CHAPTER X.

ETHICS. THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF THE STOIC ETHICS. ABSTRACT THEORY OF MORALITY.

Whatever attention the Stoics paid to the study of nature and to logic, the real kernel of their system lies, as has been already observed, in their Ethics; even natural science, that ‘most divine part of philosophy,’ was only pursued as an intellectual preparation for Ethics. In the field of Ethics the true spirit of the Stoic system may therefore be expected to appear, and it may be anticipated that this subject will be treated by them with special care. Nor is this expectation a vain one; for here the springs of information flowing freely give ample data respecting the Stoic doctrine of morality. Nevertheless, respecting the formal grouping of these data only vague and contradictory statements are forthcoming. Moreover, the Stoics appear to have followed such different courses and to have been so little afraid of repetition, that it is hardly possible to obtain a complete survey of their whole system by following any one of the traditional divisions.

Proceeding to group the materials in such a way as to give the clearest insight into the peculiarities and connection of the Stoic principles, the first distinction to be made will be one between morality in general and particular points in morality. In considering morality in general, those statements which give the abstract theory of morals will be distinguished from those which modify it with a view to meet practical wants. The former again may be grouped round three points:—the enquiry into the highest good, that into the nature of virtue, and that relating to the wise man.

The enquiry into the destiny and end of man turns, with the Stoics, as it did with all moral philosophers since the time of Socrates, about the fundamental conception of the good, and the ingredients necessary to make up the highest good or happiness. Happiness, they consider, can only be sought in rational activity or virtue. Speaking more explicitly, the primary impulse of every being is towards self-preservation and self-gratification. It follows that every being pursues those things which are most suited to its nature, and that such things only have for it a value (ἀξία). Hence the highest good—the end-in-chief, or happiness—can only be found in what is conformable to nature. —Nothing can be conformable to nature for any individual thing, unless it be in harmony with the law of the universe, or with the universal reason of the world; nor, in the case of a conscious and reasonable being, unless it proceeds from a recognition of this general law—in short, from rational intelligence. In every enquiry into what is conformable to nature, all turns upon agreement with the essential constitution of the being, and this essential constitution consists, in the case of a man, simply in reason. One and the same thing, therefore, is always meant, whether, with Zeno, life according to nature is spoken of as being in harmony with oneself, or whether, following Cleanthes, it is simply said to be the agreement of life with nature, and whether, in the latter case, φύσις is taken to mean the world at large, or is limited to human nature in particular. In every case the meaning is, that the life of the individual approximates to or falls short of the goal of happiness, exactly in proportion as it approaches to or departs from the universal law of the world and the particular rational nature of man. In a word, a rational life, an agreement with the general course of the world, constitutes virtue. The principle of the Stoic morality might therefore be briefly expressed in the sentence: Only virtue is good, and happiness consists exclusively in virtue. If, however, following Socrates, the good is defined as being what is useful, then the sentence would run thus: Only Virtue is useful; advantage cannot be distinguished from duty, whilst to a bad man nothing is useful, since, in the case of a rational being, good and evil does not depend on what happens to him, but simply on his own conduct. A view of life is here presented to us in which happiness coincides with virtue, the good and the useful with duty and reason. There is neither any good independently of virtue, nor is there in virtue and for virtue any evil.

The Stoics accordingly refused to admit the ordinary distinction, sanctioned by popular opinion and the majority of philosophers, between various kinds and degrees of good; nor would they allow bodily advantages and external circumstances to be included among good things, together with mental and moral qualities. A certain difference between goods they did not indeed deny, and various kinds are mentioned by them in their formal division of goods. But these differences amount, in the end, to no more than this, that whilst some goods are good and useful in themselves, others are only subsidiary to them. The existence of several equally primary goods appears to the Stoics to be at variance with the conception of the good. That only is a good, according to their view, which has an unconditional value. That which has a value only in comparison with something else, or as leading to something else, does not deserve to be called a good. The difference between what is good and what is not good is not only a difference of degree, but also one of kind; and what is not a good per se can never be a good under any circumstances. The same remarks apply to evil. That which is not in itself an evil can never become so from its relation to something else. Hence only that which is absolutely good, or virtue, can be considered a good; and only that which is absolutely bad, or vice, can be considered an evil. All other things, however great their influence may be on our state, belong to a class of things neither good nor evil, but indifferent, or ἀδιάφορα. Neither health, nor riches, nor honour, not even life itself, is a good; and just as little are the opposite states—poverty, sickness, disgrace, and death—evils. Both are in themselves indifferent, a material which may either be employed for good or else for evil.

