For individual life the ancients had a very slight regard; there was nothing autobiographic or introspective in their temperament.

With them public life, the life of the State, was everything; domestic life, the life of the individual, occupied but a small share of their consideration.

All the innocent pleasures of infancy, the joys of the hearth, the charm of the domestic circle, the flow and sparkle of childish gaity, were by them but little appreciated.
The years before manhood were years of prospect, and in most cases they offered but little to make them worth the retrospect.

It is a mark of the more modern character which stamps the writings of Seneca, as compared with earlier authors, that he addresses his mother in terms of the deepest affection, and cannot speak of his darling little son except in a voice that seems to break with tears.
[Footnote 1: See, however, the same question treated from a somewhat different point of view by M.Nisard, in his charming _Etudes sur les Poetes de la Decadence_, ii.

17, _sqq_.] Let us add another curious consideration.