🏛️ Sundays with Seneca
Sundays with Seneca explores Lucius Annaeus Seneca's writings and Stoic philosophy. Each week, I share a selected reading from one of Seneca's letters in search of ancient lessons on the art of living.
On Philosophy and Friendship
In a letter to Lucilius known today as On Philosophy and Friendship, Seneca wrote,
You desire to know whether Epicurus is right when, in one of his letters, he rebukes those who hold that the wise man is self-sufficient and, for that reason, does not stand in need of friendship. This is the objection raised by Epicurus against Stilbo and those who believe that the Supreme Good is a soul which is insensible to feeling.
We are bound to meet with a double meaning if we try to express the Greek term ‘lack of feeling’ summarily, in a single word, rendering it by the Latin word impatientia. For it may be understood in the meaning the opposite to that which we wish it to have. What we mean to express is a soul that rejects any sensation of evil, but people will interpret the idea as that of a soul that can endure no evil. Consider, therefore, whether it is not better to say ‘a soul that cannot be harmed’ or ‘a soul entirely beyond the realm of suffering.’
