CHAPTER XIV.. The Stoic Philosophy As a Whole and Its Historical Position.

THE STOIC PHILOSOPHY AS A WHOLE AND ITS HISTORICAL POSITION.

Having now investigated the Stoic system in detail, we are in a position to pass a definite judgment on the scope of the Stoic philosophy, the import and the relation of its various parts, and its historical position. Its peculiar character manifests itself before all things in the three points to which attention was drawn at the outset: —its pre-eminently practical tone, the determination of this practical tendency by the notions of the good and of virtue, and the use of logic and natural science as a scientific basis. Speculative knowledge is not, as we have seen, to the Stoics an end in itself, but only a means for producing a right moral attitude; all philosophical research stands directly or indirectly in the service of virtue. Both in the earlier and in the later days of its existence the Stoic School advocated this principle in the most determined and exclusive manner, nor was it even denied by Chrysippus, the chief representative of its science and learning.

If it be then asked what is the right moral attitude, the Stoics reply: action conformable to nature and reason—in other words, virtue. Virtue, however, implies two things. On the one hand it implies the resignation of the individual to the universe, obedience to the universal law; on the other hand it implies the harmony of man with himself, the dominion of the higher over the lower nature, of reason over emotion, and the rising superior to everything which does not belong to his true nature. Both statements may be reconciled, because the law of morality is addressed only to reasonable beings, and is the law of their nature, and can only be carried into execution by their own exertions. Still, in the Stoic ethics, two currents of thought may be clearly distinguished, which from time to time come into actual collision; the one requiring the individual to live for the common good and for society, the other impelling him to live for himself only, to emancipate himself from all that is not himself, and to console himself with the feeling of virtue. The first of these tendencies impels man to seek the society of others; the second enables him to dispense with it. From the former spring the virtues of justice, sociability, love of man; from the latter, the inner freedom and happiness of the virtuous man. The former culminates in citizenship of the world; the latter in the self-sufficingness of the wise man. In as far as virtue includes everything that can be required of man, happiness depends on it alone; nothing is good but virtue, nothing is evil but vice; all that is not connected with the moral nature is indifferent. On the other hand, in as far as virtue is based on human nature, it stands on the same footing with all else that is conformable with nature. If its own peculiar value cannot be surrendered, no more can it be required that we should be indifferent to its conformity to nature, that it should not have for us some positive or negative value, or in some way affect our feelings. Therewith the doctrine of things indifferent and the wise man’s freedom from emotions begins to totter. Lastly, if we look at the way in which virtue exists in man, we arrive at different results, according as we look at its essence or its manifestation. Virtue consists in acting conformably with reason, and reason is one and undivided; hence it appears that virtue forms an undivided unity, and must be possessed whole and entire or not at all. From this proposition the contrast of the wise and foolish man, with all its bluntness and extravagances, is only a legitimate consequence. Or, again, if we look at the conditions upon which, owing to human nature, the acquisition and possession of virtue depends, the conviction is inevitable that the wise man as drawn by the Stoics never occurs in reality. Hence the conclusion is undeniable that the contrast between wise men and fools is more uncertain than it at first appeared to be. Thus all the main features of the Stoic ethics may be simply deduced from their one fundamental notion, that rational action or virtue is the only good.

Not only does this view of ethics require a peculiar theory of the world to serve as its scientific basis, but it has a reflex action also, influencing alike the tone and the results of theoretic enquiry. If the duty of man is declared to consist in bringing his actions into harmony with the laws of the universe, it becomes also necessary that he should endeavour himself to know the world and its laws. The more his knowledge of the world increases, the greater will be the value which he attaches to the forms of scientific procedure. If, moreover, man is required to be nothing more than an instrument of the universal law, it is only consistent to suppose an absolute regularity of procedure in the universe, an unbroken connection of cause and effect, and ultimately to refer everything to one highest all-moving cause, and to include everything under one primary substance. If in human life the individual has no rights as against the laws of the universe, then all that is of individual occurrence in the world is powerless against universal necessity. On the other hand, if in the case of man everything turns upon strength of will, then likewise in the universe the acting power must be regarded as the highest and most exalted. There arises thus that view of the world as a series of forces which constitutes one of the most peculiar and thorough-going characteristics of the Stoic view of nature. Lastly, if such excessive importance is attached to practical conduct as is done by the Stoics, that sensuous view of the world which finds its crudest expression in the Stoic Materialism and reliance on the senses, will most nearly accord with speculation. At the same time the Materialism of the Stoics is limited and corrected by the conception of the universe and of a divine all-penetrating power and reason, just as their appeal to the senses is by the demand for the formation of conceptions, and the general application of the process of demonstration; the truth of knowledge itself is based on a practical postulate, the greater or less certainty of which is measured by the strength of personal conviction. If these elements proved too contradictory to be harmonised; if the Materialism of the Stoics was at variance with their view of the world as a series of forces; if appeals to the senses were obviously in conflict with logical method, it was at least thereby clearly established that a practical and not a purely intellectual interest lay at the root of their system.

