No leisure — but the power is yours. The fivefold refrain ἔξεστιν ("it is possible, in your power") overturns the complaint of scarce time: there is no leisure to read (books of philosophy) — but virtue needs no reading; it lies wholly in what "is possible" here and now. The same argument is 4.30 (the philosopher without a book) and the DOGMAdichotomy of control: leisure for externals may be taken from you, but not the capacity for the inner work.

Four "you can"s. The list rises in stringency: (1) to curb "insolence" (ὕβρις); (2) to be above TERMpleasure (ἡδονή) and pain (πόνος) — the pair one must "overtop" (καθυπερτερεῖν), granting it no verdict; (3) to be above "petty fame" (δοξάριον — a diminutive for the chase after honour); (4) highest of all — not to be angry (μὴ θυμοῦσθαι) at the unfeeling and ungrateful, "and moreover to care for them" (κήδεσθαι αὐτῶν). This last "you can" turns endurance into DOGMAactive affection: not merely to keep from irritation at another's ingratitude, but to benefit the ungrateful (cf. 7.22 — to love even those who err). The strict term by the word is ἡδονή; θυμοῦσθαι carries anger, but the verbal form is not entered among the terms. The governing discipline is desire (to overtop pleasure, pain, vainglory), the sustaining one action (care for the ungrateful).