On the Shortness of Life: Adapted for the Contemporary Reader

by James Harris

It is not that we have a short space of time, but that we waste much of it.

But when it is squandered in luxury and carelessness, when it is devoted to no good end, forced at last by the ultimate necessity, towards the end, we perceive that it has passed away before we were aware that it was passing. So it is—that the life we receive is not short, but we make it so, and there is no lack of it, but we are wasteful of it.

Vices surround us on every side, and they do not permit us to rise or open our eyes to the truth, but they keep us down once they have overwhelmed us, and chain us to lust.

Look at those whose prosperity men wish to have; they are already blessed with much and do not realise, to many, being rich is a burden! How many of the richest struggle to display their powers! How many are lifeless from constant pleasures! How many successful people are surrounded and offered no freedom!

Men who do not suffer threats are quick to prepare for war over the slightest preconceived danger. Yet they allow others to trespass upon their life without any barriers, they themselves even lead in those people who will eventually possess their time.

how much of your time was taken up working for another, how much with a mistress, how much repaying debts, how much with clients for a business which does not serve you, how much in arguing with your wife, how much rushing about the city socializing but gaining nothing from it.

how much was taken up in useless sorrow, in foolish joy, in greedy desire, in the allurements of society, how little of yourself was left to you; you will perceive that you are dying before you have really lived.

You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever entered your head, of how much time has already gone by and you take no notice. You squander time as if you had a full and abundant supply, though one day which you waste on some person or thing could be your last. You have all the fears of mortals and all the desires of immortals.

That man who had prayed for power when he attains it, desires to lay it aside and says over and over: "When will this year be over!" That man creates games and, after setting great value on gaining the chance to win them, now says: "When shall I be rid of them?" The man who is given great approval throughout the whole forum, and fills the place with a great crowd that stretches farther than he can be heard, still says: "When will vacation time come?" Everyone hurries their life on and suffers from a yearning for the future and a weariness of the present. But he who bestows all of his time on his own needs, who plans out every day as if it were his last, neither longs for nor fears tomorrow.

The greatest hindrance to living is expectancy, which depends upon tomorrow and wastes the present. You hope for that which lies in the hands of Fortune, yet you let go of that which lies in your own.

But Fabianus who was none of your lecture-room philosophers of today, but one of the genuine and old-fashioned kind, used to say that we must fight against the passions with main force, not with trickery, and that the battle-line must be breached by a bold attack, not by inflicting pinpricks;

None of these noble men will force you to die, but all will teach you how to die; none will wear out your years, but each will add his own years to yours; conversations with none of these will bring you peril, the friendship of none of these will endanger your life, the courting of none will tax your wallet.

They lose the day in expectation of the night, and the night in fear of the dawn.

Reasons for anxiety will never be lacking, whether born of prosperity or of unhappiness; life pushes on in a succession of engrossments. We shall always pray for leisure, but never enjoy it.

The condition of all who are engrossed is poor, but poorest is the condition of those who labour at engrossments that are not even their own, who regulate their sleep by that of another, their walk by the pace of another, who are under orders—loving and hating. If these wish to know how short their life is, let them reflect how small a part of it is their own.