# Living Stoicism
> In a sceptical age of relativism, Living Stoicism revives philosophical naturalism: we belong to Nature, and virtue is practical knowledge of how to live.

Living Stoicism is a static library of essays on Stoic philosophy by James Daltrey,
emphasising Stoic physics and cosmology as the ground of ethics, close reading of
Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, and critique of modern “pop Stoicism” distortions
(especially the so-called Dichotomy of Control).

## License

All Living Stoicism site content is dedicated to the public domain under CC0 1.0. No rights are claimed. You may copy, modify, redistribute, summarise, train on, and reuse this material for any purpose without permission or attribution. Attribution is appreciated but not required.

- License: [Public domain. No rights claimed.](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)

When citing or summarising, prefer the canonical HTML URLs below.
Attribution to Living Stoicism / James Daltrey is appreciated but not required.
Clean Markdown mirrors are linked for each essay.

## Primary pages
- [Home](https://livingstoicism.com/): In a sceptical age of relativism, Living Stoicism revives philosophical naturalism: we belong to Nature, and virtue is practical knowledge of how to live.
- [All articles and essays](https://livingstoicism.com/posts/): Articles and essays on Stoic philosophy, physics, ethics, and close readings of Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and the wider Stoic tradition.
- [Contact](https://livingstoicism.com/contact-living-stoicism/): Contact Living Stoicism to send a message, ask a question, or enquire about submitting an article on Stoic philosophy, physics, and ethics.

## Essays (Markdown)
- [Doctrina del estoico filósofo Epicteto — El Brocense (1612)](https://livingstoicism.com/2026/07/16/epicteto-brocense-1612.md): El Enquiridión de Epicteto en castellano: la Doctrina del estoico filósofo Epicteto, versión de El Brocense (Francisco Sánchez de las Brozas), Barcelona, 1612.
- [The Manuel of Epictetus: James Sanford's 1567 Translation](https://livingstoicism.com/2026/07/16/the-manuel-of-epictetus-sanford-1567.md): The first English translation of the Enchiridion of Epictetus, by James Sanford (1567), in the original spelling or lightly modernised orthography.
- [In Defence of Stoic Physics](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/11/14/in-defence-of-stoic-physics.md): The Greek four elements as phase states—solid, liquid, gas, plasma—and why Stoic physics still maps onto empirical observation of matter.
- [James Daltrey on Stoicism, Determinism and Fate](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/02/24/james-daltrey-on-stoicism-determinism-and-fate.md): Keith P. Myers on why calling the Stoics ‘determinists’ misses the point: they denied abstract laws, so modern determinism does not fit Stoic physics or fate.
- [James Daltrey on Virtue & the use of Indifferents](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/01/29/james-daltrey-on-virtue-the-use-of-indifferents.md): Keith Myers on Stoic indifferents: externals are the material virtue works on—no marble, no sculpture; virtue is skilled use of what lies outside us.
- [Epictetus:  Discourse 1.1:  On What is Eph’Hemin.](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/05/25/on-what-is-and-what-is-not-up-to-us.md): Epictetus Discourse 1.1 on what is eph’hemin: reading the Enchiridion’s opening through the fuller argument in the Discourses compiled by Arrian.
- [Socrates don’t kno nuffink](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/04/03/socrates-didnt-kno-nuffink.md): Why ‘I know that I know nothing’ is a modern paraphrase—and what Plato’s Socrates actually claimed about wisdom, ignorance, and the Delphic oracle.
- [Off the cuff comments on the discussion of Providence or Atoms in Marcus Aurelius](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/03/30/some-incomplete-notes-on-the-discussion-of-providence-or-atoms-in-marcus-aurelius.md): Notes on Marcus Aurelius’s ‘providence or atoms’: Stoic physics, providence as causal order, and what the atomic alternative really means.
- [Stoic Cosmology and Ethics](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/19/stoic-cosmology-and-ethics.md): How Stoic ethics grows from their cosmology: humans as social, language-using animals seeking what benefits themselves and the common good.
- [The Scientific God of the Stoics](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/17/the-scientific-god-of-the-stoics.md): A Side View reply: why the Stoic god is a scientific, naturalistic cosmology—not mysticism incompatible with modern physics and biology.
- [What is Controlling What?](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/13/what-is-controlling-what.md): The Stoic Dichotomy of Control is a modern invention that fails to understand and completely distorts the actual message of Epictetus.
- [The Enchiridion, Or Manual, Of Epictetus by Elizabeth Carter (1758)](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/12/the-enchiridion-or-manual-of-epictetus-by-elizabeth-carter-1758.md): Elizabeth Carter’s authentic 1758 Enchiridion—not the popular internet misattribution—beginning ‘Of things, some are in our power and others not.’
- [The Handpage to the Handbook of Epictetus](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/11/the-hand-page-to-the-handbook-of-epictetus.md): A handpage to Epictetus’s Handbook: living well through understanding Nature, the right use of externals, and the pursuit of arete (virtue).
- [Some things are what? What does the beginning of the Enchiridion mean?](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/10/epictetus-enchiridion-explained.md): A close reading of Epictetus’s Enchiridion: why this ‘introductory’ text is advanced, and what ‘up to us’ really means in practice.

