r philosophical systems. After many years' study he opened
his own school in a colonnade in Athens called the Painted Porch, or
Stoa, which gave the Stoics their name. Next to Zeno, the School of the
Porch owes most to Chrysippus (280--207 b.c.), who organised Stoicism
into a system. Of him it was said, 'But for Chrysippus, there had been
no Porch.'

The Stoics regarded speculation as a means to an end and that end was,
as Zeno put it, to live consistently omologonuenws zhn or as it was
later explained, to live in conformity with nature. This conforming of
the life to nature oralogoumenwz th fusei zhn. was the Stoic idea of
Virtue.

This dictum might easily be taken to mean that virtue consists in
yielding to each natural impulse; but that was very far from the Stoic
meaning. In order to live in accord with nature, it is necessary to know
what nature is; and to this end a threefold division of philosophy is
made--into Physics, dealing with the universe and its laws, the problems
of divine government and teleology; Logic, which trains the mind to
discern true from false; and Ethics, which applies the knowledge thus
gained and tested to practical life. The Stoic system of physics was
materialism with an infusion of pantheism. In contradiction to Plato's
view that the Ideas, or Prototypes, of phenomena alone really exist,
the Stoics held that material objects alone existed; but immanent in
the material universe was a spiritual force which acted through them,
manifesting itself under many forms, as fire, aether, spirit, soul,
reason, the ruling principle.

The universe, then, is God, of whom the popular gods are manifestations;
while legends and myths are allegorical. The soul of man is thus an
emanation from the godhead, into whom it will eventually be re-absorbed.
The divine ruling principle makes all things work together for good,
but for the good of the whole. The highest good of man is consciously
to work with God for the common good, and this is the sense in which
the Stoic tried to live in accord with nature. In the individual it
is virtue alone which enables him to do this; as Providence rules the
universe, so virtue in the soul must rule man.

In Logic, the Stoic system is noteworthy for their theory as to the test
of truth, the Criterion. They compared the new-born soul to a sheet of
paper ready for writing. Upon this the senses write their impressions,
fantasias and by experience of a number of these the soul