Seneca, Volume IV, Epistles 1-65

Seneca, Lucius Annaeus, born at Corduba (Cordova) ca. 4 BCE, of a prominent and wealthy family, spent an ailing childhood and youth at Rome in an aunt's care. He became famous in rhetoric, philosophy, money-making, and imperial service. After some disgrace during Claudius' reign he became tutor and then, in 54 CE, advising minister to Nero, some of whose worst misdeeds he did not prevent. Involved (innocently?) in a conspiracy, he killed himself by order in 65. Wealthy, he preached indifference to wealth; evader of pain and death, he preached scorn of both; and there were other contrasts between practice and principle. We have Seneca's philosophical or moral essays (ten of them traditionally called Dialogues)—on providence, steadfastness, the happy life, anger, leisure, tranquility, the brevity of life, gift-giving, forgiveness—and treatises on natural phenomena. Also extant are 124 epistles, in which he writes in a relaxed style about moral and ethical questions, relating them to personal experiences; a skit on the official deification of Claudius, Apocolocyntosis (in Loeb number 15); and nine rhetorical tragedies on ancient Greek themes. Many epistles and all his speeches are lost. The 124 epistles are collected in Volumes IV–VI of the Loeb Classical Library's ten-volume edition of Seneca. About the Author Lucius Annaeus Seneca the younger was born in Corduba (present-day Córdoba), Spain, around 3 BCE. He was the second son of three in a wealthy family. His father was a famous teacher of Rhetoric in Rome. Early in life, Seneca went to Rome with his Aunt, who was wife to the prefect Gaius Galerius, and there he was educated in philosophy in the school of the Sextii. His schooling was a blend of Stoicism and ascetic neo-Pythagoreanism. While in school he earned the reputation for being an excellent orator. Seneca experienced some ill health and followed his aunt to Egypt to recover. He returned to Rome in 31 AD, and began his career in law and politics.