Seneca - College of Stoic Philosophers

34 SENECAhad been accustomed to resort as the only wayof securing the disposition of the rest of theirproperty in accordance with their will and he;restored to the cities from which they had beentaken the statues which Caligula had broughtto Rome. Other measures, such as the prohibitionof Jewish ceremonies and the closingof public-houses, were of a more questionablecharacter.But the emperor's dull, timorous, and selfindulgentnature soon tired of well-doing ; acreature of habit, and dreading change of anykind, he fell ever more completely under theinfluence of his dissolute, cruel, and rapaciouswife Messalina, and of the freedmen to whosefaces he was accustomed, until at last he becamealmost as neglected and despised as he had beenbefore his accession. That no man isdespisedby others until he first despises himself,observation made by Seneca. Claudius despisedhimself and was comically conscious of hisweakness. Once when a female witness wasis angiving her evidence before the Senate, he said :'This was my mother's maid and freedwoman ;but she always regarded me as her master.I saythis because there are still some people living inmy house who do not regard me as their master.'The empress and the freedmen, by workingon his fears, were able to secure the condemnationof anyone whose estates they coveted orwhose designs they suspected ; and, by sellingoffices and justice, to amass huge fortunes forthemselves. The two ruling passions of Claudius