On the Shortness of Life, Section 13

Seneca — The Senator

But let me get back to my main point. I want to prove that people waste their effort on even this kind of learning. The same historian tells us that Metellus was the only Roman general who ever paraded 120 captured elephants in his victory march after defeating the Carthaginians in Sicily. He also says Sulla was the last Roman to extend the sacred boundary of the city — something the ancients only did when they conquered Italian territory, not foreign provinces. Is it really more useful to know these facts than to know why Mount Aventine sits outside the sacred boundary? According to this historian, it's either because the common people once fled there during a revolt, or because the omens were bad when Remus took his bird readings on that spot. There are countless other stories like this. They're either outright lies or might as well be.

Seneca — The Senator Original

But to return to the point from which I have digressed, I will prove that even on this very subject some people expend useless pains. The same author tells us that Metellus, when he triumphed after having conquered the Carthaginians in Sicily, was the only Roman who ever had a hundred and twenty captured elephants led before his car: and that Sulla was the last Roman who extended the pomoerium,[7] which it was not the custom of the ancients to extend on account of the conquest of provincial, but only of Italian territory. Is it more useful to know this, than to know that the Mount Aventine, according to him, is outside of the pomoerium, for one of two reasons, either because it was thither that the plebeians seceded, or because when Remus took his auspices on that place the birds which he saw were not propitious: and other stories without number of the like sort, which are either actual falsehoods or much the same as falsehoods?