Seneca: On the Shortness of Life - (My Narration & Summary)

On the shortness of Life by Lucius anas senica translated by Gareth D Williams most of mankind paulus complains about Nature's meanness because our allotted span of time is so short and because this stretch of time that is given to us runs its course so quickly so rapidly so much so that with very few exceptions life leaves the rest of us in the Lurch just when we're getting ready to live and it's not just The masses and the unthinking crowd that complain at what they perceive as this Universal evil the same feeling draws complaints even from

Men of Distinction hence that famous dicum of the greatest of Physicians life is short Art Long hence also Aristotle's grievance most Unbecoming a philosopher when he called nature to account for bestowing so much time on animals that they can live for five or 10 human lifespans while so much shorter a time Is set for humans even though they are born to do many great things it's not that we have a short time to live but that we waste much of it life is long enough and it's been given to us in generous measure for accomplishing

the greatest things if the whole of It is Well invested but when life is squandered through soft and careless living and when it's spent on no worthwhile Pursuit death finally presses and we realize the life which we Didn't notice passing has passed away so it is the life we are given isn't short but we make it so we're not ill provided but we are wasteful of life just as impressive and princely wealth is squandered in an instant when it passes into the hands of a poor manager but wealth however modest grows through careful deployment if

it is entrusted to a responsible Guardian just so our lifetime offers ample scope to the person who Maps it out Well chapter two why do we complain about nature it has acted generously life if you know how to use it is long but one person's held in the grip of voracious avarice another by the kind of diligence that busies itself with pointless Enterprises this one's Soden with wine another slack with ESS this one's tied out by his political ambition which always hangs on the Judgment of others while another's passionate desire for Trading drives him headlong

over every land and every sea in Hope for profit a passion for soldiering torments some men who are always either bent on inflicting dangers on others or worried about danger to themselves some are worn down by the voluntary enslavement of thankless attendants on the great many are kept busy either striving for other people's wealth or complaining about their own many who have no consistent goal in Life are thrown from one new design to another by a fickleness that is Shifting never settled and ever dissatisfied with itself some have no goal at all towards which to

steer their course but death takes them by surprise as they gape and yawn I cannot therefore doubt the truth of that seemingly oracular utterance of the greatest of poets scant is the part of life in which we live all the rest of existence is not living but merely Time vices are sail and surround us on all sides and they don't allow us to rise again and lift our eyes to the clear discernment of truth but they press down on them keeping them lowered and fixed on mere desire it's never possible for their victims to return

to their true selves if by chance they ever find some rest bite they still roll restlessly just like the deep sea which still swells even after the win settled they never find full relaxation from Their desires you think I'm talking only of those whose faults are admitted look at those whose Prosperity draws crowds they are choked by their own Goods how many have found wealth a burden how many are drained of their blood by their eloquence and their daily preoccupations with showing off their abilities how many are sickly pale from their incessant Pleasures how many

are left with no freedom from their multitude of Besieging clients in short look over all of them from lowest to highest this person summons counsel to plead his case another answers the call this one stands trial another acts for the defense another Prides as judge no one acts as his own Champion but each is wasted for another sake ask about those influential citizens whose names are studiously memorized and you'll see that the following distinctions tell them apart The first cultivates a second the second a third no one is his own man again certain people give

vent to the most irrational outbursts of anger they complain about the haughtiness of their superiors because the latter were too too busy to receive them when they wanted an audience dare anyone complain about another's arrogance when he himself never has time to spare for himself yet the great man has occasionally albeit With a disdainful expression condescended to look on you whoever you are he has dained to listen to your words he has allowed you to walk at his side but you never thought fit to look on yourself or to listen to yourself and so you've

no reason to expect a return from anyone for those attentions of yours since you offered them not because you wanted another's company but because you are incapable of communing with yourself chapter 3 though all the Brilliant Minds that have Shone over the ages agree on this one point they could never adequately Express their astonishment at this dark fog in the human mind no one lets anyone seize his Estates and if a trivial dispute arises about boundary lines there's a rush to stones and arms but people let others trespass on their existence or rather they go

so far as to invite in those who will take possession of their Lives you'll find no one willing to distribute his money but how many people each of us shares out his life men are thrifty in guarding their private property but as soon as it comes to wasting time they are most extravagant with the one commodity for which it is respectable to be greedy and so I'd like to color one of the older crowd I see that you've reached the limit of human life you're pressing hard on your H 100th year or More come now

submit your life to an audit calculate how much of your time has been taken up by a money lender how much by a mistress how much by a patron how much by a client how much in arguing with your wife in punishing your slaves in running about the city on social duties add to your calculations the illness that you've inflicted on ourselves and also the time that is laying idle you'll see that you fewer Years than you count look back and recall when you were ever sure of your purpose how few days turned out as

you'd intended when you were ever at your own disposal when your face showed its own depression when your mind was free from disturbance what accomplishment you can claim in such a long life how many have plundered Your Existence without your being aware of what you are losing how much time has been lost to groundless anguish foolish Pleasure greedy desire the charms of society how little is left to you from your own store of time you'll come to realize that you're dying before your time what then is the reason for this you'll sort live as if

you're going to live forever your own human Frailty never enters is your head you don't keep an eye on how much time has passed already you waste time as if it comes from a source full to overflowing when all the while that very day which is Given over to someone or something maybe your last you're like ordinary Mortals in fearing everything you're like Immortals in coveting everything you'll hear many say after my 50th year I'll retire to a life of leisure my 60th year will bring me release from all my duties and what guarantee may

