Diogenes Laërtius · fl. 3rd century CE
Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.103 — Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
Translation by R. D. Hicks (1925)
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.103
Reported speech · Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
For as the property of hot is to warm, not to cool, so the property of good is to benefit, not to injure; but wealth and health do no more benefit than injury, therefore neither wealth nor health is good. Further, they say that that is not good of which both good and bad use can be made; but of wealth and health both good and bad use can be made; therefore wealth and health are not goods. On the other hand, Posidonius maintains that these things too are among goods. Hecato in the ninth book of his treatise On Goods, and Chrysippus in his work On Pleasure, deny that pleasure is a good either; for some pleasures are disgraceful, and nothing disgraceful is good.
Cite this passage
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.103 (on the Stoics), tr. R. D. Hicks (1925)
https://whatwouldstoicsdo.com/passage/lives-of-the-stoics/7.103
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Book VII, tr. R. D. Hicks (Loeb, 1925). Text: Perseus Digital Library (CC BY-SA 4.0). Sources and licences
In plain English
AI-written notesA real good always helps and never harms, and cannot be used badly. Money and health can be used well or badly, so they are not goods in themselves. Pleasure is also not a good, since some pleasures are shameful, though one Stoic thinker disagreed about wealth and health.
Older wording
- “On Goods”
- — the title of a Stoic treatise about what is truly good
- “disgraceful”
- — shameful, dishonourable
Themes and situations
- Wealth and poverty
- Virtue and character
- Pleasure and pain
- Money, status and wanting more
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