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LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA.

Young Seneca was fascinated with the philosophical speculations of the Stoics, to which sect he became devoted. He even adopted the austere modes of life they inculcated, and refused to eat the flesh of animals; but when the emperor, Tiberius, threatened to punish some Jews and Egyptians for abstaining from certain meats, at the suggestion of his father, he departed from this singularity. In compliance with his father's advice, who urged upon him the necessity of devoting himself to some kind of business, he adopted the profession of an advocate.

As a pleader, Seneca appeared to great advantage, and consequently excited the envy of Caligula, who aspired to the reputation of an orator. Apprehensive of the consequences, he changed his views, and became a candidate for the honors and offices of the state. He was made praetor, under Claudius, but, being charged with a shameful intrigue with a lady of rank, he was banished to Corsica. Though his guilt was not satisfactorily proved, he continued for five years in exile; during which period he wrote a treatise on Consolation. In this, he seems to draw contentment and peace from philosophical views, and one would fancy that he was elevated by these, above the evils of his condition. Yet, unhappily for his reputation in respect to consistency and sincerity, history tells us that, at this period, he was suing to the emperor in the most abject terms for restitution.

Claudius at length married Agrippina, and Seneca, being recalled, was made preceptor of Nero, the son of Agrippina, who was destined to become emperor. From the favorable traits of character displayed by the pupil of the philosopher in the early part of his career, it might seem that Seneca's instructions had exerted a good influence over him. But an impartial scrutiny of the events of that period has led to the probable conclusion that he was a pander to the worst of Nero's vices. It is certain that he acquired immense wealth in a short period of time, and it appears that this was obtained through the munificence of his royal patron. The latter was avaricious and mercenary, and was likely to part with his money only for such things as ministered to his voluptuous passions.

The possessions of Seneca were enormous. He had several gardens and villas in the country, and a magnificent palace in Rome. This was sumptuously furnished, and contained five hundred tables of cedar, with feet of ivory, and all of exquisite workmanship. His ready cash amounted to about twelve millions of dollars. It appears certain that such riches could not have been acquired by means of Seneca's precepts; and the inference of many of his contemporaries, as well as of posterity, has been, that the virtue which appears so lovely in his pages was but the decorous veil of avarice, vice, and crime.

For a period after his accession to the throne, Nero's conduct was deserving of praise; but he soon threw off all regard even to decency, and launched forth upon that career which has made his name a by-word and reproach for all after time. Seneca, being accused of having amassed immense wealth by improper means, became greatly alarmed; for he knew the tyrant so well as to foresee that, under color of this charge, he was very likely to sacrifice him, in order to obtain his property. Pretending, therefore, to be indifferent to riches, he begged the emperor to accept of his entire fortune, and permit him to spend the remainder of his days in the quiet pursuits of philosophy. The emperor, with deep dissimulation, refused this offer--no doubt intending in some other way to compass the ruin of Seneca.

Aware of his danger, the philosopher now kept himself at home for a long period, as if laboring under disease. Some time after, a conspiracy for the murder of Nero, headed by Piso, was detected. Several of the most noble of the Roman senators were concerned, and Seneca's name was mentioned as an accessory. Nero, doubtless glad of an opportunity to sacrifice him, now sent a command that he should destroy himself.

It has been a question whether Seneca was really concerned in the conspiracy of Piso. The proof brought against him was not indeed conclusive, but it is obvious that his position might lead him to desire the death of the tyrant, as the only means of safety to himself; and Seneca's character, unfortunately, is not such as to shield his memory against strong suspicion of participation in the alleged crime.

Seneca was at table, with his wife, Paulina, and two of his friends, when the messenger of Nero arrived. He heard the words which commanded him to take his own life, with philosophic firmness, and even with apparent joy. He observed that such a mandate might long have been expected from a man who had murdered his own mother and assassinated his best friends. He wished to dispose of his possessions as he pleased, but his request was refused. When he heard this, he turned to those around who were weeping at his fate, and told them, that, since he could not leave them what he believed his own, he would leave them at least his own life for an example--an innocent conduct, which they might imitate, and by which they might acquire immortal fame.

