Epictetus, Discourses 2.3.1

Chapter 3: To those who commend persons to philosophers. 
 
That is a good answer of Diogenes to one who asked him for letters of introduction: “You are a man, and that his eyes will tell him; but whether you are good or bad he will discover, if he has skill to distinguish the good from the bad; and if he has not that skill, he will never discover it, though I should write him ten thousand letters.” 
 
A drachma might just as well ask to be introduced to someone in order to be tested. If the man is a judge of silver, you will introduce yourself. 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.3 
 
I recall how my application to a fancy high school already required letters of recommendation, and my poor middle school teachers had no idea about what they were supposed to write. 
 
The fine old nun who taught me algebra suggested that the admissions committee simply sit down and have a lengthy chat with me instead, since no number of formal introductions could ever provide proof of either intelligence or character. 
 
When I later found myself in the stuffy world of academia, it was as if recommendation letters were a form of currency, even as it seemed that very few people actually read them. To possess those pieces of paper, however, was enough to win admiration, though we weren’t always proud of the price we had to pay to acquire them. 
 
I have now both read and written hundreds of such letters, and I can honestly say that not a single one was able to capture the true spirit of a man, and quite often managed to be little more than a diversion from coming to appreciate his true inner merits, or was even a clever means of covering up his darkest sins.
 
Am I expected to somehow trust you implicitly, just because I have heard your name before? Are you expected to merely take my word for it, when you know full well that I am always “professionally” required to write about the candidate in glowing colors? Have we no shame? 
 
You may rightly ask how you are then supposed to learn anything about him, and I can only suggest, with Diogenes and Epictetus, as well as with Sister Judy at my middle school, that you form your own judgments, based upon your own observations, and guided by your own first principles. 
 
This will certainly take far more time, but there can be no quick answers when it comes to something as critical as virtue and vice. 
 
If I don’t already grasp a proper measure of human merit, and have the willingness to look carefully, critically, and charitably, that letter is only good for wrapping cheese or fish. I do not worry about what name is on the letterhead, for the love of status is in conflict with a love of the true, the good, and the beautiful. 
 
It is much the same in all walks of life: the banker can weed out counterfeit currency, the publican recognizes a good ale, and the honest cop will smell the crook from a mile away. It isn’t magic, and there are no hidden secrets. 
 
Join together a watchful eye for detail with a sound awareness of human nature, and then you will be able, slowly but surely, to distinguish the sinner from the saint. 
 
No letters of introduction are necessary, as every man already speaks for himself through his own words and deeds. 

—Reflection written in 6/2001 

The Paris Dance of Death 3

Guyot Marchant, The Paris Dance of Death: The Cardinal and the King (1485) 

The Paris Dance of Death 2

Guyot Marchant, The Paris Dance of Death: The Pope and the Emperor (1485) 

The Paris Dance of Death 1

Guyot Marchant, The Paris Dance of Death: The Musicians (1485) 

The oldest known Dance of Death series, these were originally paintings, completed in 1425, on the walls of St. Innocent's Cemetery in Paris. 

The walls were destroyed to widen a road in 1669, but Guyot Marchant copied these woodcuts in 1485. 

Ellis Walker, Epictetus in Poetical Paraphrase 43

XLIII. 

Avoid th' engagement of an oath, or swear,

As seldom as you can, at least forbear

To bind yourself to what you cannot do,
And only swear to that which lies in you:
For 'tis a wicked, blasphemous offence,
To call the gods to each impertinence;
To make them knights o'th'post, to testify
That to be truth, you know to be a lye. 

Sayings of Publilius Syrus 122

To refuse when extreme necessity prays, is to condemn to death. 

Epictetus, Discourses 2.2.5

On this principle it is ridiculous to say, “Give me advice.” What advice am I to give you? 
 
Say rather, “Enable my mind to adapt itself to the issue, whatever it may be,” for the other phrase is as though a man unskilled in writing should say, “Tell me what to write, when a name is set me to write.” 
 
For if I say “Dion,” and then yonder fellow comes forward and sets him the name not of Dion but of Theon, what is to happen? What is he to write? If you have practiced writing, you can prepare yourself for anything that is dictated to you. But if you have not practiced, what is the good of my making a suggestion? 
 
