The bronze is the first cause of a statue; for it could never have been made, had there not been stuff to be cast or wrought into shape. The second cause is the sculptor; for the bronze could never have been brought into the shape of a statue without the artist’s touch. The third cause is the design; for the statue would not be called the ‘javelin-man’ or the ‘crowned king’ had not such a design been impressed upon it.
There is besides a fourth cause, the purpose. What is purpose? It is that which induced the sculptor to undertake the work, the aim that he had in view. It may have been money, if he intended to sell it; or glory, if he wished to make himself a name; or religious feeling, if he proposed to present it to a temple. That for the sake of which a thing is done is therefore also a cause; for you cannot think it right in making up a list of causes to omit something, apart from which the thing would never have been made.
Thus Aristotle postulates a multiplicity of causes; but we maintain that the list is either too long or too short.
If we hold that everything, apart from which the thing would never have been made, is a cause of its making, then the list is too short. We ought to reckon time as a cause, for nothing can be made without time. We ought to reckon space as a cause; for if there is no room for a thing to be made, it will certainly not be made. Movement too should be placed in the list; for without movement nothing can be produced or destroyed; without movement there can be neither art nor change.
We Stoics look for a first and general cause. Such a cause must be single, for the stuff of the universe is single. We ask what that cause is, and reply that it is the creative reason, the deity. The various causes in the list that has been made are not a series of independent causes, but are all variations of a single cause, namely ‘the maker[41].’
Causation and free-will.
180. Although the ‘first cause’ and the ‘Word’ are thus formally identified, their associations in connexion with cosmogony are very different. For whereas the ‘Word’ suggests reason and purpose, and leads up to the dogma that the universe is governed by divine providence, the term ‘cause’ suggests the linking of cause and effect by an unending chain, the inevitable sequence of events which leaves no room for effort or hope. These terms therefore point to the supreme problems of Fate and divine Purpose, Determinism and Free-will, and as such will be discussed in a later chapter[42]. Here it is sufficient to note that the Stoics not only accept, but insist upon the use of terms suggesting both points of view, and look therefore beyond their immediate opposition to an ultimate reconciliation; and that the importance attached to the doctrine of a ‘single and general cause’ by no means excludes a multiplicity of individual causes depending upon it, and capable of classification according to their relative importance[43].
The categories.
181. Thus the conception of ‘body,’ so simple to the plain man, becomes to the philosopher manifold and intricate. Its interpretation is to some extent brought into harmony with common speech through the doctrine of the ‘categories’ based upon Aristotle’s teaching[44]. But whereas Aristotle endeavoured in his categories to classify the various but independent classes of existences, the Stoics considered the different aspects in which the one primary body might be studied. The first two categories, those of ‘substance’ (ὑποκείμενον) and of ‘quality’ (ποιόν), agree with those of Aristotle[45], and clearly correspond to the grammatical categories of noun and adjective. The third category is that of ‘disposition’ (πὼς ἔχον), as ‘lying down’ or ‘standing[46].’ The fourth is that of ‘relative position’ (πρός τί πως ἔχον), as ‘right’ and ‘left,’ ‘son’ and ‘father[47].’ Some of the categories are further subdivided[48]; but enough is here stated to shew the object of the analysis, which in practice may have been useful in securing some completeness in the discussion of particular conceptions. Of ‘substances’ the Stoics, like others, say that they ‘exist,’ and are ‘bodies’; of qualities they boldly say the same[49]. But they do not consistently apply the same terms to disposition and relative position; in this direction they are at last led, like other philosophers, to speak of things which ‘do not exist.’ They could not take the modern view that all such discussions are verbal entanglements, of which no solution is possible, because they believed that there was a natural harmony between words and things. We on the other hand shall be little inclined to follow their analysis into its manifold details[50].