“But, if I do not act in the tragedy, I shall be beheaded.”
Go then and act your tragedy, but I will not do so.
You ask me, “Why?”
I answer, “Because you count yourself to be but an ordinary thread in the tunic.”
What follows then? You ought to think how you can be like other men, just as one thread does not wish to have something special to distinguish it from the rest: but I want to be the purple, that touch of brilliance which gives distinction and beauty to the rest.
Why then do you say to me, “Make yourself like unto the many?” If I do that, I shall no longer be the purple.
Helvidius Priscus too saw this, and acted on it. When Vespasian sent to him not to come into the Senate he answered, “You can forbid me to be a senator; but as long as I am a senator, I must come in.”
“Come in then,” he says, “and be silent.”
“Question me not and I will be silent.”
“But I am bound to question you.”
“And I am bound to say what seems right to me.”
“But, if you say it, I shall kill you.”
“When did I tell you, that I was immortal? You will do your part, and I mine. It is yours to kill, mine to die without quailing: yours to banish, mine to go into exile without groaning.”
I cannot remind myself often enough how important it is for me to distinguish between preferences and principles. There are some things that I might want, that can make my life more convenient and satisfying, and then there are some things that I absolutely need, that will determine the very worth of my character.
However attached I may be to the former, I must gladly let them go for the sake of the latter.
Would I like to live instead of die, or feel pleasure instead of pain? Yes indeed. Yet should I be indifferent to them in the face of living well? Certainly. When I have confused this natural order, I have inevitably found misery; when I have surrendered the lesser in service to the greater, I have inevitably found peace.
Once I perceive a tension between gratification and virtue, I am getting myself into trouble, failing to see how the circumstances of the body only become good through their participation with the dispositions in the soul. The greatest pleasures or the longest life will do me absolutely no good without understanding and love.
Am I worried about what other people will think of me, or what they might do to me? That is within their power, and not within mine. If I am making the right choice for my character, then I possess that precious mastery over myself, and the rest can fall as it may.
Whatever the context or the rules that are laid down, it is not necessary to play along with anyone else’s game. If I blindly follow the crowd, I am then no longer myself.
Epictetus offers a wonderful image here, of the one purple thread in the midst of all the bland threads. Some are content to passively blend in with their surroundings, to be absorbed by them, while others will rise up to stand out, never ashamed of their deepest convictions.
Helvidius Priscus, the feisty Stoic and supporter of the values of the Republic, could smile in the face of Emperor Vespasian’s bullying, because he knew about how and why his life mattered. The prospect of exile or execution didn’t trouble him too much, being more concerned with acting out of integrity and justice.
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