On the Shortness of Life, Section 18

Seneca — The Senator

You manage the world's money as if it belonged to someone else — completely honest. You work as hard as if it were your own. You're as careful as if it belonged to the people. You've won people's love in a job where most people end up hated. But believe me, it's better to understand your own mind than to understand grain markets. Take that sharp mind of yours — the one that can handle the biggest problems — away from a job that might look impressive but won't make you happy. Remember, you didn't study all those subjects as a child just so you could be trusted with thousands of tons of grain. You promised us something greater and more noble than this. There will always be plenty of careful accountants and hard workers. Slow pack animals are better for carrying heavy loads than thoroughbred horses. No one would weigh down a racehorse's generous speed with a heavy pack.

Seneca — The Senator Original

You manage the revenues of the entire world, as unselfishly as though they belonged to another, as laboriously as if they were your own, as scrupulously as though they belonged to the public: you win love in an office in which it is hard to avoid incurring hatred; yet, believe me, it is better to understand your own mind than to understand the corn-market. Take away that keen intellect of yours, so well capable of grappling with the greatest subjects, from a post which may be dignified, but which is hardly fitted to render life happy, and reflect that you did not study from childhood all the branches of a liberal education merely in order that many thousand tons of corn might safely be entrusted to your charge: you have given us promise of something greater and nobler than this. There will never be any want of strict economists or of laborious workers: slow-going beasts of burden are better suited for carrying loads than well-bred horses, whose generous swiftness no one would encumber with a heavy pack.