Roman Greece

Plutarch

Rome strove hard to be magnanimous toward Greece and succeeded to some extent. In the newly formed province of Achaea it stationed no garrison; it imposed lighter dues than the taxes previously collected by its own tax farmers; it allowed the city-states to govern themselves according to their ancient laws and constitutions; and many of these city-states—Athen, Sparta, Plataea, Delphi, and others—enjoyed the rank of “free city” and were exempt from every restriction except participation in foreign wars or class warfare.

Nevertheless, since Greece thirsted for its former liberties while Roman generals, usurers, and merchants skilled in buying cheap and selling dear sucked the blood of the people, the country joined Mithridates’ revolt and paid the heaviest price. Athens suffered from a exhausting and calamitous siege; and Delphi, Elis, and Epidaurus saw their temple treasures plundered. A generation later Caesar and Pompey, then Antony and Brutus, carried their civil wars onto Greek soil; they conscripted Greek men, confiscated Greek food, silver, and gold, collected twenty years’ taxes in two years, and brought the cities of Greece to ruin. In Augustus’s time the Asian part of Greece began to recover, but Greece itself remained poor; and this poverty and desolation were due less to Roman conquest than to oppressive tyranny in Sparta, unrestrained liberty in Athens, and the sterility of both land and people. Greece’s boldest sons left their country for younger and richer lands. The rise of new powers in Egypt, Carthage, and Rome, and the progress of industry in the Hellenistic East, had left Greece, the cradle of the classical spirit, without vitality and deserted. Rome offered compliments and praise to Greece and plundered its artistic heritage: Scaurus took three thousand statues from Greece for his theater. Caligula ordered the husband of his mistress to seize all Greek carvings and statues, and Nero alone carried off half the statues of Delphi for himself. Thus Greece saw no happy days until the time of Hadrian.

The wrath of the Romans in the Macedonian wars fell upon Epirus; the Senate ordered its soldiers to plunder it, and a hundred and fifty thousand of its people were sold as slaves and concubines. Augustus, in honor of his victory at Actium, built a new capital for Epirus at Nicopolis; civilization in this “City of Victory” must have been valued in some way, for Epictetus found listening ears there and made it his home. Macedonia fared better than its loyal neighbor Epirus. Macedonia was rich in mineral stones and timber, and its commerce flourished thanks to the Via Egnatia, which passed through this province and Thrace to join Apollonia and Dyrrhachium with Byzantium. The chief cities of the province—Edessa, Pella, and Thessalonica—lay along this important highway, part of which still survives. The latter city—which we now call Salonika but the Greeks still call “Thessalonica” (the city of Thessalian victory)—was the capital of Macedonia, the seat of the provincial council, and one of the greatest commercial ports between the Balkans and Asia. A little farther east Thrace devoted itself to agriculture, stockbreeding, and mining, yet it also possessed very important cities, among them Serdica (Sofia), with Philippopolis as its center, Adrianople, Perinthus, and Byzantium (Istanbul). Here in Byzantium, in the “Golden Horn,” merchants and fishmongers grew wealthy, while inside the city Greek colonists dodged invading barbarians; all the country’s grain entered the coastal warehouses of Byzantium, all the trade of Scythia and the Black Sea paid transit dues to Byzantium while passing through, and the fish almost fell into the nets as they crossed the narrow strait of the Bosporus. A little later Constantine recognized that this city was the key city of the ancient world.

South of Macedonia, Thessaly was the home of abundant wheat and beautiful horses. Euboea, this large island, had long been famous (like Boeotia) for its flocks and herds. In the second century A.D. Dio Chrysostom describes Euboea as ready to relapse into barbarism. In this city, more than anywhere else, the discouragement of the poor due to the concentration of land and wealth in the hands of a few families, the discouragement of the rich due to the ever-increasing burden of taxes and urban services, and the discouragement of families due to the self-satisfied wealth or desperate poverty of the once-flourishing agricultural population had completely destroyed the old spirit, and cattle grazed as far as the walls of Chalcis and Eretria. Boeotia had still not recovered from the burden of losses and taxes imposed by Sulla’s wars. Strabo writes: “Thebes is now nothing more than a village” compressed into a space equal to its former citadel. Nevertheless, a century of peace and calm somewhat restored Plataea, and Chaeronea, whose plains had witnessed the conquests of Philip and Sulla, still had enough attraction to bind its most famous citizen to itself. Plutarch says: “Chaeronea has become so small that I do not wish to make it even smaller by leaving it.” In the calm cultural life and wise thought of Plutarch we see the bright side of a dark environment: a modest and honorable member of the middle class, attached to the old virtues, possessing a sense of dedication to the public, and carrying pure friendship and love for family. In the history of Rome no individual is more lovable than Plutarch.

