Your greatest struggle is with yourself; you are your own obstacle.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Sénèque le Jeune
Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC – AD 65), usually known as Seneca, was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and—in one work—humorist of the Silver Age of Latin literature.
You see where happiness lies, but you dare not go to it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
From your life to the life of the wise, one can only ascend.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The life of the wise shines with its own rays.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
From your studies in wisdom will come your true brilliance, your ennoblement.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If you want to make [someone] rich, do not add to their possessions, but subtract from their desires.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[This thought] is not meant for riches alone; whatever it is applied to, it will have the same force.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If you want [someone] to have perpetual enjoyment, do not add to their pleasures, but subtract from their desires.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do not believe that these maxims belong to [a single philosopher]: they belong to everyone.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No matter which camp one joins, one must live virtuously.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
These gardens [...] do not excite hunger, they appease it; they do not kindle a greater thirst [...] they quench it with a natural remedy that costs nothing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
This pleasure, although natural, is not necessary; you owe it nothing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The stomach [...] is not an intractable creditor; it is discharged for very little: give it only what is owed, not all that you can.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The ocean of ages will pile upon us; a few geniuses will raise their heads [...] and will know how to defend themselves for a long time.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Genius! Its glory grows unceasingly; and [...] everything connected to its memory is welcome.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Oh, how contrary are the wishes of those who love us, and all the more so when they are granted!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I am no longer surprised that from the cradle all evils follow our steps: we have grown up amidst the curses of our parents.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
May the gods [...] hear from our lips a selfless prayer.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For how long shall we sow for ourselves alone fields larger than great cities?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For a man to feed himself, it takes both land and sea.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In such a frail body, has nature given us an appetite so insatiable that we surpass in greed the largest of animals?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What does what we give to nature amount to? For very little she considers our debt paid.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not appetite that is costly, it is vanity.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Those enslaved by their belly], let us place them among the animals, not men [...] but among the dead.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To live is to be useful to many; to live is to make use of oneself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To languish in shadow and apathy is to make a tomb of one's own home.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
On the threshold of [certain] homes one could engrave on the marble, as an epitaph: dead in anticipation.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no other evil in all this than your own indignation and your complaints!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I see nothing wretched for a man of courage except the belief that there could be anything wretched for him in this world.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I will no longer tolerate myself from the day something becomes unbearable to me.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Losses], injuries, tribulations, fears [...] are ordinary things, what am I saying? Unavoidable.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I do not obey God, I unite with His will; it is out of devotion, not necessity, that I follow Him.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whatever happens to me, I will accept it all without sadness, without changing my expression.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I will never grudgingly pay my tribute [to life].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Everything that causes our moans, our terrors, is a tribute of life.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Hardships] are to a long life what dust, mud, and rain are to a long road.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
'But I wanted to live and experience no discomfort!' Such a cowardly wish is not worthy of a man.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
May the gods [...] grant that you are never the spoiled child of Fortune!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Ask yourself [...] whether you would rather live in the camps or in the taverns.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Life, [...] is warfare.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Those who [...] attempt the most hazardous expeditions are the brave and the elite of the camp.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Those whom a base inertia [...] chains to their comfort are the cowards left to live out of contempt.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A good pilot still holds the sea with a torn sail; even stripped of his rigging, he still patches up the wreckage for new journeys.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is a great thing [...] and one that requires long practice, to know how to depart without a murmur when the inevitable hour arrives.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If there is any harm or fear to be felt in this matter, it is the fault of the one dying, not of death itself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is as foolish to fear a harm that will not happen as a blow that one will not feel.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When present, [death] gives even the least trained souls the courage to no longer avoid the inevitable.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To be unwilling to die is to have been unwilling to live. Life [...] was given to us on the condition of death.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To fear death is [...] madness: for one must expect the certain, only the uncertain is to be dreaded.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death is an equal and invincible necessity for all. Who can complain of a fate from which no one is exempt?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The first principle of equity is equality.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All that [nature] has created, it decomposes, and it decomposes to create anew.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one welcomes it with a serene brow except the one who has long prepared for it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not death that we fear, but the idea we have of it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us consider [...] when any cause of death seems to approach us, how many others are closer that we do not fear!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] always think of this final hour so that you may never fear it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The man who faces death without hatred for life, who welcomes it without seeking it, has far more authority.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough [...] if it were all well invested.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
We are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
It is but the smallest part of our life that we really live. For all the rest of existence is not life, but merely time.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
You will find no one willing to share out his money; but to how many does each of us distribute his life!
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head [...].
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Is it not too late to begin to live when we must depart from life?
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
[...] the art of living must be learned throughout life; and [...] one must learn how to die throughout life.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Everyone rushes his life on, and suffers from a yearning for the future and a boredom with the present.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today [...].
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
All that is to come is uncertain: live in the now.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Life is divided into three periods: the present, the past, and the future. The present is short, the future is doubtful, the past is certain [...].
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
No one willingly reverts to the past, unless all his actions have been submitted to the censorship of his conscience [...].
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
The life of the wise is [...] very extensive [...]. He alone is freed from the limitations of the human race; all ages are his servants, as if he were a god.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
How short and troubled is the life of those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear for the future!
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
So you must not think a man has lived long because he has wrinkles and white hair: he has not lived long, he has existed long.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
I am ready to die if silence is as necessary as they say for one who isolates himself to study.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The human voice, I believe, causes more distraction than other noises: it diverts the mind towards it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I force my mind to be constantly attentive to itself, and not to be diverted by the outside.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let all the noises of the world rise up outside, provided that within me no tumult occurs, that desire and fear do not fight there.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What does the silence of a whole country matter, if I can hear my passions raging?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No rest is deep, except that which reason establishes: the night brings back our sorrows, it does not banish them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
True tranquility is that in which a good conscience flourishes.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Inner turmoil comes] from the soul, which makes noise: it is the soul that must be calmed, whose revolt must be suppressed.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Often, rest is anything but rest.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If one thing is certain, it is that the vices born of inaction are driven out by activity.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In the depths of that asylum where fear and weariness have thrown us, ambition revives at intervals.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A disorder that is acknowledged is always lighter, just as a disease tends towards its cure when it erupts [...] and brings its venom to the outside.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Greed [...] and all the sicknesses of the soul are never more dangerous [...] than when they slumber in a hypocritical reform.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He has a light mind and is still incapable of collecting himself, the man who is startled by the slightest cry.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You will not enjoy, be sure of it, perfect calm until no clamor affects you anymore, until no voice tears you away from yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Virtue alone is sufficient to fulfill all the conditions of happiness.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not the reduction, but the absence of vices that constitutes a virtuous man [...] they must be null, not merely lesser.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Besides, what does the degree of a passion matter? Whatever it may be, it does not know how to obey; it takes no advice.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Passions,] it is easier to stop them at the beginning than to control their fiery development.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The ill affections of the soul,] one expels them more easily than one directs them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Evil never keeps to a measure.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What folly it is to believe that a thing whose beginning does not depend on us will end whenever we please!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What makes it [the happy life] the best possible situation is its quality, not its magnitude.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The happy life...] to estimate it by number, measure, and parts is to strip it of its excellence.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Courage is not thoughtless temerity nor a love of danger [...], it is the science of distinguishing what is evil from what is not.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is evil? It is to yield to what are called evils, and to cowardly surrender that independence for which all must be suffered.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The arts are the servants of life; wisdom is its sovereign.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The wise man [...] is never greater than when fate stands in his way.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You think misfortune crushes him? Misfortune serves him.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whatever destiny befalls him, the wise man will bring forth memorable results from it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is this force that drags us in one direction when we are aiming for another, and pushes us toward the very place we want to flee?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We float between a thousand contradictory projects: we want nothing with a free, absolute, constant will.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one is strong enough on their own to break free: someone must hold out a hand, pull them out of the mire.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do not despise the man who can be saved with the help of others: it is already a great thing to want to be saved.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One has deserved better of oneself when one has triumphed over the misfortunes of nature, and has not been guided, but dragged to wisdom.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We walk through obstacles. We must therefore fight and call upon some helpers.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Help can come to us from those who are no longer with us as well as from the living.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us choose [...] those men whose life is a lesson; who say what must be done and prove it by doing it [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Ask for the help of those men whom one admires more for seeing them than for hearing them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is more shameful than philosophy chasing after applause?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Does the patient think of praising the surgeon who cuts his flesh? [...] submit yourself to the cure.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Can you take pleasure in the praise of people whom you yourself cannot praise?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For the observer, there is nothing that does not have its clues, and the smallest features can give the measure of our character.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Harmful is the eloquence that makes itself desired for its own sake, not for the substance of things.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Philosophy has lost [...] since it was delivered to the people; but it can be seen in its sanctuary [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The continuity of misfortune provides at least this advantage: by dint of tormenting, it ends by hardening.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
For us to taste happiness, nature does not require great preparations; our felicity is in our hands.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
Prosperity does not swell the heart of the wise man, adversity cannot cast him down. Ceaselessly, he has worked to seek all his happiness within himself.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
Reversals only break a soul that has been deceived by success.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
He who has not let himself be puffed up by the wind of prosperity is not cast down by the breath of misfortune; in the very heart of prosperity, he has tested himself against adversity.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
I have never trusted fortune, even when she seemed to leave me in peace.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
It is the soul that creates wealth; it follows man into exile; and, in the most dreadful deserts, as long as it finds what it needs to sustain the body, it enjoys its own goods.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
The soul is sacred, the soul is eternal, and no arm can reach it.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
Only a shrunken soul finds charm in earthly objects.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
Is a place ever narrow when it contains [...] great virtues?
