Go Ahead, Sue Me (and Posidonius too!)

June 3, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 121.1-2

“I think you’re going to sue me when I share today’s little question with you, one we’ve been clinging to for long enough. You will cry out again, “what’s this got to do with character traits?” Shout all you want, but let me set you against others you can sue too like Posidonius and Archidemus–those guys will take a trial.

But then I will tell you that whatever pertains to character does not actually make characters good. People need one thing for nourishment, one thing for exercising, another for dressing, another for learning, and another for pleasure. Everything matters to people, but everything doesn’t make us better. Different things change your character in different ways. Some things correct us and straighten us out; others examine their nature and origin.

When I search for why nature created humans and put us above the other animals, do you imagine that I have left the question of character behind? That’s wrong. How would you truly know how we should act if you don’t know what’s best for humans, if you don’t examine our nature?”

Litigabis, ego video, cum tibi hodiernam quaestiunculam, in qua satis diu haesimus, exposuero. Iterum enim exclamabis: “hoc quid ad mores?” Sed exclama, dum tibi primum alios opponam, cum quibus litiges, Posidonium et Archidemum; hi iudicium accipient. Deinde dicam: non quicquid morale est, mores bonos facit. Aliud ad hominem alendum pertinet, aliud ad exercendum, aliud ad vestiendum, aliud ad docendum, aliud ad delectandum. Omnia tamen ad hominem pertinent, etiam si non omnia meliorem eum faciunt. Mores alia aliter attingunt: quaedam illos corrigunt et ordinant, quaedam naturam eorum et originem scrutantur. Cum quaero, quare hominem natura produxerit, quare praetulerit animalibus ceteris, longe me iudicas mores reliquisse? Falsum est. Quomodo enim scies, qui habendi sint, nisi quid homini sit optimum, inveneris, nisi naturam eius inspexeris?

Pretending We Know the Good

June 2, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 120.4-5

“Observation seems to us imply information, along with a comparison of things that happen often. So, our discipline judges what is good and honorable by analogy. Now, Latin grammarians have granted citizenship to this word “analogy, so I don’t think it should be condemned, while I do believe that it should be properly framed in its own state of origin. So, I will use this word not as it has been adapted, but as it was customarily applied.

Let me explain what this analogy is. We have comprehended a the health of a body and from this have imagined that there is also health of mind. Just as we recognized physical strength, so too did we suggest mental vigor. Acts of kindness, humane deeds, feats of bravery, all these have dumfounded us. So we began to wonder at them as if they are perfect.

They all have many faults under the surface, but the appearance of a certain kind of glorious deed and the shine distract us. We pretend we don’t see these things. Nature commands us to amplify acts that we should praise; and everyone takes their glory beyond the truth. So, from these kinds of acts, we have crafted some appearance of the great good.”

Nobis videtur observatio collegisse et rerum saepe factarum inter se conlatio, per analogian nostri intellectum et honestum et bonum iudicant. Hoc verbum cum Latini grammatici civitate donaverint, ego damnandum non puto, puto in civitatem suam redigendum. Utar ergo illo non tantum tamquam recepto, sed tamquam usitato.

Quae sit haec analogia, dicam. Noveramus corporis sanitatem; ex hac cogitavimus esse aliquam et animi. Noveramus vires corporis; ex his collegimus esse et animi robur. Aliqua benigna facta, aliqua humana, aliqua fortia nos obstupefecerant; haec coepimus tamquam perfecta mirari. Suberant illis multa vitia, quae species conspicui alicuius facti fulgorque celabat; haec dissimulavimus. Natura iubet augere laudanda, nemo non gloriam ultra verum tulit; ex his ergo speciem ingentis boni traximus.

Little Machines that Won’t Try

May 29, 2023May 24, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 116.6-8

“As much as possible, let’s step back from the slippery slope. We stand too shakily on dry ground as it is! You will surely present me with that public complaint about Stoics: “You promise too many great things, your commands are too hard. We are only little machines, we can’t deny ourselves everything! We will grieve, but too little; we will desire, but temperately; we will get angry, but we will be appeased.”

You know why we can’t do these things? Because we don’t believe it is possible. Really, my god, there’s more in this, because we love our faults, we defend them and prefer to make excuses for them instead of addressing them. Nature has given us enough strength, if we use it, if we gather all our abilities together for us or at least we don’t let them work against us. Our unwillingness is the cause, inability is pretense. BYE.”