This historian was born in the city of Chaeronea in A.D. 46 and died there at about the age of eighty. While Nero was busy completing his collection of victories in Greece, he was studying in Athens. He apparently had a considerable income, for he traveled to Egypt and Asia Minor and twice to Italy. In Rome he delivered lectures in Greek, and it seems he also carried out a political mission there for his country. He loved the great capital and the good manners and respectable life of its new nobility. He looked with admiration upon the abstemious practices of this class, and agreed with old Ennius that the Romans owed everything to their morals and character. When he reflected upon the lives of these living nobles and the dead nobles, he conceived the idea of making a comparison between the heroes of Rome and the heroes of Greece. He did not intend merely to write history or even biography, but to teach people virtue and heroism through historical examples. He had even chosen in his mind the title Moralia (Ethics) for his book called Parallel Lives. He was always and everywhere a teacher, and never missed the smallest opportunity to attach a moral conclusion to his story, yet honestly no one in any age has done this with such charm. Plutarch explicitly declares in the “Life of Alexander” that he is more interested in characters than in history; and he hopes that by comparing great Romans with great Greeks he can transmit spiritual motives and the heroic spirit to the readers of his works. With a sincerity that makes one ashamed, he confesses that he himself has become a better man through long contact with outstanding men.

We must not, of course, expect him to possess the conscience and precision of a full historian; errors in names, places, and dates of events are numerous in his writings, and (as far as our judgment is sound) he sometimes misunderstands events. He even fails in two main duties of a biographer: one is to show which hereditary qualities, environment, and circumstances produced the character under discussion and his actions, and the other is to show the formation and growth of this character through the stages of life, responsibilities, and crises. In Plutarch’s writings, as in those of Heraclitus, a man’s character is his destiny. Yet it is impossible for anyone to read the lives of famous men and think of these defects; the lively narrative style, exciting side events, attractive anecdotes, wise interpretations, and original writing style compensate for all these defects. In the whole fifteen hundred pages of this book not a single superfluous line or page-filler can be found; every sentence is appropriate, necessary, and measured. A hundred distinguished persons from the ranks of generals, poets, and philosophers have commented on this book. Madame Roland writes: “This book is the pasture of great souls.” And Montaigne says: “I cannot manage without Plutarch; Plutarch is my prayer book.” Shakespeare borrowed stories from it, and the portrait he draws of Brutus derives from Plutarch’s works on the Roman nobility. Napoleon almost always carried the Lives with him, and Heine, after reading it, could hardly restrain himself from jumping on a horse and galloping off to conquer France. No more precious book than this has come down to us from Greece.

After traveling through the Mediterranean world and sightseeing there, Plutarch returned to Chaeronea, raised four sons and one daughter, lectured and wrote books, occasionally went to Athens, but spent most of his life until his last days sharing the simple life of his birthplace. He considered it his duty to combine public offices with his educational aims. The citizens of his city elected him inspector of buildings, then chief judge, and then member of the national council. He presided over the performance of municipal ceremonies and festivals, and in his leisure time became a priest of the Delphic oracle whose rites had been revived. He did not consider it wise to abandon old beliefs merely because they were not intellectually acceptable; in his view the rite itself is not the principle, but the principle is the support that rite gives to weakening human morals and the strengthening of the bond between members of one generation, one family, and the individuals of one country. To him the excitement arising from religious emotions is the deepest experience of human life.

Plutarch, who in addition to piety also possessed tolerance, laid the foundation of comparative study of religions by writing treatises on Roman and Egyptian rites. He argued that all gods are different manifestations of one transcendent being who is outside time, indescribable, and so far from earthly and mortal affairs that intermediary spirits must intervene for the creation and regulation of the world’s affairs. There are also evil spirits subject to a greater demon who is the source and spirit of all disorder, folly, and evil in nature and man. In Plutarch’s opinion it is good that we believe in the immortality of man, a rewarding paradise, a purifying purgatory, and a punishing hell. He liked to hope that a period of stay in purgatory might even reform Nero, and that only a few would suffer eternal damnation. In Plutarch’s view, fears arising from superstition are worse than atheism. Nevertheless, he believed in divination, heavenly voices, summoning spirits, and the power of dream prophecy. He did not claim to be an original and innovative philosopher, but like Apuleius and many of his contemporaries presented himself as one who adapts Plato’s philosophy to his own time. He condemned the Epicureans for substituting the darkness of annihilation for fear of hell and criticized the “contradictions and disharmonies” of Stoic philosophy, yet like the Stoics he believed that “following God and obeying reason are one and the same.”

