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The Art of Living

Four Roles That Shape Life

Massimo Pigliucci considers persona development.

The ancient Romans already knew what Shakespeare would later proclaim: all the world’s a stage. But the Stoics took this metaphor seriously in a way that might surprise us. When the philosopher Panaetius (185-110 BCE) spoke of us having four personae – literally the masks worn by actors in Greek and Roman theater – he wasn’t suggesting we’re all putting on a false face. Instead, he was proposing something more profound: that each of us plays four distinct roles in the drama of life, and that learning to perform them skillfully, without contradiction or confusion, is the key to living well. The catch? Some of these roles we choose freely, while others are thrust upon us by nature, chance, or circumstance. The art lies in knowing which is which.

Unfortunately for us, no works by Panaetius survive. But his theory of the four personae has made it to us through the writings of Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BCE), specifically in the first book of his De Officiis or On Duties. One of the best commentaries on this was published by David Machek in the journal Apeiron (49:2, 2016).

The fundamental question addressed by Panaetius is, What is appropriate to do in life? – that is, What sort of actions are conducive to existing in harmony with our fellow humans? The answer he proposed was: whatever accords with the four personae. Let’s then explore the four roles, as described by Cicero in On Duties:

• The first persona corresponds to our universal nature as human beings – which then meant, our rational and social natures. An ideal for a good life was to be reasonable in what we choose or reject; and the best course of action was briefly summarized by Cicero: “In every case… we should adopt this habit and should practise so that we become good calculators of our duties” (1.59).

• The second persona consists in our individual character and natural endowments. Cicero writes: “For some, as we see, their strength is the speed that they can run; for others the might with which they wrestle; again, some have figures that are dignified, others that are graceful” (1.107). These dispositions are not inherently good or bad, but they become so depending on how we use them – that is, depending on the choices made by our first persona.

• The third persona is determined by situations we find ourselves in, “which are imposed by some chance or circumstance” (115).

• The last persona comprises the kind of life and vocation that we freely choose – “who and what we wish to be, and what kind of life we want” (117).

According to Cicero the four personae are largely shaped by a combination of nature and luck (1.120). We don’t control either, which makes our choices all the more important, since they are the only things that truly are up to us, that allow us to have a say in who we wish to be and what we want to do.

But what happens if two or more of the personae come into conflict with each other? For instance, perhaps my role as a son (one I obviously did not choose) is going to be in tension – at least some of the time – with my role as a husband, father, friend, colleague, or teacher (all of which I did choose, given my character and my natural endowments).

A later Stoic thinker, Epictetus (55-135 CE), gives us a clear hierarchy of choices. So although the second, third, and fourth personae are subject to trade-offs that we need to negotiate depending on the circumstances, no matter what happens, we should never, ever subordinate the first persona to the others. This means we should always strive to behave both reasonably and prosocially, because those are the best aspects of human nature, and so naturally the ones we most wish to cultivate. Or as Machek puts it in his paper: “The core of our self is the universal rationality, while our individual psychological dispositions are somehow other to us, such that we are to use them as we use external and bodily circumstances” (p.166). This idea comes straight out of Stoic anthropology: reason belongs to our heritage as a species, and is therefore our most precious possession. Everything else about us acquires value depending on how reasonably (or not) we use it. Take, for instance, wealth, which most people consider uncontroversially a good thing. It is good if we acquire it properly (without committing injustice) and use it well (for example, to help others). But if we either acquire it improperly (for example, by exploiting others) or use it badly (for example, to corrupt a country’s politics) then wealth becomes a bad thing.

The broader idea that found Panaetius, Cicero, and other Greco-Roman authors in agreement, was that if we manage our four personae well we will achieve a smooth flow of life – just as the commentator Diogenes Laertius says in his Lives of the Eminent Philosophers (7.88). If so, it is well worth our while to ponder our multiple roles on the stage of life, and strive to play them to the best of our abilities.

Massimo Pigliucci is the K.D. Irani Professor of Philosophy at the City College of New York. His books include How to Be a Stoic: Using Ancient Philosophy to Live a Modern Life (Basic Books) and Beyond Stoicism: A Guide to the Good Life with Stoics, Skeptics, Epicureans, and Other Ancient Philosophers (with Greg Lopez and Meredith Kunz, The Experiment). More by him at figsinwintertime.substack.com.