Against their tears and wailings, he exclaimed with firmness, and asked them whether they had not learned better to withstand the attacks of fortune and the violence of tyranny. As for his wife, he attempted to calm her emotions, and when she seemed resolved to die with him, he said he was glad to have his example followed with so much constancy. Their veins were opened at the same moment; but Nero, who was partial to Paulina, ordered the blood to be stopped, and her life was thus preserved.

Seneca's veins bled but slowly, and the conversation of his dying moments was collected by his friends, and preserved among his works. To hasten his death, he drank a dose of poison, but it had no effect, and therefore he ordered himself to be carried to a hot bath, to accelerate the operation of the draught, and to make the blood flow more freely. This was attended with no better success, and, as the soldiers were clamorous, he was carried into a stove, and suffocated by the steam. Thus he died, in the 66th year of the Christian era.

The death of Seneca has been loudly applauded, and has sometimes been pronounced sublime; but this is owing to an ignorance of the time, and inattention to Seneca's own doctrines. With the Stoics, death was nothing; "It is not an evil, but the absence of all evil." This was their creed. With such principles, there could be no fear of death, and consequently, we find that courage to die--if it be courage to encounter that which is not an evil--was common in Seneca's time. "At that period of languor and luxury," says M. Nisard, "of monstrous effeminacies, of appetites for which the world could hardly suffice--of perfumed baths, of easy and disorderly intrigues, there were daily men of all ranks, of all fortunes, of all ages, who released themselves from their evils by death. How was it possible for them to avoid suicide, with no other consolation than the philosophy of Seneca, and his theories on the delights of poverty?

Viewed in this light, Seneca's death had nothing in it of the sublime: he yielded but to a fashion; he only practised what was common. If he sincerely believed his professed creed--that death is the absence of all evil--he neither evinced courage nor dignity; if he did not believe, then his conduct displayed but the skilful acting of a part, and under circumstances which mark him with the deepest hypocrisy.

It is impossible to deny that Seneca's works are full of wisdom, though they fall far short of the Christian's philosophy. In his treatise upon benefits, for example, we have the following passage:--

"The good will of the benefactor is the fountain of all benefits; nay, it is the benefit itself, or, at least, the stamp that makes it valuable and current. Some there are, I know, that take the matter for the benefit, and tax the obligation by weight and measure. When anything is given them, they presently cast it up--'What may such a house be worth? such an office? such an estate?' as if that were the benefit which is only the sign and mark of it, for the obligation rests in the mind, not in the matter; and all those advantages which we see, handle, or hold in actual possession, by the courtesy of another, are but several modes or ways of explaining and putting the good will in execution. There needs no subtlety to prove that both benefits and injuries receive their value from the intention, when even brutes themselves are able to decide this question. Tread upon a dog by chance, or put him in pain upon the dressing of a wound, the one he passes by as an accident, and the other, in his fashion, he acknowledges as a kindness. But offer to strike at him--though you do him no hurt at all--he flies in the face of you, even for the mischief that you barely meant him."

This is all just and true: it makes the heart the seat of moral action, and thus far coincides with the Christian's philosophy. But if there be nothing after death, what sanction has virtue? It may be more beautiful than vice, and consequently preferable, just as a sweet perfume is more desirable than an offensive odor. It is good taste, therefore, to be virtuous. Still, each individual may choose for himself, and without future responsibility, for all alike must share the oblivion of the tomb. The insufficiency of this philosophy to ensure virtue, is attested by the life of Seneca, as well as that of most of his sect. It resulted in the grossest hypocrisy; an ostentation of virtue, covering up the practice of vice.

VIRGIL.

It appears that all due attention was paid to young Virgil's education. He passed through his initiatory exercises at Mantua; thence he removed to Cremona, and afterwards to Milan. In all these places he prosecuted his studies with the most diligent application, associating with the eminent professors of every department of science, and devoting whole nights to the best Latin and Greek authors. In the latter he was greatly assisted by his proximity to Marseilles, the only Greek colony that maintained its refinement and purity of language, amidst the overwhelming influence of all the barbarous nations that surrounded it. At first, he devoted himself to the Epicurean philosophy, but receiving no satisfactory reason for its tenets from his master, the celebrated Syro, he passed over to the academic school, where physics and mathematics became his favorite sciences; and these he continued to cultivate, at leisure moments, during his whole life.

