1. Cicero, On The Ends of Good And Evil, 3.23-3.25 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 3.23. Cum autem omnia officia a principiis naturae proficiscantur, ab isdem necesse est proficisci ipsam sapientiam. sed quem ad modum saepe fit, ut is, qui commendatus alicui pluris eum faciat cui commendatus sit om. BEN 1 sit alicui, pluris eum faciat, cui commendatus sit, quam illum, a quo, sic sic sit BR minime mirum est primo nos sapientiae commendari ab initiis naturae, post autem ipsam ipsam autem BE sapientiam nobis cariorem fieri, quam illa sint, a quibus ad hanc venerimus. atque ut membra nobis ita data sunt, ut ad quandam rationem vivendi data esse appareant, sic appetitio animi, quae o(rmh/ Graece vocatur, non ad quodvis genus vitae, sed ad quandam formam vivendi videtur data, itemque et ratio et perfecta ratio. 3.24. ut enim histrioni actio, saltatori motus non quivis, sed certus quidam est datus, sic vita agenda est certo genere quodam, non quolibet; quod genus conveniens consentaneumque dicimus. nec enim gubernationi aut medicinae similem sapientiam esse arbitramur, sed actioni illi potius, quam modo dixi, et saltationi, ut ut arte N arte ut V in ipsa insit, insit ut sit N 1 ut insit N 2 non foris petatur extremum, id est artis effectio. et tamen est etiam aliqua aliqua Brem. alia (est alia etiam N) cum his ipsis artibus sapientiae dissimilitudo, propterea quod in illis quae recte facta sunt non continent tamen omnes partes, e quibus constant; quae autem nos aut recta aut recte facta dicamus, si placet, illi autem appellant katorqw/mata, omnes numeros virtutis continent. sola enim sapientia in se tota conversa est, quod idem in ceteris artibus non fit. 3.25. Inscite autem medicinae et gubernationis ultimum cum ultimo sapientiae comparatur. sapientia enim et animi magnitudinem complectitur et iustitiam, et ut omnia, quae homini accidant, accidunt BE infra se esse iudicet, quod idem ceteris artibus non contingit. contigit A tenere autem virtutes eas ipsas, quarum modo feci mentionem, nemo poterit, nisi statuerit nihil esse, quod intersit aut differat aliud ab alio, praeter praeter nisi BE honesta et turpia. | 3.23. "Again, as all 'appropriate acts' are based on the primary impulses of nature, it follows that Wisdom itself is based on them also. But as it often happens that a man who is introduced to another values this new friend more highly than he does the person who gave him the introduction, so in like manner it is by no means surprising that though we are first commended to Wisdom by the primary natural instincts, afterwards Wisdom itself becomes dearer to us than are the instincts from which we came to her. And just as our limbs are so fashioned that it is clear that they were bestowed upon us with a view to a certain mode of life, so our faculty of appetition, in Greek hormÄ, was obviously designed not for any kind of life one may choose, but for a particular mode of living; and the same is true of Reason and of perfected Reason. 3.24. For just as an actor or dancer has assigned to him not any but a certain particular part or dance, so life has to be conducted in a certain fixed way, and not in any way we like. This fixed way we speak of as 'conformable' and suitable. In fact we do not consider Wisdom to be like seamanship or medicine, but rather like the arts of acting and of dancing just mentioned; its End, being the actual exercise of the art, is contained within the art itself, and is not something extraneous to it. At the same time there is also another point which marks a dissimilarity between Wisdom and these arts as well. In the latter a movement perfectly executed nevertheless does not involve all the various motions which together constitute the subject matter of the art; whereas in the sphere of conduct, what we may call, if you approve, 'right actions,' or 'rightly performed actions,' in Stoic phraseology katorthÅmata, contain all the factors of virtue. For Wisdom alone is entirely self-contained, which is not the case with the other arts. 3.25. It is erroneous, however, to place the End of medicine or of navigation exactly on a par with the End of Wisdom. For Wisdom includes also magimity and justice and a sense of superiority to all the accidents of man's estate, but this is not the case with the other arts. Again, even the very virtues I have just mentioned cannot be attained by anyone unless he has realized that all things are indifferent and indistinguishable except moral worth and baseness. |
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2. Cicero, On The Nature of The Gods, 2.23-2.24, 2.33-2.36 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 2.23. However, having begun to treat the subject in a different way from that which I proposed at the beginning (for I said that this part required no discussion, since the existence of god was manifest to everybody), in spite of this I should like to prove even this point by means of arguments drawn from Physics or Natural Philosophy. It is a law of Nature that all things capable of nurture and growth contain within them a supply of heat, without which their nurture and growth would not be possible; for everything of a hot, fiery nature supplies its own source of motion and activity; but that which is nourished and grows possesses a definite and uniform motion; and as long as this motion remains within us, so long sensation and life remain, whereas so soon as our heat is cooled and quenched we ourselves perish and are extinguished. 