INTRODUCTION 



praetorian guards. In these earlier years the young 

 Emperor gained a reputation for justice and moderation 

 which has thrown a halo round that golden quinquennium. 

 His tutor must in fairness receive a portion of the credit. 

 He seems to have been throughout imbued with an honest 

 desire to promote virtue and good government and to 

 check such vicious propensities as a youth with Nero's 

 antecedents was not unlikely to develop ; but whether the 

 means adopted were always unimpeachable seems more 

 open to question. Seneca's own interests were apparently 

 not neglected. In 50 he had been made praetor ; shortly 

 after he was raised to the consulship. Within the short 

 space of four years from his appointment as Nero's master 

 he had attained a position of commanding influence in 

 the State, and had amassed a colossal fortune (nearly 

 3,000,000 it is said). The latter he attributed to the 

 unsolicited generosity of his master, but his enemies and 

 detractors had quite a different version of the matter. 



For more than a decade after Nero's succession 

 Seneca's life is part of the history of the Roman Empire. 

 The philosopher had become, as it appeared, de facto king 

 and a new era seemed to have arisen on mankind. 

 Philosophers, it is true, have neither in ancient nor in 

 modern times shone in the sphere of action. The troubled 

 sea of practical politics is strewn with the wrecks of 

 philosophic reputations. Still, even before the age of 

 the Antonines, Seneca, if any man, might have been the 

 exception to prove the rule. He was a man of versatile 

 genius, he had had a practical training, he was a man of 

 affairs. The facts show that he had a true conception 

 of the necessities as well as of the duties of government. 

 But he was placed in an impossible situation. Agrippina 

 wished to rule her son, and her chosen means was 

 through his tutor. Nero, on the other hand, once he 

 had tasted the sweets of power, determined not to be ruled 

 by his mother, but to make her instrument his tool. The 

 condition of unstable equilibrium could not long continue. 



The conflict came to a head through a disgraceful 

 intrigue of Nero's about the year 59. Seneca had to 