His lectures and essays have been collected under the title Moralia (Ethics), because most of them contain simple and natural exhortations to follow reason and wisdom in life. In these pages very diverse subjects are discussed, from the suitability of elderly men for public offices to a discussion of whether the chicken or the egg came first. Plutarch cherishes his library, yet confesses that health is more valuable than all good books:

Some people, driven by gluttony, participate in drinking parties with such greed as if they were storing provisions for a siege. … Foods that are cheaper are always more beneficial. … Artaxerxes Longimanus, when during a hasty retreat he had nothing to eat but barley bread and figs, cried out: “What pleasure! I had never tasted its flavor before!” … Wine is the most useful beverage, provided it is drunk completely in its proper place and mixed with water. … One must especially beware of indigestion caused by eating meat, for it is wearisome from the beginning and after digestion has very harmful effects. It is better to accustom the body so that it does not desire meat in the presence of other foods. For the earth has many other things that can not only be our food but also provide our comfort and pleasure. However, since habit has become a second artificial nature, we should include meat as a supplementary food in our diet. … It is proper to consume other foods … that are more compatible with our nature and that diminish less the sharpness of our rational faculty, which, so to speak, is brightened by simple and light foods.

Following Plato, Plutarch advocates equal rights for women and men, and brings many examples of learned women of the ancient period (among his own circle there were also several educated women); nevertheless he looks upon the adultery of husbands with the indulgence and tolerance of a pagan man:

If in private life a man who is unrestrained and licentious in personal pleasures commits a small sin with a mistress or a servant, his wife should not become angry with him or torment herself, but should reason that it is out of respect for her that her husband has involved another woman in his debauchery.

Yet when we finish reading Plutarch’s attractive essays we feel refreshed from the company of a truly humane, healthy, balanced, and complete man. One does not mind that his thoughts are commonplace; his pleasant moderation serves as an antidote to the intellectual madness of our age. His sound nature, affectionate humor, and entertaining images draw us irresistibly, even over the mass of his commonplace thoughts. Finding a philosopher wise enough to be happy breathes new life into a person. He advises us to be grateful for the ordinary blessings and gifts of life and especially to appreciate their permanence:

We should not forget these blessings and advantages that we share with many others, but should be glad that we are alive, healthy, and perceive the light of the sun. … Is it not true that a good man considers every day a festival? … The world is in fact the greatest temple, and the most precious in the sight of God. Man enters this temple at birth. He is not in the world before man-made and lifeless idols but before the divine spirit that manifests itself to human senses … before the sun, moon and stars and rivers that always scatter cool water and before the earth that gives us food. … Since this life causes the most complete knowledge of the highest mysteries, we should always be filled with joy and happiness.

The Lively Athens

Plutarch embodies two movements of his age: the return to religion, and the short-lived renaissance of Greek literature and philosophy. Of these two movements, the first had a universal character, while the second was limited to Athens and the Greek part of the East. The Peloponnese had six prosperous and flourishing cities, but contributed little to Greek thought. Trade with the West and a productive textile industry kept Patrae alive and standing throughout the Roman period and the Middle Ages, even into our own age. Olympia fared well with the remnant of tourists who came to see the statue of Phidias’s Zeus or to watch the Olympic games. The continuation of the Olympic games, held every four years, from 776 B.C. to A.D. 394, when Theodosius put an end to them, is one of the charming manifestations of Greek history. Like the age of Prodicus and Herodotus, philosophers and historians came and addressed the crowds gathered for the festivals. Dio Chrysostom describes how authors read their “childish compositions” to the listeners, poets recited their poems, rhetoricians waved their hands in the air, and “a host of sophists, like proud peacocks,” tried to dazzle and astonish the crowd; Dio himself was not quieter than the rest in this. Epictetus pictures the crowds of sweating spectators in the unsheltered seats, either burning from the heat or soaked by rain, yet forgetting all this amid the uproar and excitement that reached its peak at the end of each contest. The ancient Nemean, Isthmian, Pythian, and Panathenaic games were also held.

New competitions such as Hadrian’s Panhellenic contest were added to them and in many cases included poetry, oratory, and music contests as well. One of Lucian’s characters asks: “Can you not hear classical music at the great festivals?” Roman colonists made gladiatorial combats customary in Greece at Corinth. These combats spread from Corinth to several other cities, so that even the Theater of Dionysus was contaminated by these butcheries. Many Greeks, including Dio Chrysostom, Lucian, and Plutarch, protested against this desecration. Demonax, the Cynic philosopher, begged the people of Athens either to overturn first the “altar of pity” in their city or to prevent this innovation. But the Roman games lasted until Christianity gained complete dominance.

