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De Gulden Passer. Jaargang 84 (2006)

De Gulden Passer. Jaargang 84

(2006)– [tijdschrift] Gulden Passer, De–rechtenstatus Auteursrechtelijk beschermd

Vorige Volgende

Mark Morford
Lipsius's 1605 Edition of Seneca ☧



illustratie

Lipsius's edition of Seneca's prose works was the climax of thirty-seven years' involvement with Seneca.1 He prepared for it by publishing his Manuductio ad Stoicam Philosophiam and Physiologia Stoicorum, each in three books, in 1604, to which he could make reference in the commentary of his edition.2 Its importance was signified by the dedication to Pope Paul v, dated 27 June 1605, and by the presentation of the dedicatory copy to the Pope in person by Philip Rubens, probably in December 1605, since the Pope's reply, signed by M. Vestrius Barbianus, was dated 7 January 1606.3 Lipsius died on 23 March 1606, but he was able to begin revising the 1605 edition, for he was especially dissatisfied with the images of Seneca, on the title page, in the full-page portrait of Seneca that followed the dedication, and towards the end of the introductory De Vita et Scriptis Senecae.4 The editor of the second and third edition, Woverius (spelled Waverius in his Breve alloquium in the third edition) quoted Lipsius's instructions for the second edition, which he had written on the cover (involucro codicis) of his copy of the 1605 edition:

Hic Seneca corrigi a me coepit (et spero perficiam) ad alteram editionem, si quid ergo humanitus eveniet, eo servetur: et Moreto eiusve liberis detur, quibus iam nunc lego. malus improbusque qui intervertet.
I began to correct this [copy of] Seneca for a second edition, and I hope I will complete it. So if anything mortal happens, let this copy be kept for that purpose: and let it be given to [Jan] Moretus or his children, to whom I now leave it. Anyone who defrauds them is evil and immoral.5

Woverius said that he had fulfilled Lipsius's wishes and immediately handed over the revised text to Johannes Moretus, who died in 1610. Balthasar, his son, head of the firm 1610-1641, published the second edition in 1615, the successor to a limited reprint in 1614, which did not have the new illustrations that distinguished the 1615 and subsequent editions.6 A third

edition, again prepared by Woverius (who died in 1636), appeared in 1632, and was reprinted in 1652. These were splendid folio volumes, printed (as Woverius wrote in his Breve alloquium) emaculatissimis vereque regiis typis, with print-runs of 1550 (1605), 1250 (1615), and 1525 (1632), substantial by any criterion and guaranteeing a good return to the publishers on their investment. Their physical aspect alone contributed to their success, quite apart from the merits of their contents, for the editions of Erasmus, Muretus, and Gruter - the predecessors and competitors of Lipsius - were less spacious (although Froben's printing for Erasmus, even in the unsatisfactory 1515 edition, was distinguished by its clarity), and in the 1593-94 edition the commentaries of Muretus and Gruterus were set in crowded type and separated from the text of Seneca.7 These editions were not illustrated, except for the portrait of Muretus in the 1585 edition, and Balthasar Moretus, like Lipsius, realised how important illustrations would be. Here was a case where a picture was indeed worth a thousand words. But the four imagines of the first edition (1605) were unsatisfactory. The first, the frontispiece portrait of Lipsius at the age of 58 engraved by Theodore Galle, was based on a type of him at the age of 38 (reproduced in Lipsius en Leuven, no 116). He is set in an oval frame with Ivstvs Lipsivs at the top and, above it, a cartouche with his motto, Moribus Antiquis. His left hand rests on the head of a dog and his right on a dosed book. The portrait emulates the memorial portrait in Muretus's 1585 edition, in which he was set in an oval frame with an inscription running around it and above it a titulus.8 It was hardly a stirring invitation to the reader to join Lipsius in studying Seneca.

There were three portrait-busts of Seneca in the 1605 edition, all based on Orsini's bust. The first, at the bottom left of the title-page was not a fit companion for the other Stoic luminaries (Ulysses, Hercules, Zeno, Cleanthes, and Epictetus) on the same page. It lacks the full philosopher's beard and the dignity of the other figures, and hardly conveys the suffering and inspiration of Seneca's death. The third portrait (on p. xxiv) was kept in the 1615 edition, despite Lipsius's criticism. Most problematic was the frontispiece portrait, set in an oval frame with the title, L. Senecae Imago, at the top.9 Surrounding the frame is an inscription in two lines describing the portrait as one of Seneca at the moment of his death, expressing (in the words of Lipsius, which were included in the inscription) ‘something lively, forceful, and fiery’ (vividum, acre, igneum aliquid refert). Below is Invitatio ad Senecam in 22 Latin scazons composed by Lipsius, inviting the reader to enter the book and to ‘learn more than I [Lipsius] have said’. Theodore Galle's engraving fell miserably short of the ideals so elegantly expressed by Lipsius, and the general composition of the portrait, with its busy ornamental details and crowded printing of the framing description and (in small italics) the Invitatio itself, was hardly encouraging for the prospective reader. The intention was

clear: the two portraits, of Lipsius and Seneca, were to be the gateway entering into the precinct of philosophy. So the inadequacies of Theodore Galle's engravings undercut the ambitious intent of Lipsius's Propylaea (to the temple of Seneca). The first words of his address to the reader, are Aedificium enim vides (‘now you see the edifice’), but essential features of the Propylaea were not equal to the vision of Lipsius and his publisher. Balthasar Moretus brilliantly remedied this by inviting Peter Paul Rubens to supply new portraits, which were engraved by Cornelis Galle. Moretus's Ad lectorem for the 1615 edition explains precisely why these three engravings (for Rubens supplied two portraits of Seneca) succeeded where Theodore Galle had failed:10

It most excellently represents the leader of a manly school of philosophy, a man of powerful intellect and great courage, a man almost worn out by sleepless nights spent in study. Thus even the likeness of his face itself should attract the viewer to the noble writings of his most wise intellect.

The words ‘should attract’ (ut alliciat) are crucial: the Latin word, allicere, has connotations of persuasion and enticement, precisely the purpose of Lipsius's Propylaea.

