Above all, however, avoid dismal men who grumble at whatever happens, and find something to complain of in everything. I argue against two popular claims about the nature of ordinary human experience, including the psychological Narrativity thesis and the ethical Narrative thesis, which say that the authors ought to live their lives narratively, or as a story. On Tranquility of Mind is work by the Stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca, which happened to be his response to Annaeus Serenus, a friend of Seneca. Not to multiply examples, I am in all things attended by this weakness of a well-meaning mind, to whose level I fear that I shall be gradually brought down, or what is even more worrying, that I may always hang as though about to fall, and that there may be more the matter with me than I myself perceive: for we take a friendly view of our own private affairs, and partiality always obscures our judgment. We never can so thoroughly defeat the vast diversity and malignity of misfortune with which we are threatened as not to feel the weight of many gusts if we offer a large spread of canvas to the wind: we must draw our affairs into a small compass, to make the darts of Fortune of no avail. THE NINTH BOOK OF THE DIALOGUES OF L. ANNAEUS SENECA, I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII. These remarks of mine apply only to imperfect, commonplace, and unsound natures, not to the wise man, who needs not to walk with timid and cautious gait: for he has such confidence in himself that he does not hesitate to go directly in the teeth of Fortune, and never will give way to her. I'm a programmer, so I wrote one. "No one," I say, "that will give me no compensation worth such a loss shall ever rob me of a day. This is not code that I would write in a size and horizontally aligned. His friends were sad at being about to lose so great a man: "Why," asked he, "are you sorrowful? A short life is not the problem, but an excessive waste of time. - Seneca. Nor did he up to the very end cease his search after truth, and raised arguments upon the subject of his own death. As for the several causes which render us happy or sorrowful, let everyone describe them for himself, and learn the truth of Bion's saying, "That all the doings of men were very like what he began with, and that there is nothing in their lives which is more holy or decent than their conception." I have indeed cared for your property, even to my great disadvantage, but, since you command it, I give it back to you and restore it thankfully and willingly If nature should demand of us that which she has previously entrusted to us, we will also say to her: Take back a better mind than you gave: I seek no way of escape nor flee: I have voluntarily improved for you what you gave me without my knowledge; take it away. What hardship is there in returning to the place whence one has come? I have to confess the greatest possible love of thrift: I do not care for a bed with gorgeous hangings, nor for clothes brought out of a chest, or pressed under weights and made glossy by frequent manglings, but for common and cheap ones, that require no care either to keep them or to put them on. The services of a good citizen are never thrown away: he does good by being heard and seen, by his expression, his gestures, his silent determination, and his very walk. Knowing to what sorrows we were born, there is nothing for which Nature more deserves our thanks than for having invented habit as an alleviation of misfortune, which soon accustoms us to the severest evils. Yet I do not advise you to follow after or draw to yourself no one except a wise man: for where will you find him whom for so many centuries we have sought in vain? The letter known today as On the Tranquility of Mind is unique among the dialogues because it provides a genuine exchange between Serenus and Seneca. About Dialogues and Letters. Take away from these men their witnesses and spectators: they will take no pleasure in solitary gluttony. I shall never be ashamed to quote a good saying because it comes from a bad author. But I fear that custom, which confirms most things, implants this vice more and more deeply in me. Expert Answer. All these symptoms become aggravated when their dislike of a laborious misery has driven them to idleness and to secret studies, which are unendurable to a mind eager to take part in public affairs, desirous of action and naturally restless, because, of course, it finds too few resources within itself: when therefore it loses the amusement which business itself affords to busy men, it cannot endure home, loneliness, or the walls of a room, and regards itself with dislike when left to itself. Introduction. Taken out of the morall workes written in Greeke, by the most famous philosopher, & historiographer, Plutarch of Cherronea, by Iohn Clapham. Nevertheless we ought to mix up these two things, and to pass our lives alternately in solitude and among throngs of people; for the former will make us long for the society of mankind, the latter for that of ourselves, and the one will counteract the other: solitude will cure us when we