The Academicians and Peripatetics were most vigorously attacked by the Stoics for including among goods external things which are dependent on chance. For how can that be a good under any circumstances, which bears no relation to man’s moral nature, and is even frequently obtained at the cost of morality? If virtue renders a man happy, it must render him perfectly happy in himself, since no one can be happy who is not happy altogether. Were anything which is not in man’s power allowed to influence his happiness, it would detract from the absolute worth of virtue, and man would never be able to attain to that imperturbable serenity of mind without which no happiness is conceivable.

Least of all, can pleasure be considered a good, or be regarded, as it was by Epicurus, as the ultimate and highest object in life. He who places pleasure on the throne makes a slave of virtue; he who considers pleasure a good ignores the real conception of the good and the peculiar value of virtue; he appeals to feelings, rather than to actions; he requires reasonable creatures to pursue what is unreasonable, and souls nearly allied to God to go after the enjoyments of the lower animals. Pleasure must never be the object of pursuit, not even in the sense that true pleasure is invariably involved in virtue. That it no doubt is. It is true that there is always a peculiar satisfaction, and a quiet cheerfulness and peace of mind, in moral conduct, just as in immoral conduct there is a lack of inward peace; and in this sense it may be said that the wise man alone knows what true and lasting pleasure is. But even the pleasure afforded by moral excellence ought never to be an object, but only a natural consequence, of virtuous conduct; otherwise the independent value of virtue is impaired.

Nor may pleasure be placed side by side with virtue, as a part of the highest good, or be declared to be inseparable from virtue. Pleasure and virtue are different in essence and kind. Pleasure may be immoral, and moral conduct may go hand in hand with difficulties and pains. Pleasure is found among the worst of men, virtue only amongst the good; virtue is dignified, untiring, imperturbable; pleasure is grovelling, effeminate, fleeting. Those who look upon pleasure as a good are its slaves; those in whom virtue reigns supreme control pleasure, and hold it in check. In no sense can pleasure be allowed to weigh in a question of morals; seeing it is not an end-in-itself, but only the result of an action; not a good, but something absolutely indifferent. The only point on which the Stoics are not unanimous is, whether every pleasure is contrary to nature, as the stern Cleanthes, in the spirit of Cynicism, asserted, or whether there is such a thing as a natural and desirable pleasure. Virtue, on the other hand, needs no extraneous additions, but contains in itself all the conditions of happiness. The reward of virtuous conduct, like the punishment of wickedness, consists only in the character of those actions, one being according to nature, the other contrary to nature. And so unconditional is this self-sufficiency of virtue, that the happiness which it affords is not increased by length of time. Rational self-control is here recognised as the only good; thereby man makes himself independent of all external circumstances, absolutely free, and inwardly satisfied.

The happiness of the virtuous man—and this is a very marked feature in Stoicism—is thus more negative than positive. It consists in independence and peace of mind rather than in the enjoyment which moral conduct brings with it. In mental disquietude—says Cicero, speaking as a Stoic—consists misery; in composure, happiness. How can he be deficient in happiness, he enquires, whom courage preserves from care and fear, and self-control guards from passionate pleasure and desire? How can he fail to be absolutely happy who is in no way dependent on fortune, but simply and solely on himself? To be free from disquietude, says Seneca, is the peculiar privilege of the wise; the advantage which is gained from philosophy is, that of living without fear, and rising superior to the troubles of life. Far more emphatical than any isolated expressions is the support which this negative view of moral aims derives from the whole character of the Stoic ethics, the one doctrine of the apathy of the wise man sufficiently proving that freedom from disturbances, an unconditional assurance, and self-dependence, are the points on which these philosophers lay especial value.

