How Epictetus Captured The Mind Of Marcus Aurelius

One of history’s most powerful rulers was shaped by a teacher he never met. In this episode, Ryan talks with Professor William O. Stephens about how Marcus Aurelius discovered Epictetus, why the former slave’s teachings hit him so deeply, and how those ideas about freedom, power, and self-mastery helped shape the philosopher king. William O. Stephens is a philosopher specializing in Stoicism, ethics, and ancient philosophy. He earned his Ph. D. from the University of Pennsylvania and spent over 30 years teaching at Creighton University, where he is now Professor Emeritus. His work spans topics like friendship, ecology, and human nature, with a focus on Stoic thought. His latest book is Marcus Aurelius: Philosopher-King https://www.amazon.com/Marcus-Aurelius-Philosopher-King-Great-Ancient/dp/1836391161 (2025), and he is also the author of Marcus Aurelius: A Guide for the Perplexed https://www.amazon.com/Marcus-Aurelius-Guide-Perplexed-Guides-ebook/dp/B00LFPKS1U/ref=books_amazonstores_desktop_mfs_aufs_ap_sc_dsk_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=vFw52&content-id=amzn1.sym.9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_p=9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_r=139-8118888-5645531&pd_rd_wg=UukXM&pd_rd_r=be8560ba-bdf5-44fe-8446-a88fe7e8d42d, Epictetus’s Encheiridion: A New Translation and Guide to Stoic Ethics https://www.amazon.com/Epictetuss-Encheiridion-Translation-Guide-Ethics-ebook/dp/B0BWHTKRWJ/ref=books_amazonstores_desktop_mfs_aufs_ap_sc_dsk_1?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=vFw52&content-id=amzn1.sym.9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_p=9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_r=139-8118888-5645531&pd_rd_wg=UukXM&pd_rd_r=be8560ba-bdf5-44fe-8446-a88fe7e8d42d, and Stoic Ethics: Epictetus and Happiness as Freedom https://www.amazon.com/Ethics-Stoic-Epictetus-Translation-Revisioning-ebook/dp/B093T9MLFB/ref=books_amazonstores_desktop_mfs_aufs_ap_sc_dsk_4?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=vFw52&content-id=amzn1.sym.9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_p=9c9a049f-252a-49d9-a8c2-e300a1663200&pf_rd_r=139-8118888-5645531&pd_rd_wg=UukXM&pd_rd_r=be8560ba-bdf5-44fe-8446-a88fe7e8d42d. Check out more of William Stephens’ work at https://WilliamOStephens.com/ https://williamostephens.com/ 📚 Grab a copy of Marcus Aurelius: Philosopher-King by William Stephens https://www.amazon.com/Marcus-Aurelius-Philosopher-King-Great-Ancient/dp/1836391161 🎟️DAILY STOIC LIVE https://www.dailystoiclive.com/| Ryan Holiday is coming to a city near you https://www.dailystoiclive.com/! Grab tickets here https://www.dailystoiclive.com/ | https://www.dailystoiclive.com/ 🎙️AD-FREE https://dailystoic.supercast.com/| Support the podcast and go deeper into Stoicism by subscribing toThe Daily Stoic Premium https://dailystoic.supercast.com/ - unlock ad-free listening, early access, and bonus content:https://dailystoic.supercast.com/ 🎥 VIDEO EPISODES https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic/videos| Watch the video episodes onThe Daily Stoic YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic/videos:https://www.youtube.com/@DailyStoic/videos ✉️ FREE STOIC WISDOM https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail | Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email athttps://dailystoic.com/dailyemail See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ryan Holiday?

  Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key Stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world.

• 0:15Ryan Holiday?

  The right book at the right time, it can change everything, right? How did I come to read Marcus Aurelius? I was at a conference as a college journalist sponsored by Trojan condoms, of all things, and I asked for a book recommendation. And one thing led to another, and now I have a podcast about Stoicism. You know, probably exactly like your story. All of our origin stories to this philosophy, and in fact, to many of the books that have changed our lives are random. There's an element of serendipity to them, but usually it comes with some kind of recommendation. And for Marcus Aurelius, right? This is how he comes to Epictetus.

• 0:58Ryan Holiday?

  The discourses of Epictetus are handed to him by Junius Rusticus, his philosophy teacher. It's one of the great book recommendations in history. A teacher gives it to a young man who is being pulled towards power and fame and responsibility and empire. And so these words from a former slave teach a man with incredible influence and power about the importance of self mastery. And that's what I wanted to talk to today's guest about, Professor William O. Stevens, who is a professor emeritus at Creighton University. He's a longtime scholar of both Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, who wrote this great book on Stoic ethics. And then he's more recently written a biography of Marcus Aurelius called Marcus Aurelius,

• 1:43Ryan Holiday?

