Tag: Epistolography

Wherever You Go, You’re Still You

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 28.1-2

“Do you think that this has happened to only you and you are surprised as if it is a revelation that after so long a trip through so many different places you cannot escape your sadness and the weight on you mind? You need to change your spirit, not the weather.  Sure, you can cross the wide open see and let, as our Vergil says, “the lands and the cities to fade behind you,”  but wherever you go, there your faults are.

Socrates once said to someone complaining, “Why are you shocked that travelling doesn’t help you when you take yourself everywhere? The very thing that chased you away is on top of you still.” How can the novelty of other lands delight you? How can learning new cities and regions please? This travelling produces nothing. Do you ask why your escape doesn’t help you? Well , you’re fleeing with yourself.”

Hoc tibi soli putas accidisse et admiraris quasi rem novam, quod peregrinatione tam longa et tot locorum varietatibus non discussisti tristitiam gravitatemque mentis? Animum debes mutare, non caelum. Licet vastum traieceris mare, licet, ut ait Vergilius noster, “Terraeque urbesque recedant” sequentur te, quocumque perveneris, vitia.

Hoc idem querenti cuidam Socrates ait: “Quid miraris nihil tibi peregrinationes prodesse, cum te circumferas? Premit te eadem causa, quae expulit.” Quid terrarum iuvare novitas potest? Quid cognitio urbium aut locorum? In inritum cedit ista iactatio. Quaeris quare te fuga ista non adiuvet? Tecum fugis.

meme of cartoon figure with two buttons. One is "change self" the other is "schedule vacation". The character is labelled as Lucilius, the fictional addressee of Seneca's letter

Buying Erudition

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 27.5-8

“In our memory there was a rich guy named Calvisius Sabinus. He had the wealth and brains of a freedman. I never saw a more indecently lucky guy. His memory was so bad that he forget the name Odysseus, or Achilles or Priam, those names we know as well as our elementary school teachers. No aged concierge who can’t remember names assigns them as randomly as Sabinus would make up the names for Trojan and Achaeans.

Yet he used to wish to appear educated, so he came up with this strategy. He paid a high price for enslaved men, one who knew Homer and another who knew Hesiod, and he assigned nine individual slaves to each of the lyric poets. Don’t be surprised at how much he spent on this. If he didn’t find people, he made sure to have them made.

Once he completed this collection, he used to terrorize his dinner guest. He would keep them at his feet to ask for verses to repeat and he would often forget them in the middle of a line. Satellius Quadratus, a parasite of stupid millionaires and, what follows, a flatterer too (since this quality is a partner of the others) suggested that he should get some professors to clean up the fragments too. When Sabinus admitted that he had spent 100,000 sesterces on each enslaved person, Satellius said, “You could have bought a whole library.” But Sabinius was of the opinion that he knew whatever a member of his household did.”

Calvisius Sabinus memoria nostra fuit dives. Et patrimonium habebat libertini et ingenium; numquam vidi hominem beatum indecentius. Huic memoria tam mala erat, ut illi nomen modo Vlixis excideret, modo Achillis, modo Priami, quos tam bene2 quam paedagogos nostros novimus. Nemo vetulus nomenclator, qui nomina non reddit, sed inponit, tam perperam tribus quam ille Troianos et Achivos persalutabat. Nihilominus eruditus volebat videri. Hanc itaque conpendiariam excogitavit: magna summa emit servos, unum, qui Homerum teneret, alterum, qui Hesiodum; novem praeterea lyricis singulos adsignavit. Magno emisse illum non est quod mireris; non invenerat, faciendos locavit. Postquam haec familia illi conparata est, coepit convivas suos inquietare. Habebat ad pedes hos, a quibus subinde cum peteret versus, quos referret,  saepe in medio verbo excidebat.

Suasit illi Satellius Quadratus, stultorum divitum adrosor, et quod sequitur, adrisor, et quod duobus his adiunctum est, derisor, ut grammaticos haberet analectas. Cum dixisset Sabinus centenis milibus sibi constare singulos servos; “Minoris,” inquit, “totidem scrinia emisses.” Ille tamen in ea opinione erat, ut putaret se scire, quod quisquam in domo sua sciret.