The Good, in as far as it is based on the general arrangement of the world, to which the individual is subordinate, appears to man in the character of Law. Law being, however, the law of man’s own nature, the Good becomes the natural object of man’s desire, and meets his natural impulse. The conception of the Good as law was a view never unfamiliar to moral philosophy, but it was cultivated by the Stoics with peculiar zeal; and forms one of the points on which Stoicism subsequently came into contact, partly with Roman jurisprudence, partly with the ethics of the Jews and Christians. Moreover, as the Stoics considered that the Reason which governs the world is the general Law of all beings, so they recognised in the moral demands of reason the positive and negative aspects of the Law of God. Human law comes into existence when man becomes aware of the divine law, and recognises its claims on him. Civil and moral law are, therefore, commands absolutely imperative on every rational being. No man can feel himself to be a rational being without at the same time feeling himself pledged to be moral. Obedience to this law is imposed upon man, not only by external authority, but by virtue of his own nature. The good is for him that which deserves to be pursued—the natural object of man’s will; on the other hand, evil is that against which his will revolts. The former arouses his desire (ὁρμή), the latter his aversion (ἀφορμή): and thus the demands of morality are called forth by the natural impulse of a reasonable being, and are, at the same time, also the object towards which that impulse is naturally directed.

However simple this state of things may be to a purely rational being, it must be remembered that man is not purely rational. He has, therefore, irrational as well as rational impulses. He is not originally virtuous, but he becomes virtuous by overcoming his emotions. Emotion or passion is a movement of mind contrary to reason and nature, an impulse transgressing the right mean. The Peripatetic notion, that certain emotions are in accordance with nature, was flatly denied by the Stoics. The seat of the emotions—and, indeed, of all impulses and every activity of the soul —is man’s reason, the ἡγεμονικόν. Emotion is that state of the ἡγεμονικόν in which it is hurried into what is contrary to nature by excess of impulse. Like virtue, emotion is due to a change taking place simultaneously, not to the effect of a separate extraneous force. Imagination, therefore, alone calls it into being, as it does impulse in general. All emotions arise from faults in judgment, from false notions of good and evil, and may therefore be called, in so many words, judgments or opinions; —avarice, for instance, is a wrong opinion as to the value of money, fear is a wrong opinion as regards future, trouble as regards present ills. Still, as appears from the general view of the Stoics respecting impulses, this language does not imply that emotion is only a theoretical condition. On the contrary, the effects of a faulty imagination—the feelings and motions of will, to which it gives rise—are expressly included in its conception; nor is it credible, as Galenus states, that this was only done by Zeno, and not by Chrysippus. The Stoics, therefore, notwithstanding their theory of necessity, did not originally assent to the Socratic dictum, that no one does wrong voluntarily. Younger members of the School may have used the dictum as an excuse for human faults, fearing lest, in allowing freedom to emotions, they should admit that they were morally admissible and give up the possibility of overcoming them. Nay more, as all that proceeds from the will and impulse is voluntary, so too emotions are also in our power; and it is for us to say, in the case of convictions out of which emotions arise, as in the case of every other conviction, whether we will yield or withhold assent. Just as little would they allow that only instruction is needed in order to overcome emotions; for all emotions arise, as they say, from lack of self-control, and differ from errors in that they assert themselves and oppose our better intelligence. How irregular and irrational impulses arise in reason was a point which the Stoics never made any serious attempt to explain.

Emotions being called forth by imagination, their character depends on the kind of imagination which produces them. Now all impulses are directed to what is good and evil, and consist either in pursuing what appears to be a good, or in avoiding what appears to be an evil. This good and this evil is sometimes a present, and sometimes a future object. Hence there result four chief classes of faulty imagination, and, corresponding with them, four classes of emotions. From an irrational opinion as to what is good there arises pleasure, when it refers to things present; desire, when it refers to things future. A faulty opinion of present evils produces care; of future evils, fear. Zeno had already distinguished these four principal varieties of emotions. The same division was adopted by his pupil Aristo, and afterwards became quite general. Yet the vagueness, already mentioned, appears in the Stoic system in the definition of individual emotions. By some, particularly by Chrysippus, the essence of emotions is placed in the imagination which causes them; by others, in the state of mind which the imagination produces. The four principal classes of emotions are again subdivided into numerous subordinate classes, in the enumeration of which the Stoic philosophers appear to have been more guided by the use of language than by psychology.

