[1][2] Seneca lauds Democritus in relation to his treatise on the subject,[3] and states that he will use the Latin word tranquillitas as a rough translation of euthymia. Know then that every station of life is transitory, and that what has ever happened to anybody may happen to you also. He who after surveying the universe cannot control his laughter shows, too, a greater mind than he who cannot restrain his tears, because his mind is only affected in the slightest possible degree, and he does not think that any part of all this apparatus is either important, or serious, or unhappy. Footnotes, page numbers, and the chapter heading Even though others may form the first line, and your lot may have placed you among the veterans of the third, do your duty there with your voice, encouragement, example, and spirit: even though a man's hands be cut off, he may find means to help his side in a battle, if he stands his ground and cheers on his comrades. Bohn's Classical Library Edition; London, George Bell and Sons, 1900; Scanned and digitized by Google from a copy maintained by the University of Virginia. I have now, my beloved Serenus, given you an account of what things can preserve peace of mind, what things can restore it to us, what can arrest the vices which secretly undermine it: yet be assured, that none of these is strong enough to enable us to retain so fleeting a blessing, unless we watch over our vacillating mind with intense and unremitting care. few [10][11], it is more typical of a human to laugh down life than to bewail it, Seneca finishes De Tranquillitate with a quote by Aristotle:[13][14], nullum magnum ingenium sine mixtura dementiae fuitno great genius has existed without a strain of madness, Seneca, as with other Stoics, was concerned with providing insight for the development of a practice of life, for others to develop into virtuous individuals and to achieve inner harmony. He is not able to serve in the army: then let him become a candidate for civic honours: must he live in a private station? (It's okay life changes course. 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. If we believe the Greek poet, "it is sometimes pleasant to be mad"; again, Plato always knocked in vain at the door of poetry when he was sober; or, if we trust Aristotle, no great genius has ever been without a touch of insanity. We must take a higher view of all things, and bear with them more easily: it better becomes a man to scoff at life than to lament over it. There is a menu command to identify a set of grids as the default for new pages. What you desire, to be undisturbed, is a great thing, nay, the greatest thing of all, and one which raises a man almost to the level of a god. But why should it not? I wanted a tool that would put each image line and text line next to each other. If this is your first experience of that sort, you should offer thanks either to your good luck or to your caution. This is my own narration of a public domain text, it is not copied from audible or elsewhere.Buy all the Dialogues on Amazon: https://geni.us/SenecaDialogues. .mw-parser-output .dropinitial{float:left;text-indent:0}.mw-parser-output .dropinitial .dropinitial-fl{float:left;position:relative;vertical-align:top;line-height:1}.mw-parser-output .dropinitial .dropinitial-initial{float:left;line-height:1em;text-indent:0} 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. a man cannot live well if he knows not how to die well. When you reflect how rare simplicity is, how unknown innocence, how seldom faith is kept, unless it be to our advantage, when you remember such numbers of successful crimes, so many equally hateful losses and gains of lust, and ambition so impatient even of its own natural limits that it is willing to purchase distinction by baseness, the mind seems as it were cast into darkness, and shadows rise before it as though the virtues were all overthrown and we were no longer allowed to hope to possess them or benefited by their possession. Some rest in the middle of the day, and reserve some light occupation for the afternoon. What you do need, is trust in your path and an understanding that you are going in the right direction. I have no staff, no interns, not even an assistant a thoroughly one-woman labor of love that is also my life and my livelihood. [16][17], Compared with the other two works, the intention of De Tranquillitate Animi is more therapeutic. Write something therefore in a simple style, merely to pass the time, for your own use, and not for publication. they slew thirteen hundred citizens, all the best men, and did not leave off because they had done so, but their cruelty became stimulated by exercise. for even those whose children were put to death, and whose goods were confiscated, used to thank him: or was it that he willingly received death, regarding it as freedom? The Marginalian has a free Sunday digest of the week's most mind-broadening and heart-lifting reflections spanning art, science, poetry, philosophy, and other tendrils of our search for truth, beauty, meaning, and creative vitality. The most we can do, he argues, is accept every card life deals us, be it winning or losing, as temporarily borrowed from the deck to which it must ultimately return. [4], Writing a little later than Seneca, Plutarch wrote a similar work, described in the 1589 translation as, "a philosophical treatise concerning the quietness of