Great Ideas of Philosophy

C. The Stoic account relies on the notion of oikeion, natural affinities, an appropriateness that expresses theorder of nature itself. Nature as an expression of the logos is an ordered realm, governed by laws thatcollectively establish what is “right” for the entities that compose it.1. The essential nature of law or morals is rational, proportionate, unprejudiced. It is also presented andcomprehended by way of language, and this fact leads the Stoics to a rather interesting conclusion.2. Only one creature has language, and therefore, only one creature can deal with the sorts of abstractionsthat are central to the rule of law and to an ethical life: a human creature.3. Mankind is, thus, distinguished from the rest of the order of nature. It is only the linguistic communitythat is able to participate in moral, civic, and political life.4. The Stoics contended that there is something about the rational power of humanity that confers specialpowers generative of rights. It is in virtue of the powers of abstraction and comprehension that wehave liberties at all. Liberty, after all, is not anarchy; it is conforming one’s behavior to a principle.D. It can be argued that the Stoics, not the French of the 1780s or the authors of the Constitution, firstformulated the concept of natural rights. They understood that the rule of law is a rational order accessibleto rational beings so fashioned as to have a natural affinity to such a rule of conduct.E. We see here the development of the concept of the individual person as the object of the law’s regard. Invirtue of the logos, we as rational beings come to comprehend the cosmic order of things and becomecapable of legislating for ourselves to secure, not what is pleasurable but what is fitting.III. Emotion and passion are what most contradict reason. Only a man is able to control his animality and,ultimately, to surface as a fully rational being, now sharing in the universal logos.A. The right disposition to have is that of apatheia, not “apathy” in the sense of indifference but resignationbefore the fact that the cosmic order is determinative.B. We bring about our own suffering and unhappiness by violating the dictates of reason—for example, bywanting what is either unattainable or what is not in our interest.C. The essence of the Stoic worldview can be found in the words of Epictetus: “Never say of anything thatI’ve lost it, only that I’ve given it back.”D. There is an order and a rational plan to things. Nothing happens without a cause; everything is anexpression of the overarching logos. The individual must understand his or her place, first within thefamily, then within the civic community.E. The ultimate moral community is the community of language-using, reasoning, justifying beings whopossess the natural dispositions and powers that qualify them for life under the rule of law.F. On the question of good and evil, the Stoics again are defenders of a form of rationalism that resistssupernatural or mystical explanations. What we really mean by “evil” is a departure from virtue and fromthe natural order of things. This argument will later be taken up by Christians theorizing about sin.IV. The Epicureans depart from the Stoics on a number of points.A. The Epicureans are resolutely naturalistic, but their creed was not “Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrowwe die”—far from it. The actual teachings of Epicurus and his followers are extremely conservative at thelevel of individual behavior and social life.B. One of the principle differences between the Epicurean and Stoic system is that the Stoic requires us toenter the political world and participate fully in the affairs of the polis. The Epicurean scheme is one thathas us remove ourselves from the hurly-burly of daily life.C. The point of Epicureanism is to reduce the likelihood of pain and suffering, to defer death as long as onecan, and to act in such a way that the likelihood of loss is diminished. Pleasure is understood almost innegative terms—as the absence of pain.D. Where the Stoics valued friendship as central to rational community, the Epicureans used friends toachieve their central goals. Friendship is a species of self-defense, a protection against the vagaries of thefuture.E. The Epicurean would be the last one to argue that we should eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we willto die, because to perform these acts and to be so fearful of tomorrow’s death is already to be overcome by8©2004 The Teaching Company Limited Partnership