Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (4 BC – AD 65) usually known as Seneca, was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature. He was Rome’s leading intellectual figure in the mid-1st century CE and was virtual ruler with his friends of the Roman world between 54 and 62, during the first phase of the emperor Nero’s reign.
As a Stoic philosopher writing in Latin, Seneca makes a lasting contribution to Stoicism. His prose works include a dozen essays and one hundred twenty-four letters dealing with moral issues. These writings constitute one of the most important bodies of primary material for ancient Stoicism. As a tragedian, he is best known for plays such as his Medea, Thyestes, and Phaedra.
Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.All cruelty springs from weakness.
True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The greatest blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.
Seneca
Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.Non est ad astra mollis e terris via" - "There is no easy way from the earth to the stars.Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire.We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.
The time will come when diligent research over long periods will bring to light things which now lie hidden. A single lifetime, even though entirely devoted to the sky, would not be enough for the investigation of so vast a subject... And so this knowledge will be unfolded only through long successive ages. There will come a time when our descendants will be amazed that we did not know things that are so plain to them... Many discoveries are reserved for ages still to come, when memory of us will have been effaced.
Seneca
Hang on to your youthful enthusiasms—you’ll be able to use them better when you’re older.It is the power of the mind to be unconquerable.If a man knows not to which port he sails, no wind is favorable.It is not that we have so little time but that we lose so much. ... The life we receive is not short but we make it so; we are not ill provided but use what we have wastefully.If you really want to escape the things that harass you, what you’re needing is not to be in a different place but to be a different person.It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.He who is brave is free.Throw me to the wolves and I will return leading the pack.They lose the day in expectation of the night, and the night in fear of the dawn.We are always complaining that our days are few, and acting as though there would be no end of them.Every night before going to sleep, we must ask ourselves: what weakness did I overcome today? What virtue did I acquire?One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable.The bravest sight in the world is to see a great man struggling against adversity.As long as you live, keep learning how to live.Until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. We've been using them not because we needed them but because we had them.Associate with people who are likely to improve you.What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears.He suffers more than necessary, who suffers before it is necessary.No man was ever wise by chance.It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.Man is affected not by events but by the view he takes of them.You want to live but do you know how to live? You are scared of dying and tell me, is the kind of life you lead really any different from being dead?Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness.I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.Timendi causa est nescire - Ignorance is the cause of fear.
Putting things off is the biggest waste of life: it snatches away each day as it comes, and denies us the present by promising the future. The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow, and loses today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune's control, and abandoning what lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.
Seneca
Only time can heal what reason cannot.Wealth is the slave of the wise. The master of a fool.Life is never incomplete if it is an honorable one. At whatever point you leave life, if you leave it in the right way, it is whole.We become wiser by adversity; prosperity destroys our appreciation of the right.No tree becomes rooted and sturdy unless many a wind assails it. For by its very tossing it tightens its grip and plants its roots more securely; the fragile trees are those that have grown in a sunny valley.The important thing about a problem is not its solution, but the strength we gain in finding the solution.If you don't know, ask. You will be a fool for the moment, but a wise man for the rest of your life.Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired.Life is like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.If you live in harmony with nature you will never be poor; if you live according what others think, you will never be rich.People are frugal in guarding their personal property; but as soon as it comes to squandering time they are most wasteful of the one thing in which it is right to be stingy.Enjoy present pleasures in such a way as not to injure future ones.
For what prevents us from saying that the happy life is to have a mind that is free, lofty, fearless and steadfast - a mind that is placed beyond the reach of fear, beyond the reach of desire, that counts virtue the only good, baseness the only evil, and all else but a worthless mass of things, which come and go without increasing or diminishing the highest good, and neither subtract any part from the happy life nor add any part to it? A man thus grounded must, whether he wills or not, necessarily be attended by constant cheerfulness and a joy that is deep and issues from deep within, since he finds delight in his own resources, and desires no joys greater than his inner joys.
Seneca
Were all the geniuses of history to focus on this single theme, they could never fully express their bafflement at the darkness of the human mind. No person would give up even an inch of their estate, and the slightest dispute with a neighbor can mean hell to pay; yet we easily let others encroach on our lives—worse, we often pave the way for those who will take it over. No person hands out their money to passersby, but to how many do each of us hand out our lives! We’re tight-fisted with property and money, yet think too little of wasting time, the one thing about which we should all be the toughest misers.
Seneca
Leisure without books is death, and burial of a man alive.The sun also shines on the wicked.Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer's hand.Often a very old man has no other proof of his long life than his age.We learn not in the school, but in life.Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it.A gift consists not in what is done or given, but in the intention of the giver or doer.To govern was to serve, not to rule.It's all in your headJ you have the power to make things seem hard or easy or even amusing. The choice is yours.Life is long if you know how to use it.Silence is a lesson learned through life’s many sufferings.Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful where your own self-love might impair your judgment.How does it help… to make troubles heavier by bemoaning them?True happiness is… to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.It does not matter what you bear, but how you bear it.The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.He is most powerful who has power over himself.The man who has anticipated the coming of troubles takes away their power when they arrive.We should not, like sheep, follow the herd of creatures in front of us, making our way where others go, not where we ought to go.For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.It is not the man who has too little that is poor, but the one who hankers after more.It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness.
It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it… Life is long if you know how to use it.
Seneca
Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart.Health is the soul that animates all the enjoyments of life, which fade and are tasteless without it.To wish to be well is a part of becoming well.But life is very short and anxious for those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear the future.While we wait for life, life passes.Fire tests gold, suffering tests brave men.It's not because things are difficult that we dare not venture. It's because we dare not venture that they are difficult.Life, if well lived, is long enough.