the mind". Coming as I do from a long course of dull thrift, I find myself surrounded by the most brilliant luxury, which echoes around me on every side: my sight becomes a little dazzled by it: I can lift up my heart against it more easily than my eyes. This would be more fittingly answered in a coherent work designed to prove that a Providence does preside over the universe, and that God concerns himself with us. Although tranquility is a fundamental aspect of human life, the experiential nature of tranquility remains elusive. Here is what I take from it: One. We ought, however, first to examine our own selves, next the business which we propose to transact, next those for whose sake or in whose company we transact it. But in our quest to do the best we can, we are apt to defeat ourselves by pushing against life with the brute force of uncalibrated ambition, razing our peace of mind on the sharp-edged sense that there is always more to achieve. "I did not think this would happen," and "Would you ever have believed that this would have happened?" There are other special forms of this disease without number, but it has but one effect, that of making people dissatisfied with themselves. The dialogue concerns the state of the animi of Seneca's friend Annaeus Serenus, and how to cure Serenus of anxiety, worry and disgust with life. Do something of that sort yourself: if Fortune removes you from the front rank, stand your ground nevertheless and cheer on your comrades, and if somebody stops your mouth, stand nevertheless and help your side in silence. He seems to me to have said, "Fortune, mind your own business: Diogenes has nothing left that belongs to you. The Tranquility of Mind Seneca's dialogue with Serenus, more of an essay than a dialogue, is essentially comprised of the many . This page was last edited on 28 January 2023, at 14:18. Kimberly WilliamsInstructor Leila Wells Rogers Humanities 1101December 2, 2012On Tranquility of Mind (Seneca) Seneca's discussion with Serenus on the tranquility of the mind focuses on ways to obtain a tranquil mind as well as lifestyle modification in our thinking. His friends were sad at being about to lose so great a man: "Why," asked he, "are you sorrowful? or what are your ideas?" What in Seneca's view, is humanities greatest source of affliction? Fortune, which regards our lives as a show in the arena for her own enjoyment, says, "Why should I spare you, base and cowardly creature that you are? De Tranquillitate Animi (The tranquility of the soul) is a Latin work of the philosopher in the form of a dialogue. Add to this that he who laughs at the human race deserves better of it than he who mourns for it, for the former leaves it some good hopes of improvement, while the latter stupidly weeps over what he has given up all hopes of mending. Seneca's advice is practical and realistic; be aware and keep a check on the unmeaning din (both inner and outer). I: Seneca explains that he prefers simple cloths and easily prepared food, not the kind that "goes out of the body by the same path by which it . He occupies a central place in the literature on Stoicism at the time, and shapes the understanding of Stoic thought that later generations were to have. then let him help his countrymen with silent counsel. 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. 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? Someone may say, "After this Gaius might have let him live." The dialogue concerns the state of mind of Seneca's friend Annaeus Serenus, and how to cure Serenus of anxiety, worry and disgust with life. we are all included in the same captivity, and even those who have bound us are bound themselves, unless you think that a chain on the left side is lighter to bear: one man may be bound by public office, another by wealth: some have to bear the weight of illustrious, some of humble birth: some are subject to the commands of others, some only to their own: some are kept in one place by being banished thither, others by being elected to the priesthood. 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 .". by "[5] It had nothing to do with taste or care, but was a piece of learned luxury, nay, not even learned, since they amassed it, not for the sake of learning, but to make a show, like many men who know less about letters than a slave is expected to know, and who uses his books not to help him in his studies but to ornament his dining-room. But since it is your wish that a part be severed from "Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness.". . I am not sure what he meant: for many ways of explaining his conduct occur to me. a full page of OCR text. 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. Serenus sees an appeal in various . As a Stoic philosopher writing in Latin, Seneca makes a lasting contribution to Stoicism. Julius Kanus, a man of peculiar greatness, whom even the fact of his having been born in this century does not prevent our admiring, had a long dispute with Gaius, and when as he was going away that Phalaris of a man said to him, "That you may not delude yourself with any foolish hopes, I have ordered you to be executed," he answered, "I thank you, most excellent prince." at the lower right increases or decreases the number of rows (but keeps the height of each row the same). Basore: the Latin is also available). 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