This statement must of course not be taken to mean that the Stoics first developed their ethical principles independently of their theory of the universe, and afterwards brought the two into connection with each other. On the contrary, it was by the peculiar connection of theory and practice that Stoicism itself first came into existence. The leading thought of Zeno consists in the attempt to vindicate the supremacy of virtue by a scientific knowledge of the laws of the world; and he becomes the founder of a new School only by bringing to Cynicism those scientific ideas and aims which he had learned himself in the School of Polemo, Stilpo, and Diodorus, or otherwise gathered from a study of ancient philosophy. These elements are not therefore accidentally brought together in Stoicism, but they are co-extensive, and dependent one upon the other. As in the natural science and theory of knowledge of the Stoics, the experimental basis on which their system was built may be easily seen, so the peculiar development of their ethics supposes all those positions respecting the universe and the powers therein at work, which form the most important part of their natural science. Only by a scientific treatment of this kind was Stoicism at all able to improve upon the imperfection of the Cynic ethics, so far at least as it really did so, and to accommodate itself to the wants of human nature, so far as to be able to exercise an influence at large. Upon this union of ethics and metaphysics that religious attitude of the Stoic system reposes, to which it owes in a great measure its historical importance. Thereby it occupies so influential a position in an age in which intellectual power was indeed declining, but in which the interest for science was keen. But that Stoic physics and metaphysics should have adopted this line, and no other; that Zeno and his followers, who draw on former systems for their own on the most extensive scale, should have borrowed from these systems these and no other positions, and expanded them in this and no other direction; these results are, doubtless, ultimately due to their moral attitude. All that bore on the subject of ethics, and supported it, they appropriated; all that was opposed thereto they rejected. The Stoic system as such owes its rise to a union of ethical and speculative elements, in which both were more definitely determined by one another; still the ethical platform is the one on which its formation commences, and which primarily determined its course and results.

In order to obtain a more accurate notion of the rise of Stoicism, the premises on which it proceeds, and the grounds on which it is based, we must take a glance at its relation to preceding systems. The Stoics themselves deduced their philosophical pedigree directly from Antisthenes, and indirectly from Socrates. Clear as is their connection with both these philosophers, it would nevertheless be a mistake to regard their teaching as a revival of Cynicism, still more to regard it as a simple following of Socrates. From both it undoubtedly borrowed much. The self-sufficiency of virtue, the distinction of things good, evil, and indifferent, the ideal picture of the wise man, the whole withdrawal from the outer world within the precincts of the mind, and the strength of moral will, are ideas taken from the Cynics. In the spirit of Cynicism, too, it explained general ideas as simply names. Not to mention many peculiarities of ethics, the contrasting of one God with the many popular Gods, and the allegorical explanation of myths, were likewise points borrowed from Cynicism. The identification of virtue with intelligence, the belief that virtue was one, and could be imparted by teaching, were at once in the spirit of Socrates and also in that of the Cynics. The argument for the existence of God based on the subordination of means to ends, the whole view of the world as a system of means and ends, and the Stoic theory of Providence, are views peculiarly Socratic; and the Stoics followed Socrates in ethics by identifying the good and the useful.

