful and frustrating thing, because as soon as I try to define what causes the joy, I have lost the very source of it. I’m reminded of Wittgenstein in the Philosophical Investigations, when he asked what would happen to a game if you removed all the rules. Would it still be a game?

I sometimes laugh because I find something funny, but once I explain the joke it is hardly funny at all. Now I am stuck with trying to explain a spontaneous experience in a clinical manner. The Ancient and Medieval Four Humors help us to understand the root of all this, because we find reality amusing when it is exaggerated and grossly distorted, much like extreme physical features in a good political cartoon.

I will often laugh, however, not because something is humorous, but because I am nervous, because I am uncertain about what to do, because I have absolutely no clue what is happening, or because everyone else is doing it.

More importantly, I will sometimes laugh as a form of ridicule, which is a veiled expression of my own arrogance and power.

A legendary professor at my college was known for calling out young whippersnappers who were chuckling and guffawing behind their hands during his class.

He would ask them a simple question: “Are you laughing with me, or laughing at me?”

The inevitable answer, that of the bully who is really a coward, was “we’re laughing with you, Professor.”

“Funny, but I’m not laughing.”

I was once sitting on a park bench by my old elementary school, enjoying that last cigarette from a pack of Rothmans, and a car raced erratically into the parking lot.

A fellow rushed out of the car and tried the school door. I have no idea what he was thinking, but I suspected he was having a bathroom emergency, and it had not occurred to him that it was a Saturday evening. If he’d been a good Irishman, he’d have found a well-placed tree or bush.

As I looked back at the car, there was the lost love of my life sitting in the passenger seat, the one who had now refused to speak to me for four years. Instead of ignoring me, this time her finger was pointed straight at me, and she was laughing hysterically. I had seen that same laugh many times before, and it wasn’t pleasant.

I simply got up and walked away, uncertain about what else I could possibly do. The car sped off again. As I walked, I still saw that finger pointed at me, along with that broad dismissive grin.

The image of being mocked by someone I had once thought of as my best friend haunts me to this day.

Laughing is not always about sharing something funny, or enjoying a good time. Too often, it is about trying to hurt the very same people we ought to love.

Whether it is at the honky-tonk or at a fancy dinner, we are all tempted to use humor as an excuse to be important, and to make others feel less important. I often find that the most popular people are the ones that make everyone laugh, not because they are sharing something humorous, but because they are putting someone else down.

No man can show respect through the ridicule of others, and no man should expect respect from others through his insults. 

Epictetus, The Handbook 46: Right Humility

. . . In your conversation avoid frequent and disproportionate mention of your own doings or adventures; for other people do not take the same pleasure in hearing what has happened to you as you take in recounting your adventures. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I’m grateful that I have rarely felt the need to be at the center of attention, and for most of my life I have managed to blend unobtrusively into the woodwork. I am conscious, however, that my way of explaining something is oftentimes quite anecdotal, probably because I haven’t mastered more refined teaching tools, and I will quite regularly ask myself: how much of this am I offering to help someone else understand, and how much of this is just about basking in my own experiences?

I think of all the great storytellers I have known through the years, and I remind myself what it was that made them great. It was the motive that always made the difference, and that, in turn, shaped the context. What were they trying to point out to their listener or reader? Was it about inspiring or about glorifying?

I had a wonderful history professor who had served in WWII, and he would often describe, in colorful detail, the exploits of the members of a B-24 bomber crew. Some were humorous, and they always helped me to picture the camaraderie of these men. Others were terrifying, and they always helped me to admire their courage. Over the years, I felt like I had gotten to know these fellows personally. I realized one day that he had never mentioned very much about the bombardier. When I asked him about that, he just brushed it aside. “That fool couldn’t hit the side of a barn door!”

It then occurred to me that he, of course, had been the bombardier, and it was only years later, after he had passed away, that I was ever told about his own remarkable service record, including how he had been decorated for saving the life of the crew’s navigator. He had shared all those stories about his friends, had placed himself there as a sort of observer, but he never drew deliberate attention to himself.