 

Seneca, however, was only one part of the programme: equally important for this edition of his works was the image of the editor, and here again Rubens achieved the goal that Theodore Galle could not reach.11 He dispensed with the dog, the book, and the decorative ornaments, and showed Lipsius as he was in 1605, still in an oval frame but now surrounded by laurel garlands and cornucopias, with fillets naming the works that displayed his doctrina atque sapientia (learning and wisdom). Lipsius's motto, moribvs antiqvis, was prominently inscribed on the plinth, and the couplet referring to Timanthes' veil appeared in the cartouche at the bottom. The Invitatio ad Senecam was printed in spacious type on the reverse of the portrait-bust of Seneca. Moretus commented:

You [reader] should be inspired by the pleasure of looking upon the solemn features [of Lipsius] to look deep into the immortal monuments of his divine intellect. In them you should willingly embrace the image of every sort of ancient Learning and better Wisdom.

Thus the images were the approach to the temple of philosophy: the sequence was significant - first, Lipsius; next, title-page with images of the patron-goddess and heroes of Stoic wisdom and constancy, of Honour and Virtue, and of the four great Stoic philosophers; finally, the portrait (two portraits in 1615) of Seneca, with the Invitatio printed (in 1615) on the reverse of the second. The way was prepared for the reader's entry into the temple, and Lipsius proudly began his address to the reader: ‘Aedificium enim vides: via munienda est, ut adeas, et me et Senecam cum fructu legas’ (Now you see the edifice: I must construct the road for you to approach, so that you may read me and Seneca with profit).

This impressive sequence of images, however, was interrupted by the dedication, from which most readers have turned away with distress, contempt, or at best neutrality.12 Yet

this, too, was a necessary part of the Propylaea, for it associated Lipsius with the Catholic church and its head, the pope. This was no mere flattery, but a preemptive move against the inevitable criticism that Lipsius favoured the pagan philosopher over the church and its fathers,13 and, a statement that his edition had (and deserved) the patronage of the Vicar of Christ. Just as his Tacitus had been dedicated to the temporal head of the empire, the emperor Maximilian ii, so his Seneca was dedicated to the spiritual head of the earthly kingdom of Christ. One could go no higher! There were serious political purposes in the dedication, for Lipsius had been the object of criticism, temptation, and pressure from the Catholic church ever since he had ‘defected’ to Calvinist Leiden. Once he had returned to the Catholic fold and to Leuven, he was never free from supervision, real or imagined, and everything that he wrote was coloured so as to avoid criticism from his ecclesiastical supervisors.14 A dedication to the pope, then, needed exceptionally diplomatic language. Flattering references to Seneca's correspondence with St Paul, and the coincidence that the pope's ecclesiastical title was Paul v, meant little.15 Far more significant was Lipsius's appeal to the pope to use his authority and prestige in order to influence temporal leaders to make peace in a Europe racked by religious divisions and war. Pacem, Pacem ingeminamus, were the concluding words of his appeal, and they were followed by the gift of the edition of Seneca, laudatissimum inter omnes scriptorem, et virtutis studio paene Christianum. Thus Seneca was to be brought into the world of contemporary Europe and he was to be read ad usum vitae. The dedication, then, was consistent with the unchanging goal of Lipsius, to make the classical texts relevant to contemporary life.

Paul v died in 1621 and was succeeded by the short-lived Gregory xv (1621-23). Urban viii then reigned as Pope until 1644, and Balthasar Moretus addressed a new dedication to him for the third edition in 1632. It was printed in yet more spacious type than its predecessor,16 and made essentially the same political argument: that the pope, aided by the philosophy of the quasi-Christian Seneca, could bring peace to Europe, by bringing the ‘discordant minds of those in power into concord’. Thus the purpose of the first edition was confirmed.

The engravings and dedication had brought pilgrim-readers within view of the temple: now Lipsius constructed the road by which they might approach the temple itself. His road had six parts, the first three of which were important for the favourable presentation of Seneca: 1. Introductio Lectoris; 2. Iudicium super Seneca eiusque Scriptis; 3. De Vita et Scriptis L. Annaei Senecae; 4. De L. Annaeo Seneca Veterum Auctorum Loci, 5. Elogia Auctorum de L. Annaeo Seneca, twenty quotations favorable to Seneca; 6. 41 fragments from lost works, including the passages in Augustine (nos. 34 & 35: Civ. Dei 6. 10-11) that Lipsius had dis-

cussed in Electorum Libri 2, 18. These fragments were differentiated from the Excerpta quaedam e libris Senecae (pp. 791-95 in 1605, and 837-40 in 1632), which Lipsius ‘would gladly have omitted, for even a blind man could dearly see that they are not by Seneca’.17

 

The most important part of Lipsius's introductory material was the Introductio Lectoris, in two parts. Firstly, he acknowledged the work of his predecessors, listed his goals and methods, and discussed his innovations. He was generous towards Erasmus, who, he acknowledged, was the first to make a serious effort to edit the text of Seneca. ‘If he had not been my predecessor and had not made the text level, we would still have rough and difficult places.’18 Of Erasmus's successors he had no argument with Pincianus or Gruterus (who had been his own student in Leiden), but he was critical of Muretus's emendations and corrections. While Lipsius was proud of his contributions to the establishment of correct punctuation and division of words and phrases (Interpunctio et Distinctio), his most significant innovations were the summaries prefacing each work (Argumenta) and the commentary in the form of brief notes (Notae perpetuae). Erasmus had limited his critical commentary to his Prefaces, especially that to the 1529 edition, which is written in lucid Latin and is more critical of Seneca than the Preface of the 1515 edition. Scaliger thought that it was superior to Lipsius's Introduction.19 Scaliger, like many of Lipsius's critics to this day, did not approve of his purpose of relating Stoic philosophy, and above all the doctrines of Seneca, to contemporary problems, which is the focus of the Introductio lectoris.20 Erasmus, then, made no effort to reconcile Stoicism with Christianity: Muretus understood Stoicism better, but again did not believe that reconciliation was possible. Lipsius, who did understand Stoicism and could refer to his already-published treatises for support, made an effort to reconcile it with Christianity, as his dedication to the pope showed. Despite these limitations, Lipsius intended his edition to be a practical help to contemporary readers.