In treating the subject of emotions in general, far less importance was attached by the Stoics to psychological accuracy than to considerations of moral worth. That the result could not be very satisfactory, follows from what has been already stated. Emotions are impulses, overstepping natural limits, upsetting the proper balance of the soul’s powers, contradicting reason—in a word, they are failures, disturbances of mental health, and, if indulged in, become chronic diseases of the soul. Hence a Stoic demands their entire suppression: true virtue can only exist where this process has succeeded. As being contrary to nature and symptoms of disease, the wise man must be wholly free from them. When we have once learnt to value things according to their real worth, and to discover everywhere nature’s unchanging law, nothing will induce us to yield to emotion. Hence the teaching of Plato and Aristotle, requiring emotions to be regulated, but not uprooted, was attacked in the most vigorous manner by these philosophers. A moderate evil, they say, always remains an evil. What is faulty and opposed to reason, ought never to be tolerated, not even in the smallest degree. On the other hand, when an emotion is regulated by and subordinated to reason, it ceases to be an emotion, the term emotion only applying to violent impulses, which are opposed to reason. The statement of the Peripatetics, that certain emotions are not only admissible, but are useful and necessary, appears of course to the Stoics altogether wrong. To them, only what is morally good appears to be useful: emotions are, under all circumstances, faults; and were an emotion to be useful, virtue would be advanced by means of what is wrong. The right relation, therefore, towards emotions—indeed, the only one morally tenable—is an attitude of absolute hostility. The wise man must be emotionless. Pain he may feel, but, not regarding it as an evil, he will suffer no affliction, and know no fear. He may be slandered and ill-treated, but he cannot be injured or degraded. Being untouched by honour and dishonour, he has no vanity. To anger he never yields, nor needs this irrational impulse, not even for valour and the championship of right. But he also feels no pity, and exercises no indulgence. For how can he pity others for what he would not himself consider an evil? How can he yield to a diseased excitement for the sake of others, which he would not tolerate for his own sake? If justice calls for punishment, feelings will not betray him into forgiveness. We shall subsequently have an opportunity for learning the further application of these principles.

Virtue is thus negatively defined as the being exempt from emotions, as apathy. There is also a positive side to supplement this negative view. Looking at the matter of virtuous action, this may be said to consist in subordination to the general law of nature; looking at its manner, in rational self-control. Virtue is exclusively a matter of reason —in short, it is nothing else but rightly ordered reason. To speak more explicitly, virtue contains in itself two elements—one practical, the other speculative. At the root, and as a condition of all rational conduct, lies, according to the Stoics, right knowledge. On this point they are at one with the well-known Socratic doctrine, and with the teaching of the Cynics and Megarians. Natural virtue, or virtue acquired only by exercise, they reject altogether. After the manner of Socrates, they define virtue as knowledge, vice as ignorance, and insist on the necessity of learning virtue. Even the avowed enemy of all speculative enquiry, Aristo of Chios, was on this point at one with the rest of the School. All virtues were by him referred to wisdom, and, consequently, he denied the claims of most to be virtues at all.