2.24. This doctrine Cleanthes enforces by these further arguments, to show how great is the supply of heat in every living body: he states that there is no food so heavy that it is not digested in twenty-four hours; and even the residue of our food which nature rejects contains heat. Again, the veins and arteries never cease throbbing with a flame-like pulse, and frequent cases have been observed when the heart of an animal on being torn out of its body has continued to beat with a rapid motion resembling the flickering of fire. Every living thing therefore, whether animal or vegetable, owes its vitality to the heat contained within it. From this it must be inferred that this element of heat possesses in itself a vital force that pervades the whole world. 2.33. Again, if we wish to proceed from the first rudimentary orders of being to the last and most perfect, we shall necessarily arrive in the end at deity. We notice the sustaining power of nature first in the members of the vegetable kingdom, towards which her bounty was limited to providing for their preservation by means of the faculties of nurture and growth. 2.34. Upon the animals she bestowed sensation and motion, and an appetite or impulse to approach things wholesome and retire from things harmful. For man she amplified her gift by the addition of reason, whereby the appetites might be controlled, and alternately indulged and held in check. But the fourth and highest grade is that of beings born by nature good and wise, and endowed from the outset with the innate attributes of right reason and consistency; this must be held to be above the level of man: it is the attribute of god, that is, of the world, which must needs possess that perfect and absolute reason of which I spoke. 2.35. Again, it is undeniable that every organic whole must have an ultimate ideal of perfection. As in vines or cattle we see that, unless obstructed by some force, nature progresses on a certain path of her own to her goal of full development, and as in painting, architecture and the other arts and crafts there is an ideal of perfect workmanship, even so and far more in the world of nature as a whole there must be a process towards completeness and perfection. The various limited modes of being may encounter many external obstacles to hinder their perfect realization, but there can be nothing that can frustrate nature as a whole, since she embraces and contains within herself all modes of being. Hence it follows that there must exist this fourth and highest grade, unassailable by any external force. 2.36. Now this is the grade on which universal nature stands; and since she is of such a character as to be superior to all things and incapable of frustration by any, it follows of necessity that the world is an intelligent being, and indeed also a wise being. "Again, what can be more illogical than to deny that the being which embraces all things must be the best of all things, or, admitting this, to deny that it must be, first, possessed of life, secondly, rational and intelligent, and lastly, endowed with wisdom? How else can it be the best of all things? If it resembles plants or even animals, so far from being highest, it must be reckoned lowest in the scale of being. If again it be capable of reason yet has not been wise from the beginning, the world must be in a worse condition than mankind; for a man can become wise, but if in all the eternity of past time the world has been foolish, obviously it will never attain wisdom; and so it will be inferior to man, which is absurd. Therefore the world must be deemed to have been wise from the beginning, and divine. |
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3. Cicero, On Duties, 3.23-3.25 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
| 3.23. Neque vero hoc solum natura, id est iure gentium, sed etiam legibus populorum, quibus in singulis civitatibus res publica continetur, eodem modo constitutum est, ut non liceat sui commodi causa nocere alteri; hoc enim spectant leges, hoc volunt, incolumem esse civium coniunctionem; quam qui dirimunt, eos morte, exsilio, vinclis, damno coërcent. Atque hoc multo magis efficit ipsa naturae ratio, quae est lex divina et humana; cui parere qui velit (omnes autem parebunt, qui secundum naturam volent vivere), numquam committet, ut alienum appetat et id, quod alteri detraxerit, sibi adsumat. 3.24. Etenim multo magis est secundum naturam excelsitas animi et magnitudo itemque comitas, iustitia, liberalitas quam voluptas, quam vita, quam divitiae; quae quidem contemnere et pro nihilo ducere comparantem cum utilitate communi magni animi et excelsi est. Detrahere autem de altero sui commodi causa magis est contra naturam quam mors, quam dolor, quam cetera generis eiusdem. 3.25. Itemque magis est secundum naturam pro omnibus gentibus, si fieri possit, conservandis aut iuvandis maximos labores molestiasque suscipere imitantem Herculem illum, quem hominum fama beneficiorum memor in concilio caelestium collocavit, quam vivere in solitudine non modo sine ullis molestiis, sed etiam in maximis voluptatibus abundantem omnibus copiis, ut excellas etiam pulchritudine et viribus. Quocirca optimo quisque et splendidissimo ingenio longe illam vitam huic anteponit. Ex quo efficitur hominem naturae oboedientem homini nocere non posse. | 3.23. But this principle is established not by Nature's laws alone (that is, by the common rules of equity), but also by the statutes of particular communities, in accordance with which in individual states the public interests are maintained. In all these it is with one accord ordained that no man shall be allowed for the sake of his own advantage to injure his neighbour. For it is to this that the laws have regard; this is their intent, that the bonds of union between citizens should not be impaired; and any attempt to destroy these bonds is repressed by the penalty of death, exile, imprisonment, or fine. Again, this principle follows much more effectually directly from the Reason which is in Nature, which is the law of gods and men. If anyone will hearken to that voice (and all will hearken to it who wish to live in accord with Nature's laws), he will never be guilty of coveting anything that is his neighbour's or of appropriating to himself what he has taken from his neighbour. 