87 “The virtues to be complete must have fixed their residence in the

heart and become appetites impelling to actions without further

thought than the gratification of them; so that after their

expedience ceases they still continue to operate by the desire they

raise.... I knew a mercer who having gotten a competency of fortune,

thought to retire and enjoy himself in quiet; but finding he could

not be easy without business was forced to return to the shop and

assist his former partners gratis, in the nature of a journeyman.

Why then should it be thought strange that a man long inured to the

practice of moral duties should persevere in them out of liking,

when they can yield him no further advantage?”—Tucker’s _Light of

Nature_, vol. i. p. 269. Mr. J. S. Mill in his _Utilitarianism_

dwells much on the heroism which he thinks this view of morals may

produce.

88 See Lactantius, _Inst. Div._ vi. 9. Montesquieu, in his _Décadence

de l’Empire romain_, has shown in detail the manner in which the

crimes of Roman politicians contributed to the greatness of their

nation. Modern history furnishes only too many illustrations of the

same truth.

89 “That quick sensibility which is the groundwork of all advances

towards perfection increases the pungency of pains and

vexations.”—Tucker’s _Light of Nature_, ii. 16, § 4.

90 This position is forcibly illustrated by Mr. Maurice in his fourth

lecture _On Conscience_ (1868). It is manifest that a tradesman

resisting a dishonest or illegal trade custom, an Irish peasant in a

disturbed district revolting against the agrarian conspiracy of his

class, or a soldier in many countries conscientiously refusing in

obedience to the law to fight a duel, would incur the full force of

social penalties, because he failed to do that which was illegal or

criminal.

91 See Brown _On the Characteristics_, pp. 206-209.

92 “A toothache produces more violent convulsions of pain than a

phthisis or a dropsy. A gloomy disposition ... may be found in very

worthy characters, though it is sufficient alone to embitter

life.... A selfish villain may possess a spring and alacrity of

temper, which is indeed a good quality, but which is rewarded much

beyond its merit, and when attended with good fortune will

compensate for the uneasiness and remorse arising from all the other

vices.”—Hume’s Essays: _The Sceptic_.

93 At the same time, the following passage contains, I think, a great

deal of wisdom and of a kind peculiarly needed in England at the

present day:—“The nature of the subject furnishes the strongest

presumption that no better system will ever, for the future, be

invented, in order to account for the origin of the benevolent from

the selfish affections, and reduce all the various emotions of the

human mind to a perfect simplicity. The case is not the same in this

species of philosophy as in physics. Many an hypothesis in nature,

contrary to first appearances, has been found, on more accurate

scrutiny, solid and satisfactory.... But the presumption always lies

on the other side in all enquiries concerning the origin of our

passions, and of the internal operations of the human mind. The

simplest and most obvious cause which can there be assigned for any

phenomenon, is probably the true one.... The affections are not

susceptible of any impression from the refinements of reason or

imagination; and it is always found that a vigorous exertion of the

latter faculties, necessarily, from the narrow capacity of the human

mind, destroys all activity in the former.”—Hume’s _Enquiry

Concerning Morals_, Append. II.

94 “The pleasing consciousness and self-approbation that rise up in the

mind of a virtuous man, exclusively of any direct, explicit,

consideration of advantage likely to accrue to himself from his

possession of those good qualities” (Hartley _On Man_, vol. i. p.

493), form a theme upon which moralists of both schools are fond of

dilating, in a strain that reminds one irresistibly of the

self-complacency of a famous nursery hero, while reflecting upon his

own merits over a Christmas-pie. Thus Adam Smith says, “The man who,

not from frivolous fancy, but from proper motives, has performed a

generous action, when he looks forward to those whom he has served,

feels himself to be the natural object of their love and gratitude,

and by sympathy with them, of the esteem and approbation of all

mankind. And when he looks backward to the motive from which he

acted, and surveys it in the light in which the indifferent

spectator will survey it, he still continues to enter into it, and

applauds himself by sympathy with the approbation of this supposed

impartial judge. In both these points of view, his conduct appears

to him every way agreeable.... Misery and wretchedness can never

enter the breast in which dwells complete

self-satisfaction.”—_Theory of Moral Sentiments_, part ii. ch. ii. §

2; part iii. ch. iii. I suspect that many moralists confuse the

self-gratulation which they suppose a virtuous man to feel, with the

delight a religious man experiences from the sense of the protection

and favour of the Deity. But these two feelings are clearly

distinct, and it will, I believe, be found that the latter is most

strongly experienced by the very men who most sincerely disclaim all

sense of merit. “Were the perfect man to exist,” said that good and

great writer, Archer Butler, “he himself would be the last to know

it; for the highest stage of advancement is the lowest descent in

humility.” At all events, the reader will observe, that on

utilitarian principles nothing could be more pernicious or criminal

than that modest, humble, and diffident spirit, which diminishes the

pleasure of self-gratulation, one of the highest utilitarian motives

to virtue.

95 Hartley has tried in one place to evade this conclusion by an appeal

to the doctrine of final causes. He says that the fact that

conscience is not an original principle of our nature, but is formed

mechanically in the manner I have described, does not invalidate the

fact that it is intended for our guide, “for all the things which

have evident final causes, are plainly brought about by mechanical

means;” and he appeals to the milk in the breast, which is intended

for the sustenance of the young, but which is nevertheless

mechanically produced. (_On Man_, vol. ii. pp. 338-339.) But it is

plain that this mode of reasoning would justify us in attributing an

authoritative character to any habit—e.g. to that of avarice—which

these writers assure us is in the manner of its formation an exact

parallel to conscience. The later followers of Hartley certainly

cannot be accused of any excessive predilection for the doctrine of

final causes, yet we sometimes find them asking what great

difference it can make whether (when conscience is admitted by both

parties to be real) it is regarded as an original principle of our

nature, or as a product of association? Simply this. If by the

constitution of our nature we are subject to a law of duty which is

different from and higher than our interest, a man who violates this

law through interested motives, is deserving of reprobation. If on

the other hand there is no natural law of duty, and if the pursuit

of our interest is the one original principle of our being, no one

can be censured who pursues it, and the first criterion of a wise

man will be his determination to eradicate every habit

(conscientious or otherwise) which impedes him in doing so.

_ 96 On Human Nature_, chap. ix. § 10.

_ 97 Enquiry concerning Good and Evil._

98 This theory is noticed by Hutcheson, and a writer in the _Spectator_

(No. 436) suggests that it may explain the attraction of

prize-fights. The case of the pleasure derived from fictitious

sorrow is a distinct question, and has been admirably treated in

Lord Kames’ _Essays on Morality_. Bishop Butler notices (_Second

Sermon on Compassion_), that it is possible for the very intensity

of a feeling of compassion to divert men from charity by making them

“industriously turn away from the miserable;” and it is well known

that Goethe, on account of this very susceptibility, made it one of

the rules of his life to avoid everything that could suggest painful

ideas. Hobbes makes the following very characteristic comments on

some famous lines of Lucretius: “From what passion proceedeth it

that men take pleasure to behold from the shore the danger of those

that are at sea in a tempest or in fight, or from a safe castle to

behold two armies charge one another in the field? It is certainly

in the whole sum joy, else men would never flock to such a

spectacle. Nevertheless, there is both joy and grief, for as there

is novelty and remembrance of our own security present, which is

delight, so there is also pity, which is grief. But the delight is

so far predominant that men usually are content in such a case to be

spectators of the misery of their friends.” (_On Human Nature_, ch.

ix. § 19.) Good Christians, according to some theologians, are

expected to enjoy this pleasure in great perfection in heaven. “We

may believe in the next world also the goodness as well as the

happiness of the blest will be confirmed and advanced by reflections

naturally arising from the view of the misery which some shall

undergo, which seems to be a good reason for the creation of those

beings who shall be finally miserable, and for the continuation of

them in their miserable existence ... though in one respect the view

of the misery which the damned undergo might seem to detract from

the happiness of the blessed through pity and commiseration, yet

under another, a nearer and much more affecting consideration, viz.

that all this is the misery they themselves were often exposed to

and in danger of incurring, why may not the sense of their own

escape so far overcome the sense of another’s ruin as quite to

extinguish the pain that usually attends the idea of it, and even

render it productive of some real happiness? To this purpose,

Lucretius’ _Suave mari_,” etc. (_Law’s notes to his Translation of

King’s Origin of Evil_, pp. 477, 479.)

99 See e.g. _Reid’s Essays on the Active Powers_, essay iii. ch. v.

100 The error I have traced in this paragraph will be found running

through a great part of what Mr. Buckle has written upon morals—I

think the weakest portion of his great work. See, for example, an

elaborate confusion on the subject, _History of Civilisation_, vol.

ii. p. 429. Mr. Buckle maintains that all the philosophers of what

is commonly called “the Scotch school” (a school founded by the

Irishman Hutcheson, and to which Hume does not belong), were

incapable of inductive reasoning, because they maintained the

existence of a moral sense or faculty, or of first principles,

incapable of resolution; and he enters into a learned enquiry into

the causes which made it impossible for Scotch writers to pursue or

appreciate the inductive method. It is curious to contrast this view

with the language of one, who, whatever may be the value of his

original speculations, is, I conceive, among the very ablest

philosophical critics of the present century. “Les philosophes

écossais adoptèrent les procédés que Bacon avait recommandé

d’appliquer à l’étude du monde physique, et les transportèrent dans

l’étude du monde moral. Ils firent voir que l’induction baconienne,

c’est-à-dire, l’induction précédée d’une observation scrupuleuse des

phénomènes, est en philosophie comme en physique la seule méthode

légitime. C’est un de leurs titres les plus honorables d’avoir

insisté sur cette démonstration, et d’avoir en même temps joint

l’exemple au précepte.... Il est vrai que le zèle des philosophes

écossais en faveur de la méthode d’observation leur a presque fait

dépasser le but. Ils ont incliné à renfermer la psychologie dans la

description minutieuse et continuelle de phénomènes de l’âme sans

réfléchir assez que cette description doit faire place à l’induction

et au raisonnement déductif, et qu’une philosophie qui se bornerait

à l’observation serait aussi stérile que celle qui s’amuserait à

construire des hypothèses sans avoir préalablement observé.”—Cousin,

Hist. de la Philos. Morale au xviiime Siècle, Tome 4, p. 14-16.

Dugald Stewart had said much the same thing, but he was a Scotchman,

and therefore, according to Mr. Buckle (_Hist. of Civ._ ii. pp.

485-86), incapable of understanding what induction was. I may add

that one of the principal objections M. Cousin makes against Locke

is, that he investigated the origin of our ideas before analysing

minutely their nature, and the propriety of this method is one of

the points on which Mr. Mill (_Examination of Sir W. Hamilton_) is

at issue with M. Cousin.

101 M. Ch. Comte, in his very learned _Traité de Législation_, liv. iii.

ch. iv., has made an extremely curious collection of instances in

which different nations have made their own distinctive

peculiarities of colour and form the ideal of beauty.

102 “How particularly fine the hard theta is in our English

terminations, as in that grand word death, for which the Germans

gutturise a sound that _puts you in mind of nothing but a loathsome

toad_.”—Coleridge’s _Table Talk_, p. 181.

103 Mackintosh, _Dissert._ p. 238.

104 Lord Kames’ _Essays on Morality_ (1st edition), pp. 55-56.

105 See Butler’s _Three Sermons on Human Nature_, and the preface.

106 Speaking of the animated statue which he regarded as a

representative of man, Condillac says, “Le goût peut ordinairement

contribuer plus que l’odorat à son bonheur et à son malheur.... Il y

contribue même encore plus que les sons harmonieux, parce que le

besoin de nourriture lui rend les saveurs plus nécessaires, et par

conséquent les lui fait goûter avec plus de vivacité. La faim pourra

la rendre malheureuse, mais dès qu’elle aura remarqué les sensations

propres à l’apaiser, elle y déterminera davantage son attention, les

désirera avec plus de violence et en jouira avec plus de

délire.”—_Traité des Sensations_, 1re partie ch. x.