I ask do you have that your life will last longer who will allow those arrangements of yours to proceed according to Plan are you not ashamed to keep for yourself only the remnants of your existence and to allocate to philosophical thought only that portion of time which can't be applied to any business how late is it to begin living just when life must come to an end what foolish obliviousness to our mortality to put off wise plans to our 50th and 60th year and to want to begin life from a point that few have reached

chapter 4 you'll find that the most powerful men of high position drop words in which they pray for leisure praise it and prefer it to all Their Blessings they sometimes long to step down from that Pinnacle of theirs if they can safely do so for even without any external disturbance or shock Fortune crashes down on itself under its own weight the Divine Augustus to whom the gods gave more than to any man never ceased to pray for rest for himself and To seek release from the Affairs of State every conversation of his kept coming back

to this theme that he was hoping for leisure he would relieve his toils with this sweet even if ausy consolation the thought that one day he would live for himself in a letter he sent to the Senate when he had given an assurance that his retirement would not be wanting in dignity and not be inconsistent with His former Prestige I found the following words but such things are more impressive in their fulfillment than in their promise yet my deep desire for that time which I have long prayed for has led me to anticipate something of

its Delight by the pleasure of words since the joy of that reality is still slow in coming Leisure seemed such a desirable thing that because he couldn't enjoy it In reality he enjoyed the thought of it in advance he who saw that the world depended on him and him alone who determined The Fortunes of individuals and Nations he was happiest in looking forward to that day on which he would lay aside his greatness he knew by experience how much sweat was rung from him by those blessings that gleamed the world over he knew the scale

of the Hidden anxieties they veiled forced to contend in arms With his fellow citizens then with his colleagues and finally with his relatives he shed Blood by land and sea driven by War through Macedonia Sicily Egypt Syria and Asia and almost every known land he turned his armies to Foreign Wars when they were weary of slaughtering Romans while he was pacifying the Els and subjugating enemies embedded in the heart of the peaceful Empire and while he was extending its boundaries beyond The Ry Euphrates and danu in the city of Rome itself Marena capio lepidus Ignatius

and others were wetting their swords against him he had not yet escaped their intrigues when his daughter and so many noble paramor Bound by adultery as if by an oath of Allegiance kept causing him alarm in his now failing years as did paus and a woman once again posing a threat with her Anthony he had cut away these SS Limbs and all but others kept growing up In their place as if overburdened with blood the body politic was always hemorrhaging somewhere that is why Augustus prayed for leisure and why he found relief from his labors

in hoping for it and thinking of it this was the prayer of a man who could Grant the prayers of other men chapter 5 Marcus crus was storm tossed among the likes of kathyn and Clodius of pompe and crus declared enemies on the one side Doubtful friends on the other he was buffeted along with the ship of states which he tried to keep steady as it was going down but he was finally swept away he was neither at ease in prosperity nor capable of withstanding adversity how many times does he curse that very consulship of

his which he had extolled not without reason but without ceasing how pitiful are the words that he rings from himself in a letter written to atus when the Elder pompe had Been defeated and his son was still trying to revive his shattered forces in Spain you ask he says what am I doing here I'm lingering in my tusculan estate half free after that he goes on to other statements in which he bemon his former life complains about the present and despairs of the future half free Cicero said of himself but needless to say the sage

will never resort to such an abject term he will never be half free but will Always enjoy complete and unalloyed Liberty not subject to any constraints he will be his own master and Tower above all others for what can there be above a man who rises above Fortune chapter chapter 6 lius drusus was a vigorously energetic man who thronged about by a huge crowd from the whole of Italy had agitated for radical legislation and provoked the kind of troubles the graty had but he could see no clear way out for his Policies which he was

unable to carry through and which once started it was no longer an option to abandon he said to have cursed the life of constant activity that he had led from its very Beginnings saying that he was the only person who had never had a holiday even as a boy while he was still a W and had yet to assume the adult toer he ventured to plead before juries on behalf of defendants and to exert his special influence in the courts to such Effect in fact that it's generally accepted that he captured several verdicts against the

odds where would such precocious ambition not find an outlet you might have known that such premature presumptuousness would lead to a disaster both for him and for the state and so it was too late when he began complaining that he' never had a holiday since he'd been a troublemaker and a burden to The Forum from his Boyhood it is clear whether he died by His own hand he fell suddenly from a wound to the groin some doubted whether his death was self-inflicted know one that it was timely it would be Superfluous to mention more figures

who although they seem to others the happiest of Mortals themselves gave true testimony against themselves when they express the intense hatred for Every Act of their lives yet by these complaints they changed neither themselves nor anyone else for after the Outburst their feelings reverted to their normal state in reality your life even if you live a thousand years and more will be compressed into the mest span of time those vices of yours will swallow up any number of lifetimes to be sure this span of time which good management prolongs even though it naturally hurries on