Thus the Introductio lectoris repeatedly emphasized the usefulness of Seneca, and therefore Lipsius did not make philological and textual matters the primary focus of the commentary. The purpose of the Argumenta (summaries), was to help the reader, who was invited to share Lipsius's enthusiasm and follow his judgements and exhortations. A work is inter optima (of the De Constantia); libellus inter utiles (of the De Tranquillitate); aureus hic libellus (of the De Providentia); O pulchram altamque epistolam! (of Letter 41); O bona hic [sic], O aurea! Legite iuvenes senesque (of Letter 88). Lipsius defends the Argumenta thus:

I have placed Argumenta before each book and each single one of [these] writings, and I have set forth their structure and substance in a kind of summary. How useful [usui] this is for the reader, and how suitable an introduction, it will itself say: I will only say this, that it has been more difficult for me than anyone would believe. For Seneca is complicated and many-sided, and he is often disorganised or unsystematic.

The crucial word here is usui: the argumenta were essential to the didactic purpose of the edition. Because Seneca is a difficult writer for the occasional reader to understand, it was

necessary for Lipsius to present Seneca's arguments in lucid and concise Latin. Here again, Lipsius parted company with Erasmus and Muretus. His boast, fundamental to his whole life as a scholar, can be seen as the foundation of his edition: ‘ego e Philologia Philosophiam feci’.21

Lipsius's quarrel was with the narrow-minded (in his view) classical philologists, to whom the establishment of the text and provision of a learned commentary were ends in themselves. For Lipsius (as for Seneca) these things were but the foundation upon which a practical philosophy of life was to be built. Hence the repeated emphasis on practicality, usus, in the Introductio lectoris, and the jabs at Philologi in the argumenta and commentary, for example, the argumentum to Letter 108: ‘legite atque audite vos O Philologi’. Indeed, Seneca's Ep. 88 and 108 are the proof of the arguments put forward in the Introductio lectoris, for in both these commentaries Lipsius takes Seneca's arguments against the study of liberal arts as an end in itself to their extreme conclusion. Such study, Lipsius repeatedly emphasizes, is worth while only if it. leads to Philosophy, that is, a rational system that leads to a good life. This is the argument of Seneca's Letter 88, the best known of his letters in the Renaissance and, as Lipsius mentions in his first note on the text, p. 564, one that had been published separately, or printed separately after the other letters. Referring to the teaching of the grammatici, Seneca asks (p. 565), ‘quid horum ad virtutem viam sternit?’ The study of the classical text was not to be an end in itself: it ‘paved the road that leads to virtue’. Later in the same letter (p. 567), Seneca asks: ‘“Why then do we educate our children in liberal studies?” Not because they can bestow virtue, but because they prepare the mind for accepting virtue.’ On this Lipsius commented by quoting Philo: ‘Just as there are vestibules in front of doors [...] so liberal arts lie in front of virtue. They are the road that leads to virtue.’ In Letter 108 Lipsius did not even need to comment on Seneca's ‘itaque quae fuit philosophia, facta philologia est’. And Seneca's peroration to his discourse in this same letter could have been written by Lipsius (p. 637):

Illud admoneo, auditionem Philosophorum lectionemque ad propositum beatae vitae trahendam: non ut verba prisca aut ficta captemus, et translationes improbas figurasque dicendi, sed ut profutura praecepta, et magnificas voces, et animosas, quae mox in rem transferantur. Sic ista ediscamus ut quae fuerint verba sint opera.
This is the charge that I lay on you: draw to yourself, to reach your goal of the happy life, the lectures and writings of the Philosophers. Do this not to make a quarry of striking metaphors and figures of speech, but that you may catch salutary precepts, lofty and inspiring words, which immediately maybe transferred into real life. Let us learn them well, so that what once were words may become action.

Lipsius could not have said it better! The hunting (or fishing) metaphor in trahendam and captemus is typical of his style, and the substance of Seneca's words is consistent with all that Lipsius taught as a scholar and professor. Philology was not to be an end in itself, and philosophy was to lead to practical results in living a better life: words must lead to action. In the final words of his Adlocutio iterata et novissima for the 1607 edition of Tacitus he enunciated the same principles:22

Te uti frui cupio, lector: sed inprimis Tacito ipso, et altius aliquid firmiusque, quam criticorum sive Grammaticorum has curas, spirare. Non enim ad ista, sed per ista, imus.
I want you to use and enjoy (this edition). But above all use and enjoy Tacitus himself and breathe in something deeper and firmer than my labours in criticism and grammar. For these things are the means, not the goal, of our journey.

Lipsius turned next to the notae perpetuae. Here again his purpose was practical, ‘to throw light on Seneca, not on myself’, that is, to give enough explanation or cite enough parallels to make Seneca's text fully meaningful for his readers, and so to be as practical a help as possible towards living a good life. Thus the notes are short, and they are not padded with information irrelevant to the overall purpose of the edition. Lipsius was on strong ground here, for he could (and did) refer to his already-published work, including his treatises on Roman history and institutions, as well the Manuductio and the Physiologia. He concludes by once again emphasizing that he always was looking out for the interests of the reader, so as to lead him into to the Porch [Porticus], that is, Stoic philosophy.

 

Lipsius still had much to say to the reader: ‘I have told you what I have provided: now follows what I am going to ask from you.’ He had four precepts for the reader: 1. to choose the works of Seneca that would be the most useful for his life, to read them frequently and reflect on them; 2. to read ‘with the eyes of a Philosopher, not a Grammarian’; 3. to select and commit to memory select passages; 4. to be a generous critic of Lipsius's work, and, above all, make practical use of this edition.

