[155] τὴν ἀρετὴν Χρύσιππος ἀποβλητήν ... διὰ μέθην καὶ μελαγχολίαν ib.
[157] ‘semel traditi nobis boni perpetua possessio est; non dediscitur virtus. contraria enim mala in alieno haerent, ideo depelli et exturbari possunt’ Sen. Ep. 50, 8. Just in the same spirit we say that a new language or (say) the art of swimming, if once learnt, is learnt ‘for good.’
[158] ‘aliquis vir bonus nobis eligendus est, ac semper ante oculos habendus, ut sic tanquam illo spectante vivamus, et omnia tanquam illo vidente faciamus’ Sen. Ep. 11, 8, quoting however from Epicurus.
[159] ‘Heracles was the model whom [Antisthenes] and the other Cynics held up for imitation, the patron saint, so to speak, of the school. Antisthenes wrote a dialogue entitled “Heracles” and, with this for guidance, his followers delighted to tell again the story of the hero’s laborious and militant life, identifying, by ingenious allegories, the foul monsters which he vanquished with the vices and lusts that beset the souls of men’ Gomperz, Greek Thinkers, ii p. 151; ‘the more generous Cynics aver that the great Heracles also, as he became the author of other blessings, so also left to mankind the chief pattern of this (Cynic) life’ Julian, Or. vi p. 187, 3 (Mayor on Juv. Sat. x 361). So also in Buddhism: ‘besides the ideal King, the personification of Power and Justice, another ideal has played an important part in the formation of early Buddhist ideas regarding their master. It was the ideal of a perfectly Wise Man, the personification of Wisdom, the Buddha’ Rhys Davids, Hibbert Lectures, p. 141.
[160] ‘Herculem illum, quem hominum fama, beneficiorum memor, in concilio caelestium collocavit’ Cic. Off. iii 5, 25.
[161] ‘Hercules nihil sibi vicit: orbem terrarum transiit non concupiscendo sed vindicando, quid vinceret; malorum hostis, bonorum vindex, terrarum marisque pacator’ Sen. Ben. i 13, 3. See also the brilliant descriptions in Epict. Disc. iii 24.
[162] ‘Ulixen et Herculem ... Stoici nostri sapientes pronuntiaverunt, invictos laboribus, contemptores voluptatis et victores omnium terrarum’ Sen. Dial. ii 2, 1. Yet there is something to be said on the other side: ‘Ulysses felt a desire for his wife, and wept as he sat on a rock.... If Ulysses did weep and lament, he was not a good man’ Epict. Disc. iii 24, 18.
[163] So Horace, quite in the Stoic spirit: ‘rursus quid virtus et quid patientia possit, | utile proposuit nobis exemplar Ulixen’ Hor. Ep. i 2, 17 and 18.
[164] Diog. L. vi 1, 2.