And yet the greatness of the interval which separates the Stoics even from the Cynics becomes at once apparent on considering the relation of Aristo to the rest of the Stoic School. In refusing to meddle with natural or mental science, or even with ethical considerations at all, Aristo faithfully reflects the principles of Antisthenes. In asserting the unity of virtue to such an extent that all virtues are merged in one, he was only repeating similar expressions of Antisthenes. In denying any difference in value to things morally indifferent, and in placing the highest morality in this indifference, he was, according to the older writers, reasserting a Cynic tenet. Conversely in denying these statements, as the great majority of Stoics did, the points are indicated in which Stoicism differed from Cynicism. In the feeling of moral independence, and in invincible strength of will, the Cynic is opposed to the whole world; he needs for virtue no scientific knowledge of the world and its laws; he regards nothing external to himself; he allows nothing to influence his conduct, and attaches value to nothing; but, in consequence, he remains with his virtue confined to himself; virtue makes him independent of men and circumstances, but it has neither the will nor the power to interpose effectively in the affairs of life, and to infuse therein new moral notions. Stoicism insists upon the self-sufficiency of virtue quite as strongly as Cynicism, and will allow quite as little that anything except virtue can be a good in the strictest sense of the term. But in Stoicism the individual is not nearly so sharply opposed to the outer world as in Cynicism. The Stoic is too cultivated; he knows too well that he is a part of the universe to ignore the value of an intellectual view of the world, or to neglect the natural conditions of moral action, as things of no moment. What he aims at is not only a negation—independence from externals—but a positive position—life according to nature; and that life only he considers according to nature which is in harmony with the laws of the universe as well as with those of human nature. Hence Stoicism is not only far in advance of Cynicism by its intellectual attitude, but its moral philosophy also breathes a freer and milder spirit. Let only the principles of the Stoics on the necessity and value of scientific knowledge be compared with the sophistical assertions of Antisthenes, destructive of all knowledge; or the cultivated logical form of the intellectual edifice of the Stoics, with the chaotic condition of Cynic thought; or the careful metaphysical and psychological researches and the copious learning of the School of Chrysippus, with the Cynics’ contempt for all theory and all learned research, and it becomes apparent at once how deep-seated is the difference between the two systems, and how little Stoicism as a philosophic system can be deduced from Cynicism.

In ethics, too, the difference of the two Schools is also fully apparent. Stoic morality recognises, at least conditionally, a positive and negative value in external things and circumstances; the Cynic allows to these absolutely no value. The former forbids affection contrary to reason, the latter any and every kind of affection. The former throws the individual back upon human society, the latter isolates him. The former teaches citizenship of the world in a positive sense, requiring all to feel themselves one with their fellow-men; the latter in a negative sense, that of feeling indifferent to home and family. The former has a pantheistic tone about it, due to the lively feeling of the connection between man and the universe, and a definite theological stamp owing to its taking a stand by positive religion; the latter has a rationalistic character, owing to the enfranchisement of the wise man from the prejudices of popular belief, with which it has exclusively to do. In all these respects Stoicism preserves the original character of the Socratic philosophy far better than Cynicism, which only caricatured them. Still it departs from that character in two respects. In point of theory the Stoic doctrine received a systematic form and development such as Socrates never contemplated; and in natural science, it cultivated a field avoided by Socrates on principle, however much its doctrine of Providence, and its view of nature as a system of means subordinated to ends, may remind of Socrates. On the other hand, interest in science, although limited to the subject of ethics, is with Socrates far deeper and stronger than with the Stoics, the latter pursuing scientific research only as a means for solving moral problems. Hence the Socratic theory of a knowledge of conceptions, simple though it may sound, contained a fruitful germ of unexpanded speculation, in comparison with which all that the Stoics did is fragmentary. The Stoic ethics are not only more expanded and more carefully worked out in detail than those of Socrates, but they are also more logical in clinging to the principle that virtue alone is an unconditional good. There are no concessions to current modes of thought, such as Socrates allowed, who practically based his doctrine of morals upon utility. On the other hand, the moral science of the Stoics also falls far short of the frankness and cheerfulness of the Socratic view of life. If in many respects it toned down the asperities of Cynicism, still it appropriated its leading principles far too unreservedly to avoid accepting a great number of its conclusions.

Asking in the next place in how far the Stoics were induced by other influences to change and extend the platform of the Socratic philosophy, we have for determining the practical side of their system, besides the general tendency of the post-Aristotelian [(2) Relation to Megarians and Heraclitus.] philosophy, the example of Cynicism. Its speculative development, on the other hand, is partly connected with the Megarians, partly with Heraclitus; to the Megarians the personal connection of Zeno with Stilpo points, to Heraclitus the fact that from him the Stoics themselves deduced their views on natural science, which they expanded in commentaries on his writings.

