Page:Discourses of Epictetus.djvu/469



As he who is in health would not choose to be served (ministered to) by the sick, nor for those who dwell with him to be sick, so neither would a free man endure to be served by slaves, or for those who live with him to be slaves.

Whoever you are who wish to be not among the number of slaves, release yourself from slavery: and you will be free, if you are released from desire. For neither Aristides nor Epaminondas nor Lycurgus through being rich and served by slaves were named the one just, the other a god, and the third a saviour, but because they were poor and delivered Hellas (Greece) from slavery.

If you wish your house to be well managed, imitate the Spartan Lycurgus. For as he did not fence his city with walls, but fortified the inhabitants by virtue and preserved the city always free; so do you not cast around (your house) a large court and raise high towers, but strengthen the dwellers by good will and fidelity and friendship, and then nothing harmful will enter it, not even if the whole band of wickedness shall array itself against it.

Do not hang your house round with tablets and pictures, but decorate it with moderation : for the one is of a foreign (unsuitable) kind, and a temporary deception of the eyes; but the other is a natural and indelible, and perpetual ornament of the house.