Quantum possumus, nos a lubrico recedamus; in sicco quoque parum fortiter stamus. Occurres hoc loco mihi illa publica contra Stoicos voce: “Nimis magna promittitis, nimis dura praecipitis. Nos homunciones sumus, omnia nobis negare non possumus. Dolebimus, sed parum; concupiscemus, sed temperate; irascemur, sed placabimur.” Scis, quare non possumus ista? Quia nos posse non credimus. Immo mehercules aliud est in re: vitia nostra quia amamus, defendimus et malumus excusare illa quam excutere. Satis natura homini dedit roboris, si illo utamur, si vires nostras colligamus ac totas pro nobis, certe non contra nos concitemus. Nolle in causa est, non posse praetenditur. Vale.

Think Your Feelings, Write Your Thoughts

May 28, 2023May 28, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 115.1-3

“Oh, my Lucilius! I don’t want you to be too anxious about words and composition. I have more important things for you to care about! Seek what to write, not how to write it. And in this thing itself, seek not to write but to feel it, so you may turn what you feel more into your own, as if pressing your seal into it.

When you see that someone’s work is super careful and polished, know well that the mind is no less obsessed with minor details. The great person speaks in a relaxed fashion and securely. Whatever they say, they say with more confidence than worry.

You know too well those young fashy folks, with their shining beards and hair. You never hope for anything strong or solid from them. Rhetoric is the clothing of the mind–if it is cut, dyed, or done up in some way, it implies that there is something insincere, that there’s some problem.

Nimis anxium esse te circa verba et compositionem, mi Lucili, nolo; habeo maiora, quae cures. Quaere, quid scribas, non quemadmodum; et hoc ipsum, non ut scribas, sed ut sentias, ut illa, quae senseris, magis adplices tibi et velut signes. Cuiuscumque orationem videris sollicitam et politam, scito animum quoque non minus esse pusillis occupatum. Magnus ille remissius loquitur et securius; quaecumque dicit, plus habent fiduciae quam curae.

Nosti comptulos iuvenes, barba et coma nitidos, de capsula totos; nihil ab illis speraveris forte, nihil solidum. Oratio cultus animi est: si circumtonsa est et fucata et manu facta, ostendit illum quoque non esse sincerum et habere aliquid fracti.

Corrupt Ages and the Character of Speech

May 27, 2023May 23, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 114.1-2

“You ask my why public speech of a corrupt kind dominates in certain periods of time and how the decline of people’s intelligence slides into certain vices so that sometimes speech swells with a kind of strength and at others it becomes broken up and refined like song. You ask as well why sometimes bold notions–even beyond belief–delight people and at other times statements are curt and coded so that more must be understood in them than can be heard? Or, why there have been generations that rely on the use of shameless metaphor.

You can hear the answer in common speech, one that is proverbial among the Greeks: “People’s lives are like the quality of their speech.” Just as the action of an individual is similar to their speech, so too does the culture of speech imitate public character, if civic order has weakened and surrendered to self-indulgence.”

Quare quibusdam temporibus provenerit corrupti generis oratio quaeris, et quomodo in quaedam vitia inclinatio ingeniorum facta sit, ut aliquando inflata explicatio vigeret, aliquando infracta et in morem cantici ducta? Quare alias sensus audaces et fidem egressi placuerint, alias abruptae sententiae et suspiciosae, in quibus plus intellegendum esset quam audiendum? Quare aliqua aetas fuerit, quae translationis iure uteretur inverecunde? Hoc quod audire vulgo soles, quod apud Graecos in proverbium cessit: talis hominibus fuit oratio qualis vita. Quemadmodum autem uniuscuiusque actio dicenti similis est, sic genus dicendi aliquando imitatur publicos mores, si disciplina civitatis laboravit et se in delicias dedit.

The Countless Lives Within Us

May 26, 2023May 22, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 113.2-3

People agree that the soul is alive since it has the ability to make us alive and because “living things” have their name from it [anima, animal]. Virtue, moreover, is little more than a soul keeping itself a certain way. So, virtue is alive. In turn, virtue does something and nothing can do a thing without impetus. So, if a thing has impetus, then it has to be alive, since nothing has impetus unless it is alive.

