/ . / ff y BY THE SAME AUTHOR. A HISTOEICAL AND CRITICAL COMMENTARY ON THE OLD TESTAMENT, WITH A NEW TEANSLATION: VOL. I. GENESIS. Hebrew and English. 18s. Abridged Edition. 12s. VOL. H. EXODUS. Hebrew and English. 15s. Abridged Edition. 12s. VOL. III. LEVITICUS, PART I. Hebrew and English. 15s. Abridged Edition. 8s. -VOL. IV. LEVITICUS, PART II. Hebrew and English. 15s. Abridged Edition. 8s. A HEBKEW GEAMMAE, WITH EXEECISES: PAET I. The Outlines of the Language, with Exercises; being A Practical Introduction to the Study of Hebrew. 12s. Qd. PAET II. The Exceptional Forms and Constructions, preceded by an Essay on the History of Hebrew Grammar. 12s. Qd. A KEY to the Exercises of the First Part. 5s. BIBLE STUDIES: PAET I. The Prophecies of Balaam (Numbers xxii. to xxiv.), or The Hebrew and the Heathen. 10s. Qd. PAET H. The Book of Jonah, preceded by a Treatise on 'The Hebrew and the Stranger'. 10s. 6d. LONDON: LONGMANS, GEEEN AND CO. PATH AND GOAL, A DISCUSSION. Haec, sis, pernoscas, parva perdoctus opella. Namque alid ex alio clarescet, nee tibi caeca Nox iter eripiet, quin ultima naturai Pervideas : ita res accendent lumina rebus. Lucret. I. 11061109. PA AND GOAL. A DISCUSSION ON THE ELEMENTS OF CIVILISATION AND THE CONDITIONS OF HAPPINESS. M. M. KALISCH, PH. D., M. A. LONDON: LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. 1880. PRINTED BY W. DBUGULIN, LEIPZIG. CONTENTS. PAGE I. THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS ....... 1 Gabriel de Mondoza, p. 1. Hubert Gregovius, p. 4. Arthur Berghom, p. 6. Noel Abington, p. 8. Percy Humphrey, p. 10. Dr. Keginald Mortimer, p. 12. Raphael Gideon, p. 13. Emanuel Panini, p. 16. Arvada-Kalama, p. 18. Subbhuti, p. 20. Asho-raoco, p. 24. Movayyid-eddin, p. 27. Erasmus Hermes, p. 28. Walther Attinghausen, p. 29. Clement Melville, p. 31. Andreas Wolfram, p. 32. II. THE BOOK . . ., . . . . .. ., .. . '. 84 III. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC . . . . . . . 61 IV. THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN . . . . . .121 V. EPICURUS AND DARWINISM . . . . . . .188 VI. THE DIGNITY OP MAN 247 VII. GOD, SOUL, IMMORTALITY 293 VIII. IMMORTALITY . . . . 331 IX. PANTHEISM 377 X. PESSIMISM .','.'. .418 XI. IDEALISM AND THE GOAL ...... . 473 < I I. THE HOST AND HIS. -GUESTS, IN the summer evenings during the year of the last International Exhibition held in London, native and foreign guests habitually met at the house of Gabriel de Mondoza for a friendly exchange of ideas. Cordova Lodge, situated in one of the northern suburbs, was an unpretending structure of moderate dimensions, but adorned with consummate taste and judgment. Nothing betrayed an affected reproduction of a peculiar style or a particular century; yet, whether owing to the statues, busts and pictures of Greek deities and philosophers, which, besides some original masterpieces of the Italian school, studded the well-designed hall and principal apart- ments, or whether owing to the refined simplicity and arrangement of furniture abundant but not crowded, elegant yet comfortable, the, whole made an impression such as perhaps an ancient Athenian might have experienced when entering the Propylaea or the Parthenon. It was an atmosphere of calm cheerfulness inviting the mind at once to concentration and intercommunion. But the principal charm of the Lodge was its situation. The host, an ardent lover of nature, had transformed it into a veritable rus in urbe. The limited grounds which surrounded the house, he had, with the utmost discrimina- tion in economising space, laid out partly in shady walks and gay flower beds, and partly in a well-stocked and carefully cultivated kitchen garden. He had not only found room for modest conservatories and hothouses, but also for a diminutive farm that deserved to be admired as a true model of neatness and utility. As, for his sole recreation, he was often himself engaged in this 2 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. little domain with weeding and pruning, tying up and transplanting, it was his special pleasure and pride to send to his friends presents of the freshest roses and ; sweetest grapes, of cream the richest and finest eggs. When- ever he desired to pursue some deeper train of thought, he was wont to retire into one of the small bowers or summer houses, where, having encircled his small plot with a close belt of high poplars and spreading plane- trees, he was not liable to be disturbed by intrusive sights or sounds. When, on the other hand, he fell into one of those poetic moods which often powerfully swayed him, he surveyed from an upper room of his house the elevated and picturesque landscape that extended westward before his view, or, in the evening, repaired to the ob- servatory which he had constructed with most judicious discernment, and where he had, before this time, made more than one discovery of importance. For, relieved from worldly care by a sufficient patrimony, he was determined to use his powers in the service both of practical life and of science. Work was to him not only a pleasure but an indispensable necessity; he had indeed for many years carried on his labours with such incessant eagerness that his health, originally robust and elastic, began to show monitory symptoms of decline. As he thus was less enabled to seek in society that intercourse with congenial minds, which was his greatest enjoyment, he gradually gathered round himself the ablest men whose conversation promised him improvement and assistance. / For he had already passed through a remarkable inner development. He was descended from a distinguished family of Spanish Jews, which, emigrating from Holland, had settled in England even during Cromwell's Protectorate. His father, like his ancestors for many generations, was a no less learned than zealous Talmudist. His mother, of German birth, was of an essentially artistic nature, of such delicate taste and tact, and, in spite of feelings deep and strong, of such sweet gentleness and patient forbearance, THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 3 that all who came under her influence revered and loved her as a perfect type of womanhood. While the father's fire kindled Mondoza's religious sentiments, the mother's self-possessed composure engendered an aesthetic frame of mind, which seemed to calm the restless agitation of the soul by holding all powers equally balanced. Thus he naturally turned with like ardour to the study of the Bible and of the classics, and ever hesitating which of the two he should choose for special cultivation, he clung the more firmly to both, and, soon freeing himself from untenable tradi- tions, he earnestly laboured to weld the conceptions of the Scriptures and of Hellenism into one homogeneous design. Yet his mind remained unsatisfied. He felt that elevation and beauty are unavailing without clearness in general principles. For such principles he searched philosophy, but in vain. He studied its chief systems eagerly: in all he discovered uncertainty, conjecture, often self-contra- diction. Then, without abandoning his old predilections, he gave his full attention to the natural sciences which, in the last two or three decades, had been so marvel- lously advanced. Here at last, he thought, he had found what he had so long yearned for. First, in conformity with his natural bent towards the sublime, he was fascinated by the wonders of astronomy and strove to form distinct notions of the genesis and government of the universe. But then, following his ethical instincts, he entered with increa- sing delight into the problems of the origin of life upon the earth into all that could throw light on the mutual connection of all creatures up to man himself, who, what- ever his pursuits, remained his supreme object and interest. Thus, after long and laborious investigations, he succeeded in devising a general view which combined and kept in equipoise Hebrew, Greek and modern thought, and which, he was confident, did justice both to the varied aspirations of human nature and the complex course of universal history. Did he deceive himself? Will the conflict and friction with other opinions decide in his favour or compel 4 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. him to seek different paths? The following conversations will help to settle the alternative. It remains in this place only to be remarked that Mondoza had long since lost his tenderly beloved wife it was perhaps this bereavement which had stamped a pensive melancholy upon features ennobled by the constant pre- sence of great thoughts , and that now the whole wealth of his affections was centred in an only promising son centred but not absorbed; for he was charitable almost beyond his means, as open to the suffering of individuals as to the progress of society, self-denying, generous alike to friend and opponent for his decided views did not remain unchallenged : and many not un- fittingly applied to him the words used by the great German poet in describing an immortal friend: HJnd hinter ihm, in wesenlosem Scheme, 'Lag, was uns Alle bandigt, das Gremeine'. 1 The company which assembled in Cordova Lodge during the year of the International Exhibition, was more than ordinarily numerous and varied; for even those literary celebrities with whom Mondoza had not before been in correspondence, found easy access and a hearty welcome. To avoid interrupting, by personal explanations, the dia- logues we shall have to record, we may here at once mention and briefly sketch the principal guests. One of Mondoza's most valued friends was HUBERT GREGOVIUS, Professor of Biblical literature at a renowned seat of learning in Germany. Though now advanced in years, both his vigour and his zeal were unimpaired. He had at first established himself as Lecturer in one of the smaller Prussian universities, but had from the beginning taught the Scriptures with such breadth and unbiassed freedom, that in those days of despotic reaction, he soon 1 Tar from his soul, like airy phantoms, fled 'Mean thoughts, by which we all are curbed and led.' (Goethe, Epilog zu Schiller's Glocke; Werke, 1840, vol. VI, p. 424). THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. became an object of suspicion to the government, and a harm- less public utterance was eagerly seized upon as a pretext for dismissing him from his post. He was willingly received in Switzerland, where he remained as an ornament to one of the federal Colleges, until the political regeneration of his country caused him to be recalled by a popular ad- ministration proud of his learning and his fame ; and he has since then, for nearly a generation, become the guide of a large number of younger scholars happy in calling themselves his pupils. It was the merit of Gregovius to have been among the first to apply to the Scriptures a treatment at once minutely philological and largely historical. In the former respect, he drew into the scope of his examination not only all Shemitic idioms, but, soon recognising the para- mount importance of Sanscrit, the Arian languages also; while in the latter respect, he exhibited, in rare perfection, that most invaluable of all gifts, a keen historical instinct, the want of which can be replaced by no other faculty, and which, almost equivalent to divination, is indispensable in fields of enquiry, where the materials at our disposal are mostly scanty and fragmentary. Indeed, common sense was Gregovius' principal characteristic to such a degree that the results of the ripest scholarship and the highest linguistic acumen, when stated by him, appeared like simple axioms claiming acceptance from every sound mind. Being thus able at any moment to free himself from the ballast of antiquarian learning, he was a most cheerful companion, versatile in conversation, and evincing so lively an interest in every pursuit and occurrence, that strangers hardly knew, or cared to know, his particular avocation. And yet, impartially consulting the labours of all his more important predecessors, whether of the traditional or the critical schools, and cautious in his researches, though uncompromising in his conclusions, he had made the most unwearied efforts, by means of a strictly scientific method, to reconstruct on a rational basis the language and 6 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. literature of the Hebrews as well as their religion and history; and he did this with such consistency and success that future enquiries might render modifications or additions necessary, but will not easily show the necessity of altering the plan of the edifice in its main outlines. In not a few points different from Gregovius, though on the whole working in the same fields of knowledge, was ARTHUR BERGHORN, who for some weeks was Mondoza's constant guest. His appearance instantly arrested atten- tion, not so much by his unusually tall, slender and sinewy frame, but by a certain defiant aggressiveness stamped upon his physiognomy, and by a proud superciliousness that was mirrored in dark eyes half hidden under bushy eye- brows. He likewise was a German doctor of Divinity and had, with brief interruptions, held a chair at a university which, in the course of the present century, has repeatedly made itself conspicuous by very determined political demonstrations. This spirit of public agitation, which was stronger in Berghorn than in any of his restless colleagues, incited him, even when his long-cherished dream of German unity was at last realised, to oppose an almost frantic hostility to the Emperor and the Empire, merely because that unity had not been effected in the precise manner which, from his peculiar theories of history, he had declared to be the only possible one. He had been among the most gifted and most unweariedly diligent pupils of Gregovius, but he had scarcely been withdrawn from this healthful influence when his polemical vehemence delighted in setting forth, with regard to the Hebrew language and the composition of the Scriptures, many views which indeed displayed extraordinary penetration and scholarship, but which were in reality hardly more than bold conjectures, and, though eagerly read and much admired as feats of ingenuity, were adopted or approved by few. "While Gregovius was endowed with the power of simplifying the recondite problems of Biblical lore and bringing them home to the comprehension of THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 7 all, Berghorn's intellectual idiosyncrasy could hardly avoid converting the simplest facts and truths into recondite problems. Proud of an originality almost inexhaustible in its resources, he dictatorially judged and rejected the efforts of nearly all his predecessors; but he constantly mistook assertion for argument, and dazzling hypothesis for an established result. The master's criticism was by the disciple perverted into a hypercriticism which not seldom compelled him to retract or essentially to alter views put forth as infallible and defended with categorical obstinacy. Nevertheless, his suggestions and surmises, however startling, seldom failed to promote Biblical studies most effectually, since even the errors of a man of genius are instructive. His somewhat vain endeavour to make the researches of the past a tabula rasa, permitted his brilliant abilities unrestricted scope, and produced a large number of surprising combinations which, if the pictures they exhibit of Hebrew politics and literature were essen- tially kaleidoscopic, attracted to the subject many whom a more sober treatment would have left indifferent. He evinced, moreover, in the elucidation of historical and religious ideas, a depth and force as if inspired by prophetic ardour, and, in spite of a style rather quaint and hard, his earnestness often succeeded in producing truly poetical effects. Yet even these merits were not without strong shades. In unconsciously idealising his theme, he strayed into a twilight hardly less confusing than the 'mists of dogma' which he was never tired to assail as 'irreligious'. Although to a certain point unfettered by prejudice and tradition, yet he clung to the old terms, which he had neither the insincerity to take in their old sense, nor the courage to abandon. But it was just these enigmatical contradictions that made him one of the most interesting personages to some a psychological study, to others an object of admiration not unmixed with mysterious awe, though all were careful not to tempt his irascibility or to provoke his recklessly abusive antagonism. 8 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. While the two men just characterised were essentially Biblical scholars, their friend NOEL ABINGTON was a most prominent type of the Christian theologian. Although entirely dissimilar to both in their salient traits, since he possessed neither the simple clearness of the one nor the critical subtlety of the other, he was regarded by both with equal reverence. Who, indeed, could approach that extraordinary man without experiencing an influence almost akin to sanctification? Though living in an age commonly described as worldly, he appeared almost like an immediate apostle of his Master. Being the son of a zealous minister of one of the stricter English sects, he was brought up in a rigorous practice of religious forms and exercises bordering on ascetism. But the boy had a glowing heart and an exuberant ima- gination, which found little nourishment in the cold and bare ceremonialism that surrounded him. At an age earlier than is usual even with strong and independent intellects, he found himself engaged in a vehement struggle for inward deliverance; and after a brilliant College career, during which he endeavoured in vain to suppress his tumultuous conflicts by an almost breathless industry, he joined the national Church to the intense grief of his father, from whom he was thenceforth greatly estranged. Many years of toiling thought and research followed; but then he was at last able to frame a system which satisfied him, and which he has since then elucidated from the pulpit and the academical chair with an eloquence and holy fire that gained over all deeper and purer minds for the centre of his doctrine, even if they were unable to follow him in his deductions and arguments. 'The essence of religion,' which he had made it his task to fathom, he declared, like Schleiermacher, to consist, not so much in belief and worship, as in the feeling of the absolute dependence of man and the whole world upon an all-pervading Creator in that feeling of unspeak- able wonder which penetrates the human soul in con- THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 9 templating the marvellous mechanism of the universe, in scanning the stirring events of history, and in unravelling the changeful experiences of individual lives ; since all alike are felt to proclaim a boundless wisdom, power, and justice. To him religion was, in fact, the ever present consciousness of the ideas of truth and eternity, of goodness and Divine judgment working within us with such irresistible force and unfailing certainty that the soul neither demands nor requires any other proof of the existence of God and His Providence. But as the imperishable exemplar of human perfection, through whom alone a full atonement, or a union with God, is possible or can ever be truly beneficent, he regarded the Christ of history, whom he first strove to make a rea- lity in his own heart, and then endeavoured, with assiduous and passionate fervour, to render intelligible to others. In thus interpreting religion not only as a natural phe- nomenon in man's mental constitution, but as the very foundation and indispensable necessity of his exis- tence, and constantly feeling himself in a loving inter- communion with his Redeemer, he led a life truly blissful, as it was scarcely touched by the world and its anxieties. A conception which regards as the pith of religion neither knowledge of the truth nor charitable action, but an all- governing sentiment, could not, it is evident, be free from a certain enthusiastic mysticism, which precluded calmer enquirers from accepting his views without reserve. And yet, when he poured forth his tenets from the depths of his conviction in speaking, he bent his chin upon his breast, as if he were listening to the voice within ; or when he gave free scope to that torrent of speech, which seemed to flow from his lips as if under the spell of a mighty inspiration ; few could hardly imagine how warm a heart he had even for the smallest concerns of his fellow- men, and how clearly and practically his eye surveyed all the relations of life, so that complicated disputes were not seldom referred to his arbitration. 1 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. Considering his principal aims, it is not surprising that he scarcely bestowed an independent interest on the Old Testament, to which his two friends devoted themselves even with predilection: his care was not Biblical but Ecclesiastical history; not the literature but the moral and dogmatic teaching of the Scriptures ; and on all these subjects he has written works which are acknowledged to be mines of learning, classical in form and elevating in tone, but which, nevertheless, because he sacrificed the dogmatism of a past revelation to his idea of a perpetual intercourse of the human heart with its Divine source, have caused him to be described as a heretic from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot. Among his opponents the ablest and the most influential was PERCY HUMPHREY, who occupied a chair of Divinity at the same university as Noel Abington, and was no less popular with a large number of students. He also was a Christian theologian in the stricter sense ; and yet how great was the difference in the work and character of both men! Humphrey was the son of an eminent English physician, studied theology and the Oriental languages with diligence, and at first decidedly inclined towards German rationa- lism; but suddenly a change took place, the causes of which it was difficult to ascertain, and he became thence- forth one of the staunchest champions of the Protestant creed. He fought with all the arms of an extensive erudition and a penetrating shrewdness, of a searching analysis and an effective satire. The subjects he treated engaged his attention but partially; for they shared it with the refutation, or at least the unsparing criticism, of his antagonists. He took a delight in multiplying, with inventive ingenuity, the possible objections to his own opinions, in order to attack and, as he believed, to demolish them by his adroit and often surprising dialectics. "While speaking, he moved his small, twinkling, clever eyes restlessly; and when arguing, he usually placed the fore- finger of his right hand upon that of his left hand in regular THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 1 1 intervals, as if lie were beating time; unless he put it for a moment upon the extremity of his hooked and sharply cut nose, which well harmonised with his thin face and rigidly regular features. He performed his dialectic tasks, as a rule, with such specious success, that many honestly believed his arguments to be unassailable, and orthodoxy established for all times. Clinging to St. Augustin's maxim, "The New Testament is concealed in the Old, the Old Testament is revealed in the New' a , he made, of course, the utmost efforts to represent the whole of the Old Testament history simply as a prophecy pointing to Christ, the New Testament history as a prophecy pointing to the latter days, and the Scriptures in their totality as disclosing the gradual progress in the revelation of Christian dogmas and the scheme of salvation. Unlike Abington, who appealed to the innate wants and aspirations of the human soul, he attempted to prove his doctrines by means of a dexterous exegesis and the supposition of a continuous Manifestation from without. The work he had proposed to himself was not easy and, in view of the constant progress of Biblical and historical research, became more and more difficult as he advanced ; yet his vindications of the Divine and Mosaic origin and the absolute infallibility of the Pen- tateuch, his spiritual interpretations of the Psalms and other Books, and his comprehensive Christological de- ductions and applications, called forth the admiration and gratitude even of those who by no means shared his prin- ciples, but were glad to find together, in such masterly completeness and precision, everything that could well be urged in defence of tradition. Humphrey's authority extended far beyond the limits of his own country; in all Protestant communities of the Old and the New World he was honoured as a strong pillar of the Christian Church, as a powerful bulwark against the inroads of neologian subversiveness ; and his numerous works have become the 12 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. text-books in all the learned schools of Evangelical theology. It was natural that Mondoza felt pleasure in the personal acquaintance of the famous controversialist, and his in- terest was enhanced by seeing him in the company of no less distinguished colleagues, with whom he had long carried on a literary feud of more than ordinary animation and severity. A divine of a very different mould was Dr. REGINALD MORTIMER, whose accomplishments and amiability made him a welcome guest in all circles of society. He was small of stature, and it cannot be said that he looked venerable or imposing; but his fine head and a certain aristocratic cast of his features, could not fail to strike even the most casual observer as remarkable; his mouth especially, even when he was silent, showed a variety and changefulness of play indicating an unusual readiness of speech and humour. Although a dignitary of the Church he was Canon in a northern diocese he could scarcely be designated otherwise than a nominal Christian; for a very thin and transparent veil of Christian phraseology barely concealed that classical humanitarianism which formed the kernel of his creed. Yet for this very reason many who stood aloof from the Church were glad to see him in a position that enabled him to serve as a useful link between the faiths of the Bible and the conclusions of philosophy. And for such a mission, if mission it could be called, few men were better fitted. For, imbued with the spirit of Greek and Roman poetry and therefore ac- customed to convey abstract ideas in a plastic form, he most skilfully transformed the peculiar notions of the Scriptures into general emblems, and abandoning one essential tenet of Christianity after another as if it were part of its husk, he moved in a region of thought, in which every specific stamp was effaced. He hardly recognised a difference between various creeds, as he saw only the simple and iden- tical truths which are the foundations of all, and he often THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 13 pointed to the Christianity of a Shakespeare or Bacon in order to prove, or rather allow it to be inferred, that dogmas and articles of faith are unnecessary for moral and intellectual greatness. And these views he advocated with an eloquence which, if not powerfully impressive, was wondrously pleasing and insinuating, ever fresh and pic- turesque, ever elastic and buoyant. His lips and his pen imparted even to the tritest thought a new life and an unexpected charm, and the most perfect form of expression seemed to offer itself to him spontaneously. Yet in spite of his remarkable abilities, in spite of a noble and most active zeal, and a wide popularity, the effects of his work were comparatively slight. Not even his warmest friends succeeded in entirely silencing those who described his toleration in the office he occupied as laxity, and they had little to reply when his assailants failed to discover in him that strength of intellect and character which leads to strict principles of thought, or that open candour which distinguishes between beautiful play and manly conviction. Free at least from Canon Mortimer's faults was RAPHAEL GIDEON, Chief Rabbi in one of the principal towns of the Grand Duchy of Posen, who had come to England to collect among his opulent co-religionists con- tributions towards a new Synagogue and the extension of local charities. Born in a small town of that province, he became, when still a child, familiar with the Hebrew Bible and the Rabbinical commentaries. The boy soon displayed an extraordinary talent, and when he, according to custom, on the Sabbath after his thirteenth birthday delivered in the Synagogue a Talmudical disputation to signalise his religious majority, he so strongly impressed the congregation with his gifts that it was decided that he should be educated, at the expense of the commu- nity, in a Rabbinical College in Prussia, renowned for the ability and learning of its masters. After due preparation, he entered that institution, but attended at the same time the classical High School and 14 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. afterwards the university. His memory, acuteness, and perseverance were alike astonishing, and his enormous power of work, supported by a vigorous health which either knew no illness or disregarded it, was an object of wonder even to those of his teachers who were themselves quoted as prodigies of industry. Thus he acquired an accumulative knowledge not only in the Jewish and Oriental branches of learning but also in the language and literature of the Greeks sand Romans. But the latter he studied only as auxiliaries to the former, and most noteworthy was his ab- solute incapacity of understanding the spirit of Hellenic culture. In the mythology of the Greeks he saw nothing but a repulsive mixture of caprice, baseness and immora- lity; in their history nothing but the vain contests of light- headed youths who never attained the maturity of men; and in their art hardly more than the trifling levity of Sybarites who ? utterly unfit for the earnestness of life, had no other aim than sensual frivolity. To enter seriously into their philosophy, ethics, or science, he did not even deem worth his while; and if in their writings he was occasionally startled by some sentiment or principle recalling the power, dignity or elevation of the Bible, he quickly passed over the analogy by assuming an appropriation from the Hebrews or by sagaciously pointing out some heathen alloy. To him 'Mosaism' was the emanation and the sum total of all Divine wisdom, confirmed and enjoined, on the one hand, by the teaching of the prophets, expanded and 'hedged in', on the other hand, by the traditions of Rab- binism. Thus, although apparently placed amidst the currents of western civilisation and familiar with its chief productions, his thoughts rooted in the Eastern principle of absolute supernaturalism. He used indeed the modern terminology, but he lived in the notions of his ancestors. New ideas touched the old, but did not mingle with them; between both there was neither enmity nor a tendency of amalgamation; it was a state of quiet indifferentism. THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 15 For the Rabbi was convinced that no earthly intelligence could ever overthrow or even modify, however slightly, God's primeval revelations. He was in his innermost heart certain of the ultimate and universal victory of Judaism, which, by a strange illusion, was to him nothing else but a pure monotheism ; and scrupulously strict in the obser- vance of its rituals and ceremonials, he expected that Messianic time with a confidence which no adverse ex- perience was able to shake. He could indeed not fail to notice everywhere among his co-religionists great and rapid changes, and he con- stantly argued about this decay of the old faith in dis- courses and writings which all, more or less, bore the character of bitter philippics or tragically mournful laments ; and though these efforts seldom convinced or produced a practical effect, the sincerity of their ardour inspired esteem for the man, while the happy illustrations from his vast treasury of Rabbinical lore, with which they abounded, awakened admiration for the scholar and interest in his studies. But with respect to Christianity he maintained a position not only of toleration but of a certain friendliness. For he considered its doctrine of the Incarnation as a Divinely appointed instrument for gradually training heathendom to the imageless monotheism of the Old Testament. He called himself an orthodox Rabbi and he was one; he made to his age no concessions beyond those demanded by the duties of a good citizen and faithful patriot, which he exercised conscientiously and to the ready practice of which he impressively exhorted his congregations. He loved his German country and prayed for its welfare, but he prayed with equal fervour for the restoration of his people to the Holy Land and the renewal of the service of sacrifices in the Temple on Moriah. He did not, and needed not, concern himself about this contradiction, as his holy Books enjoined attachment to his adopted and his ancestral country with equal solemnity, though the 16 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. latter was perhaps the intenser feeling of his heart. If ever a fleeting doubt troubled him on this or any other perplexity, he fought it down by main force; and fearlessly indifferent to personal consequences, he never hesitated to expound his strong opinions about the Divine inspiration of the Hebrew Scriptures and Tradition, or about the holiness of Moses, the prophets and the Jewish sages ; and to expound them with the utmost determination, without the least compromise, not even shrinking from paradox and fanaticism: he was Fortis, et in se ipso totus, teres atque rotundus. \ It was men of this unbending temper who, in the first half of the present century, called forth among the educated Jews of Europe a reaction which, in nearly all countries, led to a schism, though this has hitherto proved neither wide nor deep. One of the ablest ministers of these new communities who like to call themselves 'Re- formers', was EMANUEL PANINI who, on account of the urbanity of his manners and the refined ease of his con- versation, was in Mondoza's house always greeted with pleasure. Born and educated in Italy, he gradually deve- loped that fiery eloquence which seems natural to the land of Rienzi and Savonarola, and to which he imparted an additional charm by apt citations from the great Italian poets. Although trained in a famous Rabbinical school and thoroughly competent to perform the functions of a Rabbi, he declined this title and styled himself Preacher of the 'Reform Congregation' over which he presided for many years with sustained popularity. For he desired to avoid even the remotest appearance of recognising the validity of tradition or 'the oral Law,' the repudiation of which is the main characteristic of his sect. But in this point he was as little consistent as other 'Reformers.' Although acknowledging the Mosaic ordinances as their only canon, they found it impossible to abolish, even par- tially, those customs which, like those connected with the dietary precepts and the festival rites, had by the practice * X & THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS.