Philosophical Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Vol. 2

PREFACE.

Furthermore, so that nothing would be lacking for the perfect understanding, correct estimation, and judgment of our philosopher's works, we have prefixed the Manuduction to Stoic Philosophy to the moral books, and the Physiology of the Stoics to the physical ones, namely the Natural Questions; these writings, Justus Lipsius, the foremost leader of commentators for illustrating the books of L. A. Seneca, consecrated to this task¹. Although these seemed to us most useful, or indeed necessary, we hesitated for a long time to add them to this edition, fearing that the bulk of the volumes would grow beyond measure; but since the authority of these writings is constantly invoked in almost all parts of the commentary, and the reader is referred to them to draw a deeper understanding, it could not be otherwise than that they be inserted here: for very few readers could or would have wished to acquire and constantly leaf through the entire collection of the works of J. Lipsius, of which they are a part. Nevertheless, so as to increase the size of this volume as little as possible, we have omitted many chapters that were less relevant to our purpose.

Finally, the testimony and judgment of the most renowned D. Diderot, from his book: Essai sur les règnes de Claude et de Néron, et sur les mœurs et les écrits de Sénèque, pour servir d'introduction à la lecture de ce philosophe, we have taken care to transcribe cautiously and prudently at the end of each book.

¹ Besides these two writings, Lipsius had intended to compose a third, namely on the Ethics of the Stoics, concerning which he himself says in the Introduction to the Reader which he prefixed to his Seneca: "I have poured out whatever was necessary (for illustrating the Philosophical works) in the three books of the Manuduction and as many of the Physiology; as many on Ethics remain, if God shall grant [me] the ability to polish and complete them." Death indeed prevented him from completing these books; for they appear nowhere in the collection of Lipsius's works. Nor can we mourn enough that these were not finished by such a great man, or at least published as they were. Their place, however, was filled as far as possible by many other things concerning the moral doctrine of the Stoics, and especially by Buddeus's Introduction to Stoic Philosophy (Leipzig, 1729), and Teidemann's System of Stoic Philosophy (written in German, Leipzig, 1776), which is cited very frequently in our notes.