At Milan, he composed a great number of verses on various subjects, and, in the warmth of early youth, framed a noble design of writing an heroic poem, on the Wars of Rome; but, after some attempts, he was discouraged from proceeding, by the abruptness and asperity of the old Roman names.

It is said that he here formed the plan and collected the materials for his principal poems. Some of these he had even begun; but a too intense application to his studies, together with abstinence and night-watching, had so impaired his health, that an immediate removal to a more southern part of Italy was deemed absolutely necessary for the preservation of his existence. He fixed upon Naples, and visiting Rome in his way, had the honor, through the interest of his kinsman and fellow-student, Varus, of being introduced to the emperor, Octavius, who received him with the greatest marks of esteem, and earnestly recommended his affairs to the protection of Pollio, then lieutenant of Cisalpine Gaul, where Virgil's patrimony lay, and who generously undertook to settle his domestic concerns. Having this assurance, he pursued his journey to Naples. The charming situation of this place, the salubrity of the air, and the constant society of the greatest and most learned men of the time, who resorted to it, not only re-established his health, but contributed to the formation of that style and happy turn of verse in which he surpassed all his cotemporaries.

To rank among the poets of their country, was, at this time, the ambition of the greatest heroes, statesmen, and orators of Rome. Cicero, Octavius, Pollio, Julius Caesar, and even the stoical Brutus, had been carried away by the impetuosity of the stream; but that genius which had never deserted them in the forum, or on the day of battle, shrunk dismayed at a comparison with the lofty muse of Virgil; and, although they endeavored, by placing their poems in the celebrated libraries, to hand them down to posterity, scarcely a single verse of these illustrious authors survived the age in which they lived. This preponderence of fashion, however, was favorable to Virgil; he had for some time devoted himself to the study of the law, and even pleaded one cause with indifferent success; but yielding now to the impulse of the age and his own genius, he abandoned the profession and resumed with increased ardor the cultivation of that talent for which he afterwards became so distinguished.

Captivated at an early age by the pastorals of Theocritus, Virgil was ambitious of being the primitive introducer of that species of poetry among the Romans. His first performance in this way, entitled Alexis, is supposed to have appeared when the poet was in his twenty-fifth year. Palaemon, which is a close imitation of the fourth and fifth Idyls of Theocritus, was probably his second; but as this period of the life of Virgil is enveloped in a considerable degree of obscurity,--few writers on the subject having condescended to notice such particulars as chronological arrangement,--little more than surmise can be offered to satisfy the researches of the curious. The fifth eclogue was composed in allusion to the death and deification of Caesar, and is supposed to have been written subsequently to Silenus, his sixth eclogue. This is said to have been publicly recited on the stage, by the comedian Cytheris, and to have procured its author that celebrity and applause to which the peculiar beauty and sweetness of the poem so justly entitled him.

Full of gratitude for such favor, Virgil composed his Tityrus, in which he has introduced one shepherd complaining of the destruction of his farm, the anarchy and confusion of the times; and another rejoicing that he can again tune his reed to love amidst his flocks; promising to honor, as a superior being, the restorer of his happiness.

Unfortunately for Virgil, his joy was not of long continuance, for, on arriving at Mantua, and producing his warrant to Arrius, a captain of foot, whom he found in possession of his house, the old soldier was so enraged at what he termed the presumption of a poet, that he wounded him dangerously with his sword, and would have killed him had he not escaped by swimming hastily over the Mincius. Virgil was, therefore, compelled to return half the length of Italy, with a body reduced by sickness, and a mind depressed by disappointment, again to petition Augustus for the restoration of his estate. During this journey, which, from the nature of his wound, was extremely slow, he is supposed to have written his Moeris, or ninth eclogue; and this conjecture is rendered more probable by the want of connexion, perceivable through the whole composition--displaying, evidently, the disorder at that time predominant in the poet's mind. However, on his arrival at Rome, he had the satisfaction to find that effectual orders had been given in his behalf, and the farm was resigned into the hands of his procurator or bailiff, to whom the above pastoral is addressed.