**^ 17 of many centuries taken deep roots in Jewish life. They could, therefore, in a limited sense only, be termed Karaites, especially as they, on the other hand, happily refrained from the unintelligent literalness of Karaitic interpretations. Thus they might certainly claim the merit of having materially simplified their religion, and of having Drought it into closer harmony with the age. Yet in the most essential question, their difference from the older schools was only one of degree, not of principle. For they ad- hered to the verbal inspiration of the Pentateuch with a stubborn tenacity unsurpassed by the most rigorous Rab- banites. Indeed they concentrated on that narrower field all the dogmatic energy distributed by their brethren over multifarious codes; and some of them could not be re- strained from occasional ebullitions of that bigotry from which they had themselves suffered so greatly for many years after their secession. Like the Protestants and the 'Old Catholics', they held themselves entitled to the name of 'Reformers', because they declared Divine inspiration or tradition to have ceased at an arbitrarily chosen point of their religious history. In reference to the adherents of other creeds they insisted upon a strict separation, which they believed proper for the oldest race and the exclusive depositaries of truth. And yet, with a curious inconsistency, they were proud of their prophets who constantly proclaimed God's paternal love towards all nations alike, and Emanuel Panini especially unfolded and inculcated the lessons of an Isaiah and Micah with an enthusiasm, in which the holy flame of those exalted teachers seemed to be rekindled. Being a great lover of music he seldom missed the performance of a good Oratorio, nor did he scruple to hear the master- pieces of the lyrical stage he introduced in his synagogue the organ, which his orthodox co-religionists abhor in Divine service as 'an institution of Gentiles.' While the stirring strains of some old Jewish melody were still vibrating through the hearts of the worshippers, 18 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. he would speak with a poet's fervour and imagery of the glorious age when all mankind should be gathered under the banner of Israel, and one law of love and knowledge and peace should unite all the lands of the earth ; and then it was difficult, under the thrilling sway of that influence, to re- member those barriers between nation and nation, which, from irresolution of thought and action, he himself un- fortunately helped to strengthen ; while it was impossible not to look hopefully forward to the diffusion of that ideal of spotless honour and tender charity, which he almost realized in his own life. A new and uncommon attraction was imparted to Mon- doza's assemblies by the presence of four Eastern guests, who contributed in no small degree to a fuller and broader discussion of some of the weightiest topics. The young- est, but by no means the least remarkable among them was the Brahman AEVADA-KALAMA, who had adopted this name of Buddha's first Brahmanic teacher to intimate that, like Buddha, he considered himself a regenerator of Brahmanism. Born in Calcutta of an old family which, belonging to the caste of physicians, had for several generations been familiar with English society and cul- ture, he lost no opportunity of mastering the chief Eu- ropean works on science and literature, and above all on theology. Sanguine in temperament, endowed with a glowing imagination, and enthusiastic to such a degree that he believed he beheld supernatural visions, he felt from an early age strongly impelled to a deeper inves- tigation into the nature of religious truth. The soil had for some time been effectually prepared. A Reform Association had in 1830 been originated by R,am-Mohun-K,oy, and another, nine years later, by De- bendra-Nath Tagore*. The latter maintained indeed the * The older Association bore the name of Brahmo-Subha or Brahmo Somadsh, the later one that of Tatt- vabadhing-Subha, the meaning of the one being 'God-seeking Society', of the other, 'Truth-seeking Society'. THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 19 authority of the Vedas in all points properly religious, but denied their divine inspiration on account of the palpable errors they teach with respect to the Deity; and he de- manded as the sole condition of membership the renounce- ment of idolatry, the acknowledgment of one God, and a life of probity. Arvada-Kalama studied most zealously everything connected with these reforms, to which he ac- corded his lively sympathy. But he was still more pow- erfully moved by the ardent activity of Baboo Keshub Chunder Sen. At first, he followed him implicity; for he admired the purity and strictness of his unitarianism. But soon he found it difficult to overcome various points of difference. He was reluctant to abandon some of the harmless rites of his fathers, which he deemed useful on account of their significance. Thus he declined to give up 'the holy cord', the Brahman's distinctive badge, in- tended always to remind him of his God and his duties,> of his ancestors and his posterity. He was, in fact, averse to all sudden and violent changes in the old customs of the people. He did not, like Chunder Sen, sanction marriages between members of different castes; nor would he, in public worship, read and explain, besides the Yedas, theistic passages from the holy books of other nations. He belonged, in a word, to that division of the Reform which, in 1865, under the name of 'Adi Brahmo Somadsh', separated from the bold innovators of the 'Brahmo Somadsh of India'. Penetrated with this spirit of conservatism, which alone, he believed, promised great practical -results among the bulk of his countrymen, "Ke~~tfiea to acquire a thorough knowledge of the sac- red literature of the Hindoos and their abundant tra- ditions. In due time, he was consecrated a minister of his sect. However, urged by a thirst of further en- lightenment, he so far defied Hindoo habits and notions as to venture on a journey to the chief centres of Eu- ropean learning and to make in each a shorter or longer stay. 20 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. Almist simultaneous with his arrival in London was that of the Buddhist SUBBHUTI. He was a native of Kandy in Ceylon, but descended from a Japanese family that had settled in the island forty or fifty years ago. The traces of this origin were manifest throughout Suhbhuti's life. For in spite of a most severe self-training, he never succeeded in conquering a certain sprightly vivaciousness which a censorious observer might easily interpret as worldliness; and although wholly free from personal ambition, he was agitated by an irresistible desire to see and to know every phase of life and society. Destined by his parents for the clerical order, he entered in his tenth year, as a novice, the famous and splendid viliara of his native town, and there he soon became con- spicuous no less for his remarkable capacity in compre- hending the subtleties of Gautama's doctrines, than for the difficulty he experienced in submitting to the monastic dis- cipline, more rigorous in Ceylon than in other Buddhistic communities. Yet he remained in the institution from deference to the wishes of his parents, and when he had completed his twentieth year, he received the upasampada, or ordination, amidst an exhibition of public interest such as is only accorded to the most promising associates con- fidently expected to rise, in due order, to the highest wisdom of the Qravakas. He had not only mastered the various canonical Books of the 'Triple Basket' (Tripitdka)* together with their even more voluminous Commentaries (Attliakaiha), but had eagerly studied many of the very nu- merous works considered as the secondary sources of his creed, b whether written in Cingalese, Pali, or Sanscrit. But in spite of all honours, in spite of all advantages, he could not be reconciled to the life of a recluse; he tried hard to forget his uneasiness in the zealous instruc- tion of a large number of devoted disciples, but in vain; and when, ten years after his consecration, his parents died, he renounced his vows and, laying aside the yellow robe, abandoned the priestly vocation. Such a step, permitted THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 21 in his congregations, could by him be taken without the least discredit, as not only his eminent learning but also his piety and earnest ardour for the maintenance of the faith were beyond suspicion. Partly his love of the holy sciences, the knowledge of which he was anxious to revive in Ceylon, a partly the desire of visiting his relatives in the land of his ancestors, and, not least, an unconquerable propensity for travel, induced him to undertake a journey to Japan, yet not by the direct or shortest way, but touching all the countries likely to yield new and useful information about the tenets of his religion. To such an enterprise he was especially stimulated by the illustrious example of some great Chinese travellers of earlier times, as Fa-hien and the renowned Hiouen- Thsang b , with whose works, abounding in interesting facts bearing on the origin and early development of Buddhism, he had recently had an opportunity of becoming more fully acquainted. Like those pious pilgrims, he longed 'to go and seek the Law that it might serve as a guide to men and secure their salvation'. For he saw with grief that a large portion of his countrymen had been ensnared by Brahrnanic superstitions and heresies; that they invoked and wor- shipped Hindoo gods ; nay that, permitting ordination to certain classes only and refusing to teach the holy Book of Discipline to laymen, they had even, in some measure, relapsed into the abhorred distinction of castes, which it was their master's greatest glory to have demolished. In support of these sad errors, they adduced the confused and contradictory ordinances of doubtful authorities. The increasing animosity between the two chief sects the faithful 'Amarapuras' and the more pagan 'Siamese', who taunted each other as 'religious outcasts' occasionally rose to such a violence that it threatened seriously to endanger the well-merited credit enjoyed by the Buddhists for absolute toleration towards other creeds. For these reasons, and in view of the advances Christianity had made in the island since the English occupation, it appeared to be the 22 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. duty of all good patriots to uproot those fatal corruptions by returning to the spirit of primitive Buddhism, a and for this purpose to study its first sources in those earliest Pali and Sanscrit works that command an undisputed allegiance. To this chief end Subbhuti made his jour- ney subservient with all his peculiar energy and intel- ligence. First turning to Siam, where, however, he did not remain long, he made a protracted stay in Burmah, where he entered into earnest discussions with the learned Bananas, since, by a singular turn in the course of history, the Cingalese receive at present their religious instruc- tion and their chief priests from Burmah, whereas in former ages they had themselves spread and taught Buddha's faith in many neighbouring lands. Then our traveller passed through those north-eastern provinces of India, where Buddhism, about the beginning of the Christian era, had found a last refuge from the persecutions of the Brahmans ; went on northward into Tibet where, by command of the aged Dalai Lamai, the august head of his religion, the rich treasures of an old and varied literature were opened to him; and, though reluctant to depart, he continued his journey to China, where he was rejoiced to find Fo, his beloved Buddha, in undiminished authority at least equal to that accorded to his two great rivals Confucius and Lao-tse b , and where the pious zeal of former rulers had amassed a vast number of sacred books systematically arranged and carefully translated from the original tongues . While residing in China, he entered more fully than he had done before into the wise and simple teaching of Confucius, for which he conceived a growing sympathy, as on account of its complete freedom from mysticism, it seemed to him eminently fitted to engender a life at once pure and useful. He acquired a competent knowledge of the four 'holy scriptures' (kings), but turned his special attention to the 'book of books (the sJiu-king), which, by the manifold information it offers in history, metaphysics THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 23 and ethics, extended both the range and depth of his mind. Resuming his travels, he could not resist the temptation to advance even into Mongolia, whither he was attracted by the fame of distinguished Lamas; and he at last made his way to Miako, the ecclesiastical capital of Japan and the home of his race, where, in congenial intercourse with learned bonzes, partially belonging to his own family, he passed his time no less agreeably than profitably. Eight years had thus been spent since his departure from Ceylon, when he received intelligence of new sectarian dissensions raging in the island, and he determined to return by sea without delay. During his long voyage he had leisure to survey the results of his experience, and he was confirmed in the conviction he had always cherished, that in spite of later modifications and additions, the doctrines of his great Master were most staunchly upheld in territories so wide and so densely populated that Buddhism is still one of the most farspreading creeds of the earth, a and that it has but little to fear from the exertions of Christian missionaries, however able and zealous, pro- vided that, in its present revival, it resolutely adhered to that original simplicity and grandeur, which he had made it his special task to point out and to enforced Arrived in Ceylon, he exerted himself most strenuously to conciliate the antagonists, and in the course of a few years he had the satisfaction of seeing the party of the Amarapuras strengthened by the accession of many influential de- votees, the priesthood cleansed of those who disgraced it by adding field to field and lending out money on usury , c and the community in general awakened to a sense of their grave defects in manly honesty and truthfulness. But his irrepressible love of change and thirst for new information allowed him no rest. He had from time to time read in English journals longer or shorter accounts of certain philosophical systems which had recently caused unusual sensation in Europe, and which, as appeared to 24 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. him, possessed not merely incidental analogies but an essential affinity with the teaching of Buddha; and most anxious to study these views also at their source, he joined some English officials who were returning to their country on leave. Animated by an equal desire of knowledge was the Parsee dastoor, or Bishop, whom his co-religionists honoured with the epithet of ASHO-RAOCO, i. e. pure splendour.* He was a native of Surat, and a descendant of those Parsees who, in the seventh Christian century, after the destruction of the Sassanid dominion, had sought a refuge in India from the proselytising violence of the conquering Mussulmans. Although, like his whole sect, strongly and gratefully attached to the British rule, the liberality and equity of which he never wearied in extolling, he was pene- trated by a more than ordinary love for the faith of his ancestors and by no means shared the strange eagerness, evinced by many of his brethren, of being 'Europeanised'. He appeared, therefore, always in the exact costume of his nation the sudra or long linen tunic, 'the garment of the good and beneficent way ? , held together by the Jcusti or thin woollen cord of seventy-two threads, passed three times round the waist and scrupulously tied with the four knots that are to remind the Parsee of the main import of his religion. The angrdkha or loose ungirdled tunic, which was thrown over the sudra, he usually laid off when he paid longer visits, and sometimes also the turban of folded white cloth which he wore over his topee or silk skull-cap. b He had from his early youth shown great taste for a more general culture than the hereditary priesthood hereditary against the commands of the lawgiver could offer, and he availed himself of every possible opportunity of be- coming familiar with the religious and philosophical re- searches of the West. He was filled with shame and indignation at the disgraceful ignorance of the greater part of his order, and was convinced that the mdbeds, THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 25 who had lost all authority and even respect, could only regain an honourable position by setting to the laity an example of earnest zeal in the pursuit of intellectual improvement. It was, morever, his ambition that the Parsee community, though utterly insignificant in point of numbers, should maintain and strengthen that social prominence which they had acquired in so remarkable a degree by their superior intelligence, enterprise and industry; and that their worldly prosperity and their proverbial success in commerce, should be the foundation of yet more eminent distinction*. With these objects in view, he utilised old institutions and founded new ones in Bombay, Nowsaree and elsewhere, for the systematic and comprehensive training of ecclesiastics, obtaining for these Colleges the services of the most accomplished scholars. In the course of his own studies, he could not fail to perceive that the tenets of Zoroaster had, during the twelve centuries that had elapsed since the first Parsee settlement in India, been largely intermixed with the conceptions and usages of the Hindoos: this had been inevitable; for the Parsees had come to the Indian shores as suppliants, and could conciliate the suspicions of the native princes only by adapting themselves, as far as they conscientiously could, to Hindoo practices and customs 5 . But Asho-raoco was of opinion that, under the enlightened and tolerant sovereignty of Great Britain, the opportunity had arrived for restoring the purity of his ancient faith by eliminating from its precepts and ceremonials all that could not be traced to the authority of Zoroaster or his recognised disciples and interpreters. The Society established for this purpose soon spread and gained influence, and it now bids fair to yield the most desirable results. It will, therefore, be understood how strongly the Dastoor repelled the title of 'magus' with which he was commonly addressed in his western travels; for he knew that it was borne by the superstitious sorcerers and soothsayers among the old Chaldeans, 26 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. Medes and Persians, and that it ill befits the wis- dom-loving followers of the 'Goldstar' Zarathustra, who stigmatised the arts of magic as the evil suggestions of the devas, while the 'magi', on their part, de- tested his doctrine and persecuted it with unrelenting bitterness. He insisted that those who aspired to the priesthood should be thoroughly and intelligently acquainted with all that is left of the original twenty-one divisions or noosk of their sacred literature ; not only with the three parts of the Vendidad-Sade viz. the Tagna or Jzaslme, the Vispered and Vendidad embodying the most current prayers, litanies and statutes, but also with the elaborate and difficult hymns of the Yesht, forming the chief portions of the 'little' or KJiorda-Avesta. 10 Stimulated by the erudite researches of European scholars, such as Burnouf and Bopp, Windischmann and Spiegel, he eagerly pursued the linguistic and historical investigation of those holy books. But this did not satisfy him ; he applied himself with untiring zeal to the metaphysical analysis of the Parsee creed, and was determined to ascertain whether the dualistic opposition of a good and evil force in Zoroaster's system, which was the great stumblingblock of all profounder minds of his sect, might not be removed by merging both in the abstract principle of Eternal Time or the Zervdne-Akarana. In his search for a creed of unalloyed monotheism, he hoped to be assisted by the great Christian theologians of Europe, who, he believed, had, like himself, to battle with the difficulty of reconciling unity and plurality in the nature of the deity; and impelled by this yearning for peace of mind, he had, after much hesitation, undertaken the distant journey. The acquaintance of Mondoza, which soon deepened into friendship, was procured to him by a Parsee merchant who, leaving to his sons in Bombay the management of the Indian branches of his house, had for several years been settled in London. THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 27 Perhaps the greatest sensation, owing to his personal appearance, was produced in Mondoza's circle by an Imam of Teheran, who when a child, received on account of his un- common beauty the name ofBedr el-Dsliemal (moon of come- liness), but afterwards, at his installation as religious teacher, was on account of his ardent zeal honoured with the ap- pellation of Movayyid-eddin (strengthener of religion, or defender of faith). It was, indeed, impossible not to be impressed by a stature majestic yet singularly graceful; an address dignified without coldness or apparent reserve; an eye which, habitually soft and contemplative, at times darted forth a concentrated fire like a sudden flash of lightning ; and manly features that combined an almost rock-like solidity capable of concealing the emotions of the mind, with a wonderful suppleness no less capable of reflecting them. He belonged to the most fervid and most scrupulous division of the dissenting Shiites, viz. the Sheikis, who arose, about fifty years ago, in Persia and Arabia through the teaching of Hadji Sheik-Ahmed, and who, although vehemently opposed to the orthodox Sunnites, still adopted many of their traditional beliefs and legends. With a certain complacent pride peculiar to his sect, he claimed credit for investigating these points learnedly and, as he considered, critically; but not only were his decisions questionable, but, like nearly all Mohammedans, he included in his creed many views that lie entirely beyond the horizon of Islamism an inevitable consequence of the character of a religion almost too plain and simple for imaginative Orientals, as it is virtually exhausted in the one well- known sentence, 'There is no other God but Allah and Mohammed is His prophet'. Movayyid had come to Europe in the retinue of his King and had received permission to remain for some time in order, if possible, to discover in the great national libraries new materials for a full history of the numerous sects of Islam, which work he had proposed to himself as the task of his life. 28 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. In addition to the guests who have hitherto heen described and may be taken to represent the principal shades of religious conviction, the host's large sympathies drew to his house a number of celebrities who cultivated with success the chief branches of art and science, and among whom four especially took a lively part in the following conversations. Not dissimilar to the Mohammedan in dignity and grace, though with a preponderance of the latter element, was ERASMUS HERMES, an uncompromising admirer of Greek culture. This he deemed so entirely self-sufficient that it did not require to be complemented by Christianity, which, he thought, it had actually anticipated. Friends and strangers, therefore, commonly called him the last great heathen. Nor was this designation unsuitable to his ap- pearance. His full and handsome face was a type of manly beauty and elastic strength; and he derived a certain additional grace from the habit of leaning his head slightly towards the left shoulder and looking upwards his colleagues said, as if he were holding converse with his patron saint Phoibos Apollon. He was, perhaps more thoroughly than any of his contemporaries, impregnated not only with the genius of the Greek language but with the spirit of Greek thought, and although philologists admired him especially for a remarkable instinct or saga- city in verbal criticism, he himself attached greater weight to the historical reconstruction of Hellenic life and art, on which task he brought to bear, besides an almost exhaustive erudition, such a freedom and serenity of mind, such a symmetry of mental powers, that listeners and readers received the impression of a humanity calm, complete, and happy. Moreover, his writings as well as his conversations were seasoned with the true 'Attic salt' of an easy and refined humour. Following no particular school of philosophy, he had formed eclectic conceptions from the systems of Plato, Zeno, and Epicurus. Among the ancient poets, Lucretius and Horace were his guides; THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 29 among prose writers, his inclination fluctuated between Plato and Aristotle ; but in Aristotle also he admired more the moralist and metaphysician than the man of science. The course of modern progress engaged indeed his lively attention; but its chief attraction to him was the comparison it suggested with classical antiquity, which he not rarely found to deserve the palm of superiority. As regards theology, he neither expressed adherence nor opposition to any of the common doctrines; he simply ignored them. It will readily be understood that the young students who attended his lectures at the great Dutch university whose fame he had greatly increased, were attached to him with enthusiastic affection. Not only was he an amiable com- panion and a warm friend, but above all a most patriotic citizen, since the state was in his eyes, as it had been of old, the supreme end, in which all individual interests should be unconditionally merged. It was remarkable how little animosity he provoked in spite of a turn of thought so strongly marked and apparently so anachronistic, and how great a favourite he was in all social and learned gatherings. Very different from him in temper, method and aims was WALTHEB ATTINGHAUSEN, one of the boldest champions of the most advanced school of naturalists. He missed no occasion for declaring the current forms of religion as antiquated and therefore obnoxious. True enlightenment and happiness, he maintained, were only possible by an absolute abandonment of the dualistic ideas of Creator and Creation in favour of a consistent monism simply recognising the one principle of the identity of 'force and matter'. From the movement of the primary 'cell' up to the consciousness of man, he demonstrated an unbroken connection and continuous development. The doctrines of Devolution' and 'natural selection' he proclaimed as incon- trovertibTe^certainties, which should be taught in the schools instead of the Bible; and he revered Lamarck and 30 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. Darwin not only as the originators of a new science, but also as the founders of a new, religion. This realistic zeal went hand in hand with a pretended pessimism, which he took a particular pleasure of picturing in the gloomiest colours. And yet he propounded a natural religion which, resting on man's noblest qualities, enjoined a 'charity' requiring the subdual, or at least the restriction, of our inborn selfishness for the benefit of our fellow-men. He was even convinced that morality can never be firmly established unless it be founded upon the doctrine of evolution, since it is only by a clear perception of his place in nature that man obtainsboth the right knowledge of his obligations and the due energy for fulfilling them. Against his opponents he acted with the utmost severity, though never with ill-nature. He disdained no weapon of invective or satire; and, radically consistent in his own opinions, he never hesitated to draw from the views of others inferences often exaggerated to absurdity and then more for- cibly ridiculed. In conversation, his clear grey eyes, which brightened up an open and extremely flexible countenance, looked his opponents full into the face; and in excitement, to which he was easily provoked, he was in the habit of stamping his right foot more or less gently on the ground. Yet in spite of his impulsiveness, he was a most patient and laborious enquirer; and as his sole object was truth, he was at any moment willing to sacrifice his most cherished theories to riper researches. His earnestness and courage would alone have secured him respect, even if he had not won it, far beyond his native Switzerland, by many successful investigations and not a few popular works, in which he unfolded modern systems and results with a vigorous clearness appreciated and enjoyed by a wide circle of readers. He was, moreover, a ready and effective speaker at public meetings, which he was fond of attending, especially when their object was the promotion of scientific and technical education which circumstance accounted perhaps for his constant temptation to rise even when THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. 