ABSTRACT
In third century BC Stoicism won adherents slowly and one by one, as individuals was convinced by the reasoning and example. Only a few years later, in 155 BC, the celebrated embassy from Athens, which included heads of three of the chief philosophical schools at that time, arrived in Rome. Diogenes of Seleucia represented the Stoics, Critolaus the Peripatetics, and Carneades the Academic school; and all three expounded their respective theories before enormous audiences. Panaetius may well be regarded as the founder of Roman Stoicism, and is of special interest to us as the writer of the treatise which Cicero has freely translated in his de Officiis. The virtual, though not nominal, successor of Panaetius was Posidonius of Rhodes, who after studying under Panaetius at Athens travelled widely, finally settling at Rhodes, and there took an active part in political life.