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
Nothing is enough for greed; little is enough for nature.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
It is better [...] to conquer grief than to deceive it. [...] the calm that reason provides is lasting.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
The contempt others have for us stems from our contempt for ourselves.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
A great man who falls is still great after his fall: he is no more exposed to your contempt than the ruins of temples that are trodden underfoot.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
To give oneself over to endless grief [...] is a childish weakness; to feel none would be an inhuman hardness.
41-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Cabaret-Dupaty trans.)
It is your soul you must change, not the climate.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Your vices will follow you, no matter where you land.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why are you surprised that your distant travels do you no good? It is always yourself that you take with you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do you want to know why nothing relieves you in your sad flight? You are fleeing with yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Lay down the burden of your soul: until then, no place will please you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You run here and there to cast off the weight that burdens you; and the agitation itself makes it more unbearable.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What matters is the person you are when you arrive, not where you arrive.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You must live with this conviction: "I was not born for one corner of the globe; my homeland is the whole world."
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] you are not traveling, you are wandering and drifting [...]
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The object you seek so much], happiness, is placed everywhere.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The wise man endures these things, he does not seek them out: he prefers peace to the fray.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Little is gained by freeing oneself from one's own vices if one must then battle with those of others.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What does the number of masters matter? There is only one servitude; and whoever defies it, [...] is free.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The beginning of salvation is the knowledge of one's fault.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do you think one thinks in the least of being cured, when one elevates one's infirmities into virtues?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The foundation of wisdom is not to rejoice in vain things.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The wise man] knows where to place his joy and does not leave his happiness to the discretion of another.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Above all, learn what you should rejoice in.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I want joy never to abandon you. I want it to be born [...] within yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To the soul alone belong glee, confidence, the courage that masters fate.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Believe me, true joy is a serious thing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All external joys lack a foundation; but the joy of which I speak [...] is substantial.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Cast away, trample underfoot all outward pomp, [...] and be happy from your own resources.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What are these resources? Yourself, and the best part of you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Pleasure is on a slippery slope; it slides towards pain if it does not keep within its bounds.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The thirst for the true good, however keen it may be, is without risk.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The true good is] a good conscience, honest resolutions, righteous actions, contempt for the gifts of chance.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The multitude, like objects that follow the current of rivers, does not walk, but is carried away.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is to live badly to always be beginning to live.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Others have ceased to live before they have begun.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What folly indeed to punish oneself for one's miseries, to aggravate them with a new evil?
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Man alone fans his grief and suffers, not according to what he feels, but according to his decision to suffer.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
If no sobs can bring back to life what is no more; if destiny is immutable [...], let us cease a grief that would be fruitless.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Do not wait for the day when [sorrow] leaves you against your will: be the first to leave it.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
To have foreseen present evils is to disarm them.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
All that [...] comes from uncertain and fickle fortune is but a foreign device lent to us, of which nothing is given as our own.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Our duty [...] is to always keep available what was entrusted to us for an indefinite time, and to return it all without a murmur at the first call.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Wretched ones, you do not know how to live as fugitives.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Born mortal, you gave birth to mortals: you, corruptible and passing matter [...], did you expect that from such fragile elements strength and immutability would be engendered?
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Death is the resolution, the end of all sorrows, the barrier that misfortune does not cross; it returns us to that deep calm in which we rested before we were born.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
He who weeps for the dead must also weep for those who are not born.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Against the injuries of this life, I have the benefit of death.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Nothing is so fallacious as this life, nothing so treacherous as its traps: no one surely would accept it, if they did not receive it unknowingly.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Every progress, rightly considered, is a decline.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
A perfected virtue soon disappears and steals away from mortal eyes; and that which ripens early does not wait for the late season.
37 AD - 41 AD
Source: Consolation to Marcia (Baillard translation)
Often we desire one thing and ask for another, and we hide the truth even from the gods.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In the art of living, the greatest fault is the one committed willingly.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Today, we need healing methods that are all the more powerful as the evils that attack us have much more energy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What was once food for need has become a burden for satiety.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The multiplicity of dishes has multiplied diseases.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our frenzy is not only individual, it is national: we repress assassinations [...] but wars, [...] a crime crowned with glory!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The act for which one would pay with one's head if it were clandestine, we advocate for when it is committed in military uniform.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Man, the gentlest of beings, takes joy in shedding the blood of his fellow man [...], while among themselves the most stupid and ferocious animals live in peace.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To always want the same things, one must want the truth.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To worship God is to know Him well.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do you want to make the gods favorable to you? Be good like them. He who imitates them honors them enough.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
This world that you see, which encompasses the domain of gods and men, is one: we are members of a great body.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Society is the exact image of an arch that would collapse [...] if its solidity were not ensured by the mutual resistance of its stones.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing is more shameful than the undecided, hesitant, and timid man, who puts his foot sometimes backward, sometimes forward.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The action will not be right, if the will is not, since the will makes the action.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one can lead a happy or even a bearable life without the study of wisdom.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is more difficult to remain faithful to one's plans than to form virtuous ones.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One must persevere [...] until the good that your will dreams of becomes a habit.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Philosophy is not an art for dazzling the public [...] it consists not in words, but in things.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Philosophy] forms the soul, shapes it, regulates life, guides actions.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Philosophy] shows what to practice or to flee, it sits at the helm and directs our agitated course through the reefs.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Without it there is no security: how many incidents, at every hour, require advice that can only be asked of it!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
whether destiny chains us to its inexorable law, [...] philosophy will be our shield.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Philosophy] will teach you to follow [destiny], to endure [Fortune].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All that has been well said by any other is mine.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If you live according to nature, you will never be poor; if according to opinion, never rich.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nature desires very little; opinion would have the infinite.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The desires of nature have their limits; those which deceptive opinion gives birth to have no place to stop.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There are no limits in what is false.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When you want to know if your desire is natural or suggested by blind passion, see if it has a stopping point somewhere.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What does it matter how many things you possess! There are far more that you do not possess.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
In death everything ends, everything, death itself.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
We are not children twice, as is commonly said; we are always children, with the difference that we play for higher stakes.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Philosophy is nothing other than [...] the science of living honestly, or, the art of following the right path in life.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Most philosophers are such men that their fine words turn to their shame; to hear them declaim [...], one would say that it is themselves they are denouncing.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
The wise man will sometimes do what he does not approve of, if it is a means to a noble end.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
The truly honorable man [...] is one who [...] sees death at his side without being troubled by it as if it were something new.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
It is of no use for our conscience to be closed to men: it is open to God... What do you gain by having no confidants? Do you not have your conscience?
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
[God] wants a pure soul, good and honest intentions. [...] it is in one's heart that all must dedicate a sanctuary to him.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
The love of physical beauty is a forgetting of reason, which borders on madness [...].
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
The worst corruption is that of the man who believes that his own vice, his own mania, is a frenzy in others.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Disputes between friends require not a judge, but a mediator.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
One must ascertain the inner dispositions, since the face is an unreliable guarantor. The human heart has deep folds.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Friendship is a rare thing; it is not banal and common [...]. Do you believe that a friend can be found everywhere, without any trouble, without any search?