However closely the Stoics cling to the idea that all virtue is based on knowledge, and is in itself nothing else but knowledge, they are not content with knowledge, or with placing knowledge above practical activity, as Plato and Aristotle had done. As we have seen already, knowledge with them was only a means towards rational conduct, and it is expressly mentioned, as a deviation from the teaching of the School, that Herillus of Carthage, Zeno’s pupil, declared knowledge to be the end of life, and the only unconditional good. Virtue may, it is true, be called knowledge, but it is, at the same time, essentially health and strength of mind, a right state of the soul agreeing with its proper nature; and it is required of man that he should never cease to labour and contribute towards the common good. Thus, according to Stoic principles, virtue is a combination of theory and practice, in which action is invariably based on intellectual knowledge, but, at the same time, knowledge finds its object in moral conduct—it is, in short, power of will based on rational understanding. This definition must not, however, be taken to imply that moral knowledge precedes will, and is only subsequently referred to will, nor conversely that the will only uses knowledge as a subsidiary instrument. In the eyes of a Stoic, knowledge and will are not only inseparable, but they are one and the same thing. Virtue cannot be conceived without knowledge, nor knowledge without virtue. The one, quite as much as the other, is a right quality of the soul, or, speaking more correctly, is the rightly endowed soul,—reason, when it is as it ought to be. Hence virtue may be described, with equal propriety, either as knowledge or as strength of mind; and it is irrelevant to enquire which of these two elements is anterior in point of time.

But how are we to reconcile with this view the Stoic teaching of a plurality of virtues and their mutual relations? As the common root from which they spring, Zeno, following Aristotle, regarded understanding, Cleanthes, strength of mind, Aristo, at one time health, at another the knowledge of good and evil. Later teachers, after the time of Chrysippus, thought that it consisted in knowledge or wisdom, understanding by wisdom absolute knowledge, the knowing all things, human and divine. From this common root, a multiplicity of virtues was supposed to proceed, which, after Plato’s example, are grouped round four principal virtues —intelligence, bravery, justice, self-control. Intelligence consists in knowing what is good and bad, and what is neither the one nor the other, the indifferent; bravery, in knowing what to choose, what to avoid, and what neither to choose nor to avoid; or, substituting the corresponding personal attitude for knowledge, bravery is fearless obedience to the law of reason, both in boldness and endurance. Self-control consists in knowing what to choose, and what to eschew, and what neither to choose nor eschew; justice, in knowing how to give to everyone what is his due. In a corresponding manner, the principal faults are traced back to the conception of ignorance. Probably all these definitions belong to Chrysippus. Other definitions are attributed to his predecessors, some more nearly, others more remotely, agreeing with him in their conception of virtue. Within these limits, a great number of individual virtues were distinguished, their differences and precise shades of meaning being worked out with all the pedantry which characterised Chrysippus. The definitions of a portion of them have been preserved by Diogenes and Stobæus. In a similar way, too, the Stoics carried their classification of errors into the minutest details.

The importance attaching to this division of virtues, the ultimate basis on which it rests, and the relation which virtues bear, both to one another and to the common essence of virtue, are topics upon which Zeno never entered. Plutarch, at least, blames him for treating virtues as many, and yet inseparable, and at the same time for finding in all virtues only certain manifestations of the understanding. Aristo attempted to settle this point more precisely. According to his view, virtue is in itself only one; in speaking of many virtues, we only refer to the variety of objects with which that one virtue has to do. The difference of one virtue from another is not one of inward quality, but depends on the external conditions under which they are manifested; it only expresses a definite relation to something else, or, in the language of Herbart, an accidental aspect. The same view would seem to be implied in the manner in which Cleanthes determines the relations of the principal virtues to one another. It was, however, opposed by Chrysippus. The assumption of many virtues, he believed, rested upon an inward difference; each definite virtue, as also each definite fault, becoming what it does by a peculiar change in the character of the soul itself; in short, for a particular virtue to come into being, it is not enough that the constituent element of all virtue should be directed towards a particular object, but to the common element must be superadded a further characteristic element, or differentia; the several virtues being related to one another, as the various species of one genus.