Moral Epistle 27.1

“Listen to me as if I were talking to myself.”

Sic itaque me audi, tamquam mecum loquar.

Drawing of a man with a beard and long hair, a handband around his head

Bust-length Study of the Blind Homer, drawing, Paul Buffet (MET, 2013.1122)

WWED? (What Would Epicurus Do?)

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 25.5-6

“Act in every way as if Epicurus were watching you.” It is certainly an advantage to get yourself a minder to consult, someone you consider an overseer for your thoughts. It is far better to live as if some noble man were always in your sight, but I am happy if you do what you do as if anyone else is watching–isolation commends every kind of evil to us.

When you have advanced so far that you are also embarrassed in front of yourself, then you can dismiss your witness. In the meantime, choose some other authority as a guardian for yourself, a Cato or Scipio or Laelius or any person whose presence would curb the offenses of even the worst kind of wastrel. Do this as long as it takes to make yourself the kind of person in whose presence you wouldn’t dare to sin.

When you have accomplished this and you begin to have real self-respect, I will start to let you do what Epicurus advises in another passage: “The best time to retreat within yourself is when you are compelled to be in a crowd.”

“Sic fac,” inquit, “omnia, tamquam spectet Epicurus.” Prodest sine dubio custodem sibi inposuisse et habere, quem respicias, quem interesse cogitationibus tuis iudices. Hoc quidem longe magnificentius est, sic vivere tamquam sub alicuius boni viri ac semper praesentis oculis, sed ego etiam hoc contentus sum, ut sic facias, quaecumque facies, tamquam spectet aliquis; omnia nobis mala solitudo persuadet. Cum iam profeceris tantum, ut sit tibi etiam tui reverentia, licebit dimittas paedagogum; interim aliquorum te auctoritate custodi, aut Cato ille sit aut Scipio aut Laelius aut talis, cuius1 interventu perditi quoque homines vitia supprimerent, dum te efficis eum, cum quo peccare non audeas. Cum hoc effeceris, et aliqua coeperit apud te tui esse dignatio, incipiam tibi permittere, quod idem suadet Epicurus: “Tunc praecipue in te ipse secede, cum esse cogeris in turba.”

Water cup with sticker that says "what would epicurus do" on it
I found this here: https://www.redbubble.com/i/sticker/What-Would-Epicurus-Do-Sticker-by-StregaSuprema/107168791.EJUG5#&gid=1&pid=1

A Philosopher is Done with Doing

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 24.25-26

“The brave and wise person shouldn’t flee life, but merely leave. And that affect that plagues many–a lust for death–should be avoided. Just as with other things, Lucilius, the mind has an unconsidered inclination to death that often afflicts the kindest and most serious people as much as the ignorant and dissolute. The former hate life; the latter are annoyed by it.

Others are moved by being done with doing and seeing, not by a hatred of life but by boredom. We slide into this as philosophy itself pushes. So we say, “How long for the same things? Do I just keep on waking, sleeping, getting hungry, getting bored, growing cold, then warm again? There’s no end to things, but everything is tied up in a circle, fleeing and following.  Night presses upon day, day presses upon night, summer gives way to autumn, winter replaces fall and in turn melts into spring.

I do nothing new; I see nothing new. Eventually you get sick of this too.” There are many who don’t think being alive is a hardship, but that it is empty. Goodbye.”

Vir fortis ac sapiens non fugere debet e vita, sed exire. Et ante omnia ille quoque vitetur affectus, qui multos occupavit, libido moriendi. Est enim, mi Lucili, ut ad alia, sic etiam ad moriendum inconsulta animi inclinatio, quae saepe generosos atque acerrimae indolis viros corripit, saepe ignavos iacentesque; illi contemnunt vitam, hi gravantur.. Everything moves in this way to return.

Quosdam subit eadem faciendi videndique satietas et vitae non odium sed fastidium, in quod prolabimur ipsa inpellente philosophia, dum dicimus: “Quousque eadem? Nempe expergiscar dormiam, esuriam fastidiam, algebo aestuabo. Nullius rei finis est, sed in orbem nexa sunt omnia, fugiunt ac secuntur. Diem nox premit, dies noctem, aestas in autumnum desinit, autumno hiemps instat, quae vere conpescitur; omnia sic transeunt ut revertantur. Nihil novi facio, nihil novi video; fit aliquando et huius rei nausia.” Multi sunt, qui non acerbum iudicent vivere, sed supervacuum. Vale.

