Page:Encheiridion of Epictetus - Rolleston 1881.pdf/13

PREFACE. many years. It is said that Epaphroditus treated him with much cruelty, and on one occasion even broke his leg, perhaps to see whether his philosophic slave was making satisfactory progress in Stoicism under C. Musonius Rufus. But this story rests on no good authority, and is probably a mere legend which grew up to account for the undoubted fact that Epictetus was in some way crippled or deformed. Simplicius tells us he was so from an early age. He never married; it is said, however, that he adopted and brought up a child whom a friend of his, led by a sense of the inconvenience of a large family, was about to expose: a practice not condemned in those days. The date of his death we cannot determine, but there is reason to believe that he lived to a venerable age.

Such is about all we know of the history of Epictetus. And it is much to be regretted that we have no fuller means of realising to ourselves somewhat of his outward life, ap- pearance,