Excerpt from Biographical and Critical Essays, Vol. 2 of 2: Reprinted From Reviews, With Additions and Corrections When we write a book, it is our reflection, our reason, that speak; we express only our ideas, sometimes only the hypocrisy of our ideas. When we write letters, we more commonly express our sentiments and our passions. Read, for example, the elegant pages in which Sallust raises altars to poverty, proclaims the ineffable sweetness and the eminent dignity of the Stoic moralists, stigmatises with burning declamation, with virtuous anger, the corruption of Rome, the extortion in the provinces. I s it after reading this that we shall recognise this Sallust, the corrupter of the domestic hearth, the bloodstained tribune, the slave of Caesar, the impudent extortioner, whose famous museum-gardens were built with the gold and the tears of N umidia? Incredible power of abstraction! Prodigious miracle of taste and art! This man, branded with infamy, talks of virtue like Cato pen in hand he becomes virtuous. Shall we believe also in the disinterestedness of Seneca, in his philosophy, his austerity, his clemency, by reading nothing but his moral treatises, from which morals seem to flow rather than words. Read his life, and you will avert your looks. Alongside of some real public and private virtues, what shameful weaknesses! What infamy and crime! He knew how to die: he did not know how to live.' When Seneca wrote his treatise in praise of poverty, he had some millions sterling out at usurious interest and it was the pointed saying of South, that when he (seneca) recommended people to throw away their money, it was with the view of picking it up himself. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.