Meme of Matthew mcconaughey from True Detective with Latin meaning: there's no end to anything, everything is tied up in a circle

Let Nothing External Spark Joy, the Stoic Way

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 23.1-2

“Do you think that I am going to write about how mild our winter has been, since it is over and was brief, or how terrible the spring is with its prolonged cold and all those foolish things people write when they’re grasping for words?

Nope. I will write you something out which is a huge advantages for me and for you. What, then, will this be unless it is me encouraging you to a stable mind. What is the foundation of what you are seeking? That you not take joy in minor things.

I said this is the foundation, but it is the peak. Someone crests the summit when they know what really brings them joy, when they do not invest their own happiness in an external power.”

Putas me tibi scripturum, quam humane nobiscum hiemps egerit, quae et remissa fuit et brevis, quam malignum ver sit, quam praeposterum frigus, et alias ineptias verba quaerentium? Ego vero aliquid, quod et mihi et tibi prodesse possit, scribam. Quid autem id erit, nisi ut te exhorter ad bonam mentem? Huius fundamentum quod sit quaeris? Ne gaudeas vanis. Fundamentum hoc esse dixi; culmen est. Ad summa pervenit, qui scit, quo gaudeat, qui felicitatem suam in aliena potestate non posuit

no joy in small things? no thank you stoicism

couple in bed meme with latin quotations drawn from the passage saying, in english, what is the foundation you are seeking? That you do not take joy in minor things

How Work is Like a Girlfriend

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 22.9-11

“My Lucilius, it is easy to avoid work, if you learn to reject work’s rewards! These are the things the delay and detain us–“What, should I give up such prospects? Should I quit at harvest time? Should my side be stripped of attendants? Should my litter go uncarried? Should my entryway be empty of guests?”

People give up these things begrudgingly. They love suffering’s payday, but hate suffering itself. People complain about their ambition like they would a girlfriend. What I mean is if you take a close look at their feelings, it isn’t really hate, but negotiation.

Examine those who complain about what they really want and who claim they what to flee those things they can’t bear to be without. You will understand that they willingly tarry in a place they insist is hard, even insufferable, to handle. This is why, Lucilius, while fewer people are enslaved, most people cling to slavery.”

Facile est autem, mi Lucili, occupationes evadere, si occupationum pretia contempseris. Illa sunt, quae nos morantur et detinent: “Quid ergo? Tam magnas spes relinquam? Ab ipsa messe discedam? Nudum erit latus, incomitata lectica, atrium vacuum?”

Ab his ergo inviti homines recedunt et mercedem miseriarum amant, ipsas execrantur. Sic de ambitione quomodo de amica queruntur; id est, si verum adfectum eorum inspicias, non oderunt, sed litigant. Excute istos, qui, quae cupiere, deplorant et de earum rerum locuntur fuga, quibus carere non possunt; videbis voluntariam esse illis in eo moram, quod aegre ferre ipsos et misere locuntur. Ita est, Lucili; paucos servitus, plures servitutem tenent.

Oil painting of a dark hair woman looking from beneath her eyebrows at the viewer, She has pale skin and a dark necklace
“The Albian Girl,” Albert Küchler 1831

Milk and A Blanket, A Recipe for Happiness

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 20.12-13

“It is, moreover, the sign of a great mind not to rush to these kinds of things as if they are better but to be prepared for them as if they are easy. And they are easy, Lucilius, when you approach them after deep contemplation, they are pleasurable too.–there’s some safety in them and nothing is pleasant without this.

So, I think what is needed–what I wrote to you that great men often do–is to spend some days during which we practice imaginary poverty to get ready for the real thing. We need to do this even more because we have persisted on luxury and we think everything else is harsh and challenging. Instead, the spirit needs to be shaken from sleep and pinched, reminded that nature has set out little for us. No one is born wealthy. Everyone enters into the light and is told to be happy with milk and a blanket. Kingdoms don’t satisfy us after these starts! Goodbye.”

