with all the studied ornaments of learning a good part of his life hee exercised in the Court where while the Princes ears were open to Philosophy his heart and hand were both unbent to him his favour and his noblenesse like rivalls striv'd which should with most devotion serve their Soveraigne but when debauchery usurp'd upon the Emperour the Tutor was devanced and disgraced In all these extremities Seneca in himself was so well poiz'd that neither the greatnesse of fortune could bribe him into riot the height of knowledge into pride nor the Courtier into flattery nor did he know any man great enough to make him lesse nor could his mind which Philosophie had plac'd above the World decline with fortune In his old age hee married Pompea Paulina a young faire and nobly descended Roman Lady a Lady of that worth that no Roman but hee that did enjoy her did deserve her Nero having let loose the reines of reason and himselfe to all licenciousnesse so tyranniz'd as if he did perswade himselfe that an Emperour was above the Law and must also bee without it what his will prescrib'd his tyranny did execute and so as if his actions were accountable to no power but his owne Among his chiefe and most remarked cruelties it is not the least hee exprest against his Tutor Seneca to him hee sends his Satellites to denounce his death the fashion of those times was when a person of qualitie was condemn'd to die hee was allowed the liberty to chuse his death and a time proportion'd according to the Emperours rage to dispose of his affaires but if his revenge flowed so high that it would brook no delay then hee enjoyd no time to doe any thing but die if the condemned resisted his decrees then he commonly appointed that by some slave hee should bee barbarously murdered but the nobler Romans held it nearer way to honour with their owne hands to anticipate their fates and in unhappinesse staid not the enforcement of tyranny or nature Seneca with an undaunted looke receiving the sentence of his death called for inke and paper to write his last Will and Testament which the Captaine denying him he turn'd about and then bespake his friends You see my loving friends said hee I cannot gratifie your affections with my fortunes I must therefore leave you my life and my Philosophy to enrich your minds with the invaluable and nere-to-be-depriv'd-of treasure of precept and example I shall desire you by all the tyes of friendship and by the glory you shall purchase by it to endeare my life and death which shall not staine the honour of my life unto your memory then gently reproving them who seem'd too sorrowfull hee said to what other purpose have I furnished you with precepts of Philosophie then to arme your minds against the assaults of Fortune Is Nero's tyrannie unknowne to you What man is Master of his owne life under him that massacred his Brother that us'd upon his Mother that cruelty which never yet knew name Then hee turn'd him to Paulina in whom sorrow had sweld it selfe so high that rather then break out it threatned to break her heart My Deare said hee I am now going to act what I have long taught my houre is come and nothing so welcome to me as my death now I am unloaded of this flesh that clogs my soule I shall with more ease ascend unto eternity to enjoy a condition without a change an happinesse without a period wherefore my dearest Paulina forbeare thy too immoderate passion lest thy grief disgrace my end and thou seem to value my death above mine honour enjoy thy youth but still retaine those seeds of vertue â—herewith thy mind is â—â—chly stored I confesse for thy sake I could bee content to live when I consider that in my breast lives a young Lady to whom my life may bee advantage Paulina's love now raising up her courage and her courage her dejected spirit Think not Seneca said she that like your Physitian I will leave you when the hope of life forsakes you but I will follow like your Wife your fortune This resolve shall tell you how much your life and doctrine hath availed your Paulina When can I die well but then when I cannot live well When I am bereft of thee in whom all my joyes are so wealthily summ'd up that thy losse will make my life my greatest curse then will I die in honour and think it fitter for my fame then linger out my life in sorrow Trust mee my Paulina said Seneca I cannot but admire thy love knowing from what height of vertue it proceeds as I will not envie thee thy death so I wish a glory may await thy end great as the constancie that advanc'd thee to it Then he commanded his Surgeon to cut the veins of both their armes that they might bleed to death but Seneca's veines shrunk up through age and abstinence denyed his bloud a speedy course therefore his thighs were also launced but lest his pains might insinuate too farre into Paulina's torments and a new addition of sorrow meeting with her losse of bloud might make her faint hee sought to mitigate her feares by the discourse of death Why should said he this monster nothing so affright us while we are living wee are dying for life is but a dying being when we are dead wee are after death where then or what is death It is that inconsiderable atome of time that divides the body from the soule what is it then in this afflicts us Not the rarity for all the world that is not gone before