Having eccentric tastes, I am very much aware that the things that interest me will not always be of interest to others. If I do wish to share something about my own thoughts or experiences, I try not to just think about what centers around my own benefit, but what might be of use for someone else’s benefit. I have a whole storehouse of tales and exploits I will most likely never share with anyone, and that is because I can’t really think of a way that they could truly inform, assist, or amuse.

That one about the Lebanese café owner, my suede safari hat, and a large jar of curry powder is going to have to stay locked away until I can think of a good moral to go with it.

I don’t think of humility as deliberately putting oneself down, because that can just be another way of puffing oneself up. I think of it as being able to use whatever gifts I may have to serve, instead of being served. 

Written in 2/2012

 

Franz Jägerstätter

Epictetus, The Handbook 45: Right Position

. . . When you go to visit some great man, prepare your mind by thinking that you will not find him in, that you will be shut out, that the doors will be slammed in your face, that he will pay no heed to you.

And if in spite of all this you find it fitting for you to go, go and bear what happens and never say to yourself, 'It was not worth all this'; for that shows a vulgar mind and one at odds with outward things. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I have heard some people describe these words of Epictetus as negative and pessimistic. Why should I not expect recognition, success, and glory from this life? Why should I assume the worst, when it would far better to hope for the best? Wouldn’t a more positive attitude be far more helpful in getting me what I want from others?

Indeed, I have noticed this “getting what I want from others” approach to be one of the most common of our time. It might seem to be a necessary ingredient for a productive life, as so many of those who come out on top appear to share in this way of thinking. If I am going to seek a position of importance, I should surely stop at nothing to acquire it.

Stoicism, however, asks us to reconsider the very measure of our lives, and suggests a rather different approach to outward things. Instead of asking myself whether I will or will not receive an honor I think I am due, I might be better served by asking myself whether I will or will not have acted according to my own excellence. I should seek to be in a right position toward myself, and not concern myself so much about my position toward others.

I would suggest that the very expectation of recognition and status is hardly a positive attitude at all. It isn’t within my power to determine how another receives me, even as it is very much within my power to determine how I judge and act myself. To believe that I deserve rewards from others isn’t really about self-reliance at all, but about dependence, and to measure my success by what others should give me isn’t about my own merit, but about entitlement.

How positive or negative, optimistic or pessimistic, an attitude may seem to be has everything to do with what we consider worthy. The Stoic has confidence only in himself, and is willing to let all else be as it will be. I find that deeply positive, because it is an attitude of complete liberation. The lover of worldly success judges himself happy when he looks forward to others providing their favors. I find that deeply negative, because it is an attitude of complete subservience.

As someone who has struggled with the bite of the Black Dog for many years, I recognize my own version of negative thinking. When a foul mood overcomes me, I might think that the solution is to engage all the more in fixing my circumstances. I have found, however, that this has exactly the opposite result, much like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. My attitude will not improve by fixing the world, but rather by fixing myself. I find I am being quite the pessimist when I rely upon externals, and only an optimist when I rely upon my own judgment.

Whether it was the royal courts of the past, or the corporate boardrooms of the present, “getting what I want from others” is, from the Stoic perspective, a model grounded in surrender. I may wish and hope for all the best results from my bowing and scraping, from my pandering and flattery, but I will already have sold myself out by looking for what is good in all the wrong places.

To be at odds with outward things isn’t about failing to get them to conform to me, it’s rather about even wanting them to conform to me to begin with. Once I can change my position in relation to others, I can suddenly see good and bad with very different eyes.

Written in 2/2012

Image: Jean-Leon Gerome, Reception of the Grand Condé at Versailles (1838)

Epictetus, The Handbook 44: Right Learning

. . . Do not go lightly or casually to hear lectures; but if you do go, maintain your gravity and dignity and do not make yourself offensive.

When you are going to meet any one, and particularly some man of reputed eminence, set before your mind the thought, 'What would Socrates or Zeno have done?' and you will not fail to make proper use of the occasion. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I used to consider my days playing the game of higher education as a time of trial, because I was so frustrated by all the pettiness of small minds. I still consider it as a time of trial, but I now see it as the opportunity given to me to learn to not be petty and small-minded myself.

