The Enchiridion: A Stoic Guide to Resilience and Tranquility - Softcover

Inhaltsangabe

What depends on you—and what never will?

Born into slavery in the Roman Empire, Epictetus became one of the most influential teachers of Stoic philosophy. His central lesson was uncompromising: freedom does not begin with power, wealth, reputation, or favorable circumstances. It begins with learning to distinguish what depends on us from what does not—and training our judgments, desires, and actions accordingly.

The Enchiridion, or Handbook, was compiled by Epictetus’s student Arrian as a concise guide to that discipline. Its fifty-three sections confront fear, anger, ambition, grief, insult, social pressure, loss, duty, and death. Brief enough to carry through life, yet severe enough to challenge it, the work asks readers not merely to admire philosophy, but to practice it.

This Lyceum Press edition presents the Enchiridion as a contemporary English adaptation. The language has been recast for clarity and force while preserving the traditional section numbering, allowing readers to compare the text with other editions and historical commentaries. Editorial notes distinguish ancient social assumptions from modern interpretation rather than silently rewriting them.

This edition includes:

• A clear, contemporary adaptation of all fifty-three traditional sections
• A foreword explaining the structure, history, and purpose of the Handbook
• A biography of Epictetus and an introduction to Stoic philosophy
• A note on the text, its sources, and the disputed athletic-training section
• Profiles of major figures connected to the Greek and Roman Stoa
• A glossary of essential Stoic terms, concepts, and metaphors
• Carefully separated editorial notes wherever historical context matters

The Enchiridion does not promise control over the world. It teaches something harder: how to govern your own judgments and choices when the world refuses to obey you.

For readers of Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, classical philosophy, or modern Stoicism, this volume offers a direct and practical encounter with one of antiquity’s most demanding voices.

The second volume in The Lyceum Press Roman Stoics collection and a natural companion to Meditations.

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