On the Shortness of Life

by Seneca

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.

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.

You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire.

the mind when distracted absorbs nothing deeply, but rejects everything which is, so to speak, crammed into it.

Living is the least important activity of the preoccupied man;

But learning how to live takes a whole life, and, which may surprise you more, it takes a whole life to learn how to die.

the man who spends all his time on his own needs, who organizes every day as though it were his last, neither longs for nor fears the next day.

So you must not think a man has lived long because he has white hair and wrinkles: he has not lived long, just existed long.

But nobody works out the value of time: men use it lavishly as if it cost nothing.

But if death threatens these same people, you will see them praying to their doctors; if they are in fear of capital punishment, you will see them prepared to spend their all to stay alive. So inconsistent are they in their feelings.

Can anything be more idiotic than certain people who boast of their foresight?

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.

the preoccupied become aware of it only when it is over.

Life is divided into three periods, past, present and future. Of these, the present is short, the future is doubtful, the past is certain.

In the present we have only one day at a time, each offering a minute at a time. But all the days of the past will come to your call: you can detain and inspect them at your will – something which the preoccupied have no time to do.

Of all people only those are at leisure who make time for philosophy, only those are really alive.

But life is very short and anxious for those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear the future.

For as soon as their preoccupations fail them, they are restless with nothing to do, not knowing how to dispose of their leisure or make the time pass. And so they are anxious for something else to do, and all the intervening time is wearisome: really, it is just as when a gladiatorial show has been announced, or they are looking forward to the appointed time of some other exhibition or amusement – they want to leap over the days in between. Any deferment of the longed-for event is tedious to them.

Life will be driven on through a succession of preoccupations: we shall always long for leisure, but never enjoy it.

for an illness too nothing is more harmful than premature treatment.

all grief is stubborn),

Everlasting misfortune does have one blessing, that it ends up by toughening those whom it constantly afflicts.

No man has been shattered by the blows of Fortune unless he was first deceived by her favours.

Nothing satisfies greed, but even a little satisfies nature.

It is the mind that creates our wealth,

When once virtue has toughened the mind it renders it invulnerable on every side.

If you consider that sexual desire was given to man not for enjoyment but for the propagation of the race, once you are free of this violent and destructive passion rooted in your vitals, every other desire will leave you undisturbed.

Reason routs the vices not one by one but all together: the victory is final and complete.’ Do you think that any wise man can be affected by disgrace, one who relies entirely on himself and holds aloof from common beliefs?

No man is despised by another unless he is first despised by himself.

it is better to conquer our grief than to deceive it.

if it has withdrawn, being merely beguiled by pleasures and preoccupations, it starts up again and from its very respite gains force to savage us.

the grief that has been conquered by reason is ...

confidence in yourself and the belief that you are on the right path, and not led astray by the many tracks which cross yours of people who are hopelessly lost, though some are wandering not far from the true path.

This arises from mental instability and from fearful and unfulfilled desires, when men do not dare or do not achieve all they long for, and all they grasp at is hope: they are always unbalanced and fickle, an inevitable consequence of living in suspense.

unproductive idleness nurtures malice, and because they themselves could not prosper they want everyone else to be ruined.

We are weak in enduring anything, and cannot put up with toil or pleasure or ourselves or anything for long.

The best course, as Athenodorus says, would be to busy oneself in the practical activity of political involvement and civic duties.

If you apply yourself to study you will avoid all boredom with life, you will not long for night because you are sick of daylight, you will be neither a burden to yourself nor useless to others, you will attract many to become your friends and the finest people will flock about you.

we must take a careful look first at ourselves, then at the activities which we shall be attempting, and then at those for whose sake and with whom we are attempting them.

For the performer must always be stronger than his task: loads that are too heavy for the bearer are bound to overwhelm him.

You must set your hands to tasks which you can finish or at least hope to finish, and avoid those which get bigger as you proceed and do not cease where you had intended.

a companion who is agitated and groaning about everything is an enemy to peace of mind.

we must at least curtail our possessions, so we may be less exposed to the blows of Fortune.

you will see that the idlest men possess sets of orations and histories, with crates piled up to the ceiling:

no condition is so bitter that a stable mind cannot find some consolation in it.

What is the harm in returning to the point whence you came?

He who fears death will never do anything worthy of a living man.

In any case the mind must be recalled from external objects into itself: it must trust in itself, rejoice in itself, admire its own things; it must withdraw as much as possible from the affairs of others and devote its attention to itself; it must not feel losses and should take a kindly view even of misfortunes.

The mind should not be kept continuously at the same pitch of concentration, but given amusing diversions.

Our minds must relax: they will rise better and keener after a rest.