from regard to others, do what he would not himself approve, did not
therefore cease to bestow their highest admiration on Diogenes’s
independence of wants, notwithstanding his eccentricities. [773] More
consistent thinkers even approximated to Cynicism in their moral
precepts, [774] and in later times a School of younger Cynics actually
grew out of the Stoic School.
[(b) Instances of Cynicism.]
Bearing, as the Stoics did, this close relationship to the Cynics, it
cannot astonish us to find amongst them many instances of the most
revolting traits in Cynicism. Their contempt for cultured habits and
violation of right feelings fully justify the righteous indignation of
their opponents. Chrysippus regarded many things as perfectly harmless
in which the religious feeling of Greece saw pollution, [775] and
pleaded in defence of his opinion the example of animals, to show that
they were according to nature. The care for deceased relatives he not
only proposed to limit to the simplest mode of burial, but would have
it altogether put aside; and he made the horrible suggestion, which he
even described in full, of using for purposes of nourishment the flesh
of amputated limbs and the corpses of the nearest relatives. [776]
Great offence, too, was given by the Stoics, and, in particular, by
Chrysippus, in their treatment of the relation of the sexes to each
other; nor can it be denied that some of their language on this subject
sounds exceedingly offensive. The Cynic assertion, that anything which
is in itself allowed may be mentioned plainly and without a
periphrasis, is also attributed to the Stoics. [777] By his proposals
for the dress of women, Zeno offended against propriety and modesty,
[778] and both he and Chrysippus advocated community of wives in their
state of wise men. [779] It is, moreover, asserted that the Stoics
raised no objection to the prevalent profligacy and the trade in
unchastity, [780] nor to the still worse vice of unnatural crime. [781]
Marriage among the nearest relatives was held to be consonant to nature
by the leaders of the School; [782] and the atrocious shamelessness of
Diogenes found supporters in Chrysippus, [783] perhaps, too, in Zeno.
[784]
[(c) Cynicism a theoretical consequence of Stoic principles.]
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