id
freshness of a contemporary, and if the criticism is sophistical, at
least the picture is admirably dramatic. Seneca's position as the
minister of Nero seemed exactly one of those cases which always excited
Diderot's deepest interest--a case, we mean, in which the general rules
of morality condemn, but common sense acquits.

[182] The first edition (1778) was entitled _Essai sur la Vie de
Seneque le philosophe, sur ses ecrits, et sur le regne de Claude et
de Neron_. In the second edition (1782) this was changed into _Essai
sur les regnes de Claude et de Neron, et sur la vie et les ecrits de
Seneque_.

Diderot, as we have already pointed out,[183] was always very near to
the position that there is no such thing as an absolute rule of right
and wrong, defining classes of acts unconditionally, but each act must
be judged on its merits with reference to all the circumstances of the
given case. Seneca's career tests this way of looking at things very
severely. His connivance with the minor sensualities of Nero's youth, as
a means of restraining him from downright crime, and of keeping a
measure of order in the government, will perhaps be pardoned by most of
those who realise the awful perils of the Empire. As Diderot says,
nobody blames Fenelon or Bossuet for remaining at the court of Lewis
XIV. in its days of license. But connivance with a king's amours,
however degrading it may be from a certain point of view, is a very
different thing from acquiescence in a king's murder of his mother. Even
here Diderot's impetuosity carries him in two or three bounds over every
obstacle. The various courses open to the minister, after the murder of
Agrippina, are discussed and dismissed. What, after Nero had slain his
mother, was there nothing left to be done by a firm, just, and
enlightened man, with an immense burden of affairs on his back, and
capable by his courage and benevolence, of bearing succour, repairing
misfortunes, hindering depredations, removing the incompetent, and
giving power to men of virtue, knowledge, and ability? If he had only
saved the honour of a single good woman, or the life or fortune of a
single good citizen; if he could bring a day of tranquillity to the
provinces, or cross for a week the designs of the miscreants by whom the
emperor was surrounded, then Seneca would have been blamed, and would
have deserved blame, if he had either retired from court or put an end
to his life.[184] T