Page:All the works of Epictetus - which are now extant; consisting of his Discourses, preserved by Arrian, in four books, the Enchiridion, and fragments (IA allworksofepicte00epic).pdf/376

RV 324 (Chap. 1.) of free Parents? Or was it because they were descended from Slaves, that all the Athenians, and all the Lacedemonians, and Corinthians, could not converse with them as they pleased; but feared and paid Court to them? Why then is it in your Power, Diogenes? "Because I do not esteem this sorry Body as my own. Because I want nothing. Because these [Principles,] and nothing else, are a Law to me." These were the Things that suffered him to be free.

§ 18. And that you may not think, that I show you the Example of a Man clear of Incumbrances; without a Wife or Children, or Country or Friends, or Relations, to bend and draw him aside: take Socrates, and consider him, who had a Wife and Children, but not as his own; a Country, Friends, Relations; but only as long as it was proper, and in the manner that was proper; and all these he submitted to the Law, and to the Obedience due to it. Hence, when it was proper to fight, he was the first to go out, and exposed himself to Danger, without the least Reserve. But when he was sent by the Thirty Tyrants to apprehend Leo ; because he esteemed it a base Action, he did not deliberate about it; though he knew, that, perhaps, he might die for it. But what did that signify to him? For it was something else that he wanted to preserve, not his paultry Flesh: but his Fidelity, his Honour, free from Attack, or Subjection. And afterwards, when he was to make a Defence for his Life, doth he behave like one who had Children? Or a Wife? No: