Where Do Epictetus Quotes Appear In The Discourses?

I get asked this a lot when people are trying to track down a favorite Epictetus line, and my go-to explanation is simple: Epictetus's sayings are sprinkled all through the four books of Arrian’s notes we call 'Discourses', and many of the short punchy lines people quote are also collected in the little handbook 'Enchiridion', which was compiled from those same talks.

If you want to be precise, the best approach is to look up the phrase in a searchable translation of 'Discourses' (or in 'Enchiridion') — translations differ in wording, so the exact phrasing you remember might show up in one place in one translator’s version and somewhere else in another. Arrian recorded Epictetus’s conversations as four books of 'Discourses', so any well-known Epictetus quote likely has a place in those books, often repeated in the 'Enchiridion' as a concise formulation.

Personally, I like reading a line in 'Enchiridion' first to get the distilled idea, then hunting it down in 'Discourses' to enjoy the fuller context and the back-and-forth that surrounds it. That deeper context often changes how I interpret the quote, which is half the fun.

I tend to be blunt with folks hunting a specific line: check both the four-book 'Discourses' and the compact 'Enchiridion'. Many famous Epictetus quotes are either directly in 'Discourses' or condensed into the 'Enchiridion' from those talks. Because Arrian recorded the conversations, the quotes show up throughout the books rather than in a single index spot.

If you want to find a quote fast, search an online searchable translation and then verify with a printed edition. Bear in mind translators paraphrase, so wording can vary. If you give me the quote you’re chasing, I’ll help track down which book or chapter it appears in and whether it’s better quoted from 'Discourses' or the 'Enchiridion'.

On a quieter day, I like to sit with the original structure: Arrian preserved Epictetus’s teachings in four books collectively referenced as 'Discourses', and the most famous short sayings are frequently also in the 'Enchiridion', a handbook distilled from those larger dialogues. So, practically every memorable Epictetus quote you’ve seen online will trace back to a spot inside one of the 'Discourses' books or the 'Enchiridion'.

What fascinates me is how context shifts meaning: take the common line about control — roughly, that some things are up to us and some are not — which appears as a core idea in the 'Enchiridion' and is elaborated across the 'Discourses'. When you read the fuller passage in 'Discourses', there’s often a conversational setup, examples, and follow-up questions from students that make the aphorism richer. For research or citation I prefer to reference a reliable edition (Penguin, Loeb, or a scholarly translation) so chapter and section numbers match across academic work. Still, if you’re just after a quick quote for inspiration, 'Enchiridion' usually points you back to the fuller place in 'Discourses' where Epictetus actually said it.

I usually tell friends that Epictetus’s quotations don’t live in a single chapter; they’re scattered through Arrian’s record of his lectures — the four books known as 'Discourses' — and many were later tightened up into the 'Enchiridion'. So when you see a neat one-liner credited to Epictetus, it often comes straight from one of the 'Discourses' chapters or the 'Enchiridion' summary.

A practical tip I use: search a phrase in an online library (Perseus, Internet Archive, or a university site) and then cross-check different translations. Translators like Elizabeth Carter, George Long, or modern ones will render sentences differently, which explains why the same thought can look like several separate quotes. Also remember that many modern quote lists paraphrase Epictetus, so finding the original usually requires comparing both 'Discourses' and the 'Enchiridion'.

If you tell me the exact line you have in mind, I can point to where it shows up in the texts I've checked.