Nay, even if he had failed
_completely_, and lost his life in the attempt, it would have been
infinitely better both for him and for mankind. Even Homer might have
taught him that "it is better to die than live in sin." At any rate he
might have known from study and observation that an education founded on
compromise must always and necessarily fail. It must fail because it
overlooks that great eternal law of retribution for and continuity in
evil, which is illustrated by every single history of individuals and of
nations. And the education which Seneca gave to Nero--noble as it was in
many respects, and eminent as was its partial and temporary success--was
yet an education of compromises. Alike in the studies of Nero's boyhood
and the graver temptations of his manhood, he acted on the
foolishly-fatal principle that
"Had the wild oat not been sown,
The soil left barren scarce had grown,
The grain whereby a man may live."
Any Christian might have predicted the result; one would have thought
that even a pagan philosopher might have been enlightened enough to
observe it.
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