Note 114 — Chapter X · ETHICS. THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF THE STOIC ETHICS. ABSTRACT THEORY OF MORALITY.

ἀρεταὶ πρῶται. Diog. 92; Stob. ii. 104. In stating that Posidonius counted four—Cleanthes, Chrysippus, and Antipater more than four—virtues, Diogenes can only mean that the latter enumerated the subdivisions, whereas Posidonius confined himself to the four main heads of the four cardinal virtues. Besides this division of virtues, another, threefold, division is also met with, see p. 56, 2; 57, 1, that into logical, physical, and ethical virtues. In other words, the whole of philosophy and likewise its parts are brought under the notion of virtue; but it is not stated how this threefold division is to harmonise with the previous fourfold one. A twofold division, made by Panætius and referred to by Seneca (Ep. 94, 45)—that into theoretical and practical virtues—is an approximation to the ethics of the Peripatetics. ↑