Cicero De Senectute, 84
“Even if some god should permit that I would return to the time of my birth from this age, I would sternly refuse–for, truly, I do not wish to restart as if to retrace a race run from the finish line to the starting post.
What attraction does life have? Or, rather, what labor does it lack? Let it have clear charm–even still, it must have either satiety or a conclusion. It is not my purpose to deplore life as many–even learned men–have often done. And I do not regret that I have lived, because I lived in a such a way that I do not believe I was pointlessly born. And I am leaving life as if from an inn, not a home. For nature has given us a way-station for a brief delay, not to permanently reside.”
Et si quis deus mihi largiatur ut ex hac aetate repuerascam et in cunis vagiam, valde recusem, nec vero velim quasi decurso spatio ad carceres a calce revocari. Quid habet enim vita commodi? Quid non potius laboris? Sed habeat sane; habet certe tamen aut satietatem aut modum. Non libet enim mihi deplorare vitam, quod multi et ei docti saepe fecerunt, neque me vixisse paenitet, quoniam ita vixi, ut non frustra me natum existimem, et ex vita ita discedo tamquam ex hospitio, non tamquam e domo; commorandi enim natura divorsorium nobis, non habitandi dedit.
This last bit made me think of Lucretius:
De Rerum Natura, 3.970-971
“Thus one thing never ceases to arise from another,
and life is given to no one for ownership, but to all for rent.”
sic aliud ex alio numquam desistet oriri
vitaque mancipio nulli datur, omnibus usu
You’ve got to love Lucretius