be never fo dark and palpable, we may yet affure our felves, that however Truth and Justice may fuffer a temporal Eclipfe, they will yet at the long run, as certainby vindicate themfelves, and recover their original Glo ry, as the fetting Sun fhall rife again, WHEN I Speak of my Morals, let me not be under flood to play the Plagiary, and to affume the Subject Matter of this Work to myfelf; for it is Seneca's, every Thought and Line on't: tho' it would be as hard to refer each Sentence, Text, and Precept, to the very Place whence it was drawn, as to bring every diftinct Drop in a Cafk of Wine, to the particular Grape from whence it was preffed. So that I have no other Claim to the Merit of this Compofition, than the putting of things in Order, that I found in Confufion; and digesting the loose Minutes, and the broken Meditations of that divine Heathen, into a kind of System of good Counfels, and of good Manners. But how faithfully foever I have dealt with my Author, in a juft, and genuine Reprefentation of his Senfe and Meaning, fo have I, on the other hand, with no lefs Confcience and Affection, confulted the Benefit, the Eafe, and the Satisfaction of the English Reader, in the Plainnefs and Simplicity of the Stile, and in the Perfpicuity of the Method. And yet, after all this, there is fomewhat ftill wanting, methinks, toward the doing of a full Right to Seneca, to the World, and to myself, and to the thorough-finishing of this Piece: a thing that I have had in my Head long and often, and which I have as good a Will to profecute, even at this Inftant, as ever; if I could but flatter myfelf with Day enough before me to go through with it. But before I come to the point under deliberation, it will do well, first to take a view of the true ftate of the matter in hand, upon Ground we ftand at prefent. Secondly, to confider from whence it is that we are to take our Rife to't; and fo to open briefly, and by Degrees, into the Thing itself. t. y, is e what THIS Abstract, I fay, is entirely Seneca's; and tho' little more in the Bulk, than the third part of the Origi nal; it is, in effect, a Summary of the whole Body of his Philofophy concerning Manners, contracted into this Epitome, without either overcharging it with things idle and fuperfluous, or leaving out any thing, which I thought didle might contribute to the Order and Dignity of the Work. As to his School-questions, and philofophical Difquifitions upon the natural Reason of Things; I have almost totally caft them out, as Curiofities that hold little or no Intelligence with the Government of our Paffions, and the forming of our Lives, and as Matters, confe quently, that are altogether foreign to my Province. I have taken the Liberty alfo in many Cafes, where our Author inculcates and enforces the fame Conceptions over and over again in variety of Phrafe, to extract the Spirit of them; and inftead of dreffing up the fame Thought in feveral Shapes, to make fome one adequate Word or Sentence ferve for all. But when all is faid that can be faid; nay, and when all is done too that can be done, within the compafs of an Effay of this Quality; tho' never fo correct in the kind, tis at the beft but an Abstract still; and a bare Abstract will never do the Bufinefs as it ought to be done. It is not one jot derogatory to Seneca's Character to obferve upon him, that he made it his Profeffion, rather to give Light, and Hints to the World, than to write Corpus's of Morality, and prescribe Rules and Meafures in a fet Course of Philofophy for the common Instruction of Mankind: So that many of his Thoughts feem to Spring only like Sparks, upon a kind of Collifion, or a ftriking of Fire, within himfelf, and with a very little Des pendence fometimes one upon another. What if thofe incomparable Starts and Strictures of his, that no Tranflator can lay hold of, fhall be yet allowed by the common voice of Mankind, to be as much fuperior to thofe parts of him that will bear the Turning, as the Faculties and Operations of the Soul are to the Functions of the Body And no way of conveying the Benignity of thefe Influences to the World, but by a Speculation upon them in Paraphrafe. In few Words; Seneca was a Man made for Meditation. He was undoubtedly a Mafter of choice Thoughts; and he employed the Vigour of them upon a moft illuftrious Subject: Befide that, that this ranging Humour of his (as Mr. Hobbs expreffes it) is accompanied with fo wonderful a Felicity of lively and pertinent Reflections, even in the most ordinary Occurrences of Life and his Applications fo happy also, that every Man reads him over again, within himself, and feels, and confeffes in his own Heart, the Truth of his Doctrine. What can be done more than this now in the whole World, toward establishing of a right Principle? for there is no Teft of the Truth, and Reafon of Things, like that which has along with it the Affent of univerfal Nature. As he was much given to Thinking, fo he wrote princi pally for thinking Men; the Periods that he lays most Strefs upon, are only fo many Detachments of one felect Thought from another, and every fresh Hint furnishes a new Text to work upon. So that the reading of Se neca without reading upon him, does but the one half of our Bufinefs; for his Innuendoes are infinitely more instructive than his Words at length, and there's no com ing at him in thofe Heights without a Paraphrafe. IT will be here objected, that a Paraphrafe is but the Reading upon a Text, or an arbitrary Defcant upon the Original, at the Will and Pleasure of the Interpreter: If we have all of Seneca's that's good already, there's no Place left for a Supplement; and the Animadversion will be no more Seneca's at last, than our Comments upon the Word of God are holy Writ,” A PARAPHRASE, 'tis true, may be loose, arbitrary, and extravagant. And fo may any thing elfe, that ever was committed to Writing; nay, the best, and the most neceffary of Duties, Faculties, and Things, may degenerate by the Abuse of them, into Acts of Sin, Shame, and Folly. Men may blafpheme in their Prayers; they may poison one another in their Cups, or in their Porridge. They may talk Treafon; and, in fhort, they may do a Million of extravagant things in all Cafes and Offices that any Man can imagine under the Sun. And what's the Objector's Inference now, from the Poffibility of this Abufe, but that we are neither to pray, nor to eat, nor to drink, nor to open our Mouths, nor in fine, to do a ny thing else, for fear of mere Poffibilities as dangerous as the other. 