If you were a serious undergraduate you were strongly encouraged, and if you were any sort of graduate student you were absolutely required, to attend the usual evening and weekend lectures by visiting scholars. I never much liked the lengthy hagiographies in the introductions, but I learned quite a bit from those talks themselves. I still have pages and pages of notes I took back then, complete with my own thoughts and observations.

What I really never looked forward to, however, were the lengthy question and answer sessions. As a follower of Socrates, I hardly hate either questions or answers, but what irked me so was that these questions were usually not about a love of truth, but rather about a desire for recognition. Like some twisted political press conference, people stepped into the arena to challenge, and hopefully to defeat, a reigning champion. If they could manage it, they thought their fame would spread far and wide.

I recall one such lecture, by a very well respected Classical scholar, about the proper division and order of the books in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. I hardly know if he was right or wrong, but I was fascinated by the argument, and I was grateful for being given something to mentally chew on.

The talk had actually filled a rather large lecture hall, easily many hundreds of seats. When the lecturer opened the floor to questions, a man stood up in the back and started speaking. He spoke for some time. I still have no idea who he was, but I think I was supposed to recognize him. He surely thought we should all recognize him.

I could already tell that his question was hardly a question, but a personal attack. “Your reading of the text is clearly flawed, because you don’t understand the nuances of the Greek.”

The lecturer politely thanked him for the comment, and offered, as I recall, a four point reasoned response, even admitting that there were indeed issues still to be resolved.

The fellow wouldn’t stand down. “I don’t think you’re hearing what I’m saying. I have studied the language of Aristotle for many years, and I find it absolutely ridiculous that you are making such an obvious mistake.” By this point all heads were turned back to look at this man, and even from a distance, I saw a broad, self-satisfied grin.

“I believe I have answered your question as best I can, and I’d like to move on to other questions, if I may.”

Here’s where it got ugly. As he was sitting down, the man in the back pretended to mumble an aside, even though he was shouting it from the top of his lungs. “Well, they sure don’t make philosophers like they used to!” I was startled to hear a good number of people laugh, and some even clapping, in approval of the comment.

Again, I am not one to judge about the merit of the argument about Aristotle’s Metaphysics. It hardly matters, because what was really at stake, right there and then, was a judgment about respect and decency. I walked away that night realizing that I had learned an important lesson, that philosophy hardly amounted to a hill of beans if it didn’t encourage the practice of loving one’s neighbor.

What would Socrates and Zeno have done? These men were hardly obsequious, and many people downright despised them for challenging the usual norms. But I also hardly think either of them ever thought that a lecture or a debate was about puffing up their own self-importance.

Written in 6/2009

Stoic Fairness in Sport?

I challenge my own blind loyalty and selfish bias in the following way:

Would I be willing to claim that Diego Maradona's "Hand of God" goal in 1986 was quite literally a volleyball play, AND ALSO be willing to agree that Geoff Hurst's goal against Germany in 1966 didn't actually cross the line? That is my own personal test of fairness and decency in sport.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ccNkksrfls

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Uhe_l1h3w8

Written in 2002

Epictetus, The Handbook 43: Right Amusements

. . . It is not necessary for the most part to go to the games; but if you should have occasion to go, show that your first concern is for yourself; that is, wish that only to happen which does happen, and him only to win who does win, for so you will suffer no hindrance.

But refrain entirely from applause, or ridicule, or prolonged excitement.

And when you go away do not talk much of what happened there, except so far as it tends to your improvement. For to talk about it implies that the spectacle excited your wonder. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I grew up in a town that amuses itself, and distracts itself, through the exploits of four major league sports teams. The front pages of our newspapers would regularly glorify their victories and bemoan their defeats, while the stories about corrupt politicians, businessmen, and lawyers were usually reserved for the smaller print.

Common sense seems to give way to blind tribalism when it comes to sports in America, much as with the Circuses of Rome, or the Blues and the Greens in Constantinople, or Celtic versus Rangers in the Old Country.

When I moved to the South, the teams changed, but people still danced to the same old tune. Instead of hating the Cowboys with a vengeance, I was now expected to worship them as American gods.

