Considerations...

I can't help wondering how things might have been... The Stoics (who I am currently reading) were materialists and determinists, so we start with something in common. And their ethics appeal to me, being not dissimilar in some ways to Immanuel Kant.

Taking the determinist view without question for now, I've had reason of late to reflect on the Headmaster of my Grammar School, Dr W. No-one gets a Ph.D without academic ability, a lot of work, and without gaining a lot of knowledge. Yet at school I was one of many who found it hard to take him seriously and in later years I was very critical of him indeed. I shall never forget the morning of my 'O' Level Religious Knowledge paper. I turned the paper over, and found that the first two questions were in Greek – a long Greek passage and then a question about that passage. It had been part of the course syllabus that we learn New Testament Greek, and Dr W was supposed to teach us. Two of us boys were scheduled two lessons a week. At the start of the first of these the deputy head gave us our text books, Wenham's Greek Grammar and a Greek New Testament, and left the room. We waited for Dr W. He did not come to a single lesson in 2 years.

On another occasion I was accused by one of the masters of a minor misdemeanor, quite wrongly. He exaggerated the alleged – indeed fictitious - crime out of all proportion, and hauled me before the Head. Dr W refused even to let me speak in my defence, and issued a significant punishment. I have always had a fierce sense of justice, and I was deeply angered and offended by such treatment. As he was also a Justice of the Peace I became deeply sceptical of our criminal justice system, unfairly on the strength of one example, but that's schoolboys for you. I have nursed these criticisms for years.

I have often wondered how Dr W, who must have had a serious enthusiasm for and knowledge of Greece and the ancient world, came to miss the chance to pass it on to another generation. I found, in one of the books on Stoicism that I am currently reading, a reference to a work of his from 1931. The author of that work plainly took Dr W's scholarship seriously enough. His obituary in The Times speaks of his love of and enthusiasm for Greece and the classical period. He had, apparently, a detailed knowledge of the same Stoics that I am studying now. If he had seized that opportunity maybe I'd have discovered them over 50 years earlier – my temperament hasn't changed that much, so I think I would have been attracted. In those days I was a serious Christian believer, and I'd have seen even then the issues between Stoicism and Christianity. What kind of difference might that have made to my life path? Who knows? An academic career in the Classics in some way? Who can tell?

And then again, my indignation at Dr W's dereliction of his teaching responsibilities worked in my favour. When I was studying to become a clergyman I leapt at the chance to do a year of Greek on top of the curriculum requirements that no doubt greatly aided my New Testament studies and lead to some quite good results. And now, more or less 40 years on from those days, what remains of my Greek has helped me to get to grips with the Stoics, and motivated me to take a second go at learning Classical Greek now, to enrich this new opportunity. I can thank him for that then.

The Stoic teacher Epictetus would probably chide me on my attitude to Dr W. There was little in those events that was, in his phrase, “up to me”. What Epictetus would say I am in fact responsible for is my attitude, my decisions – all the rest was out of my control. Indeed, that's how it felt when I was a schoolboy, out of my control.

And the same is true of Dr W too. He would not have chosen to be headmaster of a North London Grammar School I'm sure. His vocation was to be an academic and to enjoy his enthusiasm for Ancient Greece. I have no idea why things worked out differently for him. A book he published in 1971 when he was retired was reissued as a paperback 20 years later, and a reviewer on Amazon gives it 5 stars. No doubt he regarded us as hopeless and helpless and no doubt he could not bring himself to waste his time and knowledge on us. Not, I think, the right decision, but given who he was, the assumptions he held about life, and so on, it is hard to see how he could have done differently, even if one can justly say that he should. No matter what brought him to being scheduled to give two Greek lessons a week to two North London kids he didn't have any regard for, his knowledge of the Stoics could have shown him a different path of action. I can imagine him looking at the timetable – he didn't normally teach at all – and groaning in anticipation of casting his beloved pearls before us swine.

I can no longer hold all that against him. What he did was not “up to me”. I am responsible now for my attitude and how I make my decisions – at least that's what Epictetus would say. And there are benefits. I am greatly enjoying my present study of the Stoics, I have learned some important lessons from them and the important thing is to make the most of these current opportunities, and not to regret past ones.