Sparta and Argos still had some half-life and strength, and Epidaurus grew richer day by day thanks to the large number of patients, both physical and spiritual, who turned to the shrine of Asclepius. Corinth, which controlled trade through its isthmus, became the richest city in Greece within half a century after its reconstruction by Caesar. Its heterogeneous population, composed of Romans, Greeks, Syrians, Jews, and Egyptians, most of whom had broken away from their native land and customs, was notorious for its commercialism, Epicureanism, and disregard for morals. The ancient temple of the earthly Aphrodite still continued its flourishing business as the center and altar of Corinth’s prostitutes. Apuleius describes the magnificent ballet he saw in Corinth, which was a representation of the judgment of Paris: “Venus appeared completely naked, wearing only a delicate silk garment over the beautiful and pleasing part between her body, and even that was blown this way and that by the playful winds.” The ways of the people of Corinth had not improved since the time of Aspasia.

The villages on the road from Megara to Attica showed the severe poverty of the region. The destruction of forests, the ruin of the soil, and the reduction of mineral resources, together with war, migration, heavy taxes, and racial suicide, had turned the Roman peace into a melancholy desert. In all of Attica only two cities were flourishing and prosperous: Eleusis, whose special religious rite drew a large and profitable crowd every year; and Athens, which was the cultural and educational center of the classical world. Athens’s old institutions—the Council, the Assembly, and the Archons—still functioned, and Rome had restored to it the power of the early Areopagus (the supreme court of Athens) as a court of justice and a fortress for the defense of property rights. Rulers such as Antiochus IV, Herod the Great, Augustus, and Hadrian competed with millionaires like Herodes Atticus in generosity and charity to Athens. Herodes Atticus rebuilt the stadium with marble, spending almost all the marble from the quarries of Mount Pentelicus on this work. In addition he built an odeon (lecture or music hall) at the foot of the Acropolis. Hadrian provided the financial means to complete the Olympieion, and as a result Zeus, who now had one foot in the grave, found a place worthy of his brightest days.

Meanwhile Athens’s unrivaled fame in literature, philosophy, and education attracted many wealthy young men and poor scholars to its schools. The University of Athens, in addition to ten official chairs whose expenses were paid by the city or the emperor, also had a large number of private lecturers and teachers. There literature, philology, rhetoric, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, medicine, and law were taught. The place of teaching was usually the gymnasium or theaters and sometimes temples or private houses. The educational period, except in the case of rhetoric and law, was in no way bound to equip the student for earning a living; rather it aimed to sharpen his mind and deepen his understanding and equip him with an ethical doctrine. This place produced distinguished intellectuals, but also brought forth thousands of verbose babblers who entangled both philosophy and religion in the twists and turns of theoretical discussions.

Since Athens depended to a large extent on its students for income, it tolerated with patience the noisy and frivolous lifestyle of these young people. The annoying jokes played on “freshmen” (new students) sometimes caused annoyance to the Athenians. Students whose teachers were rivals became ardent supporters of their teachers and in occasional riots, just like the “club-wielding youths” of our time, attacked one another. Some students felt they could learn more from prostitutes and gamblers than from all the philosophy teachers. We hear from Alciphron that these ladies considered the teachers dull and unworthy rivals. But often pleasant friendly relations existed between students and teachers. Many of them invited their students to dinner, guided their studies, visited them when ill, and constantly gave false information about their academic progress to their parents. Most lecturers profited from the fees each student paid, a few teachers received salaries from the government, and the heads of the four philosophical schools received ten thousand drachmas (six thousand dollars) annually from the imperial treasury.

Under these factors, the “Second Sophistic” took shape—the period of the reappearance of rhetorician philosophers who, according to the tuition fees that attracted them, traveled from city to city, delivered lectures to the people, taught students, pleaded cases in courts, served as spiritual advisers to the wealthy, and sometimes acted as honorary secret agents for their city-states. This movement flourished throughout the empire, especially in the Greek world, in the first three centuries A.D. According to Dio the number of philosophers at that time was as great as that of cobblers. The new sophists, like the old sophists, had no common and general doctrine, expressed their teachings with eloquence, attracted many listeners, and in many cases achieved fame, high social status, or wealth. The difference between them and the former sophists was that they rarely questioned religion or morals; their interest was more in form and style, and the art of eloquence, than in the great issues that had shaken the foundations of the world’s beliefs and morals; in fact, the new sophists were ardent defenders of the ancient faith. Philostratus has left us the biographies of the prominent sophists of this age. Let us content ourselves with only one example. Adrian of Tyre learned rhetoric in Athens and obtained the official chair of rhetoric. He began his inaugural lecture with these proud words: “Speech has come again from Phoenicia.” He came to teach in a carriage whose horses were adorned with silver harness, and he himself was decked with jewels. When Marcus Aurelius visited Athens, to test Adrian he asked him to deliver an impromptu lecture on a difficult subject. This orator acquitted himself so well that Marcus showered him with honors, silver and gold, and gave him houses and slaves as well. When Adrian was promoted to the chair of rhetoric in Rome, although he delivered his material in Greek, his speech was so attractive that senators adjourned their sessions and people left pantomime shows to go and hear his lecture. Such periods almost announce the death of philosophy; philosophy had drowned in the sea of eloquence, and now that it had learned to speak it had abandoned thinking.