  Philosopher King. And in this little chunk of today's episode, I wanted to ask him about how Marcus came to encounter Epictetus, what struck him about it? And you know, who fired Epictetus's imagination as well? And how the teachings of a slave had such a powerful impact on someone destined to rule so many. Marcus Aurelius being groomed for power, Epictetus talking about freedom, literal and figuratively, Marcus surrounded by palaces and status and expectation. Epictetus saying, none of this matters. Doesn't matter how many people you are in charge of, if you are not first in charge of yourself.

• 2:27Ryan Holiday?

  And perhaps that's why Marcus kept coming back to him, why I keep coming back to both of them. And you know, probably why you're listening to this podcast as well. Do check out Marcus Aurelius, Philosopher King by Professor Stevens, and I hope you enjoy this episode. What do we know about Marcus's introduction to Epictetus, right? We know that it's a formative book. We know that Rusticus lonesome a copy because he mentions that in Meditations. But what else do we know? How does the, how does the world's greatest book recommendation happen?

• 3:04Speaker 01

  Gosh, I don't know of any more details than just that. It seems that we don't know whether Marcus knew of Seneca. So I don't know if he knew of Seneca's writings, which is surprising because of course, for us, Seneca's corpus is so much bigger than Marcus's writings, the discourses and the Encyridian and Musonius's lectures combined, right? So there's so much more Seneca that we have. It's disappointing that he doesn't mention Seneca.

• 3:43Ryan Holiday?

  Donald Robertson told me, he thinks that's a conspicuous or an intentional omission. I'd be curious what your opinion was.

• 3:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I can see that. So Donald thinks that he did know about Seneca, but Seneca's take on things didn't float his boat. Yeah, I mean, that's plausible, I suppose. It would, I mean, it was one way of explaining why he doesn't mention because he, because it supposes that he knew full well about Seneca's, yeah, output, philosophical output, but chose not to mention it or comment on it. I don't know, that strikes me as a little weird. It's easy, it's pretty easy to criticize Seneca for a certain kind of hypocrisy, given how much money he did make, not ever becoming emperor, not becoming poor like Antoninus, right?

• 4:34Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 4:34Speaker 01

  But lending out money at exorbitant rates of interest, right? A really high interest rates and raking in the interest and becoming extremely wealthy, right?

• 4:44Ryan Holiday?

  Yes.

• 4:45Speaker 01

  And then talking about riding his wagon and his, his driver being barefooted and how embarrassing it was because it did. So there is so much consciousness with, you know, how, how Seneca's, how he carries his wealth, projects his wealth, and he, he recognizes he's supposed to be frugal and austere, and he praises himself for doing that. I can see that that might have been off putting for Marcus if he knew about the guy and those sorts of stories.

• 5:12Ryan Holiday?

  Or just his complicity with Nero, period. You know, I could, I could see sort of condemning him for that reason as well, right?

• 5:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. And that's, I mean, I, when I was younger, I thought, wow, yeah, you know, it's easy to, to, you know, criticize Seneca and think poorly of him in that regard. On the other hand, you know, it could be that Seneca believed optimistically that he could have a very positive formative influence on Nero.

• 5:38Ryan Holiday?

  Sure.

• 5:38Speaker 01

  Right? And, and their, their precedence here, right? With Aristotle and Alexander the Great.

• 5:45Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 5:45Speaker 01

  How did that work out? Well, you know, he was quite a conqueror, that Alexander Magnus guy, right? But you know, Aristotle's not going to convert him into a philosopher, right? Not very much, because again, he's pursuing conquest. That's his goal that he's setting for his good life, right? So with Epictetus, I mean, I'm inclined to think that it's the kind of experience that you and I have when we discover Epictetus for the first time and we read it and this guy is electrified.

• 6:14Ryan Holiday?

  Yes.

• 6:15Speaker 01

  And like Arian says in the Prefatory Letter, right? This guy, this teacher, Epictetus, had the power to make his students feel exactly what he wanted them to feel when he was teaching, when he was lecturing. So he had a connection with his students. He's just so immediate and powerful and forceful in his teaching style, his energy and his, his earnestness, right? His passion for teaching Stoicism as a source of freedom and liberation. This is what liberates you from human misery.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  This is what frees you from bad appetites and being imprisoned, being held captive to the power of others as they threaten your life or threaten to take your property away. Hey, look how Socrates handled that. He was not threatened. He could not be coerced. And Stoicism is the armor for resisting any and all coercion. And I think that resonated. I mean, I just have to imagine that's what resonated with Marcus.