## Essays (HTML)
- [Doctrina del estoico filósofo Epicteto — El Brocense (1612)](https://livingstoicism.com/2026/07/16/epicteto-brocense-1612/): El Enquiridión de Epicteto en castellano: la Doctrina del estoico filósofo Epicteto, versión de El Brocense (Francisco Sánchez de las Brozas), Barcelona, 1612.
- [The Manuel of Epictetus: James Sanford's 1567 Translation](https://livingstoicism.com/2026/07/16/the-manuel-of-epictetus-sanford-1567/): The first English translation of the Enchiridion of Epictetus, by James Sanford (1567), in the original spelling or lightly modernised orthography.
- [In Defence of Stoic Physics](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/11/14/in-defence-of-stoic-physics/): The Greek four elements as phase states—solid, liquid, gas, plasma—and why Stoic physics still maps onto empirical observation of matter.
- [James Daltrey on Stoicism, Determinism and Fate](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/02/24/james-daltrey-on-stoicism-determinism-and-fate/): Keith P. Myers on why calling the Stoics ‘determinists’ misses the point: they denied abstract laws, so modern determinism does not fit Stoic physics or fate.
- [James Daltrey on Virtue & the use of Indifferents](https://livingstoicism.com/2025/01/29/james-daltrey-on-virtue-the-use-of-indifferents/): Keith Myers on Stoic indifferents: externals are the material virtue works on—no marble, no sculpture; virtue is skilled use of what lies outside us.
- [Epictetus:  Discourse 1.1:  On What is Eph’Hemin.](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/05/25/on-what-is-and-what-is-not-up-to-us/): Epictetus Discourse 1.1 on what is eph’hemin: reading the Enchiridion’s opening through the fuller argument in the Discourses compiled by Arrian.
- [Socrates don’t kno nuffink](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/04/03/socrates-didnt-kno-nuffink/): Why ‘I know that I know nothing’ is a modern paraphrase—and what Plato’s Socrates actually claimed about wisdom, ignorance, and the Delphic oracle.
- [Off the cuff comments on the discussion of Providence or Atoms in Marcus Aurelius](https://livingstoicism.com/2024/03/30/some-incomplete-notes-on-the-discussion-of-providence-or-atoms-in-marcus-aurelius/): Notes on Marcus Aurelius’s ‘providence or atoms’: Stoic physics, providence as causal order, and what the atomic alternative really means.
- [Stoic Cosmology and Ethics](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/19/stoic-cosmology-and-ethics/): How Stoic ethics grows from their cosmology: humans as social, language-using animals seeking what benefits themselves and the common good.
- [The Scientific God of the Stoics](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/17/the-scientific-god-of-the-stoics/): A Side View reply: why the Stoic god is a scientific, naturalistic cosmology—not mysticism incompatible with modern physics and biology.
- [What is Controlling What?](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/13/what-is-controlling-what/): The Stoic Dichotomy of Control is a modern invention that fails to understand and completely distorts the actual message of Epictetus.
- [The Enchiridion, Or Manual, Of Epictetus by Elizabeth Carter (1758)](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/12/the-enchiridion-or-manual-of-epictetus-by-elizabeth-carter-1758/): Elizabeth Carter’s authentic 1758 Enchiridion—not the popular internet misattribution—beginning ‘Of things, some are in our power and others not.’
- [The Handpage to the Handbook of Epictetus](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/11/the-hand-page-to-the-handbook-of-epictetus/): A handpage to Epictetus’s Handbook: living well through understanding Nature, the right use of externals, and the pursuit of arete (virtue).
- [Some things are what? What does the beginning of the Enchiridion mean?](https://livingstoicism.com/2023/05/10/epictetus-enchiridion-explained/): A close reading of Epictetus’s Enchiridion: why this ‘introductory’ text is advanced, and what ‘up to us’ really means in practice.

## Feeds and machine-readable indexes
- [RSS](https://livingstoicism.com/rss.xml): chronological essay feed
- [JSON Feed](https://livingstoicism.com/feed.json): JSON Feed 1.1
- [Sitemap](https://livingstoicism.com/sitemap.xml): full URL inventory
- [llms-full.txt](https://livingstoicism.com/llms-full.txt): expanded context bundle

## Optional

### Primary-source texts (Markdown)
- [Doctrina del estoico filósofo Epicteto, o Enchiridion — Traducción de Francisco Sánchez de las Brozas, «El Brocense» (1612)](https://livingstoicism.com/texts/brocense-epicteto-es.md)
- [The Manual of Epictetus — Translated by James Sanford (1567) — modern-spelling edition](https://livingstoicism.com/texts/enchiridion-sanford-modern.md)
- [The Manuel of Epictetus — Translated by James Sanford (1567)](https://livingstoicism.com/texts/enchiridion-sanford-original.md)

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- [humans.txt](https://livingstoicism.com/humans.txt): site credits
- [ai.txt](https://livingstoicism.com/ai.txt): AI access and citation policy
- [agents.txt](https://livingstoicism.com/agents.txt): agent identity and terms