Epictetus

Epictetus was born around A.D. 50 in the city of Hierapolis in Phrygia. Since he was the son of a slave woman, he was naturally a slave himself. He had little opportunity or possibility for study, for he was constantly passed from one city and master to another, until he came into the possession of Epaphroditus, a powerful freedman of Nero’s court. Epictetus was weak in body and apparently became lame due to the severe violence of one of his masters. Nevertheless, he lived his natural seventy years. Epaphroditus allowed him to attend the lectures of Musonius Rufus and later freed him. Apparently he then taught in Rome himself, for when Domitian banished the philosophers, this former slave was among those who fled. He settled in Nicopolis and there his lectures attracted students from various cities. One of these students was Arrian of Nicomedia, who later became governor of Cappadocia; he collected Epictetus’s teachings, probably through shorthand, and published them under the title “Copy.” This collection is nothing other than the same Discourses that is now on the list of the world’s best books. The work is not a boring official treatise, but a classical example of simple expression and sharp, colloquial humor, which reveals the purity and sincerity of a humble and kind spirit, yet at the same time strong and decisive. Epictetus directed barbs indiscriminately at himself and others and laughed in his own rugged style. When Demonax, hearing that this old bachelor recommended marriage to others, jokingly asked for his daughter’s hand, Epictetus was offended but made no complaint; he excused his bachelorhood by saying that learning wisdom is a service no less than producing “two or three snot-nosed children.” In the last years of his life Epictetus took a wife to care for an orphan he had taken in. In these years his fame had already crossed the borders of the empire, and Hadrian counted him among his friends.

Epictetus, who in this respect and in others resembled Socrates, did not pay enough attention to nature and metaphysics to create a particular system of thought; his only preoccupation and intense interest was a worthy life. He asks: “What difference does it make to me whether all beings are composed of particles (atoms) … or of fire and earth? Is it not enough that man understands the true nature of good and evil?” Philosophy does not mean reading books of wisdom, but the practical training of the soul based on wisdom. The principle for man is to give such a form to his life and behavior that his happiness depends as little as possible on external things. The requirement for achieving this goal is not ascetic seclusion; on the contrary, it is proper to condemn “pleasure-seekers and rascals” who make people uninterested in public services. A good man seeks to participate in civil affairs; yet with peace of mind he accepts all unfortunate events of fate such as poverty, loss and deprivation, hardship, contempt, suffering, slavery, imprisonment, and death and knows how to “endure and maintain dignity.”

Never say about anything “I have lost it,” but only say “I have given it back.” Your child has died? No, it has been given back. Your wife has died? No, she has been given back. “They have taken my land from me.” Very well, that too has been given back. Since God gives you everything, consider it a trust with you … “Alas! My leg is lame!” Slave! Do you curse heaven and earth because of a lame leg? Is it not true that you will give up everything for nothing in the end? … I must go into exile: who can prevent me from moving with a smile and open face? … “I will throw you into prison.” You only imprison my body. I who must die. Must I die wailing? … These are the lessons that philosophy must repeat, and record and practice every day. … The lecturer’s chair and the prison are both places, one high and the other low, yet in both places your spiritual aim can be the same.

A slave may be spiritually free, like Diogenes; a prisoner may be free, like Socrates; and an emperor may be a slave, like Nero. Even death is nothing more than a small incident in the life of a good man. If a good man sees that evil greatly outweighs good in the world, he can even go to meet death himself; and in any case he will accept death with peace as part of the hidden wisdom of nature.

If grains of wheat had feeling, would they pray that they might never be reaped? … I wish to realize that eternal life is nothing but a word. … The ship sinks. What should I do? Whatever I can … I sink without fear. Or I tremble without crying out to God; for I know that everything that is born one day must also perish one day. For I am a part of the whole, just as an hour is a part of a day. I must come like an hour and also pass like an hour … Consider yourself like a single thread of yarn from which a garment will be woven. … Do not wish that everything that happens should be according to your will and desire, but accept everything as it happens, and then you will have peace of mind.