 

Lipsius's edition was dated 27 June 1605, while the final Adlocutio iterata of his Tacitus (published posthumously in 1607) was dated 18 August 1605. He was, to use favourite metaphors of Seneca's, gathering his baggage before coming into harbour for the last time.23 His legacy was above all his two great editions of the authors with whom he had spent 36 years (as he says in the Adlocutio of the Tacitus) of his scholarly life, that is, since his time in Rome in 1568-1570. And in estimating the importance of his work for posterity, he put first the utility of Seneca, whose sapientia was a practical guide to life, and of Tacitus, whose prudentia was a guide to political life. In 1605 he could not have made these estimates without the foundation of good texts: for Tacitus, his own, and for Seneca, those of Erasmus and Muretus.

 

After the Introductio lectoris Lipsius turned to his Indicium super Seneca eiusque scriptis, his final estimate of Seneca, as author, man, and philosopher. ‘I have praised him elsewhere’, he begins (the reference is to Manuductio 1, 18): ‘now’, he says, ‘we come to judgement and we will hear the critics’. Continuing the legal metaphor, he says ‘we will make known our sincere vote’ (ex animi sententia tabellam dimittemus).24 Lipsius, as both judge and advo-

cate, defends Seneca against the well-known criticisms of Caligula, Quintilian, and Aulus Gellius.25 Caligula, who called Seneca's prose ‘undiluted show-pieces and sand without lime’, and Gellius, who called Seneca ‘a writer of little use, whose books are not worth the effort of reading’, were easy enough to answer, and in this Lipsius had been anticipated by Erasmus.26 As Lipsius wrote, Caligula's criticism came from a man who contemplated abolishing Homer's poetry and removing the works of Virgil and Livy from all libraries.27 He dismissed Gellius more directly: ‘the first [part of his criticism] conveys not criticism but hatred’. But Erasmus had agreed with several of the criticisms of Quintilian, and Lipsius needed to answer him. His method was to take Quintilian point by point, showing that what Quintilian disliked was actually praiseworthy. It is interesting, however, that he did not deal with Quintilian's most serious charge, that Seneca was ‘in the hands of the young’. Quintilian fairly said that he did not try to remove Seneca altogether from students' reading-lists, but that he would not allow them to prefer Seneca to ‘stronger’ (potioribus) authors. Lipsius admitted that Quintilian often played the role of ‘a critic of good and right judgement’ (boni rectique plurimum iudicii Censorem agere), and his own programme of introducing his students gradually to the style of Seneca and Tacitus was in some respects similar to Quintilian's curriculum of reading ‘stronger’ authors (he means Cicero, above all) before submitting to the allurements of Seneca. He had published his ideal curriculum in a letter to Busius (Paul Buys, Curator of the University of Leiden, 1581-1591) dated 12 July 1583 [?] (ile i, 83 07 12), and published in 1586, focusing on the moral and philosophical aspects of education.28 In his Epistolica Institutio of 1591, he had made detailed proposals for a gradual expansion of Latin models to be read over a four-year period: while this proposal was primarily concerned with models for letter-writing, it is applicable also to prose style in general (Ep. Inst. 11-13). In the letter to Busius, Seneca was to be one of the centurions and tribunes in the legion of philosophers, whose standard-bearer was to be Aristotle. In the Epistolica Institutio Cicero was to be the foundation of Latin style, the sole model for the first year of the curriculum and still to be read every day and excerpted in the later years. Not until the final two years were students allowed to read Sallust, Seneca, and Tacitus, whose terseness would be ‘a sharp pruning-hook to prune for a short time the luxuriant growth [of the Ciceronian style]’. Since Lipsius's own style was by this time aggressively Senecan and Tacitean, he had warned that the young should not try to imitate him, but that did not stop them, as Daniel Heinsius lamented,29 In 1605, then, Lipsius was on record as agreeing, to some extent at least, with Quintilian's most serious argument against Seneca's style - that it corrupted the young - and so he chose not to deal with it in his Iudicium. The foundation of his proposals, both in the letter to Busius and in the Epistolica Institutio, was that the study of classical texts was inseparable from the development of character. Lipsius's final judgement followed his answers to the critics (p. xi):

And so I boldly cast my vote for you, Seneca. In Philosophy, and especially in moral philosophy, you are the best - better than all who have been and will be. Receive the victor's palm, never to be wrested from you (let all men try as they will) any more than his club from Hercules.

It does not matter if this is inconsistent with the ranking of Seneca as a ‘centurion or tribune’ in the philosophical army of the letter to Busius. Taking stock of his intellectual and moral legacy in 1605, Lipsius felt free to express his love for Seneca and his conviction that Senecan philosophy was the best for practical use, whether in developing moral character in the young or in dealing with the dangers and distresses of contemporary life. He concluded by instructing the reader: ‘Senecam ama’ (Love Seneca).

 

Next follows De Vita et Scriptis L. Annaei Senecae, largely factual and more substantial than anything attempted by earlier editors.30 It is in ten chapters, the tenth being an appendix listing Seneca's works that were no longer extant. Its purpose, contents, and color (tone) are set in the first two sentences:

Virorum illustrium vitam prodere, vetus institutum est: et quorum ingenia, scripta, aut facta miramur, iuvat alia nosse, quae adhaeserunt. De Seneca igitur, quatenus potest, dicam: & colligam ac disponam, ex ipso & variis scriptoribus, quod huc facit.
To tell the life of distinguished men is an ancient custom, and it is pleasing to know other details which have adhered to [the lives of] those whose intellects, writings or deeds we admire. Therefore I shall speak of Seneca, as far as is possible, and I will collect and arrange that which achieves this purpose [quod huc facit] from his own writings and those of different authors.