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Let us never allow time or distance the power to make us forget our friends.
circa 65 AD
Source: Fragments of Seneca
Let us welcome [old age] and love it: it is full of sweetness for those who know how to use it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Fruits have more flavor when they are past their prime; childhood only has its full brilliance at the moment it ends.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is most piquant in any pleasure, it saves for the final moment.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How sweet it is to have tired the passions, to have left them on the way!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death [...] should be as much before the eyes of the young man as of the old: for it does not call us by order of age.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One is never so old that one cannot hope without presumption for another day.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A day is a degree of life.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us therefore arrange each of our days as if it were the last in line, as if it were finishing and completing our life.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I have lived, I have completed my course to the end.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If God grants us a morrow, let us be happy to receive it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One enjoys oneself fully and securely when one awaits the morrow without anxiety.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who says in the evening, 'I have lived,' can say in the morning, 'I am gaining a day.'
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is hard to live under the yoke of necessity, but there is no necessity to live under it!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
On all sides, numerous, short, and easy paths open up to freedom.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All truth is my own property [...] good thoughts belong to all.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I have sequestered myself and closed my door only to be useful to a greater number.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is for the benefit of posterity that I work.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The right path, which I came to know late [...], I point out to others.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Avoid all that seduces the common crowd, all that chance bestows.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The gifts of fortune [...] are its traps.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[With fortune's favors], we believe we are taking, and we are taken.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[A life plan...] is to indulge the body only as much as is necessary for health.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The body], one must treat it harshly, lest it disobey the mind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Know this, all of you: one is as well sheltered under thatch as under gold.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Despise all those laborious superfluities called ornaments and decorations.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In man, nothing is admirable but the soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For a great soul, nothing is great.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Those who seem to do nothing do more than many others.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Make yourself a slave to philosophy, to enjoy true independence.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What chance has done for you is not yours.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is healthy not to live with those who are unlike us and have different tastes from our own.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I do not fear that you will be changed, but that your progress will be hindered. To stop is already to do great harm.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
This life is so short! And our inconstancy shortens it even more by making us start it over and over again.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We break life into too many pieces, we shred it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Hurry then, [...] and think how you would quicken your pace if you had the enemy at your back.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is a beautiful thing for a man to complete his life before dying, and then to wait in security for the days he has left to live.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A happy existence does not gain in happiness by being longer.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When will you see that happy time when you feel that time no longer matters to you, when, calm and untroubled, careless of the morrow, you will have enjoyed your whole being to satiety!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What makes men greedy for the future? It is that not one has belonged to himself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I wish for you mastery of yourself, and that your soul, agitated by vague fancies, may at last settle down and become steady.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Having arrived at the understanding of true goods, [...] [the soul] has no need of additional years.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He is emancipated, he is free, who still lives after his life is completed.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Sometimes we attribute to places or times an inconvenience that is bound to follow us wherever we go.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What makes us laugh [...] happens to us all [...] No one recognizes himself as stingy, no one as greedy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The blind man at least looks for a guide; we wander without taking one.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our illness does not come from without; it is within us; its very seat is in our bowels.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If we return to health with difficulty, it is because we do not know that we are sick.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one is brought back to nature with difficulty, if he has not divorced himself from it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We blush to learn wisdom; but [...] we must not expect such a great good to fall into our hands by chance.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is nothing that a stubborn ardor, an active and sustained zeal, cannot overcome.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How much more easily the soul receives all forms, this flexible soul that yields better than any fluid!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In no one has wisdom preceded error: in everyone, the place is already occupied.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To learn virtues is nothing more than to unlearn vices.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We must approach this reform with all the more courage because such a good, once acquired, is kept forever.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One does not unlearn virtue.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Virtue is in conformity with nature; vices are contrary and hostile to it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Philosophy is at once wholesome and pleasant.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
'But the road they call us to is arduous, bristling with obstacles!' Is it then by the plain that one reaches the heights?
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
The wise man can never receive injury or humiliation.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
We call invulnerable not that which is not struck, but that which nothing can wound.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
The brave man, in my eyes, is the one whom neither wars subjugate, nor the approach of an enemy force frightens, not the one who grows fat in idleness [...].
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
Fortune only takes away what it has given: it does not give virtue, so it does not take it away.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
What man is affected by losing what is not his?
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
To remain equal and the same in the most diverse circumstances, and to think that nothing is his but himself, that is, the best part of his being.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
Perversity has no more energy than virtue, and therefore cannot harm the wise man.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
To be free is to place one's soul above injury; it is to make oneself such that one finds the source of one's pleasures in oneself alone.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
There would be no virtue in enduring what one did not feel.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
In the struggle, one descends to the level of the adversary; even having conquered him, one has made oneself his equal.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
The wise man is ignorant of anger, which is kindled by the appearance of an insult.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
Fortune triumphs over us if we do not triumph completely over it.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
The homage and insults of the crowd must be met with the same contempt: let us not be afflicted by the latter, nor congratulate ourselves for the former.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
Foreseen accidents are always lesser.
c. 55
Source: Of the constancy of the wise man
Between God and good men there is a friendship, and virtue is its bond. [...] it is rather an affinity, a resemblance.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
God does not raise the good man in softness: He tests him, He hardens him, He prepares him for Himself.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
The shock of adversity does not alter a courageous soul: it remains unshakable, it stamps its own color upon events.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Courage withers when it lacks an adversary; its greatness [...] is only shown through the ordeal of pain.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
A happiness that has never been disturbed collapses at the first blow. [...] man becomes hardened to suffering, and becomes indomitable.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
There is nothing, it seems to me, more unhappy than a man who has never experienced misfortune.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
It is only through misfortune that great examples arise.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
To trample underfoot the calamities and terrors of mortals is the privilege of great men.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
To enjoy continuous happiness [...] is to be ignorant of one half of the human condition.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
To know oneself requires trials. One never knows the measure of one's strength without testing it.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Adversity is an opportunity for virtue.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Of all excesses, the one to be feared most is the excess of happiness.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
What, then, is the duty of a virtuous man? To surrender himself to fate. It is a great consolation to be carried along with the universe.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Gold is tested by fire, and courage by adversity.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Your happiness consists in being able to do without happiness.
c. 64 AD
Source: On Providence (Naudet trans.)
Let us cease to want what we once wanted.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
My preoccupation: to put an end to my old errors.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I work to make each day a whole life for me.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I seize [each day] as it comes, not as if it were the last, but with the thought that it might be.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Before I was old, I thought of living well, and in my old age, of dying well.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To die well is to die without regret.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Take care never to do anything against your will.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For the one who consents, there is no necessity.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not in executing an order that one is unhappy, but in executing it reluctantly.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us dispose our soul to want whatever fate demands.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us contemplate the end of our being without sorrow.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One must make preparations for death before making them for life.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Something seems to be missing, and it always will.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
As for living enough, neither years nor days have anything to do with it; what matters here is the soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I have lived as much as I needed: I await death, sated.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Some wise men have defined [anger] as a brief madness, for [...] it does not control itself, forgets all decency, [...] deaf to advice and reason.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
It is easier to expel a bad principle than to govern it, easier not to admit it than to moderate it once it has been admitted.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
A hideous and repulsive sight is a man who bloats and degrades his noble face. One then doubts whether such a vice is not more deformed than it is hateful.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
Man is made to assist man; anger to exterminate him. Man seeks society [...], anger breaks from it.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
The enemy must be repelled at the very frontier: if he penetrates it and seizes the gates of the fortress, will [the soul] receive the order to stop from a captive?
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
Ultimately, what need is there for anger when reason achieves the same end?
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
What is beautiful, what is noble, is to rush to defend one's own [...] at the sole call of duty, with will, judgment, foresight, without outburst or fury.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
The great remedy for anger is time. Do not demand that it forgive at first, but that it judge. It dissipates if it only waits.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
Why should we hate those who do evil, since it is error that drives them to it? It is not the part of a wise man to curse those who are mistaken.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
An equitable judge does not decide his own case differently from another's. [...] there is no one who has the right to absolve himself.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
The vices of others are before our eyes; our own we throw behind our backs.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
The wise man will not be angered by those who sin. Why? Because he knows that wisdom is not born with us, but must be acquired.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
The wise man [...] never goes out without saying to himself: 'I will meet many who are ungrateful, greedy, restless souls.' He will see all this with as kind an eye as a doctor sees his patients.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
And he who is a terror to all, must be afraid of all.