3.24. Then, too, loftiness and greatness of spirit, and courtesy, justice, and generosity are much more in harmony with Nature than are selfish pleasure, riches, and life itself; but it requires a great and lofty spirit to despise these latter and count them as naught, when one weighs them over against the common weal. [But for anyone to rob his neighbour for his own profit is more contrary to Nature than death, pain, and the like.] 3.25. In like manner it is more in accord with Nature to emulate the great Hercules and undergo the greatest toil and trouble for the sake of aiding or saving the world, if possible, than to live in seclusion, not only free from all care, but revelling in pleasures and abounding in wealth, while excelling others also in beauty and strength. Thus Hercules denied himself and underwent toil and tribulation for the world, and, out of gratitude for his services, popular belief has given him a place in the council of the gods. The better and more noble, therefore, the character with which a man is endowed, the more does he prefer the life of service to the life of pleasure. Whence it follows that man, if he is obedient to Nature, cannot do harm to his fellow-man. |
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4. Epictetus, Discourses, 1.6.12-1.6.22, 4.1.51 (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
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5. Musonius Rufus, Fragments, 40, 17 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
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6. Seneca The Younger, Letters, 92.27 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
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7. Clement of Alexandria, Miscellanies, (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
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8. Galen, On The Doctrines of Hippocrates And Plato, 4.6.1-4.6.3, 4.6.5 (2nd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
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9. Hierocles Stoicus, , 1.5-1.33, 4.38-4.53 (2nd cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
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10. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of The Philosophers, 7.86-7.87, 7.108-7.109, 7.139 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 7.86. As for the assertion made by some people that pleasure is the object to which the first impulse of animals is directed, it is shown by the Stoics to be false. For pleasure, if it is really felt, they declare to be a by-product, which never comes until nature by itself has sought and found the means suitable to the animal's existence or constitution; it is an aftermath comparable to the condition of animals thriving and plants in full bloom. And nature, they say, made no difference originally between plants and animals, for she regulates the life of plants too, in their case without impulse and sensation, just as also certain processes go on of a vegetative kind in us. But when in the case of animals impulse has been superadded, whereby they are enabled to go in quest of their proper aliment, for them, say the Stoics, Nature's rule is to follow the direction of impulse. But when reason by way of a more perfect leadership has been bestowed on the beings we call rational, for them life according to reason rightly becomes the natural life. For reason supervenes to shape impulse scientifically. 7.87. This is why Zeno was the first (in his treatise On the Nature of Man) to designate as the end life in agreement with nature (or living agreeably to nature), which is the same as a virtuous life, virtue being the goal towards which nature guides us. So too Cleanthes in his treatise On Pleasure, as also Posidonius, and Hecato in his work On Ends. Again, living virtuously is equivalent to living in accordance with experience of the actual course of nature, as Chrysippus says in the first book of his De finibus; for our individual natures are parts of the nature of the whole universe. 7.108. Zeno was the first to use this term καθῆκον of conduct. Etymologically it is derived from κατά τινας ἥκειν, i.e. reaching as far as, being up to, or incumbent on so and so. And it is an action in itself adapted to nature's arrangements. For of the acts done at the prompting of impulse some, they observe, are fit and meet, others the reverse, while there is a third class which is neither the one nor the other.Befitting acts are all those which reason prevails with us to do; and this is the case with honouring one's parents, brothers and country, and intercourse with friends. Unbefitting, or contrary to duty, are all acts that reason deprecates, e.g. to neglect one's parents, to be indifferent to one's brothers, not to agree with friends, to disregard the interests of one's country, and so forth. 