Will and responsibility.
285.Practical choice is, according to the Stoics, exactly analogous to intellectual decision. Just as the powers of sensation never deceive us[95], so also the impulses are never in themselves irrational[96]. An impulse is an adumbration of a course of action as proper to be pursued[97]; to this the will gives or refuses its assent[98]. It is the will, and the will only, which is liable to error, and this through want of proper tone and self-control. If there is this want, it appears in a false judgment, a weak assent, an exaggerated impulse; and this is what we call in ethics a perturbation[99]. A healthy assentleads up to a right action: a false assent to a blunder or sin. Hence we hold to the Socratic paradox that ‘no one sins willingly’ (οὐδεὶς ἑκὼν ἁμαρτάνει); for the true and natural will cannot sin; it must first be warped to a false judgment and weakened by slackness of tone. We can equally use the paradox that ‘every voluntary action is a judgment of the intellect,’ or (in few words) that ‘virtue is wisdom’ (φρόνησις ἡ ἀρετή). In such views we find a starting-point for dealing with the problems of ethics, including those of the ethical ideal or supreme good, its application to daily duties, and its failure through ignorance or weakness of soul.
The body.
286.We pass on to consider the body, but at no great length; partly because many functions often considered as bodily are by the Stoics treated as belonging to the soul (as sensations and impulses), partly because the study of the body is rather the task of the physician than of the philosopher. In the body we may notice separately (i) the bones, sinews, and joints, constituting the framework on which the whole is built up; (ii) the surface, including beauty of outline and features, and (iii) the complexion, which suffuses a glow over the surface and most attracts the attention[100]. No absolute distinction can be made between body and soul. Generally speaking, we may say that body is composed of the two grosser elements, earth and water, whilst soul (as we have seen) rests on the two higher elements of air and fire[101]; of the gradations of spirit body possesses distinctively (but not exclusively) that of coherence (ἕξις), whilst it shares with the soul the principle of growth (φύσις)[102]. Yet these contrasts are after all only secondary. As surely as soul is body so body is soul, anddivinity penetrates into its humblest parts. In its practical applications Stoicism dwells so little on the body that the wise man seems hardly conscious of its existence.
‘The flesh.’
287.Side by side with the strictly Stoic view of the body we find in all the Roman literature another conception which is strongly dualistic, and which we cannot but think to be drawn from some non-Stoic source[103]. According to this view the body, often called the ‘flesh,’ is essentially evil[104]; it is the prison-house of the soul[105], the source of corruption of the will[106], the hindrance to a clear insight of the intelligence. In the language picturesquely adopted in thePilgrim’s Progress(after St Paul), it is a burden which the enlightened man longs to shake off[107]. For the body so understood we find abusive names; it is the husk in which the grain is concealed[108], the ass from which the owner should be ready to part at any moment[109]. This language tends to be exaggerated and morbid, and leads in practice to asceticism[110]. It appealed in ancient as in modern times to a widespread sentiment, but is not reconcileable with the main teaching of the Stoic philosophy.
Dignity of the body.
288.According to the true Stoic view, the body is a dwelling-place or temple inhabited for a time by the principate, its divinity[111]. Therefore the body as such is deserving of respect, even of veneration[112]. In particular the erect form of the human body is a mark of divine favour, by which it is hinted that man is fitted to contemplate the operations of the heavens[113]. The whole framework of the body, from the organs of sensation to those by which we breathe, swallow, and digest, is a masterpiece of divine skill, and an evidence of the care of providence for man[114]. And even as an architect provides that those parts of the house which are offensive to sight and smell should be out of sight, so has nature hidden away those parts of the body which are necessarily offensive, at a distance from the organs of sense[115]. The Stoic conception of the dignity of the body is symbolized in practical ethics by the culture of the beard, in which is latent the broad principle of attention to the cleanliness and healthy development of every part of the body.
It is a mark of the Oriental associations of Stoicism that this respect for the body is never associated with the Hellenic cult of the body as displayed in art and gymnastics.
Junction of soul and body.