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
What sweeter rest is there than that of a peaceful soul, and what is more tiring than anger?
c. 41 AD
Source: On Anger (Baillard translation)
We are accustomed to granting much to universal opinion; and for us, a sentiment shared by all is a proof of truth.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let me know how to face misfortune, to parry its countless blows, [...] to bear tribulations without moaning, and prosperity without making others moan.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing seems more pitiful to me than to call for death.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To die one day, when you would not wish it, is your obligation: to die whenever you wish it, is your right.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who invokes death does not wish to die.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Fate has set so many problems before you! You have not yet been able to solve them, and you quibble over words! O, what folly!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nature has not lavished time upon us with so liberal a hand that we have any to spare; and see how much of it escapes even the most careful.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The mind becomes accustomed to what amuses rather than what heals, and philosophy, the most serious of remedies, is made into a diversion.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why then do you prefer chaining me to words over training me in deeds? Inspire in me more courage, more security; make me equal to Fortune, make me greater than her.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Tell me what to flee, what to seek; what studies will strengthen my faltering soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
As for quibbles [...], they shrink and depress [the mind]: far from sharpening it, as you believe, they blunt it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One cannot at the same time enjoy being and suffer from not being. These two opposites do not mix, and the same man is not at once happy and unhappy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is desirable is a good.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Limited and swift days, which carry us away, what do we gain from squandering almost all your hours so vainly?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is so impossible to doubt that the one is not like the other, that to some they both seem to be one and the same thing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Is there any need to anticipate evils that will be felt soon enough, to forestall their arrival and lose the present for fear of the future?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is certainly madness, because one will be unhappy someday, to be so right now.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Do you want to cast off all anxiety? Whatever event you fear, consider it certain; [...] you will surely see that its cause is either trivial or fleeting.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
See how much more ardent courage is in facing trials than cruelty is in imposing them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Far from death being something to fear, it is to death that we owe our ability to fear nothing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Remember to strip things of their clamor, to see what each one is in itself: you will find nothing frightening in them but your own terror.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not only from men, but from things that we must remove the mask and restore their true face.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Pain is] light if I can bear it, and fleeting if I cannot.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The most shameful reproach is to be accused of having a philosophy of words, not of deeds.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us think that whatever can happen, will happen.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death either annihilates or liberates man. If liberated, the best part of his being remains [...] if annihilated, nothing of him is left: good and ill, all has vanished.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We die every day, for every day robs us of a portion of life, and even as we grow, the sum of our years decreases.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is ridiculous to run towards death out of disgust for life, when it is our way of living that has made us run towards death.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Such is the shortsightedness of men, or rather their madness, that the dread of death drives some to inflict it upon themselves.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The man of heart, the wise man, should not flee from life, but take his leave of it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who surpasses his neighbors is great where he surpasses them. Greatness is not absolute: it gains or loses by comparison.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A ship that is large on a river is very small on the sea.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Count yourself happy only on the day when you can live in the public eye [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] your walls would protect you without hiding you [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] those walls which most of us believe are made less to shelter our persons than to cover our shameful deeds.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You would hardly find a man willing to live with his doors open.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is conscience rather than pride that hides behind a doorkeeper.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We live in such a way that to see us unexpectedly is to catch us in a fault.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is the use of seeking darkness, of fleeing the eyes and ears of others?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A good conscience would challenge a crowd; a bad one brings its anxieties and alarms even into solitude.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If your actions are honorable, let them be known to all.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[If they are] dishonorable, what does it matter that no one else knows them? You know them yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How I pity you, if you do not take account of that witness [yourself]!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Our life is long enough [...] if all its hours were well invested.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Life, for one who knows how to use it, is long enough.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
All the rest is not life, but merely time.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Do you dare complain of another's arrogance, when you can never find time for yourself?
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
No one lets anyone seize their fields [...] but on their life they let anyone encroach; what is more, they themselves bring in the usurpers.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
When it comes to spending time, we are lavish to the point of excess with the one thing in which it is honorable to be stingy.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
You live as if you were to live forever; your own frailty never occurs to you.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
How late it is to begin living at the very moment when one must cease to live!
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
The greatest impediment to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow. [...] Live in this very hour.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Life is divided into three periods: that which is, that which was, and that which will be. [...] The past alone is certain: that is where Fortune has lost her rights.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Of all mortals, only they have true leisure, those who give theirs to wisdom; only they know how to live.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
...how short and anxious is the existence of those who are forgetful of the past, neglectful of the present, and fearful of the future!
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
The art of living must be learned throughout life; and, what may surprise you more, one must learn how to die throughout life.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
The past, he grasps it through memory; the present, he knows how to use; the future, he enjoys it in advance. His life is long, because [...] he concentrates all times into one.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
So separate yourself from the crowd [...] and, after too many storms for your limited course, may a quieter harbor finally welcome you.
c. 49 AD
Source: On the Shortness of Life
To succumb to such a great evil is the worst of evils.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
The share I covet in my father's kingdom is he himself.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
There is no greater cruelty [...] than forcing him to live against his will.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
Anyone can take a man's life; no one can take death from him.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
Virtue is not to hate life, [...] but to stand firm against the blows of Fortune, and never turn one's back on it.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
To wish to die is not to despise death.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
It is better to suffer a crime than to commit one.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
The goal you pursue is doubtful, only the crime is certain.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
A throne soiled by a [crime] is worse than the saddest exile.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
The outcome of battles is always uncertain [...]. The sword makes the most unequal adversaries equal.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
To fear hatred is to renounce the throne.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
Power and hatred are two things [...] put together on earth.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
Whoever wants to be loved wields the scepter with only a weak hand.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
A hated power is never lasting.
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
Whatever price is put on an empire, it is never too dearly bought…
62-65 AD
Source: The Phoenician Women/1863
They do not speak the truth who would have us believe that the great number of their affairs is an obstacle to their studies [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] they feign occupations or exaggerate them, and the obstacle comes from themselves.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I am free, and wherever I find myself, I am my own.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I lend myself to business, I do not give myself to it, and I do not run after opportunities to waste my time.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Wherever I stop, I resume the thread of my thoughts; and I occupy my mind with some wholesome reflection.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When I give myself to my friends, I do not for that reason take myself away from myself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I converse [...] with the most virtuous of men. No matter their country, no matter their era, my thought flies towards them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One can despise everything, one can never have everything.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To achieve wealth, the shortest path is the contempt of wealth.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How does [the wise man] live? Not as a proud scorner of all the goods of Fortune, but as a man who leaves them to others.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The obstacle comes from oneself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I lend myself to business, I do not give myself to it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The first sign of a well-ordered mind is to be able to be settled and to stay with oneself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To be everywhere is to be nowhere.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Those whose life is spent traveling end up with thousands of hosts and not a single friend.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Food does not benefit [...] if it is rejected as soon as it is taken.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing hinders a cure so much as continually changing remedies.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A shrub is not strengthened by frequent transplantations.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is nothing so useful that can be so in passing.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The multitude of books distracts the mind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Therefore, read the most esteemed books habitually; and if you sometimes take up others [...], return quickly to the former.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Make provision each day of some defence against poverty, against death, and against all other calamities.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
From the many pages you have read, choose one thought to digest thoroughly that day.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I am also accustomed to stepping into the enemy's camp, not as a deserter, but as a scout.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no longer poverty, if there is contentment.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is the measure of wealth? First, what is necessary, and second, what is enough.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing in my account shall be dictated by hatred or by favour.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
One must be born either a fool or a king.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
[...] no one has ever known the hour of his birth. For that matter, no one ever believed he was born.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
as it is good to leave a few foreigners for seed [...].
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
No one is forgetful of their own happiness.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
[...] here you are in a country where rats gnaw on iron.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
[...] everywhere a rooster is master of its own dunghill.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
In the past, [...] it was a great affair to be made a god: today you have debased this honour in public opinion.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
[...] one hand washes the other.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
I can no longer conceal my sorrow, which shame makes all the more acute: it must burst forth.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
That creature, [...] who does not seem capable of swatting a fly, killed men as easily as a dog swallows a morsel.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
In short, if you grant divinity to such people, who will recognize your own?
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
[...] the people [...] walked cheerfully as if they had shaken off their chains.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
I told you the Saturnalia would not last forever.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
It is only just that he should suffer in his turn what he made others suffer.
c. 54 AD
Source: The Apocolocyntosis of Claudius
Is there a king who finds himself happy on the throne? O deceptive idol, how many miseries you hide beneath a smiling image!
