Even
in his most oppressed days, he considered himself, by the grace of
heaven, to be more free--free in a far truer and higher sense--than
thousands of those who owed allegiance to no master's will. Whether he
had saved any small sum of money, or whether his needs were supplied by
the many who loved and honoured him, we do not know. He was a man who
was content with the barest necessaries of life, and we may be sure that
he would have refused to be indebted to any one for more than these.
It is probable that he never married. This may have been due to that
shade of indifference to the female character of which we detect traces
here and there in his writings. In one passage he complains that women
seemed to think of nothing but admiration and getting married; and, in
another, he observes, almost with a sneer, that the Roman ladies were
fond of Plato's _Republic_ because he allowed some very liberal marriage
regulations. We can only infer from these passages that he had been very
unfortunate in the specimens of women with whom he had been thrown. The
Roman ladies of his time were certainly not models of character; he was
not likely to fall in with very exalted females among the slaves of
Epaphroditus or the ladies of his family, and he had probably never
known the love of a sister or a mother's care.
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