289.Having now studied man in all his parts, it is time to consider how those parts are compacted together, how man grows and decays, and what varieties of mankind exist. First then the principate is combined with the lower functions of the soul, and every part of the soul, by the process of interpenetration (σῶμα διὰ σώματοςχωρεῖ)[116]; or (from a slightly different point of view) upon body which has cohesion (ἕξις) is overlaid growth, on growth soul, and on soul reason; so that the higher tension presupposes the lower, but notvice versa. In the act of generation the soul loses its higher tensions; and consequently the embryo possesses neither human nor animal soul, but only the principles of cohesion and growth. It is in fact a vegetable[117], but necessarily differs from other vegetables in having the potentiality of rising to a higher grade of spirit[118]. At the moment of birth its growth-power (φύσις) is brought into contact with the cold air, and through this chill it rises to the grade of animal life, and becomes soul (ψυχή from ψῦξις)[119]. This etymological theory provokes the ridicule of opponents, who do not fail to point out that soul, standing nearer to the divine fire than growth, ought to be produced by warmth rather than by coolness; but the Stoics probably had in mind that contact with either of the two higher elements must raise the gradation of spirit. The infant, according to this theory, is an animal, but not yet a man; it has not the gift of reason[120]. To attain this higher stage there is need both of growth from within, and of association with reasonable beings without; in these ways reason may be developed in or about the seventh year[121]. In the whole of its growth the soul needs continually to be refreshed by the inbreathing of air, and to be sustained by exhalations from the blood[122]. Here we touch upon oneof those fundamental doctrines of the system, derived by Zeno from Heraclitus[123], which bind together the great and the little world. Just as the heavenly bodies are maintained by exhalations from the Ocean[124], so the soul is dependent upon the body for its daily food. Hence follows the important consequence that weakness and disease of the body react upon the soul; the philosopher must keep his body in health for the soul’s good, if for no other reason[125]. If the Stoics in discussing problems of ethics constantly maintain that the health of the soul is independent of that of the body, such statements are paradoxical and need qualification[126].
Sleep and death.
290.The mutual action of body and soul is most readily illustrated by sleep. The Stoics do not hold, as the Animists do, that the soul quits the body in sleep; nor do they agree with another popular view, that the soul then quits the extremities of the body and concentrates itself at the heart[127]. Sleep is due to a relaxation, contraction, or weakening of the spirit[128]; a lowering of its grade, which nevertheless is clearly no sign of ill health. In old age there is often an imperfection of the reason, and this is also seen in the sick, the tired, and the anaemic[129]. In death there is acomplete relaxation of tone in the breath that we can feel, that is, in such spirit as belongs to the body[130]; there follows the separation of soul from body.
The beyond.
291.We are thus brought to the critically important question of the existence of the soul after death. On this point we shall not expect to find that all Stoic teachers agree in their language. In Zeno himself we shall be sure to find that variety of suggestion which is accounted for by his eagerness to learn from all sources; and later writers will also differ according to their respective inclinations either to draw strictly logical conclusions from the Stoic physics, or to respect the common opinion of mankind and to draw from it conclusions which may be a support to morality[131]. These variations need not discourage us from the attempt to trace in general outline the common teaching of the school. We have already seen that the various parts of the Stoic system are not bound together by strictly logical processes; where two conclusions appear contradictory, and yet both recommend themselves to the judgment, the Stoics are not prepared to sacrifice either the one or the other, but always seek to lessen, if they cannot altogether remove, the difficulties which stand in the way of accepting both. On the other hand, we need not too readily admit the charge of insincerity, whether it is found in the candid admission of its temptations by Stoic teachers[132], or in the less sympathetic criticisms of ancient or modern exponents of the system[133].
The Stoic standpoint.
292.On certain points all Stoic teachers seem to be agreed; first that the soul is, as regards its substance, imperishable; secondly, that the individual soul cannot survive the general conflagration[134]; lastly, that it does not of necessity perish with the body[135]. The first two dogmas follow immediately from the fundamental principles of the Stoic physics, and point out that every soul will find its last home by being absorbed in the divine being. The third dogma leaves play for ethical principles; subject to the monistic principle of an ultimate reconciliation, there is room for some sharp distinction between the destiny of good and bad souls, such as stands out in the Persian doctrine of rewards and punishments after death. And so we find it generally held that the souls of the good survive till the conflagration, whilst those of the wicked have but a short separate existence, and those of the lower and non-rational animals perish with their bodies[136]. If this difference in duration will satisfy the moral sense, the nature of the further existence of the soul may be determined on physical principles.