The greatness of his subject, Seneca, is reinforced by the rhetorical majesty of the first seven words, with their assonance (of v and i), balance (the infinitive prodere centrally placed), and by the weighty announcement in the first two words that his biography is one of a vir illustris. Lipsius did not disguise his prejudice in favour of Seneca, but he based his narrative on ancient and trustworthy texts. In fact, the biography is comparatively straightforward and it gathered, for the first time, all the known facts of Seneca's life. Its fifth chapter (Privata vita, uxores, liberi, exilium) required some careful navigation through the dangerous shoals of Seneca's exile, and Lipsius declined to speculate on the truth of the charge of adultery, for which Seneca was exiled: ‘I will not say if the charge was true: I would wish it were not, and perhaps Tacitus agrees with me.’ In the sixth chapter (Opes eius, villae, agri, faenus) he was equally evasive on the charge that Seneca's personal wealth and austere ethical precepts were inconsistent. He appealed, instead, to his defence of Seneca in Manuductio 1, 18, where ‘in passing I weakened the charge.’ For the death of Seneca (Chapter viii) he transcribed the narrative of Tacitus, Ann. 15, 60-64, supplemented by brief explanatory comments: the color of the chapter is indicated in the heading: ‘Mors eius, fortis, constans, e Tacito narrata’.

The ninth chapter of the Vita was Seneca's corpus, morbi, forma, in other words the physical imago vitae, complementing Seneca's own words when the death sentence was brought by the centurion, who forbade him to call for a copy of his last will and testament (Tacitus, Ann. 15, 62):31

Conversus ad amicos, quando meritis eorum referre gratiam prohiberetur, quod unum tamen & pulcherrimum habebat, imaginem vitae suae relinquere testatur, cuius si memores essent, bonarum artium famam tam constantis amicitiae laturos.
He turned to his friends and testified that, since he was being prevented from returning thanks for their good deeds, he was leaving to them his unique and most beautiful possession, the portrait [imago] of his life. If they kept it in mind, they would gain the fame of a good life defined by such steadfast friendship.

Seneca's portrait was composed of words: Lipsius understood that a picture can be a powerful complement to the verbal portrait, and so he added the reproduction based on Orsini's bust, although he also realised it fell miserably short of what he had in mind: ‘imago... vix praefert dignum illo animo vultum’.

 

The preliminary material to the 1605 Seneca was essentially Lipsius's response to Erasmus and Muretus, and its shortcomings were rectified by Woverius and Moretus, with the support of Rubens, in the 1615 edition and its successors. The analogy with a Propylaea is apposite, and Lipsius encouraged such a quasi-religious colouring in his metaphor of the road leading to the edifice: ‘aedificium enim vides: via munienda est ut adeas’, to which he adds its purpose, ‘[ut] et me et Senecam cum fructu legas (that you may profitably read both me and Seneca). This indeed was something new: the editor as interpreter or (if the religious symbolism is maintained) hierophant, whose utterances made clear to the enquirer the meaning and practical value of the text. Erasmus and Muretus were hardly shrinking violets, but even they stood aside as the editors of Seneca. Not so Lipsius: he claimed to be the essential means by which the study of Seneca could bear fruit in the conduct of life. It was a stupendous claim, but Lipsius supported it by his earlier publications (especially the Manuductio and Physiologia), by his unique knowledge of Stoic philosophy, and by his familiarity with the whole range of classical literature and the literature of late Antiquity. Thus his argumenta and notae perpetuae drew on a huge range of references, which he deployed selectively to further his ultimate goal of making Seneca useful for contemporary readers.32 The technique of selective quotation was the basis of Lipsius's Politica, and its more subtle application was a significant feature of the 1605 Seneca.33 The criticism of Antony Grafton, however, is valid, that Lipsius abdicated his responsibility as a humanist ‘to understand the past on its own terms.’34

One intractable problem faced Erasmus, Muretus and Lipsius, that is, how to reconcile Senecan philosophy with Christian doctrine. Erasmus did not attempt to solve it, and Muretus was uncompromisingly hostile to Stoicism in this respect, although he understood better what the Stoics were saying. Lipsius did make the attempt, and has been constantly and not unjustly criticised for it. Nevertheless, the Approbatio of the Catholic censor, allowed him to make Seneca available to as wide an audience as possible.35 I have chosen three con-

texts to illustrate the problem: the introductory matter to the De Providentia; the introductory matter to Letter 41; the Preface and first chapter of the Naturales Quaestiones.

The correct title of the De Providentia, as given in the Ambrosian manuscript, is Qua re aliqua incommoda bonis viris accidant, cum providentia sit (changed by Lipsius to Quare bonis viris mala accidant, cum sit providentia). The problem of why bad things happen to good people leads to questioning the limitations of divine providence. Muretus lectured on this dialogue in 1575, introducing his lectures with an oration delivered on 3 June 1575.36 His focus was on Seneca's style and wisdom, and his discussion of the central questions was evasive. Indeed, a great part of the oration is a summary of the twelve arguments of John Chrysostom in support of a Christian interpretation of the problem. Muretus postponed until the two days later his interpretation of Seneca: ‘perendie, si Deus volet, disputantem Senecam audietis’. The second (and subsequent lectures were not published separately but (presumably) became the substance of the 1585 commentary.

Lipsius introduced the dialogue boldly: Aureus hic libellus est. His summary is elegant and, with one exception, not inconsistent with Christian doctrine. There and in his commentary he could appeal to the De Constantia and the Physiologia. He had already discussed the problems fully in Physiologia 1, 11-16, particularly 1, 16, De Malis Externis, concluding that God was not the source of bad events, and that his divine providence was not limited by their occurrence (Physiologia 1, 12). Instead, the good man would endure adversity as a testing of his virtue. At the end of Physiologia 1, 16, Lipsius appealed to the De Providentia as the authority for dismissing arguments that diminished the providence of God. So far, then, Lipsius did not find it hard to reconcile Stoic and Christian doctrine, but he was evasive when he came to the end of the De Providentia, where Seneca recommends suicide as a way out of adversity. In the summary Lipsius says, ‘Stoice in fine. Si piget et ferre taedet, quis tenet? Patet ianua, exi’ ( at the end the argument is Stoic. If it is burdensome and unpleasant to endure, who holds on? The door is open: leave.) Yet even his note on Seneca's in proximo mors est (note 189 on p. 143) avoids saying that this is contrary to Christian doctrine: rather he writes that ‘another’ (alius) says ‘that [the means of] death are everywhere.’ ‘Don't admit him and leave,’ he replies. In his summary he relied on the adverb Stoice, implying neque autem sensu Christiano. Earlier, in De Providentia 6 commenting on hoc est, quo Deum antecedatis (p. 142, note 178), he found it necessary to debate whether Seneca's suggestion that human beings might ‘anticipate God’, could be interpreted in a Christian sense, that is, that Seneca was drawing a distinction between human and divine power, or in a Stoic sense, that is, that human decisions could anticipate God, which to a Christian would be impious. The latter interpretation was Seneca's intention, and Lipsius's appeal to his discussion in Manuductio 3, 13 (which continued in 3, 14) hardly covers the weakness of his argument here. Muretus's commentary (p. 235 of the 1585 edition) is a complete contrast: he refers to ‘the intolerable arrogance of the Stoics’, and concludes that ‘these monstrous opinions ought to terrify us, lest we ever dare to trust in our own abilities and make rash conclusions or pronouncements concerning divine matters’. It is small wonder that the censor's Approbatio to

