He was a native of Soli, Cilicia, but moved to Athens as a young man, where he became a pupil of the Stoic philosopher Cleanthes.

He created an original system of propositional logic in order to better understand the workings of the universe and role of humanity within it.

He adhered to a fatalistic view of fate, but nevertheless sought a role for personal agency in thought and action.

Ethics, he thought, depended on understanding the nature of the universe, and he taught a therapy of extirpating the unruly passions which depress and crush the soul.

He initiated the success of Stoicism as one of the most influential philosophical movements for centuries in the Greek and Roman world.

The linguistic orientation of Chrysippus' work made it difficult for its students even within the Stoic school.

[11] He was noted for intellectual audacity and self-confidence and his reliance on his own ability was shown, among other things, in the request he is supposed to have made to Cleanthes: "Give me the principles, and I will find the proofs myself.

[18] His desire to be comprehensive meant that he would take both sides of an argument[16] and his opponents accused him of filling his books with the quotations of others.

[19] He was considered diffuse and obscure in his utterances and careless in his style, but his abilities were highly regarded, and he came to be seen as a preeminent authority for the school.

[21] In the first account, Chrysippus was seized with dizziness having drunk undiluted wine at a feast, and died soon after.

[28][29] Though the earlier Megarian dialecticians – Diodorus Cronus and Philo – had worked in this field and the pupils of Aristotle – Theophrastus and Eudemus – had investigated hypothetical syllogisms,[30] it was Chrysippus who developed these principles into a coherent system of propositional logic.

[35] The first logicians to debate conditional statements were Diodorus Cronus and his pupil Philo.

[37] But Diodorus argued that a true conditional is one in which the antecedent clause could never lead to an untrue conclusion – thus, because the proposition "if it is day, then I am talking" can be false, it is invalid.

[39] Chrysippus developed a syllogistic or system of deduction in which he made use of five types of basic arguments or argument forms called indemonstrable syllogisms,[40] which played the role of axioms, and four inference rules, called themata by means of which complex syllogisms could be reduced to these axioms.

[30] According to Sextus Empiricus, Chrysippus held that dogs use disjunctive syllogism, such as when using scent to pick which path to run down.

First must come the impression, and the understanding – having the power of utterance – expresses in speech the affection it receives from the object.

"[65] Following Zeno, Chrysippus determined fiery breath or aether to be the primitive substance of the universe.

[67] The pneuma pervades all of substance and maintains the unity of the universe and constitutes the soul of the human being.

[73] If his opponents objected that, if everything is determined by destiny, there is no individual responsibility, since what has been once foreordained must happen, come what may, Chrysippus replied that there is a distinction to be made between simple and complex predestination.

[81]Thus our actions are predetermined, and are causally related to the overarching network of fate, but nevertheless the moral responsibility of how we respond to impressions remains our own.

[82] The one all-determining power is active everywhere, working in each particular being according to its nature, whether in rational or irrational creatures or in inorganic objects.

"[88] It is the guiding principle of the universe, "operating in mind and reason, together with the common nature of things and the totality which embraces all existence.

"[88] Based on these beliefs, physicist and philosopher Max Bernhard Weinstein identified Chrysippus as a Pandeist.

"[92] Firstly, he argued, following Plato, that it was impossible for good to exist without evil, for justice could not be known without injustice, courage without cowardice, temperance without intemperance or wisdom without foolishness.

[93] Thirdly, evils are distributed according to the rational will of Zeus, either to punish the wicked or because they are important to the world-order as a whole.

"[95] Chrysippus regarded bodies, surfaces, lines, places, the void and time as all being infinitely divisible.

In his Physical Theses, he stated: "for there is no other or more appropriate way of approaching the subject of good and evil on the virtues or happiness than from the nature of all things and the administration of the universe.

[109] Practice and habit are necessary to render virtue perfect in the individual – in other words, there is such a thing as moral progress, and character has to be built up.

[107] Chrysippus wrote a whole book, On Passions (Greek: Περὶ παθῶν), concerning the therapy of the emotions.

[110] Wrong judgements turn into passions when they gather an impetus of their own, just as, when one has started running, it is difficult to stop.