must in your case Escape you quickly for you fail to seize it and hold it back and you do nothing to delay the speediest of All things but you allow it to pass as if it was something overabundant that we can get back again chapter 7 in fact among the worst cases I count also those who give their time to nothing but drink and lust for these are the most shameful preoccupations of all other people even if the semblance of Glory that grips them is false nevertheless go astray in respectable fashion you can site for

me people who Are greedy those quick to anger or people who busy themselves with unjust hatreds or Wars but all of them sin in a more manly fashion it is those abandoned to the belly and lust who bear the stain Of Dishonor scrutinize every moment of such people's lives and note how much time they spend on their Ledger keeping how much on setting traps or fearing them how much on cultivating others or being cultivated by others how much on giving Or receiving bail how much on dinner parties which have themselves become business you'll see that

their Affairs whether good or bad allow them no time to draw breath to sum up everyone agrees that no one area of activity can be successfully pursued by someone who is preoccupied rhetoric cannot nor can the liberal arts since the distraction mind takes in nothing really deeply but rejects everything that is so to speak pounded Into it nothing is less characteristic of a man preoccupied than living there is no knowledge that is harder to acquire instructors of other disciplines are too A Penny indeed mere boys have been seen to master some of these disciplines so

thoroughly that they could even be Masters in the classroom but learning how to live takes a whole lifetime and you'll perhaps be more surprised at this it takes a whole lifetime to learn how to die so many men Of the highest station have set aside all their encumbrances renounced their wealth their business their pleasures and right up to the very end of life they have made it their sole aim to know how to live nevertheless the majority of them depart from Life admitting that they did not yet have such knowledge still less have those others

attained it believe me it's the mark of a great man and one Rising above human weakness to allow no part of his time to be Skimmed off accordingly such a person's life is extremely long because he's kept available for himself the whole of whatever amount of time time he had none of it lay fellow and uncultivated and none of it is under another's control for being a most careful guardian of his time he found nothing worth exchanging it for and so that man had enough time but those deprived of much of their life by the

public have necessarily had too little nor should we imagine that those People aren't sometimes conscious of their loss certainly you'll hear many of those burdened by their great Prosperity occasionally cry out amid their hordes of clients or their pleadings of cases or their other respectable forms of wretchedness I have no chance to live of course you don't all those who engage you in their business disengage you from yourself how many days did that defendant of yours take from you how many that candidate or That old lady wearied as she is by burying her HS or

that character who FS illness to excite the greed of Legacy hunters or that powerful friend who holds on to you not for True friendship but for show check off I say and review the days of your life you'll see that very few of them and those the worthless ones have stayed in your possession the man who's achieved the high office he'd prayed for longs to lay it aside and repeatedly says when will This year end the man who puts on the games thought it a great privilege that responsibility for giving them fell to him now

he says when will I be free of them that Advocate has people competing for his attention throughout the Forum with the crowd he draws he fills the whole place further than he can be heard when he says will there be a vacation everyone send his life racing headlong and suffers from a longing for the future a Lo of the present but the Person who devotes every second of his time to his own needs and who organizes each day as if it were a complete life neither Longs for nor is afraid of the next day for

what new kind of pleasure is there that any hour can now bring everything is been experienced everything enjoyed to the full for the rest Fortune may make arrangements as it wishes his life has already reached safety addition can be made to his life but nothing taken away from it an Addition made in the way that a man who is already satisfied in and full takes a portion of food which he doesn't crave and yet has room for so there's no reason to believe that someone has lived long because he has gray hair and wrinkles he's

not lived long but long existed for suppose you thought that a person had sailed far who'd been caught in a Savage storm as soon as he left Harbor and after being carried in this direction and that was Driven in circles over the same course by alternations of the Winds raging from different quarters he didn't have a long Voyage but he was long tossed about chapter 8 I'm always astonished when I see people requesting the time of others and receiving a most accommodating response from those they approach both sides focus on the object of the request

and neither side on the time itself it is requested as if it were nothing granted As if it were nothing people trifle with the most precocious commodity of all and it escapes their notice because it's an immaterial thing that doesn't appear to the eyes and for that reason it's valued very cheaply or rather it prac ically has no value at all people set very great store by annuities and gratuities and for these they hire out their services or their efforts or their attentions but no one values time all use it more than lavishly as if

it cost Nothing but if mortal danger threatens them you'll see the same people clasping their doctor's knees if they fear a capital charge you'll see them ready to spend all they have to stay alive so great is the conflict in their feelings but if each of us could see the number of years before us as precisely as the years that have passed how alarmed would be those who saw only a few years left and how carefully would they use them and yet it's easy to Manage an amount however small which is clearly defined we have

to be more careful in conserving an amount that may give out at any time yet there's no reason to believe that those people are unaware of how precious a commodity time is they habitually say to those they love most intensely that they are ready to give them some of their own years and they do give them without knowing it but they give in such a way that without adding to the year of their loved ones They subtract from themselves but this very Point namely whether they are depriving themselves eludes them and so they can bear

the loss of what goes unnoticed in the losing no one will bring back the years no one will restore you to your former self life will follow the path on which it began and it will neither reverse nor halt its course it will cause no commotion at all it will call no attention to its own swiftness it will Glide on in silence it will prolong itself at neither a king's commands nor his people's clamor it will run on just as it started out on the first day with no diversions and no delays and the outcome

