Although Epicureanism taught that man’s highest good was pleasure, it was far from being a thoroughgoing hedonism, as I pointed out a little while ago. On the contrary its founder taught that the pleasures of the mind were superior to those of the body, and that the cardinal virtue of man was correct insight, that is to say, wisdom, virtue, and justice; and that these three factors—wisdom, virtue, and justice—were necessary for a pleasant life.[274] Such doctrine as this does not properly make for religion, but it does contribute to the welfare and comfort of society. Epicureanism was the most quietistic of the later philosophic schools and so was well adapted to the conditions of the later Republic and the early Empire. We have seen how Pythagoreanism in its revival had something approaching the Christian cult of the Saints, and made sanctity an ideal of human life as well as an object of admiration. Platonism never lost its own religious fervor and missionary zeal, but had indeed communicated them to most of the eclectic later schools. Yet of all the schools perhaps Stoicism made the largest contribution directly to the moral and indirectly to the religious life of the first two centuries of our era. The Stoic, like the Cynic, his doctrinaire and less effective intellectual cousin, at this time conceived of his task as that of a missionary to a lost world; he was a director of men’s souls. Speculation was by most regarded as unpractical and useless, save as it might help to elevate men’s minds and so contribute to their moral edification. Many of the aristocracy, whose wealth furnished only a splendid cloak for the disorder of their souls within, had in their houses philosophers who served as confessors and private chaplains—physicians to the soul. Such was Seneca, to whose real significance and merit we must not be blinded either by his own weakness or by the monstrosity of the emperor whose minister he was. He was a spiritual director, a confessor, and a guide to many of the aristocracy. His correspondence shows how he endeavored to build up his friends in virtue and moral strength, not by theoretical speculation as to the nature of virtue, but by wise instructions as to the practice of a virtuous life. Epictetus on the other hand was more of a preacher to the masses. Arrian occasionally gives us the dramatic setting of his master’s discourses, as for example: “When a man asked his advice as to the way in which he could persuade his brother to be no longer angry at him, Epictetus said,” etc.[275] These words show that the text of Epictetus’ sermons might often be furnished by the question of an individual, but the sermons themselves make it clear that any one who wished might hear the teacher. Seneca and Epictetus are simply the two examples best known to us of the philosophic director and the missionary, but it is clear that there were many of both classes. Their essential moral and religious teachings were in practical accord.