Probably the Megarian influence must not be rated too high. Zeno may have thence received an impulse to that reasoning habit which appears with him in a preference for compressed sharp-pointed syllogisms; but in post-Aristotelian times, contact with Megarians was no longer wanted for this, and the greatest reasoner among the Stoics, Chrysippus, appears not only to have had no personal relations to them, but his logic is throughout a simple continuation of that of Aristotle.

Far greater, and more generally recognised, is the importance of the influence which the views on nature of the philosopher of Ephesus exercised on the Stoics. A system which laid such emphasis on the subordination of everything individual to the law of the universe, which singled out universal reason from the flux of things as the one thing everlastingly and permanently the same—a system in many other ways so nearly related to their own, must have strongly commended itself to their notice, and offered them many points with which to connect their own. If to us the view that life is dependent for its existence on matter is repulsive, it was otherwise to the Stoics; for them this very theory possessed special attractions. Hence, with the exception of the threefold division of the elements, there is hardly a single point in the Heraclitean theory of nature which the Stoics did not appropriate:—fire or ether as the primary element, the oneness of this element with universal reason, the law of the universe, destiny, God, the flux of things, the gradual change of the primary element into the four elements, and of these back to the primary element, the regular alternation of creation and conflagration in the world, the oneness and eternity of the universe, the description of the soul as fiery breath, the identification of the mind with the demon, the unconditional sovereignty of the universal law over individuals—these and many other points in the Stoic system, originally derived from Heraclitus, prove how greatly this system is indebted to him.

Nor must it be forgotten that there is nothing in Heraclitus analogous to the reasoning forms of the Stoics, nor can their ethical views be referred to his few and undeveloped hints. With all the importance the Stoics attached to natural science, it is with them only subordinate to moral science; and the very fact that it is referred to Heraclitus as its author, proves its inferior position, and the want of any independent interest in the subject. It is also unmistakeable that even in natural science the Stoics only partially follow Heraclitus, and that principles taken from Heraclitus often bear an altered meaning when wrought into the Stoic system. Omitting minor points, not only is the Stoic doctrine of nature in a formal point of view far more developed, and with regard to its extension far more comprehensive, than the corresponding doctrine of Heraclitus, but the whole Stoic view of the world is by no means so completely identical with his as might be supposed. The flux of things, which the Stoics teach equally with Heraclitus, has not for them that overwhelming importance that it had for him. The matter of which the universe consists may be always going over into new forms, but, at the same time, it is for them the permanent material and essence of things. Individual substances, too, are treated by the Stoics as corporeally permanent. Moreover, from the material they distinguish the active principle, Reason or deity, far more definitely than Heraclitus had done, and the same distinction is carried into individual things in the contrast between matter and quality. Thereby it becomes possible for them to contrast much more sharply than their predecessor had done the reason of the world, and the blindly working power of nature. Heraclitus, it would appear, confined his attention to observing nature and describing its elementary meteorological processes. But the natural science of the Stoics includes the idea of means working for ends. It sees the object in referring the whole arrangement of the world to man, and it pursues this line of thought exclusively, neglecting in consequence science proper. Hence the idea of sovereign reason or the universal law had not the same meaning in the minds of both. Heraclitus sees this reason, primarily and chiefly, in the ordinary sequence of natural phenomena, in the regularity of the course by which to each individual phenomenon its place in the world, its extent and duration are prescribed—in short, in the unchanging coherence of nature. Without excluding this aspect in their proofs of the existence of God and the rule of Providence, the Stoics attach the chief importance to the serviceableness of the order of nature. The reason which rules the world appears in Heraclitus primarily as a natural power; in the Stoics, as intelligence working with a purpose. For Heraclitus Nature is the highest object, the object of independent and absolute interest; and hence the infinite Being is no more than the power which forms the world. The Stoics regard nature from the platform of humanity, as a means for the wellbeing and activity of man. Their deity accordingly does not work as a simple power of nature, but essentially as the wisdom which cares for the wellbeing of man. The highest conception in the system of Heraclitus is that of nature or destiny. Stoicism accepted this conception also, but at the same time developed it to the higher idea of Providence.

