May 19– "The Golden Sayings of Epictetus" translated and arranged by Hastings Crossley

 Some of these quotes might even be in here!

May 19– The Golden Sayings of Epictetus translated and arranged by Hastings Crossley

Summary:

Commentary: This is kind of an odd text for T5FSOB. Elliot traditionally did his best to include complete, original works (which is why we occasionally don't get an author's most famous work, but a shorter but "lesser" one instead). The Golden Sayings of Epictetuts is just a questionably translated collection of quotes from Epictetus's philosophy, as collated by Crossley. Even the original text was apparently collected and written by one of Epictetus's students, not by him originally.

Not knowing the original texts, this looks very heavily Christianized, to the point of being largely useless. They're also extremely wordy, to a degree that seems put upon. The formatting is also weird. Sometimes a story will be broken into multiple small chunks, while others ramble on for half a page. There doesn't seem to be any clear logic to the arrangement.

All that said, I did enjoy a couple of them:

Above all, remember that the door stands open. Be not more fearful than children; but as they, when they weary of the game, cry, “I will play no more,” even so, when thou art in the like case, cry, “I will play no more” and depart. But if thou stayest, make no lamentation.

 As an adult, I think being willing to get up and say, "this isn't for me," rather than throw a tantrum (or go whine about in on your Twitter later) is really undervalued. Obviously, we sometimes have to put up with things, but being able to remove yourself from a situation is a mature and valid reaction.

Wouldst thou have men speak good of thee? speak good of them. And when thou hast learned to speak good of them, try to do good unto them, and thus thou wilt reap in return their speaking good of thee.

In which Epictetus (and Crossley) channel Ben Franklin