zeno and stoic consistency - j. rist (1977)

7/28/2019 Zeno and Stoic Consistency - J. Rist (1977)

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Zeno and Stoic Consistency

Author(s): J. M. RistSource: Phronesis, Vol. 22, No. 2 (1977), pp. 161-174Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4182012 .

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ZenoandStoicConsistency*J. M. RIST

"r,' reek ethics is eudaimonistic", observed Max Pohlenz at thebeginning of his account of the ethical theories of the Stoa;1and it is certainly true that, as Aristotle said,2 L)?ovta isregularly regarded by the Greeks as the moral good. But the Stoicversion is rather complicated, and although some of the complicationsof their theory of the telosand skoposof the morallife have been sortedout, in particularby Rieth3 and Long4,many problems remain, per-haps less in the work of Diogenes of Babylon and Antipater of Tarsusthan amongthe earliestmembersof the school, indeedin Zenohimself.Part of the difficulty lies in the relation in the thought of Zeno be-tween virtue and happiness, and an investigation of this relationshipmay conveniently begin with a passage which deals not with Zeno inparticular, but with the Stoics in general. According to Stobaeus,5the Stoics were in the habit of saying that the telos is being happy(TO 68nl[ovCZv). To be happy is something with which we are satisfied;we do not use happiness as a means to achieving something else.Such a state consists in (U7&PxELv)iving virtuously, living consistently(o,tLoyouCu;v&s) and living naturally (xavr (p9vv). We are not told whospecifically made these equations, though the impression we are leftwith is that all the Stoics would have accepted them. But the passagethen goes on to say that Zeno defined happiness as a smooth flowof life (cupoLocrLou).Cleanthes, Chrysippus, and the rest accepted thisdefinition,6 but, says Stobaeus, they called happiness the skopos,while identifying the telos with "achieving happiness" (r6 ruqeNv r-iq* A version of this paper was read to the Society for Ancient Greek Philosophyat St. Louis in December 1973. I should like to thank the reader for Phronesisfor his helpful comments.I M. Pohlenz, Die Stoa (Gottingen 1964) 111.2 N.E. 1095 A 18-19.0O. Rieth, "'ber das Telos der Stoiker", Hermes (1934) 13-45.'A. A. Long, "Carneades and the Stoic Telos", Phronesis 12 (1967) 59-90.'Stob., Ecl. rr 77, 16 (=SVF III 16).* Cf. Sextus Empiricus, adv. Math. 11.22 (SVF III 73); 11.30 (SVF I 554).For E5poLxas a time when the daimon in us is in harmony with the "will" ofthe director of the cosmos, see D.L. 7.88. But this cannot be used as evidencefor Zeno himself.

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etu vLot).7 The passage suggests that Cleanthes and Chrysippus(xatx-oL e ?cyowv'q) ut not Zeno, distinguished between the ultimatetarget (skopos) of the moral life, and its immediate good or end(telos). Has this distinctionany philosophical ignificance?Does it giveus any clue as to what kind of moral system the Stoics offer us?There has been considerable nterest in such matters recently.9Perhaps we should begin with Zeno's concept of E5pom.Happinessis a smooth flow. Presumablythe man who is happy is never taken a-back, never has to recast his priorities. He is above all consistent;his intentions and motives can be viewed as forminga coherent whole.According to Stobaeus,10Zeno also defined the end (telos)as livingconsistently, by which he meant living accordingto a single harmoni-ous pattern. The reason he gave was that people who live otherwise,not consistently, but in conflict (pao,v&s) are unhappy (xxxo-

