But, O maxims truly pompous! O affected insensibility! O false and
imaginary wisdom! which fancies itself strong because it is hard, and
generous because it is puffed up! How are these principles opposed to
the modest simplicity of the Saviour of souls, who, in our Gospel
contemplating His faithful ones in affliction, confesses that they will
be saddened by it! _Ye shall weep and lament_." Shall Christians be
jealous of such wisdom as Stoicism did really attain, when they compare
this dry and bloodless ideal with Him who wept over Jerusalem and
mourned by the grave of Lazarus, who had a mother and a friend, who
disdained none, who pitied all, who humbled Himself to death, even the
death of the cross, whose divine excellence we cannot indeed attain
because He is God, but whose example we can imitate because He was
very man?[77]
[Footnote 77: See Martha, _Les Moralistes_, p. 50; Aubertin, _Seneque et
St. Paul_ p. 250.]
The one grand aim of the life and philosophy of Seneca was _Ease_. It is
the topic which constantly recurs in his books _On a Happy Life, On
Tranquility of Mind, On Anger_, and _On the Ease_ and _On the Firmness
of the Sage_.
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