perusal laid the foundation of his philosophical fame. In the course of his mercantile pursuits he freighted a ship for Athens, with a very valuable cargo of Phoenician purple, which he completely lost by shipwreck on the coast, near the Piræus. A very acute man, who found himself in a state of sudden and complete poverty at Athens, would naturally enough think of turning philosopher, both as by its doctrines it inspired him with some consolation for the loss of his Phoenician purple, and by its profits afforded him some chance of subsistence without it. After attending various masters of the Cynic school, which was then in high reputation, he put forth his own system of opinions, upon which was formed the Stoic school, one of the most considerable in ancient Greece.

The opinions of the Stoics upon the intellectual part of our nature, were either the same as, or very nearly allied to, those of Plato and Aristotle; though they were often disguised in very different language. The accounts of the morality of the Stoics I shall read to you from the very beautiful epitome which Dr. Adam Smith has given of their doctrines in the second volume of his "Theory of Moral Sentiments" (p. 186.). "The self"love of man embraced, if I may say so, his body and "all its different members, his mind and all its different "faculties and powers, and desired the preservation and "maintenance of them all in their best and most perfect "condition. Whatever tended to support this state of "existence was, therefore, by nature pointed out to him แ as fit to be chosen; and whatever tended to destroy it "as fit to be rejected. Thus health, strength, agility, "and ease of body, as well as the external conveniences "which could promote these wealth, power, honours, "the respect and esteem of those we live with - were "naturally pointed out to us as things eligible, and of "which the possession was preferable to the want. On "the other hand, sickness, infirmity, unwieldiness, pain

"of body, as well as all the external inconveniences "which tend to occasion or bring on any of them

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poverty, the want of authority, the contempt or hatred "of those we live with were, in the same manner, pointed out to us as things to be shunned and avoided. "In each of those two opposite classes of objects, there "were some which appeared to be more the objects. "either of choice or rejection than others in the same "class. Thus, in the first class, health appeared evi"dently preferable to strength, and strength to agility; "reputation to power, and power to riches. And thus, too, in the second class, sickness was more to be "avoided than unwieldiness of body, ignominy than poverty, and poverty than the loss of power. Virtue, "and the propriety of conduct, consisted in choosing "and rejecting all different objects and circumstances "according as they were by nature rendered more or "less the objects of choice or rejection; in selecting "always from among the several objects of choice pre"sented to us that which was most to be chosen when Iwe could not obtain them all; in selecting, too, out of "the several objects of rejection offered to us, that "which was least to be avoided when it was not in our

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power to avoid them all. By choosing and rejecting "with this just and accurate discernment, by thus be"stowing upon every object the precise degree of atten"tion it deserved, according to the place which it held "in this natural scale of things, we maintained, accord"ing to the Stoics, that perfect rectitude of conduct "which constituted the essence of virtue. This was "what they called to live consistently, to live according "to nature, and to obey those laws and directions which nature, or the Author of Nature, had prescribed for "our conduct."

From the philosophy of the Stoics I shall proceed to one of a very different complexion, the sect of Epicurus. Epicurus was the son of a schoolmaster and a woman