you've been preoccupied while life hurries on death looms all the while and like it or not you have to accommodate it chapter 9 can there be anything sillier than those people who boast of their Foresight they are too busily preoccupied with efforts to live better they plan out their lives at the expense of life itself they form their purpose with the a distant future in mind yet the greatest waste of life lies in postponement it robs us of each day in turn and snatches away the present by promising the future the greatest impediment to living

is expectancy which relies on tomorrow And wastes today you map out what is in Fortune's hand but let slip what's in your own hand what are you aiming at what's your goal all that's to come lies in uncertainty live right now hear the Cry of the greatest of poets who sings his salutary song as if inspired with divine each finest day of life for wretched Mortals is ever the first to flee why are you holding back he says why are you slow to action if you don't Seize the day it Slips Away even when you've

seized it it will still slip away and you must compete with time's quickness in the speed with which you use it and you must drink swiftly as if from a fast moving torrent that will not always flow this too the poet very happly says in chastising interminable procrastination not each best age but each best day carefree and unconcerned even though Time flies so quickly why do you project for yourself months and years in Long sequence to whatever extent your greed sees fit the poet is speaking to you about the day about this very day which

is slipping away so can there be any doubt that each finest day is ever the first to flee for wretched Mortals that is the preoccupied old age takes their childish minds unawares and they meet it unprepared and unarmed for they've made No provision for it suddenly ly unsuspecting they've stumbled upon it without noticing that it was drawing nearer every day just as conversation or reading or some deep reflection beguiles Travelers and they find that they've reached their destination before being aware of approaching it so with a ceaseless and extremely rapid journey of Life which we

make at the same Pace whether awake or sleeping the preoccupied become aware of it only at Its end chapter 10 if I wanted to divide my subject into categories each with its proofs I could come up with many arguments to demonstrate that the life of the preoccupied is very short but fabianus who was not one of today's chareh holding professionals but a true philosopher of the oldfashioned sort was in the habit of saying that we must battle against the passions with a Vigorous attack not with nicity of argument the enemy line is to be turned

by a full frontal assault not by tiny pin Pricks he has no regard for mere quibbling for vices are to be crushed not merely nipped at nevertheless for the preoccupied to be censured for their distinctive failing they are to be taught a lesson not simply given up for lost life is divided into three parts past present and future of these parts the present is brief the future doubtful The past certain for this last is the category over which Fortune no longer has control and which cannot be brought back under anyone's power preoccupied people lose this

part for they have no leisure to look back at the past and even if they had it there's no pleasure in recalling something regrettable and so they're unwilling to turn their their minds back to times badly spent and they dare not revisit the past because their vices become obvious in retrospect even Those that insinuated themselves by the allurement of momentary pleasure no one gladly casts his mind back to the past except for the person whose every action has been subjected to his own self assessment which is infallible a man who's been ambitious in the scale

of his desires arrogant in his disdainful unrestrained in prevailing over others treacherous in his deceptions greedy for his plunderings and lavish in his prodigality Such a man must inevitably be afraid of his own memory yet this part of our existence that is consecrated and set apart elevated above all human visites and removed Beyond Fortune's Sway and harried by no poverty no fear no attacks of disease this part can be neither disrupted nor stolen away our possession of it is Everlasting and untroubled days are present only at a time and these only minute by minute but

all the days of the past will attend you At your bidding and they will allow you to examine them and hold on to to them at your will something which preoccupied people have no time to do it takes a tranquil and untroubled mind to roam freely over all parts of life but preoccupied Minds as if under the Yoke cannot turn around and look backward their life therefore disappears into an abyss and just as it does no good to pour any amount of liquid into a vessel if there's nothing at the bottom to Receive it so

it makes no difference how much time we are given if there's nowhere for it to settle and it's allowed to pass through the cracks and holes in the mine the present time is very brief indeed so very brief that to some people it seems to be non-existent for it's always in motion slipping by and hurrying on it ceases to be before it arrives and it no more suffers delay than do the firmament or the heavenly bodies whose ever tiess Movement never lets them remain in the same position so the preoccupied are concerned with the present

alone and it is so fleeting that it can't be grasped and even that little amount is stolen away from them because they're pulled in so many different directions chapter 11 in a word do you want to know how briefly they really live see how Keen they are to live a long life enfeebled old men begging their prayers for an Additional few years they pretend they are younger than they really are they flatter themselves by this fsid and deceive themselves as gladly as if they deceive fate at the same time but when some real illness has

at last reminded them that they are mortal how terrified they are when they die as if they're not leaving life but being dragged from it they cry out repeatedly that they've been fools because they've not really lived and that they'll live in Leisure If Only They can escape their illness then they reflect on how uselessly they've made provision for things they wouldn't live to enjoy and how fruitless was all their toil but why should life not be ample for those who spend it far removed from all business none of it is made over to another

none scattered in this direction or that none of it is entrusted to Fortune none wasted through neglect none is lost through being given away freely None is Superfluous the whole of life life yields a return so to speak and so however short it is amply sufficient and for that reason whenever his last day comes the sage will not hesitate to go to his death with a sure step chapter 12 you perhaps want to know whom I term the preoccupied don't imagine I mean only those lawyers who are driven out of the Law Court only when