For if circumstances suggest something different, what will you say or what will you do? Remember then this general principle, and you will need no special suggestion. 
 
But if you fix your gaze on outward things, you must needs be tossed up and down, at the will of your master. And who is your master? He who has authority over any of those things on which you set your heart or which you will to avoid. 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.2 
 
In moments of extreme distress, I have sometimes begged and pleaded for advice, desperate to just be told exactly what I ought to do, and yet I inevitably find that being provided with even the most subtle and detailed plans will not rid me of my problems. 
 
In hindsight, it seems rather silly of me to farm out my judgment to others, to think that I can somehow fix myself without being the one who is doing the actual work. 
 
I should listen and learn from those who are better and wiser, but it will all come to nothing if I do not choose to understand on my own terms. What I ought to do is meaningless without also knowing why I ought to do it, and I can’t take some shortcut to happiness by trying to skip over the necessary condition of self-mastery. 
 
A man is not learning to write, or to think, if he is simply copying out what has already been placed in front of him. Corporate educators, please take heed! 
 
I regularly find my students, at least the ones who remain genuinely curious, asking questions that are limited to particular instances, with very little attention to any universal standards of right or wrong. Should they eat meat? Is this career better than that? Which is the best political party? Are dogs more suitable as companions than cats? I feel as if I’ve heard them all. 
 
I certainly do not wish to discourage them, though I am increasingly hesitant to say anything at all, first because it isn’t my place to dictate any answers, and second because they finally need to start reasoning for themselves. 
 
This is especially true in a soundbite society, where attention spans have grown disturbingly shorter. How might I redirect the question from the jumble of changing circumstances, which are beyond their power to determine, to a focus on the underlying principles, which are within their power to comprehend? 
 
So, at the risk of confusing them further, I ask them to examine the terms they are using, until they perhaps arrive at a moment when they cannot escape focusing on the true and good within their very natures. 
 
“So do you think either a dog or a cat could better help you to become a better person?”
 
“Wait, what does it even mean for me to be a better person?” 
 
Excellent! Now we’re getting somewhere! Pretty soon, they will have figured out that it was never really about the dogs and the cats to begin with. 
 
The peace of mind we all seek comes from establishing the right rules on the inside, and then everything on the outside will fall into place. 

—Reflection written in 6/2001 

William Hogarth, A Rake's Progress 2

Tom is now "holding court" in the morning, surrounded by a variety of spongers, supplicants, and tradesmen. The times have hardly changed that much, since so many people today will still define their value in society in precisely the same way, The more we are seen, and the more we are admired and pursued, the more we think we have "arrived" as people of worth. 

I once briefly had the unpleasant job of being the personal assistant to a self-important administrator, and I would watch as he made his way through his string of appointments, complaining all the time what a great burden it was to deal with the petitioners, even as it was crystal clear how much he enjoyed the attention. He would strut about, grinning from ear to ear, all the while referring to his work as a "service" to the community. 

I am told that the entourage here includes a composer at the harpsichord, perhaps meant to be Handel, a dancing master with his violin, instructors in fencing and the quarterstaff, a garden designer, a burly bodyguard, a fox-hunting bugler, and a jockey, complete with trophy, who has raced Tom's horse. Further in the background are a wig maker, a hat maker, and a poet. 

My eyes always go to the French dancing master in the center, with his effete pose, who reminds me of a flamboyant Rector I knew years ago. Each day was a new opportunity for him to put on a show. 

The painting in the middle represents the Judgment of Paris, that fateful moment when a choice made out of desire led to the downfall of so many. On both sides are picture of roosters, which my old professor said stood for the practice of cockfighting, a favorite pastime for spoiled men. 

Look how good Tom has it! Doesn't he? 

William Hogarth, A Rake's Progress II: The Levée (1734) 

Maxims of Goethe 20

Character calls forth character. 

IMAGE: Salvator Rosa, The Death of Socrates (c. 1650) 

Epictetus, Discourses 2.2.4

For what think you? If Socrates had wished to keep his outward possessions, would he have come forward and said, “Anytus and Meletus have power to kill me, but not to harm me?” 
 
