Philosophy as a way of life

Concrete philosophical praxis requires that we always bear in mind the Stoics' fundamental dogmas. These dogmas were intended to constitute the basis for our rectitude of judgment, our attitude toward the cosmos, and the conduct we should adopt towards our fellow citizens within the city. Philosophy as it was lived and experienced thus implied continuous exercises of meditation and constant vigilance, in order to keep alive in one's mind the principles taught by theoretical discourse.

If we want to understand why Epictetus attaches so much importance to what he terms "the three areas of exercises," we shall have to bear in mind this distinction between theoretical philosophical discourse and concrete philosophy as it is lived and experienced. In the Discourses as reported by Arrian, these three areas are presented with such systematic rigor that we are justified in suspecting that this doctrine had an important role to play in Epictetus' theoretical teaching.

Epictetus bases his doctrine on the traditional Stoic distinction between things which depend on us and things which do not: "What depends on us is value-judgments, inclinations to act, desires, aversions, and, in a word, everything that is our doing. What does not depend on us is the body, wealth, glory, high political positions, and, in a word, everything that is not our own doing." 78 What depends u1,on us is t he nets of our own soul, hcc11u11c we 11rc

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able freely to choose them. What does not depend on us is those things that depend on the general course of nature and of fate. Among the acts of the soul which do depend on us, some correspond to the area of judgment and assent, others to the area of desire, and, finally, still others correspond to the area of inclinations to action.

For Epictetus, then, it is these three areas, acts of the soul, or aspects of

"that which depends on us" which define the three forms of philosophical exercises. By comparing the relevant passages in Epictetus' Discourses,19 we can present the theory of the three forms or areas of philosophical exercises as follows.

The first area is that of desire and aversion. People are unhappy because they desire things they may either lose or fail to obtain, and because they try to avoid misfortunes which are often inevitable. This happens because such desiderata as wealth and health, for example, do not depend on us. The discipline of desire consequently consists in accustoming ourselves to the gradual renunciation of such desires and aversions, so that, in the end, we shall desire only that which does depend on us - moral virtue - and shall also avoid only that which depends on us - moral evil. We are to regard everything which does not depend on us as indifferent; that is to say, we must not make any difference between such things. Rather, we must accept them all, willed as they are by universal nature. The discipline of desire concerns the passions or emotions ( pathe) which we feel as a result of what happens to us.

The second area of exercises is that of motivating inclinations, or action.

For Epictetus, this area is related first and foremost to human relationships within the city. It corresponds to what the Stoics traditionally called "the duties" (ta kathekonta): those actions which are appropriate to the inclinations of our nature. Duties are actions - they thus fall under the category of things which depend on us - bearing upon objects which do not depend on us - such as other people, politics, health, art, etc. As we have seen, such objects ought to be matters of indifference; yet, by dint of a reasonable justification, they can be considered as corresponding to that deeply-embedded instinct which impels rational human nature to act for its own conservation. Duties are thus actions "appropriate" to our rational nature, and they consist in placing ourselves in the service of the human community, in the form of the city/state and of the family.

The third area of exercises is that of assent (sunkatathesis). Epictetus urges us to criticize each representation ( phantasia) as it presents itself to us, and give our assent only to that which is "objective." In other words, we are to set aside all subjective value-judgments. Epictetus formulates the principle guiding this exercise as follows: "People are not troubled by things, but by their j udgements abo111 things. " 80

For Epk-u:tu11, these three areas (topoi) of exercise correspond to the t hree 1111pcL'IN 1 11' 11hil111111phy as it is lived and experienced , as opposed to

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