Although Epictetus often speaks of nature as a force without personality, he also frequently attributes personality, distinguishing power, and love to the same nature. The prevailing religious atmosphere of his time gives warmth to his philosophy and turns it into an asceticism mixed with submission and resignation that resembles the asceticism of that Stoic emperor who later read Epictetus’s works and reflected his thoughts. Epictetus with pleasing eloquence speaks of the magnificent order that governs time and space, and the evidence indicating that nature is planned and purposeful, and reaches the point of explaining: “God created some animals to be eaten, others to serve agriculture, and some to produce cheese.” In his opinion the human mind itself is such a wonderful instrument that only a creating God could have brought it into existence. In fact, since we have rational power, we are parts of the universal reason. If we could trace our ancestors back to the first Adam, we would find that God created him. Thus God is in the full sense the father of us all and all people are brothers.

Whoever has once with understanding examined the administration of the world, and realized that the greatest and most comprehensive society is the “system” (universe, in the sense of harmonious coexistence) of men and God, and that the initial seed of all things and especially rational beings is from God, why should such a person not call himself a citizen of the world … what am I saying, a son of God? … If a man could with all his heart believe this … in my opinion it would no longer be possible for him to nurture any unworthy or base thought in his existence. … So when you eat, consider well who you are that eats and whom you feed. When you live with a woman, who are you that does such a thing … Wretched man, you have God everywhere beside you and you yourself are unaware of it!

In a passage that seems to be written by the pen of the Apostle Paul, Epictetus urges his students not only to submit their will, with trust and hope, to the divine will, but also to be God’s messengers among mankind:

God says: “Go and bear witness to my existence.” … Consider how noble it is that a man can say: “God has sent me into the world to be His soldier and witness, and to tell people that their fears and sorrows are vain, that no misfortune can befall a good man, whether he lives or dies. God sends me here at one time and there at another. He tests me with poverty and imprisonment so that I may be a better witness for Him among men. When I have such a service in hand, what difference does it make to me where I am, or who my companions are, or what they say about me? No; is it not true that my whole existence must be turned toward God, and His laws and commands?”

Epictetus himself is also filled with religious fear and gratitude before the mystery and glory of things. The praise he offers to the Creator in that age of polytheism is a prominent page in the history of religion:

Which tongue is capable of praising all the works of God? … If we had any understanding, would we do anything other than praise God, both in public and in private, and give thanks for His blessings? Should we not, at the time of sowing and eating, sing a hymn of praise to God? … For what? Now that most of you have become blind, should there not be one person who takes this duty upon himself on your behalf and, in the name of all, sings a hymn in praise of God?

Although there is no word about the survival of the soul in this writing, and although the continuation of all these thoughts goes back to the Stoics and Cynics, yet in these pages we encounter many similarities with the ideas of early Christianity. In fact, Epictetus sometimes goes beyond Christianity: he rejects slavery, considers capital punishment ugly, and wants criminals to be regarded as sick people. He recommends that man examine his conscience every day and announces a kind of golden rule: “Do not do to others what you do not like for yourself;” and adds: “If they tell you that someone has spoken ill of you, do not defend yourself, but say: He did not know my other faults or he would not have mentioned only these.” He advises man to return good for evil, and “when insulted, to show humility;” to fast occasionally, and “to abstain from what he desires.” He sometimes speaks of the body with the contempt of an ascetic hermit and zealot: “The body is the most unpleasant and filthy of all things. … It is astonishing that we should love something for which we perform so many strange services every day. We fill this bag and then empty it; what is more troublesome than this?” Some of Epictetus’s writings benefit from Augustinian asceticism and Newman’s eloquence: “O God, from now on deal with me in whatever way You wish. I am of one spirit with You. I am Yours. I do not wish to be exempt from what seems good to You. Lead me wherever You wish and clothe me with whatever You wish;” and like Jesus, he invites his followers not to worry about tomorrow:

Is it not enough that God is our creator, father, and guardian to protect us from sorrow, grief, and fear? One asks: If I have nothing, what will be my food? In this case what shall we say about … animals, each of which meets its own need and is neither lacking its special food nor deficient in the kind of life appropriate to its condition and in harmony with nature?

It is not surprising that Christians like John Chrysostom and Augustine praised Epictetus, and that his textbook, with slight revisions, was chosen as a guide for monastic life. Who knows, perhaps Epictetus, in some form or other, had read the words of Jesus and, without knowing it, had converted to Christianity.

