The fervor of the day had declined, when Theon issued to the street from
the house of Epicurus: at that instant he met in the face his friend
Cleanthes; he ran to his embrace; but the young stoic, receding with
mingled astonishment and horror—“Ye gods! from the house of Epicurus?”
“I do not marvel at your surprise,” returned Theon, “nor, if I recall my
own feelings of yesterday, at your indignation.”
“Answer me quickly,” interrupted Cleanthes; “is Theon yet my friend?”
“And does Cleanthes doubt it?”
“What may I not doubt, when I see you come from such a mansion?”
“Nay, my brother,” said Theon, kindly throwing his arm round the neck of
his friend, and drawing him onwards, “I have been in no mansion of vice,
or of folly.”
“I do not understand you,” returned the stoic, but half yielding to his
kindness; “I do not know what to think, or what to fear.”
“Fear nothing; and think only good,” said the Corinthian: “True, I come
from the gardens of pleasure, where I have heard very little of
pleasure, and a very great deal of virtue.”
“I see how it is,” returned the other; “you have lost your principles,
and I, my friend.”
“I do not think I have lost the first, and I am very sure you have not
lost the last!”
“No!” exclaimed Cleanthes; “but I tell you, yes;” and his cheeks
flushed, and his eyes flashed with indignation: “I _have_ lost my
friend, and you have lost yours. Go!” he continued, and drew himself
from the arm of Theon. “Go! Cleanthes hath no fellowship with an
apostate and a libertine.”
“You wrong me; and you wrong Epicurus,” said his friend, in a tone of
more reproach than anger: “But I cannot blame you; yesterday I had
myself been equally unjust. You must see him, you must hear him,
Cleanthes. This alone can undeceive you—can convince you; convince you
of my innocence, and Epicurus’s virtue.”
“Epicurus’s virtue! your innocence?—What is Epicurus to me? What is he,
or should he be to you? Your innocence? And is this fastened to the
mantle of Epicurus: see him to be convinced of your innocence?”
“Yes, and of your own injustice: Oh! Cleanthes, what a fool do I now
know myself to have been! To have listened to the lies of Timocrates! To
have believed all his absurdities! Come, my friend! come with me and
behold the face of the Master he blasphemes!”
“Theon, one master, and but one master, is mine. To me, whether
Timocrates exaggerate or even lie, it matters nothing.”
“It does, or it should,” said the Corinthian. “Will a disciple of Zeno
not open his eyes to truth? Not see an error and atone for it, by
acknowledging it? I do not ask you to be the disciple of Epicurus—I only
ask you to be just to him, and that for your own sake, more than mine,
or even his.”
“I see you are seduced—I see you are lost,” cried the stoic, fixing on
him a look in which sorrow struggled with indignation. “I thought myself
a stoic, but I feel the weakness of a woman in my eyes.—Thou wert as my
brother, Theon; and thou—thou also art beguiled by the Syren—left virtue
for pleasure, Zeno for Epicurus.”
“I have not left Zeno.”
“You cannot follow both—you cannot be in the day and under the night at
one and the same time.”
“I tell you there is no night in the gardens of Epicurus.”
“Is there no pleasure there,” cried the stoic, his mouth and brows
curling with irony.
“Yes, there is pleasure there: the pleasure of wisdom and virtue.”
“Ah! have you learnt the Gargettian subtleties so soon? You have
doubtless already worshipped virtue under the form of the courtezan
Leontium; and wisdom under that of her master and paramour, the son of
Neocles.”
“How little you know of either!” returned Theon. “But I knew as little
yesterday.”
Cleanthes stopped. They were before the stoic portico. “Farewell! Return
to your gardens. Farewell!”