c[iovou'v'cov). It is arguable hat this is not only a deductionbut anem-pirical appeal. For to suggest that those (and only those) in conflictare unhappy entails saying that the unhappy are in conflict and in-consistent. Thus unhappiness is a visible index of the quality (e.g.the degree of harmony) of our "inner"life.11 Such ideas enable theStoics to avoid basingmoralson an unjustifiableshift fromstatementsof fact to statements of value. Everyone wishes to be happy, for God(divine reason) has ordained it so and "generated"us accordingly.Hence if people recognize that it is inconsistency which makes themunhappy, they will strive to avoid it. And for the Stoic an essentialpart of avoiding it is to recognizethe rationality of moral obligations.My behaviour, for example, cannot be both consistent and dishonest.Thereforegiven my desire for happiness, it is rational to feel that Iought not to be dishonest.Virtue regularly appears among the Stoics as either a "consistentdisposition"12r moregenerallyas some kind of conditionof the ruling7Cf. Rieth, op.cit. 24-26.s For an assimilation of skopos as a kind of telos, see Stob., Ecl. II 76, 16ff.(= SVFIII 3).9 Cf. A. A. Long, "The Logical Basis of Stoic Ethics", PAS 1970, 85-104; A.Graeser, "Zirkel oder Deduktion: Zur Begrundung der stoischen Ethik", Kant-Studien 63 (1972) 213-224; "Zur Funktion des Begriffes 'Gut' in der stoischenEthik", Zeitschrift uiir hilosophische Forschung 26 (1972) 417-425.10 Stob., Ecl. If 75, 11 (SVF I 179).11For a similar Stoic attitude to the concept of "good" (as useful) see Graeser,"Zirkel oder Deduktion", 219, n. 17, correcting Long, "The Logical Basis", 98.VID.L. 7.89 (SVF III 39) Cf. Sen., Ep. 31.8 (SVF III 200) consonans sibi.162



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part of the soul (7'y]CuovLx6v).13No one would dispute that the con-sistency in question, whether or not it was always consistency with"nature" n the sense of external nature,'4 s consistencywithin oneself.Plutarch attributes to the Stoics generally an account of virtue bothas a disposition and power produced by reason, and as a consistentand steadfast reason itself,'5 and Cleanthes,in a poem, gives 'o[Looyou-e,vovas one of a list of predicatesof "thegood"- which wouldcertain-ly include the notion of the goodforman.16Let us go back to the passage of Stobaeus with which we began.'7After identifying being happy as the end, Stobaeus tells us that theStoics said that this "consists in" (=r&pXyLv)iving virtuously, livingconsistently, and living naturally. We notice that they did not simplyidentify virtue with happiness. But how are we to understand thisconcept of "consisting in"? Several other texts will help us out.Diogenes Laertius has the same sort of language, only with eIv=L Evinstead of 6&ocpXFtvv:Happiness is in virtue.'8 Accordingto Plutarch,Chrysippusexpressed the relationship somewhat differently, thoughhis formulation need not imply a different doctrine. Vice is the otVaLoM,the "substance"of unhappiness"9 and presumably therefore virtueis the substance of happiness. This does not seem to be a technical useof oi)aLx r to point us to the Stoic doctrine of categories: probablyall that Chrysippus wanted to say is that wherever you get vice,you get unhappiness, and thereforewhereveryou get virtue (- con-sistent behaviour) you get happiness. So when we read that for theStoics virtues complete ('7ro-mXo3crt)appiness,20or that virtues pro-duce happiness (&.MOyevvOaL)21nd compose it (uCvrkpoU6m), sincethey are its parts, we need only conclude that nothing needs to beadded, if virtue is present, for the achievement of happiness. Henceit is virtue and virtuous acts which are the necessary and sufficientconditions for happiness.2213 Sextus Empiricus, adv. Math. 11.22 (SVF III 75).14 Stobaeus suggests that the reference to nature was added by Cleanthes (Ecl.II 76, 3ff. (SVF I 552)).16 Plut., De virt. mor. 441C (SVF I 202).16 Clem. Alex., Prot. 6.72 (SVF I 557).17 Stob., Ecl. II 77, 16 (SVF III 16).18 D.L. 7.89 (SVF IrI 39).19 Plut., SR 1042A (SVF III 55).20D.L. 7.96 (SVF III 107).21 Stob., Ecl. Ir 71, 15 (SVF III 106).22 Stob., Ecl. II 77, 6 (SVF III 113).

