Plain
Seneca — The Senator

Can you imagine someone so lost in luxury that they need another person to tell them whether they're sitting or standing? This man is certainly not at leisure. You need a different word for him: he's sick, or rather dead. Only someone who feels truly at leisure is actually at leisure. But this creature is barely alive if he needs someone else to tell him what position his body is in. How can such a man possibly manage any time at all?

On the Shortness of Life, Section 12 54 of 87
Knowing Yourself What Matters Most
Seneca — The Senator Original

To think that there should be any one who had so far lost his senses through luxury as to take some one else's opinion as to whether he was sitting or not? This man certainly is not at leisure: you must bestow a different title on him: he is sick, or rather dead: he only is at leisure who feels that he is at leisure: but this creature is only half alive, if he wants some one to tell him what position his body is in. How can such a man be able to dispose of any time?

On the Shortness of Life, Section 12 54 of 87
Seneca — The Senator

These people really do lose awareness of many things. But they also pretend to be unaware of even more. They actually enjoy their failings because they think being helpless proves how wealthy they are. They believe that knowing what you're doing is beneath them — something only poor, worthless people do. After seeing this, do you think playwrights have to make up stories when they mock the rich? Not at all. They actually leave out more than they invent. Our age has become so creative at producing incredible vices that playwrights can't keep up — there are too many real examples to mock.

On the Shortness of Life, Section 12 53 of 87
Human Nature What Matters Most
Seneca — The Senator Original

Such people do really become unconscious of much, but they behave as though they were unconscious of much more: they delight in some failings because they consider them to be proofs of happiness: it seems the part of an utterly low and contemptible man to know what he is doing. After this, do you suppose that playwrights draw largely upon their imaginations in their burlesques upon luxury: by Hercules, they omit more than they invent; in this age, inventive in this alone, such a number of incredible vices have been produced, that already you are able to reproach the playwrights with omitting to notice them.

On the Shortness of Life, Section 12 53 of 87
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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