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
As high mountains are always exposed to the fury of the winds [...], so the supreme rank [...] exposes them more to the blows of Fortune.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
When one trembles at the idea of a crime one does not even believe possible, one must still fear it.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
[...] the stubborn harshness of this terrible evil has dried up the source of tears, and, which is the last stage of sorrow, the eyes remain dry.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
Misfortune stifles all feeling.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
It is not worthy of a man to turn his back on an enemy Fortune.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
When the mind floats irresolutely between fear and hope, one trembles to learn what one most desires to know.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
To give the unfortunate only doubtful chances of salvation is not to want to save them.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
Often, the excess of evils is reassuring.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
When the remedy is a disgrace, one dares not heal.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
A king who fears hatred too much does not know how to reign. Fear is the rampart of thrones.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
The king who governs with an iron scepter ends up fearing those who fear him. Fear returns to the one who inspires it.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
Often, the known truth becomes fatal to the one who discovers it.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
Everything that goes beyond its proper limits touches an abyss.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
[...] one meets one's destiny by trying to avoid it.
1st century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)
I approve of your resolution: hide yourself in the heart of rest, and even hide your rest.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The wise man is never less unoccupied than when divine and human things are revealed to his eyes.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To put one's glory in doing nothing is a cowardly ambition.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Usually one disdains what is openly displayed, and searches what is mysterious and obscure: sealed things tempt the thief.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The best thing, therefore, is not to trumpet your retirement too loudly.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Once in solitude, you must not try to make the world talk about you; you must converse with your own conscience.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
But care especially for the part which you feel is weakest in you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our soul, too, has its sick parts to which our care must be applied.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What am I doing in my retirement? I am dressing my own ulcer.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I have condemned nothing but myself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not a doctor, but a patient who dwells here.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I would rather my retirement excite your compassion than your envy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Is it a great evil that men triumph over me, if at this price I triumph over Fortune?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us do as those who [...] spur on to make up for lost time.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whoever has attained wisdom in old age owes it to their years.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How rich one is when one commands one's desires.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no difference between not desiring and possessing. In both cases the result is the same: fewer torments.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Anything that goes beyond [nature] is purely voluntary, not a necessity.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In all things consider the goal, and leave aside that which does not lead to it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Hunger is never disdainful.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The wise man is the most eager pursuer of natural wealth.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Which is better: to have much or to have enough? He who has much desires more, which proves he does not yet have enough.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who possesses enough has obtained what no rich man has ever reached: the end of desire.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is enough for nature is not enough for a mortal.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Gold never makes one rich; on the contrary, it further irritates the thirst for gold.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The more one has, the easier it becomes to have still more.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The man who adapts to the requirements of nature alone, far from feeling poverty, does not even fear it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Riches possess him.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Govern all things according to natural desires, which can be satisfied at no cost, or for very little.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The spirit of exclusion is reserved for the superfluous.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I would rather be in hardship than in softness; [...] to live harshly, to suffer and to work.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The effeminate man fears to die, when he has already made a death of his own life!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Leisure without study is death; it is a man buried alive.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No matter where you hide, human miseries will besiege you with their threats.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let philosophy envelop us with its impregnable rampart: fate [...] will make no breach in it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Fortune's arms are not as long as we think: she only seizes those who cling to her.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us flee from [Fortune] [...] through the knowledge of ourselves and of nature.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What gives firmness is to meditate assiduously, to exercise not one's tongue, but one's soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death in itself is not glorious; to die bravely is what is glorious.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One praises not poverty, but the man whom it neither humiliates nor makes bend.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The things that have the least brilliance receive it from their alliance with virtue.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death only becomes honorable through that which is honorable: namely, virtue and disdain for external things.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Man will never rise to virtue if he thinks that death is an evil.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Virtue does nothing under constraint.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us defend truth with franker arms; let us fight fear more virilely.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
As for his soul, it has returned to heaven, its homeland; and I am persuaded of this, not because he led great armies, [...] but because of his rare moderation and his patriotism.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I do not wish to harm our laws or our institutions in any way: let justice remain equal for all; enjoy without me, O my country, the benefit you have received from me.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How could I not admire this magnanimity which embraces a voluntary exile to relieve [one's country] of a name that overshadows it?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One considers oneself poor and miserably housed if the walls of our baths do not gleam with ornaments whose size equals their richness [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We have become so jaded that our feet no longer wish to tread on anything but precious stones.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Today we call a bath a 'woodlouse nest' if it is not arranged in such a way that vast windows admit the sun at all hours of the day.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Buildings that drew everyone's admiration [...] are relegated to the rank of antiquities as luxury finds new ways to outdo itself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What good is it to adorn what was created for utility, not for pleasure?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The water did not rise from the bottom of the pools [...]: people did not attach so much value to the degree of transparency of water in which the body was to leave its filth.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How many people today accuse [this man] of rusticity! Should he not have let daylight into his steam room through large windows?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The unfortunate mortal! He did not know how to enjoy life. His water was not filtered [...]. But he hardly cared to find it so: he came to wash off his sweat, not his perfumes.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
They washed their arms and legs every day [...] but the washing of the whole body took place only on market days. To which someone will say: 'So they were very dirty!'
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
They smelled of war, of labor, of man, in short.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Since baths have become so clean, bodies are filthier than ever.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Using perfumes is nothing anymore, if one does not renew them two or three times a day [...]. And these people take pride in their scents, as if they came from them!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Look for the motives that push a man to destroy his fellow man, and you will find hope, envy, hatred, fear, and disdain.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You will elude the wicked man's hope by possessing nothing that excites covetousness [...], nothing that is too brilliant.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To escape envy, you will neither show off your person nor be vain about your possessions; you will know how to enjoy them in the secret of your heart.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Hatred is the daughter of offense: it is avoided if one does not gratuitously injure anyone.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let people know that they can offend you without serious peril; that with you, reconciliation is easy and sincere.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is as sad to be feared at home as it is abroad, by one's servants as by one's children.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no one who is not strong enough to do harm.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who makes himself feared is feared in turn: no one has been able to spread terror while remaining secure.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing will serve you better than to live in repose, to converse very little with others, and much with yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There slips into conversation [...] an insinuating charm which, like drunkenness or love, tears our secrets from us.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one keeps quiet what they hear; no one says only what they have heard. He who has not kept the matter secret will not keep the author's name secret.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The great foundation of security consists in doing nothing unjust.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The mind] is never at peace. Alarms follow the crime: a captive of his conscience which allows him no distraction, every wrongdoer is constantly summoned to answer to it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One suffers the penalty as soon as one expects it; one expects it when one deserves it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The guilty person sometimes has the chance to remain hidden; the certainty of it, he never has.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You who let yourselves be taken in by brilliant exteriors, and seduced by the deceptive glitter of a crown, see how a sudden revolution has overthrown an all-powerful house.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
It is not wishes that rule our lot, but destiny.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
My soul is given over to eternal terrors; it is not death I fear, but crime.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
Luxury, a terrible scourge, infected the whole world with its sweet poison.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
I was content with my lot, O Fortune! Was it necessary to raise me so high [...] only to expose me to a heavier fall?
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
It is easy to be just when one has nothing to fear.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
To spare the citizens is [...] the virtue of the father of the fatherland.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
One must trust less in [fortune's] favors; she is a fickle goddess.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
Glory consists in doing what one ought to, not what one can.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
A higher position also imposes stricter duties.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
There is no longer authority when it is the people who lead the leaders.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
O popular favor! To how many unfortunates have you been fatal! [...] you swell the sails [...] then suddenly [...] you abandon them.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
Happy is the poor man who lives in peace hidden under a humble cottage! [...] fortune only strikes palaces.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
We are all the playthings of destiny; there is no man who can promise himself firm and lasting happiness.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
Young men carry into love all the ardor of their age; but they calm down quickly, and their passions [...] dissipate like a light vapor.
circa 68 AD
Source: Octavia (Seneca)
Think of substance, and not of form.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who thinks nobly expresses himself with more simplicity, with ease [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Style is the physiognomy of the soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is neither offerings of gold and silver [...] that honor [virtue], it is righteousness and purity of intention.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If we were to remove every obstacle from the eyes of our mind, we could discover virtue, even when buried in the prison of the body [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We admire walls plated with marble sheets, although we know what vile materials they hide.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All these people you see walking with their heads held high have but a veneer of happiness.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Man [...] no longer inquires about the merit of things, but about their price.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He follows virtue as long as he hopes for some gain from it, ready to switch to the other side if crime promises more.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A man is worth as much as his purse.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Avarice never escapes its punishment, although it is already punishment enough for itself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Money torments its possessors more than its aspirants.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Is there any condition worse [...] than to be at once miserable and envied?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no man whom his prosperity [...] ever satisfies. He [...] always prefers what he has left behind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You will owe to philosophy the advantage [...] of never repenting of yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Is there a king who finds himself happy on the throne? O deceptive idol, what miseries you hide under a smiling image!