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So the Stoics are saying that virtue (consistency) always entailshappiness but that the words "virtue"and "happiness"are not inter-changeable. The doctrine was apparently unclear in antiquity.Lactantius misreads its implications in an interesting passage."He comments rightly that without virtue no one can be happy.He concludes from this, again rightly, that a happy life is the rewardof virtue. He further concludes, wrongly, that it is not the case thatvirtue is to be pursued for its own sake. But the conlcusiondoes notfollow. Happinessis elusive. Althoughit is a rewardand a desideratum,it cannot be achieved if pursued directly. It is virtue that is to bepursued,and forits ownsake.We have glanced at the distinction between an end (telos)and agoal (skopos). Rieth drew attention to the relation between thisdistinction and that between what is oaLpe'ovnd what is otpe'T6v.24We notice that the -T'ovforms of Greekverbs are used by the Stoicsto express the obligation. Stobaeus again spells out the doctrine,which is presumably in a form elaborated by Chrysippus.26Thedistinction is between what is choiceworthy and what ought to bechosen. What ought to be chosen is "everybeneficial action". Obvious-ly happinessis not a beneficialaction; it is activities which are virtueswhich areso to be described.Virtuous behaviour "ought to be chosen".Here again we ale talking about the end (telos).The Stoics are notinterested in saying that we ought to be happy; they are preparedtosay, "We ought (given a desire for happiness) to act consistently."We illuminate the problem still further by noting the distinctionmade by at least some of the Stoics, though not necessarilyZeno him-self, between a 'reXLXOV&yo46vand a 7totl-rtx6v iyoa6v.26Strictly speak-ing the Stoics preferto call only virtue a good (and only vice an evil),but they often accept more normal sorts of language - only main-taining the caveat that they would limit the term "good"to virtuein any contexts where there is a danger of philosophicalmisunder-standings.27A passage where the wider use of "good" appears listssuch things as "joy" and "sensibly walking about" as 'TfXX ayac9'.The point is that they aregood for their own sake. On the other hand afriendor a sensibleman is a "productive"good, that is he is the means2 Lact., Div. Instit. 5.17 (SVF III 47).24 Rieth, op.cit. 25.2"Stob., Ecl. II 78, 7 (SVF III 89).26 Stob., Ecl. II 71, 15 (SVF III 106).27 Plut., SR 1048A (SVF III 137).164



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for goods to be secured. The virtues, in contrast to both of these, areboth "productive"and "final" goods, that is, they are both ends inthemselves and they are productive of something else, e.g. happiness.The passagegoes on to say, as I have alreadyobserved,that the virtuesgenerate happiness since they are its parts. Thus when all the virtuesare present, happiness is present. The converse applies with vice andunhappiness.Diogenes Laertius adds a further sublety.28 He lists "actions inaccordance with virtue" as 'reX&xOnd distinguishes them from virtueitself, which is eXtxOv axi TrOLX6V, as in Stobaeus. We should alsonotice that nowhereis happiness listed as a te?xOwvMyocM6v;his helpsto confirm our view that happiness, though desirablein itself, is not tobe sought directly. Virtue is to be contrasted with this: although it isproductive (7ovYyrLx6v)f happiness, it should not be sought merelyfor the sake of happiness, but also for its own sake. If it is not re-cognizedas intrinsicallygood, it cannot be attained.A recent critic, A. A. Long, seems to think that the Stoics rejected(or at least would not have accepted) Aristotle's view that self-interest is the primaryor only moral motive.29It is not entirely clearwhat is meant in this context by a moralmotive - we need to knowwhether a moralsystem should be defined in terms of its form or itscontent - though if Long means that the Stoics would reject the viewthat one should act well only, or largely, out of self-interest, he iscorrect, but misleadingly so. It is only when a man recognizeswherehis genuine self-interest lies that he is capable of being "moral"and ofrecognizing"moral" acts.The Stoics say that virtue is sufficient for happiness (oavtpx'q 7rp6qv8oc;Luov(cv).? But it is not happiness we immediately strive for; it is avirtuous, that is, a consistent life. A conscious striving for happinesscould be ineffective for two related reasons: it might inhibit theperformanceof those virtuous acts which are the only road to happi-ness, and it might be productive if a kind of behaviour which is inconflict with the development of our natural impulses. Originallythese impulses are, as every student of Stoicism knows, associatedwith our recognition of what is "firstsuited" (ohKceov)to every animal,

I' Cf. D.L. 7.96 (SVF III 107).'9 Long, "Logical Basis", 96.$3 D.L. 7.127 (SVF III 49).

