ange and dissolution of all the elements
[himself]? for it is according to nature; and nothing is evil that is
according to nature."

The Physic of Antoninus is the knowledge of the Nature of the Universe,
of its government, and of the relation of man's nature to both. He names
the universe ([Greek: he ton hylon ousia], vi. 1),[A] "the universal
substance," and he adds that "reason" ([Greek: logos]) governs the
universe. He also (vi. 9) uses the terms "universal nature" or "nature
of the universe." He (vi. 25) calls the universe "the one and all, which
we name Cosmos or Order" ([Greek: kosmos]). If he ever seems to use
these general terms as significant of the All, of all that man can in
any way conceive to exist, he still on other occasions plainly
distinguishes between Matter, Material things ([Greek: hyle, hylikon]),
and Cause, Origin, Reason ([Greek: aitia, aitiodes, logos]).[B] This is
conformable to Zeno's doctrine that there are two original principles
([Greek: archai]) of all things, that which acts ([Greek: to poioun])
and that which is acted upon ([Greek: to paschon]). That which is acted
on is the formless matter ([Greek: hyle]): that which acts is the reason
([Greek: logos]), God, who is eternal and operates through all matter,
and produces all things. So Antoninus (v. 32) speaks of the reason
([Greek: logos])which pervades all substance ([Greek: ousia]), and
through all time by fixed periods (revolutions) administers the universe
([Greek: to pan]). God is eternal, and Matter is eternal. It is God who
gives form to matter, but he is not said to have created matter.
According to this view, which is as old as Anaxagoras, God and matter
exist independently, but God governs matter. This doctrine is simply the
expression of the fact of the existence both of matter and of God. The
Stoics did not perplex themselves with the in-soluble question of the
origin and nature of matter.[C] Antoninus also assumes a beginning of
things, as we now know them; but his language is sometimes very obscure.
I have endeavored to explain the meaning of one difficult passage (vii.
75, and the note).

[A] As to the word [Greek: ousia], the reader may see the
Index. I add here a few examples of the use of the word;
Antoninus has (v. 24), [Greek: he sumpasa ousia], "the
universal substance." He says (xii. 30 and iv. 40), "there is
one common substance" ([Greek: ousia]), distributed among
countless bodies. In Sto