"
Of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius we shall have very little to say by way
of summary, for they show no inconsistencies and very few of the
imperfections which characterise Seneca's ideal of the Stoic philosophy.
The "moral peddling," the pedagogic display, the puerile ostentation,
the antithetic brilliancy, which we have had to point out in Seneca, are
wanting in them. The picture of the _inner_ life, indeed, of Seneca, his
efforts after self-discipline, his untiring asceticism, his enthusiasm
for all that he esteems holy and of good report-this picture, marred as
it is by rhetoric and vain self-conceit, yet "stands out in noble
contrast to the swinishness of the Campanian villas, and is, in its
complex entirety, very sad and affecting." And yet we must admit, in the
words of the same writer, that when we go from Seneca to Epictetus and
Marcus Aurelius, "it is going from the florid to the severe, from varied
feeling to the impersonal simplicity of the teacher, often from idle
rhetoric to devout earnestness." As far as it goes, the morality of
these two great Stoics is entirely noble and entirely beautiful.
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