107 This is one of the favourite thoughts of Pascal, who, however, in

his usual fashion dwells upon it in a somewhat morbid and

exaggerated strain. “C’est une bien grande misère que de pouvoir

prendre plaisir à des choses si basses et si méprisables ... l’homme

est encore plus à plaindre de ce qu’il peut se divertir à ces choses

si frivoles et si basses, que de ce qu’il s’afflige de ses misères

effectives.... D’ou vient que cet homme, qui a perdu depuis peu son

fils unique, et qui, accablé de procès et de querelles, était ce

matin si troublé, n’y pense plus maintenant? Ne vous en étonnez pas;

il est tout occupé à voir par où passera un cerf que ses chiens

poursuivent.... C’est une joie de malade et de

frénétique.”—_Pensées_ (Misère de l’homme).

108 “Quæ singula improvidam mortalitatem involvunt, solum ut inter ista

certum sit, nihil esse certi, nec miserius quidquam homine, aut

superbius. Cæteris quippe animantium sola victus cura est, in quo

sponte naturæ benignitas sufficit: uno quidem vel præferenda cunctis

bonis, quod de gloria, de pecunia, ambitione, superque de morte, non

cogitant.”—Plin. _Hist. Nat._ ii. 5.

109 Paley, in his very ingenious, and in some respects admirable,

chapter on happiness tries to prove the inferiority of animal

pleasures, by showing the short time their enjoyment actually lasts,

the extent to which they are dulled by repetition, and the cases in

which they incapacitate men for other pleasures. But this

calculation omits the influence of some animal enjoyments upon

health and temperament. The fact, however, that health, which is a

condition of body, is the chief source of happiness, Paley fully

admits. “Health,” he says, “is the one thing needful ... when we are

in perfect health and spirits, we feel in ourselves a happiness

independent of any particular outward gratification.... This is an

enjoyment which the Deity has annexed to life, and probably

constitutes in a great measure the happiness of infants and brutes

... of oysters, periwinkles, and the like; for which I have

sometimes been at a loss to find out amusement.” On the test of

happiness he very fairly says, “All that can be said is that there

remains a presumption in favour of those conditions of life in which

men generally appear most cheerful and contented; for though the

apparent happiness of mankind be not always a true measure of their

real happiness, it is the best measure we have.”—_Moral Philosophy_,

i. 6.

110 A writer who devoted a great part of his life to studying the deaths

of men in different countries, classes, and churches, and to

collecting from other physicians information on the subject, says:

“À mesure qu’on s’éloigne des grands foyers de civilisation, qu’on

se rapproche des plaines et des montagnes, le caractère de la mort

prend de plus en plus l’aspect calme du ciel par un beau crépuscule

du soir.... En général la mort s’accomplit d’une manière d’autant

plus simple et naturelle qu’on est plus libre des innombrables liens

de la civilisation.”—Lauvergne, _De l’agonie de la Mort_, tome i.

pp. 131-132.

111 “I will omit much usual declamation upon the dignity and capacity of

our nature, the superiority of the soul to the body, of the rational

to the animal part of our constitution, upon the worthiness,

refinement, and delicacy of some satisfactions, or the meanness,

grossness, and sensuality of others; because I hold that pleasures

differ in nothing but in continuance and intensity.”—Paley’s _Moral

Philosophy_, book i. ch. vi. Bentham in like manner said, “Quantity

of pleasure being equal, pushpin is as good as poetry,” and he

maintained that the value of a pleasure depends on—its (1)

intensity, (2) duration, (3) certainty, (4) propinquity, (5) purity,

(6) fecundity, (7) extent (_Springs of Action_). The recognition of

the “purity” of a pleasure might seem to imply the distinction for

which I have contended in the text, but this is not so. The purity

of a pleasure or pain, according to Bentham, is “the chance it has

of not being followed by sensations of the opposite kind: that is

pain if it be a pleasure, pleasure if it be a pain.”—_Morals and

Legislation_, i. § 8. Mr. Buckle (_Hist. of Civilisation_, vol. ii.

pp. 399-400) writes in a somewhat similar strain, but less

unequivocally, for he admits that mental pleasures are “more

ennobling” than physical ones. The older utilitarians, as far as I

have observed, did not even advert to the question. This being the

case, it must have been a matter of surprise as well as of

gratification to most intuitive moralists to find Mr. Mill fully

recognising the existence of different kinds of pleasure, and

admitting that the superiority of the higher kinds does not spring

from their being greater in amount.—_Utilitarianism_, pp. 11-12. If

it be meant by this that we have the power of recognising some

pleasures as superior to others in kind, irrespective of all

consideration of their intensity, their cost, and their

consequences, I submit that the admission is completely incompatible

with the utilitarian theory, and that Mr. Mill has only succeeded in

introducing Stoical elements into his system by loosening its very

foundation. The impossibility of establishing an aristocracy of

enjoyments in which, apart from all considerations of consequences,

some which give less pleasure and are less widely diffused are

regarded as intrinsically superior to others which give more

pleasure and are more general, without admitting into our estimate a

moral element, which on utilitarian principles is wholly

illegitimate, has been powerfully shown since the first edition of

this book by Professor Grote, in his _Examination of the Utilitarian

Philosophy_, chap. iii.

112 Büchner, _Force et Matière_, pp. 163-164. There is a very curious

collection of the speculations of the ancient philosophers on this

subject in Plutarch’s treatise, _De Placitis Philos._

113 Aulus Gellius, _Noctes_, x. 23. The law is given by Dion. Halicarn.

Valerius Maximus says, “Vini usus olim Romanis feminis ignotus fuit,

ne scilicet in aliquod dedecus prolaberentur: quia proximus a Libero

patre intemperantiæ gradus ad inconcessam Venerem esse consuevit”

(Val. Max. ii. 1, § 5). This is also noticed by Pliny (_Hist. Nat._

xiv. 14), who ascribes the law to Romulus, and who mentions two

cases in which women were said to have been put to death for this

offence, and a third in which the offender was deprived of her

dowry. Cato said that the ancient Romans were accustomed to kiss

their wives for the purpose of discovering whether they had been

drinking wine. The Bona Dea, it is said, was originally a woman

named Fatua, who was famous for her modesty and fidelity to her

husband, but who, unfortunately, having once found a cask of wine in

the house, got drunk, and was in consequence scourged to death by

her husband. He afterwards repented of his act, and paid divine

honours to her memory, and as a memorial of her death, a cask of

wine was always placed upon the altar during the rites. (Lactantius,

_Div. Inst._ i. 22.) The Milesians, also, and the inhabitants of

Marseilles are said to have had laws forbidding women to drink wine

(Ælian, _Hist. Var._ ii. 38). Tertullian describes the prohibition

of wine among the Roman women as in his time obsolete, and a taste

for it was one of the great trials of St. Monica (_Aug. Conf._ x.

8).

114 “La loi fondamentale de la morale agit sur toutes les nations bien

connues. Il y a mille différences dans les interprétations de cette

loi en mille circonstances; mais le fond subsiste toujours le même,

et ce fond est l’idée du juste et de l’injuste.”—Voltaire, _Le

Philosophe ignorant_.

115 The feeling in its favour being often intensified by filial

affection. “What is the most beautiful thing on the earth?” said

Osiris to Horus. “To avenge a parent’s wrongs,” was the

reply.—Plutarch _De Iside et Osiride_.

116 Hence the Justinian code and also St. Augustine (_De Civ. Dei_, xix.

15) derived servus from “servare,” to preserve, because the victor

preserved his prisoners alive.

117 “Les habitants du Congo tuent les malades qu’ils imaginent ne

pouvoir en revenir; _c’est, disentils, pour leur épargner les

douleurs de l’agonie_. Dans l’île Formose, lorsqu’un homme est

dangereusement malade, on lui passe un nœud coulant au col et on

l’étrangle, _pour l’arracher à la douleur_.”—Helvétius, _De

l’Esprit_, ii. 13. A similar explanation may be often found for

customs which are quoted to prove that the nations where they

existed had no sense of chastity. “C’est pareillement sous la

sauvegarde des lois que les Siamoises, la gorge et les cuisses à

moitié découvertes, portées dans les rues sur les palanquins, s’y

présentent dans des attitudes très-lascives. Cette loi fut établie

par une de leurs reines nommée Tirada, qui, _pour dégoûter les

hommes d’un amour plus déshonnête_, crut devoir employer toute la

puissance de la beauté.”—_De l’Esprit_, ii. 14.

118 “The contest between the morality which appeals to an external

standard, and that which grounds itself on internal conviction, is

the contest of progressive morality against stationary, of reason

and argument against the deification of mere opinion and habit.”

(Mill’s _Dissertations_, vol. ii. p. 472); a passage with a true

Bentham ring. See, too, vol. i. p. 158. There is, however, a schism

on this point in the utilitarian camp. The views which Mr. Buckle

has expressed in his most eloquent chapter on the comparative

influence of intellectual and moral agencies in civilisation diverge

widely from those of Mr. Mill.

119 “Est enim sensualitas quædam vis animæ inferior.... Ratio vero vis

animæ est superior.”—Peter Lombard, _Sent._ ii. 24.

120 Helvétius, _De l’Esprit_, discours iv. See too, Dr. Draper’s

extremely remarkable _History of Intellectual Development in Europe_

(New York, 1864), pp. 48, 53.

121 Plutarch, _De Cohibenda Ira._

122 Lactantius, _Div. Inst._ i. 22. The mysteries of the Bona Dea

became, however, after a time, the occasion of great disorders. See

Juvenal, Sat. vi. M. Magnin has examined the nature of these rites

(_Origines du Théâtre_, pp. 257-259).

123 The history of the vestals, which forms one of the most curious

pages in the moral history of Rome, has been fully treated by the

Abbé Nadal, in an extremely interesting and well-written memoir,

read before the Académie des Belles-lettres, and republished in

1725. It was believed that the prayer of a vestal could arrest a

fugitive slave in his flight, provided he had not got past the city

walls. Pliny mentions this belief as general in his time. The

records of the order contained many miracles wrought at different

times to save the vestals or to vindicate their questioned purity,

and also one miracle which is very remarkable as furnishing a

precise parallel to that of the Jew who was struck dead for touching

the ark to prevent its falling.

124 As for example the Sibyls and Cassandra. The same prophetic power

was attributed in India to virgins.—Clem. Alexandrin. _Strom._ iii.

7.

125 This custom continued to the worst period of the empire, though it

was shamefully and characteristically evaded. After the fall of

Sejanus the senate had no compunction in putting his innocent

daughter to death, but their religious feelings were shocked at the

idea of a virgin falling beneath the axe. So by way of improving

matters “filia constuprata est prius a carnifice, quasi impium esset

virginem in carcere perire.”—Dion Cassius, lviii. 11. See too,

Tacitus, _Annal._ v. 9. If a vestal met a prisoner going to

execution the prisoner was spared, provided the vestal declared that

the encounter was accidental. On the reverence the ancients paid to

virgins, see Justus Lipsius, _De Vesta et Vestalibus_.

126 See his picture of the first night of marriage:—

“Tacitè subit ille supremus

Virginitatis amor, primæque modestia culpæ

Confundit vultus. Tunc ora rigantur honestis

Imbribus.”

_Thebaidos_, lib. ii. 232-34.