31 speaking in private company. His decision, large knowledge, and prompt, though sometimes indiscreet sarcasm never failed to render a discussion more animated and more instructive. Following Attinghausen up to a certain point and then separating from him with a somewhat unjustified and unintelligible antipathy, CLEMENT MELVILLE entered into the problems of human existence with an almost holy zeal and seriousness. Like Attinghausen he regarded the natural sciences as indispensable to all genuine and solid advancement; but he treated science merely as the basis and starting point for ascending to ideas. He clung to philosophy in a strictly logical method; yet he did not allow it to lapse into barren speculation, but caused it, on all sides, to bloom forth in lessons of practical morality, the loftiness and purity of which seemed to surpass all previous systems of ethics. For his doctrines permitted no other motives than love and the dictates of man's dignity; and they knew no other aim than tranquillity of mind through self-denying devotion to the common weal. They rejected entirely the stimulus of hope and fear, of reward and punishment. Melville used indeed the words 'God' and 'Immortality,' but, in spite of a complex and cautious phraseology, it was evident that 'God' was to him virtually identical with 'Nature,' and 'Immortality' virtually identical with the indestructibility of the eternal 'Substance;' neither the one nor the other was endowed with personality. Thus he also, like Attinghausen, taught a monism] yet, although not going so far as to assume, like his predecessor Leibnitz, a 'pre-established harmony' in the world, since he rejected the principle even of teleology, he insisted with an enthu- siasm truly sublime upon the necessary and possible harmony in the thoughts of man, and through the thoughts, in his feelings and his life. Melville's monism was, therefore, on the one hand, en- nobled by idealism, and, on the other hand, brightened 32 THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. by optimism; he was thus in a strong and twofold oppo- sition to Attinghausen's desponding materialism; and it is intelligible why he investigated with particular zest the questions of state and society, and why he often felt a keen desire for political activity, to which he would no doubt have yielded, had he not still more strongly inclined to quiet research and speculation. Yet such occasional wavering both in his theories and his actions, con- tributed, it was curious to observe, even to enhance that marvellous repose which he diffused by his personal inter- course and his writings, and which many have described as 'a foretaste of heavenly peace'. The force of his con- victions might sometimes urge him to utterances of un- disguised indignation; yet even in such rarle moments, his agitation was no more than superficial, and never touched the imperturbable depths of his soul. Unquestionably one of Mondoza's most distinguished visitors was ANDREAS WOLFRAM, the last whom we beg leave briefly to introduce to the reader. In him the spirit of classical Greece was wonderfully amalgamated with the spirit of the modern world. His easy and beau- tiful conception of life did not prevent him from the minutest enquiries into the innermost principles of creation ; and his penetrating scrutiny of the mysteries of nature seemed only to impart to his artistic conceptions additional fulness and reality. Hence he was often called 'a double man' he might, like his great German fellow countryman, justly liave been called 'legion'. For his knowledge was indeed prodigious, and in conversation it welled forth as from a hundred invisible springs. But no less remarkable than his knowledge was his clearness; he reduced everything to systematic order, shaped all details into an organic whole his mind suffered no rudis indigestaque moles, no disjecta membra. Not only had he in his long life he was a true Nestor and had passed through much more than two generations made momentous investigations and intuitive discoveries / THE HOST AND HIS GUESTS. in nearly every division of natural science; nor had he only the merit of having by long expeditions to the remotest parts of the Old and New World uncommonly extended the fields of observation and experience; but he possessed a mastery and an elegance of language, which stamped his works as models of classical German composition; for even his descriptions of ethnography, nay of metereology, were invested with the charm and value of artistic creations. But the Bible and its teaching were entirely foreign to him, the Old Testament no less than the New; and this was no secret even to those who had never heard the remark he often made to his familiar friends for all public participation in theology he scrupulously avoided that he would gladly help to deliver his age 'from here- ditary Judaism.' Many pointed to this peculiarity as the cause why, in spite of an almost boundless admiration lavished upon him by the more highly educated classes, he was hardly able to gain the ear, much less the heart, of the people. Whether they were right or wrong in such a conjecture, will perhaps become clear from some of the conversations we are about to report. It is scarcely necessary to observe, in conclusion, that seldom if ever all these friends were present together on the same evening: each came to the hospitable Lodge during the customary hours as time favoured or inclination prompted. II. THE BOOK. ON a warm and clear evening in the beginning of July, the guests assembled in Cordova Lodge earlier and more numerously than usual. They were not deceived in their expectation of finding, after the oppressive heat of the day, refreshing coolness in the shady walks and the in- viting arbours. A gentle breeze which had arisen from the south-east wafted through the pure air the fragrance of splendid roses and delicate heliotropes, mingled with the sweet scent of linden blossoms; and it was not before they had witnessed a most beautiful sunset long lingering in the crimson skies, that the friends retired to the spa- cious drawing-room which opened on the tastefully designed and partially covered terrace, and overlooked the smooth and richly skirted lawn. After having partaken of re- freshments which, in their cosmopolitan variety, were con- siderately adapted to the habits of the Oriental guests also, they had scarcely seated themselves at the open windows, when the Buddhist Subbhuti took some papers carefully wrapped up from the ample folds of his blue robe and, presenting them to the host, said with his characteristic vivacity, which made him plunge in medias res: 'I am greatly indebted to you, yet I am disappointed. True, I understand the remarkable Book better through your translation than I did in that which the worthy English missionary read and explained to me in Kandy; but I cannot find in it what you led me to expect'. *What book'? naturally asked several of the guests at once. 'The Book of Ecclesiastes', replied Mondoza, 'But did you not, in reflecting on its speculations', he continued turning THE BOOK. 35 to Subbhuti, 'discover in them something of the spirit of your own sutras, if not of the "Perfect Wisdom" of some of your metaphysical works'?* 'How could I', cried the Buddhist with great animation, 'when I find in the Biblical shaster the -most contradictory views and directions? On the one hand, the writer de- clare~vas the result of his long experience, "Then I praised mirth, because there is nothing better for man under the sun than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry ". b On the other hand, he maintains, in a very different strain, "The day of death is better than the day of one's birth; it is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting; sorrow is better than laughter; the heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth". c Yet these startling inconsistencies extend to points of even greater importance. In one part of the Book, the far-famed King Solomon, whose wisdom is still proverbial in the East'. . . . 'Ecclesiastes is hardly the production of King Solomon', said Gregovius quietly; 'it may be desirable to keep this result of criticism in mind. I beg you to pardon my interruption'. 'Not the work of King Solomon' ? exclaimed Subbhuti. 'By whom, pray, and when was it composed'? 'By whom it was written', answered Gregovius, 'it is impossible to say, but certainly not before the time of Alexander, the famous king of Macedon, who, as you know, invaded India about three hundred years after the birth of your Buddha, d and nearly seven hundred years after the beginning of Solomon's reign'. 'There is intrinsic and irrefragable evidence', said Humphrey with decision, 'that Ecclesiastes is the pro- duction of Solomon himself, despite the idle guesses of an infidel scholarship'. 'And despite the audacity of unblushing heresy', added Eabbi Kaphael Gideon. 36 THE BOOK. 'Surely it could not have been written before the period of the Ptolemies or even the Maccabees', suggested Panini with some hesitation. 'It cannot have been compiled before the age of Herod from the fifteen fragments and interpolations which all who have eyes may discern', protested Berghorn vigorously, with a dark frown in his contracted eyebrows. a 'By Gautama's holy tooth! What am I to believe?' ex- claimed the Cingalese Buddhist in bewildered agitation. 'The matter is perhaps not of such great moment as you seem to imagine', explained Canon Mortimer persua- sively. 'Every nation accustoms itself to regard certain great men as the embodiment of all wisdom or worldly shrewdness, and to attribute to them any conspicuous work on practical ethics, the author of which is unknown or doubtful; nay later writers have not seldom issued books under the authority of those great names, in order to obtain for their lessons a surer effect; and as they are indeed per- vaded by the spirit and nourished by the instructions of their renowned ancestors, might they not, with some justice, assign to them the ideal authorship of their works ? Whether the revered code of your Vinaya or moral 'Discipline' was penned by your Master Sakyamuni, or four or five centuries after him by one of his learned and pious dis- ciplesand you are aware that some of our greatest scholars regard Sakyamuni himself as an "unreal being" who never existed at all, and as much a fiction as his numberless preceding migrations 11 ^whether our Gospels were written down by Christ's immediate Apostles or, much later, by men thoroughly imbued with their teaching: is there really any material difference? And if there be, it is to the world's advantage; for thus we possess the doctrines of the Masters and Founders, enriched by the experience and enlightenment of more advanced generations. Whether, therefore, Ecclesiastes be traceable to King Solomon or some later thinker, the Book represents the highest spe- culative wisdom attained by the Hebrews.' THE BOOK. 37 'Well, well 7 , said Mondoza, smiling, 'be it so. I would not too anxiously enquire into the authorship of the Iliad, and am content to enjoy the wonderful creation as re- flecting throughout the spirit of Greece in the period of her epic youthfulness. But', he added, addressing Subbhuti, 'we have interrupted you while engaged in pointing out those divergencies in Ecclesiastes, which seem to you to diminish the value of its teaching. Pray, continue.' 'When you gave me your manuscript,' said Subbhuti with increasing warmth, 'you made me anticipate that I should find in the Book much that was almost identical with the Meditations of Buddha; and you requested me carefully to consider whether, if that were the case, I ought not to accept those Hebrew doctrines also which my creed rejects or at least ignores, especially the belief in a God and the Immortality of the soul. But I confess, I find nowhere a solid ground, nowhere a settled conviction only here a fata morgana in the desert, there an ignis fatuus in a treacherous morass ; the desert and the morass are painful realities, the tempting visions are the mockery of phantoms. I do not know whether the author is in earnest when he contends, "As the beasts die, so die men; they have all one breath of life . . . All go to one place ; all are of the dust, and all return to the dust: who knows whether the spirit of the sons of man goes upward, and the spirit of the beast goes downward to the earth?"* or when he surmises, "The dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it". b Shall I follow him when he affirms that all is accident that ( the same chance befalls man and beast, the good and the bad, the righteous perishing in his righteousness to be for ever forgotten, the wicked flourishing in his wicked- ness to be buried with honour as if a God were conceivable without the attribute of justice, that is, without a Pro- vidence ; or shall I be guided by him when he proclaims the strict doctrine of retribution with a confidence un- 38 THE BOOK. shaken by his daily experience to the contrary: "Though a sinner do evil a hundred times and prolong his life, yet surely I know that it shall be well with those that fear God" ; or "God will bring every deed into judgment, even every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil"? a How can I, from this confusion, derive a clear conception of the nature of the human soul, or the ruling power of a God, such as you assume? Again, the author admits indeed, "I saw that wisdom excels folly as far as light excels darkness", and he offers some good remarks besides in praise of wisdom b . Yet, on the other hand, he ventures strange utterances like this, "In much wisdom is much grief, and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow" ; c nay he goes so far as to assert that the same destiny and the same death are allotted to the fool and the sage, and that it is therefore idle and futile to strive after wisdom. d Have I really seized his meaning? "Science" djndna the Sublime, the Unerring, should be vain and bootless, and nothing more than "weariness of the flesh"? "Science", such as the rishis or rahats command, and is gained by one of the supreme degrees of contemplation, so teaches our revered Buddha, is omnipotent". 'Worthless is the apostate Buddhist's "knowledge"', said Arvada-Kalama bitterly and contemptuously. 'Science', continued Subbhuti firmly, 'could never have suggested the frivolous lines of the Hindoo poet: "I sang of friendship, wine and love, "In early years of giddy youth. "Now I am old, and know that all "Is vanity of vanities. "Yea, song and friendship, wine and love, "The golden times of joyous youth, "And oh! this late begotten wisdom, "Are vanity of vanities". 6 'For true Science, according to Buddha as well as the best of Hindoo sages, exercises dominion over the forces of nature and all created beings ; it is endowed with the THE BOOK. 39 powers of miracle and enchantment; for it enables its possessor to assume any form, to see and to hear at any distance, to fix the length of his life and to know the thoughts of others, to make himself visible and invisible at will, to fly through the air, to walk on water as others walk on dry land, to tell how many drops and how many living creatures there are in the ocean, to dry up the sea, though in one part it is eight hundred and forty thousand miles deep, to grasp the sun and moon, to hide the earth with the tip of his finger, and to shake to their foundations earth and heaven ; a nay more, it is "Science" alone which leads to true and imperishable happiness, since it is the last stage before the soul enters into the bliss and salvation of the Nirvana?. 'Well said, well said', murmured Movayyid-eddin ap- provingly; 'for has not our Prophet declared, "The ink of sages is more precious than the blood of martyrs" '? b 'How is it possible', continued Subbhuti, after a slight nod of acknowledgment to the Mohammedan, 'to discover in Wisdom any particle allied to pain or grief in her who is man's sole joy and felicity, and the bond that unites him with Eternity ? And this leads me to the prin- cipal x$oint which shows still more strikingly, how little community there is between the Hebrew philosopher and my exalted Guide. Without referring to the more ri- gorous precepts applicable to novices, consecrated priests and holy hermits, we have been taught by our royal Master's noble example no less than by his thrilling ex- hortations, to reduce our wants both in raiment and food, shelter and rest, to the utmost degree allowed by nature's law of self-preservation, and in fact to look upon worldly pleasures as the chief obstacle to the attainment of that transcendent knowledge which opens the portals of the Nirvana. But how does the Israelitish "Preacher" ex- press himself? He declares and it seems most strange to my ears and my mind , "God has made everything beau- tiful in its time; He has also set worldliness in tlieir 40 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (l. 1 6). heart, without which man cannot understand the works that God does, from beginning to end"'.* The listeners looked at each other with surprise, and after a short pause Gregovius said: 'I am afraid we shall be unable to understand each other or to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion unless we are permitted to examine the translation on which our excellent Eastern friend has formed his opinions with regard to the ''Preacher's" philosophy. I confess, the last quotation he has introduced can scarcely sound more strange to him than it sounds to me. May I, therefore, propose to ask our host that he will kindly read to us the version of the Book, with which he has favoured the learned Subbhuti'? 'This will certainly be most desirable', cried Berghorn with an energy that was not unlike a challenge. Mondoza readily assented, and having placed Hebrew Bibles of various editions at the disposal of those who wished to follow in the original, he read, with two or three short intervals, as follows: THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES. CHAPTER I. 1. The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. 2. Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! Ally's vanity. 3. "What profit has a man of all his labour in which he toils under the sun? 4. A generation passes away and a generation comes; but the earth abides for ever. 5. And the sun rises and the sun goes down, and hastens to its place, and there it rises again. 6. The wind goes to the south, and turns round to the north, it turns THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (l. 7 18). 41 and turns continually ; and so the wind repeats its turning. 7. All the rivers flow into the sea, yet the sea is not full ; to the place whither the rivers flow, thither they go again and again. 8. All the words are wearisome, man cannot utter them; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. 9. That which has been is that which shall be; and that which has been done is that which shall be done; and nothing whatsoever is new under the sun. 10. There are things of which it is said, See, this is new: it has been long since in the ages that were before us. 11. There is no remem- brance of the earlier generations; nor shall the later generations be in the remembrance of those that shall come after. 12. I the Preacher was king over Israel in Je- rusalem. 13. And I gave my mind to enquire and to search by wisdom concerning all that is done under heaven: this is an evil business which God has given to the sons of men to busy themselves therewith. 14. I have seen all the deeds that are done under the sun ; and, behold, all is vanity and empty trouble. 15. That which is crooked cannot be made straight, and the deficiencies cannot be numbered. 16. I said to myself, Behold, I have acquired greater and fuller wisdom than all who before me have been rulers over Jerusalem, and my mind has understood much wisdom and knowledge. 17. Yet when I gave up my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly, I perceived that this also is empty trouble. 18. For in much wisdom is much grief, and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow. 42 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (n. 1 11). CHAPTER n. 1. I said in my heart, Come now, I will try thee with mirth, and enjoy pleasure! But, behold, this also was vanity. 2. I said of laughter, It is mad; and of mirth, What does it? 3. I thought within myself to indulge my body with wine, while my mind was guiding with wisdom, and to cling to folly, till I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under the heaven in the numbered days of their lives. 4. I made me great works : I built me houses ; I planted me vineyards ; 5. 1 made me gardens and parks, and planted in them trees of all kinds of fruit; 6. I made me lakes, to water therewith the woods that bring forth trees ; 7. I acquired men servants and maid servants, and had slaves born in my house ; I had also larger possessions of herds and flocks than all that had been in Jerusalem be- fore me ; 8. 1 gathered me also silver and gold and the treasures of kings and provinces; I procured me men singers and women singers, and the delight of the sons of men, wife and wives. 9. So I was great and increased more than all that had been before me in Jerusalem ; also my wisdom remained with me ; 10. And whatever my eyes desired I did not deny them, I did not withhold my heart from any joy ; for my heart was rejoiced through all my labour, and this was my portion of all my labour. 11. Then I turned my mind to all my works that my hands had wrought, and to the labour that I had toiled to effect; and, behold, all was vanity and empty trouble, and there was no profit under the sun. THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (ll. 12 23). 43 12. And I turned my mind to behold wisdom and madness and folly; for what will the man do that comes after the king? even that which has long since been done: 13. And I saw that wisdom excels folly, as far as light excels darkness; 14. The wise man's eyes are in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. Yet I perceived also that one event happens to them all, 15. And I said in my heart, As it happens to the fool, so it will happen even to me, and why was I then more wise? And I said in my heart, that this also is vanity. 16. For the wise man, like the fool, is unremembered for ever, since in days to come everything is long forgotten, and alas! the wise man dies like the fool. 17. And I hated life, be- cause the works that are wrought under the sun appeared to me evil; for all is vanity and empty trouble. 18. And I hated all my labour in which I toiled under the sun, since I should leave it to the man who shall be after me. 19. And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? yet shall he be master over all my labour for which I have toiled and acted wisely under the sun. This is also vanity. 20. Then I turned round to let my heart despair of all the labour in which I had toiled under the sun. 21. For there is a man who labours with wis- dom and knowledge and success; yet to a man that has not laboured for it must he leave it for his portion. This also is vanity and a great evil. 22. For what has man of all his labour and of the trouble of his heart, in which he labours under the sun? 23. For all his days are sorrow, and his work is 44 THE BOOK OP ECCLESIASTES (ll. 24 in. 10). grief; even in the night his heart has no rest. This is also vanity. 24. There is nothing better for a man than that he shonld eat and drink and enjoy himself in his la- bour. This also I saw that it was from the hand of God. 25. For who can eat and who can indulge in pleasures more than I? 26. For God gives to a man who is good in His sight wisdom and know- ledge and joy; but to the sinner He gives the task to gather and to pile up, in order to give it to him that is good before God. This also is vanity and empty trouble. CHAPTER in. 1. To every thing there is a season, and a time for every purpose under the heaven: 2. A time for being born, and a time for dying ; a time for planting, and a time for plucking up that which 25 planted; 3. A time for slaying, and a time for healing; a time for breaking down, and a time for building up ; 4. A time for weeping, and a time for laughing; a time for mourning, and a time for dancing; 5. A time for casting away stones, and a time for gathering stones together; a time for embracing, and a time for keeping aloof from embracing; 6. A time for seeking, and a time for losing; a time for guarding, and a time for casting away; 7. A time for rending, and a time for sewing; a time for keeping silence, and a time for speaking ; 8. A time for loving, and a time for hating; a time for war, and a time for peace. 9. What profit has he that works in that wherein he labours? 10. I have seen the business which God THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (ill. 11 21). 45 has given to the sons of men to busy themselves therewith. 11. He has made everything beautiful in its time ; He has also set worldliness in their heart, without which man cannot understand the works that God does, from beginning to end. 12. I found that nothing is good for them but to be merry and to enjoy themselves in their lives; 13. And also that, if any man eats and drinks and is happy in all his labour, this is the gift of God. 14. 1 found that, what- soever God does, that shall be for ever ; nothing can be added to it, and nothing can be taken from it ; and God works so that men should be in fear of Him. 15. That which has been is now again long since, and that which is to be has been long since ; for God puts forward anew that which has been laid aside. 16. And moreover I saw under the sun the place of judgment there was wickedness; and the place of justice there was iniquity. 17. I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked; for a time shall then come for every purpose and in regard of every deed. 18. 1 said in my heart, This is on account of the sons of men, that God might prove them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts. 19. For that which befalls the sons of men befalls the beasts ; indeed the same thing befalls them; as the one dies, so dies the other, and they have all one breath of life, and a pre- eminence above the beast man has not; for all is vanity. 20. All go to one place ; all are of the dust and all return to the dust. 21. "Who knows whether the spirit of the sons of men goes upward, and the spirit of the beast goes downward to the earth? 46 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (ill. 22 IV. 11). 22. Therefore I perceived that there is nothing better than that a man should be joyful in his works; for that is his portion : for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him? CHAPTER IV. 1. And I saw again all the oppressions that are done under the sun; and, behold, there were the tears of the oppressed, who had no comforter ; and from the hand of their oppressors came violence, and they had no comforter. 2. Wherefore I praised the dead who have long since died more than the living who are still alive. 3. But happier than both is he who has not yet been, who has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun. 4. And I saw all the labour and all the success of work, that for this a man is envied by his neighbour. This is also vanity and empty trouble. 5. The fool folds his hands together, and consumes himself. 6. Better is a handful of quietness than both hands full of labour and empty trouble. 7. Then I saw again vanity under the sun. 8. There is one alone without a second, and he has neither child nor brother; yet is there no end of all his labour, nor is his eye satisfied with riches. But for whom do I labour and deprive myself of pleasures ? This is also vanity and an evil business. 9. Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labour. 10. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow; but woe to the single one who falls, for he has not another to help him up. 11. Again, if two lie together, then they get warm; but how can THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (iy. 12 V. 5). 47 one get warm alone? 12. And if anybody attacks the one, the two will stand up against him ; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken. 13. Better is a poor and a wise child than an old and foolish king who knows no longer how to take warnings. 14. For out of the prison he goes forth to reign ; for in his kingdom he was also born poor. 15. I saw all the living who walk under the sun, with. the second child that stood up in his place. 16. There was no end of all the people, of all that have been before them : those also that come after do not rejoice in him. Surely this also is vanity and empty trouble. 17. Guard thy foot when thou goest to the house of God; and approaching to listen is better than the offering of sacrifices by fools ; for they mind not doing evil. CHAPTER v. 1. Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thy heart be hasty to utter a word before God; for God is in heaven, and thou art upon earth, therefore let thy words be few. 2. For as a dream comes through a multitude of business, so a fool's voice is known by a multitude of words. 3. When thou vowest a vow to God, delay not to pay it ; for He has no pleasure in fools : pay that which thou hast vowed. 4. Better is it that thou shouldest not vow than that thou shouldest vow and not pay. 5. Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; nor say thou before the messenger [priest] that it was an error : why should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of 48 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (v. 6 17). thy hands ? 6. For as vanities are in a multitude of dreams, so also in many words: but fear thou God. 7. If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perversion of judgment and justice in a pro- vince, marvel not at the matter; for a high one watches over a high one, and a highest one over these. 8. Yet an advantage to a country in every way is a king of a well cultivated land. 9. He that loves silver is not satisfied with silver, nor he that loves wealth with gain: this is also vanity. 10. When property increases, they that eat it are increased ; and what benefit has the owner thereof except that he beholds it with his eyes? 11. The sleep of the labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much; but the surfeit of the rich does not suffer him to sleep. 