the Physiologia, added the cautionary clause, ‘in quibus multa non Auctoris sed Stoico sensu asserta’ (in which many things are asserted that are not the author's views but those of the Stoics).

Letter 41 is one of the most explicit statements in Seneca of the divinity of the sapiens. Here are the passages that chiefly offended Muretus:

Prope est a te Deus, tecum est, intus est. Ita dico, Lucili, sacer intra nos spiritus sedet, malorum bonorumque nostrorum observator et custos [...]. Bonus vir sine Deo nemo est.
God is close to you, he is with you, he is within you. Yes, Lucilius, a divine spirit has its dwelling in us, who sees and guards all [that we experience], good and bad [...] A good man is nothing without God.
Si hominem videris [...] ex superiore loco homines videntem, ex aequo deos, non subibit te veneratio eius?
If you see a man [...] who sees human beings from a higher place and the gods from the same level (as they), will you not be filled with reverence for him?

Muretus comments on the words in the first sentence (p. 222 of the 1585 edition), quam stultum est optare [cum possis a te impetrare]; his long note is passionate and important:37

This doctrine of the Stoics is full of impiety and foolishness. They heard the unanimous opinion of all peoples that the gods are called givers of good things. But they said that, except for virtue, a good mind, perfect reason, and things like that, nothing should be considered amongst good things, and they said that those things were not given by the gods. They said that each man obtained them through his own efforts. And so, if they wanted to be consistent, it was necessary for them to say that the gods are not givers of any good things. Indeed, that the gods gave things that they themselves called preferable or having value:38 wealth, power, physical strength, and the like, but that truly good things were not given by the gods. The poet Horace, steeped in this foolishness, wrote [Epist. 1, 18, 111-12]:
‘This is all we need to pray for from Jupiter, who gives and takes away:
let him give life, let him give wealth: I myself will provide an untroubled mind for myself.’ Rather, you fool, this ‘untroubled mind’ is indeed the greatest gift of God, and you could only achieve it as a benefit given by God. We [i.e., Christians] are sure, and have proved, that God is the fount of all good things. The philosopher himself [Seneca], so great is the power of truth, confesses this very thing a little later, that noble and upright thoughts are the gifts of God, and that no one can rise above fortune, unless with the help of God.

In this vigorous passage Muretus uses Seneca's inconsistencies to refute Stoic doctrines that were unacceptable to Christians.39 He had little choice: he was in Rome, and anything he published was superiorum permissu. Lipsius had the advantage of distance, something that he noted in the opening words of the dedication to Pope Paul v: ‘a longinquis Belgarum oris stilo et affectu Romam venio’. He could see as well as Muretus that Letter 41 was inconsistent with Catholic orthodoxy, but he wrote his comments in such a way, as to earn the censor's approbatio. Even in a work dedicated to the pope, he could not abandon Stoic doctrine.40

So his notes to Letter 41 are both a reply to Muretus and an example of his life-long dilemma. First, the argumentum (p. 453), which is a direct response to Muretus:

o pvlchram, altamque epistolam! Deum in nos habitare, & bonum virum sine eo nullum esse. Colamus ipsum, & animum, qui ab illo descendit. In eo propria nostra bona sunt: alia omnia aliena. Bonum autem, recta Ratio.
O what a beautiful and lofty letter! [Saying that] God has his dwelling in us, and that the good man is nothing without him. Let us revere him [i.e., God] and the mind that descends from him. In it are all the good things that are appropriate for us: everything else is irrelevant. The good, however, [is] right Reason.

The pronouns ipsum, illo, eo, in the third line are ambiguous, for Lipsius interpretes them as referring to Deum, whereas the development of Seneca's argument makes it obvious that ipsum and illo refer to the good man, and eo to his mind. Seneca gives a list of examples of natural objects that excite awe and reverence: old and tall trees; sacred groves; a deep cave; sources of mighty rivers; deep and dark pools. The good man is to be revered like these numinous features:

Si hominem videris interritum periculis, intactum cupiditatibus, inter adversa felicem, in mediis tempestatibus placidum, ex superiore loco homines videntem, ex aequo deos, non subibit te veneratio eius?
If you see a man who is is not terrified by dangers, untouched by desires, happy in the midst of adversity, calm in the centre of tempests, seeing human beings from a higher place, and the gods from the same level (as they) - will you not be filled with reverence for him?

On ex aequo deos Lipsius notes (p. 456): ‘Id est, qui homines superat, Deos aequat. Gloriatio haec Stoicorum crebrae’ (that is, he is more lofty than human beings, he is equal to the Gods. This is a common boast of the Stoics). Taken with the strong approval expressed in the argumentum, this could hardly be called a rousing defence of Christianity. So Lipsius seems to be consciously ambiguous, but nevertheless steering his reader to a Christian understanding of the text.

Lipsius confronted Muretus more directly in his first note to this letter, glossing [stultum est optare, cum possis] a te impetrare, the same text that Muretus had criticised: ‘A voluntate tua pendet. Velis esse bonus, eris: ut Stoici quidem censebant. Ita et Horatius’, adding the same couplet from Horace, Epist. 1.18 (It depends on your will. If it is your will to be good, you will be good: as the Stoics indeed believed. So also Horace ‘This is all we need to pray for [... ]’).The words ut Stoici censebant hardly distinguish Stoic doctrine from Lipsius's own beliefs, while his neutral quotation of the very passage of Horace that Muretus had attacked hardly conceals disagreement with Muretus.

