The Stoic Creed - College of Stoic Philosophers

"
"
The
"
ETHICS: SPECIAL POINTS 181
Athens, turn his Stoical knowledge effectively to account.
Only, there is this great difference, that the Christian
enthusiasm for humanity originates in love for the per
sonal Christ, in devotion to a divine Person, and is
stimulated by His example.
Natural fellow-feeling and
brotherly affection thus becomes intensified ;
and it is
rendered effective in a way that nothing else can do
when it is based in personal religion. At all events,
it was this very sentiment of universal brotherhood,
prompted by true altruistic motive, that broke down
the distinctions of caste among the Stoics, putting
Epictetus, the lame slave, on a level with Marcus
Aurelius, the Roman Emperor, on the principle that
rank is but the guinea stamp,
The man s the gowd for a that ;
l
and that enabled Aurelius himself to work steadily
towards the realization of his own ideal "The con
ception of an equal commonwealth based on equality
of right and equality of speech, and of imperial rule
respecting first and foremost the liberty of the sub
ject
(Med. i. 14). And it is the same sentiment,
working slowly yet surely, that in Christian lands has
procured the abolition of slavery, has made consistently
for freedom (social, political, and religious), obliterating
class animosities, and stirring the spirit of philanthropy
so deeply as it does in Christendom at the present
day. 1
1
Burns.
2
For a laudation of the social duties and the proof of their pre
eminence, see Cicero, De Officiis, i.
43-45.