are sick of crowds, and crowds will cure us when we are sick of solitude. Digital Library Production Service (DLPS) & Text Creation Partnership, Brill's Companion to Seneca: Philosopher and Dramatist, Latin Word Study Tool (for expanded definitions see page under Lewis & Short), Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling: The Function of Avowal in Justice, The Empire of the Self: Self-Command and Political Speech in Seneca and Petronius, The Paradox of Genius and Madness: Seneca and his Influence. I decided it would be tiring to do the proofreading by going back and forth between a full page image from the book to Who is there, by however large a troop of caressing courtiers he may be surrounded, who in spite of them is not his own greatest flatterer? De Tranquillitate Animi. You are a king: I will not bid you go to Croesus for an example, he who while yet alive saw his funeral pile both lighted and extinguished, being made to outlive not only his kingdom but even his own death, nor to Jugurtha, whom the people of Rome beheld as a captive within the year in which they had feared him. . report. Could you anywhere find a miserable city than that of Athens when it was being torn to pieces by the thirty tyrants? It is by far the best plan, therefore, to mingle leisure with business, whenever chance impediments or the state of public affairs forbid one's leading an active life: for one is never so cut off from all pursuits as to find no room left for honourable action. Both of these qualities, both that of altering nothing, and that of being dissatisfied with everything, are enemies to repose. You must decide whether your disposition is better suited for vigorous action or for tranquil speculation and contemplation, and you must adopt whichever the bent of your genius inclines you for. Of Peace of Mind. Yet even this life, which hides nothing from any one runs some risk of being despised; for there are people who disdain whatever they come close to: but there is no danger of virtue's becoming contemptible when she is brought near our eyes, and it is better to be scorned for one's simplicity than to bear the burden of unceasing hypocrisy. The image files are in the somewhat unusual format JPEG-2000. I fancy that many men would have arrived at wisdom had they not believed themselves to have arrived there already, had they not purposely deceived themselves as to some parts of their character, and passed by others with their eyes shut: for you have no grounds for supposing that other people's flattery is more ruinous to us than our own. You would pity some of them when you see them running as if their house was on fire: they actually jostle all whom they meet, and hurry along themselves and others with them, though all the while they are going to salute someone who will not return their greeting, or to attend the funeral of someone whom they did not know: they are going to hear the verdict on one who often goes to law, or to see the wedding of one who often gets married: they will follow a man's litter, and in some places will even carry it: afterwards returning home weary with idleness, they swear that they themselves do not know why they went out, or where they have been, and on the following day they will wander through the same round again. The sage's complete security and self-sufficiency exclude the unhealthy passions (apatheia), i.e. Buy The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca by (ISBN: ) from Amazon's Book Store. The next five buttons insert control characters that affect formatting. These "two hours" were therefore the two last of the day, https://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Of_Peace_of_Mind&oldid=10797158. There is a great difference between slackening your hold of a thing and letting it go. Go here. The chief magistrate of the Carthaginians. His ideal 'sound mind' is when: "Noise never reaches you and when voices never shake you out of yourself, whether they be menacing or inviting or just a meaningless hubbub of empty sound all round you .". Of my own free will I am ready to return what you gave me before I could think: take me away.'" He was playing at draughts when the centurion in charge of a number of those who were going to be executed bade him, join them: on the summons he counted his men and said to his companion, "Mind you do not tell a lie after my death, and say that you won;" then, turning to the centurion, he said "You will bear me witness that I am one man ahead of him." Seneca expresses to Serenus that he must be content with where he is and take care of his mind, because that is how it will become tranquil. Let us now return to town: our ears have too long missed its shouts and noise: it would be pleasant also to enjoy the sight of human bloodshed." He was a tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero. [18] The work opens with Serenus asking Seneca for counsel, and this request for help takes the form of a medical consultation. Even for studies, where expenditure is most honourable, it is justifiable only so long as it is kept within bounds. 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