The Stoic Creed - College of Stoic Philosophers

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210 THE STOIC CREED
to the sovereign ends which guide the
World-soul" (ibid. 75).
impulse
of the
Hence, taken in its entirety,
the world is perfect (this
is the view sub specie ceternitatis}. This means that
there is really no such thing as evil in it ;
for what is
real is true it is as it must be. Pain and suffering,
indeed, there are ;
but these are not evils, because
necessary and conducive to ultimate good : they are
only the
masks" that children use with which to
frighten us. They are even necessitated by the law
of relativity, or the principle that a relative implies a
corelative pleasure would have no meaning,
if there
were not pain ; up involves down ; valley
needs hill :
take away one and you take away all
(Aulus Gellius,
Nodes Atticae, vii. i).
Neither are sin itself and sinful
actions a real evil, being necessary. "When some
piece of shamelessness offends you, ask yourself, Can
the world go on without shameless people ?
Certainly
not ! Then do not ask for the impossible. Here you
see is
on without.
one of the shameless, whom the world cannot get
Similarly in any case of foul play or breach
of faith or any other wrong,
fall back on the same
thought. When once you remember that the genus
cannot be abolished, you will be more charitable to the
individual" (Aurelius, Med. ix. 42). Again, "The
gourd is bitter : drop
it then ! There are brambles in
the path : then turn aside ! It is enough. Do not go
on to argue, Why pray have these things a place in the
world? The natural philosopher will laugh at you,
just as a carpenter or cobbler would laugh, if you began
finding fault because you saw chips or parings lying
about their shop. And yet they have a place for the W