Seneca, Moral Epistles 83.1-3
“You demand that I describe each of my days to you and in their entirety too. If you think that there’s nothing I should hide among these, you have a high opinion of me. Still, this is certainly the way we should live, as if out in front of everyone. This is also how we should think, as if there is someone out there who can see into our deepest heart. And there is. For what is the advantage if something can be kept secret from a person? Nothing is secret from God. He is in our souls and is present among our thoughts. He enters among them, I say, as someone who may leave at any time.
So, I will do what you demand and write you openly what I am doing and in what order. I will observe myself constantly and take stock of every day, which is a very useful practice. This is what makes us the worst: no one examines their own life. We think about only what we are going to do, even though our future plans rely on the past.”
Singulos dies tibi meos et quidem totos indicari iubes; bene de me iudicas, si nihil esse in illis putas, quod abscondam. Sic certe vivendum est, tamquam in conspectu vivamus; sic cogitandum, tamquam aliquis in pectus intimum introspicere possit; et potest. Quid enim prodest ab homine aliquid esse secretum? Nihil deo clusum est. Interest animis nostris et cogitationibus mediis intervenit—sic intervenit, dico, tamquam aliquando discedat. Faciam ergo, quod iubes, et quid agam et quo ordine, libenter tibi scribam. Observabo me protinus et, quod est utilissimum, diem meum recognoscam. Hoc nos pessimos facit, quod nemo vitam suam respicit. Quid facturi simus cogitamus. Atqui consilium futuri ex praeterito venit.