Epictetus isn’t shunning the games, in whatever form they may take, because he’s a killjoy. He’s rather warning us about how easily mass hysteria can numb our sound judgment, and how dangerous it is to succumb to mindless passion.

The only major sporting event that has ever inspired me has been the FIFA World Cup. I made England “my” team from early on, simply because I was always moved by the romance of their incredible victory in 1966. I learned quickly that my personal preference was, according to some, worse than all the world’s worst heresies, blasphemies, and idolatries rolled into one. My Irish friends thought it a betrayal of the Cause. My German friends told me their loss in 1966 was only due to a vast political conspiracy. A fellow I knew from South America stopped speaking to me altogether, because football and a war in the South Atlantic were exactly the same thing in his mind.

My father would always frustrate me when we watched a game together. While I would jump around in ecstasy or roll around in agony, depending on the fortunes of my chosen heroes, my father would simply admire a good play, regardless of who played it, and asked only that the better team should win. I thought him a traitor, but he was simply trying to teach me good sportsmanship.

The Stoic will hardly begrudge us a pleasant amusement, but he will warn us about allowing our pastimes to consume our sense of self-control, decency, and fairness. If I am going to make such a complete fool of myself at the games, how poorly will I manage the needs of real life?

Written in 6/2009

Image: If this really upsets you, you might be taking football a bit too seriously ;-)

Epictetus, The Handbook 42: Right Passions

. . . Avoid impurity to the utmost of your power before marriage, but if you indulge your passion, let it be done lawfully.

But do not be offensive or censorious to those who indulge it, and do not always be bringing up your own chastity.

If some one tells you that so and so speaks ill of you, do not defend yourself against what he says, but answer, 'He did not know my other faults, or he would not have mentioned these alone.'. . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

My own concerns about the sexual mores of our time do not come from a frustrated hatred of the flesh, or from the reactionary belief that sexuality exists only as an unfortunate but necessary means to produce a few more copies of myself on the face of this Earth.

My concern has long been that we have turned our liberation into selfishness. We separate our desires from the commitment of love, and in the process reduce others to a means for our gratification. Once it becomes all about the taking, and abandons all the giving, we treat others as objects, and not as persons.

In my younger years, I would hear both men and women talk about “getting a piece of that”, and I would cringe. The phrases may change, but the attitude isn’t all that different. We can make it all appear right and proper, of course, but when sex is just about seeking pleasure, which so easily transforms into the exercise of control and power, we abuse others just as we abuse ourselves.

We cannot help but somehow recognize that so deep a personal intimacy brings with it so deep a personal consequence. I need only look around me to see the intense damage done by lazy affections.

In my early teaching years, I knew a young lady who spoke proudly of her “no-strings-attached” affair, and all the benefits she thought it brought her. A year later she was sobbing uncontrollably, and asking why she had let herself love the fellow in question. I did my best to help her through it, though I regret that it was hardly enough.

She learned it the hard way, as so many of us do, and as I had to learn myself, that hearts are to be cherished, and not to be played with.

Epictetus also understands that it is the mark of a frustrated and miserable person to be too quick to accuse and condemn others. I should worry far more about maintaining my own chastity than I should about policing the chastity of others, because I should readily understand all the temptations and pitfalls that come our way.

It helps little if I tell you that you are broken, without offering my friendship to help you heal those wounds.

If love is about a commitment to others, I will hardly be practicing that love, either if I abuse others by sleeping with them carelessly, or if I abuse others by damning them carelessly. I need not be promiscuous or a prude. I just need to show compassion and concern.

I was once a bit enamored of a woman I saw regularly at daily Mass. She always sat quietly in the back, right where I always did, and always in the company of a lovely three or four year old boy. I asked a friend who she might be.

“You want nothing to do with her! She had a child out of wedlock!”

“Well, all right then, but I think I’d like to get to know her. When did you start throwing stones?”

“You’d be a fool if you ever thought you could love a woman like that.”

“Perhaps she might like to share her life and her son’s life with someone, or at least find a friend to make it easier?”

“Women like that are never any good, and you should know that already.”

