The slaves were infinitely more numerous than their owners.

Hence arose the constant dread of servile insurrections; the constant hatred of a slave population to which any conspirator revolutionist might successfully appeal; and the constant insecurity of life, which must have struck terror into many hearts.
[Footnote 20: Juv._Sat_.i.

219--222.] Such is but a faint and broad outline of some of the features of Seneca's age; and we shall be unjust if we do not admit that much at least of the life he lived, and nearly all the sentiments he uttered, gain much in grandeur and purity from the contrast they offer to the common life of-- "That people victor once, now vile and base, Deservedly made vassal, who, once just, Frugal, and mild, and temperate, conquered well, But govern ill the nations under yoke, Peeling their provinces, exhausted all By lust and rapine; first ambitious grown Of triumph, that insulting vanity; Then cruel, by their sports to blood inured Of fighting beasts, and men to beasts exposed, Luxurious by their wealth, and greedier still, And from the daily scene effeminate.
What wise and valient men would seek to free These thus degenerate, by themselves enslaved; Or could of inward slaves make outward free ?" MILTON, _Paradise Regained_, iv.

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