The Sibylline Oracles, having received information from the Jews that a child was to be born, who should be the Saviour of the world, and to whom nations and empires should bow with submission, pretended to foretell that this event would occur in the year of Rome, 714, after the peace concluded between Augustus and Antony. Virgil, viewing this prophecy with the vivid imagination of a poet, and willing to flatter the ambition of his patron, composed his celebrated eclogue, entitled Pollio, in which he supposes the child, who was thus to unite mankind and restore the golden age, to be the offspring of Octavia, wife of Antony, and half sister to Augustus. In this production, the consul Pollio, Octavia, and even the unborn infant, are flattered with his usual delicacy; and the rival triumviri, though a short time before in open hostility, have the honor of equally sharing the poet's applause.

While Pollio, who seems to have been the most accomplished man of his age, and is celebrated as a poet, soldier, orator and historian, was engaged in an expedition against the Parthini, whom he subdued, Virgil addressed to him his Pharmaceutria, one of the most beautiful of all his eclogues, and in imitation of a poem of the same name, by his favorite author, Theocritus. This production is the more valuable, as it has handed down to posterity some of the superstitious rites of the Romans and the heathen notions of enchantment. Virgil himself seems to have been conscious of the beauty of his subject, and the dignity of the person whom he was addressing; and, accordingly, has given us, by the fertility of his genius and the brilliancy of his imagination, some of the most sublime images that are to be found in any of the writings of antiquity.

Augustus, having conquered his rival, Antony, gave the last wound to expiring liberty, by usurping the exclusive government of the Roman empire. To reconcile a nation, naturally jealous of its freedom, to this, seems to have been the grand object of Virgil, in his AEneid. This poem was begun in the forty-fifth year of the author's life, and not only displays admirable poetical genius, but great political address. Not an incident that could in any way tend to flatter the Roman people into a submission to the existing government, has escaped his penetrating judgment. He traces their origin to the Trojans, and makes Augustus a lineal descendant of AEneas. At the command of the gods they obey him, and in return are promised the empire of the world.

So anxious was Augustus as to the result of this poem, that he insisted upon having part of it read before the whole was completed. Gratitude, after threats and entreaties had been used in vain, at length induced its author to comply; and, knowing that Octavia, who had just lost her son, Marcellus, would be present, Virgil fixed upon the sixth book, perhaps the finest part of the whole AEneid. His illustrious auditors listened with all the attention which such interesting narrative and eloquent recital demanded, till he came to that beautiful lamentation for the death of young Marcellus, and where, after exhausting panegyric, he has artfully suppressed the name of its object, till the concluding verse:

"Tu Marcellus eris."

Having at length brought his AEneid to a conclusion, Virgil proposed travelling into Greece, and devoting three years to the correction and improvement of his favorite work. Having arrived at Athens, he met with Augustus, who was returning from a victorious expedition to the East, and who requested the company of the poet back to Italy. The latter deemed it his duty to comply; but, being desirous to see as many of the Grecian antiquities as the time would allow, went for that purpose to Megara. Here he was seized with a dangerous illness, which, from neglect, and the agitation of the vessel in returning to Italy, proved mortal, at Brundusium. Thus the great poet died on the twenty-second of September, nineteen years B. C, and at a period when he had nearly completed his fifty-second year. He expired with the greatest tranquillity; and his remains, being carried to Naples, were interred in a monument, erected at a small distance from the city; where it is still shown, with the following inscription, said to have been dictated by him on his death-bed:

Mantua me genuit; Calabri rapuere, tenet nunc Parthenope; cecini pascua, rura, duces.

In his will he had ordered that the AEneid should be burnt, not having finished it to his mind; but Augustus wisely forbade the destruction of a performance which will perpetuate his name, as one of the greatest of poets. It was, therefore, delivered to Varius and Tucca, Virgil's intimate friends, with the strictest charge to make no additions, but merely to publish it correctly, in the state it then was.