12. There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely riches kept for their owner to his harm. 13. For those riches are lost through evil business ; and if he begets a son, then there is nothing whatever in his hand. 14. As he came forth from his mother's womb, naked does he go back again as he came, and he takes nothing whatever of his la- bour, which he may carry away in his hand. 1 5. And this also is a sore evil: in every way as he came, so does he go; and what profit has he that labours for the wind? 16. Moreover, all his days he eats in darkness and he is full of sorrow and has his suffering and vexation. 17. Behold that which I have seen: it is good and fair for man to eat and to drink and to enjoy himself in all his labour in which he toils under the sun the numbered days of his life which God gives him : foi THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (v. 18 VI. 9). 49 this is his portion. 18. ^to any man also God has given riches and wealth, and has given him the power to eat thereof, and to take his portion and to be merry in his labour, this is the gift of God. 1 9. For he will not much think of the days of his life, because God engages him with the joy of his heart. CHAPTEB VI. 1. There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it befalls men frequently : 2. A man to whom God gives riches and wealth and honour, so that he wants nothing for his soul of all that he desires, yet God gives him not the power to eat thereof, but a stranger eats it. This is vanity, and it is an evil disease. 3. If a man beget a hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul do not fully enjoy happiness, and if he also have no burial; I say that an abortion is better than he. 4. For though it comes in vanity, aftd departs in darkness, and its name is covered with darkness, 5. And moreover it does not see nor know the sun; yet this has more rest than the other [the longlived man]. 6. Even though he live a thousand years twice told, but have seen no happi- ness: do not all go to one place? 7. All the labour of man is for his mouth, and yet the desire is not satisfied. 8. For what advantage has the wise man over the fool? what the poor that knows how to walk before the living? 9. Better is that which is in the sight of the eyes than the wandering of the desire: this is also vanity 50 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (VI. 10 VII. 11). and empty trouble. 10. That which exists has been named long since ; and it is known that he is but a man, who cannot contend with Him who is mightier than he. 1 1. For there are many things that increase vanity: what advantage has man? 12. For who knows what is good for man in life, in the numbered days of his vain life, which he spends as a shadow? For who can tell a man what shall be after him under the sun? CHAPTER vn. 1. As a good name is better than precious oint- ment, so is the day of death better than the day of one's birth. 2. It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting; for that is the end of all men, and the living takes it to heart. 3. Sorrow is better than laughter ; for in the sadness of the countenance the heart remains good. 4. The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. 5. It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise, than for a man to hear the song of fools. 6. For as the crackling of thorns unter a pot, so is the laughter of the fool: this also is vanity. 7. Surely oppression makes a wise man silly, and a gift corrupts the heart. 8. Better is the end of a thing than its beginning, and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit. 9. Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry; for anger is harboured in the bosom of fools. 10. Say not, How is it that the former days were better than these? for thou dost not enquire wisely concerning this. 11. Wisdom is THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (vil. 12 25). 51 as good as an inheritance, indeed better to those that see the sun. 12. For wisdom is a protection and money is a protection ; but the superiority of knowledge is, that wisdom preserves the life of those that possess it. 13. Consider the work of God; for who can make that straight, which He has made crooked? 14. In the day of happines be happy, and in the day of adversity consider that God has also ordained the one just like the other to the end that man should find nothing after him. 15. All this have I seen in the days of my vanity. There is a righteous man that perishes in his right- eousness, and there is a bad man that prolongs his life in his wickedness. 16. Be not righteous over much, nor show thyself over wise; why shouldest thou destroy thyself? 17. Be not over much wicked, nor be thou foolish; why shouldest thou die before thy time? 18. It is good that thou shouldest cling to this, and yet from that also not withdraw thy hand. For he that fears Grod comes forth safe of all that. 19. Wisdom strengthens the wise more than ten mighty men who are in the city. 20. Surely there is not a just man upon earth that does what is good and sins not. 21. Also take no heed of all words that are spoke"n, lest thou hear thy servant curse thee; 22. For oftentimes also thy own heart knows that thou likewise hast cursed others. 23. All this have I tried by wisdom: I said, I will be wise ; but it was far from me. 24. That which is far off and exceedingly deep, who can find it out? 25. I turned my mind to know and to search and seek out wisdom and intelligence, and to know 52 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (VII. 26 Vm. 8). wickedness, folly and foolishness and madness: 26. And I find more bitter than death the woman, whose heart is nets and pitfalls, and whose hands are chains: he who pleases God escapes from her, but the sinner is ensnared by her. 27. Behold, these things have I found, says the Preacher, one by one, to find a result. 28. That which my soul is still seeking, and I have not found, is this: one man among a thousand have I found, but a woman among all those have I not found. 29. This only, behold, have I found, that God has made man upright, but they seek out many devices. CHAPTER vin. 1. Who is as the wise man? and who knows the meaning of things ? A man's wisdom causes his face to shine, and the boldness of his face is changed. 2. 1 say, Keep the king's charge, and that on account of the oath of God. 3. Be not hasty to go away from him; stand not in an evil thing; for he does what- soever he pleases; 4. Since the word of a king is pow- erful, and who can say to him, what doest thou? 5. He who keeps the commandment knows of no evil, and a wise man's heart knows both time and judg- ment. 6. For to every purpose there is a time and judgment, for great is the misery of man that is upon him. 7. For he knows not that which shall be; for who can tell him how it shall be? 8. As there is no man that has power over the wind to check the wind, so there is no power in the day of death, and then is no release in the war; nor does wickedness deliver those that are given to it. THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (vm. 9 17). 53 9. All this have I seen, and applied my heart to every deed that is done under the sun. There is a time when a man rules over his fellow-man to his own harm. 10. And so also I saw the wicked buried, and they came to their rest, while those that had acted uprightly went away from the holy place and were forgotten in the city. This is also vanity. 1 1 . Because sentence upon an evil deed is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is bold in them to do evil. 12. But, though a sinner do evil a hundred times and prolong his life, yet surely I know that it shall be well with those that fear Grod, who are in fear of Him; 13. But it shall not be well with the wicked, nor shall he prolong his days as a shadow; because he does not fear Grod. 14. There is a vanity which is done upon the earth, that there are righteous men, to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked ; and that there are wicked men, to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous: I said, that this also is vanity. 15. Then I praised mirth, because there is nothing better for man under the sun than to eat and to drink and to be merry; and that will abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God gives him under the sun. 16. When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done upon the earth for neither day nor night man sees sleep with his eyes : 17. Then I beheld all the work of Grod, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun: for though a man labour to seek it out, yet he will not find it', and even if a wise man desires to know it, he is not able to find it. 54 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (iX. 1 9). CHAPTEE IX. 1. For all this I considered in my heart, and tried to explore all this, that the righteous and the wise and their works are in the hand of G-od; no man knows either love or hatred; all that lies before them. 2. All things come alike to all: the same chance befalls the righteous and the wicked, the good and the clean and the unclean, him that sacrifices and him that sacrifices not; as is the good, so is the sinner, and he that swears as he that fears an oath. 3. This is an evil in all things that are done under the sun, that the same chance befalls all; therefore also is the heart of the sons of man full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live; and after that they go to the dead. 4. For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope; for a living dog is better than a dead lion. 5. For the living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything, nor have they any more a reward; for their memory is forgotten. 6. Both their love and their hatred and their envy have passed away long since, nor have they for ever any more a portion in any thing that is done under the sun. 7. Gro thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart ; for God has long since declared these thy deeds acceptable. 8. At all times let thy garments be white, and let not thy head lack ointment. 9. Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of thy life of vanity, which He has given thee under the sun, all the days of thy vanity; for that is thy portion in life and in thy THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (iX. 10 X. 2). 55 labour in which thou toilest under the sun. 10. What- soever thy hand finds to do with thy strength, do; for there is no work nor intelligence nor knowledge nor wisdom in the Sheol whither thou goest. 11. Again I saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to the intelli- gent, nor yet favour to the shrewd; but time and chance happen to them all. 12. For man also knows not his time: as the fishes that are caught in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare, so are the sons of men entrapped in the time of misfortune, when it falls suddenly upon them. 1 3. This also have I seen that there is wisdom under the sun, and it seemed great to me: 14. There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it: 15. Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city ; yet no man remembered that poor man. 16. Then said I, Wisdom is better then strength: nevertheless the poor man's wisdom is despised, and his words are not listened to. 17. The words of the wise are listened to in quiet more than the cry of the ruler among fools. 18. Wisdom is better than weapons of war; but one sinner destrpys much good. CHAPTEE X. 1. Asde&d flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to stink and putrefy, so is a little folly more powerful than wisdom and honour. 2. A wise man's heart is at his right hand, but a fool's heart at his left. 56 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (x. 319). 3. Also when the fool goes anywhere, his mind fails him, and he says to every one that he is a fool. 4. If the spirit of the ruler rise up against thee, leave not thy place; for yielding pacifies great offences. 5. There is an evil which I have seen under the sun on account of an error which proceeds from the ruler: 6. Folly is placed in great dignity, and the rich sit in lowliness. 7. I have seen servants upon horses, and princes walking as servants on foot. 8. He that digs a pit falls into it, and he that breaks a hedge is bitten by a serpent. 9. He that hews stones hurts himself therewith, and he that cleaves wood endan- gers himself thereby. 10. If the iron be blunt, and he do not whet the edge, then must he use greater force; but wisdom is more profitable for success. 1 1. If the serpent bites for lack of enchantment, then there is no profit in a master of the tongue. 12. The words of a wise man's mouth are gracious, but the lips of a fool will destroy him. 13. The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness; and the end of his talk is mischievous madness. 14. And the fool is full of words; yet man does not know what shall be ; and what shall be after him, who can tell him? 15. The labour of the foolish wearies him out, who does not know how to go to the town. 16. Woe to thee, land, whose king is a child, and whose princes feast in the morning. 17. Happy art thou, land, whose king is the son of nobles, and whose princes eat in due season, for strength and not for revelry. 18. By slothfulness the beam decays, and through idleness of the hands the house drops through. 19. A feast is made for THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (x. 20 XI. 9). 57 merriment, and wine gladdens life; and money pro- cures everything. 20. Not even in thy thought curse the king, nor curse the rich in thy bedchamber; for the bird of the air carries the voice, and the winged creature tells the matter. CHAPTER XI. 1. Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it again after many days. 2. Give a portion to seven and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil may be upon the earth. 3. When the clouds are full of rain, they empty it out upon the earth; and when a tree falls towards the south or towards the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it lies. 4. He that observes the wind does not sow; and he that regards the clouds does not reap. 5. As thou knowest not what is the way of the wind, nor how the bones grow in the womb of her that is with child ; so thou knowest not the works of Grod who makes everything. 6. In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening let not thy hand rest ; for thou knowest not which shall prosper, whether this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good. 7. And light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to behold the sun. 8. Indeed, if a man live many years, let him rejoice in them all, and remember the days of darkness, for they shall be many. All that comes into existence is vanity. 9. Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy young strength, and walk in the ways of thy heart and in the sight of thy eyes! But know thou, that for 58 THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES (xi. 10. XH. 10). all this Grod will bring thee into judgment. 10. And remove sorrow from thy heart, and keep thy body free from evil; for youth, as the morning dawn, is vanity. CHAPTER XII. 1. And remember thy Creator in the days of thy youthful strength, ere the evil days come, and the years draw nigh, of which thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; 2. Ere the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened, and the clouds return after the rain; 3. In the time when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent, and the grinders are at rest because they are few, and those that look out of the windows are darkened, 4. And the doors in the street are shut because the sound of the mill is faint, and when one rises at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of song are low, 5. And when they are afraid of heights, and terrors are on the road, and the almond is despised, and the locust becomes distasteful, and the caperberry fails because man goes to his eternal house, and the mourners go about the streets ,6. Ere the silver cord is severed and the golden lamp shattered, and the pitcher is broken at the fountain and the wheel shattered at the cistern, 7. And the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God, who gave it. 8. Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, all is vanity. 9. And the Preacher, besides being wise, also taught the people knowledge; and he examined and searched, and set forth many proverbs. 10. The THE BOOK. 59 Preacher sought to find out pleasing words and, written in uprightness, words of truth. 11. The words of the wise are as goads, and the men of the assemblies as fastened nails; they are appointed by one shepherd. 12. And further, by these, my son, be warned: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh. 13. Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments; for this is the whole man; 14. For God will bring every deed into judgment, even every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil. When Mondoza had finished reading, a desultory dis- cussion arose on the rendering of the most disputed verses and terms, in the course of which Rabbi Gideon emphatically declared that a natural and correct interpretation of the Scriptures was only to be found in Talmud, Midrash, and Sohar; a but a most pertinacious controversy was carried on with regard to the passage which Subbhuti had cited last, till finally a virtual agreement was attained, though not without various modifications and strong provisos on the part of Berghorn and Humphrey. Then the host observed : 'However desirable it is accurately to understand every single phrase, it cannot be our object to enter into philo- logical niceties which, I am well aware, have an interest only to few of us; but, faithful to the course we have always followed in these conversations, we should try to discover and to debate those general ideas which are important to all alike as forming essential elements in our actual modes of thought, and involving the motives of our daily conduct. We do not search for that which appertains to one time or one nation, but for those truths which flow ,from the constitution and wants of human nature, and are /on that account universal and unchanging. Let no one 60 . THE BOOK. presume to disparage or to deride learning ; yet it is only the toilsome, and often steep and thorny road that leads to the goal of serenity and freedom. It should, in the poet's words, be "like the heaven's glorious sun" ; and it is indeed mere "weariness of the flesh" and "continual plodding", if it does not unchain and wing the mind in rising to the first causes and their irrevocable operation.* Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas'.* 'What else can be our aim', observed Wolfram, 'than to learn "By what pow'r "The world is to its centre held"'?* 'True', said Humphrey with a slightly satirical curve of his lips, 'but without reaching the despair of Faust'. 'Or the apostasy of Elisha ben Abujah', added Rabbi Gideon. 'And as it appears to me', continued Mondoza, not heeding the interruptions, 'that the Book of Ecclesiastes mainly relates to the Enjoyment of Life, which very closely concerns us all, may I suggest, that this question form the subject of our discussion at our next meetings, and that we, accordingly, enquire by what system of religion or philosophy true enjoyment is best attained and secured' ? '"The words of the wise are as goads,"' said Canon Mortimer with a genial smile, '"and" 'was not this your translation' ? "the men of the assemblies are as fastened nails" : it is a pleasure to be led by so gentle a shepherd, and although, in argument, we know that "one nail drives out another", we shall each be found at our post like a flag nailed to the mast.' After conversing for some time in different groups on the political and literary events of the day, the guests separated for the night, having expressed to the host their ready assent to his proposal. iWas die Welt "Im Innersten zusammenhalt" (Goethe 1 s Faust, I. 1). III. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. THE next evening many of the Mends were already assembled in the drawing-room, when the young and eager minister of the Adi Brahmo Somadsh entered and, after respectful salutations, turned to Erasmus Hermes, saying : 'Let me once more assure you how deeply I feel the pleasure and advantage I derived this morning from your company and explanations. Without so experienced a guide my visit at the grand Institution would have been perplexing and humiliating, rather than instructive. For, surely, in order to appreciate and fully to relish the trea- sures of antiquity in the British Museum, we need that freedom of mind and that extensive erudition, of which your kindness allowed me to enjoy the fullest benefit'. 'Whatever may be your satisfaction, which you so generously express', replied Hermes politely, 'it can hardly be equal to my own ; for your society has confirmed me in the conviction that the masterpieces of Greek sculpture exercise their irresistible power upon every susceptible mind, no less in our utilitarian time than in the golden era of Phidias and Praxiteles; not less in our northern skies than in the sunny clime of Athens or Corinth; nor less strongly upon an enthusiastic son of the East than upon a tranquil sage of the Academy or the Porch. The relics of Greek art are indeed among those precious possessions which our host yesterday described as not appertaining to one age and one people, but, being the emanations of the highest gifts of our common nature, belong to mankind for ever. And as Art essentially contributes to cheerful enjoyment and cloudless serenity, it is religious in its 62 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. influences and effects; nay it is itself the noblest, as it is the most attractive, form of religion'. 'Indeed', assented Wolfram, 'if we desire to attain to a humanity both sweet and perfect, we must discard the chilling austerities of our Eastern creeds, those bitter fruits of a luxuriant soil, and be Greeks again in temperament and conceptions. How cold and blank does our world appear to those who vividly recall that of a Homer or Pericles, and have made this their haven and refuge ! Has it vanished, that beautiful earth where the celestials, affec- tionately associating with mortals, led happy generations by the bands of joy, and demanded no other worship than the mirthful songs of flower-wreathed maidens in radiant temples, and the inspiriting games of emulating heroes in lovely groves? Where are the days, when sombre reality beamed in the roseate hues of poetry, grave truth smiled in the dazzling garb of blithe fancy, and labour had no other end than to add a keener zest to pleasure; when breathing Nature revealed in every rivulet, in every tree and rock, the loving trace of a god; when the sun and the myriads of stars moved in tender harmony with men's lives and hopes, and men themselves could expect, as a reward for high deeds, to shine as immortals among the hosts of heaven; when the heart, glowing in delight, knew neither fear nor hatred, and even death, coming gently as a beautiful youth, had no terrors, since it opened the portals of an Elysium bright with a new existence of bliss ; when the joyous mind matured all its innate blossoms and graces, and Hellas at last gave birth to the divine Plato who, to purify and exalt mankind, brought down from Olym- pus the undying ideals of all that is great and beautiful and noble' ? a 'I can hardly believe', said Humphrey with a marked tinge of irony, 'that even a man whose eye, "in a fine frenzy rolling", contemplates the past and the present through the magic veil of poetry, should cling in sincerity to such airy phantoms and unsubstantial shadows. The much vaunted THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 63 happiness of the ancient Greeks must, I am convinced, be reckoned among the most unaccountable of popular fallacies. There is scarcely a writer from Homer down to the latest philosophers of the Roman Empire, who does not draw human life in colours awfully dismal and gloomy. From the almost endless array of proofs, it will suffice to cite a few as they happen to occur to my memory. 'Homer, who represents his gods as "ever free from care", "lightly living", and feasting in heaven, while they sit on golden thrones and indulge in inextinguishable laughter* Homer himself leads the melancholy chorus. He not only applies to men the constant epithet of "wretched", b but he lets Zeus declare: "Of all the creatures that breathe and move on earth, none is more miserable than man", and though he fancies that he will never suffer ill, as long as he feels his strength unimpaired, he must, however reluctantly, submit to the gods who constantly send him misfortunes. 'Does Hesiod, who reaches back into antiquity far enough to be considered as intermediary between the epochs of legend and history, content himself with describing a golden time ? He sketches so terrible a picture of his own "iron age", that hardly a single feature of human misery and crime seems wanting. "Oh", he exclaims bitterly, "that I were not linked with the fifth generation of men, but had either died before, or been born later! For the present race is of iron, and neither have they by day rest of toil and woe, nor by night of consuming sorrow ; since the gods dispense grievous troubles . . . The father is not true to his child, nor the child to his father, not the guest to the host, nor friend to friend; not even a brother is loving and faithful as of old . . . Violence prevails ; town destroys town; and honour, withheld from the pious and righteous, is lavished upon the haughty evil-doer. Justice and shame have disappeared, and wickedness tyranises over virtue." And summing up his doleful experience, the poet concludes: "Sad griefs alone are left to mortal men, and from those ills there is no rescue". d How is it possible to express 64 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. more forcibly anguish and despair? Not one ray is left from the glory of Paradise to cheer a degenerate and mournful race'. 'I must beg you', said Attinghausen 'not to introduce myths. Science proclaims an invariable progress from the less to the more perfect, never the reverse. Man has not fallen, but risen. He struggled, successively, from the rude epoch of stone to that of bronze, thence onward to the period of iron, and a golden age, if it be possible at all, lies not in the past, but in the distant future'. 'If, as some modern sages have proved to their own satis- faction', replied Humphrey, 'the notion of Paradise is not even a psychological possibility, how do they account for the hard fact that it was actually conceived by nearly all nations'? 'Indeed', said Subbhuti, 'we firmly believe that the earliest inhabitants of the earth, being produced by "appari- tional birth" , started at once in full maturity of existence ; and as they retained many of the attributes of the better world from whence they had come, they lived all together in innocence and peace without requiring food, could soar through the air at will, and their bodies shone forth in such a glory that there was no need for a sun or moon ; till they unfortunately lost all this happiness by eating of the fatal substance which, having the appearance of boiled milk, grew temptingly on the surface of the earth/* 'Pray, let me return to the pretended joyousness of heathendom', resumed Humphrey, who did not seem pleased with Subbhuti's analogy. 'The thoughtful poet Theognis declares: "Of all things the most desirable would be not to exist and not to behold the beams of the piercing sun; but, having been born, it is best quickly to pass through the gates of Hades and to lie buried under a high mound of earth". b Would one not fancy to hear the heart- rending laments extorted from Jeremiah or Job in times of exceptional tribulation, or the fretful complaints indulged in by our Ecclesiastes during his brief moods of unhappy '.i V THE CYNIC AND THK S $& 65 scepticism? 3 nay are we not reminded of the custom reported to have prevailed among some savage tribes of Thrace and the Caucasus, who wept over new-born infants for having entered this world of trouble, but buried the dead with songs of rejoicing at their fortunate release? 5 'It may not appear surprising that the same desolate sentiment is expressed with equal force by Euripides ; c but who would expect it to pervade the productions of all the other tragic writers likewise, so as to throw a veil of the deepest despondency over their pages? Yet no one perhaps, whether in ancient or modern times, has depicted the ill-fated darkness of human existence with such over- whelming power and thrilling pathos as Aeschylus in his Prometheus, who, blessing men with the priceless and heavenly boon of fire and for this act of beneficence doomed to horrible agonies, is made to exemplify the woeful experience that "he who achieves must suifer; so sounds the primeval decree." d Nor is this the only harrowing elegy poured forth by the recondite poet. Impregnated with a weary melancholy must have been a mind that exclaimed, "Alas for human life ! if happy, a shadow may overthrow it; but, more grievous still, if sorrowful, a moistened sponge wipes out the picture" 6 ; or that glorified Death as the supreme deliverer ardently to be loved. f 'Where should a calm serenity be more surely looked for than in the works of Sophocles who, in thought and language, represents to us the perfection of Greek harmony ? Yet he also joins in the general dirge: "Not to be born, is man's highest felicity; the next, having seen the light, swiftly to return from whence he came" ;& or: "Oh, mortal and care-laden race of men! how, in our nothingness, do we resemble shadows creatures chased about as a valueless burden of the earth" ! h "If I die before my time", exclaims Antigone, "I call it gain"; and Ajax: "I see that we all who live are nothing but phantoms or empty shadows". 1 'Is it necessary to cite additional instances from Euripides? They are at hand in abundance, all dilating on the same 66 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. sad theme that "the fate of mortals is toil". a Not unlike the curse fastened upon Eve is man's clinging to life in spite of its dire wretchedness: "Oh ye life-loving mortals, who ever yearn to see the morrow, though laden with the weight of unnumbered ills" ! b And yet man grasps so convulsively this existence of sorrow only from the tormenting uncer- tainty of his lot after death, which he dreads as a riddle obscure and fearful; and in vain does his anxious soul languish for deliverance from this agony of doubt. d 'Let me pass over the touching regrets of Pindar, the magnificent, at man's frailty, "the dream of a shadow" 6 , bound to purchase every joy by consuming torture f , and merely allude to the famous line of Menander, "He whom the gods love dies young ;" but let me proceed to Herodotus, the placid, who embodied this maxim in the charming story of the pious youths Cleobis and Biton, concluding with the words: "In these the gods have clearly shown, that it is better for man to die than to live'". h 'May I be permitted', said Hermes 'for why should I not be generous even to an adversary? in confirmation of this remark to remind you of the analogous but perhaps not quite so familiar narrative concerning Trophonius and Agamedes, which, originally related by Pindar, has been preserved to us by Cicero and Plutarch? After those two brothers, the sons of a king of Orchomenus, had with great exertions and sacrifices built the beautiful temple of Apollo at Delphi, they entreated the god to bestow upon them as a recompense that gift which would make them most happy. Apollo replied that in three days their petition would be granted, and at daybreak on the third day they were found dead. 1 Nay when Pindar himself once enquired of the oracle, what was best for man, the priestess is said to have replied: of this he could not be ignorant, if indeed he had sung of the fate of Trophonius and Agamedes; yet he would soon be still more clearly enlightened and a few days afterwards he died. k But what do all these stories prove ? Hardly anything else, I THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 67 imagine, than the Biblical account of the comparatively short life of Enoch, who "walked with God, and was no more, for God had taken him"'. 