the watch dogs are Finally let in for the night or those patrons you see crushed either with impressive display in their own crowd of admirers or more contemptuously in someone else's crowd or those clients whose duties summon them from their own houses in order to dash them against the doors of others Al those the prayer to spear keeps busy for disreputable gain which is someday bound to Fester even the Leisure of some people is preoccupied in their country Retreat Or on their couch in the midst of their Solitude and even when they've withdrawn from everyone

they are troubling company for themselves their existence is to be termed not leisurely but one of idle preoccupation do you call a man at leisure who arranges with meticulous attention to detail his Corinthian bronzes which are made so expensive by their collecting Mania of a few and who spends most of the day on Rusty strips of copper or a Man who sits at a wrestling ring for shame on us we suffer from vices that are not even Roman enthusiastically watching boys brawling who separates the troops of his own well oiled wrestlers into pairs of the

same age and skin color who maintains a stable of the freshest athletes tell me do you call those people leisured who spend many hours at The Barbers while any overnight growth is trimmed away solemn consultation is Taken over each separate hair and disheveled locks are rearranged or thinning hair is combed forward from both sides to cover the forehead how angry they get if the barber has been a little too careless as if you were cutting a real man's hair how they flare up if anything is wrongly cut off their precious Mane if a hair lies

out of place or if everything doesn't fall back into its proper ringlets which of those people wouldn't Rather have their country thrown into disarray than their hair who isn't more concerned about keeping his head neat rather than safe who wouldn't rather be well- groomed and well respected you call leisured these people who are kept busy between the comb and the mirror what about those who are absorbed in composing listening to and learning songs The Voice whose best and simplest flow is naturally straightforward they Twist into sinuous turns of the most feeble cring their fingers are

always snapping in time to some song they carry in their head and when they've been asked to attend to serious and often even sorrowful matters you can overhear them quietly humming a tune there isn't Leisure but idle occupation and Heaven Knows I'd not classify their Banquets among leisurely pastimes because I see how anxiously they arrange their Silver Plate how Carefully they gather up the tunics of their pretty boys at table how they are on tenter hooks to see how the boar turns out from the cook how quickly the smooth skinned slaves hurry to discharge their

Duty at the given signal how skillfully birds are carved into carefully shaped portions and how attentively wretched little slave boys wipe away the spittle of drunks by these means they seek a reputation for refinement and Sumptuous Living and their evils follow them into every corner of their lives to such an extent that they cannot eat or drink without ostentation nor would I count among the alleur those that have themselves carried around in a sedan chair and litter and who arrive precisely on time for their rides as if they were forbidden to skip them and who

have to be reminded of their scheduled time for bathing for swimming or for dining they Are so innovated by the excessive sloth of a Pampered mind that they can't tell by themselves if they are hungry I hear one of these pampered creatures if pamper is the right word for unlearning life and normal human practice was manually lifted out of a bath and sat down on his sedan chair and asked am I now seated do you think that someone like this who doesn't know if he is sitting knows whether he's alive whether he can see whether

he's at Leisure it's hard for me to say whether I pity him more if he really didn't know as much or if he pretended not to know they are oblivious to many things but they also affect forgetfulness of much they find certain vices pleasing as evidence of their prosperity to know what you're doing seems to be the mark of a man who's lowly and contemptible what Folly to think that M act has Fain many details in order to attack luxury truth be told they pass Over more than they fabricate and such a wealthy of unbelievable

vices has arisen in an age that has applied its fertile talents in this one direction that by now we can charge the MIM actors with ignoring them to imagine that there's anyone so ruined by pampering that he takes another's word as to whether he's seated so here is not a person of leisure you should apply a different term to him he is sick or rather as good as dead the truly leisured person is one Who is also conscious of his own Leisure but a person who needs a guide to make him aware of his own

bodily positions is only half alive how can he be in control of any of his Time chapter 13 it would be a long business to run through the individual cases of people who spent their whole lives playing checkers or playing bowl or baking their bodies in the sun people whose Pleasures put them to considerable work are not at Leisure for instance nobody will doubt that those who devote their time to useless literary questions Rome 2 now has a significant number of such people are busily engaged in doing nothing it was once the well-known failing of

the Greeks to ask how many rowers ulses had whether the ilad or the Odyssey was written first and also whether they belong to the same author and other questions of the same stamp which if you keep them to yourself do nothing to Improve your private knowledge and if you divulge them you're made to appear not more learned but more annoying now this vacuous enthusiasm for acquiring useless knowledge has infected the Romans as well only a few days ago I heard someone mentioning which Roman general had been first to do what Julius was the first to

win a battle at Sea curious dentatus the first to parade elephants in a Triumph so far even if such items as these are hardly steer us Towards Glory they still involve models of service to the state such knowledge isn't going to profit us but it's nevertheless of the sort to hold our interest because its subject matter though empty is appealing we may also excuse investigators who ask who first persuaded the Romans to deploy a naval force it was Claudius who was called cordex for for this reason because the Ancients term the composite structure of Several

