Chapter 2: On peace of mind.
Consider, you who are going into court, what you want to maintain and where you want to end: for if you want to maintain your freedom of will in its natural condition, you have all security and facility to do so, and your trouble is over.
If you wish to maintain authority over what is in your power and to keep it naturally free, and if you are content with this, what more need you attend to? For who is master of this, who can take it away from you?
If you wish to be a man of honor and trust, who will forbid you? If you wish not to be hindered or compelled, what man will compel you to will to get what is against your judgement, and to will to avoid things that you do not think proper to avoid?
What can he do then? He will cause you troubles which seem to you formidable: but how can he make you will to avoid what is done to you? As long, then, as you retain in your control the will to get and the will to avoid, you need attend to nothing else. This is your introduction, this your narrative, this your proof, this your victory, this your peroration, this your ground of boasting.
Consider, you who are going into court, what you want to maintain and where you want to end: for if you want to maintain your freedom of will in its natural condition, you have all security and facility to do so, and your trouble is over.
If you wish to maintain authority over what is in your power and to keep it naturally free, and if you are content with this, what more need you attend to? For who is master of this, who can take it away from you?
If you wish to be a man of honor and trust, who will forbid you? If you wish not to be hindered or compelled, what man will compel you to will to get what is against your judgement, and to will to avoid things that you do not think proper to avoid?
What can he do then? He will cause you troubles which seem to you formidable: but how can he make you will to avoid what is done to you? As long, then, as you retain in your control the will to get and the will to avoid, you need attend to nothing else. This is your introduction, this your narrative, this your proof, this your victory, this your peroration, this your ground of boasting.
—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.2
I try to avoid courtrooms and law offices whenever I can, not because I despise justice, but rather because I so revere her.
Carefully observe the usual proceedings in such places, and then try to tell me that they are populated with men who are trying to do what is right. No, they are largely filled with those who feel that they have been wronged, and they wish to impose yet another wrong in return. If they have suffered, someone else must suffer even more. The attention is on winning property and reputation, instead of inspiring propriety and reformation.
I need not despair, however, since I know that if the good and the evil in my life are not determined by the deeds of others, I will not have to fear their eagerness to do me harm. What is within their power to seize, and what remains within my power to retain? When my priorities are in order, the threats from the lawyer or the sentences of the judge no longer appear nearly as dreadful as they once did.
Can the prospect of poverty or prison break my will? Only if I permit it to do so.
Bullies of all sorts, who believe that making us feel smaller will somehow make them feel bigger, are always counting on us to lose our faith in our convictions. They become very angry when we stand up to them, for we have exposed how powerless they really are over our inner judgments.
I remain deeply ashamed of the number of times I compromised my conscience due to an outer threat, when I should have used each and every situation, however pleasant or painful, as an opportunity for acting with integrity. If I truly know it to be right, regardless of my preferences, I have nothing to fear.
Leave the love of lawsuits to those who are too keen on vengeance. The desire to intimidate, and the readiness to be intimidated, are both marks of weak soul.
I try to avoid courtrooms and law offices whenever I can, not because I despise justice, but rather because I so revere her.
Carefully observe the usual proceedings in such places, and then try to tell me that they are populated with men who are trying to do what is right. No, they are largely filled with those who feel that they have been wronged, and they wish to impose yet another wrong in return. If they have suffered, someone else must suffer even more. The attention is on winning property and reputation, instead of inspiring propriety and reformation.
I need not despair, however, since I know that if the good and the evil in my life are not determined by the deeds of others, I will not have to fear their eagerness to do me harm. What is within their power to seize, and what remains within my power to retain? When my priorities are in order, the threats from the lawyer or the sentences of the judge no longer appear nearly as dreadful as they once did.
Can the prospect of poverty or prison break my will? Only if I permit it to do so.
Bullies of all sorts, who believe that making us feel smaller will somehow make them feel bigger, are always counting on us to lose our faith in our convictions. They become very angry when we stand up to them, for we have exposed how powerless they really are over our inner judgments.
I remain deeply ashamed of the number of times I compromised my conscience due to an outer threat, when I should have used each and every situation, however pleasant or painful, as an opportunity for acting with integrity. If I truly know it to be right, regardless of my preferences, I have nothing to fear.
Leave the love of lawsuits to those who are too keen on vengeance. The desire to intimidate, and the readiness to be intimidated, are both marks of weak soul.
—Reflection written in 6/2001
IMAGE: Jean-Louis Forain, Trial Scene (1904)
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