All virtues have, however, one and the same end, which they compass in different ways, and all presuppose the same moral tone and conviction, which is only to be found where it is to be found perfect, and ceases to exist the moment it is deprived of one of its component parts. They are, indeed, distinct from one another, each one having its own end, towards which it is primarily directed; but, at the same time, they again coalesce, inasmuch as none can pursue its own end without pursuing that of the others at the same time. Accordingly, no part of virtue can be separated from its other parts. Where one virtue exists, the rest exist also, and where there is one fault, there all is faulty. Even each single virtuous action contains all other virtues, for the moral tone of which it is the outcome includes in itself all the rest. What makes virtue virtue, and vice vice, is simply and solely the intention. The will, although it may lack the means of execution, is worth quite as much as the deed; a wicked desire is quite as criminal as the gratification of that desire. Hence only that action can be called virtuous which is not only good in itself, but which proceeds from willing the good; and although, in the first instance, the difference between the discharge and the neglect of duty (κατόρθωμα and ἁμάρτημα) depends on the real agreement or disagreement of our actions with the moral law, yet that alone can be said to be a true and perfect discharge of duty which arises from a morally perfect character.

Such a character, the Stoics held, must either exist altogether, or not at all; for virtue is an indivisible whole, which we cannot possess in part, but must either have or not have. He who has a right intention and a right appreciation of good and evil, is virtuous; he who has not these requisites is lacking in virtue; there is no third alternative. Virtue admits neither of increase nor diminution, and there is no mean between virtue and vice. This being the case, and the value of an action depending wholly on the intention, it follows, necessarily, that virtue admits of no degrees. If the intention must be either good or bad, the same must be true of actions; and if a good intention or virtue has in it nothing bad, and a bad intention has in it nothing good, the same is true of actions. A good action is unconditionally praiseworthy; a bad one, unconditionally blameworthy, the former being only found where virtue exists pure and entire; the latter, only where there is no virtue at all. All good actions are, on the one hand, according to the well-known paradox, equally good; all bad actions, on the other, equally bad. The standard of moral judgment is an absolute one; and when conduct does not altogether conform to this standard, it falls short of it altogether.

From what has been said, it follows that there can be but one thoroughgoing moral distinction for all mankind, the distinction between the virtuous and the vicious; and that within each of these classes there can be no difference in degree. He who possesses virtue possesses it whole and entire; he who lacks it lacks it altogether; and whether he is near or far from possessing it is a matter of no moment. He who is only a hand-breadth below the surface of the water will be drowned just as surely as one who is five hundred fathoms deep; he who is blind sees equally little whether he will recover his sight to-morrow or never. The whole of mankind are thus divided by the Stoics into two classes—those who are wise and those who are foolish; and these two classes are treated by them as mutually exclusive, each one being complete in itself. Among the wise no folly, among the foolish no wisdom of any kind, is possible. The wise man is absolutely free from faults and mistakes: all that he does is right; in him all virtues centre; he has a right opinion on every subject, and never a wrong one, nor, indeed, ever what is merely an opinion. The bad man, on the contrary, can do nothing aright; he has every kind of vice; he has no right knowledge, and is altogether rude, violent, cruel, and ungrateful.

The Stoics delight in insisting upon the perfection of the wise man, and contrasting with it the absolute faultiness of the foolish man, in a series of paradoxical assertions. The wise man only is free, because he only uses his will to control himself; he only is beautiful, because only virtue is beautiful and attractive; he only is rich and happy (εὐτυχὴς), because goods of the soul are the most valuable, true riches consisting in being independent of wants. Nay, more, he is absolutely rich, since he who has a right view of everything has everything in his intellectual treasury, and he who makes the right use of everything bears to everything the relation of owner. The wise only know how to obey, and they also only know how to govern; they only are therefore kings, generals, pilots; they only are orators, poets, and prophets; and since their view of the Gods and their worship of the Gods is the true one, only amongst them can true piety be found—they are the only priests and friends of heaven; all foolish men, on the contrary, are impious, profane, and enemies of the Gods. Only the wise man is capable of feeling gratitude, love, and friendship, he only is capable of receiving a benefit, nothing being of use or advantage to the foolish man. To sum up, the wise man is absolutely perfect, absolutely free from passion and want, absolutely happy; as the Stoics conclusively assert, he in no way falls short of the happiness of Zeus, since time, the only point in which he differs from Zeus, does not augment happiness at all. On the other hand, the foolish man is altogether foolish, unhappy, and perverse; or, in the expressive language of the Stoics, every foolish man is a madman, he being a madman who has no knowledge of himself, nor of what most closely affects him.

