Bibliograph

Moral essays, Seneca ; with an English translation by John W. Basore

Type

Label

Moral essays, Seneca ; with an English translation by John W. Basore

Language

eng

Literary Form

essays

Main title

Moral essays

Medium

electronic resource

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Oclc number

655393843

Responsibility statement

Seneca ; with an English translation by John W. Basore

Series statement

Loeb classical library online

Summary

In Moral Essays, Seneca (c. 4-65 CE) expresses his Stoic philosophy on providence, steadfastness, anger, forgiveness, consolation, the happy life, leisure, tranquility, the brevity of life, and gift-giving., 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. His moral essays are collected in Volumes I-III of the Loeb Classical Library's ten-volume edition of Seneca--, Provided by Publisher

Table Of Contents

v. I. De Providentia. De Constantia. De Ira. De Clementia -- v. II. De Consolatione ad Marciam. De Vita Beata. De Otio. De Tranquillitate Animi. De Brevitate Vitae. De Consolatione ad Polybium. De Consolatione ad Helviam -- v. III. De Beneficiis

Target audience

general

Contributor