“We do not yet part,” said Theon: “Zeno is still my master.” He followed
his friend up the steps. A crowd of disciples were assembled, waiting
the arrival of their master. Some, crowded into groups, listened to the
harangues of an elder or more able scholar: others walking in parties of
six or a dozen, reasoning, debating, and disputing: while innumerable
single figures, undisturbed by the buzz around them, leaned against the
pillars, studying each from a manuscript, or stood upon the steps with
arms folded, and heads dropped on their bosoms, wrapped in silent
meditations. At the entrance of Cleanthes, the favored pupil of their
master, the scholars made way, and the loud hum slowly hushed into
silence. He advanced to the centre, and the floating crowd gathered and
compressed into a wide and deep circle. All eyes bent on the youth in
expectant curiosity, for his countenance was disturbed, and his manner
abrupt.
Cleanthes was of the middle size: so slender, that you wondered at the
erectness of his gait and activity of his motion. His neck was small;
his shoulders falling; his head elegantly formed; the hair smooth and
close cut; the forehead narrow, and somewhat deeply lined for one so
young: the eyebrows marked and even, save a slight bend upwards, as by a
frown, above the nose. The eyes blue; but their gaze was too earnest,
and their spirit too clear, to leave any of the melting softness so
usual with that color:—And yet there were moments when this would appear
in them; and when it did, it went to the soul of him who observed it,
but such moments were short and rare. The nose was finely and perhaps
too delicately turned; the mouth—mild and always in repose. The cheeks
were thin, and though slightly flushed, the face had a look of paleness
till enthusiasm awoke, and deepened all its dyes. The whole expression
had more spirituality and variety, and the manner more agitation, than
you would have looked for in the first and favorite pupil of Zeno. The
youth turned a rapid glance round the circle: he threw out his right
arm; the mantle dropped from his shoulder, and in a varied, piercing,
and yet melodious voice he began—
“My friends! My brothers! Disciples of Zeno and of virtue. Give me your
ears, and awake your faculties! How shall I tell the dangers that
surround you? How shall I paint the demon that would ensnare you;
Timocrates hath escaped from his enchantments, and told us that riot and
revelling were in his halls, that impiety was in his mouth; vice in his
practice; deformity in his aspect: and we thought that none but souls
born for error, already steeped in infamy, or sunk in effeminacy, could
be taken in his toils and seduced by his example. But behold! he hath
changed his countenance—he hath changed his tongue:—amid his revels he
hath put on the garb of decency: in his riot he talks of innocence; in
his licentiousness, of virtue. Behold the youth! they run to him with
greedy ears—they throng his gardens and his porticoes. Athens, Attica,
Greece, all are the Gargettian’s. Asia, Italy, the burning Africa and
the frozen Scythia—all, all send ready pupils to his feet. Oh! what
shall we say? Oh! how shall we stem the torrent? Oh! how shall we fence
our hearts—how our ears from the song of the Syren?—to what mast shall
we bind ourselves, to what pilot shall we trust, that we may pass the
shores in safety without dashing on the rocks?—But why do I speak? Why
do I enquire? Why do I exhort? Is not the contagion already among us? In
the school of Zeno—in this portico—in this circle are there not
waverers—Yea, are there not apostates?” Emotion choked his utterance: he
paused, and glanced his kindled eyes round upon the audience. Every
breath was held in expectation; each looked on the other in doubt,
dismay, and inquiry. Theon’s heart beat quick and high: he advanced one
step, and raised his arm to speak; but Cleanthes, gathering his breath,
again in a rapid voice continued:—
“Does this silence speak conscious guilt, or startled innocence? The
last: I will believe the last. Praise be to the gods! praise to our
guardian, Minerva! praise to our great, our glorious master, there are
yet some sons left to Athens and to Greece, who shall respect, follow,
and attain to virtue! Some choice and disciplined souls who shall stand
forth the light and ornament of their age, and whose names shall be in
honor with those yet unborn. Rouse, rouse up your energies! Oh! be firm
to Zeno, and to virtue! I tell you not—Zeno tells you not, that virtue
is found in pleasure’s repose. Resistance, energy, watchfulness,
patience, and endurance—these, these must be your practice, must be your
