Seneca hoped against hope that, now that Nero's wild oats were sown and the crop destroyed, all would be well. The past should be buried and remembrance of it sunk deep in oblivion.
But Nero feared Seneca might expose his worthlessness and the philosopher himself take the reins. In this Nero did not know his man: Seneca's love was literary—political power to him was transient and not worth while.
It became known that the apology to the Senate was the work of Seneca, and Nero, who wanted the world to think that all his speeches and addresses were his own, got it firmly fixed in his head he would not be happy until Seneca was out of the way. Sabina said he was no longer a boy, and should not be tagged and dictated to by his old teacher.
Seneca, seeing what was coming, offered to give his entire property to the State and retire. Nero would not have it so—he feared Seneca would retire only to come back with an army. A cordon of spies was put around Seneca's house—he was practically a prisoner. Attempts were made to poison him, but he ate only fruit, and bread made by his wife, Paulina, and drank no water except from running streams.
Finally a charge of conspiracy was fastened upon him, and Nero ordered him to die by his own hand. His wife was determined to go with him, and one stroke severed the veins of both.
The beautiful Sabina realized her hopes—she divorced her husband, and married the Emperor of Rome. She died from a sudden kick given her by the booted foot of her liege.
Three years after the death of Seneca, Nero passed hence by the same route, killing himself to escape the fury of the Pretorian Guard. And so ended the Julian line, none of whom, except the first, was a Julian.
From the death of Augustus on to the time of Nero there was for Rome a steady tide of disintegration. The Emperor was the head of the Church, and he usually encouraged the idea that he was something different from common men—that his mission was from On High and that he should be worshiped. Gibbon, making a free translation from Seneca, says, "Religion was regarded by the common people as true, by the philosophers as false, and by the rulers as useful." And Saint Augustine, using the same smoothly polished style, says, in reference to a Roman Senator, "He worshiped what he blamed, he did what he refuted, he adored that with which he found fault." The sentence is Seneca's, and when he wrote it he doubtless had himself in mind, for in spite of his Stoic philosophy the life of luxury lured him, and although he sang the praises of poverty he charged a goodly sum for so doing, and the nobles who listened to him doubtless found a vicarious atonement by applauding him as he played to the gallery gods of their self-esteem, like rich ladies who go a-slumming mix in with the poor on an equality, and then hasten home to dress for dinner.