Stoicism - College of Stoic Philosophers

STOICISM. 127CHAPTER IX.THE CAREER OF SENECA.The life and influence of Seneca fill so large a placein the history of Stoicism at Rome, that we may findat someit of advantage to dwell upon these topicslength, for they will serve to bring before us and toillustrate several of the leading questions connectedwith the spread of philosophy among the highersocial circles, and the practical value of the doctrinesof the Porch. We shall have before us one who wasno professional moralist, but a scholar and a statesman;familiar with the world of fashion, endeavouringnot only to shape his life by the Stoic rule, but tohelp others as a sort of spiritual director, too wide inhis intellectual sympathiesto be content with therigid monotony of Zenon's paradoxes, and also it mustbe owned too weak in moral fibre to escape somecompromise of principle and honour ; straining aftera high ideal which he confesses that he is very farfrom having reached, and tempering the hard formalismof his school with tones of tenderness andsympathy, and with the language of a religious feelingwhich rises at times almost to a Christian level, thoughits real spirit is essentially cold and self-contained,and alien to the graces of the Gospel. No Roman