Between Heathenism and Christianity - College of Stoic Philosophers
Between Heathenism and Christianity - College of Stoic Philosophers
Between Heathenism and Christianity - College of Stoic Philosophers
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"<br />
Though<br />
Seneca:<br />
His Character <strong>and</strong> Environment<br />
We still hope to find a place<br />
for the scholar in<br />
politics, but we have given up the search so far as<br />
the ecclesiastic is concerned. Yet in Seneca we have<br />
a man who had mastered all the knowledge<br />
<strong>of</strong> his<br />
time; who was by no means an unsuccessful preacher<br />
<strong>of</strong> righteousness, <strong>and</strong> who, nevertheless, was a success<br />
ful courtier <strong>and</strong> statesman during part <strong>of</strong> his life.<br />
He might have been both to the ending <strong>of</strong> his days<br />
in peace, had it not been his fate to serve one <strong>of</strong> tinworst<br />
rulers that ever lived. The secret <strong>of</strong> his undy<br />
ing fame then is his ability <strong>and</strong> his whilom position<br />
at the court that ruled the greatest empire <strong>of</strong> the<br />
world.<br />
It is probable that the cause <strong>of</strong> his exile, at an<br />
age when he had as yet not written very much, so far<br />
as we know, was his prominence in a way that was<br />
distasteful to the emperor Claudius. While thenwas<br />
nothing in his past life or present conduct to<br />
justify putting him to death, his removal from Koni"<br />
seemed desirable to the reigning monarch <strong>and</strong> his<br />
most influential advisers. But even in exile Seneca<br />
was not a man calmly to permit<br />
his enemies to for<br />
get him; nor would his friends suffer him to be for<br />
gotten.<br />
Notwithst<strong>and</strong>ing his sudden elevation to a position<br />
<strong>of</strong> great importance in the empire, he seems never to<br />
have lost sight <strong>of</strong> the fact that he was st<strong>and</strong>ing on<br />
the edge <strong>of</strong> a precipice from which he might be<br />
thrust at any moment, <strong>and</strong> that he still had need <strong>of</strong><br />
all the consolation his philosophy could afford. Boissier<br />
rightly says,<br />
praetor <strong>and</strong> consul lie re-<br />
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