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Just as the high mountains are always exposed to the fury of the winds [...] so the supreme rank of kings exposes them more to the blows of fortune.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
When a man trembles at the idea of a crime, even when he does not see it as possible, he must still fear it.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
It is not worthy of a man to turn his back on an enemy fortune.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
To give the unfortunate only doubtful chances of salvation is to not want to save them.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
When the remedy is so awful, it is cruel to heal.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
A silent liberty is often more fatal to kings and their subjects than a bold truth.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
For kings, a suspicion is as good as a certainty.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
A king who fears hatred too much does not know how to reign. Fear is the bulwark of thrones.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
The king who only knows how to govern with an iron scepter ends up fearing those who fear him. Fear returns to the one who inspires it.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Often the known truth becomes fatal to the one who discovers it.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Everything that goes beyond its proper bounds touches an abyss.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Our anxious cares will never succeed in changing the web of the fatal spindle. All that we suffer here below, all that we do, comes from above.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Our crime is that of destiny; the man it persecutes is not guilty.
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
Ignorance does not cure ills; do you intend to make a mystery to me of what must save this country?
1st Century AD
Source: Oedipus (Seneca)/1834
The incalculable speed of time, more manifest when one looks back!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Those who are absorbed by the present hour do not feel [the speed of time], so precipitously does it flee.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All of elapsed time is compressed into a single space [...] and falls into a bottomless abyss.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our life is but a point, and even less than that.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
I see men [...] spending almost all [their time], which cannot suffice for the essential, on the superfluous.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why torture oneself over a problem that it is more stimulating to disdain than to solve?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When the enemy is at one's back, necessity makes one discard everything that leisure [...] had allowed to be gathered.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A strong soul, that is what I need.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Danger would come to me from without [...]; here, the mortal enemy is within me.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Death is on my heels, life is escaping me: [...] make it so that I do not flee death and do not let life escape.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not the length but the use of life that makes it happy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It very often happens that one who has lived a long time has lived very little.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When I go out: 'You may not come back'; and when I come back: 'You may not go out again.'
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nature has created us capable of learning: we hold from her an imperfect, but perfectible, reason.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Truth is simple in its discourse: so it must not be complicated.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If you are practicing true philosophy, I am glad. For that is true health.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Therefore, tend to your soul's health as a priority; let the health of the body come second.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Too great a burden of flesh chokes the spirit and hinders its nimbleness.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One must, as much as possible, restrain the body's domain to make more room for the soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whatever you do, return quickly from the body to the soul; you must exercise it night and day.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Cultivate this possession [the soul] which time only improves.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The soul must be given some relaxation, yet in such a way as not to unstring its springs, but to slacken them.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The life of a fool is one of ingratitude, anxiety, and a constant lurching toward the future.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Consider how sweet it is to ask for nothing, how beautiful it is to say: 'I have enough'.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
When you see how many are ahead of you, consider how many are behind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What have you to envy in others? You have surpassed yourself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Set a limit for yourself that you cannot cross, even if you wanted to.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If there were any substance in them [these fallacious goods], they would quench thirst; but the more you draw from them, the more your thirst is inflamed.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why should I obtain from fate that it gives me something, rather than obtain from myself that I do not ask for it?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Behold, this day is my last! And if it is not, it is so very close to the last!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is to the immortal gods that we have the obligation to live, and to live well is a gift of philosophy.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is inestimable and magnificent about it [philosophy] is that it does not come spontaneously, that one holds it from oneself, and that one does not borrow it from another.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Its sole purpose is truth in things divine and human: always in its footsteps come justice, the sense of duty, [...] and the procession of all virtues [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We ceased to possess all things as soon as we wanted to possess things for ourselves.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For he can do all that he wants, who believes he can only do what he must.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Thatch covered free men: under marble and gold dwells servitude.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How have I kept a superfluous piece of furniture for so long?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nature is far from having imposed anything hard or difficult on us; [...] one can possess all that is necessary for our needs by being content with what the earth offers on its surface.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nature is sufficient for what she demands. But luxury has strayed from nature, a luxury that spurs itself on day by day, that grows with the centuries, an ingenious auxiliary to vices.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Wisdom has its seat higher up; it does not educate the hands, it is the teacher of souls.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It [philosophy] shows what is evil, and what only appears to be so; it strips us of our illusions, it gives solid greatness.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He has pointed out to all, as the most fortunate of men, the one who does not need Fortune, and as the most powerful, the one who has power over himself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
May this philosophy [...] see good only in what is honorable, [...] the one whose price consists in being unable to be sold at any price.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Avarice burst in upon this all-too-happy abundance: [...] by aspiring to much, it saw everything escape it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The distance is great between not wanting to do evil and not knowing how to do evil.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Just as glory prefers to attach itself to those who flee it, so gratitude responds to benefits with a tribute all the sweeter for being left free to ignore them.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Vice does not withstand virtue, if you are not too quick to hate it.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Never, in honorable struggles, is defeat shameful, provided one does not throw down one's arms and the vanquished wishes to seize victory again.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
The will alone to rise toward goodness is praiseworthy, even when a more agile competitor has outpaced us.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Even in the face of a superior force, the soul can remain invincible.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
No, a person is never defeated in benefits, for gratitude is always on the same level as the will.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Was not [Diogenes] far more powerful, far richer than that Alexander who possessed everything? For he had more to refuse than the other could offer.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
There is no shame in not reaching the goal, provided one persists in the pursuit.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
[Diogenes] triumphed over Alexander [...] on the day the conqueror [...] saw a man from whom he could take nothing, and to whom he could give nothing.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
What person is more admirable than one who knows how to command themself, who is their own master?
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
It is easier to govern barbarian nations [...] than to contain one's own soul and impose law upon it.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
A benefit is a social act that earns us an obliged person, a friend; giving to oneself has nothing social about it [...].
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
It is [...] the mark of an ungrateful person to find the passing days too short. They are always too short if you value them by their number.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Let us be grateful to the gods, let us be grateful to men, and let us be grateful to those who have done some good either for us or for our own.
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
How much better it is to thank heaven for the joys it has permitted us; instead of calculating the years of others, to appreciate one's own well, and count them as gains!
1st century AD
Source: On Benefits
Grief, among other miseries, has this peculiarity: it is fruitless, and what is more, it is ungrateful.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You should [...] rejoice for having possessed it than be saddened for no longer having it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The time that is no more is ours, and nothing is in a safer place than that which has been.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our expectations of the future make us ungrateful for the good things that came before [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What folly it is, then, to allow ourselves to be deprived of the most secure of possessions [the past]?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Regrets and complaints are unreasonable where so few moments separate the one who departs from the one who mourns.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To complain that a man has died is to complain that he was a man. We are all bound to the same destiny.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
In such a revolution of human affairs, nothing is certain for any of us, except death.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Life is neither a good nor an evil: it is the stage for both.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is a pomp of grief more demanding than grief itself: how few men are sad for themselves alone!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
As deserters from nature, we give ourselves over to opinion, always a bad counselor [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is, even in grief, a decorum that the wise must observe; and, like all things, affliction has its limits.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Endure without a murmur the blows of necessity. What has happened that is improbable or extraordinary?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To lose the memory of one's loved ones and bury it with their ashes [...] is not to bear a human heart.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our share of all time is less than what can be called the most imperceptible [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The continuity of misfortune has at least this advantage, that by dint of torment it ends up hardening us.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
You would have lost the prize of so much suffering if it had not taught you how to suffer.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
Everyone can create their own happiness.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
She [Fortune] overwhelms the man she surprises; she is easy to repel for one who is always expecting her.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
Adversity only breaks the souls that prosperity has deceived.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
What is best in man is placed beyond human power, and can no more be given than it can be taken away.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
It is the decree of fate that nothing should be constantly prosperous and standing in the same place.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
How narrow is the soul that finds its joy in the things of the earth!
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
What the body requires is little: [...] beyond that, it is for the whims of vice, not for need, that we toil.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
Is it not madness [...] to have such vast desires with such limited needs?