habit, ere you can reach the perfection of your nature. The ascent is
steep, is long, is arduous. To-day you must ascend a step, and to-morrow
a step, and to-morrow, and to-morrow—and yet shall you be far from the
summit, from rest, and from security. Does this appal you? Does this
disgust you? Go then to the Gardens! Go to the man of Gargettium—he who
calls himself philosopher, and who loves and teaches folly! Go, go to
him, and he shall encourage and soothe you. He shall end your pursuit,
and give you your ambition! He shall show you virtue robed in pleasures,
and lolling in ease! He shall teach you wisdom in a song, and happiness
in impiety!—But I am told, that Timocrates hath lied; that Epicurus is
not a libertine; nor Leontium a prostitute; nor the youth of the Garden
the ministers to their lusts. Be it so. Timocrates must answer to
himself, whether his tale be the outpourings of indignant truth, or the
subtle inventions of malevolence: with his own conscience be the secret:
to us it matters nothing. We, who have nought to do with the doctrines
of Epicurus, have nought to do with his practice. Let him who would
vindicate the one, vindicate the other: let him come forth and say, that
the master in the Gardens is not only pure in action, but perfect in
theory. Let him say, that he worships virtue as virtue, and shuns vice
as vice. Let him say that he arms the soul with fortitude, ennobles it
with magnanimity, chastens it with temperance, enlarges it with
beneficence, perfects it with justice;—and let him moreover say, that he
does this, not that the soul so schooled and invigorated may lie in the
repose of virtue, but that it may exult in its honor, and be fitted for
its activity. Fie on that virtue which prudence alone directs! Which
teaches to be just that the laws may not punish, or our neighbors
revenge:—to be enduring—because complainings were useless, and weakness
would bring on us insult and contempt:—to be temperate—that our body may
keep its vigor, our appetites retain their acuteness, and our
gratifications and sensualities their zest:—to serve our friends—that
they may serve us;—our country—because its defence and well-being
comprehends our own. Why all this is well—but is there nothing more? Is
it our ease alone we shall study, and not our dignity?—Though all my
fellow-men were swept away, and not a mortal nor immortal eye were left
to approve or condemn—should I not here—within this breast, have a judge
to dread, and a friend to conciliate? Prudence and pleasure! Was it from
such principles as these that the virtue of Solon, of Miltiades, of
Aristides, of Socrates, of Plato, of Xenophon, of all our heroes and all
our sages, had its spring and its nourishment? Was it such virtue as
this that in Lycurgus put by the offered crown?—that in Leonidas stood
at Thermopylæ?—that in the dying Pericles gloried that he had never
caused a citizen to mourn? Was it such virtue as this—that spoke in
Socrates before his judges?—that sustained him in his prison—and when
the door was open, and the sails of the ready ship unfurled, made him
prefer death to flight; his dignity to his existence?”
Again the young orator paused, but his indignant soul seemed still to
speak from his flashing eyes. His cheeks glowed as fire, and the big
drops rolled from his forehead. At this moment the circle behind him
gave way. Zeno advanced into the midst: he stood by the head and
shoulders above the crowd: his breast, broad and manly: his limbs, cast
in strength and symmetry: his gait, erect, calm, and dignified: his
features, large, grand, and regular, seemed sculptured by the chisel for
a colossal divinity: the forehead, broad and serene, was marked with the
even lines of wisdom and age; but no harsh wrinkles, nor playing muscles
disturbed the repose of his cheeks, nor had sixty years touched with one
thread of silver his close black hair; the eyes, dark and full, fringed
with long straight lashes, looked in severe and steady wisdom from under
their correct and finely arched brows: the nose came from the forehead,
straight and even: the mouth and chin, were firm and silent. Wisdom
undisturbable, fortitude unshakeable, self-respect, self-possession, and
self-knowledge perfected, were in his face, his carriage, and his tread.
He stopped before the youth, who had turned at his approach. “My son,”
fixing his calm gaze on the working countenance of his pupil, “what hath
disturbed thy soul?” Cleanthes laid a hand on his laboring breast: he
made one violent effort for composure and speech: it failed. The hot
blood forsook his cheeks: it rushed again: again it fled: he gasped, and
dropped fainting at the feet of his Master.