127 Bees (which Virgil said had in them something of the divine nature)

were supposed by the ancients to be the special emblems or models of

chastity. It was a common belief that the bee mother begot her young

without losing her virginity. Thus in a fragment ascribed to

Petronius we read,

“Sic sine concubitu textis apis excita ceris

Fervet, et audaci milite castra replet.”

Petron. _De Varia Animalium Generatione._

So too Virgil:—

“Quod neque concubitu indulgent nec corpora segnes

In Venerem solvunt aut fœtus nixibus edunt.”—_Georg._ iv. 198-99.

Plutarch says that an unchaste person cannot approach bees, for they

immediately attack him and cover him with stings. Fire was also

regarded as a type of virginity. Thus Ovid, speaking of the vestals,

says:—

“Nataque de fiamma corpora nulla vides:

Jure igitur virgo est, quæ semina nulla remittit

Nec capit, et comites virginitatis amat.”

“The Egyptians believed that there are no males among vultures, and

they accordingly made that bird an emblem of nature.”—Ammianus

Marcellinus, xvii. 4.

128 “La divinité étant considérée comme renfermant en elle toutes les

qualités, toutes les forces intellectuelles et morales de l’homme,

chacune de ces forces ou de ces qualités, conçue séparément,

s’offrait comme un Être divin.... De-là aussi les contradictions les

plus choquantes dans les notions que les anciens avaient des

attributs divins.”—Maury, _Hist. des Religions de la Grèce antique_,

tome i. pp. 578-579.

129 “The Church holds that it were better for sun and moon to drop from

heaven, for the earth to fail, and for all the many millions who are

upon it to die of starvation in extremest agony, so far as temporal

affliction goes, than that one soul, I will not say should be lost,

but should commit one single venial sin, should tell one wilful

untruth, though it harmed no one, or steal one poor farthing without

excuse.”—Newman’s _Anglican Difficulties_, p. 190.

130 There is a remarkable dissertation on this subject, called “The

Limitations of Morality,” in a very ingenious and suggestive little

work of the Benthamite school, called _Essays by a Barrister_

(reprinted from the _Saturday Review_).

131 The following passage, though rather vague and rhetorical, is not

unimpressive: “Oui, dit Jacobi, je mentirais comme Desdemona

mourante, je tromperais comme Oreste quand il veut mourir à la place

de Pylade, j’assassinerais comme Timoléon, je serais parjure comme

Épaminondas et Jean de Witt, je me déterminerais au suicide comme

Caton, je serais sacrilége comme David; car j’ai la certitude en

moi-même qu’en pardonnant à ces fautes suivant la lettre l’homme

exerce le droit souverain que la majesté de son être lui confère; il

appose le sceau de sa divine nature sur la grâce qu’il

accorde.”—Barchou de Penhoen, _Hist. de la Philos. allemande_, tome

i. p. 295.

132 This equivocation seems to me to lie at the root of the famous

dispute whether man is by nature a social being, or whether, as

Hobbes averred, the state of nature is a state of war. Few persons

who have observed the recent light thrown on the subject will

question that the primitive condition of man was that of savage

life, and fewer still will question that savage life is a state of

war. On the other hand, it is, I think, equally certain that man

necessarily becomes a social being in exact proportion to the

development of the capacities of his nature.

133 One of the best living authorities on this question writes: “The

asserted existence of savages so low as to have no moral standard is

too groundless to be discussed. Every human tribe has its general

views as to what conduct is right and what wrong, and each

generation hands the standard on to the next. Even in the details of

their moral standards, wide as their differences are, there is yet

wider agreement throughout the human race.”—Tylor on Primitive

Society, _Contemporary Review_, April 1873, p. 702.

134 The distinction between innate faculties evolved by experience and

innate ideas independent of experience, and the analogy between the

expansion of the former and that of the bud into the flower has been

very happily treated by Reid. (_On the Active Powers_, essay iii.

chap. viii. p. 4.) Professor Sedgwick, criticising Locke’s notion of

the soul being originally like a sheet of white paper, beautifully

says: “Naked man comes from his mother’s womb, endowed with limbs

and senses indeed well fitted to the material world, yet powerless

from want of use; and as for knowledge, his soul is one unvaried

blank; yet has this blank been already touched by a celestial hand,

and when plunged in the colours which surround it, it takes not its

tinge from accident but design, and comes forth covered with a

glorious pattern.” (_On the Studies of the University_, p. 54.)

Leibnitz says: “L’esprit n’est point une table rase. Il est tout

plein de caractères que la sensation ne peut que découvrir et mettre

en lumière au lieu de les y imprimer. Je me suis servi de la

comparaison d’une pierre de marbre qui a des veines plutôt que d’une

pierre de marbre tout unie.... S’il y avait dans la pierre des

veines qui marquassent la figure d’Hercule préférablement à d’autres

figures, ... Hercule y serait comme inné en quelque façon, quoiqu’il

fallût du travail pour découvrir ces veines.”—_Critique de l’Essai

sur l’Entendement._

135 The argument against the intuitive moralists derived from savage

life was employed at some length by Locke. Paley then adopted it,

taking a history of base ingratitude related by Valerius Maximus,

and asking whether a savage would view it with disapprobation.

(_Moral Phil._ book i. ch. 5.) Dugald Stewart (_Active and Moral

Powers_, vol. i. pp. 230-231) and other writers have very fully

answered this, but the same objection has been revived in another

form by Mr. Austin, who supposes (_Lectures on Jurisprudence_, vol.

i. pp. 82-83) a savage who first meets a hunter carrying a dead

deer, kills the hunter and steals the deer, and is afterwards

himself assailed by another hunter whom he kills. Mr. Austin asks

whether the savage would perceive a moral difference between these

two acts of homicide? Certainly not. In this early stage of

development, the savage recognises a duty of justice and humanity to

the members of his tribe, but to no one beyond this circle. He is in

a “state of war” with the foreign hunter. He has a right to kill the

hunter and the hunter an equal right to kill him.

136 Everyone who is acquainted with metaphysics knows that there has

been an almost endless controversy about Locke’s meaning on this

point. The fact seems to be that Locke, like most great originators

of thought, and indeed more than most, often failed to perceive the

ultimate consequences of his principles, and partly through some

confusion of thought, and partly through unhappiness of expression,

has left passages involving the conclusions of both schools. As a

matter of history the sensual school of Condillac grew professedly

out of his philosophy. In defence of the legitimacy of the process

by which these writers evolved their conclusions from the premisses

of Locke, the reader may consult the very able lectures of M. Cousin

on Locke. The other side has been treated, among others, by Dugald

Stewart in his _Dissertation_, by Professor Webb in his

_Intellectualism of Locke_, and by Mr. Rogers in an essay reprinted

from the _Edinburgh Review_.

137 I make this qualification, because I believe that the denial of a

moral nature in man capable of perceiving the distinction between

duty and interest and the rightful supremacy of the former, is both

philosophically and actually subversive of natural theology.

138 See the forcible passage in the life of Epicurus by Diogenes

Laërtius. So Mackintosh: “It is remarkable that, while, of the three

professors who sat in the Porch from Zeno to Posidonius, every one

either softened or exaggerated the doctrines of his predecessor, and

while the beautiful and reverend philosophy of Plato had in his own

Academy degenerated into a scepticism which did not spare morality

itself, the system of Epicurus remained without change; his

disciples continued for ages to show personal honour to his memory

in a manner which may seem unaccountable among those who were taught

to measure propriety by a calculation of palpable and outward

usefulness.”—_Dissertation on Ethical Philosophy_, p. 85, ed. 1836.

See, too, Tennemann (_Manuel de la Philosophie_, ed. Cousin, tome i.

p. 211).

139 Thus e.g. the magnificent chapters of Helvétius on the moral effects

of despotism, form one of the best modern contributions to political

ethics. We have a curious illustration of the emphasis with which

this school dwells on the moral importance of institutions in a

memoir of M. De Tracy, _On the best Plan of National Education_,

which appeared first towards the close of the French Revolution, and

was reprinted during the Restoration. The author, who was one of the

most distinguished of the disciples of Condillac, argued that the

most efficient of all ways of educating a people is, the

establishment of a good system of police, for the constant

association of the ideas of crime and punishment in the minds of the

masses is the one effectual method of creating moral habits, which

will continue to act when the fear of punishment is removed.

140 An important intellectual revolution is at present taking place in

England. The ascendency in literary and philosophical questions

which belonged to the writers of books is manifestly passing in a

very great degree to weekly and even daily papers, which have long

been supreme in politics, and have begun within the last ten years

systematically to treat ethical and philosophical questions. From

their immense circulation, their incontestable ability and the power

they possess of continually reiterating their distinctive doctrines,

from the impatience, too, of long and elaborate writings, which

newspapers generate in the public, it has come to pass that these

periodicals exercise probably a greater influence than any other

productions of the day, in forming the ways of thinking of ordinary

educated Englishmen. The many consequences, good and evil, of this

change it will be the duty of future literary historians to trace,

but there is one which is, I think, much felt in the sphere of

ethics. An important effect of these journals has been to evoke a

large amount of literary talent in the lawyer class. Men whose

professional duties would render it impossible for them to write

long books, are quite capable of treating philosophical subjects in

the form of short essays, and have in fact become conspicuous in

these periodicals. There has seldom, I think, before, been a time

when lawyers occupied such an important literary position as at

present, or when legal ways of thinking had so great an influence

over English philosophy; and this fact has been eminently favourable

to the progress of utilitarianism.

141 There are some good remarks on this point in the very striking

chapter on the present condition of Christianity in Wilberforce’s

_Practical View_.

142 See Reid’s _Essays on the Active Powers_, iii. i.

143 I say usually proportioned, because it is, I believe, possible for

men to realise intensely suffering, and to derive pleasure from that

very fact. This is especially the case with vindictive cruelty, but

it is not, I think, altogether confined to that sphere. This

question we shall have occasion to examine when discussing the

gladiatorial shows. Most cruelty, however, springs from callousness,

which is simply dulness of imagination.

144 The principal exception being where slavery, coexisting with

advanced civilisation, retards or prevents the growth of industrial

habits.

145 See Mr. Laing’s _Travels in Sweden_. A similar cause is said to have

had a similar effect in Bavaria.

146 This has been, I think, especially the case with the Austrians.

147 See some remarkable instances of this in Cabanis, _Rapports du

Physique et du Moral de l’Homme_.

148 Diog. Laërt. _Pythag._

149 Plutarch, _De Profectibus in Virt._

150 Diog. Laërt. _Stilpo._

151 Clem. Alexand. _Strom._ vii.

152 Cicero, _De Nat. Deorum_, i. 1.

153 Lactant. _Inst. Div._ i. 5.

154 “Pythagoras ita definivit quid esset Deus: Animus qui per universas

mundi partes, omnemque naturam commeans atque diffusus, ex quo omnia

quæ nascuntur animalia vitam capiunt.”—Ibid. Lactantius in this

chapter has collected several other philosophic definitions of the

Divinity. See too Plutarch, _De Placit. Philos._ Tertullian explains

the stoical theory by an ingenious illustration: “Stoici enim volunt

Deum sic per materiem decucurrisse quomodo mel per favos.”—Tert. _De

Anima_.

155 As Cicero says: “Epicurus re tollit, oratione relinquit, deos.”—_De

Nat. Deor._ i. 44.

156 Sometimes, however, they restricted its operation to the great

events of life. As an interlocutor in Cicero says: “Magna dii

curant, parva negligunt.”—Cic. _De Natur. Deor._ ii. 66. Justin

Martyr notices (_Trypho_, i.) that some philosophers maintained that

God cared for the universal or species, but not for the individual.

Seneca maintains that the Divinity has determined all things by an

inexorable law of destiny, which He has decreed, but which He

Himself obeys. (_De Provident._ v.)

