of self and of preserving one"s own vitality and activity, is the
primary element, intuitive and connate, to which all rational
preference (_officium_) was at first referred,--they thought it not the
less true, that in process of time, by experience, association, and
reflection, there grows up in the mind a grand acquired sentiment or
notion, a new and later light, which extinguishes and puts out of sight
the early beginning
While therefore (according to Peripatetics as well as Stoics) the love
of self and of preserving one"s own vitality and activity, is the
primary element, intuitive and connate, to which all rational
preference (_officium_) was at first referred,--they thought it not the
less true, that in process of time, by experience, association, and
reflection, there grows up in the mind a grand acquired sentiment or
notion, a new and later light, which extinguishes and puts out of sight
the early beginning. It was important to distinguish the feeble and
obscure elements from the powerful and brilliant aftergrowth; which
indeed was fully realized only in chosen minds, and in them, hardly
before old age. This idea, when once formed in the mind, was _The
Good_--the only thing worthy of desire for its own sake. The Stoics
called it the only Good, being sufficient in itself for happiness;
other things being not good, nor necessary to happiness, but simply
preferable or advantageous when they could be had: the Peripatetics
recognized it as the first and greatest good, but said also that it was
not sufficient in itself; there were two other inferior varieties of
good, of which something must be had as complementary (what the Stoics
called _praeposita_ or _sumenda_). Thus the Stoics said, about the
origin of the Idea of Bonum or Honestum, much the same as what
Aristotle says about ethical virtue. It is not implanted in us by
nature; but we have at birth certain initial tendencies and capacities,
which, if aided by association and training, enable us (and that not in
all cases) to acquire it.