will follow us is it the separation and tyed to that the jealousie how we shall bee dealt with upon this hinge I confesse turnes the wickeds fear but the Stoick whom Philosophy hath taught the art of living well death frees from misery and wafts him to the haven of his happinesse For this necessity of death wee are bound to thank the Gods for it redeems from a worse of being eternally miserable The separation as it is naturall so it is the only meanes conducing to our better being The body being the corruptible and ponderous part falls naturally to the earth whence it was first elemented the soul etheriall gaines by this losse for being purg'd from the drosse of weight and of corruption is made heavens richest ore so refin'd that the great Gods image may bee stamp'd upon it and ascends unto the skies from whence it first descended Nor doe I hold this dis-junction to be eternal for when the world by the revolution of times and ages whirls about into her first Chaos then shall they meet again never to bee sundred The soul shal be so purified by the immortall Gods that it shall neither hope nor feare nor grieve that it shall bee freed from all those discording passions and affections that here transport it from it selfe The body so spirited that it shall know no necessity of nourishment and therefore
griev'd her not that it was gone but returned she thus bespake them You see how vainly you imploy your care to keep a prisoner that will be free you may make mee die with more paine and lesse honour but not to die at all this is beyond your power whilst I wear a hand commanded by a heart that knowes no feare I shall not despaire of death nor shall I long protract a loathed breath in such wretched times that make life but the nursery of sorrowes and seminary of misfortunes Some few dayes she wasted in comforting and condoling with her friends the generall calamities wherein the most vertuous were involv'd under that monster of men Nero then tyrannizing Then she retired into Paetus lodging and there thus spake her last The soule imprison'd in a necessity of being miserable must break through all fence of nature into an honourable end This very precept nature her selfe imprinteth in us shee denyeth not the iron-bound Slave a death to free him from the toylsome Oare doth she deny the Sun-scorch'd Pilgrim his nights sleep no nor the world-beaten man his eternall rest Surely then shee allowes us to shake off her interest when we are sunke below her succour Paetus thy life is not link'd to nature but to fame fall then by thine owne sword and thy spirit wound up in thine honour mounts to the Palaces of the immortall Gods If thou faintest under so brave a resolution or enviest thy selfe the glory of thy end know that ere two dayes expire thou thy selfe expirest but how by whose hands beheaded by a base hangman offered up a tame sacrifice to insated tyranny Awake the Roman in thee shall high Paetus whom when the World unworthy of his Vertue ingratefully flung off claspe broken hopes and fortunes to save himselfe with the shipwrack of his fame shall hee to whom thousand servile necks did bow stoop to the basenesse to beg life while his death is in his hands Cato and Scipio whom this age is more prone to adore then admire held it not honourable to begg life though they might expect more from Caesars Vertue But what canst thou hope for from a Tyrant abjur'd by all the Vertues one that approves nothing in Soveraigntie but Power and that guided by Passion to insatiate revenge Then as if shee had distrusted her Husbands spirit shee drew out the poyniard from his side Paetus said shee how I have not entertain'd life nor death but for thy sake this last act of honour be my witnesse Doe this Paetus then she plung'd the dagger into her heart and having drawne it out shee delivered it to him againe trust my departing breath Paetus said shee not the wound it gives mee but thee afflicts mee There died the noble Arria there did that soule flie to eternity that soule that was too great to owe her liberty to any power but to her owne Paetus blushing to be indebted to a president for his death especially his Wife took to him the dagger that was so lately guilded in his Arria's bloud and with these words hastned to his end Had fortune answered my resolution and crown'd my enterprize with happinesse I had entered Rome envied by the most noble not pitied by the basest I now see how the successe of humane affaires depends not upon valour but uncertain fates and our actions elevated by the height of spirit do but intrench us deeper into misery But though I am bereft of all the advantages of fortune and of honour yet am I Master of a mind unconquered over which nor Tyrannie nor Fate shall triumph Then embracing her dead hee sigh'd and said Pardon blest spirit my too long absence from thee I have borrowed this little leave of life but to admire thy Vertue which being above my wonder I must soare unto that height where it is ascended to search out her true perfection Pardon my soule that she ascends not to thee in an extasie faine would shee but this dagger claimes her liberty that gave thee thine Then he thrust it into his heart and there the dagger acted his last and most faithfull service slew his Master Pro Arria THE first Being tyed the first two into one and formed