Part 5 (1/2)
”Be willing at length to be approved by yourself, be willing to appear beautiful to G.o.d, desire to be in purity with your own pure self and with G.o.d. Then, when any such appearance visits you, Plato says, Have recourse to expiations, go a suppliant to the temples of the averting Deities. It is even sufficient if you resort to the society of n.o.ble and just men, and compare yourself with them, whether you find one who is living or dead.”
”This is the true athlete, the man who exercises himself against such appearances. Stay, wretch, do not be carried away. Great is the combat, divine is the work; it is for kings.h.i.+p, for freedom, for happiness, for freedom from perturbation. Remember G.o.d, call on him as a helper and protector, as men at sea call on the Dioscuri in a storm. For what is a greater storm than that which comes from appearances which are violent and drive away the reason?”
Epictetus, compared with Plato, is the warrior philosopher beside the seeing philosopher. He is in closest grip with the foe, and his calm is the calm of the victor holding down his enemy.
His apparent unconcern as to the hereafter is in keeping with his whole att.i.tude, which is that of cheerful acquiescence in the divine order, whatever it be. ”To be free, not hindered, not compelled, conforming yourself to the administration of Zeus, obeying it, well satisfied with this, blaming no one, charging no one with fault, able from your whole soul to utter these verses:--
”Lead me, O Zeus, and thou, too, Destiny.”
He vindicates Providence against injustice. ”The unjust man has the advantage,--in what? In money. But the just man has the advantage in that he is faithful and modest.”
”We ought to have these two principles in readiness, that except the will nothing is good nor bad; and that we ought not to lead events, but to follow them. My brother ought not to have behaved thus to me. No, but he will see to that; and, however he may behave, I will conduct myself toward him as I ought.”
”As a mark is not set up for the purpose of missing the aim, so neither does the nature of evil exist in the world.”
That is, it is inconceivable that the universe is a blunder. This is one of the fundamental ideas of Epictetus. The inference is, that man has only to define his true end and pursue it, which is the right action of the will, or as we should say, right character. Pursuing this, he never finds himself thwarted or unfriended, never rebels or mistrusts the G.o.ds.
The substance of his message is: ”On the occasion of every accident (event) that befalls you, remember to turn to yourself and inquire what power you have for turning it to use.”
”G.o.d has delivered yourself to your own care, and says, 'I had no fitter one to intrust him to than yourself; keep him for me such as he is by nature, modest, faithful, erect, unterrified, free from pa.s.sion and perturbation.'”
G.o.d, says Epictetus, has made me his witness to men. ”For this purpose he leads me at one time hither, at another time sends me thither; shows me to men as poor, without authority and sick; sends me to Gyara, leads me into prison, not because he hates me,--far from him be such a meaning, for who hates the best of his servants? nor yet because he cares not for me, for he does not neglect any, even of the smallest things; but he does this for the purpose of exercising me and making use of me as a witness to others. Being appointed to such a service, do I still care about the place in which I am, or with whom I am, or what men say about me? and do I not entirely direct my thoughts to G.o.d, and to his instructions and commands?”
Thus he falls back on the life of the spirit,--simple, sure, victorious.
To place all good in character is the secret. From virtue grows piety.
It is desire set on externals, and so disappointed, that brings discontent, repining, impiety.
Yet Epictetus has distinct and serious limitations. He a.s.sumes that to avoid all perturbation is the aim of the wise man. This can be accomplished only by the sacrifice of all objects of desire which lie outside of the control of the will, and he advises this sacrifice. ”If you love an earthen vessel, say it is an earthen vessel which you love; for when it has been broken you will not be disturbed. If you are kissing your child or wife, say that it is a human being whom you are kissing, for when the wife or child dies you will not be disturbed.”
All joys but the purely moral are to be despised. In going to the theatre one should be indifferent to who gains the prize. This attempted indifference to all the great and little pleasures of life which have no distinct moral character, if successful, makes an ascetic, and of most men is liable to make prigs. It is the vice of Puritanism.
The modern world is riper and richer than the Roman world. We say now, the ideal man is not ”unperturbed.” Perturbations are inevitable to the man normally and highly developed, with sensibilities and sympathies keenly alive. The true aim is to include composure, but not as sole and supreme. This is a more complex development than the Stoic, less capable perhaps of symmetrical completeness, but grander, as a Gothic church is grander than a Greek temple.
Again, the a.s.sumption of Epictetus and of all the Stoics that the will is wholly free, that man has only to choose and seek goodness and he can perfectly achieve it, misses the familiar and bitter experience of humanity, that too often man carries his prison and fetters within himself. A Roman poet voiced it: _Meliora video proboque, deteriora sequor_. Paul spoke it: ”The good that I would, I do not; and the evil I would not, that I do.”
But Epictetus himself is one of the great souls who are not to be described by the label of any creed. He has in himself the secret of spiritual victory, and he has a peculiar power to impart it. The limitations of Stoicism as a creed are more plainly seen in Marcus Aurelius. His character, revealed in the ”fierce light that beats upon a throne,” is of rare n.o.bility and beauty. To a man's strength he unites a woman's tenderness. Just because of that tenderness, and the deep heart of which it is the flower, the philosophy he so bravely practices gives him but a bleak and chill abiding-place. Through his Meditations--manly, wise, and gracious--there runs a deep note of sadness. For this man's nature cried out for love, and not even faithfulest duty can take the place of love.
Stoicism was the most distinct embodiment of the virtues of the cla.s.sic world. Those virtues shone in many who did not profess themselves to be of the Stoic school. Plutarch's gallery of portraits is a part of the world's best possession. His heroes belong not to their own time alone.
They may be distinguished in some broad respects from the saints and sages of other lands and times; some advance of type may be traced in the highest products of the successive ages; but while one turns the pages of Plutarch, he scarcely asks for better company.
Why, then, did Stoic philosophy fail of more wide or lasting success among mankind? Because--we may perhaps answer--its chief weapon was the reasoning intellect, in which only a few could be proficient. Because, fixing its ideal in imperturbability, it denied sensibilities of affection, joy, and hope, which are a large part of normal humanity.
Because, in its lack of natural science, and its revulsion from the mythologic deities, it isolated man in the universe, claiming for the individual will a sovereignty which ignored the ensphering play of natural forces, and denying to the heart any outreach beyond the earthly and finite. If we may venture to summarize the defects of ancient philosophy in two words--it lacked womanliness and it lacked knowledge.
We are now to study the building up of another side of the ideal man.
Philosophy had essayed a religion of the intellect and the will; now from Judaism sprang Christianity, a religion of the imagination and the heart.
The highest outcome of the cla.s.sic civilization was the clear conception and strenuous practice of right for its own sake. The outcome of Judaism in Christianity was essentially the belief and feeling of an intimate union between man and a higher power, with love and obedience on the one side, love and providence on the other.
In the vast tract of Greek-Roman history, we have looked at only a few of the highest mountain peaks--the n.o.blest contributions. But since the Christian church still treats the Old Testament as one of its charter doc.u.ments, we need to enlarge a little upon the general outline and color of Jewish history, and we must recognize the shadows as well as the lights.