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namely its own nature.31As has recently been pointed out,32 he term"first" probably refers to temporal rather than logical priority.Now we find differentthings "suited"as we grow; our "first" mpulses,however, are directed towards the preservation of the state we arein when we first acquire any kind of awareness of the exteinal world,that is, at birth.33Presumably at this moment we are in some sort of"right" condition. Obviously in the strict Stoic sense we are neithervirtuous nor happy. We are for the first time, however,presentedwitha hostile environment andwe react accordingly,34atisfying so far as wemay our instinct for self-preservation.Although as we grow our rangeof oikeiosisexpands, and indeed, if we become wise, a desire for self-preservation will cease to be of overwhelmingimportance- the wiseman may choose o sacrifice his own life - yet presumably the Stoicswould have held that no "developed"mpulses (i.e. impulsesnot presentat birth, but developed as we grow towards maturity, physical andmoral)should be given priority over earlierones without good reason.Clearly in such a view of man the notion of consistent behaviour ismaintained.A manshouldnot abandonhis life lightly, supportedasit isby the instinct forself-preservation.But new sound impulses and reactionsare built on old, and we haveto learn to adapt the old to the new. Presumably in an ideal worldsuch adaptation would be simple and we should all develop into sages.Yet in fact from the very beginning there is the new factor of theexternal world. Corrupting influences from beyond the self impingeon our own individual nature, which ceteris paribus would developvia the "rationalizing"of the impulses to virtue and via the virtuesto happiness. Before trying to understand,therefore,how the externalworld with its moral temptations can be reconciled with our ownworld, with the world governed by the instinct of self-preservationwhich we are given at birth, we have to determinethe form in which31 I still prefer cuvet8ncrta in this passage (D.L. 7.85 = SVF III 82) despitethe comments of H.S. Long A.J.P. 92 (1971) 749. Long seems to me to missthe point that the harder cruvet8acs is too easily emended into auvMta t5. Thesense does not require the change.32 G. B. Kerferd, "The Search for Personal Identity "Bulletin o/ theJohn RylandsUniversity Library of Manchester 55 (1972) 190-191 Cf. D.L. 7.85 (SVF III 178)and other references supplied by Kerferd.33 Hierocles, Ethische Elementarlehre (P. Berlin 1780), ed. H. von Arnim,Berliner Klassikertexte 4 (Berlin 1906) Col. 6.23-24." See S. G. Pembroke, "OIKEIOSIS", in Problems in Stoicism (Ed. A. A. Long,London 1971) 146, n. 89 (with Philo, de opil. mundi. 161 (1, 56, 7ff. Cohn)).166



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these external dangers confront us. And the first form in which thisoccurs is the formof pleasure and pain. DiogenesLaertius has a passagein whichthe situation of the new-bornhumanbeingis well summarized.Nature, he says, gives nonperverted points of departure (a'coptocL).35The rational animal is pervertedeither by the persuasivenessof exter-nal pursuits or by the communicationsof his companions.The imageof perversion is notable. The Stoics seem to have comparedbringingthe soul from vice to virtue to straightening a bent stick.86Thus if aman lived aright frombirth, he would start off right, as we all do, andmaintain a consistent and straight path of virtue. He would thereforereact to external stimuli in a consistent and coherent way. How doesthis work out in practice?When Chrysippus and it presumably is Chrysippus n the passageof Diogenes Laertius - says that we do not start perverted, he mustmean that it is somehowright or sound for us to develop fromour firstoikeiosis, and to act in accordancewith our instinct for self-preserva-tion. In what sense is this right, unperverted, sound, or whatever?Nature gives us these starting points, we read, and this cannotreferto our own human nature, for it is a set of circumstancesgranted by"nature"whereby we are enabled to have a chance of survival in theworld. Thus, at any rate for Chrysippus,our human first beginningsare in accordance with some sort of plan or design of nature - of the"designing fire" (MtUprxvLx6v). So when we are newborn, it must beassumed that our behaviour patterns are in accordancewith the law-like operations of nature as a whole, and are consistent with them.Now when we develop, if we are to be virtuous and consistent, ourac-tions must flow smoothly fromourunpervertedfirstbeginnings- whichmeans that our actions will themselves have to be consistent withthe nature which gave us these first beginnings. So we can see whyCleanthes and Chrysippusargued that the telos - formula should bethat we must live consistently with Nature, not merely that our livesshouldbe internallyconsistent.

