Today I have some free time, thanks not so much to myself as to the games, which have attracted all the bores to the boxing-match. No one will interrupt me or disturb the train of my thoughts, which go ahead more boldly as the result of my very confidence. My door has not been continually creaking […]
Letter 79: On the rewards of scientific discovery
I have been awaiting a letter from you, that you might inform me what new matter was revealed to you during your trip around Sicily, and especially that you might give me further information regarding Charybdis itself. I know very well that Scylla is a rock – and indeed a rock not dreaded by mariners; […]
Letter 78: On the healing power of the mind
That you are frequently troubled by the snuffling of catarrh and by short attacks of fever which follow after long and chronic catarrhal seizures, I am sorry to hear; particularly because I have experienced this sort of illness myself and scorned it in its early stages. For when I was still young, I could put […]
Letter 74: On virtue as a refuge from worldly distractions
Your letter has given me pleasure and has roused me from sluggishness. It has also prompted my memory, which has been for some time slack and nerveless. You are right, of course, my dear Lucilius, in deeming the chief means of attaining the happy life to consist in the belief that the only good lies […]
Letter 73: On philosophers and kings
It seems to me erroneous to believe that those who have loyally dedicated themselves to philosophy are stubborn and rebellious, scorners of magistrates or kings or of those who control the administration of public affairs. For, on the contrary, no class of man is so popular with the philosopher as the ruler is; and rightly […]