Lucian and the Skeptics

But in this last stage of Hellenistic culture there were skeptics who again brought forward all the doubts of Protagoras, and there was also a Lucian who mocked faith and belief with the boldness of Aristippus and the charm and attractiveness of Plato. The school of Pyrrho had not died. Aenesidemus of Cnossus in first-century Alexandria had systematized his denials by presenting his famous “ten modes” or contradictions that make knowledge impossible. In the late second century A.D., Sextus Empiricus, whose place and date of life are unknown, gave the final formulation to skeptical philosophy in several negative critical works, only three of which have survived. Sextus considers the whole world his enemy; he divides philosophers into various groups and slaughters each group one after another. In his writings he has the necessary intensity of an executioner, the order and clarity peculiar to ancient philosophies, occasional sarcastic jokes, and the fierce slaughter of logic.

Sextus says that against every argument one can present a counter-argument; therefore in the end nothing is more superfluous than reasoning. A syllogism will not be certain unless it is based on a complete induction; but complete induction is also impossible, since we can never know when a “counter-example” will occur. “Cause” is nothing but a familiar antecedent (as Hume would later repeat), and all knowledge is relative. In the same way there is no objective good or evil; morals change from border to border, and virtue has a different definition in every age. All the arguments of the nineteenth century against the possibility of knowing whether God exists or not are found in these books, as well as all the contradictions between the merciful and compassionate nature of the Almighty and the sufferings existing in this world. But Sextus’s agnostic philosophy is more complete than all agnostics, for he even believes that we cannot know that we cannot know. Agnosticism in him is a principle of belief. But he reassures us that we do not need certainty. Probability is sufficient for practical purposes and in philosophical matters too the suspension of judgment (aphasia, non-statement) instead of confusing and disturbing the mind brings a kind of purity of spirit (ataraxia). So, now that nothing is certain and sure, let us accept the conventions and beliefs of our time and place and, with humility, worship our ancient gods.

If Lucian had been unwise and limited his judgments to a labeled and restricted tag, he would have been placed in the rank of skeptics. Like Voltaire, to whom he is similar in every respect except for having a sense of compassion, he wrote philosophy so brilliantly that no one would imagine he was writing philosophy. Lucian, as if to show the spread of Hellenistic culture, was born in Samosata, in the remote province of Commagene. He himself says: “I am a Syrian from beside the Euphrates River.” His mother tongue was Syriac and his race was probably Semitic. He first became a student of a sculptor, but after a while abandoned it to learn rhetoric. After a short stay in Antioch and legal apprenticeship, he traveled as a “wandering scholar,” and his livelihood was through arranging lecture and speech sessions, especially in Rome and Gaul. Then, in A.D. 165 he settled in Athens. In later years, Marcus Aurelius, who while being ascetic also possessed tolerance, saved him from poverty by assigning him official duties in Egypt. He died in this land, but the date of his death is unknown.

Seventy-six small works of Lucian have survived the ravages of time. Most of these writings are still as fresh and readable today as they were eighteen centuries ago—when he read them to his friends and listeners. He experimented with all forms until he found the style of conversation or dialogue suitable to his own talent. His Dialogues of the Courtesans were so outspoken that they attracted many listeners. But at least in his writings the gods attracted his attention more than the prostitutes; he gets tired of speaking ill of the gods. One of his characters named Menippus says: “When I was a child, and heard the stories of Homer and Hesiod about the gods—gods who were adulterers, thieves, quarrelsome, greedy, and had illicit relations with their kin—I found them all quite natural and was deeply fascinated. But when I reached adulthood I saw that the laws officially contradicted the words of the poets and condemned adultery and theft. “Menippus, who has become bewildered, goes to the philosophers to find a convincing explanation, but they are so busy refuting each other’s opinions that they only increase his confusion. Then he makes wings for himself and goes to the heavens to examine the matters himself. Zeus receives him with magnanimity and gives him permission to see how Olympus works. Zeus himself listened to the prayers that reached his presence through “a row of lidded slits similar to well lids.” … “Among those who were at sea some wanted the north wind and others the south wind. The farmer wanted rain and the fuller wanted sunshine. … Zeus had become perplexed and did not know which prayer to answer; and he experienced a truly academic case of suspension of judgment, and showed a caution and balance worthy of Pyrrho himself.” The great god rejects some requests and grants others, then arranges the weather of that day: Scythia rainy, Greece snowy, the Adriatic stormy, and “a thousand bushels of hail also in Cappadocia.” Zeus is annoyed by the new gods who have come from abroad and secretly entered his “Pantheon.” He issues a decree to this effect: Since foreigners have occupied Olympus who speak several languages and have caused a severe increase in the price of nectar water, and since the old gods, these only true gods, find their place cramped, a commission of seven members is assigned to examine the complaints. In another treatise called “Zeus under Examination” an Epicurean philosopher asks Zeus whether the gods are also subject to fate or not? Zeus replies: “Yes, quite naturally.” The philosopher asks: “In that case why should man sacrifice to you? And if fate rules over gods and men, why are we responsible for our actions? Zeus says: “I see that you have associated with the cursed race of sophists.” In another writing called “Zeus the Tragic Actor” the god is taken and ill-tempered, because he sees that a large crowd has gathered in Athens to hear the debate between Damis the Epicurean who denies the existence of the gods and their concern for man, and Timocles the Stoic who confesses to this issue. Timocles is defeated and flees, and Zeus fears for his future. But Hermes reassures him: “There are still many believers left—the majority of Greeks, the common and ordinary people, and the barbarians to the last man.” The fact that such a writing did not cost Lucian his head either indicates the existence of tolerance in that age or tells of the decline of the power of the Greek gods.