In person, Virgil was tall, and wide-shouldered, of a dark swarthy complexion, which probably proceeded from the southern extraction of his father; his constitution was delicate, and the most trifling fatigue, either from exercise or study, produced violent headache and spitting of blood. In temper he was melancholy and thoughtful, loving retirement and contemplation. Though one of the greatest geniuses of his age, and the admiration of the Romans, he always preserved a singular modesty, and lived chastely when the manners of the people were extremely corrupt. His character was so benevolent and inoffensive, that most of his cotemporary poets, though they envied each other, agreed in loving and esteeming him. He was bashful to a degree of timidity; his aspect and behavior was rustic and ungraceful; yet he was so honored by his countrymen, that once, coming into the theatre, the whole audience rose out of respect to him. His fortune was large, supposed to be about seventy thousand pounds sterling, besides which he possessed a noble mansion, and well-furnished library on the Esquiline Mount, at Rome, and an elegant villa in Sicily. Both these last, he left to Mecaenas, at his death, together with a considerable proportion of his personal property; the remainder he divided between his relations and Augustus,--the latter having introduced a politic fashion of being in everybody's will, which alone produced a sufficient revenue for a prince.

In his intercourse with society, Virgil was remarkable; his friends enjoyed his unbounded confidence, and his library and possessions in Rome were so liberally offered for the use of those who needed them, as to seem to belong to the public. Amiable and exemplary, however, as he was, he had bitter enemies; but their revilings only served to add lustre to his name and fame.

CICERO.

Marcus Tullius Cicero was born on the 3d of January, 107, B. C. His mother, whose name was Helvia, was of an honorable and wealthy family; his father, named Marcus, was a wise and learned man of fortune, who lived at Apulia. This city was anciently of the Samnites, now part of the kingdom of Naples. Here Cicero was born, at his father's country seat, which it seems was a most charming residence.

The care which the ancient Romans bestowed upon the education of their children was worthy of all praise. Their attention to this, began from the moment of their birth. They were, in the first place, committed to the care of some prudent matron, of good character and condition, whose business it was to form their first habits of acting and speaking; to watch their growing passions, and direct them to their proper objects; to superintend their sports, and suffer nothing immodest or indecent to enter into them, that the mind, preserved in all its innocence, and undepraved by the taste of false pleasures, might be at liberty to pursue whatever was laudable, and apply its whole strength to that profession in which it should desire to excel.

Though it was a common opinion among the Romans that children should not be instructed in letters till they were seven years old, yet careful attention was paid to their training, even from the age of three years. It was reckoned a matter of great importance what kind of language they were first accustomed to hear at home, and in what manner their nurses, and even their fathers and mothers spoke, since their first habits were then formed, either of a pure or corrupt elocution. The two Gracchi were thought to owe that elegance of speaking for which they were distinguished, to their mother, Cornelia, who was a very accomplished woman and remarkable for the purity of her diction, as well in speaking as writing.

Young Cicero experienced the full advantage of these enlightened views, in his childhood. When he was of sufficient age to enter upon a regular course of study, his father removed to Rome, and placed him in a public school, under an eminent Greek master. Here he gave indications of those shining abilities, which rendered him afterwards so illustrious. His school-fellows carried home such stories of his extraordinary powers, that their parents were often induced to visit the school, for the sake of seeing a youth of such endowments.

Encouraged by the promising genius of his son Cicero's father spared no cost or pains to improve it by the help of the ablest professors. Among other eminent instructors, he enjoyed the teaching of the poet Archias. Under this master, he applied himself chiefly to poetry, to which he was naturally addicted and made such proficiency in it, that, while he was still a boy, he composed and published a poem, called Glaucus Pontius.

When Cicero was sixteen years old, he was introduced to this place, with all customary solemnity. He was attended by the friends and dependants of the family, and after divine rites were performed in the capital, he was committed to the special protection of Q. Mucius Scaevola, the principal lawyer as well as statesman of that age.

Young Cicero made good use of the advantages he enjoyed. He spent almost his whole time in the society of his patron, carefully treasuring up in his memory the wisdom that fell from his lips. After his death, he came under the instruction of another of the same family--Scaevola, the high priest, a person remarkable for his probity and skill in the law.