• 7:24Ryan Holiday?

  When he read the discourses, do we have any idea how old he is when this happens? Like when he would have come to Epictetus?

• 7:31Speaker 01

  I mean, it's probably, you know, when he's, you know, in his teens, when he's in his early to mid teens roughly, because that's when he's studying with, you know, Sextus and other, you know, other philosophy teachers of his. And so Junius Rusticus is, well, if you're interested in philosophy, if you're into philosophy and you like the figure of Socrates.

• 7:52Ryan Holiday?

  I've got the guy for you.

• 7:53Speaker 01

  I've got the guy for you. Read, read what Epictetus, because Socrates is Epictetus's biggest hero. It's not Zeno, it's not Chrysippus, it's Socrates, right? Socrates is number one and in second place is Diogenes of Sinope, the cynic, the dog philosopher. He lived his talk. He walked his talk as Socrates did. But Socrates had to do it with a wife, with kids, you know, serving as a soldier in the Athenian army, right? Whereas Diogenes, shortcut to virtue, cynicism, as they say, is the shortcut to virtue. No spouse, no kids, no citizenship.

• 8:34Speaker 01

  You've got your cloak, your staff and a leather sack that you keep your food that you beg off of strangers, right? That, that's a hard row to hoe for most of us. Whereas for Stoics, you call, you have relationships with friends, family members, you have a job, you live in a house, you don't live in a, in a jar.

• 8:57Ryan Holiday?

  Do you think there was something transgressive about Marcus's attraction to Epictetus? Like here you have this kid, he's on this path, he's being drawn towards power, success, fame, you know, palaces. And what lights him up is a, is a poor slave, you know? Do you think there was some attraction there that that might've been part of it?

• 9:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I mean, there was a tug of war between philosophy and rhetoric.

• 9:25Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  And they're fighting over Marcus, right? Because with Frato, Frato wanted him to fall in love with oratory, with rhetoric. And he pushed hard, hard, hard for that. And we know that he was very disappointed when Marcus said, my heart belongs to philosophy.

• 9:43Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 9:43Speaker 01

  That is my discipline. That is where my head and my heart are, is with philosophy. And Frato was very disappointed and they, they continued to correspond. But you can understand that. I mean, as a retired philosophy professor myself, you know, when I've had really, really bright students and I'm trying to share with them my love and passion for philosophy and how it's, how it is transformative and is used to transgressive, right? Especially these days, right? You know, to be that reflective in a very serious way, the life of ideas, exploring concepts seriously as a good way to live your life. I mean, that's going upstream. That's really going upstream.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  And so, you know, when I present that to bright students and they're thinking, hell, I like philosophy a lot, Professor Stevens, but you know, I'm also thinking, you know, chemistry.

• 10:37Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 10:37Speaker 01

  Um, and I'm also thinking, you know, I want to go to law school and so I'm going to study, you know, government and, you know, that sort of thing. It's like, okay, like his political science, sure, you know, I see that, but you know, you know, isn't, isn't the most interesting part of that political philosophy? Because you need the philosophical foundations, right? And so, you know, students go one way or another, that's up to them.

• 11:03Ryan Holiday?

  Right.

• 11:04Speaker 01

  So I can understand Frato's disappointment. But for Marcus, yeah, Epictetus, Epictetus really, really won his heart. And that's, and that's what he wanted to do, but it wasn't to be.

• 11:16Ryan Holiday?

  And it's clear he knows his Epictetus. I mean, he is quoting him from memory, you know, years probably after, or because he's constantly read and reread him. But yeah, there is just something remarkable about the, the influence on a seemingly powerless person on such a powerful person.

• 11:37Speaker 01

  Yeah. And this is, this is a guy who was born into slavery. Epictetus, it's not even a real name.

• 11:44Ryan Holiday?

  Right. Basically means slave, right?

• 11:47Speaker 01

  Acquired, yeah. And so he's, he was acquired by one master from another master. And he was given that name. And so that's what he went by. His mother was a slave. So he's born into slavery, the slave son of a slave mother.

• 12:02Ryan Holiday?

  Right.

• 12:02Speaker 01

  And, you know, and we don't know much at all about Epictetus's. We don't know about his childhood, but you know, he made his way to Rome and his master allowed him to study with Musonius Rufus. And he, he was a natural. And thank goodness, Arian wrote down his discourses. And so they survived, they were copied and, you know, and that's how they got into Junius Rusticus's library and found their, found their way to, to Marcus. So yeah, I mean, he knows his Epictetus, he does. He knows his Epictetus very well. And there's, there's just so much earnestness there.

• 12:38Ryan Holiday?

  Yeah.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  Epictetus gets it. This is about freedom.