who gained her livelihood by curing discases by magic, driving away ghosts, and performing other services equally marvellous. The circumstance which first turned his attention to philosophy is said to have been, that, on reading the works of Hesiod, he consulted his master upon the meaning of the word chaos. The pedagogue, unable to solve the point, instead of scourging him for asking too difficult a question, as is commonly the custom, referred him to the philosophers for an explanation. To the philosophers, as soon as an opportunity offered, he had recourse for more information than he could gain from schoolmasters, and acquired all he could glean from Pamphilus a Platonist, Nausiphanes a Pythagorean, and Pyrrho the Sceptic. He was at Athens also a student, while Xenocrates taught in the Academy, and Theophrastus in the Lyceum. When Cicero therefore calls him a self-taught philosopher, we are not to understand by that expression that he was never instructed in the tenets of other masters, but that his system of philosophy was the result of his own reflections, after comparing the doctrines of other sects. In the thirty-second year of his age, he opened a school at Mytilene. Not satisfied, however, with the narrow sphere of philosophical fame which this obscure situation afforded him, he repaired to Athens, purchased a pleasant garden, where he took up his residence and taught his philosophy; - and hence his disciples were called the philosophers of the garden. The friendship of the Epicurean sect is described by Cicero, in his treatise "De Finibus," as unexampled in the history of human attachments; and Valerius Maximus relates a memorable example of friendship between Polycrates and Hippoclides, two disciples of this sect. It is impossible, however, to receive these accounts without some sort of mistrust. A set of graminivorous metaphysicians, living together in a garden, and employing their whole time in acts of benevolence towards each

other, carries with it such an air of romance, that I am afraid it must be considerably lowered, and rendered more tasteless, before it can be brought down to the standard of credibility and the probabilities of real life. At least we may be tolerably sure, that if half a dozen metaphysicians, such as metaphysicians are in these modern days, were to live in a garden in Battersea or Kew, that their friendship would not be of very long duration; and their learned labours would probably be interrupted by the same reasons which prevented Reaumur's spiders from spinning, - they fabricated a very beautiful and subtle thread, but, unfortunately, they were so extremely fond of fighting, that it was impossible to keep them together in the same place.

There are two totally opposite accounts of the lives and doctrines of the Epicureans:- the one, that they only recommended and pursued such sort of pleasures as they deemed not inconsistent with that virtuous tranquillity which was the chief end of their philosophy; the opposite opinion goes to fix upon them the charge of shameless and unlimited debauchery. Unfortunately, all the writings of Epicurus (by far the most prolific writer among the Grecian philosophers) have perished, with the exception of a very few fragments dispersed among ancient authors. It is probable, however, that both accounts are true; for it must be observed, that the philosophy of Epicurus, in its most favourable garb, contains within itself a principle of rapid corruption : it is precisely that which may inhabit a great and vigorous mind with safety, but which, dispersed abroad among all the medley of human minds and dispositions, would shoot up into rank licentiousness.

Epicurus held that there are three instruments of judgment -sense, preconception, and passion. Sense, he was of opinion, could never be deceived; though the judgment founded upon the representations of the senses might be either true or false. For instance, if a person

of imperfect sight were to mistake the head of a post for the head of a cow, Epicurus would contend that the eye conveyed to the mind a notice of every ray of light that acted upon it in this instance, and that the mind had determined hastily upon the evidence presented to it. Every opinion he thought to be true which was attested, or not contradicted, by the senses. Lastly, opinions might be received as true, which were established by some immediate inference from the senses: as, if I see any thing move, it is a plain proof there must be a vacuum in nature, to admit of the motion of any body whatever; and the contrary opinion, that there is no vacuum, cannot be true, because it contradicts the evidence of the senses. By preconceptions he appears to have meant what we denominate general ideas, which are formed, he contends, either by the repeated impression of the senses; by enlarging or diminishing a sensation, as in the instances of a giant or of a dwarf; by resemblance, as of an unknown city to one which has been seen; or by composition, as in the instance of a centaur. Preconception is necessary to enable us to inquire, reason, or judge of any thing. Truths not selfevident, are to be deduced from some manifest preconception; or, where the relation of ideas is obscure, it is to be made manifest by the intermediate use of some acknowledged principle.

This philosopher considered the pleasures and pains of the body to be the sole objects of desire and aversion. That they were always the object of desire and aversion he considered to be a matter of fact too notorious to require proof; but he contended that they were also the sole original object. The pains and pleasures of the mind, he contended, were all, in the first instance, derived from those of the body, though they afterwards became incomparably more powerful and important, because the body feels but for the present moment,—the mind joys and grieves, by anticipation and by recollec

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