Plain
Epictetus — The Slave

Listen, your job was to learn how to handle life's events naturally. To want things without being crushed when you don't get them. To avoid things without panicking when they happen anyway. To never feel completely helpless or completely unlucky. To be free, unblocked, and unforced. To align yourself with how Zeus runs the universe. To obey that order and be satisfied with it. To blame no one and find fault with no one. To be able to say from your heart: 'Lead me, Zeus, and you too, Destiny.'

Discourses, On the Power of Speaking 196 of 388
Freedom & Control Calm Your Mind
Epictetus — The Slave Original

Man, your purpose (business) was to make yourself capable of using conformably to nature the appearances presented to you, in your desires not to be frustrated, in your aversion from things not to fall into that which you would avoid, never to have no luck (as one may say), nor ever to have bad luck, to be free, not hindered, not compelled, conforming yourself to the administration of Zeus, obeying it, well satisfied with this, blaming no one, charging no one with fault, able from your whole soul to utter these verses: Lead me, O Zeus, and thou too Destiny.

Discourses, On the Power of Speaking 196 of 388
Epictetus — The Slave

The same thing happens with philosophy. You come here to learn how to think clearly and fix your judgment. You need to purify your will and correct how you see things. Teaching requires a certain style of speaking — variety and sharpness to make points clear. But some people get captivated by these tools instead of the goal. One person falls in love with clever expressions. Another gets obsessed with logical arguments. Another gets trapped by tricky reasoning. Another gets stuck in some other roadside attraction. They stay there and waste away like sailors enchanted by sirens.

Discourses, On the Power of Speaking 195 of 388
Knowing Yourself What Matters Most
Epictetus — The Slave Original

Something of the kind takes place in the matter which we are considering. Since by the aid of speech and such communication as you receive here you must advance to perfection, and purge your will and correct the faculty which makes use of the appearances of things; and since it is necessary also for the teaching (delivery) of theorems to be effected by a certain mode of expression and with a certain variety and sharpness, some persons captivated by these very things abide in them, one captivated by the expression, another by syllogisms, another again by sophisms, and still another by some other inn ([Greek: paudocheiou]) of the kind; and there they stay and waste away as they were among sirens.

Discourses, On the Power of Speaking 195 of 388
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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