'How is it possible', cried Humphrey, loftily, 'to maintain such a parallel for a single moment? The heathen fables exhibit the gods as arbitrary, capricious and frivolous; for why do they grant life, if they do not mean it to extend to its natural duration? Whether giving or taking away, they act alike without a deeper ethical purpose. You will ask, Why then was it necessary that Enoch should depart prematurely? If the reason were not amply evident from the narrative in Genesis, we should learn it from that profound Apocryphal Book, the Wisdom of Solomon, which plainly tells us: "Enoch pleased God, and was beloved by Him, so that, living among sinners, he was translated"; and again: "He being made perfect in a short time, fulfilled a long time". a Enoch', continued Humphrey, beating regular time with his right forefinger, 'Enoch died so young, not that he might be delivered from worldly troubles, but that he might be protected from the pitfalls of sin ; therefore, in dying young, he lost not the true end of his existence ; for when he died, he was perfect in piety and righteousness. We have here one of the many striking instances proving the necessity of extreme cautiousness in adducing heathen analogies: materials almost identical are generally made to convey ideas totally opposite. Paganism regards the body, revelation the soul; the one is of the earth, earthy, the other connects man with heaven'. 'On these points', replied Hermes politely, 'I cannot presume to argue with the learned Professor of Divinity, who enjoys means of illumination denied to an uninitiated layman: may I ask him to continue with his relentless indictment of classical antiquity'? 'I had observed', resumed Humphrey, ignoring the irony, 'that, according to Herodotus, even the most deserving men were at a loss how to employ their lives with profit 68 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. or contentment. But this is not all ; he declares, through the mouth of the Persian Artabanus, that there has pro- bably never existed a man who did not more than once yearn for death as his sole escape from constant af- fliction, and our torture is only enhanced by the moments of happiness we are occasionally allowed to taste ; so that, both in our life and our death, we manifestly see the envy of the deity a , that does not suffer our prosperity to be either great or lasting b . Indeed the thoughtful historian is constantly and irrepressibly pursued by the idea that human life is nothing but an unbroken chain of unavoi- dable accidents which may at any moment shatter the proudest power or fortune; he illustrates this conviction, with tragical effect, by the conspicuous instance of Croesus, and he never fails to impress a warning against calling a man happy before his death. c Are such principles in any way compatible with serenity of mind? More excruciating than a Damocles' sword, the fear of rousing the jealousy of the gods poisoned the enjoyment of the very boons which they themselves were supposed to have bestowed. Nor was that a fear which leads to wisdom or piety, but on the contrary, a fear which undermined both, founded as it was upon a depravity in the gods, which is the most odious and detestable even in men'. 'But should we not remember', said Mondoza, 'that this old view of the envy the deity was but transitorily held; that not long after Herodotus, Anaxagoras with equal decision laid down the maxim, "The deity is good"; and that the same pure notion was still more refined by subsequent thinkers' ? d 'Be this as it may', continued Humphrey, who felt that he had laid perhaps too much stress on that point ; 'was the disheartening apprehension of the treacherous insta- bility of all human possessions ever conquered? The fickleness of fortune was dwelt upon at all times 6 and des- cribed in every conceivable imagery as a hasty flight, a swiftly rolling stream, and especially as withering foliage/ THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 69 which simile indeed Biblical writers also employ, but never without adding some elevating comfort; for when they exclaim, "All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is as the flower of the field", they hasten to continue, "But the word of our God shall stand for ever": a we are readily reconciled to the brevity of our existence when we know, that, whether we live or die, God's kingdom on earth is steadily advanced'. Several of the listeners seemed desirous to reply, but Humphrey resumed quickly: 'Pray, do not let me lose the thread of my remarks. I have hitherto spoken of the poets and historians ; do we find the matter different when we turn to the philosophers? Did these succeed in attaining by reflection that cheer- fulness which the former were unable to secure by ima- gination and experience? Certainly not; the writings of the philosophers are no less shrouded in gloom and des- pondency. Not astonishing perhaps is the saying of the mystic Empedocles that "the miserable and wretched race of men is wholly made up of struggles and groans" ; b but who would expect similar, nay stronger laments being uttered by that Plato whom our ardent Graecophile, in common with many others, has called the divine, who is uniformly pourtrayed to us as ever dwelling in the ce- lestial and joyous harmonies of the spheres, and who, in conjunction with his master, unjustly condemned and ready to die, is so often asserted not only to have anticipated, but in many points to have surpassed, the doctrines of Christianity? And yet this divine Plato contends, that "he who properly applies himself to philosophy ... is only intent upon the one object of dying and being dead", c that is, he is burning to escape from life's torments'. 'You must indeed allow me', said Canon Mortimer, 'here to interrupt you for a moment. If I remember rightly, Plato, in this passage of Phaedo, meant to express that peculiar idea of "yearning for death" [AsXsrav ano- ^vyvKetv which recalls the Apostle's words, "you are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God", d and to convey 70 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. that the wise man frees himself, by every effort of con- templation, from the disturbing influences of the body, and thus tastes, even while still living on earth, a felicity si- milar to that which his unfettered soul will enjoy in the realms of immortality.* Am I mistaken in this reading of the words?' he added, turning to Hermes. 'I believe,' replied Hermes, 'that they have always been so understood by the profane expositors of the fine dialogue, from Cicero down to our own time." 3 'By all in fact', added Wolfram calmly, 'who do not search the literature of the Greeks as a polemical armoury, but study it for improvement. In assuming an absolute hostility between Christianity and pagan culture, you will neither understand the one nor the other'. "'"Anyone", muttered Attinghausen, glancing at Hum- phrey, "anyone can cite Scripture for his purpose", as the poet says/ c 'Well', continued Humphrey, by no means disconcerted, *I can easily afford to sacrifice a few lines in Plato, as I am able to adduce for my argument a whole work, in which the same philosopher expresses himself with unmistakable clearness I mean the dialogue "Axiochus" or "On death"'. 'It is with extreme regret', said Hermes with a passing expression of irony, 'that I am again compelled to con- tradict. The small book, in its first part, alludes to the instruction given in the Academy and the Lyceum; it cannot, therefore, have been written by Plato, but only after his death, when his successors occupied the Academy, and those of Aristotle the Lyceum.' d 'But certainly', rejoined Humphrey stubbornly, 'the author of the "Axiochus" lived not long after Plato and wrote in his spirit'. 'This must, to a certain extent, be admitted', said Hermes, 'and you are free to draw any legitimate con- clusion from this concession'. 'Well then', continued Humphrey in a tone as if he had achieved a triumph, 'what does Socrates maintain in THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 71 that work? After quoting with approval some of the Ho- meric and Euripidean meanings on human distress,* he contends that man is a soul pent up in a mortal prison during a wearisome journey, not a single portion of which, from the helplessness of infancy to the crippling infirmities of old age, b is exempt from pain and vexation; that a removal from this life is a change from an evil to a blessing which the gods grant early to those they love; and that all alike, writhing under cares and passions, be- wail their condition, whether they follow the slippery and thorny paths of ambition as statesmen and scholars, or earn a precarious livelihood in constant toil and peril; and he finally confesses that he was so strongly impressed by the teaching of the wise Prodicus on these matters, that he had long since "drawn a line through the word life as a thing utterly valueless", and was longing for nothing so fervently as for death'. d *I must at present', observed Hermes with more than his usual decision, 'content myself with simply recording my protest against these remarks and deductions, hoping that a subsequent meeting will afford me an opportunity of stating my reasons'. 'But this is not enough', continued Humphrey, without attempting a rejoinder, and without the least change in his voice and manner; 'the much extolled lessons of Socrates, bearing fruit in many directions, matured two monstrosities opposite in character but equal in hideous noxiousness the sect of the Cynics andofCyrenaics. Who can be so bold as to talk of enjoyment of life, when he recalls the caricature figures of an Antisthenes and his still more uncouth disciple Diogenes? When we represent to ourselves these so-styled philosophers enveloped in a coarse cloak as their only garment, and carrying a stick and wallet to complete their beggar's outfit, and when we see them infesting the streets and market places, demanding alms or food, we fancy ourselves in the desolate forests near one of the Buddhistic vihdras in China or Japan, in 72 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. Ceylon or Java, and not in the presence of the "radiant temples" and "flower- wreathed altars" of holy Athens or Corinth; and instead of admiration, we can only feel dis- gust or a Christian's compassion.' '"Those who live in glass houses etc.'", said Atting- hausen sotto voce. 'As if the Church had not fed more mendicants than all the other creeds together'! 'The wise Sirach enjoins', said Rabbi Gideon with emphasis, "My son, lead not a beggar's life; far better it is to die than to beg"; and he declares justly, "Beg- ging is sweet in the mouth of the shameless'".* 'Properly, therefore', added Humphrey with satis- faction, 'was Antisthenes, on account of that brazen- faced shamelessness, called "a downright dog" 'AnXo- KVUV and his votaries simply Cynics'. b 'But Diogenes', interposed Mondoza, 'was designated "the offspring of Zeus and a heavenly dog"\ c 'I thank our good host for this timely remark', said Subbhuti with ardour. 'The fame of Diogenes has reached us also and has penetrated into those Buddhistic monastries to which our theological friend has referred so contemptuously, and which, I am sure, he can not have visited. We greatly admired Diogenes when we learnt that, living in a tub, he cast away even his cup when he saw a child drink out of the hand, and broke his spoon when he found a boy taking up his lentils with a crust of bread ; d that he asked of the mighty king of Macedon no other favour than "not to shade him from the sun"; and that, begging his simple wants, he devoted himself entirely to his own improve- ment and that of his fellow-men. All this we heard with delight and confessed that he was a worthy disciple of the great Buddha himself. For Gautama, the prince, brought up in luxury and splendour, the heir to a power- ful kingdom, gloried in none of his numerous names so much as in that of "Maha Bhixu" or "the Great Mendi- cant"; of this appellation he was prouder than of the THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 73 titles of Tatliagata, Baglmvat, Bodliisattva, Arhat, Qra- mana, and even Dagabala, which describe his spiritual dignity, his greatness of mind, and sanctity of heart; a and we, his followers, feel honoured when our opponents mean to deride us as Bhixus'. 'More easily indeed can you endure this designation', said Arvada-Kalama pointedly, 'than those more reproach- ful names of Ndstikas and Sunyavadins, which mark you as believers in nothing or in a universal void'. b 'I know well how to appreciate your kind indulgence', rejoined Subbhuti, without showing irritation, 'when I recall to my mind those Brahmans who, with a high-sounding term, call themselves Digambaras, that is, "men clothed with space", but whom the Greeks, when they saw them with amazement on the borders of the Ganges, called yymnosophists, because they rejoice in a nudity shunned even by savages. That simplicity of dress which our Master enjoined and practised, was, however, one only of the twelve rigorous observances which, in their combina- tion, constitute the life of a pious ascetic, and one only of the two hundred and twenty-seven precepts and pro- hibitions of the Pratimoksha or great code of discipline, which qualify him to rise to the highest contemplation. And when we remember how strongly Buddha insisted on almsgiving as a boundless charity to be practised towards all creatures with the utmost self-sacrifice, and how he intended it to lead "to the perfect maturity of our individual being", that is, to the absolute extinction of every impulse of selfishness; we must acknowledge that the prescribed mendicancy of the holy monks is an important means of moral training, and as such it has in reality ever been found efficacious. 7 'Forsooth', exclaimed Humphrey emphatically, 'the champions of Cynicism, by a strange fatality, become its severest arraigners, and the very analogies they cite condemn it. For what is Buddhism but an unwieldy tree rank and poisonous, and ready to be cut down by 74 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. the axe of Christianity, since it "cumbereth the ground" as the most formidable of all superstitions that oppose the spread of the Gospel? The Buddhist's charity is not self-denial, but the most transparent selfishness; it does not inculcate the command "to give", but the prohi- bition "to take", unless the gift be offered as alms; it engenders none of the activities of benevolence; it is as inoperative as the dead faith which the Apostle James rebukes; for the whole character of the Buddhist's prin- ciples is negative; he resembles the modern utilitarian, not in aiming at the greatest possible happiness, but at the removal of all possible inconvenience from himself; and in his scheme "nature becomes a machine, man an organism, morality self-interested, deity a fiction". a Almost the same may be said of his western twin-brother, the Cynic', continued Humphrey quickly, as he saw Subbhuti ready to reply; 'no sophistries will be able to disprove that the Greek Cynics made human existence a frightful parody, outraged decency, and revelled in habits at once preposterous and repulsive. 6 To live in conformity to nature was to them to live like beasts ; the human body, which the Apostle Paul more than once calls "the Temple of the living God", c was to them not merely the dungeon of the soul, but its very grave'. d 'They called it even "a carcase" ', murmured Gideon, 6 'thus surpassing the very Buddhists, who regard it as one large wound or sore, of which the garments are the bandage'/ 'Is "beasts" not rather a strong term to apply to the sect'? said Panini with hesitation. 'Not at all', answered Humphrey dogmatically. 'Diogenes did not blush to advocate the community of women and children, the nullity of marriage, and horribile dictu the eating of human flesh. In such principles and practices he saw nothing either "absurd" or "impious", and he believed that all nations might adopt them with the greatest advantage.^ The Cynics, in clamouring for the suppression THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 75 of the passions, blunted all natural feelings; and in preaching contempt of praise, displayed an unbearable vanity and arrogance. The bitter abuse with which the disciples of the same master assailed each other incessantly, was surely not edifying; but when Diogenes reproached Plato with conceit and interminable ventilation of palpable fallacies, and Plato, on the other hand, raised the counter- accusations of affectation, morbid love of notoriety, and even insincerity ; a or when Socrates, beholding Antis- thenes with the rent in his cloak conspicuously turned outside, taunted him saying, "I see your vanity through the hole of your garment" ; it can be doubtful to nobody on which side was the greater sense and truth. It is well known and he has confessed it himself thatDiogenes, this reputed despiser of temporal possessions, was com- pelled to flee from his native town Sinope as a coiner and a debaser of the public money ; b and how far from insanity was a man who constantly repeated, "I would rather go mad than feel pleasure"'? 'Those Cynics', said Gideon contemptuously, 'held indeed, that "most men are within a finger's breadth of being insane", d and Diogenes was by his contemporaries fitly called "Socrates gone mad"'. e 'It is not surprising', continued Humphrey, who began to feel some uneasiness at seeing himself so often in agreement with Eabbi Gideon, 'that one who insolently mocked, vilified and repelled everything which Providence and nature supply for the comfort and beauty of life, who despised the sciences and all arts as unnecessary and unprofitable/ and was entirely indifferent to politics and the interests of the state, as he boastingly called himself "a citizen of the world" s it is not surprising that such a man should at last lament that he had been overtaken by the tragic curse, since he was "Houseless and citiless, a wretched exile "From his dear native land; a wandering outlaw, "Begging a pittance poor from day to day". h 76 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 'This is your Greece and her beaming gladness; this the happiness bestowed by the gods of your pantheon' ! 'It cannot be denied', said Mondoza with a slight smile, 'that there is much truth in these eloquent charges; but are they quite free from exaggeration ? I fear that, just as Cynicism was a onesided interpretation of the lessons of Socrates, so are those charges a onesided exposition of the system of the Cynics. It appears that Socrates' mind and character were so large and all-embracing that his disciples with the exception of Plato alone were unable to grasp his teaching in its totality, and that therefore some, as Euclid and the rest of the "Megarics", studied only his scientific methods, and some, as the Cynics and Cyrenaics, only his code of ethics. This was of itself a dissolution of that fine harmony which was the master's main characteristic, but it must be admitted that, in addition to this error, Antisthenes and his votaries in many respects sadly confounded nature and human nature* They forgot that none of our instincts can be injurious if controlled by reason, which is the seal of human nature, and blended with those higher principles to which our whole life must obey; nay that all natural impulses, thus ennobled and working in mutual subordi- nation, not only engender a feeling of joyous well-being and completeness, but open and enlarge the mind to a deeper insight into the spirit and organism of the universe. The whole man only can understand the whole creation: if but a single nerve in the wonderful mechanism of the eye be destroyed or inactive, the objects appear perverted in form, colour, and proportions and all beauty has vanished. The very misconceptions of the Cynics, who fancied that by deadening some powers they fortified the rest, prove most strikingly the truth of that principle of Ecclesiastes, which our worthy Buddhist friend seems so indignantly to repudiate, that "God has made everything beautiful in its time, and has also set worldliness in man's heart, without which he cannot understand the work that THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 77 God does, from beginning to end". I think I may hope that his penetration and sincere love of enlightenment begin to bring this idea nearer to his mind, and that he will in theory also adopt those principles which, by aban- doning his monastic life, he has acknowledged in practice'. 'I may confess', said Subbhuti cautiously, 'that our conversations have strongly roused my reflection; yet I cannot arrive at a decision; and I am so far from regard- ing my withdrawal from the holy order as a merit, that, on the contrary, I deeply deplore it as a weakness, which the worldliness of my disposition was unable to overcome. I am, alas! not one of those "brave conquerors", of whom your poet speaks, "That war against their own affections "And the huge army of the world's desires ; " but one who broke the solemn vow I had taken that "To love, to wealth, to pomp I pine and die, "With all these living in philosophy." 'Doubt is the pioneer of truth', rejoined Mondoza, encouragingly; 'and conviction will, I trust, soon follow. But do not, in order to sanction a stunted life, invoke that poet whose gifts were as varied as the universe and whose sympathies as wide as mankind, and who declared -that "Every man with his affects is born, "Not by might master'd but by special grace", and who almost seemed to point to your sect when he wrote: "All delights are vain, but that most vain, "Which with pain purchased doth inherit painV 'Cynicism, I ventured to observe, is disfigured by grave defects; yet extreme carefulness is needed in our final estimate. For who knows to what extent the Cynics owe their evil repute to those eccentric singularities of manner, which, being offences against established customs, are often less readily pardoned than offences against nature? And can we be quite certain that the accounts preserved 78 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. to us by ancient writers are exact or even truthful, since nothing is more easy than to make peculiarities con- temptible and odious by travesty? Who would recognise the real Socrates, such as Xenophon and Plato have drawn him, in the reckless parodies of Aristophanes ? But granting the authenticity of all the scurrilous details handed down to us, we shall yet, if we keep our judgment unbiassed, discover the grandeur of the Socratic mind even in its Cynical mutilation and distortion. Penetrated with the principle that, as the deity needs nothing, those approach nearest to the deity who want least, Socrates had incul- cated the utmost abstinence, temperance and simplicity: the practical development of this principle in its fullest consistency, was the aim of Antisthenes and his successors. They were unable to attain it, as they strove mainly after virtue and not equally after intellectual knowledge, and by this error even imperilled their morals. Yet they were surely neither without a certain happiness, nor without a certain dignity and greatness. They looked upon them- selves by no means as poor, for they argued: "Every- thing belongs to the gods, and wise men are the friends of the gods; but friends have all things in common, therefore everything belongs to the wise"; a and Seneca hence remarked that, if anyone doubted their felicity, he might as well doubt the felicity of the immortal gods b . In self- denial they found a source of constant cheerfulness. "The very contempt of pleasure", they said, "if we only inure ourselves to it, is a hearty pleasure", which those who have once tasted it will not easily renounce. "A life of ease", they were certain, the gods have graciously given to men, who, however, by pining for luxuries, turn that existence into a torture. d But a life of ease was to them above all a life of independence; and fully in the spirit of the sect was the answer given by Diogenes, who, when Plato saw him wash vegetables and said, "If you had paid court to Dionysius, you would not now be washing vege- tables", laughingly exclaimed : "If you had washed vegetables, THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 79 you would never have paid court to Dionysius".* Yet they were neither averse to life nor to such pleasures as came spontaneously in their way. u lt is not living that is a bad thing, hut living badly", said Diogenes, including, of course, moral evil; and when asked whether he would accept delicacies, he replied: "Philosophers eat everything just as the rest of mankind do"'. b "These little things", whispered Attinghausen to Wolfram, "are great to little man" 'and even to great men'. When Antisthenes, dangerously ill', continued Mondoza, 'endured terrible pain, and Diogenes hinted that a sword might release him, he said: "I desire to escape from my suffering, not from my life", to which his Greek biographer adds: "He seemed to bear his disease more calmly for his love of life"'.' 'But Diogenes himself, said Humphrey, 'is, by the most trustworthy account, reported to have died by holding his breath, "wishing", as the same biographer observes, "to get rid of the remaining portion of his life"'. 'True', replied Mondoza, 'but Diogenes had at that time reached the age of ninety. d Moreover, the Cynics found delight and support in the exercise of virtue, which, they contended, is of itself sufficient for happiness, may be taught, can never be lost, and is like "a fortress in our own impregnable thoughts" ; e pleasure they found in useful labour, which, they contended, is sure to make life happy, and even in literary pursuits; for they were by no- means ignorant, as has been assumed, and they produced numerous works especially on ethical subjects/ Their most deplorable misapprehensions were those associated with their professed return to nature ; and yet, even in carrying out this idea, they acquired a merit for which they surely deserve no slight praise ; for they were the first among the ancients who denounced slavery as treason against the dignity of man, because opposed to the ordinances of nature. In this momentous question they were, therefore,, in advance not only of Aristotle who considered that some 80 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. men are born for servitude,* but also of legislators who claimed a higher inspiration and are honoured as the wisest guides of mankind. And when Diogenes himself fell into slavery, he displayed an equanimity, a freedom, and a manly self-respect, which compelled the esteem of an illiterate master and evoked the deep attachment of the children he instructed and trained; he became virtually the ruler of the household, into which, as his employer declared, a good genius seemed to have entered; so that it was no empty boast when he, taken prisoner and exposed for sale, bade the herald enquire, "if any one desired to purchase a master". b And what was the opinion enter- tained of him by those among whom he lived with a publicity perhaps never equalled by any other man? We are told that "he was greatly beloved by the Athenians'^, not merely on account of the wonderful charm of his lectures and conversations and his fascinating gift of persuasion, but because, as an inscription on his brazen statues recorded, "he alone taught men the great art of a contented life and the surest path to glory and a lasting happiness".' 'I cannot resist the tempation', continued Mondoza after a short pause, 'to ask your permission to read to you a translation I have prepared for a special purpose of a few pages from the Discourses of Epictetus, which may perhaps be new to some of our Eastern friends. The wise Epictetus, not unjustly called the second Socrates, draws in that treatise a picture of Diogenes and of Cynicism, which appears to me hardly less than sublime, and as the question how far simplicity of life contributes to its happiness and enjoyment, is closely connected with the chief subject of our discussion, I am inclined to believe that the reading I propose would at this point not be irrelevant'. Mondoza, complying with a general request, brought from his adjoining study a manuscript, and having observed that he would omit a few passages not directly bearing upon the main enquiry, read as follows: THE CYNIC "Epictetus was once asked by an acquaiStSHS^'wn seemed disposed to join the sect of Diogenes, what were the Cynic's qualifications and in what light the doctrine should be viewed. 'Let us consider the question at leisure', he replied. 'But I must at once tell you so much that, whosoever approaches so weighty a matter without God, is hateful in His eyes and only brings upon himself disgrace . . . Therefore, weigh the subject well; it is different from what you may imagine it to be. You think: "I am wearing a coarse cloak now; I shall wear one as a Cynic also; I am sleeping on a hard bed now, I shall lie hard then; I shall, besides, take a little wallet and a staff, and going about to beg I shall begin to abuse everyone I meet; and if I see anybody plucking the hair out of his body, or having his hair neatly dressed, or walking in purple, I shall revile him". If you fancy Cynicism to be something like this, keep away, do not come near, it will never suit you. But if, on the other hand, you represent it to your mind as it really is and do not deem yourself unworthy of it, reflect what a grand thing you undertake. 'First, as regards yourself, you must henceforth appear in none of your actions as you are at present : you must accuse neither Grod nor man ; must entirely banish desire, and con- fine aversion solely to things that lie within our will and choice ; you must be free from anger, resentment, envy and pity; must covet no beauty, no fame, no luxury. For you should remember that, when other people do such things, they conceal them by their walls and houses, by darkness and many similar expedients . . . But instead of all this, the Cynic's only protection is a sense of shame and honour . . . This is his house, his door, his attendant, his darkness. He must never wish to hide any of his actions; if he does, he is lost, he has ceased to be a Cynic, ceased to be a person living under the open sky, a free man ; he has begun to be afraid of something external, begun to need concealment, and he cannot act as he likes ... If he thus lives in fear, how can he have courage to direct other men with all his soul? It is impracticable, impossible. 