7.109. Acts which fall under neither of the foregoing classes are those which reason neither urges us to do nor forbids, such as picking up a twig, holding a style or a scraper, and the like.Again, some duties are incumbent unconditionally, others in certain circumstances. Unconditional duties are the following: to take proper care of health and one's organs of sense, and things of that sort. Duties imposed by circumstances are such as maiming oneself and sacrifice of property. And so likewise with acts which are violations of duty. Another division is into duties which are always incumbent and those which are not. To live in accordance with virtue is always a duty, whereas dialectic by question and answer or walking-exercise and the like are not at all times incumbent. The same may be said of the violations of duty. 7.139. For through some parts it passes as a hold or containing force, as is the case with our bones and sinews; while through others it passes as intelligence, as in the ruling part of the soul. Thus, then, the whole world is a living being, endowed with soul and reason, and having aether for its ruling principle: so says Antipater of Tyre in the eighth book of his treatise On the Cosmos. Chrysippus in the first book of his work On Providence and Posidonius in his book On the Gods say that the heaven, but Cleanthes that the sun, is the ruling power of the world. Chrysippus, however, in the course of the same work gives a somewhat different account, namely, that it is the purer part of the aether; the same which they declare to be preeminently God and always to have, as it were in sensible fashion, pervaded all that is in the air, all animals and plants, and also the earth itself, as a principle of cohesion. |
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11. Origen, On Prayer, 6.1 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
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12. Origen, On First Principles, 2.1.2-2.1.3 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 2.1.2. But God, by the ineffable skill of His wisdom, transforming and restoring all things, in whatever manner they are made, to some useful aim, and to the common advantage of all, recalls those very creatures which differed so much from each other in mental conformation to one agreement of labour and purpose; so that, although they are under the influence of different motives, they nevertheless complete the fullness and perfection of one world, and the very variety of minds tends to one end of perfection. For it is one power which grasps and holds together all the diversity of the world, and leads the different movements towards one work, lest so immense an undertaking as that of the world should be dissolved by the dissensions of souls. And for this reason we think that God, the Father of all things, in order to ensure the salvation of all His creatures through the ineffable plan of His word and wisdom, so arranged each of these, that every spirit, whether soul or rational existence, however called, should not be compelled by force, against the liberty of his own will, to any other course than that to which the motives of his own mind led him (lest by so doing the power of exercising free-will should seem to be taken away, which certainly would produce a change in the nature of the being itself); and that the varying purposes of these would be suitably and usefully adapted to the harmony of one world, by some of them requiring help, and others being able to give it, and others again being the cause of struggle and contest to those who are making progress, among whom their diligence would be deemed more worthy of approval, and the place of rank obtained after victory be held with greater certainty, which should be established by the difficulties of the contest. 2.1.3. Although the whole world is arranged into offices of different kinds, its condition, nevertheless, is not to be supposed as one of internal discrepancies and discordances; but as our one body is provided with many members, and is held together by one soul, so I am of opinion that the whole world also ought to be regarded as some huge and immense animal, which is kept together by the power and reason of God as by one soul. This also, I think, is indicated in sacred Scripture by the declaration of the prophet, Do not I fill heaven and earth? Says the Lord; and again, The heaven is My throne, and the earth is My footstool; and by the Saviour's words, when He says that we are to swear neither by heaven, for it is God's throne; nor by the earth, for it is His footstool. To the same effect also are the words of Paul, in his address to the Athenians, when he says, In Him we live, and move, and have our being. For how do we live, and move, and have our being in God, except by His comprehending and holding together the whole world by His power? And how is heaven the throne of God, and the earth His footstool, as the Saviour Himself declares, save by His power filling all things both in heaven and earth, according to the Lord's own words? And that God, the Father of all things, fills and holds together the world with the fullness of His power, according to those passages which we have quoted, no one, I think, will have any difficulty in admitting. And now, since the course of the preceding discussion has shown that the different movements of rational beings, and their varying opinions, have brought about the diversity that is in the world, we must see whether it may not be appropriate that this world should have a termination like its beginning. For there is no doubt that its end must be sought amid much diversity and variety; which variety, being found to exist in the termination of the world, will again furnish ground and occasion for the diversities of the other world which is to succeed the present. |
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13. Stobaeus, Anthology, 2.65.8 (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
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14. Stoic School, Stoicor. Veter. Fragm., 1.137-1.138, 1.140, 2.310, 2.389, 2.416, 2.440, 2.442, 2.444, 2.446, 2.473, 2.546, 2.634, 2.714, 2.716, 2.787, 2.836, 2.841, 3.391
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