IIDiogenes Laertius not only tells us that Zeno referred to "livingconsistently with nature"but he gives us the source of this information,"5 D.L. 7.89 (SVF III 228).36 Cf. SVF III 489.

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a book entitled On The Nature of Man.37 Cicero,for what it is worth,agrees with this.38On the other hand Stobaeus gives what seems to be afairly circumstantial but different view.39 According to him Zenohad originally only spoken of internal consistency, but later thinkers,believing that "consistent"was an incomplete term and that we shouldbe told with what we should be consistent, added that we should beconsistent with nature. Cleanthesis specifically named as the first tohave taken this step.There has been a tendency to dismiss the reference to nature inZeno, on the grounds that Diogenes is merely transferring a schoolcommonplace to the founder. But the reference to the book On TheNature of Man makes it clear that Diogenes, or his source, had aspecific text in mind. On the other hand the statement of Stobaeusthat Cleanthes found the term "consistent" in some way incompletehas also to be taken seriously. The only solution which does justiceto both sourcesis that Zeno spoke both of consistency with nature andof consistency with self, while Cleanthes thought that the second ofthese formulations was unnecessary, or imprecise, or misleading.Diogenes gives us the further information that Cleanthes thoughtthat the nature in accordancewith which we should ive must be under-stood only as "universalnature"(xotvycpaL).4Oand this can be under-stood as implying that our first impulses to selfpreservation, thosestarting points on the road to virtue and happiness, are a gift of apower i.e. Nature, which subsumes and indeed engendersthe specifi-cally humansphere.Let us try to develop this theory of the roles of Zeno and Cleanthes.Why may Zeno have spoken now of living consistently with Nature,now simply of living consistently? Such accounts of the end, thoughnot mutually exclusive, could well be given as answers to differentkinds of philosophical questions. Talk about an internally consistentlife could arise as a result of an ethical question; "consistency withNature" should involve us with the grounds of ethics. Looking atthis in another way, we might say that any questions about the endto which the answer "self-consistency"could be meaningfully givenentail a further question about the kind of consistency required- towhich the answer "consistency with Nature" might be given. We37D.L. 7.87 (SVF I 179).38Cic., De Fin. 4.14.39 Stob., Ecl. II 134, 75ff.40 D.L. 7.89 (SVF I 555).168