two different sexes into one body and one soule the bodies by alternate use so proprietated not to one but both the soules so sympathizing in affections and in passions as both became one to both They that keep this mystery inviolable know no outward respects of power to divide them into two If Paetus be unhappy Arria is unfortunate Paetus is doom'd to die and shall Arria live to see him slaine Hath hee outliv'd his hopes and can shee hope to outlive him But why would she die was the feare of the Emperours cruelty mingled in her cause What feares she that feares not death what Emperour is cruell to her that dares die what cruelty is to be parallel'd to that which bereft her of her life It was Paetus slew her Paetus had Arria liv'd Paetus had not slaine himselfe therefore Arria died died because Paetus should die Oh unheard of cruelty oh unparallel'd affection Arria died because Paetus could not live Paetus by death redeem'd himself from what was worse than death from torture Arria redeem'd her honour and her Paetus from torture and dishonour Fortune made her miserable that Vertue might make her happie her faith so firmly tyed her love that death could not undo it with her life Her fortunes were so ingrafted in her Paetus that with his they did bud flourish and wither Her life was fastned to his strings of life with him she liv'd with him she died Contra Arriam THrough what forbidden pathes doth passion hurrie us when once our reason is unseated Arria would die rather then bee led in triumph did death redeem her No death was but fortunes headsman to execute her she had condemn'd The Emperors power extended no faerther then to afflict her withred body not able to endure this weak revenge shee yeelded up her mind a triumph to her fortune and her selfe unto her sorrow If fear did not surprize her then engag'd in Paetus treason she was her own wrack and torture scorning all Executioners but her self Who then condemns her death when it was due to justice But what law exacts of her this justice The Gods forbid her to kill another much more her self being nearer to her selfe than any other Nature by her law claims life as her due debt payable when shee demands it If she died because Paetus should die shee did but invite him to her rage not to her vertue But I think fear the common defect of Nature in women depriv'd her of her life for death appeard so accoutred in the terrours of wrack and hangman that she died for fear of death PAVLINA LVcius Annaeus Seneca the Philosopher and Tutor to Nero the Emperour was Lord of great Revenues to which his vertue not his fortune was his title his mind was richly embroydered
no weight alteration or mortality Of great consequence then is death to our wel-being since before it wee can account none happy we see it end all miseries we see it make none miserable why then should we feare it or condemne it What have the wisest thought it but the Port wee all must touch He that scarce arrives at half a man hath as little to quarrell at his fate as hee that in a weeke reacheth his haven whereas by the troubled winds he might bee bound up in the more troubled seas a year Nor is hee that is his owne death being condemn'd to die shipwrack'd even at the very shoare for honour and the Emperour allow the liberty and to die by the most abject of men an hangman is to die dishonourable For this boone I gratulate the Gods but more that they are pleas'd to call the perfect Seneca unto their joyes the Seneca that hath not yet outliv'd himselfe nor return'd into his infancy There Paulina not through feare knowing none but what proceeded from her love but through decaying nature fainted therefore Seneca taking his leave caus'd her to be remov'd into the next chamber In Seneca all these incisions were not of force to force out life he therefore commanded his Physitian to poyson him but wanting naturall heat to convey it to his heart the poyson was rather a nourishment then a destruction to his nature then he was laid in warme bathes by this forc'd heat the poyson in his full source and violence raged in his witherd body While he had life he discours'd freely of life and death his end approaching all bloudy in his bath hee bath'd his head and said I vow this to Iupiter the Deliverer Nature at the last conquerd by those strong assaults yeelded up her Fort which weaknesse had so song fortified to death her common enemy So liv'd the famous Seneca and so hee died that with the Gods his soul 's immortaliz'd with the world his fame Nero informed of Paulina for whom hee seem'd much troubled for though pitie had no entrance at his yron breast yet feare the Tyrants tyrant â—old him that her death being one of the most nobly allyed in Rome would make his tyranny and hate the greater hee therefore sent with all possible speed to recall her life now posting to her stage and entring the dark confines of death Her servants receiving the command unbound her and clos'd up her incisions she more than halfe dead devoyd of sense thus against her will return'd unto her life and very honourably for that of life shee lost did witnesse to the world that nothing but want of power restrain'd her from her death Pro Paulina PAulina when Seneca was condemn'd to die would die her selfe was ever constancie raisd higher in a womans breast She did not die