Ceterum magnae indolis est ad ista non properare tamquam meliora, sed praeparari tamquam ad facilia. Et sunt, Lucili, facilia; cum vero multo ante meditatus accesseris, iucunda quoque; inest enim illis, sine qua nihil est iucundum, securitas. Necessarium ergo iudico, id quod tibi scripsi magnos viros saepe fecisse: aliquos dies interponere, quibus nos imaginaria paupertate exerceamus ad veram. Quod eo magis faciendum est, quod deliciis permaduimus et omnia dura ac difficilia iudicamus. Potius excitandus e somno et vellicandus est animus admonendusque naturam nobis minimum constituisse. Nemo nascitur dives. Quisquis exit in lucem, iussus est lacte et panno esse contentus; ab his initiis nos regna non capiunt. Vale.

Black and white image of a woodcut showing a child sitting on floor next to a table with a feeding cup while a woman mixes something in a bowl and looks at the child
Child with feeding bottle. Woodcut appears in “Ein Regiment … für die jungen Kinder” by Heinrich von Louffenberg.

The More You Owe

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 19.11-12

“I might be able use this saying of Maecenas to settle up my account with you  But, if I know you, you will lodge a complaint against me that you don’t want to accept what I owe in this rough and debased form. Whatever happens, I have to give you these words from Epicurus:

“You must examine who you eat and drink with rather than what you eat and drink. For a barbeque without a friend is the life of a lion or wolf.” Well this won’t be your situation unless you retire; until then you will have whomever your head of household invites from the crowd of visitors. Someone makes a mistake, however, who seeks a friend in the dining hall or examines them over dinner. A person overwhelmed by their own possessions has no greater evil than believing they have friends in people they don’t actually like and thinking that their own gifts actually create friendships, when there are people who hate more because they owe more. A small loan makes someone a debtor; a big one makes them your enemy.

“What then? Gifts don’t help with friendship?” They help, if you can choose who accepts them, if they are carefully placed and not just tossed around.

So, while you are beginning to be of your own mind, use this advice from the wise: see that it is who gets something that matters more than what they receive.”

Poteram tecum hac Maecenatis sententia parem facere rationem. Sed movebis mihi controversiam, si novi te, nec voles quod debeo in aspero et inprobo accipere. Ut se res habet, ab Epicuro versura facienda est. “Ante,” inquit, “circumspiciendum est, cum quibus edas et bibas, quam quid edas e bibas. Nam sine amico visceratio leonis ac lupi vita est.” Hoc non continget tibi, nisi secesseris; alioqui habebis convivas, quos ex turba salutantium nomenclator digesserit. Errat autem, qui amicum in atrio quaerit, in convivio probat. Nullum habet maius malum occupatus homo et bonis suis obsessus, quam quod amicos sibi putat, quibus ipse non est, quod beneficia sua efficacia iudicat ad conciliandos amicos, cum quidam, quo plus debent, magis oderint. Leve aes alienum debitorem facit, grave inimicum. “Quid ergo? Beneficia non parant amicitias?” Parant, si accepturos licuit eligere, si conlocata, non sparsa sunt.

Itaque dum incipis esse mentis tuae, interim hoc consilio sapientium utere, ut magis ad rem existimes pertinere, quis, quam quid acceperit. Vale.

meme of sponge bob square pants saying "the more you owe the more you hate"

Bypassing Treatment for Sorrow

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Libanius, 6 6. Ἀρισταινέτῳ

“When I heard that your wife was sick, I felt compassion as I thought about how you probably felt about her condition. Then, when I learned that she died, I moaned out loud, taking it badly that Aristainetos, a man so naturally suited to celebrations, was in grief.

I was going to try to comfort you with a speech, but I restrained myself because I worried that even though I think I know you well I might be caught ignorant. For those passages I was about to use to relieve you–the bits from Pindar and Simonides and all those we are in the habit of using from the tragedians as a treatment for sorrow–I imagine that you knew them long ago and spoke them to others yourself.

So I figured that if these were the kinds of things to comfort your despair, then you could minister to yourself or, if not, it would be useless for someone else to recite them to you. So, I stopped that project and I offer instead a summary of everything that has happened during the winter.”