'Tis fuggefted again, that the Paraphrase is foreign to the Text, and that the Animadvertor may make the Author fpeak what he pleases. Now the Queftion is not the Pollibility of a vain, an empty, a flat, or an unedifying Expofition; but the Need, the Ufe, the Means, the Poffibility, nay, and the Easiness of furnish ing a good one: Befide that, there's no hurt at all, on the one hand, to countervail a very confiderable Advantage to all Men of Letters, and of common Honesty, on the other. A fhort or an idle Comment, does only dif grace the Writer of it, while the Reputation of the Author ftands nevertheless as firm as ever it did; but he that finishes Seneca's Minutes, with proper and reafonable Supplements, where he does not Ipeak his own Thoughts out at large, does a neceffary right both to the dead, and to the living, and a common Service to Man. kind. He does a Right to the dead, I fay, more ways than one: for over and above the Juftice and Refpect that is due to his Memory; it is, in a fair Equity of construction, a Performance of the very Will of the Dead. For all bis Fragments of Hint, and Effay, were manifeftly defigned for other People to meditate, read, and fpeculate upon: and a great part of the end of them is loft without fuch an Improvement; fo that the very manner of his Writings call for a Paraphrafe; a Paraphrafe he expected; and a Paraphrafe is due to him; and in fhort, we owe a Paraphrafe to ourfelves too: for the meaning of his Hints and Minutes, does, as well deferve to be expounded, as the Senfe and Energy, of his. Words Nay, and when all is done, whofoever confiders how he diver Gifies the fame thing over and over in a change of Phrase; how many feveral ways he winds and moulds his own Thoughts; and how he labours under the Difficulty of clearing even his own Meaning: Whoever confiders this, I fay, will find Seneca, upon the whole Matter, to be in a great meafure a Paraphraft upon himfelf., He gives you his firft Senfe of Things, and then he enlarges upon it, improves it, diftinguishes, expounds, dilates, &c. and when he finds at last that he cannot bring up the Force of his Words to the Purity and Vigour of his Conception, fo as to extricate himself in all refpects to his own Satisfaction, 'tis his Courfe commonly, to draw the Stress of the Question to a Point, and there to let it relt; as a Theme of Light that flapds effectually recommended to farther Confideration. This muft not be taken as if Seneca could not fpeak his own Mind, as full, and as home as any Man; or as he left any thing imperfect, because he could not finish it himself: But it was a turn of Art in him, by breaking aff with an &c. to create an Appetite in the Reader of purfuing the Hint; over and above the flowing of Matter fo falt upon him, that it was impoffible for his Words to keep pace with his Thoughts. BE this now fpoken with all Reverence to his divine Effays upon Providence, Happy Life, Benefits, Anger, Clemency, Human Frailty, &c. where he fhews as much of Skill in the Distribution of his Matter, the Congruity and Proportion of the Parts, and the Harmony of the whole in the Context, as he does of a natural Felicity, in adapting the Tendency and the Virtue of all his fententious Raptures to the use of human Life. So that he was evidently in Poffeffion of both Faculties (of fpringing Game, that is, and of flying it home) though he made Choice of exercising the one oftner than the other. There is a Vein in this mixture that runs through all his Difcourfes, whether broken, or continued; elbeit that there is no touching any Piece of his to Advantage, after he has finifbed it: there's room abundantly yet for Explication, and for Supplement in other Cafes, where he fnaps off fhort with a kind of Cetera defiderantur; and fo leaves a Foundation for those to build upon that fhall come after him. Now thefe independent Thoughts are the Touches that I would offer to a f farther improvement; and only here and there one of the most elevat ed, even of them too; which will amount to no more in the Conclufion, than a Difcourfe upon this or that Theme or Text, under what Name or Title the Expofiter pleafes. I would not however have the Comment break in upon the Context; and I would fo ferupaloufly confine it to the Bounds of Modefty and Confcience, as not to depart upon any Terms, either from the Intent of the Original, or from the Reafon of the Matter in question: This Office performed, would raise another Seneca out of the Afhes of the former: and make, perhaps, a Manual of falutary Precepts, for the ordering of our Pallons, and for the Regulation of our Lives, not inferior to any other whatfoever, the divine Oracles of holy Infpi ration only excepted. For it would reach all States of Men, all Conditions of Fortune, all Diftreffes of Body, all Perturbations of Mind; and in fine, it would answer |