157 See on this theory Cicero, _De Natur. Deor._ i. 42; Lactantius,

_Inst. Div._ i. 11.

158 Diog. Laërt. _Vit. Zeno._ St. Aug. _De Civ. Dei_, iv. 11. Maximus of

Tyre, _Dissert._ x. (in some editions xxix.) § 8. Seneca, _De

Beneficiis_, iv. 7-8. Cic. _De Natur. Deor._ i. 15. Cicero has

devoted the first two books of this work to the stoical theology. A

full review of the allegorical and mythical interpretations of

paganism is given by Eusebius, _Evang. Præpar._ lib. iii.

159 St. Aug. _De Civ._ vii. 5.

160 Plin. _Hist. Nat_. ii. 1.

161 “Nec vero Deus ipse qui intelligitur a nobis, alio modo intelligi

potest nisi mens soluta quædam et libera, segregata ab omni

concretione mortali, omnia sentiens et movens, ipsaque prædita motu

sempiterno.”—_Tusc. Quæst_. i. 27.

162 Senec. _Quæst. Nat._ ii. 45.

163 “Estne Dei sedes, nisi terra et pontus et aër.

Et cœlum et virtus? Superos quid quærimus ultra?

Jupiter est quodcumque vides, quodcumque moveris.”

_Pharsal._ ix. 578-80.

164 “Quæve anus tam excors inveniri potest, quæ illa, quæ quondam

credebantur apud inferos portenta, extimescat?”—Cic. _De Nat. Deor._

ii. 2.

“Esse aliques Manes et subterranea regna ...

Nec pueri credunt nisi qui nondum ære lavantur.”

Juv. _Sat._ ii. 149, 152.

See on this subject a good review by the Abbé Freppel, _Les Pères

Apostoliques_, leçon viii.

165 Cicero, _De Leg._ i. 14; Macrobius, _In. Som. Scip._ i. 10.

166 See his works _De Divinatione_ and _De Nat. Deorum_, which form a

curious contrast to the religious conservatism of the _De Legibus_,

which was written chiefly from a political point of view.

167 Eusebius, _Præp. Evang._ lib. iv.

168 The oracles first gave their answers in verse, but their bad poetry

was ridiculed, and they gradually sank to prose, and at last ceased.

Plutarch defended the inspiration of the bad poetry on the ground

that the inspiring spirit availed itself of the natural faculties of

the priestess for the expression of its infallible truths—a theory

which is still much in vogue among Biblical critics, and is, I

believe, called dynamical inspiration. See Fontenelle, _Hist. des

Oracles_ (1st ed.), pp. 292-293.

169 See the famous description of Cato refusing to consult the oracle of

Jupiter Ammon in Lucan, _Phars._ ix.; and also Arrian, ii. 7. Seneca

beautifully says, “Vis deos propitiare? bonus esto. Satis illos

coluit quisquis imitatus est.”—_Ep._ xcv.

170 Cicero, _De Divin_. ii. 24.

171 Aulus Gellius, _Noct. Att._ xv. 22.

172 See a long string of witticisms collected by Legendre, _Traité de

l’Opinion, ou Mémoires pour servir à l’Histoire de l’Esprit humain_

(Venise, 1735), tome i. pp. 386-387.

173 See Cicero, _De Natura Deorum_; Seneca, _De Brev. Vit._ c. xvi.;

Plin. _Hist. Nat._ ii. 5; Plutarch, _De Superstitione_.

174 “Olim truncus eram ficulnus, inutile lignum,

Cum faber, incertus scamnum faceretne Priapum,

Maluit esse Deum.”

_Sat._ I. viii. 1-3.

175 There is a very curious discussion on this subject, reported to have

taken place between Apollonius of Tyana and an Egyptian priest. The

former defended the Greek fashion of worshipping the Divinity under

the form of the human image, sculptured by Phidias and Praxiteles,

this being the noblest form we can conceive, and therefore the least

inadequate to the Divine perfections. The latter defended the

Egyptian custom of worshipping animals, because, as he said, it is

blasphemous to attempt to conceive an image of the Deity, and the

Egyptians therefore concentrate the imagination of the worshipper on

objects that are plainly merely allegorical or symbolical, and do

not pretend to offer any such image (_Philos. Apoll. of Tyana_, vi.

19). Pliny shortly says, “Effigiem Dei formamque quærere

imbecillitatis humanæ reor” (_Hist. Nat._ ii. 5). See too Max.

Tyrius, Diss. xxxviii. There was a legend that Numa forbade all

idols, and that for 200 years they were unknown in Rome (Plutarch,

_Life of Numa_). Dion Chrysostom said that the Gods need no statues

or sacrifices, but that by these means we attest our devotion to

them (_Orat._ xxxi.). On the vanity of rich idols, see Plutarch, _De

Superstitione_; Seneca, _Ep._ xxxi.

176 1 Lact. _Inst. Div._ vi. 25.

177 Dion. Halic. ii.; Polyb. vi. 56.

178 St. Aug. _De Civ. Dei_, iv. 31.

179 Epictetus, _Enchir._ xxxix.

180 Cicero, speaking of the worship of deified men, says, “indicat

omnium quidem animos immortales esse, sed fortium bonorumque

divinos.”—_De Leg._ ii. 11. The Roman worship of the dead, which was

the centre of the domestic religion, has been recently investigated

with much ability by M. Coulanges (_La Cité antique_).

181 On the minute supervision exercised by the censors on all the

details of domestic life, see Aul. Gell. _Noct._ ii. 24; iv. 12, 20.

182 Livy, xxxix. 6.

183 Vell. Paterculus, i. 11-13; Eutropius, iv. 6. Sallust ascribed the

decadence of Rome to the destruction of its rival, Carthage.

184 Plutarch, _De Adulatore et Amico_.

185 There is much curious information about the growth of Roman luxury

in Pliny (_Hist. Nat._ lib. xxxiv.). The movement of decomposition

has been lately fully traced by Mommsen (_Hist. of Rome_); Döllinger

(_Jew and Gentile_); Denis (_ Hist. des Idées morales dans

l’Antiquité_); Pressensé (_Hist. des trois premiers Siècles_); in

the histories of Champagny, and in the beautiful closing chapters of

the _Apôtres_ of Renan.

186 Sueton. _Aug._ xvi.

187 Ibid. _Calig._ v.

188 Persius, _Sat._ ii.; Horace, _Ep._ i. 16, vv. 57-60.

189 See, on the identification of the Greek and Egyptian myths,

Plutarch’s _De Iside et Osiride_. The Greek and Roman gods were

habitually regarded as identical, and Cæsar and Tacitus, in like

manner, identified the deities of Gaul and Germany with those of

their own country. See Döllinger, _Jew and Gentile_, vol. ii. pp.

160-165.

190 “Ego deûm genus esse semper dixi et dicam cœlitum; Sed eos non

curare opinor quid agat hominum genus.”

Cicero adds: “magno plausu loquitur assentiente populo.”—_De Divin._

ii. 50.

191 Plutarch, _De Superstitione_.

192 St. Aug. _De Civ. Dei_, vi. 6; Tertul. _Apol._ 15; Arnobius, _Adv.

Gentes_, iv.

193 “Pars alia et hanc pellit, astroque suo eventus assignat, nascendi

legibus; semelque in omnes futuros unquam Deo decretum; in reliquum

vero otium datum. Sedere cœpit sententia hæc pariterque et eruditum

vulgus et rude in eam cursu vadit. Ecce fulgurum monitus, oraculorum

præscita, aruspicum prædicta, atque etiam parva dictu, in auguriis

sternumenta et offensiones pedum.”—_Hist. Nat._ ii. 5. Pliny himself

expresses great doubt about astrology giving many examples of men

with different destinies, who had been born at the same time, and

therefore under the same stars (vii. 50). Tacitus expresses complete

doubt about the existence of Providence. (_Ann._ vi. 22.) Tiberius

is said to have been very indifferent to the gods and to the worship

of the temples, being wholly addicted to astrology and convinced

that all things were pre-ordained. (_Suet. Tib._ lxix.)

194 Ammianus Marcellinus, xxviii.

_ 195 De Profectibus in Virt._ It was originally the custom at Roman

feasts to sing to a pipe the actions and the virtues of the greatest

men. (Cic. _Tusc. Quæst._ iv.)

196 E.g. Epictetus, _Ench._ lii. Seneca is full of similar exhortations.

197 According to Cicero, the first Latin work on philosophy was by the

Epicurean Amafanius. (_Tusc. Quæst._ iv.)

198 See on the great perfection of the character of Epicurus his life by

Diogenes Laërtius, and on the purity of the philosophy he taught and

the degree in which it was distorted and misrepresented by his Roman

followers. Seneca _De Vita Beata_, c. xii. xiii. and _Ep._ xxi.

Gassendi, in a very interesting little work entitled _Philosophiæ

Epicuri Syntagma_, has abundantly proved the possibility of uniting

Epicurean principles with a high code of morals. But probably the

most beautiful picture of the Epicurean system is the first book of

the _De Finibus_, in which Cicero endeavours to paint it as it would

have been painted by its adherents. When we remember that the writer

of this book was one of the most formidable and unflinching

opponents of Epicureanism in all the ancient world, it must be owned

that it would be impossible to find a grander example of that noble

love of truth, that sublime and scrupulous justice to opponents,

which was the pre-eminent glory of ancient philosophers, and which,

after the destruction of philosophy, was for many centuries almost

unknown in the world. It is impossible to doubt that Epicureanism

was logically compatible with a very high degree of virtue. It is, I

think, equally impossible to doubt that its practical tendency was

towards vice.

199 Mr. Grote gives the following very clear summary of Plato’s ethical

theory, which he believes to be original:—“Justice is in the mind a

condition analogous to good health and strength in the body.

Injustice is a condition analogous to sickness, corruption,

impotence in the body.... To possess a healthy body is desirable for

its consequences as a means towards other constituents of happiness,

but it is still more desirable in itself as an essential element of

happiness _per se_, i.e., the negation of sickness, which would of

itself make us miserable.... In like manner, the just mind blesses

the possessor twice: first and chiefly by bringing to him happiness

in itself; next, also, as it leads to ulterior happy results. The

unjust mind is a curse to its possessor in itself and apart from

results, though it also leads to ulterior results which render it

still more a curse to him.”—Grote’s _Plato_, vol. iii. p. 131.

According to Plutarch, Aristo of Chio defined virtue as “the health

of the soul.” (_De Virtute Morali._)

200 “Beata est ergo vita conveniens naturæ suæ; quæ non aliter

contingere potest quam si primum sana mens est et in perpetuâ

possessione sanitatis suæ.”—Seneca, _De Vita Beata_, c. iii.

201 The famous paradox that “the sage could be happy even in the bull of

Phalaris,” comes from the writings not of Zeno but of

Epicurus—though the Stoics adopted and greatly admired it. (Cic.

_Tusc._ ii. See Gassendi, _Philos. Epicuri Syntagma_, pars iii. c.

1.)

202 “Sed nescio quomodo dum lego assentior; cum posui librum et mecum

ipse de immortalitate animorum cœpi cogitare, assensio omnis illa

elabitur.”—Cic. _Tusc._ i.

203 Sallust, _Catilina_, cap. li.

204 See that most impressive passage (_Hist. Nat._ vii. 56). That the

sleep of annihilation is the happiest end of man is a favourite

thought of Lucretius. Thus:

“Nil igitur mors est, ad nos neque pertinet hilum,

Quandoquidem natura animi mortalis habetur.”—iii. 842.

This mode of thought has been recently expressed in Mr. Swinburne’s

very beautiful poem on _The Garden of Proserpine_.

