Minor Dialogues, Together With the Dialogue on Clemency
lands for no reward except that of discovering something hidden and
remote. This is what draws people to public shows, and causes them
to pry into everything that is closed, to puzzle out everything
that is secret, to clear up points of antiquity, and to listen to
tales of the customs of savage nations. Nature has bestowed upon
us an inquiring disposition, and being well aware of her own skill
and beauty, has produced us to be spectators of her vast works,
because she would lose all the fruits of her labour if she were to
exhibit such vast and noble works of such complex construction, so
bright and beautiful in so many ways, to solitude alone. That you
may be sure that she wishes to be gazed upon, not merely looked at,
see what a place she has assigned to us: she has placed us in {245}
the middle of herself and given us a prospect all around. She has
not only set man erect upon his feet, but also with a view to making
it easy for him to watch the heavens, she has raised his head on
high and connected it with a pliant neck, in order that he might
follow the course of the stars from their rising to their setting,
and move his face round with the whole heaven. Moreover, by carrying
six constellations across the sky by day, and six by night, she
displays every part of herself in such a manner that by what she
brings before man’s eyes she renders him eager to see the rest also.
For we have not beheld all things, nor yet the true extent of them,
but our eyesight does but open to itself the right path for research,
and lay the foundation, from which our speculations may pass from
what is obvious to what is less known, and find out something more
ancient than the world itself, from whence those stars came forth:
inquire what was the condition of the universe before each of its
elements were separated from the general mass: on what principle
its confused and blended parts were divided: who assigned their
places to things, whether it was by their own nature that what was
heavy sunk downwards, and what was light flew upwards, or whether
besides the stress and weight of bodies some higher power gave laws
to each of them: whether that greatest proof that the spirit of man
is divine be true, the theory, namely, that some parts and as it
were sparks of the stars have fallen down upon earth and stuck there
in a foreign substance. Our thought bursts through the battlements
of heaven, and is not satisfied with knowing only what is shown to
us: “I investigate,” it says, “that which lies without the world,
whether it be a bottomless abyss, or whether it also is confined
within boundaries of its own: what the appearance of the things
outside may be, whether they be shapeless and vague, extending
equally in every direction, or whether they also are arranged {246}
in a certain kind of order: whether they are connected with this
world of ours, or are widely separated from it and welter about in
empty space: whether they consist of distinct atoms, of which
everything that is and that is to be, is made, or whether their
substance is uninterrupted and all of it capable of change: whether
the elements are naturally opposed to one another, or whether they
are not at variance, but work towards the same end by different
means.” Since man was born for such speculations as these, consider
how short a time he has been given for them, even supposing that
he makes good his claims to the whole of it, allows no part of it
to be wrested from him through good nature, or to slip away from
him through carelessness; though he watches over all his hours with
most miserly care, though he live to the extreme confines of human
existence, and though misfortune take nothing away from what Nature
bestowed upon him, even then man is too mortal for the comprehension
of immortality. I live according to Nature, therefore, if I give
myself entirely up to her, and if I admire and reverence her. Nature,
however, intended me to do both, to practise both contemplation and
action: and I do both, because even contemplation is not devoid of
action.
VI. “But,” say you, “it makes a difference whether you adopt the
contemplative life for the sake of your own pleasure, demanding
nothing from it save unbroken contemplation without any result: for
such a life is a sweet one and has attractions of its own.” To this
I answer you: It makes just as much difference in what spirit you
lead the life of a public man, whether you are never at rest, and
never set apart any time during which you may turn your eyes away
from the things of earth to those of Heaven. It is by no means
desirable that one should merely strive to accumulate property
without any love of virtue, or do nothing but hard work without any
cultivation of the {247} intellect, for these things ought to be
combined and blended together; and, similarly, virtue placed in
leisure without action is but an incomplete and feeble good thing,
because she never displays what she has learned. Who can deny that
she ought to test her progress in actual work, and not merely think
what ought to be done, but also sometimes use her hands as well as
her head, and bring her conceptions into actual being? But if the
wise man be quite willing to act thus, if it be the things to be
done, not the man to do them that are wanting, will you not then
allow him to live to himself? What is the wise man’s purpose in
devoting himself to leisure? He knows that in leisure as well as
in action he will accomplish something by which he will be of service
to posterity. Our school at any rate declares that Zeno and Chrysippus
have done greater things than they would have done had they been
in command of armies, or filled high offices, or passed laws: which
latter indeed they did pass, though not for one single state, but
for the whole human race. How then can it be unbecoming to a good
man to enjoy a leisure such as this, by whose means he gives laws
to ages to come, and addresses himself not to a few persons but to
all men of all nations, both now and hereafter? To sum up the matter,
I ask you whether Cleanthes, Chrysippus, and Zeno lived in accordance
with their doctrine? I am sure that you will answer that they lived
in the manner in which they taught that men ought to live: yet no
one of them governed a state. “They had not,” you reply, “the amount
of property or social position which as a rule enables people to
take part in public affairs.” Yet for all that they did not live
an idle life: they found the means of making their retirement more
useful to mankind than the perspirings and runnings to and fro of
other men: wherefore these persons are thought to have done great
things, in spite of their having done nothing of a public character.
