Wherever You Go, You’re Still You

March 6, 2023March 6, 2023 ~ 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.

Buying Erudition

March 5, 2023March 5, 2023 ~ 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)

The Age of Knowing Better

March 4, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistle 26.1-3

“I was just telling you that I am in sight of old age. Well, I fear that I am already past it. Now some other word applies to these years, or at least to this body,–since old age is the title of a time of weariness, not being broken. Count me among the derelicts and those just reaching the end.

Still, I am thankful to myself with you as my witness: I don’t see any weakness to my mind, although I feel it in my body. Only my faults and those servants of my faults have grown old. My spirit is strong and takes joy in the fact that it is not all wrapped up in this body. It has laid the great part of its burden down to rest. Yet it celebrates and communes with me about old age. It says that this is its season to bloom. And I want to believe it–let me make good use of it.”

Modo dicebam tibi, in conspectu esse me senectutis; iam vereor, ne senectutem post me reliquerim. Aliud iam his annis, certe huic corpori, vocabulum convenit, quoniam quidem senectus lassae aetatis, non fractae, nomen est; inter decrepitos me numera et extrema tangentis.

Gratias tamen mihi apud te ago; non sentio in animo aetatis iniuriam, cum sentiam in corpore. Tantum vitia et vitiorum ministeria senuerunt; viget animus et gaudet non multum sibi esse cum corpore. Magnam partem oneris sui posuit. Exultat et mihi facit controversiam de senectute. Hunc ait esse florem suum. Credamus illi; bono suo utatur.

WWED? (What Would Epicurus Do?)

March 3, 2023 ~ 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

March 2, 2023March 2, 2023 ~ 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.

Let Nothing External Spark Joy, the Stoic Way

March 1, 2023November 19, 2024 ~ 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

How Work is Like a Girlfriend

February 28, 2023 ~ 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

February 26, 2023 ~ 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

February 25, 2023 ~ 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.

Cosplay at Being Poor

February 24, 2023 ~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

Seneca, Moral Epistles 18.5-6

“Still, it pleases me so much to test the strength of your conviction that I will select for you a lesson from the great men: designate some days for yourself when you will be happy with the cheapest food, with hard and poorly-made clothing, and say to yourself: ‘Is this something I was afraid of?”

The mind should prepare itself for difficulties amid safety and harden itself against harm during the enjoyment of good fortune. The soldier practices in the middle of peace, builds fortifications without any enemy around, and wears himself out with meaningless work in order to to meet necessary challenges.

If you don’t want someone to hesitate in the act itself, you need to train before it happens. This is the practice of those who have approached total privation by imitating poverty every month so that they might never grow pale at something they had often studied.”

Ceterum adeo mihi placet temptare animi tui firmitatem, ut ex praecepto magnorum virorum tibi quoque praecipiam: interponas aliquot dies, quibus contentus minimo ac vilissimo cibo, dura atque horrida veste dicas tibi: “Hoc est quod timebatur?” In ipsa securitate animus ad difficilia se praeparet et contra iniurias fortunae inter beneficia firmetur. Miles in media pace decurrit, sine ullo hoste vallum iacit et supervacuo labore lassatur, ut sufficere necessario possit. Quem in ipsa re trepidare nolueris, ante rem exerceas. Hoc secuti sunt, qui omnibus mensibus paupertatem imitati prope ad inopiam accesserunt, ne umquam expavescerent quod saepe didicissent.