V.—He made Society tutelary to the individual in an excessive degree. He had no clear conception of the province of authority or law; and did not separate the morality of obligation from the morality of reward and nobleness.
VI.—His exclusion of Theology from morality was total.
THE STOICS.
The Stoics were one of the four sects of philosophy, recognized and conspicuous at Athens during the three centuries preceding the Christian era, and during the century or more following. Among these four sects, the most marked antithesis of ethical dogma was between the Stoics and the Epicureans. The Stoical system dates from about 300 B.C.; it was derived from the system of the Cynics.
The founder of the system was ZENO, from Citium in Cyprus (he lived from 340—260 B.C.), who derived his first impulse from Krates the Cynic. He opened his school in a building or porch, called the Stoa Poecile ('Painted Portico') at Athens, whence the origin of the name of the sect. Zeno had for his disciple CLEANTHES, from Assos in the Troad (300—220 B.C.), whose Hymn to Jupiter is the only fragment of any length that has come down to us from the early Stoics, and is a remarkable production, setting forth the unity of God, his omnipotence, and his moral government. CHRYSIPPUS, from Soli in Cilicia (290—207 B.C.), followed Cleanthes, and, in his voluminous writings, both defended and modified the Stoical creed. These three represent the first period of the system. The second period (200—50 B.C.) embraces its general promulgation, and its introduction to the Romans. Chrysippus was succeeded by ZENO of Sidon, and DIOGENES of Babylon; then followed ANTIPATER, of Tarsus, who taught PANAETIUS of Rhodes (d. 112 B.C.), who, again, taught POSIDONIUS of Apamea, in Syria. (Two philosophers are mentioned from the native province of St. Paul, besides Chrysippus—ATHEKODOEUS, from Cana in Cilicia; and ARCHEDEMUS, from Tarsus, the apostle's birthplace. It is remarked by Sir A. Grant, that almost all the first Stoics were of Asiatic birth; and the system itself is undeniably more akin to the oriental mind than to the Greek.) Posidonius was acquainted with Marius and Pompey, and gave lessons to Cicero, but the moral treatise of Cicero, De Officiis, is derived from a work of Panaetius. The third period of Stoicism is Roman. In this period, we have Cato the Younger, who invited to his house the philosopher Athenodorus; and, under the Empire, the three Stoic philosophers, whose writings have come down to us—SENECA (6 B.C.-65 A.D.), EPICTETUS (60-140 A.D.), who began life as a slave, and the Emperor MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS (121-180 A.D.). Stoicism prevailed widely in the Roman world, although not to the exclusion of Epicurean views.
The leading Stoical doctrines are given in certain phrases or expressions, as 'Life according to Nature' (although this phrase belongs also to the Epicureans), the ideal 'Wise Man,' 'Apathy,' or equanimity of mind (also an Epicurean ideal), the power of the 'Will,' the worship of 'Duty,' the constant 'Advance' in virtue, &c. But perspicuity will be best gained by considering the Moral system under four heads—the Theology; the Psychology or theory of mind; the theory of the Good or human happiness; and the scheme of Virtue or Duty.
I.—The THEOLOGICAL doctrines of the Stoics comprehended their system of the Universe, and of man's position in it. They held that the Universe is governed by one good and wise God, together with inferior or subordinate deities. God exercises a moral government; under it the good are happy, while misfortunes happen to the wicked. According to Epictetus, God is the father of men; Antoninus exults in the beautiful arrangement of all things. The earlier Stoics, Zeno and Chrysippus, entertained high reverence for the divination, prophecy, and omens that were generally current in the ancient world. They considered that these were the methods whereby the gods were graciously pleased to make known beforehand revelations of their foreordained purposes. (Herein lay one among the marked points of contrast between Stoics and Epicureans.) They held this foreordination even to the length of fatalism, and made the same replies, as have been given in modern times, to the difficulty of reconciling it with the existence of evil, and with the apparent condition of the better and the worse individuals among mankind. They offered explanations such as the following: (1) God is the author of all things except wickedness; (2) the very nature of good supposes its contrast evil, and the two are inseparable, like light and dark, (which may be called the argument from Relativity); (3) in the enormous extent of the Universe, some things must be neglected; (4) when evil happens to the good, it is not as a punishment, but as connected with a different dispensation; (5) parts of the world may be presided over by evil demons; (6) what we call evil may not be evil.
Like most other ancient schools, the Stoics held God to be corporeal like man:—Body is the only substance; nothing incorporeal could act on what is corporeal; the First Cause of all, God or Zeus, is the primeval fire, emanating from which is the soul of man in the form of a warm ether.
It is for human beings to recognize the Universe as governed by universal Law, and not only to raise their minds to the comprehension of it, but to enter into the views of the administering Zeus or Fate, who must regard all interests equally; we are to be, as it were, in harmony with him, to merge self in universal Order, to think only of that and its welfare. As two is greater than one, the interests of the whole world are infinitely greater than the interests of any single being, and no one should be satisfied with a regard to anything less than the whole. By this elevation of view, we are necessarily raised far above the consideration of the petty events befalling ourselves. The grand effort of human reason is thus to rise to the abstraction or totality of entire Nature; 'no ethical subject,' says Chrysippus, 'could be rightly approached except from the pre-consideration of entire Nature, and the ordering of the whole.'
As to Immortality, the Stoics precluded themselves, by holding the theory of the absorption of the individual soul at death into the divine essence; but, on the other hand, their doctrine of advance and aspiration is what has in all times been the main natural argument for the immortality of the soul. For the most part, they kept themselves undecided as to this doctrine, giving it as an alternative, reasoning as to our conduct on either supposition, and submitting to the pleasure of God in this as in all other things.