Was he so foolish as not to see that this road leads not to that end, but elsewhere? Why is it then, that he renders no account to his judges, and adds a word of provocation? 
 
Just as my friend Heraclitus, when he had an action in Rhodes concerning a plot of land and had pointed out to the judges that his arguments were just, when he came to his peroration said, “I will not supplicate you, nor do I regard the judgement you will give; it is you who are on your trial rather than I”, and so he made an end of the business. 
 
You need not speak like that, only do not supplicate. Do not add the words, “I do not supplicate,” unless, as happened to Socrates, the right time has come deliberately to provoke your judges. 
 
If, indeed, you are preparing a peroration of this sort, why do you appear in court? Why do you answer the summons? If you wish to be crucified, wait and the cross will come: but if reason requires that you should answer the summons and do your best to persuade the judge, you must act in accordance with this, but always keeping true to yourself. 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.2 
 
While I have always been notably eccentric, my increasing commitment to the practice of Stoicism has made me appear more and more insane to the “normal” crowd. I speak here of normality in the sense of popular convention, and not of conforming to the measure of Nature, even as I find that my entire life has become a gradual shift from settling for the former to seeking out the latter. I think it no accident that some of the oddest of people are quite often also the very best of people.
 
Just the other day, a fellow at a Twelve Step meeting I help to run charged at me in a moment of rage, and though I was carrying a hefty shillelagh I sometimes use to help with my gimpy leg, I found myself, without any deliberate thought, tossing it aside, closing my eyes, and waiting for him to do his worst. Such a reaction would never have occurred to me ten years ago, but now it is almost instinctive.
 
He stopped dead in his tracks, glared at me for a moment, and then shuffled out of the room, without uttering another word. Everyone else was rather confused. A friend of mine looked at me with a grin, and shook his head as he exaclaimed, “You are one crazy bastard!” 
 
Thank you. I suppose I am. 
 
Socrates must have seemed deranged as well, when he not only refused to beg and plead for his life, but when he went even further by turning the tables on his accusers: “You’re out of order!” Because I am still so prone to resentment, I can’t yet manage to call out the bullies without losing my head, but I can now at least stand my ground with a shred of dignity. I am a novice, not a sage. 
 
It is most fruitful to rely upon the truth, plain and simple, not to launch into some elaborate display of sentimentality. At the very best, it remains strained and superficial, and at the very worst, it is an outright deception. The sophists, in their various guises, will thrive on such exploitation, though the philosophers will gladly stay clear. 
 
Like many young people who first stumble across philosophy, I’m afraid I did try to imitate Socrates’ incisive style, and yet I was failing to see that the presence of such eloquence is merely optional, while a complete dedication to character, however unassuming, is the mark of the gentleman or the lady, properly understood. Indeed, the fancy and fiery words will come across as just another form of bravado if not firmly grounded in the virtues. 
 

We are free to retain our preferences or quirks, and different circumstances will call for different replies, but in the end, I must be at peace with my own conscience. 

—Reflection written in 6/2001 

Fish Vignette

M.C. Escher, Fish Vignette (1954) 

Delphic Maxims 31

Κακίας ἀπέχου 

Shun evil 

IMAGE: Duccio di Buoninsegna, Temptation on the Mount (c. 1311) 

James Vila Blake, Sonnets from Marcus Aurelius 9

9.  

Ἄλλος ἁμαρτάνει τι εἰς ἐμέ; ὄψεται: ἰδίαν ἔχει διάθεσιν, ἰδίαν ἐνέργειαν. ἐγὼ νῦν ἔχω, ὅ με θέλει νῦν ἔχειν ἡ κοινὴ φύσις, καὶ πράσσω, ὅ με νῦν πράσσειν θέλει ἡ ἐμὴ φύσις.

Some man or other does me some wrong. He shall look to that himself. For his disposition is his own, and his action in accord therewith is his own. As for me, what universal Nature now purposes me to possess, that now I possess, and I do what my own nature requires of me.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 5.25  

9. 

Halt! To the right about! Away with you, enemies! 

Nay, rather—second thoughts are best—here stay! 

Come on and do your worst, and cry what shame it is

Fellows like me cumber the earth a day! 

