a body in it
Which might be felt: that we, the poorer born,
Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes,
Might with effects of them follow our friends
And show what we alone must think; which never
Returns us thanks."

"All's Well that ends Well," Act i. sc. 1.

Though, if this will not fit the supposed date of that play, he may
have taken the idea from "The Woorke of Lucius Annaeus Seneca concerning
Benefyting, that is too say, the dooing, receyving, and requyting of
good turnes, translated out of Latin by A. Golding. J. Day, London,
1578." And even during the Restoration, Pepys's ideal of virtuous and
lettered seclusion is a country house in whose garden he might sit on
summer afternoons with his friend, Sir W. Coventry, "it maybe, to read a
chapter of Seneca." In sharp contrast to this is Vahlen's preface to the
minor Dialogues, which he edited after the death of his friend Koch, who
had begun that work, in which he remarks that "he has read much of this
writer, in order to perfect his knowledge of Latin, for otherwise he
neither admires his artificial subtleties of thought, nor his childish
mannerisms of style" (Vahlen, preface, p. v., ed. 1879, Jena).

Yet by the student of the history of Rome under the Caesars, Seneca is
not to be neglected, because, whatever may be thought of the intrinsic
merit of his speculations, he represents, more perhaps even than
Tacitus, the intellectual characteristics of his age, and the tone of
society in Rome--nor could we well spare the gossiping stories which we
find imbedded in his graver dissertations. The following extract from
Dean Merivale's "History of the Romans under the Empire" will show the
estimate of him which has been formed by that accomplished writer:--

"At Rome, we, have no reason, to suppose that Christianity was only the
refuge of the afflicted and miserable; rather, if we may lay any stress
on the documents above referred to, it was first embraced by persons in
a certain grade of comfort and respectability; by persons approaching
to what we should call the MIDDLE CLASSES in their condition, their
education, and their moral views. Of this class Seneca himself was the
idol, the oracle; he was, so to speak, the favourite preacher of the
more intelligent and humane disciples of nature and virtue. Now the
writings of Seneca show, in their way, a real anxiety among this class
to raise the moral tone of mankind around them; a spirit of reform, a
zea