1001Philosophers

Epictetus vs Marcus Aurelius

Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius are the two most influential late Roman Stoics. Marcus Aurelius read Epictetus carefully, drawing extensively on his Discourses in the Meditations, and the two thinkers form a single Stoic chain across very different lives.

At a glance

EpictetusMarcus Aurelius
Datesc. 50 – c. 135121 – 180
NationalityGreekRoman
EraAncientAncient
Movements Stoicism, Hellenistic Stoicism, Hellenistic
Profile Epictetus → Marcus Aurelius →

Where they agree

Both held the foundational Stoic doctrine that the only good is the rational use of one's own faculties — what Epictetus called what is up to us — and that everything outside this is indifferent. Both treated philosophy as a daily discipline of attention rather than a body of doctrine to be learned.

Where they disagree

Their lives could not have been more different. Epictetus was born a slave; Marcus Aurelius died an emperor. Epictetus taught philosophy in a school and his Discourses are explicitly pedagogical; Marcus's Meditations are private notes never intended for publication. The contrast in voice — Epictetus's pointed, didactic, often satirical, against Marcus's austere first-person self-address — is a contrast in philosophical genre rather than philosophical doctrine.

Representative quotes

Epictetus

  • “First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.”

    Τίς εἶναι θέλεις, σαυτῷ πρῶτον ἐιπέ· εἶθ᾿ οὕτως ποίει ἃ ποιεῖς.

  • “No man is free who is not master of himself.”

    Οὐδεὶς ἐλεύθερος ἑαυτοῦ μὴ κρατῶν.

  • “Only the educated are free.”

    οὐ γὰρ τοῖς πολλοῖς περὶ τούτων πιστευτέον, οἳ λέγουσιν μόνοις ἐξεῖναι παιδεύεσθαι τοῖς ἐλευθέροις, ἀλλὰ τοῖς φιλοσόφοις μᾶλλον, οἳ λέγουσιν μόνους τοὺς παιδευθέντας ἐλευθέρους εἶναι.

Marcus Aurelius

  • “Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.”

    Μηκέθ᾽ ὅλως περὶ τοῦ οἷόν τινα εἶναι τὸν ἀγαθὸν ἄνδρα διαλέγεσθαι, ἀλλὰ εἶναι τοιοῦτον. | X, 16

  • “The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.”

    The universe is flux, life is opinion.

  • “Confine yourself to the present.”

    VII, 29

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