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start off with the assumption that happinessis in some sense the goal.We are faced with trying to determinehow such a goal may become areality. What would be the natural way of looking at such a problem?In the first instance everyone would tend to look at it as a strictlyethical problem.And anyone thinking philosophicallyat the time whenZeno was first active would presumablylook first to the kind of ethicalanswers available. According to Diogenes Laertius, whose testimonythere is no reason to reject on such a point, Zeno was in some sense apupil of the Cynic Crates.4'And there is abundant avidence, particu-larly in his Republic, that the Cynic influence on his early thoughtwas deep and persistent.42Zeno, of course, later brokewith the Cynicson a numberof issues, and one of the most important of these was hisinsistence that it is necessary for the wise man to know something ofphysics and logic as well as of ethics."3In his early days, Zeno wascertainly writing with a more strongly Cynic flavour than he laterthought desirable; his Republic is said by Diogenes to have beenwritten when he was still a pupil of Crates." So at a time when hehas no use for physics we can well imagine Zeno defining the end as"living consistently" (that is, with no reference to nature - where areferenceto nature would imply some kind of knowledge by the wiseman of the laws of physics or of "naturalphilosophy").Of course theCynics themselves frequently talk of nature, but the context is theold Sophistic antithesis between nature and convention.45and has nosignificant connection with the use of the term by the Stoics to referto natural philosophy. Thus for Zeno, when still largely in a Cyniccontext and thinking of ethics as the only necessary realm of thoughtfor the wise man, to define the end as living in accordancewith naturewould be to point not to the factor of consistency with a more thanmoral Power in the universe, but to "living naturally" rather than"living conventionally". (Of course, it might well be the case that theconsistent (Stoic) life would be unconventional, but in talking ofconsistency that is not the principalpoint a Stoic wouldwant to make.)Zeno's point in defining the end as a consistent life and in sayingthat a consistent life is a virtuous life and leads to happiness would41D.L. 7. 2-3 (SVF I 1).4'2Cf. H. C. Baldry, "Zeno's rdeal State", JHS 79 (1959) 3-15; J. M. Rist,Stoic Philosophy (Cambridge 1969) 64-67.43 RiSt., op.cit. 71-76." D.L. 7.4 (S VF 1 2)."6 D.L. 7.38; 7.71.

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be made within a purely ethical frame. It is the assumption of thoseworking inside such a frame that happiness is the goal and that thecontent of virtue can be understood by right reason. Right reason,of course, must be consistent, for inconsistent reasoning can hardly be"right". It is the assumptionof such a search for consistency that theoriginal impulses of each man are sound and intelligible n themselves,and therefore that consistency with them in later thought and actionwill be sufficient for virtue. Thereis probably an echo of this attitude- together with its built-in ambiguities - in the remark of Cleanthesthat all men have the starting points for virtue given by nature,46though he is using "nature"here in a way which (Stoically) does notmake an obvious referenceto the antithesis with convention.It was, of course, the very issue of whether the ethical end could bedetermined by "ethical" reflection alone that seems to have beenone of the causes of the antagonism to Zeno developed by his formerpupil Aristo.47But Zeno had clearly seen further than the Cynics.Let us assume that he did define virtue, at some stage, as Diogenessays, as a consistent or harmonious life. The obvious question is,Consistentwith what? In other words, is the predicate reallyelliptical,as Cleanthes seems to have thought. There seems no reason to doubtthat Zeno's answer to this must have been "consistentwith the naturalbehaviour to which our first impulses guide us". And this would puthim right into a contemporary debate about what natural impulsesare. In fact the best interpretationof why Zeno took up the study of"nature",of "naturalphilosophy" n the traditionalpre-Socraticsense,would seem to be that he wished to find content for the formulathatvirtue is a consistent life. For one might admit that formula to beacceptable while disagreeingwith Zeno about the nature of the con-sistency, if one took (for example) an Epicurean view of one's firstnatural impulses. In other words I should like to argue that Zenowas probably drawn to find an extra-ethical justificationfor his brandof ethics by those who could have accepted the importanceof a con-sistent life. Such opponents might even have included Epicurus.Epicurus could easily agreewith the Cynicsin distinguishingnaturefrom convention, while still proposinga different account of "natural"behaviour. According to him pleasure is the first good we recognizewhen we are newly born: it is the beginningandend of the happy life.48"19Stob.,Ecl. II 65, 7 (SVF I 566).'1 SVF 1 351 & 353; J.Moreau, "Ariston et le Stoicisme", REA 50 (1948) 43.I' Ep. ad Men. 128-129.170