“What, you mean the ones like Mary Magdalene?”

He had no answer for that, beyond a sigh and a roll of the eyes.

I was pathetically too shy to ever speak to her, but I always deeply admired her commitment to raising her son. The only good that ever came from it was that I found some better friends.

If the best criticism you can come up with is a rumor that someone has been intemperate, you are sadly missing the forest for the trees.

We can’t complain that we have separated love from sex, and then also separate love from all of our other judgments and actions.

Written in 6/2009

Image: Jacques de L'Ange, Allegory of Lust (mid 17th c.)

Epictetus, The Handbook 41: Right Possessions

. . . For your body take just so much as your bare need requires, such as food, drink, clothing, house, servants, but cut down all that tends to luxury and outward show. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I was pleasantly surprised the other day to overhear someone uttering those wonderful words of G.K. Chesterton:

There are two ways to get enough: One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less.

The only problem was that the man was actually wearing a Rolex, and had just been bragging about his new country club membership. I suspect he was applying this rule to others, though not to himself.

The Stoic hardly needs to be a pauper, and circumstances may even put him in high places. What will set him apart is his attitude toward his possessions, such that he seeks only to make use of what is necessary, and he recognizes that Nature has offered even these things only on loan.

I have never been rich, and I’m fairly sure I never will be. Yet whenever I have had even a bit more than I need, I always seem to raise the bar on what I think I need. Necessity grows into luxury, and I begin to confuse need with greed. It becomes far too easy to condemn the rich, but the problem has never been being rich at all, but thinking rich.

I find it very helpful to perform a certain thought exercise every so often, which then spills over into the way I choose to live. When circumstances seem oppressive, I ask myself what I really need to be happy. What is quite enlightening and useful is how sparse and humble that list can really be.

I push the limits as far as I can. “But without the clothes on my back I will freeze, and without some food in my belly I will starve!” Then I’ll freeze and starve. Death will come in any event, and the only thing I really need at all is to face such things rightly.

I recently caught myself saying that I couldn’t live without my music. Of course I could live without it, and if you took away my ridiculous record collection, I could play it myself, and if you took away my instruments, I could still whistle a tune. Keep me from whistling, and I can play music in my own head, which is what I do most of the day in any event. I am, of course, my only possession.

I take this to the point where I recognize that if I can’t imagine being without something, and be willing to give it up at a moment’s notice, I’m wanting it too much. I will thankfully take what Nature offers me to live well, but I should take no more. If I also remember that I am only borrowing such goods, I will hardly resent returning them. This can transform me from a creature of entitlement to a creature of gratitude. 

Written in 6/2009

Epictetus, The Handbook 40: Right Company

. . . Refuse the entertainments of strangers and the vulgar.

But if occasion arise to accept them, then strain every nerve to avoid lapsing into the state of the vulgar.

For know that, if your comrade has a stain on him, he that associates with him must needs share the stain, even though he be clean in himself. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I would be filled with rage when my elders told me I should always keep good company. I knew better, of course, because I was certain that I was may own man, and I would never let my companions influence the way I thought or lived. If I had known anything about Stoic thought back then, I would surely have appealed to Epictetus. I rule myself, I would have said, and others do not rule me.

Why was it, then, that when I spent time with a rowdy crowd in middle school, I was quite rowdy myself? Why did I start smoking in high school as soon as I hung around on a park bench with all the other smokers? Why did I become more heartless and calculating when I fell in love with a heartless and calculating girl? Why did I drink like a fish whenever I was around all the lounge lizards?

I can parade all the proud theory I like, but the practice of daily living and the grounding of common sense will always remind me that birds of a feather flock together. This isn’t because I’m not free, or do not rule my own choices and actions, but is rather about the very causes and effects of my own decisions.

No one ever forced me to spend time with the seedy set, or made me fall in love with the wrong girl. There was already something about me that wanted to be shifty instead of honest, dismissive instead of kind. That I chose my company poorly reflected less on them, and more on what was already brewing in my own heart.

And once I was in that world, no one ever forced me to start thinking and living in a certain way. I chose to do so entirely of my own accord, precisely because I freely allowed others to influence me. No one broke down the door. I unlocked and opened it entirely by myself.

