All specific bodies, whether animal, mineral, or vegetable, are composed of a godly matter. The human mind is also a fragment of god contained in the individual. By living in harmony with nature, the mind is able to direct a person into a life guided by correct reason. Everything that happens in the world is planned by fate. Just as everyone has a duty to live by reason, so everyone should learn to accept with courage and calm whatever circumstances the world brings. The notion of morality involves a life in accordance with nature and controlled by virtue. It is as ascetic system, which teaches perfect indifference to everything external. Nothing external can be either good or evil (Stanford). To Stoics, both pain and pleasure, poverty and wealth, and sickness and health, are supposed to be equally unimportant. Stoic Ethical teaching is based on two principles: first, that the universe is governed by absolute law, which admits of no exceptions; and second, that the essential nature of humans is reason. Virtue, is the life according to reason. Morality is simply rational action. It is the universal reason, which is to govern our lives. The definition of morality as the life according to reason was shared by Plato, Aristotle, and Stoics. The Stoics however, had a much narrower interpretation, which they gave this principle. Aristotle had taught that the essential nature of humans is reason, and that morality consists in following this. He did recognize that passions and appetites have their place in the human organism and did not demand their suppression, but merely their control by reason. The Stoics looked upon passions as essentially irrational, and demanded their complete extirpation. They envisioned life as a battle against the passions, which had to be completely annihilated. The Stoics did, in fact hold that emotions like fear or envy (or impassioned sexual attachments, or passionate love of anything whatsoever) a...
