272 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. [bOOK VII. 



of pliilosopliy, when being asked by Hiero who he was, lie 

 answered, " I am a looker-on ; for as at the Olynipic gamea 

 some come to try for the prize, others to sell, otht-rs to meet 

 their friends and be merry, but others again conu^ merely as 

 spectators, I am one of the latter." But men ought to know 

 that in the theatre of human life it is only for God and 

 angels to be spectators. Nor could any dcn/ot about this 

 Y matter have arisen in the Church, if a monastic life had been 

 '^merely contemplative and unexercised in ecclesiastical duties, 

 — as continual prayer, the sacrifice of vosvs, oblations to God, 

 and the writing of theological books, for propagating the 

 Divine law — as Moses retired in the solitude of the mount, 

 and Enoch, the seventh from Adam, who, though the Scripture 

 says he walked with God, intimating he was the first founder 

 of the spiritual life, yet enriched the Church with a book of 

 prophecies cited by St. Jude. But for a mere contemplative 

 life, which terminates in itself, and sends out no rays either 

 of heat or light into human society, theology knows it not. 



It also determines the question that has been so vehe- 

 mently controverted between the schools of Zeno and So- 

 crates on the one side, who placed felicity in virtue, simpk 

 or adorned, and many other sects and schools on the other, 

 — as particularly the schools of the Cyrenaics and Epicureans, 

 who placed felicity in pleasure;" thus making virtue a mere 

 handmaid, without which pleasure could not be well served. 

 <^f the same side is also that other school of Epicurus, as on 

 the reformed establishment, which declared felicity to be 

 nothing but tranquillity and serenity of mind. With these 

 also joined the exploded school of Pyrrho and Herillus, who 

 placed felicity in an absolute exemption from scruples, and 

 the allowing no fixed and constant nature of good and evil, 

 but accounting all actions virtuous or vicious, as they pro- 

 ceed from the mind by a pure and undisturbed motion, or 

 with aversion and reluctance.^ But it is plain that all thmgs 

 of this kind relate to private tranquillity and complacency 

 of mind, and by no means to the good of communion. 



" For an account of these sects, consult Ritter's "Geschichte der 

 Philosophie alter Zeit." 



o This opinion has been revived in the Anabaptist heresy, who mea- 

 sure everything by the humours and .'jistincts of the spirit and constancy 

 or vacillation of faith. £d. 