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Now it is generally agreed, and I would not want to dispute the view,that the majority of the evidence that refers to direct conflict betweenStoics and Epicureans dates from a period later than the times ofZeno and Epicurus, but although these two may not have engaged indirect conflict, they certainly may have been dealing with the sameissues - and coming up with conflicting answers. If one of the issueswas, What is the nature of the first natural impulse?, the answer tosuch a question would obviously predetermine the kind of consistentlife a philosopher would come to advocate for adult human beings.And we have already observed that the question of the nature ofnaturalthings is raisedby implicationby the Cynics.We know from a number of sources that Zeno was some kind ofpupil of the Academic Polemo,49 but Cicero provides us with theinvaluable evidence that Zeno accepted Polemo's account of the"first-principlesof nature".50This can only mean that it was Polemowho taught that the first natural instinct is to self-preservation, hetheory which provided a basis for the Stoic account of oikeiosis, andwhich gave Zeno his opportunity to break with the Cynic view ofnature. Perhaps Polemo was not the only personwho held this theory- perhaps even Cicero's account is mistaken - but what really mattersis that somewhere or other Zeno came across an account of naturewhich enabled him to develop his own particularversion of the con-sistent life. For, as I have already indicated, to talk of consistencyalone is to approachethics in the way of a formalist: and no ancienttheorist is a formalist. But when looking for a content for nature,Zeno desperately needed a context. The Cynics failed him almostcompletely here. Whatever they may have intended, we have ampleevidence that for the Cynics the term "nature"is largely devoid ofpositive force. Natural behaviour seems consistently to be regardedas behaviour freed from conventional restraints. There are no specificand immediate goals in the Cynic freedom, the Cynic life according onature; if a Cynic ethic had ever managed to exhibit consistency,it could only have been a consistent freedomfrom the constraints ofsociety. There is no evidence that the Cynics added up their variousfreedoms romto amountto any kind of freedomto.We have ample evidence that Zeno broke with the Cynic road of"morality alone"; his talk of "appropriate hings" (xoc4axov'rcx)51oins4 D.L. 7.1 (SVF I 1); Strabo 13 p. 614 (SVF I 10).60 Cic., De Fin. 4.45 (SVF I 198).61 D.L. 7.2 (SVF I 1).

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with his uncynic approach to "natural impulses" to point to whatAristo abhorred:the wise man's study of physics. Physics not merelyenabledZenoto argueformallythat consistencyis necessaryfor virtue,and will bring happiness, but to show the nature of that consistency.In our terminology Zeno invoked extra-ethical factors to justify anapproach to ethics, though, to avoid anachronism,we have to addthat he was not conscious that this was what he was doing. In otherwords Zeno did not ask, How can I give point to the pursuit of con-sistency as an ethical end by the use of criteria not drawn from myown ethical system? Rather he seems to have asked,What is the natureof the first impulse with which my later life must be in harmony?This question is a non-ethical one in that it is value-free. It is simplya matter of finding the means to describewhat naturehas managedtogive us.The conclusion of all this must be that if Zeno did not speak pre-cisely both of "living consistently" and "living consistently withnature", he must have described his ethical end in two differentways to which these different phrases could be properly applied -and therefore that since Diogenes Laertius attributes the secondphrase to him there is no good reasonto reject it.The only other question which should be treated briefly here iswhat it might mean for us to develop, to passfrom infancyto manhood,while still living consistently with our first natural impulses. It isclear that from the time of Chrysippusthe Stoics were in the habit oftalking about different oikeioseis; from the oikeiosis to oneself atbirth, there develop oikeioseiswith different conditions in later life.As Kerferd puts it, "an organism seeks to preserve the constitutionin which it is at the moment".52But our oikeiosis not only reconcilesus with ourselves; it helps to associate each man with his fellows.According to Hierocles, there is an oikeiosis with one's relations";and there is no doubt that later Stoics extended oikeiosisto the humanrace in general.54 Furthermore, as Porphyry puts it, "the followers ofZeno make oikeiosis the beginning of justice"55;and this statement6a G. B. Kerferd, "The Search for Personal Identity", Bulletin of the John RylandsUniversity Library of Manchester 55 (1972) 191; cf. Sen., Ep. 121, 15-16.'3 Hierocles, P. Berlin 1780 (ed. von Arnim, Berliner Klassikertexte 4 (Berlin1906)), Col. 9. 3-4; Cf. Anon. Comm. on Theaet. (P. 9782), Berliner Klassikertexte2, ed. Diels and Schubart (Berlin 1905) Cols. 7.28; 8.5-6.64 Cic., De Fin. 3.63 (SVF III 340).6 Porphyry, De Abst. 3.19 (SVF I 197).172