planks a cordex hence the public records are called codices and the barges which carry Provisions up the Tyber are still called codari in accordance with ancient practice doubtless also this may have some relevance the fact that valerus cenus was the first to conquer missana and was the first of the family of Valeri to be called misana after appropriating the name of the captured City common usage gradually changed the Lettering so he became misala but will you also allow interest in the fact that El Salah was the first to display lons off the leash in the

circus there was a general rule they were shown in Chains and that Javelin throwers were supplied by King bckas to dispatch them all right let's allow that as well but is any useful purpose really served by knowing that Pompei was the first to put on a fight in the circus involving 18 elephants with non-criminals ar raid against them in mock battle a leader of the state and a man of outstanding kindliness as his reputation has it among leaders of old he thought it a memorable form of spectacle to destroy human beings in an unheard of

fashion a fight to the death that's not enough Torn to Pieces not enough let them be utterly crushed by animals of massive bulk it would certainly be preferable for such stuff to be forgotten for fear That some future strong man might learn of it and be envious of an utterly inhuman episode what Darkness great Prosperity casts in our minds he thought he was above the laws of nature when he was throwing so many hordes of human wretches to beasts born under a different Sky when he was arranging war between such desperate creatures when he was

shedding so much blood before the eyes of the Roman people people he' Later forced to shed still more blood themselves but this same man was later Taken in by alexandrian treachery and offered himself to be run through by the meanest of his chattles then at last he recognized the empty boast that was his own surname but to return to the point from which I digressed and to demonstrate the futility of the pains that some people take in these same matters the same Source reported that matelis in his Triumph after Conquering the carthaginians in Sicily was

Al loone of all Romans in having 120 captured elephants LED in procession before his Chariot and that solo was the last Roman to extend the pomerium which it was the custom of all to extend after the acquisition of Italian but never provincial territory is there any more benefit in knowing this than to know that the avonite hill is outside the pomerium According to him for for one of two reasons either because it was the rallying point for the pans in secession from Rome or because the birds had not been propitious when RIS took the orices

there and to know countless other items beside that are either crammed with lies or improbable for even if you grant that people say all these things in good faith and even if they guarantee the truthfulness of their writing whose Mistakes will such items of information make fewer whose passions will they hold in check whom will they make braver or more just or more generous of spirit my friend fabianus used to say that he sometimes wondered whether it was better to apply oneself to no researchers at all than to be embroiled in these chapter 14 of

all people they alone who give their time to philosophy are at leisure they alone really Live for it's not just their own lifetime that they watch over carefully but they Annex every age to their own all the years that have gone before are added to their own own unless we prove most ungrateful those most distinguished founders of hallowed thoughts came into being before us and they have prepared for us a way of living we are led by the work of others into the presence of the most beautiful Treasures which have been pulled from darkness and

brought to Light from no age are we debarred we have access to all and if we want to transcend the narrow limitations of human weakness by our expansiveness of mind there is great span of time for us to range over we can debate with so es entertain doubt with carneades be at peace with epicurus overcome human nature with the stoics and go beyond it with the cynics since nature allows us shared possession of any age why not turn from this short and fleeting Passage of time and give ourselves over completely to the past which is

measureless and eternal and shared with our betters as for those who run about performing their social duties agitating themselves and others when they've duly acted like Madmen when they've crossed every threshold on their daily r and pass no open door when they've delivered their money grubbing greeting to houses very distant from one another how few Patrons will they be able to catch sight of in a city so vast and so fragmented by varied passions how many patrons will there be whose sleep or self-indulgence or churlishness denies their callers access how many who after they've tortured

them with the long wait pretend to be in a hurry as they pass them by how many will avoid going out through a reception hall packed with clients and make their escape through a door that's hidden from View As if it were not even crer to deceive them than to refuse them admittance how many half asleep and weighed down by the effects of yesterday's drinking will yawn with utter disdain and address those wretched clients who cut short their own sleep in order to wait on anothers by the right name only after it's been whispered to

them a thousand times over by lips that hardly move do we suppose these clients spend Time on morally commendable duties but we can say as much of those who will want to have Zeno Pythagoras democracy and the other high priest of philosophical study and Aristotle and theophrastus as their closest companions every day none of these will ever be unavailable to you none of these will fail to send his visitor off in a happier condition and more at ease with himself none will let anyone leave empty-handed they can be approached by All Mortals by night and

by day chapter 15 none of these philosophers will force you to die but all will teach you how none of them will diminish your years but each will share his own years with you with none of them will conversation be dangerous friendship lifethreatening or cultivation of them expensive from them you'll take whatever you wish it will be no fault of theirs if you fail to take in the very fullest Amount you have room for What happiness What a fine old age lies in store for the person who's put himself under the patronage of these people

he'll have friends Whose advice he can seek on the greatest or least important matters whom he can consult daily about himself from whom he can hear the truth without insult and receive praise without foring and who will provide a model after which to Fashion himself there is a common saying that it Was not in our power to choose the parents we were allotted and that they were given to us by chance yet we can be born to whomever we wish there are households of the most distinguished intellects choose the one into which you'd like to