The released soul.
293.In the living man the soul, as we have already seen reason to suppose, derives its cohesion (ἕξις) and shape from its association with the body. Separated from the body, it must assume a new shape, and what should that be but the perfect shape of a sphere[137]? Again, the soul being compounded of the elements of air and fire must by its own nature, when freed from the body, pierce through this murky atmosphere, and rise to a brighter region above, let us say to that sphere which is just below the moon[138]. Here thensouls dwell like the stars, finding like them their food in exhalations from the earth[139]. Here they take rank as daemons or heroes (of such the air is full), and as such are joined in the fulfilment of the purposes of divine providence[140]. Yet it must be admitted that this bright destiny, if substantiated by the laws of physics, is also subject to physical difficulties. Suppose for instance that a man is crushed by the fall of a heavy rock; his soul will not be able to escape in any direction, but will be at once squeezed out of existence[141]. To fancies of this kind, whether attractive or grotesque, we shall not be inclined to pay serious attention.
Tartarus.
294.In this general theory hope is perhaps held out before the eyes of good souls, but there is little to terrify the wicked, even if it be supposed that their souls neither survive so long, nor soar so high, as those of the good[142]. As against it we are told by a Church Father that Zeno accepted the Persian doctrine of future rewards and punishments, and with it the primitive belief in an Inferno in its crudest form[143]. We must agree with the first English editor of the fragments of Zeno that ‘it is hardly credible that Zeno can have attached any philosophical importance to a theory stated in these terms[144]’; they can at the best only have occurred insome narration in the style of the Platonic myths, intended to illustrate a principle but not to convey a literal truth[145]. For just as the whole Hellenistic world, including the Stoics, stood aloof from the Persian doctrine of a spirit of evil, so it firmly rejected the dogma of a hell. Lucretius makes it a principal argument in favour of the philosophy of Epicurus that it drives out of men’s hearts the fear of Tartarus[146]; but writers partly or wholly Stoic are not less emphatic. ‘Ignorance of philosophy,’ says Cicero, ‘has produced the belief in hell and its terrors[147].’ In the mouth of the representative of Stoicism he places the words ‘Where can we find any old woman so silly as to believe the old stories of the horrors of the world below?[148]’ ‘Those tales’ says Seneca ‘which make the world below terrible to us, are poetic fictions. There is no black darkness awaiting the dead, no prison-house, no lake of fire or river of forgetfulness, no judgment-seat, no renewal of the rule of tyrants[149].’
Purgatory of Virgil.
295.Of far more importance to us is the theory of purgatory familiar through the description in Virgil’sAeneid:
‘In the beginning the earth and the sky, and the spaces of night,Also the shining moon, and the sun Titanic and brightFeed on an inward life, and, with all things mingled, a mindMoves universal matter, with Nature’s frame is combined.Thence man’s race, and the beast, and the feathered creature that flies,5All wild shapes that are hidden the gleaming waters beneath.Each elemental seed has a fiery force from the skies,Each its heavenly being, that no dull clay can disguise,Bodies of earth ne’er deaden, nor limbs long destined to death.Hence their fears and desires, their sorrows and joys; for their sight,10Blind with the gloom of a prison, discerns not the heavenly light.Nor, when life at last leaves them, do all sad ills, that belongUnto the sinful body, depart; still many surviveLingering within them, alas! for it needs must be that the longGrowth should in wondrous fashion at full completion arrive.15So due vengeance racks them, for deeds of an earlier daySuffering penance; and some to the winds hang viewless and thin,Searched by the breezes; from others the deep infection of sinSwirling water washes, or bright fire purges, away.Each in his own sad ghost we endure; then, chastened aright,20Into Elysium pass. Few reach to the fields of delightTill great time, when the cycles have run their courses on high,Takes the inbred pollution, and leaves to us only the brightSense of the heaven’s own ether, and fire from the springs of the sky[150].’
