Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 18.djvu/684

* STOICS. 588 STOKES. from Citium in Cyprus, who opened his school in a portico called the Stoa Pceeile ('painted porch') at Athens, whence the origin of the name of the sect. Zeno had for his disciple Cleanthes, from Assus, in the Troad (died c. 220 B.C. ), wliose Hymn to Zeus is the only fragment of any length that has come down to us from the early Stoics, and is a remarkable production, setting forth the unity of God, His omnipotence, and His moral government. Chrysippus, from Soli in Cilicia (c. 280-207 B.C.), followed Cleanthes, and, in his voluminous writings, both defended and modified the Stoical creed. He was regarded as a second founder of the school, and it was a saying in antiquity that without Chrysippus there had been no Stoa. Chrysippus was suc- ceeded by Zeno of Tarsus and Diogenes of Baby- lon ; then followed Antipater of Tarsus, who taught Panaetius of Rhodes (died B.C. 112). Panietius introduced Stoicism to Rome, and also made such modification in the sj'stem that it is customary to regard Stoicism as entering with him upon a second period, characterized by a "nearer approach to the Peripatetic and Pla- tonic teaching" (Windelband). Among the most prominent Stoics of this period are to be men- tioned Boethius of Sidon and Posidonius of Apa- mea in Syria. The third period of Stoicism is the Roman period, represented by L. Annoeus Cornutus, L. Annaeus Seneca, Epictetus, and the Emperor Marcus Aurclius Antoninus. Stoicism was mainly an ethical theorj-, but it had a logic and a physics as well. Under logic it included both dialectic and rhetoric. Dialectic was predominantly a theory of knowledge. The main question here was: How can we test truth ? In answer to this question the Stoics worked out a sensationalistic epistemology. The soul is originally like a blank wax tablet. Things cause alterations or impressions on the soul, and those alterations or ideas which refer to par- ticular things compel assent. These impressions are kept in memory, and, partly without and partly with conscious intention, concepts arise. These are entirely subjective: thus in ancient times we find the germ of nominalism (q.v. ). The highest value is attached to the involuntarily formed concepts, for these compel assent from all men {consensus gentium). Physics included, for the Stoics, cosmology, psychology, and theology. All reality is corporeal, but falls into two class- es, the active and the passive, which, however, are inseparable. The active principle is some- times represented as fire, sometimes as spirit. The spirit-fire is God, and is self-conscious. Out of it is developed air, water, earth, the whole universe of separate beings, and all nature is rational. Every individual soul is a part of the universal world-soul for a time individualized, but ultimately to be absorbed into the world- soul again, at the time when all the dilTcrentia- tion of the universe is consumed in all-devouring fire. This process takes place by Fate, i.e. in accordance with irreversible laws, but is also purposeful, i.e. mechanism is conceived of as compatible with teleology. When one cycle of differentiation and absorption is complete, an- other begins. The Stoic ethics was the ethics of apathy. The soul or the divine principle in man should not allow itself to be carried away by the passions aroused in it by external things. A man must be self-controlled. The passions are due to false judgments and mental disturbances, hence they can be overcome by wisdom and by a refusal to assent to their dictation. A man is not, indeed, master of liis fate, but he can keep his self-control and proud self-complacency through all the vicissitudes of life. The Stoic formula was a life in accordance with nature. As we have seen that for Stoeism nature is all rational, to live in accordance with nature was to live in accordance with reason. Such a life is happy. Pleasure is an accessory, not an end, of a reasonable life. The Stoics took a very rigor- ous view of virtue, which they claimed admitted of no degree. One may be virtuous, but if he is not thoroughly so he is not so at all. There may be approximation to virtue, short of virtue, but such approximation is not virtue. Only very few men are virtuous; the vast majority are fools. The four cardinal virtues of the Stoic system are insight, courage, temperance, and justice, a classification which in essence does not depart from the Platonic. One very distinctive feature of Stoicism was its cosmopolitanism. Because all men are manifestations of the one universal Spirit, they .should live in brotherly love and readiness to help each other. Differ- ences of rank and wealth are external, and should not interfere with social relations. Thus, long before Christianity taught that there is neither Greek nor .Jew, nor male nor female, nor bond nor free. Stoicism had recognized and lived up to the brotherhood of man. _ Consult: Capes, Stoicism (London, 1880) : Zel- ler. Die Phitosophie der Griechen (3d ed., Leip- zig, 1880: Eng. trans, by Reichel, London, 1880). STOKES, stokg, Geoege Thomas (1843-98). An Irish divine and author, born in Athlone, Westmeath, Ireland. He was educated at Queen's College, Galway, and Trinity College, Dublin, and, after acting as curate in Killaloe and New- ry, he became, in 180(1, vicar of All Saints, Blackrock, which position he retained until his death. In 1883 he was called to the chair of ecclesiastical history in Dublin University, and in 1893 he became canon of Saint Patrick's in Dublin. Among his publications are: Ireland and the Celtic Church (1886); Sketch of Me- di(pral History (1887) : Ireland and the Anglo- 'A'orinan Church (1889); Bishop Pocock's Tour Around Ireland in lloB (1891) ; The Acts of the Ajiostlcs (1891) ; and Greek in Gaul and West- ern Europe Down to A.D. 700 (1892). STOKES, Sir George Gabriel (18I9-I903). An English mathematician and physicist, horn in Skreen, County Sligo, Ireland. He was edu- cated at Cambridge, and became fellow of Pem- broke College in 1841, and was elected in 1849 to fill the Lucasian chair of mathematics in Cambridge. In 1885 he was appointed presi- dent of the Royal Society. Stokes was the first to explain in his lectures the scientific principles on which spectrum analysis depends, while to him is due also the first thorough stud.v and explana- tion of the phenomena of fluorescence, in his paper On the Change of the Refrangibilitti of Light {Philosophical Transactions for 1852-53), for which he received the Rumford Medal. He greatly extended and improved the application of mathematics to physico-mathematical treat- ment of questions connected with the distortion of elastic solids, the motion of waves in water, the imdulatory theory of light, the summation