 

More substantial is the note on sacer intra nos spiritus sedet. ‘Animus ille ab aethere avulsus, pars Animae mundi, id est Dei, et ipse Deus. Vide Manuduct. ii. Dissert. xix. et Physiol. iii. [sic]’ (This mind is a fragment broken off from the upper air, part of the World-Soul. See [the references to my Manuductio and Physiologia]). Here Lipsius refers to orthodox Stoic doctrine, which could be made acceptable to Christians thanks to the ambiguity of the word Dei, to the Stoics the divine world-spirit, to the Christians, God. In Manuductio 2, 19 he states (but hardly proves) that the Stoic Natura is God: tu magnus ille, Natura communis es! This God is defined with a mixture of quotations from pagan and Christian authors. Develop-

ing the argument that it is right to obey God and Reason, Lipsius adds that one must imitate and become like God, that is by the process of ὁμοίωσις (assimilatio), in support of which he quotes Paul, imitatores mei estote sicut et ego Christi (1 Cor. ii, i), extending this to mean that whoever imitates Christ is imitating God. By now Lipsius has (intentionally, no doubt) confused the Stoic and Christian gods, so that the reference to Manud. 2, 19 in the commentary on Seneca's Letter 41 leaves him room to praise Seneca's remarks without being openly unfaithful to Christian doctrine. This ambivalence is a significant aspect of Lipsius's Neostoicism and it goes to far to explain why his commentary on Seneca is so different from the forthright criticism of Erasmus and Muretus. It is worth adding that in Manuductio 2, 19 he quotes this letter (Bonus virsine Deo [deo in modern texts] nemo est): reference to this passage, then, in his commentary on the letter is a circular argument. The reference, incomplete as printed, to the Physiologia is probably to 1,8 (i. Diss. viii, but only iii is printed), which is also referenced in the Preface to the Naturales Quaestiones (p. 679, note p).41 It is Lipsius's most explicit discussion of the relationship between God, Nature, the World, and the World-soul (anima mundi). Here again, there is a typical lack of clarity: the argumentum to the chapter says: Mundum ipsum Deum etiam Stoicis dici, sed proprie tamen eius Animam, a definition that blurs the distinctions between the Stoic deos and the Christian Deus, and between the Mundus and the anima mundi. In this chapter, also, Lipsius explains the Stoic aether (the origin of the sacer spiritus which he was glossing in Letter 41), in which, he says, the supreme mind of God (Stoic and Christian) is located.

 

Lipsius stopped writing at the end of the first chapter of Seneca's Naturales Quaestiones (p. 681, reprinted in the third edition, p. 677, as part of Libertus Fromondus's ad lectorem). It is a poignant farewell to his readers and to an author whom he had studied for forty years: ‘Abstineo, Lector, et calamum pono, illum tuis commodis quadraginta iam annos operatum’. In the 1605, 1614 and 1615 editions Muretus's notes were added at the end of each book and Lipsius's notes were printed with the text of the first pages of Book i. (His argumentum to the Naturales Quaestiones, however, was printed in the third edition, p. 678). Except for the Preface to Book i, Muretus's notes were thin,42 and were replaced in the third edition (1632) by the commentary of Libertus Fromondus, Professor of Philosophy at Leuven, whose learned commentary unintentionally makes clear how concise and subtle were the notes of Lipsius. The subject-matter of Book i is De Caelestibus ignibus, and therefore it begins with a declaration of the relationship between Stoic theology and meteorology (that is, the study of anything to do with the heavens), the latter being that part of philosophy quae ad ad deos pertinet.43 Thus the problem of the difference between Stoic and Christian ideas of the divine was inescapable. Here again, Muretus was forthright and Lipsius more subtle.

On p. 678, line 13, Seneca poses a series of dilemmas, beginning:

[cum disco] quae universa materia sit, quis auctor aut custos, quid sit deus, totus in se tendat an ad nos aliquando respiciat, faciat cottidie aliquid an semel fecerit, pars mundi sit an mundus [...]. [when I learn] what is the universal substance, who is its creator or guardian, what is god, whether god is concerned wholly with himself or whether he has some regard at times for human beings, whether he acts daily or has acted once and for all, whether he is part of the universe or is the universe [...].

On quis auctor Muretus noted Idem et auctor et custos Deus (‘the same God is both creator and guardian’). Lipsius (note b) noted: Deus sive Ratio, thus obliterating Muretus's clear distinction between the Christian creator and the Stoic almalgamation of god, Reason, and Nature. Later (note p), on quid est Deus (p. 679) Lipsius referred back to his discussion in Physiologia 1, 8. Muretus, however, commenting on quid sit deus was content to say merely, ‘Hoc maius est quam ab homine aut quaeri debeat, aut percipi prosit’ (this is too great an enquiry for human beings to make, or for them to perceive with profit). Lipsius at least was not contented with avoiding the problem, even if his solution was unconvincing.

On an totus in se intendat an ad nos aliquando respiciat Muretus noted:

Et perpetua sui cognitione fruitur, et humana respicit, ut qui propter hominem aha condiderit omnia.
[God] both enjoys knowledge of himself and has regard for human affairs, as one who because of human beings has hidden everything else.

Again, Muretus focuses on the distance between the Christian God and human beings, as he had done in the note on quid sit Deus. Lipsius, who had discussed this at great length in Physiologia 1, 3-8, did not need to comment further. Instead he focused on the Epicureans, the real subject of Seneca's dilemma. So on an totus in se intendat an ad nos aliquando respiciat, Lipsius (notes c and d) said:

Vt Epicurei. qui Deum nihil alienum agere, sibi vacare et acquiescere tantum volebant. [Note d] Imo semper, et opus suum assidua, et nulla cura, curat.
Like the Epicureans, who wanted God to do nothing except for himself, to be at leisure for himself, and only to be at rest. [Note d] Rather always does he care for his creation with constant care and no effort.