205 Diog. Laërtius. The opinion of Chrysippus seems to have prevailed,

and Plutarch (_De Placit. Philos._) speaks of it as that of the

school. Cicero sarcastically says, “Stoici autem usuram nobis

largiuntur, tanquam cornicibus: diu mansuros aiunt animos; semper,

negant.”—_Tusc. Disp._ i. 31.

206 It has been very frequently asserted that Antigonus of Socho having

taught that virtue should be practised for its own sake, his

disciple, Zadok, the founder of the Sadducees, inferred the

non-existence of a future world; but the evidence for this whole

story is exceedingly unsatisfactory. The reader may find its history

in a very remarkable article by Mr. Twisleton on _Sadducees_, in

Smith’s _Biblical Dictionary_.

207 On the Stoical opinions about a future life see Martin, _La Vie

future_ (Paris, 1858); Courdaveaux _De l’immortalité de l’âme dans

le Stoïcisme_ (Paris, 1857); and Alger’s _Critical Hist. of the

Doctrine of a Future Life_ (New York, 1866).

208 His arguments are met by Cicero in the _Tusculans_.

209 See a collection of passages from his discourses collected by M.

Courdaveaux, in the introduction to his French translation of that

book.

210 Stobæus, _Eclog. Physic._ lib. i. cap. 52.

211 In his consolations to Marcia, he seems to incline to a belief in

the immortality, or at least the future existence, of the soul. In

many other passages, however, he speaks of it as annihilated at

death.

212 “Les Stoïciens ne faisaient aucunement dépendre la morale de la

perspective des peines ou de la rémunération dans une vie future....

La croyance à l’immortalité de l’âme n’appartenait donc, selon leur

manière de voir, qu’à la physique, c’est-à-dire à la

psychologie.”—Degerando, _Hist. de la Philos._ tome iii. p. 56.

213 “Panætius igitur, qui sine controversia de officiis accuratissime

disputavit, quemque nos, correctione quadam adhibita, potissimum

secuti sumus.”—_De Offic._ iii. 2.

214 Marcus Aurelius thanks Providence, as for one of the great blessings

of his life, that he had been made acquainted with the writings of

Epictetus. The story is well known how the old philosopher warned

his master, who was beating him, that he would soon break his leg,

and when the leg was broken, calmly remarked, “I told you you would

do so.” Celsus quoted this in opposition to the Christians, asking,

“Did your leader under suffering ever say anything so noble?” Origen

finely replied, “He did what was still nobler—He kept silence.” A

Christian anchorite (some say St. Nilus, who lived in the beginning

of the fifth century) was so struck with the _Enchiridion_ of

Epictetus, that he adapted it to Christian use. The conversations of

Epictetus, as reported by Arrian, are said to have been the

favourite reading of Toussaint l’Ouverture.

215 Tacitus had used this expression before Milton: “Quando etiam

sapientibus cupido gloriæ novissima exuitur.”—_Hist._ iv. 6.

216 Two remarkable instances have come down to us of eminent writers

begging historians to adorn and even exaggerate their acts. See the

very curious letters of Cicero to the historian Lucceius (_Ep. ad

Divers._ v. 12); and of the younger Pliny to Tacitus (_Ep._ vii.

33). Cicero has himself confessed that he was too fond of glory.

217 “Unus homo nobis cunctando restituit rem;

Non ponebat enim rumores ante salutem.”—Ennius.

218 See the beautiful description of Cato’s tranquillity under insults.

Seneca, _De Ira_, ii. 33; _De Const. Sap._ 1, 2.

_ 219 De Officiis_, iii. 9.

_ 220 Tusc._ ii. 26.

221 Seneca, _De Vit. Beat._ c. xx.

222 Seneca, _Ep._ cxiii.

223 Seneca, _Ep._ lxxxi.

224 Persius, _Sat._ i. 45-47.

225 Epictetus, _Ench._ xxiii.

226 Seneca, _De Ira_, iii. 41.

227 Seneca, _Cons. ad Helv._ xiii.

228 Marc. Aur. vii. 67.

229 Marc. Aur. iv. 20.

230 Pliny, _Ep._ i. 22.

231 “Non dux, sed comes voluptas.”—_De Vit. Beat._ c. viii.

232 “Voluptas non est merces nec causa virtutis sed accessio; nec quia

delectat placet sed quia placet delectat.”—Ibid., c. ix.

233 Peregrinus apud Aul. Gellius, xii. 11. Peregrinus was a Cynic, but

his doctrine on this point was identical with that of the Stoics.

234 Marc. Aurel. ix. 42.

235 Marc. Aurel. v. 6.

236 Seneca, however, in one of his letters (_Ep._ lxxv.), subtilises a

good deal on this point. He draws a distinction between affections

and maladies. The first, he says, are irrational, and therefore

reprehensible movements of the soul, which, if repeated and

unrepressed, tend to form an irrational and evil habit, and to the

last he in this letter restricts the term disease. He illustrates

this distinction by observing that colds and any other slight

ailments, if unchecked and neglected, may produce an organic

disease. The wise man, he says, is wholly free from moral disease,

but no man can completely emancipate himself from affections, though

he should make this his constant object.

_ 237 De Clem._ ii. 6, 7.

238 “Peccantes vero quid habet cur oderit, cum error illos in hujusmodi

delicta compellat?”—Sen. _De Ira_, i. 14. This is a favourite

thought of Marcus Aurelius, to which he reverts again and again.

See, too, Arrian, i. 18.

239 “Ergo ne homini quidem nocebimus quia peccavit sed ne peccet, nec

unquam ad præteritum sed ad futurum pœna referetur.”—Ibid. ii. 31.

In the philosophy of Plato, on the other hand, punishment was

chiefly expiatory and purificatory. (Lerminier, _Introd. à

l’Histoire du Droit_, p. 123.)

240 Seneca, _De Constant. Sap._ v. Compare and contrast this famous

sentence of Anaxagoras with that of one of the early Christian

hermits. Someone told the hermit that his father was dead. “Cease

your blasphemy,” he answered, “my father is immortal.”—Socrates,

_Eccl. Hist._ iv 23.

241 Epictetus, _Ench._ 16, 18.

242 The dispute about whether anything but virtue is a good, was, in

reality, a somewhat childish quarrel about words; for the Stoics,

who indignantly denounced the Peripatetics for maintaining the

affirmative, admitted that health, friends, &c., should be sought

not as “goods” but as “preferables.” See a long discussion on this

matter in Cicero (_De Finib._ lib. iii. iv.). The Stoical doctrine

of the equality of all vices was formally repudiated by Marcus

Aurelius, who maintained (ii. 10), with Theophrastus, that faults of

desire were worse than faults of anger. The other Stoics, while

dogmatically asserting the equality of all virtues as well as the

equality of all vices, in their particular judgments graduated their

praise or blame much in the same way as the rest of the world.

243 See Seneca (_Ep._ lxxxix.). Seneca himself, however, has devoted a

work to natural history, but the general tendency of the school was

certainly to concentrate all attention upon morals, and all, or

nearly all the great naturalists were Epicureans. Cicero puts into

the mouth of the Epicurean the sentence, “Omnium autem rerum natura

cognita levamur superstitione, liberamur mortis metu, non

conturbamur ignoratione rerum” (_De Fin._ i.); and Virgil expressed

an eminently Epicurean sentiment in his famous lines:—

“Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,

Quique metus omnes et inexorabile fatum

Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque

Acherontis avari.”

_Georg._ 490-492.

244 Plutarch, _Cato Major_.

245 Cicero, _Ad Attic._ vi. 2.

246 This contrast is noticed and largely illustrated by M. Montée in his

interesting little work _Le Stoïcisme à Rome_, and also by Legendre

in his _Traité de l’Opinion, ou Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de

l’esprit humain_ (Venise, 1735).

247 “Atque hoc quidem omnes mortales sic habent ... commoditatem

prosperitatemque vitæ a diis se habere, virtutem autem nemo unquam

acceptam deo retulit. Nimirum recte. Propter virtutem enim jure

laudamur et in virtute recte gloriamur. Quod non contingeret si id

donum a deo, non a nobis haberemus.”—Cicero, _De Nat. Deor._ iii.

36.

_ 248 Ep._ i. 18.

249 Seneca _Ep._ lxvi.

250 Lucretius, v. It was a Greek proverb, that Apollo begat Æsculapius

to heal the body, and Plato to heal the soul. (Legendre, _Traité de

l’Opinion_, tome i. p. 197.)

251 “Orandum est ut sit mens sana in corpore sano:

Fortem posce animum, mortis terrore carentem....

Monstro, quod ipse tibi possis dare.”

Juvenal, _Sat._ x. 356.

Marcus Aurelius recommends prayer, but only that we may be freed

from evil desires. (ix. 11.)

252 Seneca, _Ep._ lxvi.

253 Ibid. _Ep._ liii.

_ 254 De Const. Sap._ viii.

_ 255 Ench._ xlviii.

256 Arrian, i. 12.

257 Arrian, ii. 8. The same doctrine is strongly stated in Seneca, _Ep._

xcii.

258 Cicero, _De Nat. Deor._ ii. 66.

_ 259 Ep._ lxxxiii. Somewhat similar sentiments are attributed to Thales

and Bion (Diog. Laërt.).

_ 260 Ep._ xli. There are some beautiful sentiments of this kind in

Plutarch’s treatise, _De Sera Numinis Vindicta_. It was a saying of

Pythagoras, that “we become better as we approach the gods.”

261 Marc. Aur. iii. 5.

262 Marcus Aurelius.

263 Seneca, _Præf. Nat. Quæst._ iii.

264 Marc. Aur. x. 25.

265 Epict. _Ench._ xvii.

266 Epict. _Ench._ xi.

267 Seneca, _De Prov._ i.

268 Ibid. iv.

269 Marc. Aurel. ii. 2, 3.

270 The language in which the Stoics sometimes spoke of the inexorable

determination of all things by Providence would appear logically

inconsistent with free will. In fact, however, the Stoics asserted

the latter doctrine in unequivocal language, and in their practical

ethics even exaggerated its power. Aulus Gellius (_Noct. Att._ vi.

2) has preserved a passage in which Chrysippus exerted his subtlety

in reconciling the two things. See, too, Arrian, i. 17.

271 We have an extremely curious illustration of this mode of thought in

a speech of Archytas of Tarentum on the evils of sensuality, which

Cicero has preserved. He considers the greatest of these evils to be

that the vice predisposes men to unpatriotic acts. “Nullam

capitaliorem pestem quam corporis voluptatem, hominibus a natura

datam.... Hinc patriæ proditiones, hinc rerumpublicarum eversiones,

hinc cum hostibus clandestina colloquia nasci,” etc.—Cicero, _De

Senect._ xii.

272 Diog. Laërt. _Anax._

273 “Cari sunt parentes, cari liberi, propinqui, familiares; sed omnes

omnium caritates patria una complexa est; pro qua quis bonus dubitet

mortem oppetere si ei sit profuturus?”—_De Offic._ i. 17.

274 See Seneca, _Consol. ad Helviam_ and _De Otio Sapien._; and

Plutarch, _De Exilio_. The first of these works is the basis of one

of the most beautiful compositions in the English language,

Bolingbroke’s _Reflections on Exile_.

_ 275 De Officiis_.

_ 276 Epist._ i. 10.

277 “Tota enim philosophorum vita, ut ait idem, commentatio mortis

est.”—Cicero, _Tusc._ i. 30, _ad fin_.

_ 278 Essay on Death._

279 Spinoza, _Ethics_, iv. 67.

280 Camden. Montalembert notices a similar legend as existing in

Brittany (_Les Moines d’Occident_, tome ii. p. 287). Procopius (_De

Bello Goth._ iv. 20) says that it is impossible for men to live in

the west of Britain, and that the district is believed to be

inhabited by the souls of the dead.