there shee exprest the true valour that derives it selfe from vertue and that spirit that issues from the truest honour That shee would but could not die are both Nero's act that shee could live or die her owne That she was Mistris of her fortune witnesse that shee did live how she valued her Husbands death that shee would die Fame and vertue did both attend her in the progresse of her actions had she died it had been thought the wretched times had interest in her end but in her life shee conquer'd the extremities of life and death The rule of vertue ties us to live so long as we ought not as we list then is the fittest time to die when we can live no longer To die is at the height but like a Roman but to dare to live when life is tedious this is as much above the Roman as the true substance of vertue that false shade of honour Had shee then died she had acted but the Roman but she liv'd to exceed the noblest of all Romans but her selfe Contra Paulinam VVHY revolted shee from her resolve when Seneca himself allowed it Did hee teach her so to live that shee durst not die or did shee distrust his happinesse that shee would not follow him Shee had too much of death to have more and those pangs so much endeared her to her life that she would live at any rate rather then break through fleeting torments into honour While Seneca was yet alive she was dying he dead she return'd to life Was her life vowed to him when his death reviv'd her Nero call'd her back the greater was her shame to take Sanctuary in her Husbands murtherer Sure death was far more terrible then Seneca did speak it she fled to a most inhumane Tyrant for protection Seneca did not force her to die nor Nero to live one day gave her her liberty she had as much strength as life and that little power she could use was able to force out that little life she did detain She would dy in the extremity of sorrow for her husbands fate but she did live to repent her both of her sorrow and her death LVCRECIA WHen Rome in the glory of her active Spirits had prest out her youth more ambitious of honour then life for the common exployt the siege of Ardea Sextus Tarquinius entertain'd the night with the Roman Nobility in the pride of luxury and riot The ruines of Kingdomes were sacrificed to Bacchus the sea and land plow'd up to appease ingenuous gluttony They as frolick as youth and wine that made them so unlock the treasures of their hearts their Wives and their beauties to the admiration of unsound eares But Collatine the most justly prodigall of his Wives fame tels them nor Italy nor the World holds her that stands in parallell of wonder with the faire and vertuous Lucrecia Tarquin divided between astonishment and rage that Collatine his servant should be his Soveraigne in happinesse mounted upon the wings of lust and fury flies to Rome where his eyes having encountred the Idoll of his heart and he the noone of night to enjoy it with his sword and taper breaks into her chamber into her presence shee affrighted at the sword and blasted by the light that lust gave life to trembling like a prey with more horrour then attention hears him thus bespeak her Madam wonder not at my unlookt for arrivall at Collatium or at this visit so unseasonable but applaud the wonder of your beauty the silent night will speak my purpose when in my restlesse bed a flame kindled from your fair eyes burn'd through my soule consum'd my Countries service my hopes of honour then which nothing but your faire selfe is so near unto my thoughts Let not the slave Fear intrude upon your princely breast nor this steele divorce those Roses from the Lilies drawne to hew out a way through all obstacles to encounter Paradise The same love that arm'd those eyes with Lightning armes these hands with Thunder bids them grapple with great Iove were hee rivall in my affection This night I must enjoy thee Lucrecia or on thy name engrave an
must sheath thee againe Where In this guiltlesse breast of mine Call up thy too degenerous spirit Of what bravery can it accuse the act Thou murdrest a poor innocent maid Shall posteritie brand mee with that weaknesse Shall it say that not able to stand under the miseries of life I was press'd down by the hard extremity of fortune to despaire to death No my tide of furie flowes into another channell here is a revenge fit for thy spirit fit for thine arme thine honour shall bee proud to riot in his bloud whose bloud would riot in thine honour Thus then I shake off woman and her frailtie thus doe I strangle the monster lust that revels in thy veines and to complete my vengeance send thy sin-surfetted soule into the land of endlesse night where it hath already tane sure footing With that her spirit restlesse in the revenge of words eager of action directed her arme which gave Amalius so fatall a wound that it seem'd her hot-metled fury was bridled with exactest discretion and nothing wanted the attempt but passion Bravest Theutilla sooner shall the Fathers bowels bee silent at the sight of his long unseen Sonne then posterity forget thy name Amalius now miserably groaning now miserably opening his eyes to shut them againe more miserably had little more of life then what could give her life in appeasing the fury of his servants that rushed in to her destruction What means said he is Chaos of confounding