moral system are: first, the principle that we ought to follow Nature;
and, secondly, the supposed perfectibility of the ideal man.

1. Now, of course, if we explain this precept of "following Nature" as
Juvenal has explained it, and say that the voice of Nature is always
coincident with the voice of philosophy--if we prove that our real
nature is none other than the dictate of our highest and most nobly
trained reason, and if we can establish the fact that every deed of
cruelty, of shame, of lust, or of selfishness, is essentially
_contrary_ to our nature--then we may say with Bishop Butler, that the
precept to "follow Nature" is "a manner of speaking not loose and
undeterminate, but clear and distinct, strictly just and true." But how
complete must be the system, how long the preliminary training, which
alone can enable us to find any practical value, any appreciable aid to
a virtuous life, in a dogma such as this! And, in the hands of Seneca,
it becomes a very empty formula. He entirely lacked the keen insight and
dialectic subtlety of such a writer as Bishop Butler; and, in his
explanation of this Stoical shibboleth, any real meaning which it may
possess is evaporated into a gorgeous mist of confused declamation and
splendid commonplace.

2. Nor is he much more fortunate with his ideal man. This pompous
abstraction presents us with a conception at once ambitious and sterile.
The Stoic wise man is a sort of moral Phoenix, impossible and repulsive.
He is intrepid in dangers, free from all passion, happy in adversity,
calm in the storm; he alone knows how to live, because he alone knows
how to die; he is the master of the world, because he is master of
himself, and the equal of God; he looks down upon everything with
sublime imperturbability, despising the sadnesses of humanity and
smiling with irritating loftiness at all our hopes and all our fears.