‘In the beginning the earth and the sky, and the spaces of night,Also the shining moon, and the sun Titanic and brightFeed on an inward life, and, with all things mingled, a mindMoves universal matter, with Nature’s frame is combined.Thence man’s race, and the beast, and the feathered creature that flies,5All wild shapes that are hidden the gleaming waters beneath.Each elemental seed has a fiery force from the skies,Each its heavenly being, that no dull clay can disguise,Bodies of earth ne’er deaden, nor limbs long destined to death.Hence their fears and desires, their sorrows and joys; for their sight,10Blind with the gloom of a prison, discerns not the heavenly light.Nor, when life at last leaves them, do all sad ills, that belongUnto the sinful body, depart; still many surviveLingering within them, alas! for it needs must be that the longGrowth should in wondrous fashion at full completion arrive.15So due vengeance racks them, for deeds of an earlier daySuffering penance; and some to the winds hang viewless and thin,Searched by the breezes; from others the deep infection of sinSwirling water washes, or bright fire purges, away.Each in his own sad ghost we endure; then, chastened aright,20Into Elysium pass. Few reach to the fields of delightTill great time, when the cycles have run their courses on high,Takes the inbred pollution, and leaves to us only the brightSense of the heaven’s own ether, and fire from the springs of the sky[150].’
‘In the beginning the earth and the sky, and the spaces of night,Also the shining moon, and the sun Titanic and brightFeed on an inward life, and, with all things mingled, a mindMoves universal matter, with Nature’s frame is combined.Thence man’s race, and the beast, and the feathered creature that flies,5All wild shapes that are hidden the gleaming waters beneath.Each elemental seed has a fiery force from the skies,Each its heavenly being, that no dull clay can disguise,Bodies of earth ne’er deaden, nor limbs long destined to death.Hence their fears and desires, their sorrows and joys; for their sight,10Blind with the gloom of a prison, discerns not the heavenly light.Nor, when life at last leaves them, do all sad ills, that belongUnto the sinful body, depart; still many surviveLingering within them, alas! for it needs must be that the longGrowth should in wondrous fashion at full completion arrive.15So due vengeance racks them, for deeds of an earlier daySuffering penance; and some to the winds hang viewless and thin,Searched by the breezes; from others the deep infection of sinSwirling water washes, or bright fire purges, away.Each in his own sad ghost we endure; then, chastened aright,20Into Elysium pass. Few reach to the fields of delightTill great time, when the cycles have run their courses on high,Takes the inbred pollution, and leaves to us only the brightSense of the heaven’s own ether, and fire from the springs of the sky[150].’
‘In the beginning the earth and the sky, and the spaces of night,
Also the shining moon, and the sun Titanic and bright
Feed on an inward life, and, with all things mingled, a mind
Moves universal matter, with Nature’s frame is combined.
Thence man’s race, and the beast, and the feathered creature that flies,5
All wild shapes that are hidden the gleaming waters beneath.
Each elemental seed has a fiery force from the skies,
Each its heavenly being, that no dull clay can disguise,
Bodies of earth ne’er deaden, nor limbs long destined to death.
Hence their fears and desires, their sorrows and joys; for their sight,10
Blind with the gloom of a prison, discerns not the heavenly light.
Nor, when life at last leaves them, do all sad ills, that belong
Unto the sinful body, depart; still many survive
Lingering within them, alas! for it needs must be that the long
Growth should in wondrous fashion at full completion arrive.15
So due vengeance racks them, for deeds of an earlier day
Suffering penance; and some to the winds hang viewless and thin,
Searched by the breezes; from others the deep infection of sin
Swirling water washes, or bright fire purges, away.
Each in his own sad ghost we endure; then, chastened aright,20
Into Elysium pass. Few reach to the fields of delight
Till great time, when the cycles have run their courses on high,
Takes the inbred pollution, and leaves to us only the bright
Sense of the heaven’s own ether, and fire from the springs of the sky[150].’
Although we cannot accept Virgil as a scientific exponent of Stoic teaching, yet there is much reason to suppose that he is here setting forth a belief which met with very general acceptance in our school, and of which the principle is that the sufferings of the disembodied are not a punishment for past offences, but the necessary means for the purification of the soul from a taint due to its long contact with the body.
Probable Stoic origin.