This assertion is all the more trenchant because the Stoics recognised neither virtue nor wisdom outside their own system or one closely related to it, and because they took a most unfavourable view of the moral condition of their fellow-men. That they should do so was inevitable from their point of view. A system which sets up its own moral idea against current notions so sharply as that of the Stoics can only be the offspring of a thorough disapproval of existing circumstances, and must, on the other hand, contribute thereto. According to the Stoic standard, by far the majority, indeed, almost the whole of mankind, belong to the class of the foolish. If all foolish people are equally and altogether bad, mankind must have seemed to them to be a sea of corruption and vice, from which, at best, but a few swimmers emerge at spots widely apart. Man passes his life—such had already been the complaint of Cleanthes —in wickedness. Only here and there does one, in the evening of life, after many wanderings, attain to virtue. And that this was the common opinion among the successors of Cleanthes, is witnessed by their constant complaints of the depravity of the foolish, and of the rare occurrence of a wise man.

No one probably has expressed this opinion more frequently or more strongly than Seneca. We are wicked, he says; we have been wicked; we shall be wicked. Our ancestors complained of the decline of morals; we complain of their decline; and posterity will utter the very same complaint. The limits within which morality oscillates are not far asunder; the modes in which vice shows itself change, but its power remains the same. All men are wicked; and he who has as yet done nothing wicked is at least in a condition to do it. All are thankless, avaricious, cowardly, impious; all are mad. We have all done wrong—one in a less, the other in a greater degree; and we shall all do wrong to the end of the chapter. One drives the other into folly, and the foolish are too numerous to allow the individual to improve. He who would be angry with the vices of men, instead of pitying their faults, would never stop. So great is the amount of iniquity!

No doubt the age in which Seneca lived afforded ample occasion for such effusions, but his predecessors must have found similar occasions in their own days. Indeed, all the principles of the Stoic School, when consistently developed, made it impossible to consider the great majority of men as anything else than a mass of fools and sinners. From this sweeping verdict, even the most distinguished names were not excluded. If asked for examples of wisdom, they would point to Socrates, Diogenes, Antisthenes, and, in later times, to Cato; but not only would they deny philosophic virtue, as Plato had done before them, to the greatest statesmen and heroes of early times, but they would deny to them all and every kind of virtue. Even the admission that general faults belong to some in a lower degree than to others can hardly be reconciled with their principle of the equality of all who are not wise.

The two moral states being thus at opposite poles, a gradual transition from one to the other is, of course, out of the question. There may be a progress from folly and wickedness in the direction of wisdom, but the actual passage from one to the other must be momentary and instantaneous. Those who are still progressing belong, without exception, to the class of the foolish; and one who has lately become wise is in the first moment unconscious of his new state. The transition takes place so rapidly, and his former state affords so few points of contact with the one on which he has newly entered, that the mind does not keep pace with the change, and only becomes conscious of it by subsequent experience.

In this picture of the wise man, the moral idealism of the Stoic system attained its zenith. A virtuous will appears here so completely sundered from all outward conditions of life, so wholly free from all the trammels of natural existence, and the individual has become so completely the organ of universal law, that it may be asked, What right has such a being to call himself a person? How can such a being be imagined as a man living among fellow-men? Nor was this question unknown to the Stoics themselves. Unless they are willing to allow that their theory was practically impossible, and their ideal scientifically untenable, how could they escape the necessity of showing that it might be reconciled with the wants of human life and the conditions of reality? Let the attempt be once made, however, and withal they would be forced to look for some means of adapting it to those very feelings and opinions towards which their animosity had formerly been so great. Nor could the attempt be long delayed. Daily a greater value was attached to the practical working of their system, and to its agreement with general opinion. The original direction of Stoic morality aimed at the absolute and unconditional submission of the individual to the law of the universe, yet, in developing that theory, the rights of the individual asserted themselves unmistakably. From this confluence of opposite currents arose a deviation from the rigid type of the Stoic system, some varieties of which, in the direction of the ordinary view of life, deserve now further consideration.