281 In his _De Sera Numinis Vindicta_ and his _Consolatio ad Uxorem_.

282 In the _Phædo_, _passim_. See, too, Marc. Aurelius, ii. 12.

283 See a very striking letter of Epicurus quoted by Diogenes Laërt. in

his life of that philosopher. Except a few sentences, quoted by

other writers, these letters were all that remained of the works of

Epicurus, till the recent discovery of one of his treatises at

Herculaneum.

_ 284 Tusc. Quæst._ i.

_ 285 Consol. ad Polyb._ xxvii.

286 Maury, _Hist. des Religions de la Grèce antique_, tom. i. pp.

582-588. M. Ravaisson, in his Memoir on Stoicism (_Acad. des

Inscriptions et Belles-lettres_, tom. xxi.) has enlarged on the

terrorism of paganism, but has, I think, exaggerated it. Religions

which selected games as the natural form of devotion can never have

had any very alarming character.

287 Plutarch, _Ad Apollonium_.

288 Ibid.

289 Cic. _Tusc. Quæst._ i.

290 Philost. Apoll. of Tyan. v. 4. Hence their passion for suicide,

which Silius Italicus commemorates in lines which I think very

beautiful:—

“Prodiga gens animæ et properare facillima mortem;

Namque ubi transcendit florentes viribus annos

Impatiens ævi, spernit novisse senectam

Et fati modus in dextra est.”—i. 225-228.

Valerius Maximus (ii. vi. § 12) speaks of Celts who celebrated the

birth of men with lamentation, and their deaths with joy.

291 Aulus Gellius, _Noctes_, i. 3.

292 Tacitus, _Annales_, xv. 62.

293 Sueton. _Titus_, 10.

294 Capitolinus, _Antoninus_.

295 See the beautiful account of his last hours given by Ammianus

Marcellinus and reproduced by Gibbon. There are some remarks well

worth reading about the death of Julian, and the state of thought

that rendered such a death possible, in Dr. Newman’s _Discourses on

University Education_, lect. ix.

296 “Lex non pœna mors” was a favourite saying among the ancients. On

the other hand, Tertullian very distinctly enunciated the patristic

view, “Qui autem primordia hominis novimus, audenter determinamus

mortem non ex natura secutam hominem sed ex culpa.”—_De Anima_, 52.

297 Plutarch, _Ad Uxorem_.

298 St. Augustine, _Epist._ 166.

299 “At hoc quidem commune est omnium philosophorum, non eorum modo qui

deum nihil habere ipsum negotii dicunt, et nihil exhibere alteri;

sed eorum etiam, qui deum semper agere aliquid et moliri volunt,

numquam nec irasci deum nec nocere.”—Cic. _De Offic._ iii. 28.

300 See the refutation of the philosophic notion in Lactantius, _De Ira

Dei_.

301 “Revelation,” as Lessing observes in his essay on this subject, “has

made Death the ‘king of terrors,’ the awful offspring of sin and the

dread way to its punishment; though to the imagination of the

ancient heathen world, Greek or Etrurian, he was a youthful

genius—the twin brother of Sleep, or a lusty boy with a torch held

downwards.”—Coleridge’s _Biographia Litteraria_, cap. xxii., note by

Sara Coleridge.

302 “Vetat Pythagoras injussu imperatoris, id est Dei, de præsidio et

statione vitæ decedere.”—Cic. _De Senec._ xx. If we believe the very

untrustworthy evidence of Diog. Laërtius (_Pythagoras_) the

philosopher himself committed suicide by starvation.

303 See his _Laws_, lib. ix. In his _Phædon_, however, Plato went

further, and condemned all suicide. Libanius says (_De Vita Sua_)

that the arguments of the _Phædon_ prevented him from committing

suicide after the death of Julian. On the other hand, Cicero

mentions a certain Cleombrotus, who was so fascinated by the proof

of the immortality of the soul in the _Phædon_ that he forthwith

cast himself into the sea. Cato, as is well known, chose this work

to study, the night he committed suicide.

304 Arist. _Ethic._ v.

305 See a list of these in Lactantius’ _Inst. Div._ iii. 18. Many of

these instances rest on very doubtful evidence.

306 Adam Smith’s _Moral Sentiments_, part vii. § 2.

307 “Proxima deinde tenent mœsti loca qui sibi lethum

Insontes peperere manu, lucemque perosi

Projecere animas. Quam vellent æthere in alto

Nunc et pauperiem et duros perferre labores.”

—_Æneid_, vi. 434-437.

308 Cicero has censured suicide in his _De Senectute_, in the _Somn.

Scipionis_, and in the _Tusculans_. Concerning the death of Cato, he

says, that the occasion was such as to constitute a divine call to

leave life.—_Tusc._ i.

309 Apuleius, _De Philos. Plat._ lib. i.

310 Thus Ovid:—

“Rebus in adversis facile est contemnere vitam,

Fortiter ille facit qui miser esse potest.”

See, too, Martial, xi. 56.

311 Especially _Ep._ xxiv. Seneca desires that men should not commit

suicide with panic or trepidation. He says that those condemned to

death should await their execution, for “it is a folly to die

through fear of death;” and he recommends men to support old age as

long as their faculties remain unimpaired. On this last point,

however, his language is somewhat contradictory. There is a good

review of the opinions of the ancients in general, and of Seneca in

particular, on this subject in Justus Lipsius’ _Manuductio ad

Stoicam Philosophiam_, lib. iii. dissert. 22, 23, from which I have

borrowed much.

312 In his _Meditations_, ix. 3, he speaks of the duty of patiently

awaiting death. But in iii. 1, x. 8, 22-32, he clearly recognises

the right of suicide in some cases, especially to prevent moral

degeneracy. It must be remembered that the _Meditations_ of Marcus

Aurelius were private notes for his personal guidance, that all the

Stoics admitted it to be wrong to commit suicide in cases where the

act would be an injury to society, and that this consideration in

itself would be sufficient to divert an emperor from the deed.

Antoninus, the uncle, predecessor, and model of M. Aurelius, had

considered it his duty several times to prevent Hadrian from

committing suicide (Spartianus, _Hadrianus_). According to

Capitolinus, Marcus Aurelius in his last illness purposely

accelerated his death by abstinence. The duty of not hastily, or

through cowardice, abandoning a path of duty, and the right of man

to quit life when it appears intolerable, are combined very clearly

by Epictetus, _Arrian_, i. 9; and the latter is asserted in the

strongest manner, i. 24-25.

313 Porphyry, _De Abst. Carnis_, ii. 47; Plotinus, 1st Enn. ix. Porphyry

says (_Life of Plotinus_) that Plotinus dissuaded him from suicide.

There is a good epitome of the arguments of this school against

suicide in Macrobius, _In Som. Scip._ 1.

314 Quoted by Seneca, _Ep._ xxvi. Cicero states the Epicurean doctrine

to be, “Ut si tolerabiles sint dolores, feramus, sin minus æquo

animo e vita, cum ea non placet, tanquam e theatro, exeamus” (_De

Finib._ i. 15); and again, “De Diis immortalibus sine ullo metu vera

sentit. Non dubitat, si ita melius sit, de vita migrare.”—Id. i. 19.

315 This is noticed by St. Jerome.

316 Corn. Nepos, _Atticus_. He killed himself when an old man, to

shorten a hopeless disease.

317 Petronius, who was called the arbitrator of tastes (“elegantiæ

arbiter”), was one of the most famous voluptuaries of the reign of

Nero. Unlike most of his contemporaries, however, he was endowed

with the most exquisite and refined taste; his graceful manners

fascinated all about him, and made him in matters of pleasure the

ruler of the Court. Appointed Proconsul of Bithynia, and afterwards

Consul, he displayed the energies and the abilities of a statesman.

A Court intrigue threw him out of favour; and believing that his

death was resolved on, he determined to anticipate it by suicide.

Calling his friends about him, he opened his veins, shut them, and

opened them again; prolonged his lingering death till he had

arranged his affairs; discoursed in his last moments, not about the

immortality of the soul or the dogmas of philosophers, but about the

gay songs and epigrams of the hour; and partaking of a cheerful

banquet, died as recklessly as he had lived. (Tacit. _Annal._ xvi.

18-19.) It has been a matter of much dispute whether or not this

Petronius was the author of the _Satyricon_, one of the most

licentious and repulsive works in Latin literature.

318 Seneca, _De Vita Beata_, xix.

319 “Imperfectæ vero in homine naturæ præcipua solatia, ne Deum quidem

posse omnia; namque nec sibi potest mortem consciscere si velit,

quod homini dedit optimum in tantis vitæ pœnis.”—_Hist. Nat._ ii. 5.

_ 320 Hist. Nat._ ii. 63. We need not be surprised at this writer thus

speaking of sudden death, “Mortes repentinæ (hoc est summa vitæ

felicitas),” vii. 54.

_ 321 Tusc. Quæst._ lib. 1. Another remarkable example of an epidemic of

suicide occurred among the young girls of Miletus. (_Aul. Gell._ xv.

10.)

322 Sir Cornewall Lewis, _On the Credibility of Early Roman History_,

vol. ii. p. 430. See, too, on this class of suicides, Cromaziano,

_Istorica Critica del Suicidio_ (Venezia, 1788), pp. 81-82. The real

name of the author of this book (which is, I think, the best history

of suicide) was Buonafede. He was a Celestine monk. The book was

first published at Lucca in 1761. It was translated into French in

1841.

323 Senec. _De Provid._ ii.; _Ep._ xxiv.

324 See some examples of this in Seneca, _Ep._ lxx.

325 See a long catalogue of suicides arising from this cause, in

Cromaziano, _Ist. del Suicidio_, pp. 112-114.

_ 326 Consol. ad Marc._ c. xx.

_ 327 De Ira_, iii. 15.

_ 328 Ep._ lxx.

329 See Donne’s _Biathanatos_ (London, 1700), pp. 56-57. Gibbon’s

_Decline and Fall_, ch. xliv. Blackstone, in his chapter on suicide,

quotes the sentence of the Roman lawyers on the subject: “Si quis

impatientia doloris aut tædio vitæ aut morbo aut furore aut pudore

mori maluit non animadvertatur in eum.” Ulpian expressly asserts

that the wills of suicides were recognised by law, and numerous

examples of the act, notoriously prepared and publicly and gradually

accomplished, prove its legality in Rome. Suetonius, it is true,

speaks of Claudius accusing a man for having tried to kill himself

(Claud, xvi.), and Xiphilin says (lxix. 8) that Hadrian gave special

permission to the philosopher Euphrates to commit suicide, “on

account of old age and disease;” but in the first case it appears

from the context that a reproach and not a legal action was meant,

while Euphrates, I suppose, asked permission to show his loyalty to

the emperor, and not as a matter of strict necessity. There were,

however, some Greek laws condemning suicide, probably on civic

grounds. Josephus mentions (_De Bell. Jud._ iii. 8) that in some

nations “the right hand of the suicide was amputated, and that in

Judea the suicide was only buried after sunset.” A very strange law,

said to have been derived from Greece, is reported to have existed

at Marseilles. Poison was kept by the senate of the city, and given

to those who could prove that they had sufficient reason to justify

their desire for death, and all other suicide was forbidden. The law

was intended, it was said, to prevent hasty suicide, and to make

deliberate suicide as rapid and painless as possible. (Valer.

Maximus, ii. 6, § 7.) In the Reign of Terror in France, a law was

made similar to that of Domitian. (Carlyle’s _Hist. of the French

Revolution_, book v. c. ii.)

