Page:The Emperor Marcus Antoninus - His Conversation with Himself.djvu/18

Rh Church, St, Hierom is positive that the Stoicks agree with the Tenets of Christianity in most Points, And that they agree with us in many Things is past all Dispute, as will appear to any Person that will be at the pains to compare the Moral Precepts of the one Perswasion with those of the other. Indeed I think there's no Division of the Pagan Philosophy which reaches up to the Stoicks. To speak modestly, there's no Sect that I know of, that sets a greater value upon Virtue and Religion, drives the Notion higher, discovers more of good Earnest, and Bravery, presses the Practise with more Spirit and Argument, and promotes it with more warmth of Inclination.

To make this Truth more Evident, 'twill not be improper to compare the Philosophy of the Stoicks, with the most considerable pretensions of those of another Way; And here I shall wave the mention of Pythagoras's mystick, or rather magical System, of which there are only some broken Remains come to our Hands: For the Golden Verses which go under Pythagoras's Name, are of the same stamp with Phocylides's Monitory, both of them Forg'd and Counterfeit. And as for the slovenlyness Smut and lewd Practice of the Cynicks, they don't deserve the honour of a Rh