Ancient philosophy a new history of western philosophy volume 1 (new history of western philosophy) ( PDFDrive ) 309

ETHICS

free from passion, and is in possession of all worthwhile knowledge: his
virtue is the same as that of a god (LS 61j, 63f).
The wise man whom we seek is the happy man who can think no human
experience painful enough to cast him down nor joyful enough to raise his spirits.
For what can seem important in human aVairs to one who is familiar with all
eternity and the vastness of the entire universe? (Cicero, Tusc. 4. 37).

The wise man is rich, and owns all things, since he alone knows how to use
things well; he alone is truly handsome, since the mind’s face is more
beautiful than the body’s; he alone is free, even if he is in prison, since he is
a slave to no appetite (Cicero, Fin 3. 75). It was unsurprising, after all this,
that the Stoics admitted that a wise man was harder to Wnd than a phoenix
(LS 61n). They thus purchase the invulnerability of happiness only at the
cost of making it unattainable.
Since a wise man is not to be found, and there are no degrees of virtue,
the whole human race consists of fools. Shall we say, then, that the wise
man is a mythical ideal held up for our admiration and imitation (LS 66a)?
Hardly, because however much we progress towards this unattainable goal,
we have still come no nearer to salvation. Someone who is only two feet
from the surface is drowning as much as anyone who is 500 fathoms deep
in the ocean (LS 61t).
The Stoics’ doctrine of wisdom and happiness, then, oVers us little
encouragement to strive for virtue. However, later Stoics made a distinction between doctrine (decreta) and precepts (praecepta), the one being
general and the other particular (Seneca, Ep. 94, 1–4). While the doctrine
is austere and Olympian, the precepts, by an amiable inconsistency, are
often quite liberal and practical. Stoics were willing to give advice on the
conduct of marriage, the right time for singing, the best type of joke, and
many other details of daily life (Epictetus, discourses 4. 12. 16). The
distinction between doctrine and precepts is matched by a distinction

between choice and selection: virtue alone was good and choiceworthy
(D.L. 7. 89), but among indiVerent matters some could be selected in
preference to others. Smart clothes, for instance, were in themselves
worthless; but there could be good in the selection of smart clothes
(Seneca, Ep. 92, 12). Critics said that a selection could be good only if
what was selected was good (LS 64c). Sometimes, again, Stoics spoke as if
the end of life was not so much the actual attainment of virtue as doing
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