Welcome to Sundays with Seneca on the Perennial Meditations podcast. Join the search for ancient lessons for modern life in the writing and Stoic philosophy of Lucius Annaeus Seneca.
In a letter known today as On the True Joy Which Comes from Philosophy, Seneca wrote to Lucilius,
Do you suppose that I shall write you how kindly the winter season has dealt with us—a short season and a mild one—or what a nasty spring we are having—cold weather out of season—and all the other trivialities which people write when they are at a loss for topics of conversation? No, I shall communicate something which may help both you and myself. And what shall this “something” be, if not an exhortation to the soundness of mind? Do you ask what is the foundation of a sound mind? It is not to find joy in useless things. I said that it was the foundation; it is really the pinnacle.
We have reached the heights if we know what it is that we find joy in and if we have not placed our happiness in the control of externals. The man who is goaded ahead by the hope of anything, though it is within reach, though it be easy of access, and though his ambitions have never played him false, is troubled and unsure of himself.
Above all, my dear Lucilius, make this your business: learn how to feel joy.
Do you think that I am now robbing you of many pleasures when I try to do away with the gifts of chance when I counsel the avoidance of hope, the sweetest thing that gladdens our hearts? Quite the contrary; I do not wish you ever to be deprived of gladness. I would have it born in your house, and it is born there if only it were inside of you. Other objects of cheer do not fill a man’s bosom; they merely smooth his brow and are inconstant—unless perhaps you believe that he who laughs has joy. The very soul must be happy and confident, lifted above every circumstance.
Real joy, believe me, is a stern matter. Can one, do you think, despise death with a carefree countenance?
Or can one thus open his door to poverty, or hold the curb on his pleasures, or contemplate the endurance of pain? He who ponders these things in his heart is indeed full of joy, but it is not a cheerful joy. It is just this joy, however, of which I would have you become the owner, for it will never fail you when once you have found its source.
Therefore I pray you, my dearest Lucilius, do the one thing that can render you really happy: cast aside and trample underfoot all the things that glitter outwardly and are held out to you by another or as obtainable from another; look toward the true good, and rejoice only in that which comes from your own store. And what do I mean by “from your own store”? I mean from your very self, that which is the best part of you.
Do you ask me what this real good is and whence it derives? I will tell you: it comes from a good conscience, from honorable purposes, from right actions, from contempt of the gifts of chance, from an even and calm way of living which treads but one path. For men who leap from one purpose to another or do not even leap but are carried over by a sort of hazard—how can such wavering and unstable persons possess any good that is fixed and lasting?
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Thank you for listening; I hope you found something useful.
Until next time, be wise and be well,
Seneca on the True Joy of Philosophy