This comment could be taken to be as much Stoic as Christian, and Lipsius's deliberate ambiguity is amplified by the antithesis and play on words in assidua / nulla and cura / curat.

Finally, on pars mundi sit, an mundus, Muretus's note reads: ‘Neutrum. Neque opifex opus suum, aut operis sui pars est (‘Neither. The creator is neither his creation nor part of his creation’). Lipsius again needed two notes: [f] (on pars mundi sit) anima ipsa illa Mundi (the very soul of the Universe); [g] (on an mundus) An et totus (ut Stoicis) veniat in hoc nomen (‘or whether [God] can wholly be called this [i.e., the Universe], as the Stoics say’). Here Lipsius does distinguish between Stoic and Christian doctrine, and he does not answer Muretus's argument. But he had discussed at length (in Physiologia 1, 8) the Stoics' concept of Deus as Mundus. He found their definition incorrect (parum sane) and improved it by defining God not as Mundus but as Anima mundi.44 Thus his brief notes here again refer

back to material that he had already published, in which he made clear that he needed to make but a small adjustment to reconcile the Christian and Stoic doctrines.

 

Jill Kraye has concluded (‘The Humanist as Moral Philosopher’, p. 328) that ‘the 1605 edition of Lipsius was the end result of a humanist re-evaluation of Seneca, beginning with Erasmus and carried forward by Muret.’ Lipsius made it clear in his Introductio lectoris that he valued Erasmus for his work on the text, and Papy, in his ‘Erasmus’ and Lipsius' Editions of Seneca', has argued that Lipsius's edition was a complement to the 1520 edition of Erasmus. Yet the 1605 edition was more than a complement or re-evaluation, for it asserted Lipsius's conviction that Seneca's works were, as Kraye has said, ‘an invaluable moral tract for his own times’, and that their Stoic doctrine could be (and, indeed, had to be) reconciled with Christian doctrine if they were to be of practical use for Catholic readers in post-Reformation Europe. Thus his Seneca, in addition to its value as a commentary about and on Seneca (undervalued by modern classical scholars and philosophers), is a complex monument to the struggle for intellectual freedom despite the demands of Catholic orthodoxy.

Samenvatting

Ter voorbereiding van zijn Seneca-editie publiceerde Lipsius in 1604 zijn Manuductio ad Stoicam Philosophiam en Physiologia Stoicorum. Deze uitgave was bedoeld als de kroon op het Seneca-onderzoek, die kon wedijveren met de edities van Erasmus (2de druk van 1529) en Muretus (1585). Naast deze aemulatio zag Lipsius zijn Seneca ook als een praktiche gids voor het leven van elke dag. Ook de materiële presentatie van het boek, met zijn verzorgde vormgeving en de illustraties (die er nog aanzienlijk op vooruitgingen dankzij de medewerking van Rubens aan de postume editie van 1615), moest bijdragen tot een beter begrip van Seneca. Een portret van Lipsius, vanaf 1615 vervangen door een van Rubens' hand, gaf te kennen dat de uitgever een essentiële rol speelde voor een goed begrip van de Romeinse filosoof en dat beiden de sleutel vormden tot de stoïcijnse filosofie. De inleiding was ‘de toegangsweg die naar de tempel leidde (aedificium)’, een echte Propylea.

Zelfs de dedicatie, door Lipsius' tegenstanders geringschattend van de hand gewezen, was belangrijk om het nut van Seneca voor de hedendaagse lezer te onderstrepen, samen met de veel relevantere Introductio Lectoris waarin Lipsius de gekozen werkwijze uiteenzette en verdedigde, een biografie en evaluatie van Seneca, een verzameling getuigenissen van antieke auteurs, en een lijst van 41 fragmenten van werken die verloren waren gegaan. Wat de uitgave zelf betreft liet Lipsius iedere dialoog of brief voorafgaan door argumenta (samenvattingen) en de notae perpetuae (commentaar) verwezen keer op keer naar een uitgebreidere toelichting in de traktaten van 1604. In deze bijdrage neemt de auteur een aantal passages onder de loep om Lipsius' principes en werkwijze te verduidelijken, en besteedt hij ook aandacht aan zijn pogingen om de stoïcijnse filosofie te verzoenen met de christelijke doctrine. Het besluit stelt dat deze uitgave, ondergewaardeerd door geleerden van de klassieke oudheid en filosofen, een monument is in de strijd voor intellectuele vrijheid, ondanks de eisen van katholieke orthodoxie.

Summary

Lipsius prepared for his 1605 edition of Seneca by publishing the Manuductio ad Stoicam Philosophiam and Physiologia Stoicorum in 1604. It was intended to be the final achievement in Senecan scholarship, rivaling and replacing the editions of Erasmus (2nd edition, 1529) and Muretus (1585). Beyond the obvious aemulatio, Lipsius intended to present Seneca's works as as a practical guide to contemporary life. His means included the physical presentation of the edition, whose printing types and illustrations (the latter vastly improved for the posthumous second edition of 1615, designed by P.P. Rubens) were integral to the proper evaluation of Seneca. A portrait of Lipsius (replaced by Rubens in 1615) indicated that the editor was essential to the understanding of Seneca, and that he and Seneca together were the gateway to Stoic philosophy. The introductory matter was ‘the road that leads to the temple [aedificium]’, truly a Propylaea. Even the dedication (universally despised by Lipsius's critics) played its part in making Seneca useful to contemporary readers, along with the far more significant Introductio Lectoris (in which Lipsius explained and defended his methods), the biography and evaluation of Seneca, a collection of ancient testimonia, and texts of 41 fragments from lost works. In the text the argumenta (summaries) preceding each work were important, while the notae perpetuae (commentary) were supported by reference to the Stoic works of 1604. This paper examines a number of passages to elucidate Lipsius's principles and methods, and illustrates his efforts to reconcile Stoic philosophy with Christian doctrine. It concludes that the edition, undervalued by Classical scholars and philosophers, it is a monument to the struggle for intellectual freedom despite the demands of Catholic orthodoxy.


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