Epictetus — "You may fetter my leg, but Zeus himself cannot get the better of my free will."
You may fetter my leg, but Zeus himself cannot get the better of my free will.
Get This Quote & Author's Image Illustrated On:
Click any product to generate a realistic preview. Up to 3 at a time.
* Initial load can take up to 90 seconds — revising the preview in another color is nearly instant.
Kitchen
Apparel
Other
More from Epictetus
"To a reasonable creature, that alone is insupportable which is unreasonable; but everything reasonable may be supported."
"Good and evil, per Epictetus, lie only in the will."
"Don't be surprised if those outside are always talking against you and making jokes about you."
"Protect what belongs to you at all costs; don't desire what belongs to another."
"When you are going to meet with any person, and particularly one of those who are considered to be in a superior condition, represent to yourself what Socrates or Zeno would have done in such circumst…"
About Epictetus (c. 50-135 CE)
Greek Stoic philosopher and former slave whose Discourses (recorded by his student Arrian) shaped Marcus Aurelius and the modern Stoic revival. Closely associated with Seneca (earlier Roman Stoic) and Marcus Aurelius (his student-by-text on the imperial throne). For an intellectual contrast, see Epicurus, Greek philosopher of pleasure-as-tranquility — the Stoic-Epicurean rivalry was the central philosophical debate of the Hellenistic and Roman world for 400 years — Epicurean materialist hedonism is the precise alternative the Stoic discipline-of-acceptance was built against.
The standard scholarly entry points to Epictetus's work: A.A. Long (UC Berkeley, Classics) — Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life (2002); Pierre Hadot (Collège de France) — Philosophy as a Way of Life (1995); Anthony R. Birley (Manchester, Roman historian) — Marcus Aurelius (1987) — the standard biography of Epictetus's most famous student. These are the works graduate seminars cite when teaching Epictetus.