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is confirmedby Plutarch who remarksmorepreciselythat the parentalinstinct is "incomplete and not adequate"'as a basis for justice.66Apparently Chrysippus expressly treated of the matter in his bookOn Justice.7We may take it as certain that justice was derived from oikeiosisin the Stoa at least from the time of Chrysippus.To translate the firstimpulse to self-preservation into a deliberate intention to promotejustice, of course, requires the use of the will and reason. The Stoicsspoke of the intervention of logos as a craftsman.-8The first oikeiosisis transformedby reason into an oikeiosishairetike.9

Porphyry says that the "followersof Zeno" regard oikeiosis as thebeginning of justice. Certainly Chrysippus seems to have done so,but the "followersof Zeno" could be a general term for Stoics andneed not imply any real knowledge of whether Zeno himself thoughtalong these lines. If the doctrine of oikeiosis grew up in the way wehave suggested, in association with Zeno's liberation from the Cynicsand indebtedness to Polemo, it would not originallyhave needed suchwide ramifications. A feeling of endearment to oneself at differentstages of one's life, and for one's family and friends might be ade-quate - and even morethan adequate - for Zeno'spurposeof providingthe individualwith a widerframeof referenceand of associating humannature with Nature. Of course, as a man grows, his needs will change.Hence his consistent life must be determined in the light of the factthat men are not static beings, and that reason should more andmore come to characterize them. However it is not the same to saythat oikeiosis will be extended beyond the self and its immediatesurroundings, and that oikeiosis, as it widens rationally, will entailany kind of affection, let alone sense of justice, towards the wholehuman race. The Cynics think constantly of freeingoneself from con-ventional ties and the bond of society; the doctrine of oikeiosis is anattempt to understand the empirically observable instincts for self-preservation and the love for one's parents, and to use them tosupport the theory of natural bonds as distinct from bonds of conven-tion. The question is how far did Zeno himselfextend the ramificationsof oikeiosis. And this entails the further question, With whom does6" Plut., De Amore Prolis 495 B (Cf. Sull. An. 962A). Cf.S. G. Pembroke, in Problems in Stoicism (ed. A. A. Long, London 1971)."7 Plut., SR 1038B (SVF II 724).I' D.L. 7.86 (SVF III 43).69 Kerferd, op.cit. 191; Hierocles, Col. 9.5-8; Anon. Comm. Col. 7.40.

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the wise man feel akin? In his Cynic days, in the days of his Republic,Zeno would probably have said "Only with the wise".60But he wasbreaking with the Cynics and might have extended this. There isno answer in the sources. We simply do not know Zeno's attitudeabout the origin of a sense of justice towards those who are not tobe counted among the wise. However, although Zeno's doctrineof oikeiosis may have been narrower than Chrysippus'(and possiblyexpansion took place even after Chrysippus),oikeiosisis necessary orZeno, and it cannot thereforebe only a doctrinein embryoin the foun-der of Stoicism.6"The really fundamental principles of Stoicism can-not be stated without recourse o it.Any Cynic could advocate a consistent life, for the description ispurely formal. But one consistent life might be set against another,and Zeno's appeal to natural consistency prevents this, as well asshowing exactly why virtue pays. The question could, of course, havebeen tackled in another way: Is there in fact more than one kind ofconsistent ife?Universityof Toronto

6' See 0. Murray, Review of Baldry, Unity of Mankind, C.R. 80 (1966) 369.61Rightly Kerferd, op.cit. 178, and S. G. Pembroke, op.cit. 114-115 againstBrink, "Otxecwat5and O[XEx6'rjq:heophrastus and Zeno on Nature and MoralTheory", Phronesis 1 (1956) 141ff. Brink rightly emphasizes the role of Polemo(against Pohlenz), but neglects the problem of Cynicism.174

zeno and stoic consistency - j. rist (1977)

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