be adopted and you'll inherit not just the name but also the actual property which is not to be hoarded in a mely or mean Spirit the more people you share it with the greater it will Become these will open for you the path to immortality and raise you to an elevation from which no one is cast down this is the sole means of prolonging mortality or rather of transforming it into immortality honors monuments all that ostentatious ambition has ordered by decree or erected in stone are soon destroyed there's nothing that the long lapse of time

doesn't demolish and transform but it cannot harm the works Consecrated by wisdom no age will a face them no age reduce them at all the next age and each one after that will only enhance the respect in which they are held since Envy focuses on what is close at hand but we more freely admire Things From a Distance so the sag's life is ample in scope and he's not constricted by the same limit that confines others he alone is released from the limitations of the human race and he has mastered of all Ages as though

a god some time has passed he holds it in recollection time is upon us he uses it time is to come this he anticipates the combining Of All Times into one makes his life long chapter 16 but for those who forget the past disregard the present and fear for the future life is very brief and very troubled when they reach the the end of it they realize too late poor wretches That they've been busied for so long in doing nothing and the fact that they sometimes pray for death need hardly be taken as evidence that

their life is long in their Folly they are afflicted by fickle feelings that rush them into the very things they fear they often pray for death precisely because they fear it and there's no reason to find evidence that they live long in the fact that the day often seems long to them or that they complain in the hours pass Slowly until the appointed hour for dinner arrives for when their usual pre occupations fail them and they are left with nothing to do they fret without knowing how to apply their free time or how to drag

it out and so they move on to some other preoccupation and find all the intervening time burdensome precisely as they do when a gladiatorial show has been announced for a given day or when the date of some other show or Amusement is keenly awaited and they Want to skip over the days in between any postponement of something they look forward to is long to them but the time of actual enjoyment is short and fleeting and made far shorter by their own fault for they desert one pleasure for another and cannot persist steadily in any one

desire their days aren't long but hateful yet on the other hand how short seem the nights they spend cavorting with prostitutes and drinking hence the Mad inspiration of poets too who feed human Frailty by their stories and imagine that Jupiter actually doubled the length of the night when seduced by sexual pleasure all this inflaming of our worst passions amounts to nothing but enlisting the gods as setting a precedent for our vices and giving a license for a corruption that is justified by a Divine example how can the knights they pay for so dearly not seem

so very short to These people they lose the day in looking forward to the night and the night in fear of the Dawn chapter 17 the very pleasures of such people are anxious and disturbed by various kinds of alarm and at the very moment when they are rejoicing the agitated thought steals in on them how long will this last it is the feeling that has caused Kings to weep over their own power the extent of their prosperity gave them no Pleasure but the prospect of its eventual end terrified them when the exceedingly arrogant King of

the Persians ranged his army over the vast plains and could only measure its size not count it he wept at the thought that within a century not one soldier from that huge force would still be alive yet the very man who wept was destined to bring their fate on them to lose some troops at Sea others at land some in battle others in flight and so to Destroy in a very short time all those for whose 100th year he feared and what of the fact that even the joys of such people are anxiety ridden this

is because they don't rest on stable causes but are disrupted as frivolously as they are produced but what do you think their times are like when they are wretched even by their own admission since even the joys which lift and transport them above their fellow men are by no means Unmixed all the greatest blessings cause anxiety and Fortune is never less Les wisely trusted than when it's at its most advantageous to maintain Prosperity we need fresh prosperity and other prayers are to be offered instead of those that have already turned out well everything that comes

our way by chance is unsteady and the higher our fortunes rise the more susceptible they are to falling but what must inevitably Collapse gives no one pleasure and so the life of those who acquire through hard work what they must work harder to possess is necessarily very wretched and not just very brief they obtain with great effort what they desire and they anxiously hold on to what they've obtained and meanwhile they give no consideration to 's irretrievability new preoccupations take the place of Old Hope arouses New Hope ambition new ambition they don't look For an

end to their wretchedness but change the cause of it we've been tormented by our own public office we spend more time on somebody else's we've stopped toiling as candidates we start canvasing for others we've given up the vexation of being a prosecutor we take on that of being a judge a man stops being a judge he starts presiding over a special commission a man spent all his working life managing other people's property for a salary he's diverted by Looking after his own wealth Marius was done with army service and the consulship kept him busy quintius

hurries to get through his dictatorship but he'll be called back to it from his plow CIO will go up against the carthaginians before being fully ready for such an undertaking Victorious over Hannibal Victorious over Antiochus he will win distinction in his own consulship and act as shity for his brother's Consulship and but for his own objections his statue would be placed in Jupiter's company in the capitaline temple but Discord among the citizens will bring trouble to their Savior and after he has scorned as a Young Man public honors rivaling those of the Gods in old

age he'll eventually take pleasure in an ostentatiously defined Exile reasons for anxiety will never be wanting whether because of prosperity or wretchedness life will always be driven On through one preoccupation after another we shall always pray for leisure but never attain it chapter 18 and so my dearest polus remove yourself from the crowd and storm toss more than your years deserve withdraw at last to a more peaceful Haven consider how many waves you've endured and on the one side how many storms you've weathered in private and on the other how many you've brought on Yourself

in your public career long enough has your virtue been demonstrated through toysome and unceasing proofs put to the test what it can achieve in Leisure the greater part of your life and certainly the better part has been given to the state take some of your time for yourself as well it's not to a sluggish and idle state of inaction that I summon you or to drown all your Lively energy in sleep and in the pleasures that are dear to The crowd that's not to find peace of mind you'll find tasks to Biz yourself about in

