ONE:Jeff called and signaled that all was ready. Larry summoned Sandy but the latter lingered, while Dick, a little sorry he had taunted so much, followed Larry toward the waiting airplane. But Sandy, scowling, hesitated whether he would go or be angry and refuse to join the Sky Patrol. Then, as he clambered onto the forward bracing of the under wing and leaned on the cockpit cowling, his face assumed a startled, intent expression.The principal improvements and changes in machine fitting at the present time is in the application of special tools. A lathe, a planing machine, or drilling machine as a standard machine, must be adapted to a certain range of work, but it is evident that if such tools were specially arranged for either the largest or the smallest pieces that come within their capacity, more work could be performed in a given time and consequently at less expense. It is also evident that machine tools must be kept constantly at work in order to be profitable, and when there are not sufficient pieces of one kind to occupy a machine, it must be employed on various kinds of work; but whenever there are sufficient pieces of the same size upon which certain processes of a uniform character are to be performed, there is a gain by having machines constructed to conform as nearly as possible to the requirements of special work, and without reference to any other.
TWO:Again, the Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics all pass for being absolute rationalists. Yet their common ideal of impassive self-possession, when worked out to its logical consequences, becomes nearly indistinguishable from the self-simplification of Plotinus. All alike exhibit the Greek tendency towards endless abstractionwhat we have called the analytical moment of Greek thought, working together with the moments of antithesis and circumscription. The sceptical isolation of man from Nature, the Epicurean isolation of the individual from the community, the Stoic isolation of will from feeling, reached their highest and most abstract expression in the Neo-Platonic isolation of pure self-identity from all other modes of consciousness and existence combined.
ONE:
TWO:We have now to consider how the philosophy of the empire was affected by the atmosphere of supernaturalism which surrounded it on every side. Of the Epicureans it need only be said that they were true to their trust, and upheld the principles of their founder so long as the sect itself continued to exist. But we may reckon it as a first consequence of the religious reaction, that, after Lucretius, Epicureanism failed to secure the adhesion of a single eminent man, and that, even as a popular philosophy, it suffered by the competition of other systems, among which Stoicism long maintained the foremost place. We showed in a former chapter how strong a religious colouring was given to their teaching by the earlier Stoics, especially Cleanthes. It would appear, however, that Panaetius discarded many of the superstitions accepted by his predecessors, possibly as a concession to that revived Scepticism which was so vigorously advocated just before his time; and it was under the form imposed on it by this philosopher that Stoicism first gained acceptance in Roman society; if indeed the rationalism of Panaetius was not itself partly determined by his intercourse with such liberal minds as Laelius and the younger Scipio. But Posidonius, his successor, already marks the beginning of a reactionary movement; and, in Virgil, Stoical opinions are closely associated with an unquestioning acceptance of the ancient Roman faith. The attitude of Seneca is much more independent; he is full of contempt for popular superstition, and his god is not very distinguishable from the order of Nature. Yet his tendency towards clothing philosophical instruction in religious terms deserves notice, as a symptom of the superior facility with which such terms lent themselves to didactic purposes. Acceptance of the universal order became more intelligible under the name of obedience to a divine decree; the unity of the human race and the obligations resulting therefrom242 impressed themselves more deeply on the imaginations of those who heard that men are all members of one body; the supremacy of reason over appetite became more assured when its dictates were interpreted as the voice of a god within the soul.375
