fight of athletes; and will you not choose to see the combat between a
fever and a man?" Would such a man accuse God who sent him down as
if God were treating him unworthily, a man who gloried in his
circumstances, and claimed to be an example to those who were
passing by? For what shall he accuse him of? because he maintains a
decency of behavior, because he displays his virtue more
conspicuously? Well, and what does he say of poverty, about death,
about pain? How did he compare his own happiness with that of the
Great King? or rather he thought that there was no comparison
between them. For where there are perturbations, and griefs, and
fears, and desires not satisfied, and aversions of things which you
cannot avoid, and envies and jealousies, how is there a road to
happiness there? But where there are corrupt principles, there these
things must of necessity be.
When the young man asked, if when a Cynic is sick, and a friend asks
him to come to his house and be taken care of in his sickness, shall
the Cynic accept the invitation, he replied: And where shall you find,
I ask, a Cynic's friend? For the man who invites ought to be such
another as the that he may be worthy of being reckoned the Cynic's
friend. He ought to be a partner in the Cynic's sceptre and his
royalty, and a worthy minister, if he intends to be considered
worthy of a Cynic's friendship, as Diogenes was a friend of
Antisthenes, as Crates was a friend of Diogenes. Do you think that, if
a man comes to a Cynic and salutes him, he is the Cynic's friend,
and that the Cynic will think him worthy of receiving a Cynic into his
house? So that, if you please, reflect on this also: rather look round
for some convenient dunghill on which you shall bear your fever and
which will shelter you from the north wind that you may not be
chilled. But you seem to me to wish to go into some man's house and to
be well fed there for a time. Why then do you think of attempting so
great a thing?
"But," said the young man, "shall marriage and the procreation of
children as a chief duty be undertaken by the Cynic?" If you grant
me a community of wise men, Epictetus replies, perhaps no man will
readily apply himself to the Cynic practice. For on whose account
should he undertake this manner of life? However if we suppose that he
does, nothing will prevent him from marrying and begetting children;
for his wife will be another like himself, and his father-in-law
another like himself, and his children will be brought up like
himself. But in the present state of things which is like that of an
army placed in battle order, is it not fit that the Cynic should
without any distraction be employed only on the administration of God,
able to go about among men, not tied down to the common duties of
mankind, nor entangled in the ordinary relations of life, which if
he neglects, he will not maintain the character of an honourable and
good man? and if he observes them he will lose the character of the
messenger, and spy and herald of God. For consider that it is his duty
to do something toward his father-in-law, something to the other
kinsfolk of his wife, something to his wife also. He is also
excluded by being a Cynic from looking after the sickness of his own