INTRODUCTION 



be accepted with some qualification. There seems room 

 for Ruhkopfs explanation (Q.N. Pref.) that Seneca's work 

 was, and continued to be, the sole fountain whence Natural 

 Philosophy derived its source and drew its supplies during 

 many centuries, " until Aristotle's books were transmitted 

 for public use into Western Europe." 



By the thirteenth century Aristotle had come fully into 

 vogue, and the references to his teaching in Dante (1265- 

 1321), said to number upwards of 300, show what a hold 

 he had obtained upon the greatest man of the age. The 

 " moral Seneca " is also known to Dante, and placed by 

 him in the same region of the unseen world (H. iv.), but 

 the references to his teaching are insignificant by com- 

 parison (less than ten). Dr. Sandys states (op. cit. 591 .) 

 that the references to Aristotle are mainly to the Ethics, 

 Physics, Metaphysics, and De Anima. 



But we are now on the eve of the Renascence, whose 

 "morning-star . . . arose in the person of Petrarch" 

 (pp. cit. 650), early in the fourteenth century (1304-1374). 

 Greek scholarship was reviving in the West, and Petrarch 

 studied the language in his later days. But his inspiration 

 was derived in the first instance from Latin, " the philo- 

 sophical works of Cicero and the moral letters of Seneca " 

 (op. cit. ii. 4). The latter he cites as many as sixty times 

 (ib. 7), and he was also familiar with the Senecan tragedies 

 (ib. 6). 



From this and from the general course of history 

 we seem justified in believing that during the Middle 

 Ages, in default of any general knowledge of Aristotle, 

 Seneca was the chief authority on Physical Science. 

 The views transmitted by him, for they were compara- 

 tively seldom altogether his own, having obtained currency, 

 found their way into literature, and probably went far 

 to colour the conceptions entertained on the subject 

 in all the earlier literature of Modern Europe. Later, 

 when Aristotle's works became more widely known, his 

 authority became supreme alike in philosophy and in 

 science. Nor does the temporary ascendancy of Seneca, 

 though historically very important, carry with it any pre- 