'Therefore you must, in the first place, purify your mind or ruling faculty, and next your mode of life. Now the mind is my material, as the wood is the material of the carpenter, . . . and the work I have to accomplish is the right use of the perceptions and impressions. But this poor body of mine does not concern me ; its limbs do not concern me. Death? G 82 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. Let it come whenever it pleases, whether death of the whole body or of any part. Flee? But whither? Can anybody banish me from the world? He cannot. For wherever I go, there I find the sun and the moon and the stars, there I find visions and prophecies and intercourse with the gods. a 'However, the true Cynic must not be contented with this preparation, but should remember that he has been sent as a messenger from Zeus to mankind to instruct them with respect to good and evil, and to show that they have gone astray and are seeking the substance of good and evil in paths where it is not, while they take no heed of those paths where it may be found. And he must be a scout in the same manner as Diogenes declared to Philip after the battle of Chaeronea that he was a scout ; b for he must eagerly and carefully espy which things are beneficent to men and which hostile, and having espied them, he must come forward and impart the truth fearlessly, taking care not to mark as hostile that which is not really so, nor in any way to be perturbed or confounded by false imaginations. 'He must, therefore, if occasion arises, be able to ascend the tragic stage and with uplifted voice to say, like Socrates : '"Oh friends, whither are you rushing? what are you beginning? Oh ye miserable men, you are driven up and down like the blind ; you are proceeding on a wrong road, having left the right one; you seek happiness and strength where they are not, nor do you trust others who would direct you. Why do you seek happiness without? In the body? It is not there ... In riches? It is not there. If you disbelieve me, look at Croesus, look at the many wealthy men of our time and consider the dire griefs which fill their lives. In high station? It is not there; for if it were, those who have been twice or three times consuls would necessarily be happy; but they are not ... In royalty? Certainly not; for then Nero and Sardanapalus would be happy; yet not even Agamemnon was happy, although he was nobler than either. '"Oh wretched man, what is it that goes wrong with you? Your money affairs? No. Your body? No. You are rich in gold and copper. What then goes wrong with you? That part of you, whatever it may be, is neglected and corrupted, with which we desire and avoid, strive onward and hold aloof. In what respect is it neglected? It is ignorant of the good for which it was created, ignorant also of the nature of evil, and knows not what is essential to it and what foreign . . . THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 83 '"But how is it possible to live happily without money or raiment, without house or hearth, without slave or home? See, God has sent you a man to prove to you that it is possible. Look at me: I am homeless and houseless, own no property nor slaves, sleep on the ground, have neither wife nor children nor protection, but only earth and heaven, and one rough cloak; yet what do I want? Am I not painless? Am I not fearless? Am I not free? When did ever anyone of you see me fail in anything I desired, or fall into anything I wished to avoid? When did I ever blame God or man? When did I accuse anybody? Did onyone of you ever see me looking distressed or dejected? How do I treat those whom you fear and admire? Do I not meet them like servants? Who, seeing me, does not believe he is seeing his king and master?'" 'This is the Cynic's language, his character, his aim in life. Do you still suppose he is merely distinguished by wallet and staff and begging and indiscriminate jeering at everybody? . . . Therefore, reflect more carefully; know thyself; consult the Deity; do not attempt anything without God; for when He approves of your plan, you may be certain that He either intends you to become great or to receive many blows : for this also is peculiar to the Cynic, that he must be beaten like an ass, and even while he is being beaten love those that beat him, like the father of all, and like their brother. a But you, when beaten, run into the public streets and cry out: '"Oh Emperor, how am I ill- treated in the midst of thy peace! Let us go to the Pro- consul"' ! 'But what concern has the Cynic with the Emperor or the Proconsul or anyone else except Zeus alone, who has sent him on the earth and whom he serves? Does he invoke any other than him? Is he not convinced that, when he suffers anything from men, Zeus is training him? But Hercules, so trained by Eurystheus, did not consider himself unhappy, but ungrudgingly performed his tasks; and should anyone practised and trained by Zeus himself, call out and be angry, if he is worthy to bear the sceptre of Diogenes? . . . Was this Diogenes likely to argue with the god who sent him into the world, complaining that he was not treated as he deserved he who gloried in his trials? . . . 'For why should he argue with Zeus? . . . Well, what did he say about poverty ? what about death or toil ? How did he estimate his own happiness compared to that of the great king of Persia? Indeed he thought the two were not 84 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. comparable at all. For do perturbations and griefs and fears, and unsatisfied desires and the dread of accidents, and envy and jealousies, allow even an approach to happiness? But wherever the principles are depraved, there all these evils are inevitable . . . 'If there existed a community composed only of wise men, the Cynic might marry without detriment . . . But in the condition of things as we find it at present, when we are, as it were, arrayed for battle, the true Cynic should never be drawn away from the ministration of God. He must be able to move about among men, unfettered by the ordinary duties of the world, and unentangled by those relations of life, which he cannot neglect without forfeiting the character of an honourable and good man, and to which he cannot attend without ceasing to be a messenger and scout and herald of the gods . . . When generalship or statesmanship exempts a man from the obligation of matrimony and is held to secure boons sufficient to compensate for childlessness ; should the Cynic's royalty not be worth as much? 'We do not properly feel his greatness, nor represent to ourselves his character in its full dignity . . . For if we did, we should not wonder that he has not wife and children. All are his children the men his sons, the women his daughters ; he goes to all, he cares for all. Or do you think that he rebukes the people from idle recklessness? He does it as a father, as a brother and as the minister of our common father Zeus. a 'If you please, ask me also if the Cynic shall take part in affairs of the state. Do you require a higher kind of public duty than that in which he is engaged? Must he come forward among the Athenians and address them on the revenues and the supplies? he who must speak to all men, to Athenians and Corinthians and Romans alike, not about revenues and supplies, nor about peace and war, but about happiness and unhappiness, about well-being and misery, about servitude and freedom? . . . What more exalted public post can he fill than that which he actually occupies ?... b 'However, not merely by the qualities of his mind must he convince the people that it is possible to be honourable and good without enjoying the possessions they generally prize; but he must prove to them also by the robustness of his body that a simple and plain life in the open air is by no means injurious to health and vigour ... A Cynic who inspires pity, is considered a beggar; all turn away THE CYNIC AKD THE STOIC. 85 from him, all take offence at him. Nor must he appear dirty, lest he repel people ; but his very ruggedness should be clean and attractive. He ought also to have that natural grace and penetration ... by which he is enabled to acquit himself in all emergencies with readiness and propriety . . . 'But above all his mind, the dominant faculty, must be purer than the sun; or else he is no better than an unprincipled gambler who, being himself in the bonds of vice, presumes to correct others . . . "When you see that he has watched and laboured for mankind ; . . . that all his thoughts are such as behove a friend and minister of the gods and a sharer of Jove's dominion; and that he has constantly before his mind these two maxims, "Guide me, Zeus, and thou, Destiny", and "If it so pleases the gods, let it so be done": a why should he not take courage to speak freely to his brothers, his children, in a word, to his kinsmen? 'And finally, the Cynic's patience must be such that he might appear to the multitude as devoid of all feeling and like a stone. Nobody abuses him, nobody strikes him, nobody insults him. He readily delivers up his body to all, to let them use it as they please . . . 'So great, my friend, is the matter you contemplate; there- fore, if you follow my counsel, take God as your guide, and consider well your own qualifications'". 11 'No one, I believe, will deny', said Mondoza, laying aside the manuscript, 'that a grand spirit breathes through these thoughts; and few will fail to discover a striking resemblance to many conceptions of the Old and the New Testament, especially to that type of the Hebrew prophets, or of the suffering Messiah, who, despised and rejected, a man of sorrows, is sent down to enlighten or to redeem mankind, and patiently bears their trespasses, sins, and woes'. c 'This remark may be correct', replied Humphrey, evidently summoning all his courage and confidence, 'but it refutes most conclusively what it is meant to prove. Such principles admit indeed a certain kind of happiness, but whatever truth they contain, Epictetus has undoubtedly borrowed from Christianity. . .' 'Indeed!' cried Hermes with unconcealed irony, 'bor- rowed from . . .' 86 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 'I entreat you, gentlemen', interposed Mondoza, 'to re- frain from an old and intricate dispute rarely carried on with profit, and still more rarely without bitterness; for our purpose it is sufficient to know that the later successors of Diogenes believed his views to have been faithfully expoun- ded by Epictetus and his pupil Arrianus. But it is, perhaps, just to remember that even Cicero quotes Antisthenes' doctrine of one God pervading all nature, in declared op- position to the plurality of gods assumed by the people'.* 'Well', said Humphrey, mortified and reluctantly sub- duing his polemical ardour, 'I contend that such enjoy- ment as may flow from the sonorous and strained senti- ments to which we have been privileged to listen, is not the enjoyment we are accustomed to associate with the cheerfulness of the Greeks, and that, at any rate, it differs toto coelo from that high-wrought picture which, early this evening, has been so enticingly unfolded to us in the description of a time "when sombre reality beamed in the roseate hues of poetry, and grave truth smiled in the dazzling garb of blithe fancy". Instead of pleasure we find austerity, and instead of contentment we meet dismal resignation; yet this austerity involves no depth, and this resignation no strength. Thus the Cynic's life, shrinking from man's most important duties and shorn of all refining graces, is neither a full nor a beautiful life, and is devoid both of true harmony and true joy'! 'How great, in spite of all its defects', began Hermes, 'were the charm and vitality of Cynicism'. . . 'Assuredly', interrupted Berghorn, 'in this age of "restitutions", or as Lessing would say "Ehrenrettungen", when scholars waste their energy and learning in glori- fying a Tiberius or' (he added with knit brows and a raised voice) 'even a Balaam, we cannot be surprised at meeting with enthusiastic champions and uncompromising votaries of a Krates and Hipparchia, a Monimus and Onesicratus, all taking their inspirations from the ex- patriated coiner'. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 87 'How great were the charm and vitality of Cynicism, I was about to observe', continued Hermes, suppressing a smile, 'appears from the fact that it became the parent of Stoicism, which, while following the profound Heraclitus in physics, and Aristotle in logic, avoided in practical life all that was offensive in the adherents of Antisthenes, and enlarged his moral precepts into a system of ethics, the wonderful consistency of which has been a frequent theme of admiration,* and which, I do not hesitate to affirm, was more calculated than that of any other school or sect, whether philosophical or religious, to call forth and to train men in the noblest sense of the word, b men of an immovable strength of character, men who, being the very prototypes of dignity and self-respect, attained an absolute dominion not only over their passions and affections but over the events of life itself, who governed but were not governed, the real "lords of human kind"'. 'Hardly men', protested Rabbi Gideon with a tinge of an- noyance; 'did not Diogenes himself describe the Athenians as women, the Spartans as boys' ? c 'I will not at present', interrupted Humphrey, 'enter into the doctrines of Zeno; but I may ask: were the Stoics happy? Did they, any more than the Cynics, enjoy that cheerfulness which is supposed to be specifically Hellenic? Most pitiful were their declamations about the miseries of human existence, and what was their sole and effectual deliverance and remedy? Suicide! Suicide they legalised and declared heroic, and they resorted to it without any sense of its criminality. They maintained that "the only, or at least the highest, boon for man is death", d which is simply a parting from evils; 6 in fact that life is really death, and ought to be lamented, if laments did not render it still more unbearable/ Yet Cicero, who quotes these sentiments with approval, devoted to the subject a special work with such effect that many readers declared they desired nothing more ardently than to quit the world and its agonies. ff 88 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 'From the writings of that Stoic sage, whose "Christian" piety and enlightenment it is the custom of neologian sceptics triumphantly to extol, from the writings of Seneca, it would be easy to gather a large florilegium of despair. "Our life", he says, "is a perpetual source of tears" ; "to the most happy we can wish nothing better than death"; nay, "whenever you see a wretched creature, you may be sure that it is a man", and so in endless forms and shades, varied and yet tediously monotonous. a Hardly less fruitful in such dreary utterances is that other cheval de bataille of heathen eulogists M. Aurelius, who plainly declared it to be contrary to common sense to suppose that man was created for the least enjoyment ; b but I will only cite very few sentences as I must hasten to an even more conspicuous example. "All human affairs", says the glorious Emperor, "are smoke and nothing", "smoke and ashes and a tale, nay, not even a tale". c "All that belongs to the body is a river, all that belongs to the soul a dream and vapour, life a warfare and a stranger's sojourn, and after-fame oblivion". d "Amidst the darkness and squalor of the world . . . our chief consolation is the prospect of a speedy dissolution", 6 of "the extinction of that soul which is nothing but a mist rising from the blood"/ 'But now, passing over many other Stoic threnodies, I finally proceed to Pliny's portraiture of human suffering, which, in its shocking hideousness, might satisfy even a Schopenhauer and Biichner, or any other fanatic of modern pessimism a veritable slough of despond, black, ghastly, and agonising'. 'But Pliny', observed Hermes calmly, 'was no Stoic ; he did not sympathise with the teaching of Zeno, he did not even understand it'.e 'Well', rejoined Humphrey, quickly collecting himself, 'I shall return to Pliny's dismal wail on a future occasion; for I think, I have sufficiently illustrated the joyousness of your Stoic idols'. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 89 'The lot of the Stoics', said Dr. Mortimer, 'was not cast in happy times. The independence of Greece had succumbed to the ambition and astuteness of the Macedonian tyrant. a The best and ablest minds, no longer finding satisfaction in public life, and shunning it as a chaos of lawless selfishness and mean passions, reluctantly withdrew, for comfort and repose, into the sanctuary of their own thoughts, and thus gathered strength to bear a sad and painful reality. b To them liberty was the divinest attribute of man, and liberty had been forfeited not more through the insidious stratagems of a foreign conqueror, than through the violence of a licentious populace: is it surprising that a veil of gloom was spread over their vision, and that, when their principles were diffused in Italy at a period when Rome, corrupt and demoralised, groaned under the terrors of a military despotism, they borrowed additional shadows from the sternness of the Roman character and the dangers of the time? "To be self-collected, to strive after moral improvement, to bear, to suffer, to die, became the object of life". c A favourite maxim was, "Gold is tried by fire, a brave man by misery ". d There prevailed that revelling in adversity, that keen delight in trials, which is echoed in the beatitudes of our Sermon on the Mount: "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted"; "blessed are they that are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven". 6 Calamities were wel- comed especially as a training to virtue. As Paul declared, "We glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation worketh patience", and James exhorted, "Count it all joy when you fall into divers temptations"; so the Cynic Demetrius considered that man most unfortunate who lived without troubles and disturbing vicissitudes ; and Seneca was con- vinced that God educates good men with severity, since, like a strict father, he applies to them his own high standard/ 'But the retirement of the Greek Stoics from their immediate surroundings was not without consequences both important and beneficent. For it prompted them to 90 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. raise their eyes beyond the narrow limits of their own country, and thus not only to demolish the hateful distinction between Greek and barbarian, but this is their immortal merit to conceive the idea of a universal community, to consider themselves as citizens of the world, and to realise the scheme of a united mankind, governed and guarded by an omnipresent and bountiful deity, the world-pervading primeval Cause, at once supreme Reason and supreme Love. Is it necessary to adduce proofs and examples? They are copiously supplied in recent works attempting to elucidate the analogies of the chief systems of religion, and giving its due meed to paganism without questioning the superior claims of Christianity. a But I may be per- mitted to cite a few additional sentences which have struck me as remarkable. For by a happy chance, I have this morning gathered on this very point some passages of which I intend availing myself in my next Missionary Sermon, and which, as I found them, I at once translated into English'. And taking a note-book from his pocket, he read as follows : "If you have abandoned the offices of a citizen, exercise those of a man. Therefore we do not shut ourselves up within the walls of a single city, but have extended our life to an intercourse with the whole earth, and have declared our country to be the world, being thus enabled to afford to virtue a larger field. Are the tribune and the public Assembly closed to you, look round and behold the lands and nations endlessly spread before your eyes". b "It is wicked to injure our country, therefore also any citizen, for each citizen is a part of the country, and the parts are sacred if the whole claims reverence. Hence it is also wicked to injure any man, for every man is our fellow-citizen in the larger commonwealth. How, if the hands were to injure the feet, or the eyes the hands? As all the members work together because it is in the interest of the whole body that each should be preserved intact, so must men take care of every individual, because all are born for one community". "Why should I specify in detail all that a man should do and should not do, when I can express his whole duty in THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 91 a single formula? All that you see, all that appertains both to matters human and divine, is one. We are members of one great body. Nature has created us as kinsmen, since we are all born from the same substance and for the same work. She has implanted in us mutual love and made us sociable beings". 4 "Let us have in our thoughts two commonwealths the one large and truly common, which embraces both* gods and men, in which we do not look upon this corner or upon that, but measure the boundaries of our state by those of the sun; and the other, that assigned to us by the accident of our birth, and not including all men, but only a small number. Some cherish both the larger and the smaller commonwealth, some only the smaller, some only the larger". b "To the wise we have given a commonwealth worthy of him the world". c "To whatever country I come, I come to my own. No country is a place of exile, but another home". d "Asia, Europe, are only corners of the world, the whole ocean a drop in the universe, . . . the whole present time a point in eternity. All is small, changeful, perishable. Everything proceeds from the common ruling Power, either issuing from it directly or by sequence". 6 "As you are yourself a component part of a social system, so every act of yours should be a component part of it. Therefore, any act which has no reference to the social good either directly or remotely, tears your life asunder, destroys its unity, and is factious, just as in a community a man is factious when he acts for himself, standing apart from the common agreement"/ "A person separatinghimself from one fellow-man through hat- red or aversion, cuts himself off from the whole social system".^ "I say to the Universe, 'I love as thou lovest'". h "Everything harmonises with me, which is in full harmony with thee, Universe. The poet says, 'Dear city of Cecrops'; should you not say, 'Dear city of Zeus'"? 1 "Man has kinship with the whole human family, not a community of blood or race, but of mind". k 'I will omit', continued the Canon, 'the terse aphorisms in which Cicero states these views of the Stoics, 1 and will conclude with a saying attributed to the founder of the sect himself, and noteworthy as recalling one of the most memorable utterances attributed to Christ: 92 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. "The whole organisation tends to this, that we shall no more live separated by towns and communities, each distin- guished by its own statutes, but that we shall consider all men fellow-citizens and kinsmen, and that there shall be one rule and order of life, like that of a single flock guided and feeding by a common law". a 'Is there no grandeur', continued Mortimer, 'in views so large and elevated? Is it possible for anyone to be penetrated with their spirit, and at the same time, as the Stoics did, to deem virtue the highest good and the end of all knowledge, without feeling a constant thrill of joy at any progress achieved even in the most distant country by the obscurest race? It is easy to ridicule the hyper- bolical saying of Chrysippus, "If a single wise man, wherever he may be, only lifts up his finger intelligently, all the good men on the whole earth are thereby bene- fited" ; b yet it implies a wonderful conviction not only of human community, but of the magic power of truth. Every step the Stoic advanced in his wisdom added to his clearness, his confidence, his cheerfulness. No more than the Buddhist, could the Stoic understand the affirma- tion of the Hebrew sage, "In much wisdom is much grief, and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow", because his only object was duty, and his sole enjoyment obedience to its call for the weal of mankind. "Toil" and "wearying labour" were as foreign to him as pain and grief. And even if, in the depth of his sympathy, he should sometimes have been saddened by a bitter experience, is not that sympathy itself the intensest pleasure, the holiest joy? The Apostle Paul speaks of a "godly sorrow" which brings salvation, while "the sorrow of the world worketh death"'. d 'I must positively protest', said Humphrey with ill- restrained vehemence, 'against this perversion of Stoicism. The true Stoic was proud of feeling nothing, proud of an impassiveness equally inaccessible to pleasure and distress, to sympathy and aversion; or in the words of Pope: "In lazy Apathy let Stoics boast "Their virtue fix'd ; 'tis fix'd as in a frost". 6 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 93 'Epictetus contended that it is better for a father to let his children grow up in wickedness than, by chastising them, to imperil his own equanimity.* In losing a child or a wife, we should simply say, it was a mortal being we had loved, and we shall no more be disturbed; or "My son died: what has happened? My son died, nothing else". b The same sage graciously permitted a man to pity a mourner with words and even to sigh and weep with him, but only on condition that he felt no pity in his heart. c Not even in the theatre ought we to evince any inward interest in the action, nor should we speak of the performance afterwards, lest we seem to feel admiration. d Justly, therefore, has the Stoic's tranquillity been called by Lactantius "an arrogant and almost insane principle", since "he fancies he is able to overrule the power and design of nature". 6 When Macduff was informed of the murder of his wife and children, and bidden by Malcolm to "dispute it like a man", he replied, "I shall do so, but I must also feel it as a man". This is nature, at once true and great, as depicted by a Christian poet. f 'And what is the Stoics' liberty, upon which so much stress has been laid? Had they even lived in the most flourishing period of republican Greece, they would have been pitiful bondmen enthralled by the dreary doctrine of a necessity or fate, to which man must blindly bend, and which leaves no room whatever for the exercise of his will. Do such notions admit of elastic buoyancy of mind, of energy and hopefulness'? 'It is strange', observed Hermes, 'how prejudices are bequeathed from generation to generation "like an eternal disease"! There are questions, the discussion of which should be approached with the warning given by Cleanthes especially to the young, "Silence, silence, gently step"!e Is it in itself credible that men like Zeno, Chrysippus, Eratosthenes, or Panaetius, who scrupulously weighed and considered even the least of their actions, regarded themselves and others to be reduced to lifeless automata? Their "necessity" 94 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. was hardly anything else than our "Providence or law of nature" ; and the difficulties they experienced were scarcely greater than ours are when we try to harmonise those notions with the principle of free-will'. 'Good, good', said Movayyid-eddin pensively; 'the very same charge has constantly been brought against Mohammed and the Koran, and with equal injustice; for neither the Prophet nor his revealed Book ever favoured fatalism. He enjoined sincere and pious submission to Allah's dis- pensations ; but who was more wonderfully active ? It was tradition with its usual distortions, which, lowering itself to man's natural indolence, grafted the idea of immovable fatalism on the Islam. Tradition invented that "Preserved Table" or "Book of Divine Councils", regarded as the heavenly prototype of the Koran, which, woven of light and gold, written with an angel's pen before the creation of the world, and guarded by the awful arch-angel Israfil, contains the record of God's unalterable decrees and sets forth whether a man is to be happy or wretched, good or bad, a child of Paradise or of hell. Thus the folly of the Sunna has made men idle and helpless tools. One of our great poets has these lines: "You do not escape your fate ! This belief, listen, shall not discourage but fortify you in trials: you are wise if, in every deed, you rely on God's counsel, yet exert your strength'". 3 - 'I am glad', said Mondoza, 'that you have referred to a very farspread prejudice against your religion. As regards the Stoics, caution seems at least desirable. For Josephus, in speaking of the chief sects of the Jews, employs terms very similar to those used by the Stoics. For with regard to the pious Essenes, he says plainly, "They affirm that fate governs all things and that nothing happens to man but what is in accordance with its decision;" 6 and even in reference to the strict Pharisees, his own sect, he intimates, "They believe that some actions, but not all, are the work of fate, while some are in our own power, being liable to fate, but not caused by fate" c THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 95 which casuistry betrays an embarrassment the historian exhibits elsewhere still more decidedly.* Yet the Jews have ever claimed the privilege of unfettered free-will, and pro- bably with good reason, considering such declarations of the Pentateuch as: "I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life that both thou and thy seed may live"'. b 'Our Eabbins say', observed Gideon with an air of great satisfaction, "Everything is in the hands of God except our fear of God"; c and they relate that, when Job was to be born, the angel of birth enquired of God whether the man about to be called into existence was to be brave or weak, wise or simple, rich or poor, but it is signi- ficant to observe he did not enquire whether he was to be pious or wicked. d Yet this is no more than what God Himself said to Moses, as stated in Deuteronomy, "0 that there were such a heart in them that they would fear Me and keep My commandments . . . that it might be well with them" ; e which implies that piety and happiness are so entirely in man's own power that not even God can compel him to the one in order to secure for him the other. And the same principle is very clearly unfolded by the wise Sirach, who enjoins, "Say not thou, It is through the Lord that I fall away ... He has caused me to err; . He left man in the hand of his own counsel ; . . . He has set fire and water before thee, stretch forth thy hand unto whether thou wilt"'. f 'Yet your wise Sirach', said Attinghausen, who always showed peculiar impatience whenever the Rabbi spoke, 'your Sirach repeats with approval that "the Lord hardened Pharaoh, that he should not know Him"; your chief historian narrates that God incited, or allowed Satan to incite, the great king David to commit a sin which He punished with a fearful plague destroying the innocent; and your most sublime prophet records God's injunction concerning His chosen nation, "Make the heart of this people torpid, and make their ears heavy, and shut their 96 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. eyes, lest . . . they turn from their evil ways and be healed'". a 'Very thoughtfully', said Arvada-Kalama, 'our poet sings : "Brahma may indeed at will "Threaten the flamingo's joys "And his nest of lotus twined: "But deprive him of his gift of "Drawing milk from out the water, "This not even Brahma may." b 'It is unnecessary', resumed Hermes smiling, 'here to enter into the subtle speculations, by which the Stoics strove to solve this problem, one of the obscurest in philosophy and theology; it is sufficient to remark that, in spite of their "Fate", they considered free-will possible, since they referred the predestined decrees only to the concatenation of events, not to human efforts, and only to the general course of the whole, not specially to the actions of in- dividuals; and that at any rate which is the essential con- sideration they held men responsible for their conduct, and hence sanctioned rewards and punishments : the well-known anecdote of Zeno who, when his slave, convicted of theft and chastised, remonstrated saying, "It was fated that I should steal", answered him, "True, but it was also fated that thou shouldest be scourged" this simple anecdote settles the point. c And as they held virtue inseparable from good intention or disposition, they stamped all deeds as emanations of their own will, and could thus justly call virtue "self-chosen". d Seneca declared: "Oh immortal gods, I shall give you willingly whatever you demand; I am compelled in nothing, I suffer nothing against my wish, I do not serve God but give him my assent". 