330 Compare with this a curious “order of the day,” issued by Napoleon

in 1802, with the view of checking the prevalence of suicide among

his soldiers. (Lisle, _Du Suicide_, pp. 462-463.)

331 See Suetonius, _Otho._ c. x.-xi., and the very fine description in

Tacitus, _Hist._ lib. ii. c. 47-49. Martial compares the death of

Otho to that of Cato:

“Sit Cato, dum vivit, sane vel Cæsare major;

Dum moritur, numquid major Othone fuit?”

—_Ep._ vi. 32.

332 Xiphilin, lxviii. 12.

333 Tacit. _Hist._ ii. 49. Suet. _Otho_, 12. Suetonius says that, in

addition to these, many soldiers who were not present killed

themselves on hearing the news.

334 Ibid. _Annal._ xiv. 9.

335 Plin. _Hist. Nat._ vii. 54. The opposite faction attributed this

suicide to the maddening effects of the perfumes burnt on the pile.

336 Tacit. _Annal._ vi. 26.

337 Plin. _Ep._ i. 12.

338 This history is satirically and unfeelingly told by Lucian. See,

too, Ammianus Marcellinus, xxix. 1.

339 Sophocles.

340 Arrian, i. 24.

341 Seneca, _Ep._ lviii.

342 Stobæus. One of the most deliberate suicides recorded was that of a

Greek woman of ninety years old.—Val. Maxim. ii. 6, § 8.

343 Plin. _Ep._ iii. 7. He starved himself to death.

_ 344 Ep._ i. 22. Some of Pliny’s expressions are remarkable:—“Id ego

arduum in primis et præcipua laude dignum puto. Nam impetu quodam et

instinctu procurrere ad mortem, commune cum multis: deliberare vero

et causas ejus expendere, utque suaserit ratio, vitæ mortisque

consilium suscipere vel ponere, ingentis est animi.” In this case

the doctors pronounced that recovery was possible, and the suicide

was in consequence averted.

345 Lib. vi. _Ep._ xxiv.

_ 346 Ep._ lxxvii. On the former career of Marcellinus, see _Ep._ xxix.

347 See the very beautiful lines of Statius:—

“Urbe fuit media nulli concessa potentum

Ara Deum, mitis posuit Clementia sedem:

Et miseri fecere sacram, sine supplice numquam

Illa novo; nulla damnavit vota repulsa.

Auditi quicunque rogant, noctesque diesque

Ire datum, et solis numen placare querelis.

Parca superstitio; non thurea flamma, nec altus

Accipitur sanguis, lachrymis altaria sudant ...

Nulla autem effigies, nulli commissa metallo

Forma Deæ, mentes habitare et pectora gaudet.

Semper habet trepidos, semper locus horret egenis

Cœtibus, ignotæ tantum felicibus aræ.”—_Thebaid_, xii. 481-496.

This altar was very old, and was said to have been founded by the

descendants of Hercules. Diodorus of Sicily, however, makes a

Syracusan say that it was brought from Syracuse (lib. xiii. 22).

Marcus Aurelius erected a temple to “Beneficentia” on the Capitol.

(Xiphilin, lib. lxxi. 34.)

348 Herodotus, vi. 21.

349 See Arrian’s _Epictetus_, i. 9. The very existence of the word

φιλανθρωπία shows that the idea was not altogether unknown.

350 Diog. Laërt. _Pyrrho_. There was a tradition that Pythagoras had

himself penetrated to India, and learnt philosophy from the

gymnosophists. (Apuleius, _Florid._ lib. ii. c. 15.)

351 This aspect of the career of Alexander was noticed in a remarkable

passage of a treatise ascribed to Plutarch (_De Fort. Alex._).

“Conceiving he was sent by God to be an umpire between all, and to

unite all together, he reduced by arms those whom he could not

conquer by persuasion, and formed of a hundred diverse nations one

single universal body, mingling, as it were, in one cup of

friendship the customs, marriages, and laws of all. He desired that

all should regard the whole world as their common country, ... that

every good man should be esteemed a Hellene, every evil man a

barbarian.” See on this subject the third lecture of Mr. Merivale

(whose translation of Plutarch I have borrowed) _On the Conversion

of the Roman Empire_.

352 They were both born about B.C. 250. See Sir C. Lewis, _Credibility

of Early Roman History_, vol. i. p. 82.

353 Aulus Gellius mentions the indignation of Marcus Cato against a

consul named Albinus, who had written in Greek a Roman history, and

prefaced it by an apology for his faults of style, on the ground

that he was writing in a foreign language. (_Noct. Att._ xi. 8.)

354 See a vivid picture of the Greek influence upon Rome, in Mommsen’s

_Hist. of Rome_ (Eng. trans.), vol. iii. pp. 423-426.

355 Plin. _Hist. Nat._ vii. 31.

356 See Friedlænder, _Mœurs romaines du règne d’Auguste à la fin des

Antonins_ (French trans., 1865), tome i. pp. 6-7.

357 See the curious catalogue of Greek love terms in vogue (Lucretius,

lib. iv. line 1160, &c.). Juvenal, more than a hundred years later,

was extremely angry with the Roman ladies for making love in Greek

(_Sat._ vi. lines 190-195). Friedlænder remarks that there is no

special term in Latin for to ask in marriage (tome i. p. 354).

358 Aul. Gell. _Noct._ xv. 4; Vell. Paterculus, ii. 65. The people were

much scandalised at this elevation, and made epigrams about it.

There is a curious catalogue of men who at different times rose in

Rome from low positions to power and dignity, in Legendre, _Traité

de l’Opinion_, tome ii. pp. 254-255.

359 Dion Cassius, xlviii. 32. Plin. _Hist. Nat._ v. 5; vii. 44.

360 The history of the influence of freedmen is minutely traced by

Friedlænder, _Mœurs romaines du règne d’Auguste à la fin des

Antonins_, tome i. pp. 58-93. Statius and Martial sang their

praises.

361 See Tacit. _Ann._ vi. 23-25.

362 On the Roman journeys, see the almost exhaustive dissertation of

Friedlænder, tome ii.

363 Joseph. (_Antiq._ xvii. 11, § 1) says above 8,000 Jews resident in

Rome took part in a petition to Cæsar. If these were all adult

males, the total number of Jewish residents must have been extremely

large.

364 See the famous fragment of Seneca cited by St. Augustin (_De Civ.

Dei_, vi. 11): “Usque eo sceleratissimæ gentis consuetudo convaluit,

ut per omnes jam terras recepta sit: victi victoribus leges

dederunt.” There are numerous scattered allusions to the Jews in

Horace, Juvenal, and Martial.

365 The Carthaginian influence was specially conspicuous in early

Christian history. Tertullian and Cyprian (both Africans) are justly

regarded as the founders of Latin theology. (See Milman’s _Latin

Christianity_ (ed. 1867), vol. i. pp. 35-36.)

366 Milo had emancipated some slaves to prevent them from being tortured

as witnesses. (_Cic. Pro Milo._) This was made illegal. The other

reasons for enfranchisement are given by Dion. Halicarn. _Antiq._

lib. iv.

367 This subject is fully treated by Wallon, _Hist. de l’Esclavage dans

l’Antiquité_.

368 Senec. _De Clemen._ i. 24.

369 See, on the prominence and the insolence of the freedmen, Tacit.

_Annal._ iii. 26-27.

370 Montesquieu, _Décadence des Romains_, ch. xiii.

371 See the very curious speech attributed to Camillus (Livy, v. 52).

372 “Caritas generis humani.”—_De Finib._ So, too, he speaks (_De Leg._

i. 23) of every good man as “civis totius mundi.”

373 He speaks of Rome as “civitas ex nationum conventu constituta.”

_ 374 De Legib._ i. 7.

_ 375 De Offic._

376 Ibid. iii. 6.

_ 377 De Offic._ iii. 6.

_ 378 De Legib._ i. 15.

379 “Tunc genus humanum positis sibi consulat armis,

Inque vicem gens omnis amet.”

—_Pharsalia_, vi.

_ 380 Ep._ xcv.

_ 381 Ep._ xxxi.

_ 382 De Vita Beata_, xx.

383 Arrian, ii. 10.

384 vi. 44.

385 “Hæc duri immota Catonis

Secta fuit, servare modum, finemque tenere,

Naturamque sequi, patriæque impendere vitam,

Nec sibi sed toti genitum se credere mundo.”

Lucan, _Phars._ ii. 380-383.

386 There is a passage on this subject in one of the letters of Pliny,

which I think extremely remarkable, and to which I can recall no

pagan parallel:—“Nuper me cujusdam amici languor admonuit, optimos

esse nos dum infirmi sumus. Quem enim infirmum aut avaritia aut

libido solicitat? Non amoribus servit, non appetit honores ... tunc

deos, tunc hominem esse se meminit.”—Plin. _Ep._ vii. 26.

_ 387 Ep._ viii. 16. He says: “Hominis est enim affici dolore, sentire,

resistere tamen, et solatia admittere, non solatiis non egere.”

388 This characteristic of Stoicism is well noticed in Grant’s

_Aristotle_, vol. i. p. 254. The first volume of this work contains

an extremely good review of the principles of the Stoics.

389 Cie. _De Finib._ lib. iv.

390 Arrian, _Epict._ ii. 14.

391 Ibid. i. 9.

392 Ibid. i. 14.

393 Ibid. i. 16.

394 Arrian, ii. 8.

395 Plutarch, _De Profect. in Virt._ This precept was enforced by Bishop

Sanderson in one of his sermons. (Southey’s _Commonplace Book_, vol.

i. p. 92.)

396 Diog. Laërt. _Pythagoras_.

397 Thus Cicero makes Cato say: “Pythagoreorumque more, exercendæ

memoriæ gratia, quid quoque die dixerim, audiverim, egerim,

commemoro vesperi.”—_De Senect._ xi.

398 Ibid.

_ 399 Sermon_, i. 4.

400 He even gave up, for a time, eating meat, in obedience to the

Pythagorean principles. (_Ep._ cviii.) Seneca had two masters of

this school, Sextius and Sotion. He was at this time not more than

seventeen years old. (See Aubertin, _Étude critique sur les Rapports

supposés entre Sénèque et St. Paul_, p. 156.)

401 See his very beautiful description of the self-examination of

Sextius and of himself. (_De Ira_, iii. 36.)

402 Arrian, ii. 18. Compare the _Manual_ of Epictetus, xxxiv.

403 “Quod de Romulo ægre creditum est, omnes pari consensu præsumserunt,

Marcum cœlo receptum esse.”—Aur. Vict. _Epit._ xvi. “Deusque etiam

nunc habetur.”—Capitolinus.

404 The first book of his _Meditations_ was written on the borders of

the Granua, in Hungary.

405 i. 14.

406 See his touching letter to Fronto, who was about to engage in a

debate with Herod Atticus.

407 i. 6-15. The eulogy he passed on his Stoic master Apollonius is

worthy of notice. Apollonius furnished him with an example of the

combination of extreme firmness and gentleness.

408 E.g. “Beware of Cæsarising.” (vi. 30.) “Be neither a tragedian nor a

courtesan.” (v. 28.) “Be just and temperate and a follower of the

gods; but be so with simplicity, for the pride of modesty is the

worst of all.” (xii. 27.)

409 iii. 4.

410 i. 17.

411 v. 1.

412 ix. 29.

413 viii. 59.

414 xi. 18.

415 ix. 11.

416 viii. 15.

417 vii. 70.

418 vii. 63.

419 vii. 22.

420 Mr. Maurice, in this respect, compares and contrasts him very

happily with Plutarch. “Like Plutarch, the Greek and Roman

characters were in Marcus Aurelius remarkably blended; but, unlike

Plutarch, the foundation of his mind was Roman. He was a student

that he might more effectually carry on the business of an

emperor.”—_Philosophy of the First Six Centuries_, p. 32.

