Chapter XV. What Kind of Opinion the Stoics Profess Concerning God, and Concerning the Constitution of the Universe. From Arius Didymus

[ARIUS DIDYMUS] ‘THE whole ordered world (κόσμος) with all its parts they call god, and say that he is one alone, and finite, and living, and eternal, and god: for all bodies are contained in him, and in him there is no vacuum. For the name order (κόσμος)is applied to the quality of all substance as well as to that which has an arrangement of like kind consequent on the ordering (διακόσμηνσιν).

‘Wherefore according to the former rendering they say that the world is eternal, but as to its orderly arrangement created and subject to change at infinite periods past and future.

‘And the quality of all being is an eternal world and god; the name world (κόσμος)also means the system compounded of heaven, and the air, and earth, and sea, and the natures contained in them; and again the name world means the dwelling-place of gods and men, and of all things made for their sake.

‘For in the same way as the name city has two meanings, the dwelling-place, and the system resulting from the combination of residents and citizens, so also the world is, as it were, a city composed of gods and men, in which the gods hold the rule, and the men are subject.

‘There is, however, a community between them, because they partake of reason, which is nature’s law: and for their sakes all other things have been made. From which things it follows that we must suppose that the god who administers the whole takes thought for mankind, being beneficent, and kind, and friendly to; man, and just, and possessed of all virtues.

‘For this reason indeed the world is also called Zeus, since he is the cause of our life (ζῆν): and inasmuch as from eternity he administers all things unchangeably by connected (εἰρομένῳ)reason, he is also called Fate (εἱμαρμένην): and Adrasteia, because nothing can escape him (ἀποδιδράσκειν)and Providence, because, he arranges things severally for good.

‘Cleanthes would have the sun to be the ruling power of the world, because it is the greatest of the heavenly bodies, and contributes most to the administration of the whole by making the day and the year and the other seasons.

‘Some, however, of the sect thought that the earth was the ruling power of the world. But Chrysippus thought it was the ether, the clearest and purest as being most mobile of all things, and carrying round the whole course of the world.’

Let this extract then suffice from the Epitomeof Arius Didymus. But with reference to the opinion of the Stoics concerning God it is sufficient to quote the words of Porphyry in the answer which he wrote to Boëthus On the Soul,in the form following: [1]