A response might be that “if virtue is alive, then virtue itself has virtue.” Well, why wouldn’t it!? Just as a wise person does everything through virtue, so to does virtue accomplish its goals through itself. “Therefore, ” people continue, “all the arts are also alive and our thoughts and everything the mind contains with it. So it follows that thousands of living things make their home in the narrows of a person’s heart and that each one of are made up many creatures or have many within us

Animum constat animal esse, cum ipse efficiat, ut simus animalia, cum ab illo animalia nomen hoc traxerint. Virtus autem nihil aliud est quam animus quodammodo se habens; ergo animal est. Deinde virtus agit aliquid; agi autem nihil sine impetu potest. Si impetum habet, qui nulli est nisi animali, animal est. “Si animal est,” inquit, “virtus, habet ipsa virtutem.” Quidni habeat se ipsam? Quomodo 3sapiens omnia per virtutem gerit, sic virtus per se. “Ergo,” inquit, “et omnes artes animalia sunt et omnia, quae cogitamus quaeque mente conplectimur. Sequitur, ut multa millia animalium habitent in his angustiis pectoris, et singuli multa simus animalia aut multa habeamus animalia.”

Your Friend, The Slender Vine

May 25, 2023May 27, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 112

“By god, I do want your friend to be shaped and trained as you want, but he has been taken up already hardened, or, really–and this is worse–soft and ground down by constant bad habits.

I want to provide you an example from my own technique. Not every vine will submit to grafting–if it is old and starting to rot or too thin and weak, the fine won’t take a shoot or it will refuse to feed it and integrate and it will not accept the quality and the nature of the transplant. So, we typically sever the vine above the ground, so if it does not respond at first, a second attempt is possible. Then the second graft is made below the ground.

This person you are writing and worried about,has no strength and indulges their weaknesses. They have somehow become fat and hard at once. They can neither accept reason nor feed it. You say, “But they want to”. I am not saying that they are lying to you, they want to desire this. But excess has ruined their stomach. Soon they’ll turn back again.

“Yet, they claim their own life offends them!” I don’t deny this. Who is not upset with their own life? People love and hate their own faults at the same time. We will form an opinion about them when they have shown us some proof that they truly hate luxury. Now? They’re just in an argument. BYE.”

Cupio mehercules amicum tuum formari, ut desideras, et institui; sed valde durus capitur, immo, quod est molestius, valde mollis capitur et consuetudine mala ac diutina fractus.

Volo tibi ex nostro artificio exemplum referre. Non quaelibet insitionem vitis patitur; si vetus et exesa est, si infirma gracilisque, aut non recipiet surculum aut non alet nec adplicabit sibi nec in qualitatem eius naturamque transibit. Itaque solemus supra terram praecidere, ut si non respondit, temptari possit secunda fortuna, et iterum repetita infra terram inseratur.

Hic, de quo scribis et mandas, non habet vires; indulsit vitiis. Simul et emarcuit et induruit. Non potest recipere rationem, non potest nutrire. “At cupit ipse.” Noli credere. Non dico illum mentiri tibi; putat se cupere. Stomachum illi fecit luxuria; cito cum illa redibit in gratiam. “Sed dicit se offendi vita sua.“Non negaverim. Quis enim non offenditur? Homines vitia sua et amant simul et oderunt. Tunc itaque de illo feremus sententiam, cum fidem nobis fecerit invisam iam sibi esse luxuriam; nunc illis male convenit. Vale.

Seneca’s Serenity Prayer

May 21, 2023May 20, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 107.7-9

“Winter returns the cold, and we feel cold. Summer brings the heat, and we must be warm. Intemperate skies test health and we must be sick Wild beasts approach us in one place, while people more dangerous than beasts are everywhere. Floods ruin one thing; fires destroy another.

We are incapable of changing the nature of things. But we can do this: develop a strong spirit worthy of a good person, the very thing that helps us bravely endure chance and give our consent to nature. Indeed, nature oversees the realm you look on with her changes. A peaceful sky replaces clouds; the seas get stirred up when they have been calm; winds take their turns blowing; day follows night; part of the sky rises, the rest sets. Eternity resides in the tensions among these things.

Our souls must fit themselves to this law, this is the law we follow. Whatever happens, believe that it had to happen and don’t long to castigate nature. It is best to endure what you cannot change.”

Hiems frigora adducit: algendum est. Aestas calores refert: aestuandum est. Intemperies caeli valitudinem temptat: aegrotandum est. Et fera nobis aliquo loco occurret et homo perniciosior feris omnibus. Aliud aqua, aliud ignis eripiet. Hanc rerum condicionem mutare non possumus; illud possumus, magnum sumere animum et viro bono dignum, quo fortiter fortuita patiamur et naturae consentiamus. Natura autem hoc, quod vides, regnum mutationibus temperat; nubilo serena succedunt; turbantur maria, cum quieverunt; flant in vicem venti; noctem dies sequitur; pars caeli consurgit, pars mergitur. Contrariis rerum aeternitas constat.

