Stoicism - College of Stoic Philosophers

132 STOICISM.this school, and Seneca speaks thus from personal"of his lectures. Sotion used to explain tomemoryus the reasons which led Pythagoras to abstainfrom animal food, and why Sextius did the same inlater times. Their motives were different, but didthem equal credit. The latter thoughtcould find food enough without resortingthat manto theblood of life, and that he learnt to practise crueltyby making murder minister to his pleasures. Weought, he said moreover, to cut short all that tendsto pamper us. He argued that a varied diet isprejudicial to good health, and ill-suited to our constitution.Pythagoras maintained that all livingbeings were akin, and that their souls passed by freeinterchange from one form to another. If he is tobe trusted, no soul dies altogether, nor is its lifesuspended for more than a brief moment, while themetamorphosis is taking place. After Sotion hadexplained these views and pressed them home withfurther arguments, he said, 'Great men have heldthese sentiments, therefore suspend your judgmentand reserve the right of embracing them yourself.If they are true,a law of nature ; if not,the abstinence from animal food isit is at least a measure ofeconomy. ... I was strongly influenced by suchlanguage and began to abstain myself, and after ayear's trial I found the practice not only easy, butagreeable. My mental powers seemed to gain invigour, and to this day I am not sure that they didnot. You may wonder why I dropped the practice.My early life fell in the years when Tiberius was