{248}
VII. Morever, there are three kinds of life, and it is a stock
question which of the three is the best: the first is devoted to
pleasure, the second to contemplation, the third to action. First,
let us lay aside all disputatiousness and bitterness of feeling,
which, as we have stated, causes those whose paths in life are
different to hate one another beyond all hope of reconciliation,
and let us see whether all these three do not come to the same
thing, although under different names: for neither he who decides
for pleasure is without contemplation, nor is he who gives himself
up to contemplation without pleasure: nor yet is he, whose life is
devoted to action, without contemplation. “It makes,” you say, “all
the difference in the world, whether a thing is one’s main object
in life, or whether it be merely an appendage to some other object.”
I admit that the difference is considerable, nevertheless the one
does not exist apart from the other: the one man cannot live in
contemplation without action, nor can the other act without
contemplation: and even the third, of whom we all agree in having
a bad opinion, does not approve of passive pleasure, but of that
which he establishes for himself by means of reason: even this
pleasure-seeking sect itself, therefore, practises action also. Of
course it does, since Epicurus himself says that at times he would
abandon pleasure and actually seek for pain, if he became likely
to be surfeited with pleasure, or if he thought that by enduring a
slight pain he might avoid a greater one. With what purpose do I
state this? To prove that all men are fond of contemplation. Some
make it the object of their lives: to us it is an anchorage, but
not a harbour.
VIII. Add to this that, according to the doctrine of Chrysippus, a
man may live at leisure: I do not say that he ought to endure
leisure, but that he ought to choose it. Our Stoics say that the
wise man would not take part in the government of any state. What
difference does it {249} make by what path the wise man arrives at
leisure, whether it be because the state is wanting to him, or he
is wanting to the state? If the state is to be wanting to all wise
men (and it always will be found wanting by refined thinkers), I
ask you, to what state should the wise man betake himself; to that
of the Athenians, in which Socrates is condemned to death, and from
which Aristotle goes into exile lest he should be condemned to
death? where virtues are borne down by jealousy? You will tell me
that no wise man would join such a state. Shall then the wise man
go to the commonwealth of the Carthaginians, where faction never
ceases to rage, and liberty is the foe of all the best men, where
justice and goodness are held of no account, where enemies are
treated with inhuman cruelty and natives are treated like enemies:
he will flee from this state also. If I were to discuss each one
separately, I should not be able to find one which the wise man
could endure, or which could endure the wise man. Now if such a
state as we have dreamed of cannot be found on earth, it follows
that leisure is necessary for every one, because the one thing which
might be preferred to leisure is nowhere to be found. If any one
says that to sail is the best of things, and then says that we ought
not to sail in a sea in which shipwrecks were common occurrences,
and where sudden storms often arise which drive the pilot back from
his course, I should imagine that this man, while speaking in praise
of sailing, was really forbidding me to unmoor my ship . . . .
[1] Virg. “Aen.” ix. 612. Compare Sir Walter Scott, “Lay of the
Last Minstrel,” canto iv.:—
“And still, in age, he spurned at rest, And still his brows the
helmet pressed. Albeit the blanched locks below Were white as
Dinlay’s spotless snow,” &c.
{250}
THE NINTH BOOK OF THE DIALOGUES OF L. ANNAEUS SENECA, ADDRESSED TO
SERENUS.
OF PEACE OF MIND.
I. [_Serenus._]
When I examine myself, Seneca, some vices appear on the surface,
and so that I can lay my hands upon them, while others are less
distinct and harder to reach, and some are not always present, but
recur at intervals: and these I should call the most troublesome,
being like a roving enemy that assails one when he sees his
opportunity, and who will neither let one stand on one’s guard as
in war, nor yet take one’s rest without fear as in peace. The
position in which I find myself more especially (for why should I
not tell you the truth as I would to a physician), is that of neither
being thoroughly set free from the vices which I fear and hate, nor
yet quite in bondage to them: my state of mind, though not the worst
possible, is a particularly discontented and sulky one: I am neither
ill nor well, It is of no use for you to tell me that all virtues
are weakly at the outset, and that they acquire strength and solidity
by time, for I am well aware that even those which do but help our
outward show, such as grandeur, a reputation for eloquence, and