  1. Καὶ ὅτε ἀσθενεῖν σοι τὴν γυναῖκα ἠκούομεν, συνηλγοῦμεν ἐννοοῦντες ὡς εἰκός σε διακεῖσθαι καμνούσης, καὶ ἐπειδὴ τὴν τελευτὴν ἐπυθόμην, ἀνῴμωξα δεινόν τι ποιούμενος Ἀρισταίνετον εἶναι ἐν πένθει, οὗ τῇ φύσει πανηγύρεις πρέπουσιν.
  2. ὁρμήσας δὲ παραμυθεῖσθαι λόγοις ἀνέσχον δείσας μὴ πάνυ σε δοκῶν εἰδέναι ἔπειτα ἁλοίην ἀγνοῶν. οἷς γὰρ ἔμελλόν σε κουφιεῖν, τούτοις δὴ τοῖς Πινδάρου καὶ Σιμωνίδου, καὶ ὅσα ἐκ τραγῳδιῶν εἰώθαμεν φάρμακα λύπῃ προσάγειν, πάντα ἐδόκεις μοι πάλαι τε εἰδέναι κἂν πρὸς ἄλλους εἰπεῖν.
  3. ἐλογιζόμην οὖν ὅτι, εἰ μὲν οἷά τε κατακοιμίζειν ἀθυμίαν, αὐτὸς ἰάσῃ σαυτόν, εἰ δ᾿ οὐχ οἷά τε, καὶ παρ᾿ ἄλλου μάτην ἂν λέγοιτο. διὰ ταῦτα τοῦ μὲν ἀφίσταμαι, τὴν διήγησιν δέ σοι τῶν πραγμάτων ἀποδίδωμι, ἃ τοῦ χειμῶνος συνέβη.
David Teniers The Younger “Man of Sorrow”

The Eternal Autumn of Your Smile: A Love Note

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Philostratus, Letters 51

To Kleonide*,

“Sappho adores the rose and always adorns the flower with praise, even comparing beautiful girls to it. And she also likens it to the arms of the Graces when they are bare up to the elbows.

The rose, even if it is the most beautiful of the flowers, has but a brief season—for it follows other flowers which blossom in the spring.

But your charm is always in bloom—this is how the autumn of your beauty still smiles like the spring in your eyes and on your cheeks.”

Κλεονίδῃ

Ἡ Σαπφὼ τοῦ ῥόδου ἐρᾷ καὶ στεφανοῖ αὐτὸ ἀεί τινι ἐγκωμίῳ τὰς καλὰς τῶν παρθένων ἐκείνῳ ὁμοιοῦσα, ὁμοιοῖ δὲ αὐτὸ καὶ τοῖς τῶν Χαρίτων πήχεσιν ἐπειδὰν ἀποδύσῃ σφῶν τὰς ὠλένας. ἐκεῖνο μὲν οὖν, εἰ καὶ κάλλιστον ἀνθέων, βραχὺ τὴν ὥραν, παρέπεται γὰρ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἐννεάσαν τῷ ἦρι. τὸ δὲ σὸν εἶδος ἀεὶ τέθηλεν· ὅθεν ὀφθαλμοῖς ἐμμειδιᾷ καὶ παρειαῖς οἷόν τι ἔαρ τὸ μετόπωρον τοῦ κάλλους.

*One MS glosses the addressee as πόρνῃ (a prostitute) others merely as γυναικί (a woman)

Greek Anthology, 5.26

“If I saw you shining with dark hair
Or at another time with blond locks, mistress,
The same grace would gleam from both.
Love will make its home in your hair even when it’s gray.”

Εἴτε σε κυανέῃσιν ἀποστίλβουσαν ἐθείραις,
εἴτε πάλιν ξανθαῖς εἶδον, ἄνασσα, κόμαις,
ἴση ἀπ’ ἀμφοτέρων λάμπει χάρις. ἦ ῥά γε ταύταις
θριξὶ συνοικήσει καὶ πολιῇσιν ῎Ερως.

Add_ms_20698_f073r
 Bruges, 1475, Add MS 20698, f. 73r