I have indeed always ruled myself, as does any man, but my rule is also something I can freely surrender, and few things will encourage us to choose vice than being surrounded by it. We defer to the default.

Even if I had the incredible strength to remain pure in thought and deed, association is itself a choice, and with any choice comes a responsibility.

If I stand by idly while one man robs another, though I have done no robbing, I am hardly blameless. If I spend my time with friends who deceive, betray, and abuse, though I may not actually be doing these things myself, I am also hardly blameless. We carry each other.

It took some hard knocks to realize that my elders, and Epictetus, were always quite right. I need only look at my own friends, virtuous or vulgar, and I can immediately learn quite a bit about myself.

 Written in 6/2009

Image: Thomas Couture, The Romans of the Decadence (1847)

Epictetus, The Handbook 39: Right Promises

. . . Refuse to take oaths, altogether if that be possible, but if not, as far as circumstances allow. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

We think of “swearing” as simply the use of foul language, but to properly “swear” refers to the offer of a solemn oath, an affirmation, a promise, or a vow. Such statements are made upon the guarantee of a certain name or authority we claim to hold as sacred or dear.

Now just as we so freely make light use of obscene language, so too we often make light use of such words of promise. Think of how often we promise on God, on our country, on our friendship, or on our honor that something is true, or that our commitment is real. Now think of how often we truly mean it.

Epictetus isn’t telling us that we shouldn’t make promises, but rather that we should make those promises rightly, based upon our conviction, and not upon empty show. I can imagine the Romans saying “by Jupiter” just as often as we now thoughtlessly say “Oh my God.”

Words without commitment are lies, and we too freely use words loosed from their meanings. I should not think that a man who swears will necessarily mean what he says, but I should think that a man of character will certainly mean what he says. I remember the words of Aeschylus:

It is not the oath that makes us believe the man, but the man the oath.

How easily one of my heroes, St. Thomas More, could have mouthed the words of the Oath of Supremacy and the Oath of Succession in 1534, and escaped with his life and his position intact. Like a clever child, he might just have crossed his fingers behind his back. Yet he knew that he could not swear upon the name of a king who was asking him to go against his own conscience. Conviction won out over words that day.

In right Stoic manner, a man should hardly have to appeal to the power of another to guarantee his own promise. When I was younger, men of the old school still told me that a man without his word had nothing. When I grew older, I began to see how lightly people spoke words of allegiance and loyalty, and how easily they broke them. This, in turn, helped me to take my own commitments far more seriously.

Engaging with Stoicism allowed me to give all of this a deeper context. If, as Epictetus says, I rule only myself, then I surely cannot sell out this responsibility for anything else. I am certainly going beyond the pale when I place greater weight in the name of something else than I do in my own conviction.

Historians will sometimes argue that the point of no return in Nazi Germany was not the party’s electoral victories, or all the legal machinations that followed, but when the officers of the Wehrmacht swore an oath not to their own conscience, or even to their country or its constitution, but to the person of Adolf Hitler. Under a Stoic light, it could be said that this was the moment when they surrendered the rule of themselves through the name of another.

I must always ask myself not only what I am promising, but also upon what grounds I am promising it. By all means, let us certainly show right reverence to our kings and to our gods. But let us also reserve the final authority of our own promises to our own character. I should hardly ever pass the weight of so great and noble a responsibility on to another. 

Written in 6/2009

Image: Hans Holbein, Sir Thomas More (1527) 

Epictetus, The Handbook 38: Right Speech

. . . Be silent for the most part, or, if you speak, say only what is necessary and in a few words.

 Talk, but rarely, if occasion calls you, but do not talk of ordinary things—of gladiators, or horse-races, or athletes, or of meats or drinks—these are topics that arise everywhere—but above all do not talk about men in blame or compliment or comparison.

If you can, turn the conversation of your company by your talk to some fitting subject; but if you should chance to be isolated among strangers, be silent. Do not laugh much, nor at many things, nor without restraint. . . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

I immediately think of the old aphorism, sometimes attributed to Mark Twain, that it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt.

