confounded by the things of sense.

CXIV

How can it be that one who hath nothing, neither raimant,
nor house, nor home, nor bodily tendance, nor servant, nor city,
should yet live tranquil and contented? Behold God hath sent you
a man to show you in act and deed that it may be so. Behold me! I
have neither house nor possessions nor servants: the ground is my
couch; I have no wife, no children, no shelter--nothing but
earth and sky, and one poor cloak. And what lack I yet? am I not
untouched by sorrow, by fear? am I not free? . . . when have I
laid anything to the charge of God or Man? when have I accussed
any? hath any of you seen me with a sorrowful countenance? And in
what wise treat I those of whom you stand in fear and awe? Is it
not as slaves? Who when he seeth me doth not think that he
beholdeth his Master and his King?

CXV

Give thyself more diligently to reflection: know thyself:
take counsel with the Godhead: without God put thine hand unto
nothing!

CXVI

"But to marry and to rear offspring," said the young man,
"will the Cynic hold himself bound to undertake this as a chief
duty?"
Grant me a republic of wise men, answered Epictetus, and
perhaps none will lightly take the Cynic life upon him. For on
whose account should he embrace that method of life? Suppose
however that he does, there will then be nothing to hinder his
marrying and rearing offspring. For his wife will be even such
another as himself, and likewise her father; and in like manner
will his children be brought up.
But in the present condition of things, which resembles an
Army in battle array, ought not the Cynic to be free from all
distraction and given wholly to the service of God, so that he
can go in and out among men, neither fettered by the duties nor
entangled by the relations of common life? For if he transgress
them, he will forfeit the character of a good man and true;
whereas if he observe them, there is an end to him as the
Messenger, the Spy, the Herald of the Gods!
CXVII

Ask me if you choose if a Cynic shall engage in the
administration of the State. O fool, seek you a nobler
administration that that in which he is engaged? Ask you if a man
shall come forward in the Athenian assembly and talk about