Epictetus, the Discourses as reported by Arrian, the Manual, and Fragments/Book 1/Chapter 21
CHAPTER XXI
To those who would be admired
When a man has his proper station in life, he is not all agape for things beyond it. Man, what is it you want to have happen to you? As for myself, I am content if I exercise desire and aversion in accordance with nature, if I employ choice and refusal as my nature is, and similarly employ purpose and design and assent. Why, then, do you walk around in our presence as though you had swallowed a spit?[1] "It has always been my wish that those who meet me should admire me and as they follow me should exclaim, 'O the great philosopher!'" Who are those people by whom you wish to be admired? Are they not these about whom you are in the habit of saying that they are mad? What then? Do you wish to be admired by the mad?
Footnotes[edit]
- ↑ Of one with a stiff and self-important bearing. Our equivalent phrase is "to swallow a ramrod."