life? On the contrary, these troubles and difficulties are strong
antagonists pitted against us, and we may conquer them, if we will, in
the Olympic game of life.

"But if life and its burdens become absolutely intolerable, may we not
go back to God, from whom we came? may we not show thieves and robbers,
and tyrants who claim power over us by means of our bodies and
possessions, that they have _no power_? In a word, may we not commit
suicide?" We know how Shakespeare treats this question:--

"For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th' oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
Which patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
_But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovered country from whose bourne
No traveller returns, puzzles the will:
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of_?"

But Epictetus had no materials for such an answer. I do not remember a
single passage in which he refers to immortality or the life to come,
and it is therefore probable either that he did not believe in it at
all, or that he put it aside as one of those things which are out of our
own power. Yet his answer is not that glorification of suicide which we
find throughout the tragedies of Seneca, and which was one of the