421 vi. 47.

422 Capitolinus, Aurelius Victor.

423 M. Suckau, in his admirable _Étude sur Marc-Aurèle_, and M. Renan,

in a very acute and learned _Examen de quelques faits relatifs à

l’impératrice Faustine_ (read before the Institut, August 14, 1867),

have shown the extreme uncertainty of the stories about the

debaucheries of Faustina, which the biographers of Marcus Aurelius

have collected. It will be observed that the emperor himself has

left an emphatic testimony to her virtue, and to the happiness he

derived from her (i. 17); that the earliest extant biographer of

Marcus Aurelius was a generation later; and that the infamous

character of Commodus naturally predisposed men to imagine that he

was not the son of so perfect an emperor.

424 “Quid me fletis, et non magis de pestilentia et communi morte

cogitatis?” Capitolinus, _M. Aurelius_.

425 Ibid.

426 Many examples of this are given by Coulanges, _La Cité antique_, pp.

177-178.

427 All this is related by Suetonius, _August_.

428 Tacit. _Annal._ iv. 36.

429 See, e.g., the sentiments of the people about Julius Cæsar, Sueton.

_J. C._ lxxxviii.

430 Sueton. _Vesp._ xxiii.

431 “Qualis artifex pereo” were his dying words.

432 See Sueton. _Calig._ 1.

433 Sueton. _Calig._ xxii. A statue of Jupiter is said to have burst out

laughing just before the death of this emperor.

434 Seneca, _De Ira_, i. 46; Sueton. _Calig._ xxii.

435 Lampridius, _Heliogab._

436 Senec. _De Clemen._ i. 18.

437 Tacit. _Annal._ iii. 36.

438 Senec. _De Benefic._ iii. 26.

439 Tacit. _Annal._ i. 73. Tiberius refused to allow this case to be

proceeded with. See, too, Philost. _Apollonius of Tyana_, i. 15.

440 Suet. _Tiber._ lviii.

441 “Mulier quædam, quod semel exuerat ante statuam Domitiani, damnata

et interfecta est.”—Xiphilin, lxvii. 12.

442 “Eos demum, qui nihil præterquam de libertate cogitent, dignos esse,

qui Romani fiant.”—Livy, viii. 21.

443 Valerius Maximus, iv. 3, § 14.

444 See the picture of this scene in Tacitus, _Hist._ iii. 83.

445 Dion. Halicarnass.

446 “Divina Natura dedit agros; ars humana ædificavit urbes.”

447 See a collection of passages from these writers in Wallon, _Hist. de

l’Esclavage_, tome ii. pp. 378-379. Pliny, in the first century,

noticed (_Hist. Nat._ xviii. 7) that the _latifundia_, or system of

large properties, was ruining both Italy and the provinces, and that

six landlords whom Nero killed were the possessors of half Roman

Africa.

448 Tacit. _Annal._ xii. 43. The same complaint had been made still

earlier by Tiberius, in a letter to the Senate. (_Annal._ iii. 54.)

449 Augustus, for a time, contemplated abolishing the distributions, but

soon gave up the idea. (Suet. _Aug._ xlii.) He noticed that it had

the effect of causing the fields to be neglected.

450 M. Wallon has carefully traced this history. (_Hist. de l’Esclav._

tome iii. pp. 294-297.)

451 Livy, iv. 59-60. Florus, i. 12.

452 Livy, xxiv. 49.

453 Sallust, _Bell. Jugurth._ 84-86.

454 Livy, xxxix. 6.

455 “Primus Cæsarum fidem militis etiam præmio pigneratus.”—Suet.

_Claud._ x.

456 See Tacitus, _Annal._ xiii. 35; _Hist._ ii. 69.

457 M. Sismondi thinks that the influence of Christianity in subduing

the spirit of revolt, if not in the army, at least in the people,

was very great. He says: “Il est remarquable qu’en cinq ans, sept

prétendans au trône, tous bien supérieurs à Honorius en courage, en

talens et en vertus, furent successivement envoyés captifs à Ravenne

ou punis de mort, que le peuple applaudit toujours à ces jugemens et

ne se sépara point de l’autorité légitime, tant la doctrine du droit

divin des rois que les évêques avoient commencé à prêcher sous

Théodose avoit fait de progrès, et tant le monde romain sembloit

determiné à périr avec un monarque imbécile plutôt que tenté de se

donner un sauveur.”—_Hist. de la Chute de l’Empire romain_, tome i.

p. 221.

458 See Gibbon, ch. v.; Merivale’s _Hist. of Rome_, ch. lxvii. It was

thought that troops thus selected would be less likely to revolt.

Constantine abolished the Prætorians.

459 The gladiatorial shows are treated incidentally by most Roman

historians, but the three works from which I have derived most

assistance in this part of my subject are the _Saturnalia_ of Justus

Lipsius, Magnin, _Origines du Théâtre_ (an extremely learned and

interesting book, which was unhappily never completed), and

Friedlænder’s _Roman Manners from Augustus to the Antonines_ (the

second volume of the French translation). M. Wallon has also

compressed into a few pages (_Hist. de l’Esclavage_, tome ii. pp.

129-139) much information on the subject.

460 Hence the old name of _bustuarii_ (from _bustum_, a funeral pile)

given to gladiators (Nieupoort, _De Ritibus Romanorum_, p. 514).

According to Pliny (_Hist. Nat._ xxx. 3), “regular human sacrifices

were only abolished in Rome by a decree of the senate, B.C. 97,” and

there are some instances of them at a still later period. Much

information about them is collected by Sir C. Lewis, _Credibility of

Roman History_, vol. ii. p. 430; Merivale, _Conversion of the Roman

Empire_, pp. 230-233; Legendre, _Traité de l’Opinion_, vol. i. pp.

229-231. Porphyry, in his _De Abstinentia Carnis_, devoted

considerable research to this matter. Games were habitually

celebrated by wealthy private individuals, during the early part of

the empire, at the funerals of their relatives, but their mortuary

character gradually ceased, and after Marcus Aurelius they had

become mere public spectacles, and were rarely celebrated at Rome by

private men. (See Wallon, _Hist. de l’Esclav._ tome ii. pp.

135-136.) The games had then really passed into their purely secular

stage, though they were still nominally dedicated to Mars and Diana,

and though an altar of Jupiter Latiaris stood in the centre of the

arena. (Nieupoort, p. 365.)

461 Cicero, _Tusc._ lib. ii.

462 Capitolinus, _Maximus et Balbinus_. Capitolinus says this is the

most probable origin of the custom, though others regarded it as a

sacrifice to appease Nemesis by an offering of blood.

463 Much curious information on this subject may be found in

Friedlænder, _Mœurs romaines_, liv. vi. ch. i. Very few Roman

emperors ventured to disregard or to repress these outcries, and

they led to the fall of several of the most powerful ministers of

the empire. On the whole these games represent the strangest and

most ghastly form political liberty has ever assumed. On the other

hand, the people readily bartered all genuine freedom for abundant

games.

464 Valer. Maximus, ii. 4, § 7.

465 On the gladiators at banquets, see J. Lipsius, _Saturnalia_, lib. i.

c. vi., Magnin; _Origines du Théâtre_, pp. 380-385. This was

originally an Etruscan custom, and it was also very common at Capua.

As Silius Italicus says:—

“Exhilarare viris convivia cæde Mos olim, et miscere epulis

spectacula dira.”

Verus, the colleague of Marcus Aurelius, was especially addicted to

this kind of entertainment. (Capitolinus, _Verus_.) See, too,

Athenæus iv. 40, 41.

466 Senec. _De Brevit. Vit._ c. xiii.

467 Sueton. _J. Cæsar_, xxvi. Pliny (_Ep._ vi. 34) commends a friend for

having given a show in memory of his departed wife.

468 Pliny, _Hist. Nat._ xxxiii. 16.

469 Sueton. _Cæsar_, x.; Dion Cassius, xliii. 24.

470 Sueton. _Aug._ xxix. The history of the amphitheatres is given very

minutely by Friedlænder, who, like nearly all other antiquaries,

believes this to have been the first of stone. Pliny mentions the

existence, at an earlier period, of two connected wooden theatres,

which swung round on hinges and formed an amphitheatre. (_Hist.

Nat._ xxxvi. 24.)

471 Dion Cassius, liv. 2. It appears, however, from an inscription, that

10,000 gladiators fought in the reign and by the command of

Augustus. Wallon_, Hist. de l’Esclavage_, tome ii. p. 133.

472 Sueton. _Tiber._ xxxiv. Nero made another slight restriction (Tacit.

_Annal._ xiii. 31), which appears to have been little observed.

473 Martial notices (_Ep._ iii. 59) and ridicules a spectacle given by a

shoemaker at Bologna, and by a fuller at Modena.

474 Epictetus, _Enchir._ xxxiii. § 2.

475 Arrian, iii. 15.

476 See these points minutely proved in Friedlænder.

477 Suet. _Aug._ xliv. This was noticed before by Cicero. The Christian

poet Prudentius dwelt on this aspect of the games in some forcible

lines:—

“Virgo modesta jubet converso pollice rumpi

Ne lateat pars ulla animæ vitalibus imis

Altius impresso dum palpitat ense secutor.”

478 Sueton. _Tiberius_, xl. Tacitus, who gives a graphic description of

the disaster (_Annal._ iv. 62-63), says 50,000 persons were killed

or wounded.

479 Tacit. _Annal._ xiii. 49.

480 Joseph. _Bell. Jud._ vi. 9.

481 See the very curious picture which Livy has given (xli. 20) of the

growth of the fascination.

482 Joseph. _Antiq. Jud._ xix. 7.

483 Lucian, _Demonax_.

484 Philost. _Apoll._ iv. 22.

485 Friedlænder, tome ii. pp. 95-96. There are, however, several extant

Greek inscriptions relating to gladiators, and proving the existence

of the shows in Greece. Pompeii, which was a Greek colony, had a

vast amphitheatre, which we may still admire; and, under Nero, games

were prohibited at Pompeii for ten years, in consequence of a riot

that broke out during a gladiatorial show. (Tacit. _Annal._ xiv.

17.) After the defeat of Perseus, Paulus Emilius celebrated a show

in Macedonia. (Livy, xli. 20.)

486 These are fully discussed by Magnin and Friedlænder. There is a very

beautiful description of a ballet, representing the “Judgment of

Paris,” in Apuleius, _Metamorph._ x.

487 Pacuvius and Accius were the founders of Roman tragedy. The

abridger, Velleius Paterculus, who is the only Roman historian who

pays any attention to literary history, boasts that the latter might

rank honourably with the best Greek tragedians. He adds, “ut in

illis [the Greeks] limæ, in hoc pœne plus videatur fuisse

sanguinis.”—_Hist. Rom._ ii. 9.

488 Thus, e.g., Hobbes: “Alienæ calamitatis contemptus nominatur

crudelitas, proceditque a propriæ securitatis opinione. Nam ut

aliquis sibi placeat in malis alienis sine alio fine, videtur mihi

impossibile.”—_Leviathan_, pars i. c. vi.

489 Sueton. _Claudius_, xxxiv.

490 “Et verso pollice vulgi

Quemlibet occidunt populariter.”—Juvenal, _Sat._ iii. 36-37.

491 Besides the many incidental notices scattered through the Roman

historians, and through the writings of Seneca, Plutarch, Juvenal,

and Pliny, we have a curious little book, _De Spectaculis_, by

Martial—a book which is not more horrible from the atrocities it

recounts than from the perfect absence of all feeling of repulsion

or compassion it everywhere displays.