Serene seclusion that are more important than any you've dealt with so energetically thus far you manage the revenues of the world it is true as scrupulously as you would as strangers as diligently as you would your own as conscientiously as you would the States you win affection in a post in which it is hard to avoid being hated yet it is nevertheless better Believe me to know the balance sheet of one's own life than that of the public grain Supply recall that energetic mind of your yours which is supremely qualified to deal with the greatest

challenges from an office that is certainly eminent but is hardly in keeping with the happy life and consider that you didn't make it your aim with all of your training in the liberal arts from the earliest age for many thousands of grain measures to be safely entrusted To you you'd shown promise of something greater and higher there'll be no shortage of men of both scrupulous good character and diligent service but slow-moving pack animals are far better suited to carrying heavy loads than thoroughbread horses whoever hampered the fleetness of these well-bred creatures with a weighty burden

consider moreover how stressful it is to subject yourself to such a Heavy responsibility you have to deal with the human stomach and a hungry people neither submits to reason nor is soothed by fair treatment or influenced by any untreat only recently within those few days after gas Caesar died he was still pain to the utmost if the dead have any Consciousness because he saw that the Roman people survived him and still had enough rations for seven or at all events eight days because he made his Bridges of boats and played with the Empire's resources we

faced the worst kind of disaster even for a People Under Siege a shortness of food his imitation of a crazed foreign king of ill- fated arrogance almost came at the cost of mass destruction by starvation and the general catastrophe that follows famine what was the frame of mind of the officials in charge of the grain Supply when they were destined to face Stones weapons fires and gayes with the Greatest concealment they covered over such a great sickness lurking amid the state's innermost organs and with good reason to be sure for certain complaints are to be

treated without the patients being aware of them knowing about their disease has caused many to die chapter 19 retire to those Pursuits that are calmer safer and more important do you think it amounts to the same thing whether you are in charge of Seeing that imported grain is transferred to the granaries undamaged by either the dishonesty or the carelessness of the Transporters that it doesn't absorb moisture and then get spoiled through heat and that it corresponds to the declared weight and measure or whether you occupy yourself with these hallowed and lofty studies so as to

learn the substance of God his will his General character and his shape what outcome awaits your soul where Nature lays us to rest upon release from our bodies what it is that bears the weight of all the heaviest matter of this world in the center suspend the light components above carries fire to the highest parts and Rouses the Stars to their given changes of movement and to learn other such matters in turn that are full of great wonders you really ought to leave ground level and turn your mind's eye to these studies now while enthusiasm

is still Fresh those with an active interest should progress to better things in this mode of Life much that is worth studying awaits you the love and practice of the virtues forgetfulness of the passions knowledge of how to live and to die and deep Repose the plight of all preoccupied people is wretched but most wretched is the plight of those who labor under preoccupations that are not even their own whose sleep schedule is regulated by Somebody else's who walk at somebody else's pace and who are under instructions in that freest of all activities loving and

hating if these people want to know how short their life is let them reflect on how small a part of it is their very own chapter 20 so when you see a man repeatedly taking up the robe of office or a name well known in public don't envy him those trappings are bought at the cost of life For one year to be dated by their name they'll waste all their own years life deserts some of them amid their first struggles before the arduous climb up to the peak of their ambition some after they've clamored up

through a thousand indignities to arrive at their crowning dignity are assailed by The Wretched thought that all of their toil has been for an inscription on an epith some map out new aspirations for their extreme old age as if in their Youth and they succumb to weakness amid their great and immoderate Endeavors it's a shameful end when an old man acting in court for litigants who are perfectly unknown to him breathes his last even at the moment when he's winning the Applause of impressionable bystanders it's a disgraceful end when the man who's sooner worn out

by living than by working drops dead in the middle of his duties and disgraceful end when a Man dies in the act of going over his accounts and draws a smile from The Heir who's long been kept waiting I can't pass over one example that occurs to me gas tyranus was an old man of proven diligence who was past 90 when on the emperor's initiative he was granted retirement from his administrative post by G Caesar he gave instructions for himself to be laid out on his bed and to be mourned by his assembled household as

if he were dead the house lamented its Elderly Master's unemployment and didn't cease their mourning until his job was restored to him is it really such a pleasure to die preoccupied yet many have that same attitude and their desire for work lasts longer than their capacity for it they struggle against their bodily infirmity and old age itself they judge a hardship for no other reason than because it removes them from Office the Lord doesn't draft a soldier after 50 it Doesn't require a senator's attendance after 60 it's harder for people to obtain retirement from themselves

elves than from the law all the time while they plunder and are plundered and break in on each other's rest and make each other miserable life is without profit without pleasure without any progress of mind no one holds death in view no one refrains from distant hopes indeed some people even make arrangements for things Beyond life huge tombstones dedications of public buildings gladitorial shows for the funeral and ostentatious funeral processions yet in truth the funerals of such people should be conducted by the light of torches and wax tapers as if they'd lived for the briefest

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