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Rh not to the impulses which urge us on, but rather to the restraints which hold us back, a life conformable, not to the driving principle, but to the controlling principle, of our constitution, is the life of nature. It is a life according to nature, because it is a life which leads to the end for which nature designed us, to that happiness, namely, which springs from a limitation and subjugation of the passions.

35. Such, then, in a very few words, seems to be the leading difference of opinion between the Stoics and Epicureans as to the nature of man, and as to the life which is conformable to that nature. This difference turns on the same principle as that on which their difference of opinion as to man's happiness hinges. The one party regards as essential what the other party regards as accidental, and conversely. Just as the Epicurean holds that the passion and not the limit is the essential element in the constitution of man's happiness, so he holds that the passion and not the limit is the essential element in man's nature, and in the life which is in conformity with that nature; and again, just as the Stoic holds that the limit and not the passion is the essential element in The constitution of man's happiness, so he holds that the limit and not the passion is the essential element in man's nature, and in the life which is conformable thereto.

36. In the next place, the Stoics and the Epicureans differ in their opinions as to virtue, and as