with Mary was overshadowed by her superior claim to the royal power; and Nero from the first regarded with aversion, which ended in assassination, the poor young orphan girl who recalled to the popular memory his slender pretensions to hereditary empire, and whom he regarded as a possible rival, if her cowed and plastic nature should ever become a tool in the hands of more powerful intriguers.

But we do not hear of any attempt on Seneca's part to urge upon Nero the fulfillment of this high duty, and we find him sinking into the degraded position of an accomplice with young profligates like Otho, as the confident of a dishonourable love.

Such conduct, which would have done discredit to a mere courtier, was to a Stoic disgraceful.

But the principle which led to it is the very principle to which we have been pointing,--the principle of moral compromise, the principle of permitting and encouraging what is evil in the vain hope of thereby preventing what is worse.

It is hardly strange that Seneca should have erred in this way, for compromise was the character of his entire life.