Take counsel now, be warlike as you will, 

Brush up your pandoors’ whiskers, your hussars 

Clap on their helmets, spit your leaden pill, 

Bare your sabres and hack your sanguine scars, 

Your venoms ply, your wily slanders wake, 

Your stabbing points of lies polish the more! 

Ye can not get you where I live, nor make 

My ruling faculty worse than before. 

Forsooth ye make a very pretty foe, 

That can not hurt me and soon prove it so. 

IMAGE: Edouard Detaille, Vive l'Empereur! (1891) 

Sayings of Ramakrishna 219

When a storm blows, it is impossible to distinguish an Asvattha (pippal) and a Vata (banian) tree. 

So when the storm of true knowledge (the knowledge of one universal existence) blows, there can be no distinction of caste. 

Epictetus, Discourses 2.2.3

But if you wish to keep what is outside you as well—your paltry body, and goods, and reputation—I advise you to begin this moment to make all possible preparation, and further to study the character of your judge and your opponent. 
 
If you must clasp his knees, clasp them; if you must weep, then weep; if you must lament, then lament. For when once you allow outward things to dominate what is your own, you had better become a slave and have done with it. 
 
Don't be drawn this way and that, wishing to be a slave one moment and free another, but be this or that simply and with all your mind, free or slave, philosopher or unenlightened, a fighting cock of spirit, or one of no spirit; either bear stroke after stroke patiently until you die, or give way at once. Let it not be your lot to suffer many blows and then give way in the end.
 
If such conduct is shameful, get your own mind clear at once: “Where is the nature of good and evil to be found? Where truth is. Where truth and nature are, there is caution; where truth and nature are, there is confidence." 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.2 
 
There are so many folksy sayings about the perils of equivocating, precisely because it is a matter of such common sense that only those with their heads in the clouds, to put it politely, believe they can have their cake and eat it too. Cook or get out of the kitchen. Stop sitting on the fence. Get off the pot. Fish or cut bait. Feed the goat or keep the cabbage. If you chase two rabbits, you’ll catch neither. 
 
Perhaps it is just a reflection of my solemn disposition, but I always remember, with appropriate fear and trembling, this version from the Scriptures: “So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew you out of my mouth.” 
 
If I know it to be true, I should commit to it. If I judge it to be good, I should act upon it. If I perceive it to be beautiful, I should cling to it. And with all of my might! What’s with the half measures? 
 
If I don’t yet comprehend, now is the time to find out. If I am hesitant to decide, this is the moment to take a stand. If my senses are confused, let me get my bearings. Otherwise, I am doing nothing less than brushing aside my human calling. 
 
Do I truly wish to pledge myself to a life of wealth, honor, and pleasure? Then my dedication ought to be absolute, if it is indeed the best thing to do. Now I must expect to calculate the odds, to estimate others by their utility, to learn the art of manipulation. There will need to be flattery, and crocodile tears, and gratitude that is probably not so heartfelt. I will be placing my own fate in the hands of circumstances. 
 
But if I don’t want to make myself a slave to fortune, it remains within my power to go in a completely different direction. Yet I don’t have the time to dawdle—only today is assured, perhaps only this very hour. 
 
I do not need to assume some “tough guy” attitude, or retreat into a cold disregard for the world. To possess my own mind and my own will is enough for me to understand and to love. 

—Reflection written in 6/2001 

Stoic Snippets 207

Termination of activity, cessation from movement and opinion, and in a sense their death, is no evil. 

Turn your thoughts now to the consideration of your life, your life as a child, as a youth, your manhood, your old age, for in these also every change was a death. Is this anything to fear? 

Turn your thoughts now to your life under your grandfather, then to your life under your mother, then to your life under your father; and as you find many other differences and changes and terminations, ask yourself, is this anything to fear? 

In like manner, then, neither are the termination and cessation and change of your whole life a thing to be afraid of. 

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 9.21 

IMAGE: Titian, The Three Ages of Man (c. 1514) 

Plutarch, The Life of Cato the Younger 11

While Cato was still in military service, his brother, who was on his way to Asia, fell sick at Aenus in Thrace, and a letter came at once to Cato advising him of this. 

A heavy storm was raging at sea and no ship of sufficient size was at hand, but nevertheless, taking only two friends and three servants with him in a small trading-vessel, he put to sea from Thessalonica. 