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
For greed, nothing is enough: for nature, so little is enough!
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
It is through the soul that one is rich: that treasure follows us into exile, into the harshest solitudes.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
The contempt of others only reaches the man who already despises himself.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
To nurture an endless affliction [...], is an unreasonable weakness; to feel none would be inhumanly harsh.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
It is better, then, to conquer grief than to deceive it.
42-43 AD
Source: Consolation to Helvia (Baillard translation)
Let us speak of our own miseries rather than those of others: let us probe our heart, see for how many things it makes itself a candidate, and refuse it our vote.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
True greatness, [...] security, independence consist in soliciting nothing and keeping away from all contests where Fortune presides.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How great is the soul that alone makes no demands, courts no one, and says: 'I have no business with you, O Fortune! I do not place myself at your mercy.'
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] thousands of ambitious people who, to gain some disastrous advantage, run through so many evils toward a new evil, coveting what they will soon flee [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What man was ever satisfied by a success for which the very desire had seemed audacious to him?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not that prosperity is, as people imagine, greedy for pleasures: it is that it is poor in them; thus it satisfies no one.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You think a man is highly elevated because you crawl far beneath him; but the point he has reached seems, to him, very low.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] what you take to be the highest point is, in his eyes, merely a stepping stone.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All are lost through ignorance of the truth: they imagine they are flying towards happiness, deceived as they are by empty rumors [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Almost always, what is distant deceives us, and we admire it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is no good but the true, but that which invites, which entices, is only plausible: it steals, it solicits, it carries away.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The virtuous is the perfect good, the completion of a happy life, which turns everything it touches into good.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Goodness stems from virtue; virtue exists by itself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What is good could have been evil; what is virtuous could only have been good.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not new to see certain things change as they grow.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Physical deformity does not make the soul ugly, but the beauty of the soul embellishes the body.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Virtue needs no embellishment; it is its own greatest adornment, and it consecrates the body it inhabits.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
A soul that contemplates truth, [...] assigning value to things not according to opinion, but according to their nature, [...] such a soul is properly virtue.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The highest good cannot decrease, nor can virtue regress.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You will find nothing more upright than uprightness, truer than truth, more temperate than temperance.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The ability to grow is a sign of imperfection.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Reason is nothing other than a particle of the divine spirit immersed in the human body.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing is closed to the man for whom death is open and who expires in the arms of liberty.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Every honest act is voluntary: bring to it laziness, murmurs, hesitation, fear, and it loses its great merit, self-satisfaction.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Honesty cannot exist where there is no freedom; and he who fears is a slave.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Suffering, setbacks, misfortunes of any kind are of no importance; virtue neutralizes it all.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The annoyances of life affect [virtue] no more, when they rain down on it, than a light shower affects the Ocean.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No one loves their country because it is great, but because it is their own.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The highest good? Conduct in accordance with the will of nature.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is a greater thing to break through difficulties than to moderate one's joys.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Although the true fruit of good deeds is to have done them, and there is no prize worthy of virtues outside of the virtues themselves.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
Pretense quickly falls away and returns a man to his character; but when truth is there, [...] time can only make [virtues] grow and improve.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
[...] as soon as all distinction between the good and the wicked is erased, confusion ensues and vices overflow. [...] it is equally cruel to forgive everyone and to spare no one.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
That clemency is, of all virtues, the one that best suits man, as it is the one that most humanizes us.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
Great power is honorable and glorious only insofar as its action is beneficial; and it is a scourge when it is strong only for evil.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
It is the mark of a great soul to be calm and serene and to look down upon insults and offenses with contempt.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
One can take the life of someone greater than oneself; one can only grant it to an inferior. To grant life is the privilege of sovereignty [...].
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
We have all transgressed, some more, others less [...]. And we are seen and will be seen to fail until our last day.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
A cruel government is a storm in a dark night, where everything trembles at the sound of unexpected blows [...].
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
Gentleness all the more ensures their [the kings'] security. [...] the will to punish must cease before the reasons for it do.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
True clemency [...] is that which is not born of repentant barbarism, which consists in remaining unstained, in never having shed the blood of citizens.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
The most dreadful thing about cruelty is its need to persevere; and the return to good is no longer open to it.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
One is ashamed to fail when clemency governs. The punishment seems much more severe when it comes from a judge known for his gentleness.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
There is no impregnable rampart other than the love of the citizens.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
Compassion considers not the cause, but the fate of the sufferer; clemency accords with reason.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency (Baillard trans.)
Even if we tried no other means of salvation, retirement itself would still be beneficial: one is better for being alone.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
Life could proceed on an equal and uniform course, this life that we fragment into the most contradictory projects.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
The worst of all our miseries is that we are changeable even in our vices; thus we do not even have the advantage of sticking to an evil that is familiar to us.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
We depend entirely on opinion, and the best path seems to us to be the one with the most followers [...] rather than the one that deserves them.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
We judge the road to be good or bad not by what it is, but by the great number of footprints, none of which marks a return.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
Would to the gods that truth appeared unveiled [...]. Until now, we search for it alongside the very ones who teach it.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
He who earns merit for his soul serves society, for he prepares for it a person who will one day serve it.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
The highest good consists in living according to nature; and nature has made us for two things: contemplation and action.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
Nature has given us a mind eager for knowledge [...] it has created us as spectators of its sublime scenes.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
The thought of man forces its way to the ramparts of heaven; it is not enough for it to know visible things.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
Even contemplation is not without action.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
It is an imperfect and languid good, a virtue that is apathetic and cowardly idle, which never demonstrates what it knows.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
[The wise] are the legislators not of one city, but of the entire human race.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
If this republic that we dream of for ourselves is not to be found, then rest becomes a necessity for us all.
c. 62-65
Source: On Tranquility of Mind
A pleasure which, however illusory, still has the effect of reality.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If a man's possessions perish with him, and if there is nothing left for him who is no more?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
That a single virtuous man thinks well of me is to me as if all virtuous people had the same thought of me.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The wise man loves truth, which has but one character and one face; it is falsehood that wins the assent of others.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Glory is the approbation of the crowd; renown, the approbation of good men.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To praise one who deserves it is justice.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Is it not much better to follow the straight path frankly, than to prepare a labyrinth for oneself, only to have to retrace it with great difficulty?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The human soul is a great and noble thing: it allows no limits to be set upon it but those which are common to it and God himself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The homeland [of the human soul] is this vast circuit which encircles the universe.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All years are mine; no century is closed to genius, no time is impenetrable to thought.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
This day, which you dread as the last, is the birthday of an endless day.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not a new thing [...] to be separated from that of which you were a part. Willingly give up these limbs which are now useless.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why cherish these remains so much, as if they were your own? They have only covered you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Such thoughts leave no room in the soul for any sordid, base, or cruel inclination.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Consider how much good examples serve humanity, and recognize that the memory of great men is no less beneficial than their presence.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who does not know to which port he is steering has no favorable wind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our faults arise because our deliberations always embrace partial facts, never a general plan for life.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The highest good is what is honorable; and [...] the honorable is the only good; all others are false and tainted with falsehood.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
All that others consider evil will soften and turn to good if you can rise above it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let anyone try outrage and injustice against you; you will suffer nothing, if virtue is with you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If you wish to be happy and a truly good man, there are contempts you must accept.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is the same virtue that overcomes bad fortune and regulates good fortune: for virtue can neither grow nor shrink.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Everything that exists will cease to be, not to perish, but to decompose.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why then should I be outraged or grieve, if I am but a few moments ahead of the common catastrophe?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
An honorable life is not [...] a greater good than an honorable death, since virtue does not increase its own value.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is not what we see, but how we see it that matters.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We must appreciate great things with a great soul; otherwise we will see in them the vice that is within us.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
We will fall back if we do not persist in moving from effort to effort; if our zeal [...] weakens in the slightest, we must retreat.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is already a great step forward to want to move forward.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Let us hasten then! Only thus will life be a blessing; otherwise it is but an obstacle to be ashamed of.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There is in these thoughts such majesty, such nobility, that I find it hard to believe that the generations they are to instruct [...] can bear their brilliance.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
You know, indeed, in what circumstances, through what intermediaries, to which persons certain secrets must be entrusted.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Neither reed nor ink should trace thoughts [...]; for one gives a precise form to ideas, and the other, a color that strikes the eye.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Let us show patience towards them, and we will eventually triumph [...] provided they are capable of repentance.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
The gods [...] often speak through the mouths of the simple, and not through those of men who might abuse their knowledge.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
I would wish that when you express these excellent thoughts, the elegance of the language would match their majesty.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Fear, in wanting to prove your attachment to me, to offend the one who reigns over the emperor's mind.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Now, if the queen is truly a queen, she will not be angered; if she is merely a woman, she will be hurt.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Let us know how to bear our fate and yield to time, until an unalterable happiness puts an end to our suffering.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
If obscure mortals could [...] speak with impunity on these mysteries, the evidence would shine in everyone's eyes.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
But he will fall in his turn, that villain, whoever he may be, who takes pleasure in being an executioner, and who resorts to lies to conceal his crimes.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
You are the peak, the highest summit among all eminences [...].
