Stoic Stories: Stoicism by Its Best Stories

This is a book of Stoic stories: stories about Stoics, stories told by Stoics, and stories with a Stoic bent. Snuck between these heroic tales, and exemplified by them, are the main tenets of Stoic philosophy, served up in small, bite-size chunks.

Romans by the imperial period had stopped believing in the hoary myths of old. In any case, ancient religion privileged ritual over doctrine and offered little in terms of guidance and consolation. For that, people, especially educated people, turned instead to philosophy, which held out the promise of a flourishing life removed from wrongdoing and suffering. In that much, Stoicism can be thought of as the first and original self-help. The movement by this stage had become eclectic and syncretic, borrowing freely from other schools, and, in practical terms at least, represents the best that ancient philosophy and antiquity have to offer. Ancient though they are, Stoic precepts and practices are timeless and universal insofar as they speak to our deepest human nature: for all our progress in science, technology, and education, we are still plagued and tormented—perhaps now more than ever—by anger, fear, greed, grief, death, and mis-living.

Stoicism was originally known by the name of its founder, Zeno of Citium, as ‘Zenonism’. But Zeno, being a Zenonist, was not given to megalomania, and the name was soon dropped in favour of ‘Stoicism’. The word ‘Stoicism’ derives from the Stoa Poikile or ‘Painted Porch’, a colonnade on the northern side of the agora in Athens where, overlooked by mythic and historic battle scenes, Zeno and his followers met to discuss and disseminate their ideas.

At the heart of Stoicism is the idea that human beings ought to act in accord with their nature, which means two things. First, we are social animals, and designed to work together ‘like hands, or feet, or eyelids’. ‘Human nature’ said Musonius, ‘is very much like that of bees. A bee is not able to live alone; it perishes when isolated. Indeed, it is intent on performing the common task of members of its species—to work and act together with other bees.’

Second, while ants and bees, and maybe even wolves, may be more social than human beings, we are by a country mile the most rational of all animals, so that reason might be said to be our distinctive or defining function. Just as leopards ought to excel at running if they are to count as good leopards, so human beings ought to excel at reasoning if they are to count as good human beings. If we aim instead to excel at running or jumping or making money, we have not properly understood what it means to be a human being. Thus, of one who boasted of his diving, Aristippus asked, “Are you not ashamed to be proud of that which a dolphin can do?”

As human beings, we ought at every moment to be rational and social. Unfortunately, we are all too readily waylaid by unwise attachments and the destructive emotions to which they give rise. These attachments dangle the promise of pleasure or happiness but really offer only slavery—whereas, if only we could see it, nothing leads to pleasure and happiness as surely as reason and self-control.

Today, most people think of ancient Stoicism (capital 'S') in terms of modern stoicism, that is, as the simple suppression or closeting of emotions. This misleading modern derivation originate in the sixteenth century and should not be confused with the much older philosophical movement. The Stoic is not without emotions, but, ideally, without painful or unhelpful emotions such as anger, envy, and greed. To be without emotion, were that even possible, would be to be reduced to the inanimate state of a tree or a rock, whereas the Stoic seeks, on the contrary, to exist and excel qua human being. Thus, the Stoics invited positive and prosocial emotions such as compassion, friendship, and gratitude, which pour out of Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations. Already in Book 1, Marcus praises his tutor Sextus of Charonea for being ‘free from passion and yet full of love’.

Those familiar with Stoicism often came to it in a crisis, but soon discovered that it is about much more than firefighting or even longer-term resilience building. While I was writing this book, a buttoned-up surgeon put me on the spot by asking how stoicism, the modern disposition, differs from Stoicism, the ancient philosophical movement. I ventured in reply, “stoicism today is about maintaining a stiff upper lip, whereas ancient Stocism is about seeking to maintain the ultimate perspective on everything, which then raises many interesting questions.” Unlike many modern interventions, Stoicism is not merely about feeling better, but about being better—which is, all considered, the surest way of feeling better, and not just better but better than ever before.

Stoic Stories makes the case for the continued relevance of Stoicism when applied to contemporary life, and does so in an engaging and illuminating manner. —The BookLife Prize

The Ancient Wisdom series

The best, most beautiful, and most powerful ideas of the Classical World.

The first three books in the Ancient Wisdom series survey a thousand years of Western intellectual history, from the rise of the Greek city states to the peak height of the Roman Empire. This uniquely fertile period, which encompasses the Golden Age of Athens, began in mystical, mythological thought, and culminated in the hyper-rational, hyper-practical philosophy of the Stoics.

The incipient Christian religion absorbed and adapted, and for a long time occulted, many ancient doctrines, which is why, despite their remoteness, they can seem so strangely familiar. In the late Middle Ages, the rediscovery of Plato fuelled the humanistic Renaissance, which pushed back against the Church.

The Renaissance was a time of great hope and optimism, which, in many ways, proved premature. Faith provides a compelling reason to live, and a compelling reason to be good, which, for better or worse, many people have lost. For all our progress in science, technology, and education, more than one in five adults are now suffering from some form of depression. It’s almost as if we’ve come full circle, minus the philosophy.

Might it then be time to look afresh at these ancient ideas and find in them a happier way of living? Might it be time, in other words, for a new Renaissance?