cked, give hospitality to the proscribed, and
alms to the poor, ... restore the son to the mother's tears, save the
captive from the arena, and even bury the criminal; but in all, his mind
and his countenance will be alike untroubled. He will feel no pity. He
will succour, he will do good, for he is born to assist his fellows, to
labour for the welfare of mankind, and to offer each one his part. His
countenance and his soul will betray no emotion as he looks upon the
withered legs, the tattered rags, the bent and emaciated frame of the
beggar. But he will help those who are worthy, and, like the gods, his
leaning will be towards the wretched.... It is only diseased eyes that
grow moist in beholding tears in other eyes, as it is no true sympathy,
but only weakness of nerves, that leads some to laugh always when others
laugh, or to yawn when others yawn."

Cicero, in a sentence which might be adopted as the motto of stoicism,
said that Homer "attributed human qualities to the gods; it would have
been better to have imparted divine qualities to men." The remarkable
passage I have just cited serves to show the extremes to which the
Stoics pushed this imitation. And indeed, if we compare the different
virtues that have flourished among Pagans and Christians, we invariably
find that the prevailing type of excellence among the former is that in
which the will and judgment, and among the latter, that in which the
emotions are most prominent. Friendship rather than love, hospitality
rather than charity, magnanimity rather than tenderness, clemency rather
than sympathy, are the characteristics of ancient goodness. The Stoics,
who carried the suppression of the emotions farther than any other
school, laboured with great zeal to compensate the injury thus done to
the benevolent side of our nature, by greatly enlarging the sphere of
reasoned and passionless philanthropy. They taught, in the most emphatic
language, the fraternity of all men, and the consequent duty of each man
consecrating his life to the welfare of others. They developed this
general doctrine in a series of detailed precepts, which, for the range,
depth, and beauty of their charity, have never been surpassed. They even
extended their compassion to crime, and adopting the paradox of Plato,
that all guilt is ignorance, treated it as an involuntary disease, and
declared that the only legitimate ground of punishment is prevention.
But however fully they might recognise i