It is one of the surprising things in the history of mankind that the progress of the anti-slavery sentiment was so rapid when the cause of the slave had obtained a hearing before the bar of public conscience. Slavery had existed from time immemorial. The wrongs it condoned, the evils entailed upon its victims, attracted but little attention until the close of the last century. Within less than a hundred years after the agitation had begun there was not a slave recognized as such by law in Christendom. The contemplation of this fact may well teach political prophets to be careful in their predictions as to what will or will not happen in the future. * * * * * In the foregoing essay I have, for the most part omitted such biographical data as may be found in any encyclopedia, and have confined myself chiefly to a study of the society in which Seneca moved, and to a consideration of some of the leading characteristics of the age in which he lived. Every man should be judged by his times, for no man is uninfluenced by them. It is only men of the strongest character that rise far above the manners and thoughts of their contemporaries. Seneca was not one of these. Though endowed with a penetrating intellect and strong moral convictions he sometimes yielded to temptations against the protest of his better judgment. He compelled his intellect to sanction or at least to excuse conduct that he felt to be unworthy of the philosophy he professed and taught. Yet after making all due allowance for his shortcomings, I am persuaded that one cannot long study his writings and his career without reaching the conviction that among the great men of Rome none towered above him in moral grandeur and but few surpassed him in intellectual stature. If I may be allowed to express a personal opinion I do not hesitate to affirm that in the first thousand years of its history no more interesting and attractive character lived and died in the City of the Seven Hills than the philosopher Seneca. Footnote 1: It is a noteworthy fact that many of Rome’s great men were Spaniards, while many others were not natives of the city. Among the former were the emperors Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus and Marcus Aurelius. The two Senecas, Lucan, Martial and Quintillian were also Spaniards. Vespasian was born at Reate; Livy, in Padua; Horace, at Venusia; Virgil, in Mantua; Cicero, at Arpinum; the emperor Claudius, at Lugdunum; the two Plinys, at Comum, etc. Footnote 2: Seneca is generally regarded as the first Roman writer who used _caro_, flesh, as distinct from, and opposed to, spirit. The following is a list of Seneca’s extant works: _De Providentia_, (On Providence). _De Constantia Sapientis_, (On the Constancy of the Sage). _De Ira_, (On Anger). _De Vita beata_, (On a happy life). _De Otio_, (On Leisure). _De Tranquillitate Animi_, (On Peace of Mind).