The Works of Epictetus: Discourses, Enchiridion, and Fragments

But only four of the original eight books remain. The date of Epictetus's death is entirely unknown.

Marcus Aurelius ranked this philosopher with Socrates, and Origen thought that his writings had done more good than those of Plato. In modern times, Niebuhr has said of him, "Epictetus's greatness cannot be questioned, and it is impossible for any person of sound mind not to be charmed by his works." I am acquainted with no book more replete with high conceptions of the Deity and noble aims for man; nor do I know any in which the inevitable laws of retribution are more grandly stated, with less of merely childish bribery or threatening. It is pathetic to see good Mrs. Carter Elizabeth Carter, a renowned 18th-century translator of Epictetus. apologizing for this elevation of thought as if it were a weakness, and to find Merivale Charles Merivale, a 19th-century historian. censuring it as "a low and popular view" to represent vice as its own punishment and virtue as its own reward. It is not, however, my object to vindicate these plain principles, but to let them speak for themselves, with as much as possible of their original clearness.