The legal profession, as well as that of arms and eloquence, was a sure recommendation to the first honors of the republic; for it appears to have been the practice of many of the most eminent lawyers to give their advice gratis to all that asked it. It was the custom of the old senators, eminent for their wisdom and experience, to walk up and down the forum in the morning, freely offering their assistance to all who had occasion to consult them, not only in cases of law, but in relation to their private affairs. At a later period, they used to sit at home, with their doors open, upon a kind of throne, or raised seat, giving access and audience to all who might come.

It is not surprising that a profession thus practised should be honored among the Roman people, nor is it wonderful that Cicero's ambitious mind should have been attracted by so obvious a road to honor and preferment. But his views were not satisfied with being a mere lawyer. He desired especially to be an orator; and, conceiving that all kinds of knowledge would be useful in such a profession, he sought every opportunity to increase his stores of information. He also attended constantly at the forum, to hear the speeches and pleadings; he perused the best authors with care, so as to form an elegant style; and cultivated poetry, for the purpose of adding elegance and grace to his mind. While he was thus engaged, he also studied philosophy, and, for a time, was greatly pleased with Phaedrus, the Epicurean, who then gave lessons at Rome. Though he retained his affection for the amiable philosopher, Cicero soon rejected his system as fallacious.

It was always a part of the education of the young gentlemen of Rome, to learn the art of war by personal service, under some general of name and experience. Cicero accordingly took the opportunity to make a campaign with Strabo, the father of Pompey the Great. During this expedition, he manifested the same diligence in the army that he had done in the forum, to observe everything that passed. He sought to be always near the person of the general, that nothing of importance might escape his notice.

Returning to Rome, Cicero pursued his studies as before, and about this time, Molo, the Rhodian, one of the most celebrated teachers of eloquence of that age, coming to the city to deliver lectures upon oratory, he immediately took the benefit of his instructions, and pursued his studies with ceaseless ardor. His ambition received an impulse at this time, from witnessing the fame of Hortensius, who made the first figure at the bar, and whose praises fired him with such emulation, that, for a time, he scarcely allowed himself rest from his studies, either day or night.

He had in his own house a Greek preceptor, who instructed him in various kinds of learning, but more particularly in logic, to which he paid strict attention. He, however, never suffered a day to pass, without some exercise in oratory, particularly that of declaiming, which he generally performed with some of his fellow-students. He sometimes spoke in Latin, but more frequently in Greek, because the latter furnished a greater variety of elegant expressions, and because the Greek masters were far the best, and could not correct and improve their pupils, unless they declaimed in that language.

Cicero had now passed through that course of discipline, which, in his treatise upon the subject, he lays down as necessary for the formation of an accomplished orator. He declares that no man should pretend to this, without being acquainted with everything worth being known, in art and nature; that this is implied in the very name of an orator, whose profession is to speak upon every subject proposed to him, and whose eloquence, without knowledge, would be little better than the prattle and impertinence of children.

He had learnt grammar and the languages from the ablest teachers, passed through the studies of humanity and the polite letters with the poet Archias been instructed in philosophy by the principal philosophers of each sect--Phaedrus the epicurean, Philo the academic, Diodorus the Stoic--and acquired a thorough knowledge of the law from the greatest jurists and statesmen of Rome--the two Scaevolas.

These accomplishments he regarded but as subservient to the object on which his ambition was placed,--the reputation of an orator. To qualify himself, therefore, particularly for this, he had attended the pleadings of the greatest speakers of his time, heard the daily lectures of the most eminent orators of Greece, constantly written compositions at home, and declaimed them under the correction of these masters.

That he might lose nothing which would in any degree improve and polish his style, he spent the intervals of his leisure in the company of ladies, especially those who were remarkable for elegant conversation, and whose fathers had been distinguished for their eloquence. While he studied the law, therefore, under Scaevola, the augur, he frequently conversed with his wife, Laelia, whose discourse he says was tinctured with all the eloquence of her father, Laelius, the most polished orator of his time. He also frequented the society of her daughter, Mucia, as well as that of two of her granddaughters, who all excelled in elegance of diction, and the most exact and delicate use of language.

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