118 lines
6.4 KiB
Markdown
118 lines
6.4 KiB
Markdown
---
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tabtitle: "Seneca's Letter to Lucilius, Letter 12"
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title: "Seneca's Letter to Lucilius, Letter 12: On Old Age"
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topics: [philosophy]
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pub: ""
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short_desc: ""
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---
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# Letter 12: On Old Age
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## Original Text
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Wherever I turn, I see evidences of my advancing years. I visited lately my
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country-place, and protested against the money which was spent on the
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tumble-down building. My bailiff maintained that the flaws were not due to
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his own carelessness; "he was doing everything possible, but the house was
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old." And this was the house which grew under my own hands! What has the
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future in store for me, if stones of my own age are already crumbling? I
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was angry, and I embraced the first opportunity to vent my spleen in the
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bailiff's presence. "It is clear," I cried, "that these plane-trees are
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neglected; they have no leaves. Their branches are so gnarled and shrivelled;
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the boles are so rough and unkempt! This would not happen, if someone
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loosened the earth at their feet, and watered them." The bailiff swore by my
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protecting deity that "he was doing everything possible, and never relaxed
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his efforts, but those trees were old." Between you and me, I had planted
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those trees myself, I had seen them in their first leaf. Then I turned to
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the door and asked: "Who is that broken-down dotard? You have done well to
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place him at the entrance; for he is outward bound. Where did you get him?
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What pleasure did it give you to take up for burial some other man's
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dead?" But the slave said: "Don't you know me, sir? I am Felicio; you used
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to bring me little images. My father was Philositus the steward, and I am
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your pet slave." "The man is clean crazy," I remarked. "Has my pet slave
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become a little boy again? But it is quite possible; his teeth are just
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dropping out."
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I owe it to my country-place that my old age became apparent whithersoever
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I turned. Let us cherish and love old age; for it is full of pleasure if
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one knows how to use it. Fruits are most welcome when almost over; youth
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is most charming at its close; the last drink delights the toper, the
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glass which souses him and puts the finishing touch on his drunkenness.
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Each pleasure reserves to the end the greatest delights which it contains.
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Life is most delightful when it is on the downward slope, but has not yet
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reached the abrupt decline. And I myself believe that the period which
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stands, so to speak, on the edge of the roof, possesses pleasures of its
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own. Or else the very fact of our not wanting pleasures has taken the
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place of the pleasures themselves. How comforting it is to have tired out
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one's appetites, and to have done with them! "But," you say, "it is a
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nuisance to be looking death in the face!" Death, however, should be
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looked in the face by young and old alike. We are not summoned according
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to our rating on the censor's list. Moreover, no one is so old that it
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would be improper for him to hope for another day of existence. And one
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day, mind you, is a stage on life's journey.
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Our span of life is divided into parts; it consists of large circles
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enclosing smaller. One circle embraces and bounds the rest; it reaches
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from birth to the last day of existence. The next circle limits the period
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of our young manhood. The third confines all of childhood in its
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circumference. Again, there is, in a class by itself, the year; it
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contains within itself all the divisions of time by the multiplication of
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which we get the total of life. The month is bounded by a narrower ring.
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The smallest circle of all is the day; but even a day has its beginning
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and its ending, its sunrise and its sunset. Hence Heraclitus, whose
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obscure style gave him his surname, remarked: "One day is equal to
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every day." Different persons have interpreted the saying in different
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ways. Some hold that days are equal in number of hours, and this is true;
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for if by "day" we mean twenty-four hours' time, all days must be equal,
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inasmuch as the night acquires what the day loses. But others maintain
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that one day is equal to all days through resemblance, because the very
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longest space of time possesses no element which cannot be found in a
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single day, – namely, light and darkness, – and even to eternity day makes
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these alternations more numerous, not different when it is shorter and
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different again when it is longer. Hence, every day ought to be
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regulated as if it closed the series, as if it rounded out and completed
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our existence.
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Pacuvius, who by long occupancy made Syria his own, used to hold a
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regular burial sacrifice in his own honour, with wine and the usual
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funeral feasting, and then would have himself carried from the dining-room
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to his chamber, while eunuchs applauded and sang in Greek to a musical
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accompaniment: "He has lived his life, he has lived his life!" Thus
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Pacuvius had himself carried out to burial every day. Let us, however, do
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from a good motive what he used to do from a debased motive; let us go to
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our sleep with joy and gladness; let us say:
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I have lived; the course which Fortune set for me
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Is finished.
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And if God is pleased to add another day, we should welcome it with glad
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hearts. That man is happiest, and is secure in his own possession of
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himself, who can await the morrow without apprehension. When a man has
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said: "I have lived!", every morning he arises he receives a bonus.
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But now I ought to close my letter. "What?" you say; "shall it come to
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me without any little offering? "Be not afraid; it brings something, –
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nay, more than something, a great deal. For what is more noble than
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the following saying of which I make this letter the bearer: "It
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is wrong to live under constraint; but no man is constrained to live
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under constraint." Of course not. On all sides lie many short and
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simple paths to freedom; and let us thank God that no man can be kept
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in life. We may spurn the very constraints that hold us.
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"Epicurus," you reply, "uttered these words; what are you doing with
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another's property?" Any truth, I maintain, is my own property. And I
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shall continue to heap quotations from Epicurus upon you, so that all
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persons who swear by the words of another, and put a value upon the
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speaker and not upon the thing spoken, may understand that the best
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ideas are common property. Farewell.
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## Response
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### Source
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[Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 12 on Wikisource](
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https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Letter_12)
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###### [Letter Index]({{ site.baseurl }}{% post_url 2018-01-15-Letters-To-Lucilius %})
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- Update pub to publication date
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- Set short_desc
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