296.The language in which Virgil first describes the creation and life of the universe closely resembles that of Stoicism; the phrases ‘elemental seed,’ ‘fiery force,’ ‘heavenly being’ might be used by any Stoic teacher. The conception of the body as a ‘prison-house,’ even though it does not express the most scientific aspect of Stoic physics, was nevertheless, as we have seen, familiar to Stoics of the later centuries. The ethical conception, again, of the doctrine of purgatory is exactly that of which the Stoics felt a need in order to reconcile the dualism of good and evil souls with the ultimate prevalence of the divine will. Again, we can have no difficulty in supposing that Virgil drew his material from Stoic sources, seeing that he was characteristically a learned poet, and reflects Stoic sentiment in many other passages of his works[151]. We have also more direct evidence. The ChurchFather whom we have already quoted not only ascribes to the Stoics in another passage the doctrine of purgatory, but expressly quotes this passage from Virgil as an exposition of Stoic teaching. And here he is supported to some extent by Tertullian, who says that the Stoics held that the souls of the foolish after death receive instruction from the souls of the good[152]. Finally, we have the doctrine definitely accepted by Seneca[153].
Views of Greek Stoics.
297.We may now consider more particularly the views and feelings of individual Stoic teachers. It appears to us accordingly that Zeno left his followers room for considerable diversity of opinion, and quoted the Persian doctrine because of its suggestiveness rather than for its literal truth. Of Cleanthes we are told that he held that all souls survived till the conflagration, whilst Chrysippus believed this only of the souls of the wise[154]. Panaetius, although a great admirer of Plato, is nevertheless so strongly impressed by the scientific principle that ‘all which is born must die,’ that he is here again inclined to break away from Stoicism, and to suspend his judgment altogether as to the future existence of the soul[155]; the belief in a limited future existence was meaningless to a philosopher who disbelieved in the conflagration. Of the views of Posidonius we have the definite hint, that he taught that the ‘air is full of immortal souls[156]’;and this is in such harmony with the devout temper of this teacher that we may readily believe that he enriched the somewhat bare speculations of his predecessors by the help of an Oriental imagination, and that he introduced into Stoicism not only the doctrine of daemons but also that of purgatory, holding that souls were both pre-existent and post-existent.
View of Seneca.
298.In the period of the Roman principate the question of the future existence of the soul acquires special prominence. Seneca is criticized on the ground that he affects at times a belief which he does not sincerely entertain, partly in order to make his teaching more popular, partly to console his friends in times of mourning. The facts stand otherwise. At no time does Seneca exceed the limits of the accepted Stoic creed; he bids his friends look forward to the period of purgation[157], the life of pure souls in the regions of the aether, and the final union with the divine being. It is after purgation that the soul by the refinement of the elements of which it is built forces its way to higher regions[158]; it finds a quiet and peaceful home in the clear bright aether[159]; it has cast off the burden of the flesh[160]; it is parted by no mountains or seas from other happy souls[161]; it daily enjoys free converse with the great ones of the past[162]; it gazes on the human world below, and on the sublime company of the stars in its own neighbourhood[163]. At a later epoch all blessed souls will be re-absorbed in the primal elements[164], suffering change but notforfeiting their immortal nature[165]. The somewhat exuberant language of Seneca has frequently been adopted by Christian writers, to express a belief which is not necessarily identical[166]; but for the associations thus created Seneca must not be held responsible.
Personality cannot survive.