6 Epictetus affirmed: "Nobody is master over another's will, . . . God has placed me by myself, has put my will in obedience to myself alone, and given me rules for its right use"; f nay he boldly maintained: "If God had made that part of himself which he took from himself and gave to us, of such a nature as to be hindered or compelled either by him or by others, he would not then be God, THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 97 nor would lie be taking care of us as he ought"*. And Marcus Aurelius wrote that, in all the changes of life, it was his comfort to know: "I have the power to do nothing displeasing to my God and to the Divine genius within me, for there is none who can force me to trespass against him" ; b a view very closely approaching that expressed by the English poet who described the great First Cause as a Being "Who, binding Nature fast in Fate, "Left free the human will". 'Hence the Stoics neither sanctioned the dark concep- tion of the tragic poets that "God himself puts guilt into man's heart when he desires utterly to destroy a house" ; c nor were they tempted to assume, like the Greek people and the Hebrews, that God visits the iniquities of the fathers upon the children'. d 'The Stoics', said Attinghausen, who evidently found it impossible to remain silent any longer, and fairly rose to his feet, 'were on the right track with regard to human liberty as well as to several momentous problems of physics; but they had neither sufficient courage nor sufficient knowledge to be consistent. Their pantheism and pessimism, their sound materialism, their partial insight into the relation of "force" and "matter" 6 and the indestructibility of both, all this not less than their pro- clamation of an all-governing law irrevocable as Fate, were the first harbingers of the great truths which modern researches into the operations of nature have worked out and placed beyond all doubt ; while with respect to God, it is enough to refer to that fine passage of Seneca declaring how preposterous it is to pray to heaven with uplifted hands, since the God who is able to grant us everything is with us and in us, and raises us above every extraneous Power/ However, the Stoics carried no principle to its full and legitimate conclusions, and have by this half- heartedness caused manifold and serious mischief. For they set the example of monastic ascetism; they assumed in H 98 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. the universe a perfection and fitness entirely imaginary; they suggested to the Christian theologian most of his proofs of the existence of God; a they retained as a damnosa hcereditas from the schools of Socrates the fantastic doctrine of Immortality as far as it was com- patible with their view of a periodical conflagration of the world; and they invented that purgatory fire, which for many millions of men has converted the earth into a veritable hell. b Thus, in physics, they were unable to conquer the old dualism of God and universe; and in ethics, they clung to the no less dangerous dualism of necessity and free-will'. 'However important these points are', said Mondoza more quickly than was his wont, 'I beg you to refrain from the consideration of subjects which would draw us far away from our present discussion. I am indeed, for my part, inclined to think that the Stoics did not feel themselves so unfree in their actions as is often repre- sented, since they defined virtue as strength of will founded on good sense ; but I believe that we should more surely arrive at an agreement, if it were possible to place before our minds a complete picture of the Stoic sage, the indi- vidual traits being carefully gathered from ancient authori- ties, and the whole bearing the stamp of authentic truth- fulness in fact the real eagle, and not some fabulous griffin or visionary dragon. All of us, I am sure, would be pleased and grateful, if our erudite friend Hermes, who lives and breathes in the classics, would undertake the task'. 'It is impossible', replied Hermes, 'to decline an appeal which imposes upon me so agreeable a duty, although I am afraid that my extemporised attempt after the elabo- rate efforts of not a few ancient and modern writers will prove an Ilias post Homerum. Like our amiable host, I well perceive how essential an element in our enquiry such a portrait would be, and I am, therefore, doubly anxious to do it full justice: the subject is ramified rerum tamen ordine ducar. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 99 'Well, the wise man, say the Stoics, finds supreme happiness or "the .chief good" in a life conformable to nature, by which he understands a life in accordance with reason, with virtue, and the laws of the universe, since "men's individual natures are all parts of universal nature" ;* and as he holds that virtue alone, which may be taught, b leads to happiness, so he believes that it is of itself sufficient to secure it; wherefore he deems everything else to be "indifferent", such as noble birth, health, beauty, power, fame, riches, life itself, and above all pleasure; 6 although some Stoic teachers d allowed that for happiness "there is also need of good health and strength and competence." 6 But virtue is by the Stoic sage considered to be a disposition of the mind always consistent and resulting in a life of perfect harmony. This disposition he is bound to seek for its own sake, in purity of heart and intention; and in the same spirit he must practise virtue, not in obedience to the law, or from hope and fear, or any other extrinsic motive in all which cases it is no quality that produces right actions/ In virtue he includes the virtues, of which four are fundamental viz. prudence, manliness, justice, and temperance and the rest subordinate yet indis- pensable, such as magnanimity, self-restraint, endurance, energy, and thoughtfulness ;* although some admit only the one all-comprising virtue of prudence analogous to James 7 and Paul's "royal" or "perfect" law of charity 11 or consider that he who possesses one virtue completely, possesses all, since they are mutually connected. 1 He is "good", which is to him equivalent to being "perfect according to the nature of a rational being" ; for reason is his guide and guardian, and morality his strongest principle of action k . 'Therefore, though he does not disregard logic and physics, he attaches supreme importance to ethics. Comparing philosophy to a fertile field, he looks upon logic as the fence, on physics as the soil or the fruit-tree, and on ethics as the crop ; and in this sense the chief good is to him 100 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. also "knowledge". a His first and holiest law is duty, and he scrupulously fulfils his obligations towards his country, his parents, b relatives and friends ; for the wise man alone is capable of that true and unselfish friendship which holds the friend to be "another self". c He does not live in soli- tude or inactivity, d being by nature "sociable and prac- tical". He takes part in the affairs of the state according to his abilities and opportunities; since he alone is fit to be magistrate, judge, and orator. He marries and carefully educates his children in his own strict principles. 6 Yet he does not consider himself the citizen of a particular country, but of the whole community of men, since all are brothers and must live together as such, being not merely "parts" v but "organic members" of the same divinely formed and >A\H directed system. f He alone is happy, free, good, perfect, \ Mionourable, beautiful, loveable. He is anxious for self- Vj improvement and therefore never wholly immersed in worldly business. He is without vanity, presumption or hypocrisy, modest and contented, equally free from false pride and servile humility. He is upright in heart and mind. He appreciates men's good qualities and overlooks their faults; he cherishes, therefore, neither hatred nor revenge. He s severe in countenance and demeanour, yet affable and kind, and considers urbanity a duty. He is strictly economical, yet no lover of money, which he spends freely for the acquisition of knowledge. He is abstemious and rigidly simple in food and dress ; in this respect he regards Cynicism as "a short cut to virtue" ; but he rejects it in as much as it is indecorous and self-castigating. He is pious and worships the gods by prayer and sacrifice in holiness of heart a true priest and a true king, nay even divine and godlike.^ 'He believes that God is one or a unity, whether He be called Mind, Providence, Fate, Zeus, or by any other name ; h that He is "unbegotten", immortal and imperishable, wise, rational, perfect, omniscient, without human form, the Creator of the Universe, the beneficent Father of all men. 1 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 101 'He wonders at nothing as extraordinary, 3 but is parti- cularly careful to keep himself free from all perturbations of the mind, not only from their four chief forms of pleasure and desire, grief and fear, but also from anger, and passion, displeasure and indignation,^ and'-^though he should constantly practise benevolence 3ven from' pity> However, and this has too frequently" been oveiloofed he is a stranger to perturbations, not, like the bad, from callousness and obtuseness, but from self-control ; d and he admits sensibility so far as it does not impair composure. He is indeed so teaches even Epictetus like all men unavoidably subject to first and sudden emotions or affec- tions of the mind 6 in feeling fright, terror or grief, but his reason at once recovers its balance and, refusing assent to those emotions, soon restores him to complete equanimity/ He does not regard physical pain as an evil ; for there is only one evil that can befall the virtuous, which is his succumbing to vice. He thus lives in perfect "impassi- bility" (apatlma), sustained by reason and nature, enjoying "a fearless liberty".* 'He does not form his opinions lightly, and takes care not to be misled by appearances, whence he is "free from error" and always acts and judges rightly. h He attaches little value to the polish and graces of style and is satisfied with clearness and precision. 1 Yet when elo- quence offers itself spontaneously, he may properly employ it to adorn noble thoughts. k Nor is he in general indifferent to the beautiful, but, like all Socratics assigning to it a very high function, he holds that the beautiful is the only good, which is virtue ; as, on the other hand, everything good is beautiful, since both terms are equivalent. 1 'And lastly, though he regards pleasure as no good but as "an irrational elation of the mind at something which appears to be desirable"," 1 and shuns much or excessive laughter, he loves and courts joy, which, being the opposite of pleasure, is "a rational elation of the mind", and includes delight, mirth and cheerfulness of spirits. He reckons it 102 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. among the three "good conditions of the mind", the other two being caution and volition, and among the few "final boons" in conjunction with courage, prudence and liberty ; and he is ccnripced that such joy is felt especially as a concomitant' of the chief good, or of the practice of virtue.* * ''Tli6se : are : tH-e main features of the picture', concluded Hermes, ~'ancl they suggest, I think, serious doubts as to the right of desponding pessimists to claim the Stoics as their own.' b 'If this is not', said Humphrey, "haughtiness and rebellious presumption, it is simply and purely an ideal'. 'And so is Christ, the Christ of our faith', said Abington, who had followed Hermes with close attention. 'Let no one undervalue ideals, whether those of the philosopher or of the theologian. They are the fullest expression of the eternal attributes in man, the guides of his soul to the Promised Land of light and truth. Man's greatness is in his deeds, his dignity in his aspirations. The goal lies in a bound- less distance, it is enough for mortals to be sure that they are advancing on the Divinely illumined path. But were the Stoics on that path?' he added musingly, and almost to himself. 'The statement with which we have been favoured', resumed Humphrey, 'is a mixtum compositum, the motley ingredients of which, like the herbs for Medea's cauldron, have been collected from all zones and all ages. Glance at the model sage as he is revealed to us in the pages of Seneca: that exemplar has aptly been characterised by a recent writer as "a pompous abstraction at once ambitious and sterile, a sort of moral Phoenix, impossible and repul- sive, a faultless and unpleasant monster, dry and bloodless, yet indulging in practical Epicureanism."' 'I must beg your pardon', said Hermes with a slight shade of sarcasm in his manner, 'my delineation has not been culled from "all zones and ages", but I have been particularly anxious not to introduce any trait unwarranted by the authority of the earliest founders of the sect them- THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 103 selves. And as regards Seneca's description of the "vir bonus", I must confess, I am fairly amazed. That sketch breathes a fervour for virtue, which it seems hardly possible to feel or to express more strongly. The passage is too long for quotation. Seneca begins : "If we were permitted a vision of the good man's soul, what beautiful and holy features should we behold! how grandly and serenely bright" ! He then specifies the sage's qualities, which com- prise nearly every manly excellence; 8 he continues: "If anyone should meet with such a character, more exalted and more majestic than any we are accustomed to see among men, should he not, spell-bound with awe as if he had met a divinity, silently pray that the sight may not be accounted to him sinful" ? h and he concludes: "It will be in our power to recognise such virtue even if it be hidden by bodily infirmity, oppressed by indigence, and assailed by humiliation and ignominy". 6 How much is wanting to complete the figure of a "Servant of God" or "a suffering Messiah"'? 'But the visionary character of the Stoic ideal', said Humphrey, 'is amply proved by the fact that it has never been even distantly approached'. 'This assertion may well be questioned', said Hermes. 'We are told that the Athenians who honoured Zeno with a golden crown and a splendid tomb, declared in a pub- lic decree that these distinctions were accorded to him because "he made his life a pattern to all men in adapting it to the doctrines he had taught". d Seneca expressly declares : "Let it not be said that our wise man is nowhere found ; we do not invent an idle paragon of human per- fection, nor do we conceive the lofty image of a phantom ; but such as we really see him, so we have represented him and shall in future represent him, although within long periods one only may be found" ; he adds that Cato perhaps exceeded even the Stoic model ; e and with rising confidence he encourages men to nourish the expectation of seeing such greatness commonly realised ; for, he says, 104 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. "it is in consonance with the commonwealth of the human race, that there should exist something invincible, that there should be some one against whom fortune is power- less ". a And did not the first Antonines on the imperial throne, who as men and rulers followed no other law than that of reason and nature, almost make this dream a truth? It is only necessary to recall the wonderful character of Antoninus Pius, as depicted by his adop- tive son Marcus Aurelius. b And may not our hope almost grow into a cheering certainty when we remember how constantly this Emperor exhorted himself, in his high position "to remain simple, to be good, pure, earnest, unostentatious, a lover of justice, pious, kind, affectionate, and zealous in all good works; in a word, to become and always to be such as philosophy would wish to make hini"? c Not even the most inveterate opponents of the Stoics, who denounced their tenets, dared to attack the purity of their lives ; nay those who, like Plutarch, tried to ridicule their teaching, bore brilliant witness to their moral elevation ; d though it would, of course, be too much to suppose, that all who assumed the Stoic's cloak were distinguished by the Stoic's virtues ; for everywhere "there are many wandbearers, but few inspired"'. 6 'Well is it said in our great national epic', remarked Arvada-Kalama : "The triple staff, long matted hair, "A squalid garb of skins or bark, "A vow of silence, meagre fare, "All signs the devotee that mark, "And all the round of rites, are vain, "Unless the soul be pure from stain."' f 'But even if all this were so', cried Humphrey with increased eagerness, 'it would prove very little ; for grant- ing that you are right in attributing to the Stoics all the fine qualities you have so adroitly woven into a specious likeness, I must accuse you of a partiality into which a scholar ought not to be misled even by blind enthusiasm; THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 105 for it amounts to a deliberate suppression of an important part of the truth'. Heedless of the murmur of disapprobation with which the last words were received, Humphrey continued firmly : 'I do not hazard statements without being prepared to support them by adequate proofs. I will not dwell upon the many sophistical absurdities propounded by the Stoics, which have often and deservedly been covered with derision, such as, that the "wise man" is the lawful and sovereign possessor of everything; that the foolish are mad; that suffering, misery and bondage do not exist ; that all offences are equal in guilt and all virtues equal in merit, without any differences or intermediate gradations conceits which the so-styled philosophers of the sect have themselves called "paradoxes'". 4 'Let us even here be lenient or at least cautions', inter- posed Abington ; 'the central doctrine of Christianity was "unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness" ; b many of the noblest maxims in the New Testament might sound like "paradoxes" to those who, shrouded in worldly prudence, are blind to all-sacrificing Wisdom ; for "the foolishness of God is wiser than men". c "Willst du, Freund, die erhabensten Holm der Weisheit erfliegen, "TVag' es auf die Gefahr, dass dich die Klugheit verlacht. "Die Kurzsichtige sieht nur das Ufer, das dir zuruckflieht, "Jenes nicht, wo dereinst landet dein muthiger Flug." d 'Like Stoicism, Christianity allows only the one distinction between a godly and an ungodly life; there is nothing between the two". 6 That truth which is drawn from the depth of our inner nature, if measured by the ordinary standard of temporal interest, must appear paradoxcial. Not without justice Chrysippus observed: "On account of the exceeding grandeur and beauty of our doctrines, they appear to many like exaggerated fancies" ; f and Epictetus said to a disciple : "Those who taunt you at first, will afterwards admire you".* This was certainly the case of the 106 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. Christians. For who but the spiritually minded will fathom Christ's injunction, "Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also"? or his affirmation, 'If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say unto this mountain, remove hence . . . and it shall remove' ; or St. Paul's saying, almost in the words of the Stoics, that the believers "though having nothing, yet possess all things"? or the maxim of John, 'Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer', or of James, "Whosoever shall keep the whole Law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all" ? a or even the repeated utterances expressing the absolute inability of the rich to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, at which Christ's very disciples were "excee- dingly amazed"' ? b 'Sophocles' Antigone also', added Hermes, 'valuing the unwritten and eternal law of the~gods more highly than the king's command, declared, when about to meet her death: "If I now appear to thee to do a deed of folly, I am, I think, guilty of folly only in a fool's eye"' c . 'I certainly did not expect', said Humphrey lightly, 'that the Stoic extravagances would find so many warm champions in this company. But this is of little importance to my argument, and I proceed to observe that your Stoic sage, that non-pareil of perfection, repudiated none of those detestable doctrines which he had inherited from the schools of Socrates, neither the community of women surely a hideous blot on your fair picture, admirably screened by the plea that "thus he could love all children equally after the manner of fathers" , cl nor incestuous marriages 6 , nor the eating of human flesh/ nor the super- stitions and abuses of divination, which the Stoics even confirmed and extended'.^ 'May I venture to remark', said Hermes timidly, and avoid- ing Humphrey's sparkling eye, 'that the reason why Zeno and Chrysippus, Athenodorus and Posidonius, vindicated to divination a universal existence was because they believed "that Providence was universal" ; while Panaetius and others THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 107 denied it all foundation ? a And may I be permitted to add', he continued, regaining his confidence, 'that most of the eccentricities with which the Stoics have been charged, were gradually corrected by themselves through the force of common sense and experience? Some plainly admitted that pain was an evil and health a good, that even property was not undesirable, that pleasure might without reproach be enjoyed as "a common boon", though not valued as "an end", b and that all offences and crimes are not equal. With respect to power, fame and the adiaphora in general, Seneca observes, that the wise man, who is worthy of them all, need not shun them, though he must not be anxious for their possession; and he need not abandon them, though he must be able to bear their loss without apang. d The same philosopher avows that the Stoics depart indeed from the prevailing views, but generally return to them by another path. 6 This was admitted by their ancient antagonists, though these blamed it as inconsistency/ Even in reference to the mode of living I beg you to allow me this one remark more , a moderate enjoyment was gradually permitted and recommended. True, Stoics loved to repeat those verses of Euripides which Chrysippus was wont to quote : "Mortals need but two things, the ground corn of Demeter and a draught of water ";& they faithfully maintained this old diet of "water and polenta", which satisfied even the wealthy Seneca, and with which, he said, he would challenge the gods to a contest of bliss ; h and they clung to the traditional habit of "a plank-bed and skin", which the great Stoic Emperor thankfully enjoyed; 1 nay, a few of their very rigorous teachers, such as Epictetus, believed that he only who denies himself even unsought enjoyments, "will govern with the immortals" like "those godlike men" Diogenes and Heraclitus. k But as a rule, they adopted, in these matters also, a judicious middle- course delineated by Seneca with excellent good sense: the Stoic, he says, should in his dress and all his habits carefully avoid everything that might bring his tenets into 108 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. contempt and repel people from adopting them; being directed to live in accordance with nature, he should not neglect his physical wants ; and while practising frugality, he should abstain from self-torture, and keep equally remote from worldliness and austerity'. a 'May I now', said Humphrey impatiently, 'at last be allowed to proceed to my principal point? The Stoic reprehensibly passed beyond the anterior schools in showing indulgence to no one, in considering no punishment too severe for the slightest offence, and holding himself free from any obligation whatever towards the animals "on account of their dissimilarity to men". b He did not con- ceive God simply as he has been described to us but and now I am able to make good my charge of a suppressio veri he believes that "the substance of God is the whole world and the heaven" in such manner that each fraction of the universe is pervaded by "a portion of God", each division bearing a distinct name according to its powers, such as Zeus, Hephaestus, or Poseidon ; while every human soul is a part or fragment of the world, which is one and finite and, of course, endowed with life and reason. 6 He holds, therefore, the most unequivocal pantheism and the crudest materialism, which make "God is the world" identical with "God produced the world". He conceives God both as the primary matter d from which all existing things were formed, and as the primary power that formed them; and he thus arrives at the paradoxical inference that "the universe is neither animate nor inanimate". 6 Yet in order not to leave the slightest doubt, he assigns the rank of "the first god" also to the ether or original fire sensibly infused into all created beings and things ; f nay he sets forth the bare definition: "God is a rational body", or "Intelligence in matter. "" It was therefore, a well-founded taunt that "the Stoic god has neither head nor heart" '. h 'Allow me a single word in self-justification', interrupted Hermes. 'My object was to describe the wise man of THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 109 the Stoics from the ethical aspect, and hence I did not include their views on physics or metaphysics. Pray, continue'. 'The ancient writers of the school', resumed Humphrey, without heeding the explanation, 'furnish, with respect to God, a long series of alternatives, from which they allow us to choose ad libitum. Seneca speaks of "that Framer of the Universe, whoever he was", whether an all-powerful God or incorporeal Reason, whether a divine Breath diffused with equal force through all things great and small or a Spirit hovering over the world extraneously, whether Fate or an immutable chain of closely connected causes.* No less helplessly does Marcus Aurelius waver between a Power that has regulated the world for all times by a single act of creation, and a perpetual pro- duction and annihilation of atoms ; between the anthropo- morphic gods of Greece and Rome, who freely interfere in the course of events, and an invisible Spirit who has no influence over the eternal order of nature; between a God and no God; between a God who concerns himself with the affairs of men, and one to whom these affairs are utterly indifferent; between stern Necessity, benign Providence, and blind Chance. b In a word, a pantheistic monotheism is confusedly mingled with a motley polytheism'. 'But is it not' said Hermes, 'a splendid proof of the Stoic's moral greatness that, in spite of these uncertainties, he never flinched in his allegiance to virtue, and that, even if he should have failed to recognise a ruling Provi- dence, he had in his own "dominant principle" an unerring guide all-sufficient to secure his well-being by fortifying him for his duties'? 'This rationalistic assertion', replied Humphrey, 'which is a mere evasion of my charge, may well be doubted. For what is the Stoic's "dominant principle" ? What is his soul? It is, by his own definition, "a body" divisible into eight parts, which if it be the precious soul of a sage of the Porch, for the souls of the rest of mankind 110 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. are not worth troubling about continues indeed after death, but only, like every other material substance, to perish in the periodical conflagration of the world, a or, according to a later teacher, to return "to its friends and kinsmen, the elements" 6 a noble kinship! Chrysippus thus compendiously expounds the Stoic's theology: "Zeus and the world equal man, while Providence equals the soul; at the universal conflagration Zeus, being alone imperishable, withdraws himself into Providence ; and then both combined continue to exist in the single substance of the ether" c surely, a wonderful system, as luminous as it is sublime, and an exquisite foundation of a sound morality! To complete his aids to self-improvement, the Stoic considers the only criteria of truth and the only means of judgment to be external "perception and sen- sation" ' d 'Not a few, however', remarked Hermes, 'added also "right reason"'. 6 'Thus', concluded Humphrey, 'the magnificent sage descending from his soaring elevation to grovelling materialism, is responsible for the fatal principles of a Hobbes and Locke; he is the true author of the tabula rasa of the human mind ; it is he who first taught virtually that "nothing is in the intellect that was not before in the senses"/ This is your "fragment of the deity": it is certainly not our "Divine image" 7 ! 'Let angry censors beware', said Attinghausen with a great effort at composure, 'lest all these alleged charges be in reality as many eminent praises ; for they strongly recall that famous cosmogony of the Stoics, which almost disputes with Kant and Laplace the palm of originality^, and even that monism or absolute unity of the world, which it is the glory of modern science to have established. How imperfect and elementary, compared to these notions, are those of the Hebrew sage Ecclesiastes ! He may possibly have had a faint glimmer of the uniform and unchangeable order of things, when he said, "I found THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. Ill that whatever God does, that shall he for ever, nothing can be added to it and nothing can be taken from it"; or -perhaps also when he declared that everything has its fixed and appointed season : a but of an intimate interchaining of the parts of the universe, of an inner and inevitable relation of cause and effect, he exhibits not the slightest appreciation'. *I will not at present', said Humphrey, 'argue these wide and somewhat irrelevant subjects; for I must advance to my concluding and most serious impeachment of the Stoics, namely, that they reckoned life among the "in- different" things, and thus not only authorised but encou- raged suicide. "Of all matters necessary to man", they said, "none is easier to him than to kill himself". b It was their particular pride to be true to nature: but nature binds everything that lives to life. If there were any consistency in their system, no occasion for the crime of suicide could possibly arise. For if, as they maintain, there exists a complete harmony between the laws of human life and the laws of the universe, the result would follow that man could never be brought into a condition con- stituting a material antagonism between the course of the world and his own destiny. But such perfect harmony, quite natural under a monotheistic dispensation, can never be realised under the assumption of a pantheistic autonomy of reason, which consistently leads to self- extinction. Yet life is a sacred trust, of which we have not the arbitrary disposal; life is a post, which we must not desert; life is a preparation for eternity, which it is iniquitous to shorten; life is' ... 