 This sort of objection seems especially damaging for the Stoics, with their emphasis on agency and public participation. In effect Cicero argues that the Stoics can have their integrity, or their theory, but not both. They cannot express their doctrines about virtue in public contexts without incurring ridicule or incomprehension. What they are left with, according to Cicero, is hypocrisy: the use of ordinary language in public, their own language in their writings (4.22).