Stoicism - College of Stoic Philosophers

J 6ST0IC1SI>I.the increasing disposition to take refuge from practicallife in indolent apathy or empty irony, that occasionedduring this epoch the extension of the system ofEpicurus to a larger circle."^ It is probable that thehistorian somewhat underrates the moral influence oftheories for which he has so littlesympathy himself;but, indeed, in that exceptional ageof social dissolutionand upheaval, men would be more likely tolisten to the cry, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrowwe die," or be prompted to parade a sceptical indifferenceor cynical despair.But the writer does not speak so lightly of theinfluence of Cato's name and character upon thefollowing generation. "The unrelenting warfare whichthe ghost of the legitimate republic waged for centuries,from Cassius and Brutus down to Thrasea and Tacitus,—nay, even far later, against the Csesarian monarchya warfare of plots and of literature— was the legacywhich the dying Cato bequeathed to his enemies.This republican opposition borrowed from Cato itswhole attitude— stately, transcendental in its rhetoric,pretentiously rigid, hopeless, and faithful to death ;and, accordingly, itbegan even immediately after hisdeath to revere as a saint the man who in his lifetimewas not unfrequentlyits laughing-stock andscandal.""But though the din of civil wars may have madeit hard for any but a Cato or a Brutus to calmlymeditate on abstract questions, there can be no doubt*Mommsen. English translation, iv. 2, p. 560.* Ibid., p. 449.