By whatever motives induced, or by whatever cir- cumstances favored, Zeno established a new school at Athens. At what time this occurred cannot be defi- nitely ascertained. According to some accounts, he was thirty years of age when he reached Athens, and attend- ed philosophers of high repute for twenty years. But the chronology of his life is uncertain and confused. The beginning of the 3d century before Gbrist may be conveniently accepted as the ]iroxiniate date of the foundation of his school. This school maintained itself successfully against older and later competitors. It min- istered to a latent and growing want. The character and bearing of the teacher gave weight to his doctrine and secured respect. He devoted himself and his in- structions, with earnest assiduity, to the incidcation of individual morality and personal purity. Itetaining the Cynic aim and the C'ynic abstemiousness and self-suf- ficiency, he divested Cynicism of its coarser, more igno- rant, and more offensive characteristics. He taught liis hearers to seek contentment and satisfaction in conscious rectitude of thought, feeling, and conduct; to recognise and to discharge faithfully every duty ; to contemn in- dulgences; to resist temptations; to enihire with serene disregard the accidents of life: and to maintain ilie same unswerving eiiuanimity in adverse and in ]irosperous fortune. Whatever opinion may be entertained in re- gard to the invalidity of his theories or the hypocrisy of members of his sect in later days, he rendered an im- portant service to his own and to subsequent generations by winning men from the aboiniding intamies of the time, and guiding them to the pursuit of honesty, in- tegrity, justice, iniselfishness, and personal ])ropriety of sentiment an<l action. During his extended career as a teacher he earned the cordial regard of his fellow-citi- zens (or rather of his fellow-inhabitants of the same city, for he refused Athenian citi/enship) and of his ccpiitem- poraries. Antigonus (ionatas, king of ISlacedon, attend- ed his lectures, and invited him to his court; Zeno ex- cused himself on accoinit of his age. but sent two of his disciples to represent him. Another pupil, Sphasriis, illustrated his doctrine at the court of the Ptolemies. The Athenians hoiu)red him with a panegyric, a golden crown, a statue, an<l a public tomb: "because he had exercised his vocation in Athens as a philosopher for many years, demeaning himself as a truly good man in all tlie offices of life; because he had trained to virtue and sobriety the j-outh who had resorted to him for in-
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striiction; and because he had exhibited in his own OMirse of life an exemplar for all, consonant with his professions and doctrine" (.Diof,'. Laert. vii, 10). After a lonj; life of uninterrupted but not robust health, and the guidance of his si-hool for nearly sixty years, as was alle>,'ed. tlie frail, thin, dark-skinned philosopher ended his career by a vohmiary death, in conseipience of a trivial acciilent. As he was comini^ out of his school lie fell, and broke or crushed his tinj^er. He exclaimed, "Why call me. death? I come;" and himself terminated his existence by suff"ocation. He left many writings, on a threat iliversity of subjects, which have been enumer- ated bv niofrencs Laertius. Tliey have all lieen lost. Thev. like his liviuic instructions, justilied the culoijy of .Vntipaier of Sidon, that he had shown "the path to heaven by the way of virtue:"
Tuv di ircir' aarpa 'ArpaircTOk' ^loitfa^ €up€ tTO}<t}poavva^,
2. The disciples of Zeno were at first called Zenonians, after the master. Tiiey received the name of ^7(»«'s from the painted porch ((ttou noiKtXr}) at the mirth- western an^le of the Agora, in which they were accus- tomed to assemble for instruction.
The numerous changes in the Stoic doctrine, and, still more, the variations and oscitancy in the exposition of that iloctrine, readily explain the disappearance of the works of Zeno and of tlie other chiefs of the school. These changes were themselves due to the imperfections and inconsistencies in the philosophy which resulted from its syncretistic complexion, and naturally provoked and excused partial dissent, frequent rectitications, and repeate*! attem|(ts at systematization. Its very defects, liowever, rendered it pliant, and eas\' of adaptation to the changing sentiments and the altering needs of suc- cessive generati(tns, and thus maintained its vitality and increased its adaptability to dissimilar ages and circum- gtances. Aristo of Chios, one of the pupils of Zeno, manifested Cynic proclivities. Me did not accord with the wider range of his master's expositions, and deviated widely from his teachings. Ilerilliis of Carthage, an- other pupil, approximated more closely to Plato and to the I'eripatetics, and subordinated the acipnsition of virtue to the attainment of knowledge which should lead to virtue. Cleanthes, another disciple, and the im- mediate successor of Zeno in the direction of the Stoic school, ditfered from the founder in many important re- Bliects. The pupil and successor of Cleanthes, Chrysip- pu8 of Soli, moditied, harmonized, eidarged, and reor- ganized the doctrine of the I'orch to such an extent that the saying became proverbial,
E* fit] 7(ip tjv Kpi'tTtmroij ovK av t]v ffroii
(unless Chrysippus had lived, there would have been no .Stoic school), lie treated all the departments of philosophy, and treated them with fulness, ingenuity, aud minuteness. To Stoic dialectics, however, he ren- «lered such signal services as to suggest the eulogistic remark, n' ttuou ^toir >))' »'; i"t«\ncn/o//, oi'kc «»< »/»' a/\X»; »; I'l \tivtrnnrfii)r (if the gods hail any art of dialectics, it coidd be no other than that of Clirysip|)us). In con- sequence of the citmplete redintegration of Stoicism by ('hryHi|)pus, the phrase Cliry.ii/ijil t/i/psinii is employed by .luvcnal lo <li-Higimte the .Stoic system. Aristo of CliioH ba<l conliiiecl philosophy to ethics, and I'ana'tiiis of UliodcH, near the close of ilu- 2(1 century !{.(;., gave his chief alien) ion to ibis branch, and furnished the sub- Hlaiice of the celebrated treatise of Cicero J)e OJj'uri.i. I'oHidoniiis, the pupil of i'ana'tius, and his successor in the ICIiodian school, was distinguished for the variety of his knowledge ancj for I be extent of his information.