“Know so far as is permitted thee, that Nature in all things is like unto herself:
“That thou mayest not hope that of which there is no hope, nor be ignorant of that which may be.
“Know thou also, that _the woes of men are the work of their own hands_.
“Miserable are they, _because they see not and hear not the good that is very nigh them_: and the way of escape from evil few there be that understand it.
“Verily, Father Zeus, thou wouldst free all men from much evil, if thou wouldst teach all men what manner of spirit they are of.
“Keep from the meats aforesaid, using judgment both in cleansing and setting free the soul.
“Give heed to every matter, and set reason on high, who best holdeth the reins of guidance.[19]
“Then when thou leavest the body, and comest into the free æther, thou shalt be a god undying, everlasting, neither shall death have any more dominion over thee.”
Referring to these verses, which inculcate that the human race is itself responsible for the evils which men, for the most part, prefer to regret than to remedy, Professor Clifford, to whom we are indebted for the above version of the _Golden Verses_, remarks on the merits of this teaching, that it reminds us that “men suffer from _preventible_ evils, that the people perish for lack of knowledge.”[20] Thus we find that the principal obstructions, in all ages, to human progress and perfectibility may be ever found in IGNORANCE and SELFISHNESS.
The school of Pythagoras and of Plato, although it was not the fashionable or popular religion of Rome, counted amongst its disciples some distinguished Italians, and the name of Cicero, who belonged to the “New Academy,” is sufficiently illustrious. The Italians, however, who borrowed their religion as well as their literature from the Greeks, were never distinguished, like their masters, for that refinement of thought which might have led them to attach themselves to the Pythagorean teaching. Under the bloody despotism of the Empire, the philosophy which was most affected by the _literati_ and those who were driven to the consolations of philosophy was the _stoical_, which taught its disciples to consider _apathy_ as the _summum bonum_ of existence. This school of philosophy, whatever its other merits, was too much centred in self--paradoxical as the assertion may seem--to have much regard for the rest of mankind, much less for the non-human species. Nor, while they professed supreme contempt for the luxuries and even comforts of life, did the disciples of the “Porch,” in general, practice abstinence from any exalted motive, humanitarian or spiritual. They preached indifference for the “good things” of this life, not so much to elevate the spiritual and moral side of human nature as to show their contempt for human life altogether.