Transactions. 7 1 



to Schweighaeuser by Gamier, the autlior of a " Memoire sur les 

 Ouvrages d'Epictete" : — "Epictete dut apparemment les avantages 

 d'une Education distinguee a la fantaisie qu 'avaient sur la fin de 

 la Republique, et sous les premiers Empereurs, les grands de 

 Rome de compter parmi leurs nomhreux esclaves desGrrammairiens, 

 des Pontes, des Rheteurs et des Philosoplies, dans le meme espi-it 

 et les memes vues qui ont porte de riches financiers dans ces 

 derniers si6cles ii former k grands fraix de riches et de nombreuses 

 Biblioth^ques. Cette supposition est la seule qui puisse nous 

 expliquer, comment un malheureux enfant, n6 pauvre comma 

 Irns, avoit regu une 6ducation distinguee, et comma un Stoicien 

 rigide se trouvoit etre esclave d'Epaphrodite, I'un des officiers de la 

 gai'de Imp6riale. Car on ne soupQonnera pas, que ce fut par 

 pr(;diIection pour la doctrine Stoique, et pour son propre usage, 

 que le confident et le ministre des debauches de N^ron, eut 6t6 

 curieux de se procurer un pareil esclave." 



It is assumed that Epictetus was manumitted by his master 

 Epaphroditus ; but there is no statement to this effect to be 

 found. At anyrate, by some means or other, he obtained his 

 freedom, and began to teach in Rome. But in a.d. 89 Domitian 

 expelled the philosophers from Italy (see Tacitus, Agricola 2 ; 

 Suetonius, Domitian 10 ; Dio Cassius 67-13 ; Gellius 15-11), and 

 he retired to Nicopolis, in Epirus, where he opened a school of 

 philosophy, and lectured till he was an old man. Nicopolis was 

 a city which had been built by Augustus to commemorate the 

 victory at Actium (see Suetonius' " Octavian," 18). The fact 

 that Epictetus taught at Nicopolis is stated by Suidas and 

 Gellius ; and Spartian says against all probability that he was a 

 familiar friend of the Emperor Hadrian ; but nothing is said 

 about his ever i-eturning to Rome. There are frequent allusions 

 in the " Discourses " to Nicopolis as his place of residence. 

 Here it was that Arrian became his disciple, and took down in 

 writing his lectures, which form the "Discourses." Like 

 Socrates, Epictetus wrote nothing, and just as for our knowledge 

 of the doctrines of the former we are indebted to his disciples, 

 Plato and Xenophon, so we owe our knowledge of those of the 

 latter to Arrian, afterwards the historian of Alexander the Great. 

 He himself says in the epistle to Lucius Gellius which forms the 

 preface to the " Discourses " : — " Neither did I compose the 

 ' Discourses ' of Epictetus in the way a man might compose such 

 things ; nor did I publish them myself, for I assert that I did not 