Shall we be wrong if we attribute this modification of the Heraclitean theory of nature by the Stoics partly to the influence of Socrates’ and Plato’s theory of final causes, but in a still greater degree to the influence of the Aristotelian philosophy? To Aristotle belongs properly the idea of matter without qualities, no less than the distinction between a material and a formal cause. Aristotle applied the idea of purpose to natural science far more extensively than any other system had done before; and although the mode in which the Stoics expressed this idea has more resemblance to the popular theological statements of Socrates and Plato than to Aristotle, still the Stoic conception of a natural power working with a purpose, such as is contained in the idea of artificial fire and λόγοι σπερματικοὶ, is essentially Aristotelian. Even many positions which appear to be advanced in opposition to Aristotle were yet connected with him. Thus the existence of ether as a body distinct from the four elements is denied, and yet in point of fact it is asserted under a new name—that of artificial fire. The Peripatetic doctrine of the origin of the rational soul is contradicted by the Stoic theory of development, and yet the latter is based on a statement in Aristotle to the effect that the germ of the animal soul lies in the warm air which surrounds the seed, warm air which Aristotle distinguishes from fire quite as carefully as Zeno and Cleanthes distinguished the two kinds of fire. Even the point of greatest divergence from Aristotelian teaching—the transformation of the human soul and the divine spirit into something corporeal—might yet be connected with Aristotle, and, indeed, the Peripatetic School here comes to their assistance. For had not Aristotle described the ether as the most divine body, the stars formed out of it as divine and happy beings? Had he not brought down the acting and moving forces from a heavenly sphere to the region of earth? Had he not, as we have just seen, sought the germ of the soul in an ethereal matter? And might not others go a little further and arrive at materialistic views? and all the more so, seeing how hard it is to conceive the extra-mundane intelligence of Aristotle, at once as incorporeal, and yet touching and encircling the world of matter, and to make personal unity in the human soul accord with an origin in a reason coming from above?

The way for Stoicism was more directly paved by the Aristotelian speculations as to the origin of notions and conceptions. Here the Stoics did little more than omit (in conformity with their principles) what their predecessor had said as to an original possession and immediate knowledge of truth. It has been remarked on an earlier occasion how closely their formal logic followed that of Aristotle; they contented themselves with building on Aristotelian foundations, and even their additions have more reference to grammar than to logic. The actual influence of Peripatetic views on those of the Stoics appears to have been least in the province of ethics. Here the crudity of the Stoic conception of virtue, the entire suppression of emotions, the absolute exclusion of everything external from the circle of moral goods, the distinction between the wise and the foolish man, the attacks on a purely speculative life, present a sharp contrast to the caution and many-sidedness of Aristotle’s moral theory, to his careful weighing of current opinions and their practicability, to his recognition of propriety in every shape and form, and to the praise which he lavishes on a purely speculative life. What the Stoics chiefly owe to Aristotle is the formal treatment of the materials and the psychological analysis of individual moral faculties. On the other hand, the province of ethics must be looked to for traces of the teaching which Zeno received from Polemo, perhaps even from Xenocrates.

The speculative portions of Plato’s teaching could offer no great attractions to practical men and materialists like the Stoics, either in their original form or in the form which they assumed in the older Academy under Pythagorean influence. On the other hand, such points in Platonism as the Socratic habit of making knowledge the foundation of virtue, the comparative depreciation of external goods, the disparagement of all that is sensual, the elevation and the purity of moral idealism, and, in the older Academy, the demand for life according to nature, the doctrine of the self-sufficingness of virtue, and the growing tendency to confine philosophy to practical issues—all these were questions for a Stoic full of interest. Unfounded as the notion of the later Eclectics is, that the Stoic and Academician systems of morality were altogether the same, the Stoics, nevertheless, appear to have received suggestions from the Academy which they carried out in a more determined spirit. Thus the theory of living according to nature belongs originally to the Academy, although the Stoics adopted it with a peculiar and somewhat different meaning. Besides influencing the moral doctrines of the Stoics, the attitude assumed by the older Academy towards positive religion may also have had some influence on their orthodoxy; their most prominent representative, Cleanthes, is in his whole philosophic character the counterpart of Xenocrates. Although later in its origin than Stoicism, the new Academy was not without important influence on that system, through the person of Chrysippus, but this influence was at first only of an indirect kind, inasmuch as it obliged the Stoics by its logical contradiction to look about for a more logical basis for their system, and therewith to attempt a more systematic expansion of their teaching. Somewhat similar is the effect of Epicureanism, which by its strong opposition in the field of ethics imparted decision and accuracy to the Stoic doctrine, and thus indirectly helped to form it.

