"Yes," he answered; "Seneca spent his whole life in seeking for the truth, but the truth for which he sought was one which should be agreeable to his own nature. A divinity was necessary to his well-being. He speaks of a loving God, of a God who orders the world aright and whose will we should obey without a murmur; and in consequence his hatred for the Epicureans was great. He could not forgive us for showing the gods serene and untroubled in their abode, into which penetrates no whisper of mortal anguish; and for saying that no voice of prayer troubles their endless pleasure, and that without tears or anger they gaze at once upon our sorrow and our sin, and are heedless of the hands uplifted in supplication from every corner of the earth. Yes; God is necessary to a Stoic. But we Epicureans have called upon the gods and they have not answered us; we have sought them throughout the world and have not found them; neither are they in the seas nor in the skies; we have not seen them destroy the wicked nor protect the innocent; we think that they are not interested in our humble affairs; they are neither our masters nor our creators, but belong to the same order of things as we do, though of a finer and less perishable nature: if, indeed, they exist at all."
"Stoicism is a hatred of humanity," said Marcus; "perhaps Epicureanism is a love of it. Rufus, do you not think the Epicureans are clever? They do not deny the existence of gods; but they make their gods of such a divinely intangible substance that doubt becomes in itself almost an act of worship. It is as if they feared to profane the sanctuary with human feet soiled by the dust of travail."
"I have given you my opinion of philosophy and philosophers," said Rufus. "Once a man begins to think of the difference between right and wrong he is lost, morally and mentally. I studied philosophy in order to learn how to write despatches; and in the short course I took, I acquired enough knowledge of the subject to know that good and evil belong to the category of reflex actions, they are spasmodic movements over which we have no control. Do I praise my legionaries because they are brave? I do, as a matter of fact. It makes an admirable prelude to the imposition of another task. Seneca imagined that men could be disciplined into virtue. It was a great mistake, because discipline is not applicable to the individual, it is only applicable to a crowd. It is easy to fill a regiment with courage; but it is impossible to make one man brave."
"You do not think that it is possible to form individual habits?" said Serenus.
"Yes, of course," answered Rufus; "it is possible to accustom a man to sleep on a hard bed, to deny himself wine or flesh, even in some degree to control his temper. But an action is good or bad, only in so far as it is a reflex action."
"What you say is very curious," said Serenus quickly.
"In fact Rufus is a complete philosopher," said Marcus, laughing. "I should like to drink a little wine."
Serenus struck a sounding-bowl of silver, and a Greek boy entered.
"Wine," said Serenus, and the boy left them. "Rufus, you have heard of a sect of Jews called Christians; do you know their belief?"
"No," said Rufus contemptuously; "I only know that it is against the Jewish religion to pay tribute. I believe that they have no religion; they are contemptuous of all known gods; they will eat no flesh which has been offered in the temples; and they loathe the whole human race: a feeling which, I think, is reciprocated. The Christians seem to be one of the numerous sects given over to the practice of a depraved and fantastic superstition. The East is full of such monstrous cults."