Ad hanc legem animus noster aptandus est; hanc sequatur, huic pareat. Et quaecumque fiunt, debuisse fieri putet nec velit obiurgare naturam. Optimum est pati, quod emendare non possis

The Five Causes of Our Ruin

May 19, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 105.2-4

“Think about the kinds of things that cause people to destroy each other. You will see hope, envy, hatred, fear, and contempt. Contempt is the least serious of these to such a degree that many have defaulted to it as a remedy for the others. When someone feels contempt, they do cause harm, but then move on. No one harms someone continually or quite carefully because of contempt. In battle, the fallen soldier is passed by and the fight is carried on by someone standing.

You will avoid the hope of wicked people if you possess nothing capable of inspiring someone else’s desire, if you possess nothing outstanding. People desire even small things if they are notable or rare.

You will avoid envy if you don’t parade yourself around in public, if you don’t make a big deal about your good things, if you know how to laugh in private. Hatred comes either from causing some offense–which you will avoid by not harming anyone–or it has no explanation. Common sense will make you safe from this. Still, it has been dangerous for many–there are those who have suffered hatred but have no enemy.

Moderate wealth and a kind character will prevent you from being feared. People should know that you are someone they can offend without danger and that making amends would be easy and certain. It is, indeed, as problematic to be feared at home as outside, by enslaved people as by the free. Every person has enough ability to harm you. This matters too: who ever is feared, fears as well. No one who inspires fear can feel safe.”

Considera, quae sint, quae hominem in perniciem hominis instigent: invenies spem, invidiam, odium, metum, contemptum. Ex omnibus istis adeo levissimum est contemptus, ut multi in illo remedii causa delituerint. Quem quis contemnit, violat sine dubio, sed transit; nemo homini contempto pertinaciter, nemo diligenter nocet. Etiam in acie iacens praeteritur, cum stante pugnatur. Spem inproborum vitabis, si nihil habueris, quod cupiditatem alienam et inprobam inritet, si nihil insigne possederis. Concupiscuntur enim etiam parva, si notabilia sunt, si rara.

Invidiam effugies, si te non ingesseris oculis, si bona tua non iactaveris, si scieris in sinu gaudere. odium aut est ex offensa: hoc vitabis neminem lacessendo; aut gratuitum: a quo te sensus communis tuebitur. Fuit hoc multis periculosum; quidam odium habuerunt nec inimicum Illud, ne timearis, praestabit tibi et fortunae mediocritas et ingenii lenitas; eum esse te homines sciant, quem offendere sine periculo possint; reconciliatio tua et facilis sit et certa. Timeri autem tam domi molestum est quam foris, tam a servis quam a liberis. Nulli non ad nocendum satis virium est. Adice nunc, quod qui timetur, timet; nemo potuit terribilis esse secure.

Every Day is an Entire Life

May 15, 2023May 15, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

CW: ableism

Seneca, Moral Epistles 101.10-12

So, hurry, my Lucilius, and live–treat each individual day like a whole life. Who ever adapts in this way–whoever’s daily life is complete–feels safe. But the time right in front of them always slides away from those who live for hope and that greed and that miserable fear of death that makes everything else miserable slips in.

It is from there that that foulest prayer of Maecenas comes. In it, he does not swear off weakness, deformity, and then at the end the painful cross as long as he can continue life throughout.

Give me a broken hand, weaken my foot;
grow a hump on my back and shake my teeth loose
as long as life persists, it’s all good.
Keep it going, even if I lie on a sharp cross

He begs for something that would be completely pitiable if it merely happened to him and he pleads for a delay as if he were asking for life!”

Ideo propera, Lucili mi, vivere et singulos dies singulas vitas puta. Qui hoc modo se aptavit, cui vita sua cotidie fuit tota, securus est; in spem viventibus proximum quodque tempus elabitur subitque aviditas et miserrimus ac miserrima omnia efficiens metus mortis. Inde illud Maecenatis turpissimum votum, quo et debilitatem non recusat et deformitatem et novissime acutam crucem, dummodo inter haec mala spiritus prorogetur:

Debilem facito manu, debilem pede coxo,
Tuber adstrue gibberum, lubricos quate dentes;
Vita dum superest, benest; hanc mihi, vel acuta
Si sedeam cruce, sustine.

Quod miserrimum erat, si incidisset, optatur et tamquam vita petitur supplici mora.