By the aid of these remarks it now becomes possible to give a satisfactory account of the history of Stoicism. Belonging to an age of moral debasement and political oppression, its founder, Zeno, conceived the idea of liberating himself and all who were able to follow him from its degeneracy and slavery by means of a philosophy which, by purity and strength of moral will, would procure independence from all external things, and unruffled inward peace. That his endeavours should have taken this practical turn, that he should have proposed to himself not knowledge as such, but the moral exercise of knowledge as the object to be realised, was in part due to his own personal character, and may be in part referred to the general circumstances of the times. On nobler and more serious minds, these circumstances weighed too heavily not to call forth opposition and resistance in place of listless contemplation. The sway of the Macedonian, and afterwards of the Roman Empire, was far too despotic to allow the least prospect of open resistance. Nor must it be overlooked that philosophy itself had reached a pass at which satisfactory answers to speculative problems were no longer forthcoming; hence attention was naturally directed to questions of morals.

Haunted by this longing for virtue, Zeno must have felt attracted by a system of philosophy which had at an earlier period followed a similar course with marked success, viz. the system of the Cynics, and what he doubtless identified therewith, the old Socratic teaching. Anxious to find a positive meaning and scientific basis for virtue, he strove to appropriate from every system whatever agreed with the bent of his own mind. By using all the labours of his predecessors, and keeping his eye steadily fixed upon the practical end of philosophy, he succeeded in forming a new and more comprehensive system, which was afterwards completed by Chrysippus. In point of form this system was most indebted to the Peripatetic philosophy; in point of matter, next to its debt to the Cynics, which has been already mentioned, its chief obligation was to Heraclitus. But the moral theory of the Stoics was as little identical with that of the Cynics, as the natural science of the Stoics was with that of Heraclitus. If the divergence was, in the first instance, due to the influence of the Stoic principles, still the influence of the Peripatetic teaching is unmistakeable in the natural and speculative science of the Stoics, and the influence of the Academy in their moral science. Stoicism does not, therefore, appear simply as a continuation of Cynicism, nor yet as an isolated innovation, but, like every other form of thought which marks an epoch, it worked up into itself all previous materials, and produced from their combination a new result. In this process of assimilation much that was beautiful and full of meaning was omitted; everything was absorbed that could be of use in the new career on which the Greek mind was about to enter.

It was the fault of the age that it could no longer come up to the many-sidedness of an Aristotle or a Plato. Stoicism, it is true, approximates thereto more nearly than any other of the post-Aristotelian systems. But in its practical view of philosophy, in its materialistic appeal to the senses, in its theoretical self-sufficiency, setting up the wise man as superior to the weaknesses and wants of human nature; in its citizenship of the world, throwing political interests into the background; and in so many other traits it is the fit exponent of an epoch in which the taste for purely scientific research and the delight in ethical speculation were at an end, whilst out of the overthrow of states, and the growth of freedom, the idea of humanity was coming to the fore. Stoicism represented most powerfully the moral and religious convictions of such an age, yet not without onesidedness and exaggeration. By exercise of the will and by rational understanding, man is to become free and happy. This aim is, however, pursued so persistently that the natural conditions of human existence and the claims of individuality are ignored. To man, regarded as the exponent of universal law, as little freedom of will is allowed by the Stoic natural science in face of the inexorable course of nature as freedom of action is allowed by the Stoic ethics in face of the demands of duty. The universal claims of morality are alone acknowledged; the right of the individual to act according to his peculiar character, and to develop that character, is almost ignored. The individual, as such, dwindles into obscurity, whilst a high place in the world is assigned to mankind collectively. The individual is subordinated to the law of the whole; but by regarding nature as a system of means and ends, and introducing the belief in Providence and Prophecy, the universe is again subordinated to the interests of man—a view against which a more careful research has many objections to urge. In both respects Epicureanism is in decided contrast to Stoicism, though agreeing with it in the general tone of its practical philosophy and in its aim to make man independent of the outer world and happy in himself.