Evening star., 1929-11-15

"It Is the action of an uninstructed
person to reproach others Tor MS own
misfortunes; of one entering upon In
struction, to reproach himself. and OF
one perfectly instructed, to reproach
neither others nor himself"
This sentence from the Enchlridion
or Manual, of Epictetus. Is one OF
those utterances in which the ancient
writer's delighted.
II From Palestine to Greece and back
again there was balance OF thought,
a placing of one idea over against
another, with a resulting swing OF
rhythm delightful to eye and ear.
The great Stole philosopher put one
more element into the above sentence
than any of the great Hebrew writers
would have used. No doubt the writer
of the Wisdom of Jesus of Sirach, :
commonly called Ecclesiasticus, would
have been content with the first two
ideas, that a man usually blarnes either
others or himself for anything which
goes contrary to his wishes.
With that surprising modern attitude
which pervades the entire Stole phuoso-
ply, which was a practical system OF
ethics for a practical world. Eplctetus
put forward the third element. that
the man who is perfectly instructed
would blame neither others nor him
self.
He meant. of course, perfectly in-
structed in the principles OF his own
philosophy, the key idea OF which was
that there are certain things which be-
long to a man, and certain which DO
not, and that the human mind the
called it "will') should reject those
which do not.
The ascertainment Of those good
things which, properly belong to man man
philosophy. Today the idea of a
"stoic" is one who calmly meets
physical pain, but that was only part
OF the original idea. 1t was to be ca
pected that the most spectacular OF
those ideas would be singled out for
remembrance through the ages. The.
Epicureans did not fare so we'll all
that the average person knows To-Day
of the doctrines of that sect, cordially
detested by Epictetus, is a distorted
saying, Eat, drink and be merry, for
tomorrow we die"
One does not have to be Stole to
appreciate the quality of the sentence
which heads this column today. Some
how 1t gives one a thrill to think that
after 1000 years this bit of wisdom can
come down into print and that 1t
squares very we'll with the latest dis
cover ) in psychology.
Nor does one have to be psychol-
ogist either to sense the divine COM
mon sense In 1t. 1t will be found that
all the great writings of the ages,
whether In the sacred or secular litera-
ture, are suffused With what may be
termed a glorious common sense.
1T is the action of an uninstructed
person to reproach others for his own
nisfortunes; of one entering upon in
struction, to reproach himself; and OF
one perfectly instructed, to reproach
neither others nor himself"
One has but to look around him in
any home or Office to see perfect rep
resentatives of these three types Of hu"
man beings. Every Office knows the
growler who is forever placing the
blame for his lack of progress on his
superior officers.
If one keeps his ears open in public
vehicles in the morning he will hear
some man or woman telling the world y
Just how abused he or she Is when 1t
comes to the matter of promotion.
It must be borne In mind that "ah
uninstructed person" refers, in this
modern day. to one who is working out
his own salvation in the economic and