'Yes, yes', cried Attinghausen impatiently, 'but what would become of liberty, of truth, of patriotism? what would have become of the Christian Church itself without a contempt of life? "A path for liberty"! Der Freiheit eine Gasse! my great countryman Arnold von Winkelried is said to have exclaimed when he threw himself into the dense forest of hostile spears. You believe, that "there 112 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. is no atonement without blood"; and we know that a signal progress was never achieved without self-sacrifice. The Cynics and Stoics were the great examples of the host of martyrs who sealed their convictions with their death'. 'Our ancestors', said Rabbi Gideon with an expression of contempt, 'hardly required such questionable models. That they could die for the truth, they proved in the age of the Maccabees, in the wars with the sanguinary Romans, and ever afterwards during unhappy centuries. The mother of the seven children was not more brave than Rabbi Akiva, or than Rabbi Chanina ben Teradyon, who exclaimed when the flames were closing round him: "My children, I see this holy parchment crumble into ashes, but its Divine words rise uninjured to heaven" '. a 'To offer up our lives', said Humphrey, as if he had not heard the last speaker's remark, c for the highest boons, for the revealed truths and the glory of the Church, is a worship precious in the sight of God and securing the crown of immortality. But to throw away our existence for a caprice or in a fit of frivolous despondency, "to commit suicide out of pure ennui and discontent at a life overflowing with every possible means of indulgence"' . . . b 'The Stoics', interrupted Mondoza, 'certainly did not act thus. They regarded life as worthless when they believed they could, neither in the world nor in solitude, continue it any longer in congruity to their notions of moral dignity, that is, "according to nature" in the sense which they attached to the term; c and they only held themselves justified in resorting to the "rational departure", as they euphemistically called self-destruction,* 1 when they desired to escape from thraldom and ignominy, from the ruthlessness of despotism, from compulsory acts of baseness, yet also from paralysing -infirmity of body or mind. They were wrong. Their action was, in most cases, shortsighted impatience. It was flight, not combat. 6 For there are thousand unexpected ways of rescue from difficulties which despair deems insur- THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 113 mountable. Everyone leaves behind those for whom it is his duty to live, to work, or at least to feel; and even to the weakened frame and intellect a sphere of usefulness is possible, which may be most important for the completion of the great task of life or for the purposes of the whole. 'This conviction began to dawn upon the later Stoics themselves; Seneca exhorted alike to "a fortitude of dying" and "a fortitude of living", to a frame of mind equally averse to a passion for life and a passion for death ; a and Epictetus said that, if disciples consulted him on this point, he would answer: "Wait for God; when he shall give the signal and release you from this service, then depart to him; till then, persevere in the duties he has imposed upon you; . . . remain, do not recklessly withdraw yourselves" ; b and both acknowledged that there is hardly any condition or misfortune, in which a well-balanced mind cannot discover features of brightness or hopefulness, or which might not be made profitable for self-training. d 'Yet, notwithstanding all this, many of the eager Stoics were noble and heroic souls. An ever elevating spectacle will be the life and death of Cato, whose unbending mind alone, as Horace wrote, Caesar who conquered the world, could not conquer; whom Yirgil, the pure-minded, has placed in the pious retreats of Elysium as a lawgiver and a judge ; whose self-destruction even Cicero recognised as the inevitable necessity of a nature of unsurpassed grandeur; and whom the enthusiasm of Lucanus has pictured as one not born for himself but for the whole earth, the common father of nations, the spotless defender of right and justice, virtuous for mankind. 6 When in Rome every depraving vice was sapping the foundations of society and success was worshipped as the supreme deity, it was the Stoics alone who still believed in integrity, the Stoics alone who opposed their lives to unscrupulous violence or criminal ambition. They were convinced that not conquest, not wealth, not even art or refinement makes and preserves 1 14 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. a state powerful, but the citizen's inflexible morality. Their lot could not be otherwise than tragical; for they were preachers in the desert. They vainly believed that they could save the republic when the ancestral manliness and purity had vanished, and when "the question was not whether there should be despotism but who should be the despot". a Yet they did not shrink from the post as- signed to them by the deity that spoke in their hearts ; they boldly asserted it even against the apparent decision of fate or the gods "Victrix causa diis placuit, sed victa Catoni" b than which few grander words have ever been uttered: for the sake of human right and human dignity they calmly suffered derision and death. Their spirit guided the stinging pen of a Tacitus, c a Persius and Juvenal ; d and even Horace, who in his earlier productions taunted some of their paradoxes, has yet, in devoting one of his finest and maturest odes to the description of "the just and steadfast man" who "is neither terrified by the lawless dictates of the populace nor the tyrant's frowning mien nor even by Jove's destructive thunderbolt", 6 unconsciously depicted a Quintus Sextius and a Julius Canus, a Thrasea and a Helvidius, a Musonius Rufus and a Cornutus. "Das Leben ist der Giiter hochstes nicht" life is not the highest of boons this was the watchword of all patriots, all great champions of mankind, and will remain our watchword as long as we are faithful to our nature and our duty'. 'The modern English poet', said Canon Mortimer, 'has well echoed our thoughts: "We must be free or die, who speak the tongue "That Shakespeare spoke, the faith and morals hold "Which Milton held"'. f 'This fills me with great delight', said Subbhuti warmly, 'for it reminds me of a fine saying of Confucius in his Tchong-yong. The true sage, he declares, combines equanimity and heroism, which never forsake him, whether he lives in a land where virtue or the divine Tao reigns, THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 115 or in a land where it is despised; not even there will he bend, but look bravely into the face of death"'*. 'But this subordination of life to yet more precious possessions', continued Mondoza gratified, 'by no means involves indifference to its value. On the contrary, "the readiness" imparts to our mind a secure and intrepid composure, which is at least akin to serenity, if to many it is not one of its choicest forms'. 'Whatever judgment we may pass on the adiapliora', said Gregovius, anxious to complement Mondoza's remarks, 'this notion was fraught with momentous consequence for the Stoic's life and mode of thinking. Our worthy friend Subbhuti has referred to the inconsistencies of Ecclesiastes with respect to the doctrine of retribution to the frequent instances of good men suffering and wicked men flourishing. 1 * In fact, the Preacher finally discarded the whole problem in utter perplexity as unfathomable by human wisdom. To the Stoic that problem did not exist. For all those boons which the Preacher had in view, were to the Stoic no boons, all those ills were to him no ills : he knew only one good virtue, and only one ill moral evil. Of the former, he believed, he could be robbed by no fate; the latter, he was certain, no fate could force upon him. The saying alluded to before, "Whenever you see a wretched being, you may be sure that it is a man", he met with the maxim, "Whenever you see a manly man, you may be sure that he is not wretched". d The gods, he said, have put it entirely into our power not to fall into any real calamity; for how can that which does not make a man worse, make a man's life worse? Universal nature, he argued, can surely not have committed so great a mistake as to suffer good and evil to happen indiscrimi- nately to the upright and the bad; but as life and death, pain and pleasure, riches and poverty, happen equally to the upright and the bad, being intrinsically neither honourable nor base, they are neither boons nor ills. 6 A production like the Book of Job was impossible from the 116 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. Stoic point of view; Stoical is not even the sentence, "The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord;" nor the final result, "The fear of the Lord that is wisdom, and to depart from evil is understanding." And the Book of Ecclesiastes? It would not be difficult to gather from this work a number of maxims which might appear to coincide with the principles of the Stoic. The Preacher recognises also the beauty of a tranquil mind devoted to a life of simplicity and labour. "Better is a handful of quietness" he declares, "than both hands full of toil and empty trouble"; "He that loves silver is not satisfied with silver" ; "The sleep of the labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much". a He insists likewise on purity of thought, cautious- ness of speech, and charity of deeds: "Approaching to listen is better than the offering of sacrifices by fools"; "Be not rash with thy mouth and let not thy heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven, and thou art upon earth, therefore let thy words be few" ; "Cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shalt find it again in many days". b And he also censures heedless laughter, rejects speculation as weariness of the flesh, and counsels practical obedience to God's commands. But is therefore the spirit of the Book, of Ecclesiastes akin to the Discourses of Epictetus or the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius? Even these excellent maxims lose a great part of their value by being scattered, amidst frequent and palpable self- contradictions, in a composition which conveys the spasmodic lamentations of a restless discontent utterly foreign to Stoicism. But even if this better teaching were consistently carried out, would it harmonise with that of Zeno? Reference to one fundamental idea will suffice. As a physician, says the Stoic, "prescribes" for different patients different remedies with the identical object of curing them, so universal nature "prescribes" for men cer- tain afflictions in consonance with the order establisted by Fate, since the whole universe is one harmonious system : THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 117 therefore man must be satisfied with anything that befalls him, first because it was so appointed and interwoven with his destiny through an unbroken series of antecedent causes, and secondly, because it is certain to contribute to the good of the whole.* Is this at all in the spirit of the Bible? 'I should say. certainly not', cried Humphrey emphatically. 'But might not that pious resignation in the will of Providence, as exemplified in the Book of Job, and espe- cially in the two verses you have quoted from it', said Paniniwith some hesitation, 'be made to agree, at least in a certain sense, with the Stoic principles you have enunciated' ? b 'By no means', replied Gregovius ; 'but in order to answer your question fully, I shall have to make a few prelimi- nary remarks on' ... 'Pray', interposed Mondoza, 'let us not to-night enter into a new subject. The evening is far advanced, and our Eastern friends are not accustomed like ourselves in this respect far from following nature in the manner of the Stoics to turn night into day and day into night. You will, however, permit me to add a few words. Our esteemed Canon Mortimer has kindly compared me to a gentle shepherd; I would fain aspire to be at least a vigilant one. Yet my flock seems to-night to have roamed and strayed in various directions, though I trust always to good and wholesome pastures. I would, therefore, re-unite the flock once more and bring it back to the fold that is, I would, before we part, briefly recapitulate the course of our argument, as far as it has gone, lest we lose the Path and miss the Goal. 'In our meeting of yesterday, I proposed, in connection with the Book of Ecclesiastes, to make "the enjoyment of life" the subject of our conversations, and this evening an accidental description and eulogy of Greek art and habits furnished the welcome opportunity for advancing at once to the heart of the question. Our friend Hum- phrey considered that praise not only exaggerated, but 118 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. entirely undeserved, and, with great knowledge and a zeal evidently stimulated by some ulterior object dear to him, he endeavoured to prove that a cheerful view of life is neither discoverable in Homer nor in Hesiod, neither in Theognis nor in Pindar, nor in the works of the three great tragic poets, nor in the pages of Herodotus, and still less in the teaching of those philosophers whom he has so far characterised. Against the earlier portions of his remarks comparatively few objections were entertained, although it appeared to me that our friends Hermes and Wolfram have only postponed, not renounced, a full rejoinder. But a very determined opposition was at once raised against the depreciatory account and estimate of Cynicism and Stoicism; and what is the result of the discus- sion? It seems to be this: both systems are certainly grand in conception and design, but cannot be absolved from a harshness and onesidedness which do not permit a life either full or joyous; for they impart indeed to the character strength, but not elasticity; fortify the moral sense and partially occupy and train the intellect, but leave the feelings and the imagination unsatisfied. 'A commonwealth of Stoics would be glorious and magnificent, but it is impossible. For by placing fame, power, and wealth among the adiaphora, it banishes all those incentives to action, by which, as the experience of many ages has shown and thoughtful Stoics have themselves admitted, men are generally prompted and urged onward. The interests of such a society would be few, and stagna- tion would inevitably terminate in decay. a Chrysippus, in acknowledging that the wise man, when engaged as orator or statesman, must speak and act as if riches, reputation, health and all other temporal objects, were boons and not adiaplioraf virtually acknowledged the impractibility of Stoicism in actual society. Thus again the truth of the Hebrew philosopher's maxim is brought home to us that without "worldliness" man is unable either to measure or to carry out his aims and tasks. THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. 119 'Yet, we should be careful to notice, Stoicism involves three important elements of true happiness. It teaches universal fellowship and equality with an unrestricted consistency upheld by no other sect or creed: it enforces constant self-improvement and untiring exertion for the true welfare of others: and it aims at an equanimity undisturbed by passion and unshaken by events; while it supplies at the same time the means for maintaining this fortitude in assigning absolute sovereignity to reason, reducing earthly boons to their true value, and exalting man's dignity and freedom. These are not only strong foundations but essential ingredients of a serene existence. They realise what Wordsworth describes as "the homely beauty of the good old cause", that is, "plain living and high thinking". 'However, the Cynic and Stoic systems are not co-extensive with Greek culture or philosophy ; and our erudite Hellenists will no doubt take care to prevent in this respect mistakes or injustice. I foresee a struggle, but the minds, as Luther thinks, must "burst against each other" to produce the spark of truth'. Refreshments were again taken, after which most of the guests departed. Abington alone remained to speak with the host, while Hermes engaged in conversation with Humphrey. At first the latter was cold and distant, but Hermes' consummate urbanity soon conquered this reserve, and he was just observing that he agreed with Antisthenes' saying that we ought to be most thankful to our enemies, as they are the first to detect our errors, 4 when they were joined by Mondoza who, strongly commending this sentiment, remarked that he admired it especially in the improved form given to it by his favourite German poet: "Theuer ist mir der Freund, doch auch den Feind kann ich niitzen ; "Zeigt mir der Freund was ich kann, lehrt mich der Feind was ich soll"; b 120 THE CYNIC AND THE STOIC. but that he admired even more the maxim of the Stoics that "good men are friends even when they belong to different countries", and that therefore, though the one had his intellectual home in Greece and the other in Palestine, they would, he was sure, continue to enrich the discussions in Cordova Lodge by their instructive encounters : upon which Humphrey and Hermes separated with a cordial shake of the hand. IY. THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN. THE next evening, many of the guests had already assembled and were admiring the splendid roses which Movayyid-eddin had sent to the host from Yeitch's famous nursery, and which, he said, surpassed in brilliancy of colour and richness of perfume those even of his own native Teheran, the home of some of the finest varieties, when Humphrey entered with a quick step and, instead of taking the empty chair by the side of Hermes, he sat down almost exactly opposite to him in the farthest window. This circumstance, Mondoza surmised, augured little good for the stability of the amicable alliance which he had flattered himself he had secured between his theological and his classical friend; and in order to remove the un- certainty at once, he turned to Humphrey saying: 4 We must indeed at least, not a few of us must beg your forgiveness for having yesterday so often inter- rupted you in your remarks on what you believe to be the current fallacy of ascribing cheerfulness to the ancient Greeks ; may I ask whether you intend continuing the argument, or whether we may now enter upon a general examination of our main subject'? 'I shall briefly continue the argument', replied Humphrey; 'but', he added with decision, 'I hope that, in this cos- mopolitan company, we shall be allowed freedom of dis- cussion. For the contention which I yesterday waived in reference to Cynicism, I now repeat in reference to Stoicism with increased determination and maintain that the later Stoics borrowed their best doctrines from Christianity and then surreptitiously foisted them on the founders of their sect, whose opinions are known to us 122 THE STOIC AND THE CHEISTIAN. only through the questionable medium of those later followers, as the original writings are almost totally lost'. 'But will not this enquiry', remonstrated Mondoza with some anxiety, 'lead us considerably away from our prin- cipal point'? 'Only apparently', replied Humphrey; 'moreover, the importance of the subject would even justify a digression. 1 am supported by the uncontestable authority of the Christian Fathers. Origen and Jerome do not merely point out a general resemblance between the Stoic para- doxes and some striking maxims of Christ, a but the one distinctly informs us that Epictetus was a Christian, the other, in common with St. Augustin, says the same of Seneca, who should be recognised as a Father of the Church and inserted in the "Catalogue of Saints" ; b while Tertullian and Eusebius assure us of the intimate relations enter- tained by Marcus Aurelius with Christian teachers. 6 We are, therefore, justified in regarding the Stoic writers as unscrupulous plagiarists of the New Testament.'* 1 'It is an amazing folly', cried Berghorn, 'to stamp Seneca as a Christian on the ludicrous assumption that the pro- consul Gallic, who tried St. Paul in Achaia and treated him with supreme contempt, sent to his brother Seneca some of the Apostle's writings at a time when the latter had hardly yet written anything; 6 or on the strength of the spurious, though early, fabrication of a fictitious corres- pondence between St. Paul and Seneca, the absurd triviality of which is a shameless libel on the fiery originality of the one and the eloquent persuasiveness of the other. f All that has been discovered in Seneca of Christian dog- mas, such as the Trinity, Confession, or the Paradise of Saints, is simply a proof of the incredible ignorance and obtuseness of purblind though perhaps well-meaning theologians. Seneca utterly ignored the Christians, probably because he knew 7 , and cared to know, nothing about their life or creed, and not, as St. Augustin supposes, because he dared not praise and would not blame them; while THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN. 123 he branded the Jews as "a most iniquitous people" wasting the seventh part of their existence in the culpable idleness of their sabbath.' 4 'We have the testimony of the Talmud', remarked Rabbi Gideon peremptorily, 'that Marcus Aurelius, the friend of Rabbi Judah Hannasi, was a secret Jew. True, there is still some Itttle doubt as to the identity of that "An- toninus" whom our Rabbins so often introduce, since Jewish historians of almost equal authority identify him, severally, with Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Alexander Severus, Caracalla, and Heliogabalus ; b but as Marcus Aurelius in his "Meditations" declares that "all men are children of one Father", and that "all are citizens of the same world- comprising state, and enjoy equal rights", what is clearer than that he is the "Antoninus" of the Talmud, since those maxims are evidently echoes from the Old Testament? Indeed we have almost a right to consider Zeno himself a Hebrew; for was not his native town, Citium in Cyprus, largely populated by Shemites, and did not ancient writers repeatedly call him a "Phoenician"? Not so preposterous, therefore, as has often been asserted, is Philo's view that Zeno derived the chief part of his wisdom from the Books of Moses, and that for this reason he deserves, like Cleanthes, to be called a holy man. More- over, Josephus plainly says that "the sect of the Pharisees greatly resembles that which the Greeks call Stoic" '. d 'Surely', said Arvada-Kalama, 'great and good must those have been whom all races and creeds are proud to call their own'. 'How is it possible', said Hermes, 'to attribute to Epictetus the least sympathy with the Nazarenes, when we remember that he characterised them as "madmen", 6 though his admirable "Manual", adapted and modified, was diligently read by Christians ! f Or how can we consider Marcus Aurelius as a friend of the Christians when we know that he sanctioned more than one sanguinary persecution; that in Rome not a few were cruelly tortured; that almost 124 THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN. under his eyes many, and among them the pious Justin, suffered the death of martyrdom ; a that, so far from being impressed with this heroism, he wrote in his "Meditations", slightingly, that man's readiness to die "must proceed from his judgment and not be mere obstinacy, such as is displayed by the Christians, and it must be carried out rationally and with dignity, not theatrically"'! 5 'The reason is obvious', replied Humphrey. 'The Stoic Emperor, accustomed to regard self-sacrifice merely as cold resignation, was utterly incapable of understanding the fervent enthusiasm with which the Christian martyrs went to death "glorying in the Lord". Moreover, the taunt has of late been fully returned by a celebrated historian, who properly describes Stoic philosophy as u an empty, yet perfidious play with hypocritical phrases", "a terminological chatter" made up of "hollow conceits", and the Stoics themselves as "bigmouthed and unbearable Pharisees", among whom Cato was conspicuous "as a fool of prin- ciples" and "a Don Quixote". 'And certainly', continued Hermes, a smile of irony having passed quickly away, 'no one in our days will found a conclusion on the famous story of the Legio Fiilminatrix said to have been composed entirely of Christians and so called because, in the war against the Quadi, their prayers called down a terrible thunderstorm which scattered the enemy, and copious showers of rain which saved the exhausted Romans ; d in consequence of which phenomenon, the Emperor, it is asserted, wrote a letter to the Senate, attributing his deliverance to the Christians and thenceforth recommending them to clemency and consideration : e a legion of that name existed even under Augustus j f the letter to the Senate has, from Scaliger to our time, been recog- nised as the composition of some ignorant semi-barbarian f and the second awful persecution of the Christians took place three years after the alleged miracle ; h whereas, on the other hand, there can be no doubt as to the authenticity of imperial decrees warning all, under penalty THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN. 125 of banishment, against the introduction of creeds calculated to excite or unsettle people's minds. 3 Marcus Aurelius was, therefore, a no less determined, and a much more dangerous, enemy of the new faith than the Epicurean Celsus, the earliest and strongest type of its literary opponents'. 13 'But do not all these facts plainly prove', said Gideon, 'that the philosophical Emperor inclined towards Judaism'? 'In his time', replied Hermes, 'Christianity was hardly considered as anything else than a sect of Judaism, and both alike were denounced as "pernicious and execrable superstitions", the diffusion and toleration of which, to the detriment of the national religion, was supposed to have incited the angry gods to visit the Empire with grievous perils and disasters.* 1 It was a common charge that the Christians "practised the feasts of Thyestes and the incests of Oedipus" ; current on all lips was the saying, "Rain is wanting, it is the Christians' fault"; when the Tiber overflowed its banks or the Nile did not overflow, when famine or pestilence ravaged, when a solar eclipse or an earthquake spread terror, the multitude, to appease the gods, at once raised the cry, "The Christians to the lions"! 6 'Fain would I, to conciliate our theological friends, admit at least a mutual influence between Christianity and Stoicsm; f but not even this middle course is open to us. In the two centuries before and after the Christian era, Stoicism was in the Roman world the most widespread and the most popular of all speculative schools. The "domestic philosophers", such as from the time of the Scipios were attached to the households of the great, and who, similar to the Christian private chaplains, attended to their masters' spiritual wants as moral guides, confessors, and comforters in misfortune or bereavement, were, as a rule, Stoics, among whom Areus of Alexandria, in the retinue of Augustus, has become noted in history/ And as the Stoics taught in the palaces of the rich, so the kindred Cynics preached to the poor and the idle in the streets, in the market place, in all public thorough- 126 THE STOIC AND THE CHRISTIAN. fares, an ever active band of wandering "messengers" or apostles, reproving the reckless, correcting the profligate, and constantly keeping before the eyes of all the bright and spotless image of virtue. Such a life tempted, of course, the pen of the satirist, and it is difficult to resist the impression that Lucian, in pourtraying Peregrinus Proteus travelling about and enjoining a new code of morals, then imprisoned and issuing cyclical epistles, but always surrounded by an admiring crowd wearing the Cynical cloak, and at last, amidst a terrible earthquake, dying voluntarily for the good of mankind, yet walking and seen on earth even after his death it is difficult, I say, not to recognise in this delineation a travesty of the life, labours and death partly of St. Paul and partly of Christ. a 'Thus an impartial study of history compels the con- viction that Christianity, in its most essential tenets and conclusions, is largely indebted to the system of the Stoics ; and it is so indebted in the doctrine of the logos through Philo and the Alexandrian teachers ; in the ascetic severity, poverty and unworldliness of the Essenes, with their rejection of slavery and their un- Jewish partiality for celibacy ; b and above all in that limitless universalism which embraces within its circle all mankind'. 'But was not this universalism', said Panini fervently, 'proclaimed with unequalled force by the Hebrew prophets, from the earliest down to the latest, and cherished as the most precious of human hopes'? 'This is in a certain sense true', rejoined Hermes, 'but that great principle would unfailingly have been lost, if Judaism, which in the four or five centuries intervening between the last prophet and the origin of Christianity, was steadily narrowed and contracted, had not been fertilised from without. Moreover, I repeat, your remark can only be admitted with great restrictions. The univer- salism of the Hebrews, glorious as it was, never freed itself entirely from a certain national peculiarity and exclusiveness : it was in Jerusalem and the mountain of THE STOIC AND THE CHEISTIAN. 127 the Temple of the Lord that, in the Messianic time, the Gentiles were to join the Hebrews under the sceptre of a king from the favoured race of David ; a whereas Diogenes and Zeno, Epictetus and Antoninus declared the world to be their home, considered that, wherever they found fellow-men, they had found the abode of the deity, and deemed all good and wise men alike fit rulers of the world. b The Hebrew legislators never abrogated slavery, and even in their latest ordinances they sanctioned odious distinctions between Hebrew and Gentile slaves. And when in a subsequent period the doctrine of Immor- tality was developed, it was only by a few isolated and enlightened Rabbins that the idea of an equal par- ticipation of Jew and Gentile in the bliss of a future world was timidly and vaguely entertained'. 4 'But are the Christians less rigorous in this point'? asked Gideon sarcastically, and taking care not to look at the speaker. 'I think I have somewhere read that Gregory, called the Great, once wept and prayed for the soul of Trajan who had afforded protection to the Christians : in the following night, so he relates, he was assured by a Divine vision that the power of his supplications had delivered the good Emperor from hell, but that this favour was only granted on condition that he would never intercede for any other heathen'. 6 'It is neither my wish nor my duty to defend Christian intolerance', replied Hermes firmly; 'only Christians like Zwinglius, Erasmus and others nurtured by the humanising spirit of the classics, admit into their heaven upright pagans like Aristides, Socrates, or Marcus Aurelius; f and I rejoice to think that, under the same beneficent influence, the number of su