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
[...] many [...] by such a pursuit, distort thoughts and weaken the vigor of feelings.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Your profound research has encountered truths that the Divinity reveals to very few men.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
It will be difficult for you to convince them [...], for most will prove rebellious to your advice.
3rd or 4th century AD
Source: Apocryphal Correspondence of Seneca and Saint Paul
Glory is the shadow of virtue: it accompanies it even against its will.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Old discoveries do not stand in the way of new ones.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The advantage is for the latecomer: they find ready-made words which, arranged differently, take on a new appearance.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Once the summit [of wisdom] is reached, all is equal: no further advancement is possible, it is the stopping point.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whatever has reached its natural proportions can grow no more.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Virtue [...] is the only greatness that knows no decline.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To be better than the worst is not to be good.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our soul will have cause to rejoice when, freed from the darkness in which it struggles, it can [...] be wholly filled with the great light.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No virtue remains hidden. [...] The day will come that, out of the darkness [...], must bring it to light.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He who thinks only for his own age is born for few.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Even if envy had silenced all the men of your time, judges will be born for you who, without favor or hatred, will know how to appreciate you.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If fame is an additional reward for virtue, even that is never lost.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One must only think of doing good, and let glory follow virtue.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Outwardly as inwardly, the truth alone is always the same. False appearances have no substance.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Nothing is flimsier than a lie; it is transparent if you look at it closely.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[My] character does not lead me to flattery [...] I have more often spoken as a free man than as a slave.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
After I am dead, let the earth be mingled with fire.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
And rather, while I am still alive.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
After me, the flood.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
Let them hate me, so long as they fear me.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
The translation can present, at least to a certain degree, the physiognomy of the text.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
Compassion is a real flaw; cruelty and compassion are two extremes, one of severity, the other of clemency.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
The influence of general customs [...] led what we regard as a sentiment of humanity to be treated as a weakness.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
[The Stoic doctrine] regarded greatness of soul as incompatible with fear and sorrow.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
The wise man was without pity, because pity was a painful state of the soul.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
Without compassion or pity, the philosopher will do everything that the sensitive and compassionate man does.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
By helping the one who suffers, the sensitive and compassionate man relieves himself.
55-56 AD
Source: On Clemency
The finest privilege of royalty is to force the people not only to suffer, but to praise the actions of their masters.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
The same fear that imposes praise, also gives birth to hatred.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
Without virtue, without respect for justice [...] there is no lasting power.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
Honesty, humanity, good faith, are purely private virtues. Kings should have no rule but their own whim.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
To kill is clemency; under my reign, I want death to be a favor.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
Crime often turns back against the master who taught its lessons.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
There can be a measure in crime, but never in vengeance.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
One is a king when without fear; one is a king when without desires; and this kingship, each person can give to themselves.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
Death is a misfortune only for the man who, too well-known to others, reaches the fatal end without knowing himself.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
The feeling of suffering sours with time. One bears a misfortune when it arrives, but to carry it always is an intolerable torment.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
The usual flaw of the unfortunate is that they no longer believe in happiness.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
The fear of war is more terrible than war itself.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
One must neither be too confident in prosperity, nor despair in misfortune. [...] fortune [...] moves everything with the sway of her wheel.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
All power answers to a higher power.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
Now I am content with my work, now I enjoy my victory. Without the excess of your sorrow, my crime would be lost.
c. 62 AD
Source: Thyestes
If any bond holds you back, either untie it or cut it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For how many men has wealth been an obstacle to philosophy! Poverty walks with a free step, in complete safety.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Hunger is inexpensive, a jaded palate is very much so. It is enough for poverty that its pressing needs be satisfied.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Whoever wishes to cultivate their soul freely must be poor or live as if they were.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Frugality is voluntary poverty.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is this philosophy that must be acquired above all; [...] that with which you must begin.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If something prevents you from living well, what prevents you from dying well?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
How much greater is a conquest that promises perpetual freedom and the happiness of fearing neither man nor God!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Would one hesitate before a poverty that frees the soul from its furious passions?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
One can arrive at philosophy even without provisions for the journey.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Why put off enjoying yourselves until so late?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Wisdom takes the place of possessions for a man: for to make them superfluous is to give them to him.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
For how many men has conquered wealth not been the end, but the changing of their misery!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The evil is not in the things, but in the soul.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Place a sick mind in wealth or in poverty, its illness follows it everywhere.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Who speaks with affectation, if not one who wishes to be a tasteless speaker?
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The essential goal must be to speak as one feels, to feel as one speaks, and to make one's language consistent with one's conduct.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
He has fulfilled his commitments who, upon seeing and hearing him, is always the same.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Our words should aim not to please, but to be useful.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The sick man does not seek a doctor who speaks well, but one who cures.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[Philosophy] must be tested through action. Here, the happy man is not the one who knows, but the one who practices.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Men who are making progress are still among the foolish, but separated from them by a vast interval.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
However, no matter how close one may be to the goal, one is still short of it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] no one is beyond the temptations of wickedness, unless he has completely rid himself of it [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The diseases [of the soul] are ingrained, hardened vices, like greed, excessive ambition [...].
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Affections are reprehensible, sudden, and impetuous movements of the soul, which, when repeated and neglected, cause diseases.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[...] you will feel that for us, it is enough not to be among the most corrupt.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Evil has a head start in us; we walk towards virtue, entangled in a thousand vices; I am ashamed to say it: we cultivate honesty in our spare moments.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
To fear neither men nor gods, to want nothing shameful, nothing excessive, to exercise unlimited sovereignty over oneself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
What an inestimable good it is to belong to oneself!
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
...I am neither sick nor well.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Let no one make me lose a day, since nothing can compensate for such a great loss.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
I think that many men could have attained wisdom, if they had not flattered themselves that they had already arrived.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
...it is not the storm that torments me, but the seasickness.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Vice is infinite in its varieties, but uniform in its result, which is to be displeased with oneself.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Thus each man flees himself. But what good is it to flee, if one cannot escape?
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Nothing is more shameful than an old man who, to prove that he has lived long, has no other witnesses than his years.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Minds that one tries to constrain never yield what is hoped of them: and one works in vain against the will of nature.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
...there is nothing that can give more contentment to the soul than a tender and faithful friendship.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
The true measure of wealth is to free ourselves from need, without moving too far from poverty.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
It is better to stick to a few authors than to let one's capricious attention wander over a hundred works.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
Let us not envy those who are placed higher than us: what appears to us as elevation is often but the edge of an abyss.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
One lives badly when one does not know how to die well.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
It is more in keeping with humanity to laugh at the things of life than to groan over them.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
...it is better to be scorned for one's candor than to be continually tormented by the need to dissemble.
49 to 62 A.D.
Source: On the Tranquility of the Soul
I feel not only that I am improving, but that I am transforming.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
It is [...] proof of a happy metamorphosis that our soul discovers in itself faults it did not know it had.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There are sick people who are congratulated for knowing their illness well.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
True friendship [...] that neither hope, nor fear, nor the prospect of private interest can break.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
There are many people who have not lacked for friends, but have lacked for friendship.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[True friends] know that everything is common between them, misfortunes more than anything else.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
No discovery would delight me, [...] if I had to keep it for myself alone.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If wisdom were given to me on the condition that I keep it to myself [...], I would refuse it.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Any enjoyment that is not shared loses its sweetness.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
The path of precept is long; that of example is short and effective.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
[The disciples] reaped more benefit from Socrates's character than from his speeches.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
If I urge you to [join me], it is not for your progress alone, but also for mine: the profit will be great and mutual.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
You ask what progress I have made? I am beginning to be a friend to myself.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius
Such a man [who is a friend to himself], be sure of it, is the friend of all mankind.
63-64 AD
Source: Letters to Lucilius