What command should I give you? Has not Zeus laid commands upon you? Has He not given you what is yours, free from hindrance and constraint, and what is not yours subject to hindrance and constraint?
What command then have you brought with you into the world, and what manner of ordinance? Guard what is your own by all means, grasp not at the things of others. Your good faith is your own. . . .
Who can take these qualities from you? Who shall hinder you from using them but yourself? And how will you do so? When you take no interest in what is your own, you lose it and it ceases to be yours.
One part of an eagerness to move on is the desire to jump ahead to the answers without pondering the questions. I usually associate this with a distinctly modern longing for instant gratification, but then a writer like Epictetus reminds me how both the strengths and the weaknesses of human nature are remarkably constant. Why should I have to put in the effort when someone else can provide the solution ready-made?
It can’t be ready-made at all, of course, because the very meaning of the conclusion only makes sense within the context of figuring out the proof for myself. Do you remember how annoyed you were when a math teacher demanded that you show your work? It turns out he was onto something important, and it applies to far more than just problems with numbers.
And so the student naively thinks he can pressure the master into providing a set of rules, and then mechanically following said rules will somehow bring enlightenment and happiness. Yet understanding is something I can only do for myself, and it cannot be done for me, just as living well is something I must freely choose on my own terms, and another is powerless to manage my decisions.
If I take the time to reflect, I will see that I do not need to look to the outside for a model of living, since I already contain the instructions on the inside. They are not written down with any words, though they are most certainly written into my nature, which is itself an expression of the Providence that rules over the whole of Nature.
Beyond the sensitive powers I share in common with other animals, I further possess a mind and a will, undeniably present in every act of my experience, and serving as the ultimate arbiters of all my actions. These truths are self-evident to me, on account of such functions being inseparable from my conscious identity, and not merely because some “expert” has dictated them to me.
Yes, God, by whatever name you wish to address Him, has granted me these capacities, through the exercise of which I am able to become myself most fully, to grow into who I was intended to be. By my knowledge, I am made to comprehend the forms of things, and by my choice I am made to love their purpose.
There need be no rocket science here, no impenetrable secrets. When I strip away the dirt, the years of accumulated diversions, I will find that this is who I am, as my very essence. This is what Zeus has commanded me to do, a privilege I should feel honored to receive.
That my free judgments are at one with my being is further indicated by the fact that they are mine to determine as long as I still live. Where I am content to rule myself, I will be at peace with myself; where I lay claim to what is under the authority of another, I bring myself nothing but conflict and grief. It’s funny how beautifully Zeus worked this out for all of us. . . .
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