Perhaps we are uncertain, nervous, or frustrated by silence, but we all have the tendency to speak far too much. I try to rein myself in by remembering my mother’s example. Throughout her life, whenever she was asked why she was being so quiet, and not joining in the fiery conversation of the moment, she would calmly say, “ I am a silent creature.”

Words mean things, and I abuse them when I use them too lightly. In doing so, I disrespect myself, and I disrespect others.

I have also learned that not all topics of conversation are worthy of our time and effort. Petty speech, about vain frivolities, does nothing but reveal my own inner vanity and frivolity. I am hardly more important or relevant in this life the more I make myself heard, and I am hardly wiser or better when I pontificate about shallow interests.

Even more importantly, petty speech deeply harms justice when it takes on the form of gossip and slander. I know how tempting it is to blame or praise others, but this is usually done not out of respect at all, but rather from self-importance or flattery. I lower or raise others to glorify myself.

I have often found that as soon as I am qualifying a statement “with all due respect,” or “he’s a wonderful fellow, but . . .” the chances are good that I am really just playing games.

I spent too many years thinking I was in a friendship with someone because we shared so well in putting down other people. I did not learn quickly enough that I was being put down just as much when I was out of earshot. Such an unpleasant memory reminds me again how much our words mean.

Because I become too easily impassioned by principle, and therefore will not suffer fools gladly, I will sometimes think it best to challenge the boasting and pettiness of others. I have done nothing, of course, but become boastful and petty myself.

If a friendly change of topic cannot steer a conversation right by good example, it is often best to say nothing at all. If I am frustrated by so many words that mean so little, I should start at home and simply use my own words more wisely.

Finally, laughter in the joy of fellowship is one thing, but laughter from dismissal and ridicule is quite another. I find the latter far more common than the former, so I try to laugh sparingly. A dozen mocking snorts can never hold a candle to a single friendly smile.

Written in 6/2009

Image: Arnold Lakhovsky, The Conversation (c. 1935)

Epictetus, The Handbook 37: Right Conduct

Lay down for yourself from the first a definite stamp and style of conduct, which you will maintain when you are alone and also in the society of men. . .

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 33 (tr Matheson)

The Stoic never sees any inherent conflict between theory and practice, but the Stoic can surely see how easy it is to wrongly neglect action at the expense of too much abstraction. Consequently, most every Stoic writer I have read will offer a very specific set of guidelines for daily living. Sweeping generalizations just won’t cut it.

We may order these in any number of ways, but I think the trick is recognizing that I need to do more than think and say that I should be wise, or virtuous, or decent. Such broad statements, as true as they may be, can far too easily mask indifference and a lack of commitment. I must also add to them how, in a very particular manner, I will confront and manage the many sorts of concrete circumstances I will face in my daily life.

For my own benefit, I always break these rules down to their basic elements, and I consider each part on its own merits. I do this not to be tedious, but to be responsible. I have lost track of the number of times I’ve allowed myself to be excused from a task because I have managed to somehow conveniently overlook it.

I further ask myself what all the variables will be when I make my everyday choices. What sorts of people will I be facing? What situations will I have to find my way through? What feelings may tempt me? What motives must I keep in mind? How will I face consequences that haven’t necessarily been convenient for me?

With this passage of Epictetus, I’ve always read it in twelve parts. This first part is telling me I need to not only think with decency, but also to live with decency. I cannot live a life of contradiction, or being different men at different times. I must become deeply aware of the walk matching the talk.

I am especially conscious of my own integrity. As soon as I am willing to say one thing in public, and do another thing in private, I have renounced the right to be my own master. I am grateful that Epictetus reminds me of this, and I must certainly be reminded, because it so easy to confuse the presence of character with the mere appearance of character. Whether many see me, or none at all, my actions should remain exactly the same.

I do indeed believe that love is the law, and that the exercise of the virtues is what will set me free. Now that theory of the classroom will have to be put into the hard practice of the trenches. Whether or not I am able to do that will determine whether I am a decent man or a fraud. 

Written in 6/2009

Image: Vincent van Gogh, The Good Samaritan (1890)