He narrowly escaped drowning, and by some unaccountable good fortune came safe to land, but Caepio had just died. 

In bearing this affliction Cato was thought to have shown more passion than philosophy, considering not only his lamentations, his embracings of the dead, and the heaviness of his grief, but also his expenditure upon the burial, and the pains that he took to have incense and costly raiment burned with the body, and a monument of polished Thasian marble costing eight talents constructed in the market-place of Aenus. 

For some people cavilled at these things as inconsistent with Cato's usual freedom from ostentation, not observing how much tenderness and affection was mingled with the man's inflexibility and firmness against pleasures, fears, and shameless entreaties. 

For the funeral rites, moreover, both cities and dynasts sent him many things for the honor of the dead, from none of whom would he accept money; he did, however, take incense and ornaments, and paid the value of them to the senders. 

Furthermore, when the inheritance fell to him and Caepio's young daughter, nothing that he had expended for the funeral was asked back by him in the distribution of the property. 

And although such was his conduct then and afterwards, there was one​ who wrote that he passed the ashes of the dead through a sieve, in search of the gold that had been melted down. So confidently did the writer attribute, not only to his sword, but also to his pen, freedom from accountability and punishment. 

Dhammapada 328-330

If a man find a prudent companion who walks with him, is wise, and lives soberly, he may walk with him, overcoming all dangers, happy, but considerate. 

If a man find no prudent companion who walks with him, is wise, and lives soberly, let him walk alone, like a king who has left his conquered country behind—like an elephant in the forest. 

It is better to live alone, there is no companionship with a fool; let a man walk alone, let him commit no sin, with few wishes—like an elephant in the forest. 

Epictetus, Discourses 2.2.2

That is why Socrates, in reply to one who reminded him to make ready for the court, said: “Do you not think my whole life is a preparation for this?” 

What kind of preparation?

“I have maintained,” said he, “what is my own.” 

What do you mean?

“I never did an unjust act in my private or in my public life." 

—from Epictetus, Discourses 2.2 

There seems to be an unwritten rule, in both academia and in popular culture, that Socrates is owed some sort of vague reverence. We speak in hushed tones about the importance of “knowing ourselves” and the danger of “unexamined lives”, in much the same way that words like “freedom” and “democracy” are absolutely sacred in politics, though rarely will you find someone who dares to look beyond the shallow platitudes. 
 
After all, to actually live the way Socrates asked us to live, to follow through on his teachings about virtue as the greatest human good, would fly in the face of how we reduce people to being means for profit and pleasure. In a society where production and consumption are the measures, Socrates can only be unmasked as an enemy of the state. 

And so, I choose to stop playing along with the hypocrisy, and I am no longer afraid to follow Socrates unreservedly. I think of him as the grandfather of Stoicism in particular, and as a guide for all decent people in general, those who are not afraid to put character first. I should be honest about where my loyalties lie, without any interest in trying to have it both ways. 

A passage like the one above, which I believe is originally from Xenophon, immediately shows how radical a Socratic attitude has to be. I waste so much of my time worrying about how I am going to impress this man, or how I am going to pay for that convenience, but if I have my head on straight, such concerns will appear trivial in contrast to the nurturing of the soul. 

Why could Socrates be so carefree before his trial? Because he understood he had done nothing wrong, and that no one else could do any harm to his dignity. How did he know this? Because his whole life had been committed to mastering himself, without attempting to be a master over anyone else. 

As Plato later had Socrates say, in the Republic: justice is basically learning to mind your own business. If I attend to what is properly mine, the formation of my own inner excellence, I do not need to prepare some elaborate show in order to make my case. My words and deeds are already my witnesses. 

Is Socrates being cocky when he says he has wronged no one? It would only be arrogant if it weren’t true. I am sure Socrates made his mistakes, and yet there is no reason a man can’t be absolutely at peace with his conscience, for he is the only one who decides if he will act for right or for wrong. 

—Reflection written in 6/2001 

IMAGE: Louis Joseph Lebrun, Socrates' Address (1867) 

The Philosopher

I know that look so very well, the moment of transformative insight, the unfolding of awareness, upon which the value of everything else in life then depends. 

Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The Philosopher (1764)