more
admirable because pity, like all other deep emotions, was regarded by
the Stoics in the light rather of a vice than of a virtue. In this
respect, however, both Seneca and Epictetus, and to a still greater
extent Marcus Aurelius, were gloriously false to the rigidity of the
school to which they professed to belong. We see with delight that one
of the _Discourses_ of Epictetus was _On the Tenderness and Forbearance
due to Sinners_; and he abounds in exhortations to forbearance in
judging others. In one of his _Fragments_ he tells the following
anecdote:--A person who had seen a poor ship-wrecked and almost dying
pirate took pity on him, carried him home, gave him clothes, and
furnished him with all the necessaries of life. Somebody reproached him
for doing good to the wicked--"I have honoured," he replied, "not the
man, but humanity in his person."

But one fact more is known in the life of Epictetus, Domitian, the
younger son of Vespasian, succeeded his far nobler brother the Emperor
Titus; and in the course of his reign a decree was passed which banished
all the philosophers from Italy. Epictetus was not exempted from this
unjust and absurd decree. That he bore it with equanimity may be
inferred from the approval with which he tells an anecdote about
Agrippinus, who while his cause was being tried in the Senate went on
with all his usual avocations, and on being informed on his return from
bathing that he had been condemned, quietly asked, "To death or
banishment?" "To banishment," said the messenger. "Is my property
confiscated?" "No," "Very well, then let us go as far as Aricia" (about
sixteen miles from Rome), "and dine there."

There was a certain class of philosophers whose external mark and whose
sole claim to distinction rested in the length of their beards; and when
the decree of Domitian was passed these gentleman contented themselves
with shaving. Epictetus alludes to this in his second _Discourse_,
"Come, Epictetus, shave off your beard," he imagines some one to say to
him. "If I am a philosopher I will not," he replies. "Then I will take
off your head." "By all means, if that will do you any good."

He went to Nicopolis, a town of Epirus, which had been built by Augustus
in commemoration of his victory at Actium. Whether he ever revisited
Rome is uncertain, but it is probable that he did so, for we know that
he enjoyed the friendship of several eminent philosophers and statesmen,
and was esteemed an