A Little Book of Stoicism | Page 2

exercised the right of
private judgment in selecting the authority whom he should follow, and,
having once done that, trusted to him for all the rest. With the analogue
of this contention also we are familiar in modern times. Cicero allows
that there would be something in it, if the selection of the true
philosopher did not above all things require the philosophic mind. But
in those days it was probably the case, as it is now, that, if a man did
not form speculative opinions in youth, the pressure of affairs would
not leave him leisure to do so later.
The life span of Zeno, the founder of Stoicism, was from B.C. 347 to
275. He did not begin teaching till 315, at the mature age of forty.
Aristotle had passed away in 322, and with him closed the great
constructive era of Greek thought. The Ionian philosophers had
speculated on the physical constitution of the universe, the
Pythagoreans on the mystical properties of numbers; Heraclitus had
propounded his philosophy of fire, Democritus and Leucippus had
struck out a rude form of the atomic theory, Socrates had raised
questions relating to man, Plato had discussed them with all the
freedom of the dialogue, while Aristotle had systematically worked
them out. The later schools did not add much to the body of philosophy.
What they did was to emphasize different sides of the doctrine of their
predecessors and to drive views to their logical consequences. The
great lesson of Greek philosophy is that it is worth while to do right
irrespective of reward and punishment and regardless of the shortness
of life. This lesson the Stoics so enforced by the earnestness of their
lives and the influence of their moral teaching that it has become
associated more particularly with them. Cicero, though he always
classed himself as an Academic, exclaims in one place that he is afraid
the Stoics are the only philosophers, and whenever he is combating

Epicureanism his language is that of a Stoic. Some of Vergil's most
eloquent passages seem to be inspired by Stoic speculation. Even
Horace, despite his banter about the sage, in his serious moods borrows
the language of the Stoics. It was they who inspired the highest flights
of declamatory eloquence in Persius and Juvenal. Their moral
philosophy affected the world through Roman law, the great masters of
which were brought up under its influence. So all pervasive indeed was
this moral philosophy of the Stoics that it was read by the Jews of
Alexandria into Moses under the veil of allegory and was declared to
be the inner meaning of the Hebrew Scriptures. If the Stoics then did
not add much to the body of Philosophy, they did a great work in
popularising it and bringing it to bear upon life.
An intense practicality was a mark of the later Greek philosophy. This
was common to Stoicism with its rival Epicureanism. Both regarded
philosophy as 'the art of life,' though they differed in their conception
of what that art should be. Widely as the two schools were opposed to
one another, they had also other features in common. Both were
children of an age in which the free city had given way to monarchies,
and personal had taken the place of corporate life. The question of
happiness is no longer, as with Aristotle, and still more with Plato, one
for the state, but for the individual. In both schools the speculative
interest was feeble from the first, and tended to become feebler as time
went on. Both were new departures from pre-existent schools. Stoicism
was bred out of Cynicism, as Epicureanism out of Cyrenaicism. Both
were content to fall back for their physics upon the pre-Socratic schools,
the one adopting the firm philosophy of Heraclitus, the other the atomic
theory of Democritus. Both were in strong reaction against the
abstractions of Plato and Aristotle, and would tolerate nothing but
concrete reality. The Stoics were quite as materialistic in their own way
as the Epicureans. With regard indeed to the nature of the highest god
we may, with Senaca represent the difference between the two schools
as a question of the senses against the intellect, but we shall see
presently that the Stoics regarded the intellect itself as being a kind of
body.
The Greeks were all agreed that there was an end or aim of life, and

that it was to be called 'happiness,' but at that point their agreement
ended. As to the nature of happiness there was the utmost variety of
opinion. Democritus had made it consist in mental serenity,
Anaxagoras in speculation, Socrates in wisdom, Aristotle in the
practise of virtue with some amount of favour from fortune, Aristippus
simply in pleasure. These were opinions of the philosophers. But,
besides these,