But Lucian was as skeptical about rhetoric and philosophy as he was about the old religion. In one of the Dialogues of the Dead, Charon orders a scholar of rhetoric, whom he has placed in his boat and is taking to the other world, to “cast away the long endless sentences, contradictions, and weighty expressions that he has taken as his covering,” or else the boat will certainly sink. In “Hermotimus” a student enthusiastically begins the study of philosophy, in the hope that philosophy will give him something to replace faith; but he is greatly shocked by the self-conceit and greed of teachers who are rivals to each other, and the mutual refutation of their arguments leaves him morally and spiritually without support; so he concludes: “Just as I avoid a mad dog, I will keep myself away from every philosopher.” Lucian himself defines philosophy thus: “It is an experiment for reaching an elevation from which all directions can be seen.” From such an elevation, life appears to him as a ridiculous confusion, and a noisy and chaotic dance and song in which each dancer moves and shouts according to his own will and desire, “until the theater manager takes the actors off the stage one by one.” In “Charon” he draws a dark picture of human life as eyes with supernatural vision see it from a heavenly place: people plow, tire themselves, quarrel with each other, sue one another, lend money at interest, deceive and are deceived, and run after gold, silver, and pleasure; above their heads a cloud of hopes and fears, of madnesses and hatreds is moving; above these clouds the goddesses of fate are busy weaving the threads of every man’s life; such-and-such a man is lifted above the crowd, then falls with noise, and the messenger of death takes each one in turn. Charon observes two armies in the Peloponnese fighting each other; he cries out: “Fools! They do not know that even if each of them conquers the entire Peloponnese, their share in the end will be no more than half a foot of earth.” Lucian is as impartial as nature. He mocks the rich for their greed and the poor for their envy, philosophers for their babbling and gods for their non-existence. Finally he too, like Voltaire, concludes that Menippus in the underworld meets Tiresias and asks him what is the best life? The old prophet replies:

The life of an ordinary man is the best and most prudent choice. Put aside the madness of delving into metaphysics, and inquiry and research about the beginning and end; consider all this logic mere chatter, and pursue only one goal—that of how to do the work that is within your reach, and how to follow your path without anxiety and always with a smile on your lips.

If we summarize Greek thought in the first two centuries A.D., despite Lucian we reach the conclusion that this thought is predominantly religious. People had once lost faith in faith and turned to reason; now they had lost faith in reason and were turning back toward faith. Greek philosophy had thus completed its cycle: from its primitive theism that was its starting point through the skepticism of the early sophists, the atheism of Democritus, Plato’s conciliatory caresses, Aristotle’s naturalism, and the pantheism of the Stoics, it had finally returned to mysticism and submission and asceticism. The Academy, from the utilitarian myths of its founder, after passing through the skepticism of Carneades, had reached the sincere scholarship mixed with Plutarch’s piety; and soon it would reach its peak in the heavenly vision of Plotinus. The scientific achievements that Pythagoras had forgotten had found new life in his idea of reincarnation. The new Pythagoreans sought the secrets of numbers, examined their conscience every day, and prayed that after a minimum of reincarnations—if necessary through purgatory—they would reach a blissful union with God.

Stoic philosophy was no longer the philosophy mixed with the pride and indifference of aristocrats, and its final expression, which was also its most eloquent, had been found in the existence of a slave. Its doctrine, based on the idea that the world would eventually be set on fire and destroyed, its rejection of every kind of bodily pleasure, its humble submission to the unseen divine will, all prepared the way for Christian theology and moral principles. The Eastern spirit was conquering the European fortress.