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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. According to Stoic thought, what is the formless substance with "unlimited potential?"
(a) Mass.
(b) Matter.
(c) Cause.
(d) Reason.

2. Who wrote the Iliad?
(a) Virgil.
(b) Seneca.
(c) Homer.
(d) Petronius.

3. How does Seneca spend most of his day?
(a) Dreaming.
(b) Exercising.
(c) Praying.
(d) In study.

4. According to his criticism in Letter CVIII, what does Seneca say literary scholars do with philosophical theories?
(a) Dissect the words without garnering the meaning.
(b) Read them over and over.
(c) Help spread them to the masses.
(d) Ruin them by writing them down incorrectly.

5. What does Scipio volunteer to do?
(a) Care for the ailing Seneca.
(b) Help teach Seneca.
(c) Kill Seneca.
(d) Go into exile.

Short Answer Questions

1. Who ran away in Letter CVII that made Lucilius grieve?

2. What kind of events does Seneca say upsets people the most?

3. What does Seneca give advice about coping with in Letter LXXVIII?

4. What is symptomatic of excessive attachment to the body, according to Seneca?

5. What is caused by the flaunting of one's possessions?

Short Essay Questions

1. Which city burned and how did it affect Seneca?

2. What advice does Seneca give Lucilius about coping with illness and the sometimes severe symptoms that accompany it?

3. How does Seneca feel about moving to improve studies?

4. How, according to Seneca, are life and philosophy both the gifts of the gods?

5. What does Seneca say causes envy and how can envy be avoided?

6. Why does Seneca say the Stoic account of causation is better than both Aristotle's and Plato's?

7. According to Seneca, what destroyed man's harmonic relationship with nature and what was the result?

8. List and explain three types of people who, according to Seneca, find philosophy attractive for the wrong reasons.

9. What fault does Seneca find in Zeno's logic that a good man will not drink to excess?

10. What does Seneca say about people who have an excessive concern with pain?

(see the answer keys)

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