noise this unwelcome Traine to the more unwelcome Pomp of death Whither rush yee yee betrayers of innocence yee servants of nothing but my lust Oh may mine infamie find a grave as soone as life and you sooner that the world may want a witnesse of it I conjure you by the relation that ties you to my commands and this last spare her life whose chastitie the Gods are pleas'd to spare Then to make a minute of his life famous hee contemplated on mortality Nature said hee that first digested this All into an exact method of parts preserves it likewise by a constant concordance of the same without the which it would soone resolve into the first nothing onely man ungovern'd man Natures Master-peece revolting from her allegeance deposes her Lieutenant Reason le ts in the Usurper Passion to untune the harmony that preserves the soul. Hence is it that death the privation of being in this disorder seizes the Fort hurries the Governesse captive to an eternall a never redeem'd imprisonment The Sunne the Sea have both their bounds and man his stage from life to death of equall length to all though one runs faster then another The world whirles about continually till it be dissolv'd and mans brain not satisfied in the bare necessaries of life moves in an unbounded motion till stil'd by the period of action the undoer of Nature Death There is but one doore at which wee enter this Labyrinth of life but infinite are the waies wee turne and wind out of it The infant no sooner with much difficulty rak'd out of the wombe punishing the Mothers guilt of his short-liv'd misery enters the Tombe flashing through the world being but a lightning of life Pleasure or businesse wears out the riper mans vitals and forceth out life let Nature block it up never so strongly The aged man because a burden to himselfe sinks under his own weight These are ordinary waies out of this world into the next but to bee hurld out by violence of Fate this is the doom of strictest Justice that makes eternity our curse This is the hard fate my just merit hath encountred to be punish'd by the sex I have so much abus'd This was his last for Nature though shee could not tell him he had liv'd long enough told him hee had been long enough dying There she withdrew her selfe from him and seal'd up his eyes to the eternall sleep of eternall night Pro Theutilla REason is the only and noble difference between the free and servile creature and they whose actions are not moderated and well poyzed by her power deviate from themselves into the slavery of Sense Theutilla if shee could obtaine of her selfe to yeeld to sense why should not Amalius obtaine it If to reason why should shee not kill Amalius or why should she be ravished Her selfe then was Victor of her sense and to conquer reason she conquer'd Amalius Never had her vertue a fairer tryall then when her honour was a martyr stak'd to unlawfull flames never could her honour bee more honourably releived then by her vertue nor both then by this act Though Vertue being within her Honour being above her was not to be really violated without the Theutilla that was below her yet must Amalius be sacrificed as well to deprive her of the interest he might have in her dishonour as to make opinion cleare as her actions It was that mind that stoop'd not to her body that made her of consequence not her beauty the other sullied who but Amalius would value this or one whose sense is so scattered in the admiration of the outward forme that hee discernes not even those deformities of soule which are detected It was necessary for her fame not onely to resolve not to yeeld but to prevent occasions that might prejudice her vertue or her honour But why was Amalius slaine not master of the opportunity hee knew not why was she forc'd thither Because shee would not yeeld because she should bee ravished But haply her handsome prayers had wrought him to an handsome repentance Is beauty the loadstar that attracts hearts of steel to it the Orator that pleads against it selfe Amalius had his eyes been open had not read contradictions in her face nor made so obscure a Comment upon so cleare a Text. Hee had seene her but as hee had seene her her eyes inviting all eyes her lippes all lippes her face Loves banquet where shee ryots in the most luxuriant feast of sense not as shee was the modell of Divine Perfection so innocent shee knew not the meaning of a Mistris Theutilla had she had no other Sword but her innocence might satisfie her selfe in that defence but Conscience is but one witnesse to one and her actions must endure the triall of another touch-stone beside her owne Amalius would easily confront her meanenesse Then allow her this great revenge of little innocence Contra Theutillam A Mind well habited to vertue enjoyes all true content within it self knowing nothing without it to transport it from it selfe Why should she then strain her vertue to a vice in the too nice satisfaction of others unsatisfie her selfe Why should shee to prevent unlawfull love act a more unlawfull revenge Why should shee revenge an unacted injury commit a certain murder to avoid an uncertain rape Had she been absolutely tyed either to die kill or be ravished she had shewed a greater height of spirit in enduring then revenging her dishonour For the passive valour is more laudable then the