299.With the decay of interest in the Stoic physics there begins a tendency to overlook the intermediate stage of the soul’s life, and to dwell solely on its final absorption; whilst at the same time it is urged from the ethical standpoint that no possible opinion as to the soul’s future should disturb the calm of the virtuous mind. On one further, but important, point the Stoic teaching becomes clearer. In no case is the soul that survives death to be identified with the man that once lived. Cut off from all human relations, from the body and its organs, and from its own subordinate powers[167], it is no longer ‘you,’ but is something else that takes your place in the due order of the universe. In all this the Stoic doctrine remains formally unchanged; but its expression is now so chastened that it seems only to give a negative reply to the inherited hope, and the chief comfort it offers is that ‘death is the end of all troubles.’ This change of tone begins in Seneca himself; it is he who says to the mourner ‘your loved one has entered upon a great and never-ending rest[168]’; ‘death is release from all pain and its end[169]’; ‘death is not to be. I know all its meaning. As things were before I was born, so they will be after I am gone[170].’ ‘If we perish in death, nothing remains[171].’ In Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius this new tone rings out much more clearly; if we like so to speak, more unrelentingly. To the characteristic passages fromthese writers which are quoted above[172]may be added the following, perhaps the most precise of all:
‘If souls survive death, how can the air hold them from all eternity? How, we reply, does earth hold the bodies of generation after generation committed to the grave? Just as on earth, after a certain term of survival, change and dissolution of substance makes room for other dead bodies, so too the souls transmuted into air, after a period of survival, change by processes of diffusion and of ignition, and are resumed into the seminal principle of the universe, and in this way make room for others to take up their habitation in their stead. Such is the natural answer, assuming the survival of souls[173].’
‘If souls survive death, how can the air hold them from all eternity? How, we reply, does earth hold the bodies of generation after generation committed to the grave? Just as on earth, after a certain term of survival, change and dissolution of substance makes room for other dead bodies, so too the souls transmuted into air, after a period of survival, change by processes of diffusion and of ignition, and are resumed into the seminal principle of the universe, and in this way make room for others to take up their habitation in their stead. Such is the natural answer, assuming the survival of souls[173].’
Such are the last words of Stoicism, not wholly satisfying either to knowledge or to aspiration, but assuredly based on a wide outlook and a keen discrimination.
Men and women.
300.The whole nature of man, as discussed up to this point, is common to every individual born into the world, with some exceptions dependent on age or temperament which have been explained incidentally. It remains to discuss shortly the important differences which result from sex, nationality, and location. There seems every reason to believe that the equality of men and women, though at the time seemingly paradoxical, was generally accepted by the earlier Stoics, and adopted as a practical principle in Stoic homes. The whole treatment of human nature by the Stoics applies equally to man and woman, and points to the conclusion that as moral agents they have the same capacities and the same responsibilities[174]. Seneca in writing to a great lady of philosophical sympathies states this as his firm conviction[175], and the lives of many Stoic wives and daughters (to whom we shall refer in a later chapter)[176]showed it to have a firm basis in fact. We need attach no great importance to those more distinctively masculine views which Seneca occasionally expresses, to theeffect that woman is hot-tempered, thoughtless, and lacking in self-control[177], or to the Peripatetic doctrine that man is born to rule, women to obey[178]; for these sentiments, however welcome to his individual correspondents, were not rooted in Stoic theory nor exemplified in the Roman society of his own days.
Class and race.
301.It follows with equal certainty from the early history of Stoicism, and in particular from the doctrine of the Cosmopolis, that differences of class and race were hardly perceived by its founders. For this there was further historical cause in the spread of Hellenistic civilisation, which was of an entirely catholic spirit and welcomed disciples from all nationalities[179]. The doctrine of Aristotle, that some nations are by nature fitted only for slavery, finds no echo in the Stoic world[180]. There we look in vain for any trace of that instinctive feeling of national difference, that sensitiveness to race and colour, which can easily be recognised in the early history of Greece and Rome, and which has become so acute in the development of modern world-politics. The Roman Stoics, as we shall see later, might individually be proud of advantages of birth, but they never associated this feeling with their philosophy. Here and there, however, we find signs of a scientific interest in the question of differences of national character, which are generally ascribed to the influences of climate. Seneca, for instance, remarks that the inhabitants of northern climates have characters as rude as their sky; hence they make good fighters, but poor rulers[181]. Yet when he contemplates the northern barbarians, his mind is mainly occupied by admiration; and, like other pro-Germans of the period, he foresees with propheticclearness a danger threatening the Roman empire. ‘Should the Germans once lay aside their fierce domestic quarrels, and add to their courage reason and discipline, Rome will indeed have cause to resume the virtues of its early history[182].’ The roots of true greatness of soul, then, lie deeper than in literary culture or philosophic insight. It is a part of the irony of history that Stoicism, which aimed above all things at being practical, should diagnose so correctly the growing weakness of the Roman world, and yet fail to suggest any remedy other than a reversion to an epoch in which philosophy was unknown.