It holds a man straight, gives him strength and sustenance, and forms a mainspring of vigorous action.

"No man," once said Sir Benjamin Rudyard, "is bound to be rich or great,--no, nor to be wise; but every man is bound to be honest." [104] But the purpose, besides being honest, must be inspired by sound principles, and pursued with undeviating adherence to truth, integrity, and uprightness.

Without principles, a man is like a ship without rudder or compass, left to drift hither and thither with every wind that blows.
He is as one without law, or rule, or order, or government.

"Moral principles," says Hume, "are social and universal.

They form, in a manner, the PARTY of humankind against vice and disorder, its common enemy." Epictetus once received a visit from a certain magnificent orator going to Rome on a lawsuit, who wished to learn from the stoic something of his philosophy.