If I were a nightingale, I would perform the work of a nightingale, and if I were a swan, that of a swan. But as it is, I am a rational being, and I must sing the praise of God. This is my work, and I accomplish it, and I will never abandon my post for as long as it is granted to me to remain in it; and I invite all of you to join me in this same...
Seneca’s writing reveals a committed Stoic, a pious soul, and an inspirational moral philosopher. Nevertheless, some of his actions and financial dealings have generated doubt about his genuineness. The historical Seneca is a mixed bag if the record can be trusted. Nevertheless, it is important to keep in mind that Seneca engaged in politics at the highest levels of the dominant world power of his time. Thus, he had powerful enemies, not the least of which was Emperor Nero. When...
If I were a nightingale, I would perform the work of a nightingale, and if I were a swan, that of a swan. But as it is, I am a rational being, and I must sing the praise of God. (Epictetus, Discourses 1.16-20) As I wrote in a previous post, many people introduced to Stoicism by twenty-first-century popularizers are surprised by the religious nature of Stoic philosophy and the deep religious piety of the Stoics. Likewise, they are unaware that...
Say to yourself at the start of the day, I shall meet with meddling, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, and unsociable people. They are subject to all these defects because they have no knowledge of good and bad. But I, who have observed the nature of the good, and seen that it is the right; and of the bad, and seen that it is the wrong; and of the wrongdoer himself, and seen that his nature is akin to my own—not...
[T]rue education consists precisely in this, in learning to wish that everything should come about just as it does. And how do things come about? As the one who ordains them has ordained… It is with this order of things in mind that we should approach our education, and not so as to change the existing order of things (for that has not been permitted to us, nor would it be better that it should be), but rather, things around...
It escapes most people, that the study of arguments which have equivocal or hypothetical premises, and those which are developed by questioning, and, in a word, all such arguments, has a connection with how we should behave in our lives. For what we seek in every matter is how the virtuous man may find the path he should follow and the way he should behave with regard to it. (Discourses 1.7.1) This is the second of several posts that will...
Who is making progress, then? The person who has read many treatises by Chrysippus? Why, does virtue consist in this, in having gained a thorough knowledge of Chrysippus? For if that is the case, we must agree progress is nothing other than knowing many works of Chrysippus. ~ Epictetus “What now?” That was the question I asked myself after I completed my first course of study in Stoicism. Like most people who turn to Stoicism for answers, I was seeking...
Prosochē, the practice of attention, is the fundamental spiritual attitude necessary to practice Stoicism as a way of life.[1] It is the practice of consistent, vigilant attention to impressions, assents, desires, and actions, for the purpose of creating excellence (virtue) in one’s inner self and thereby experiencing a good flow in life (eudaimonia). This post is excerpted from an essay I wrote on prosochē in 2013, if you find this post interesting, I encourage you to read the essay. What...
I recently finished Barbara Ehrenreich’s thought-provoking book, Living with a Wild God: A Nonbeliever’s Search for the Truth about Everything. Some may be familiar with her 2010 New York Times bestseller, Bright-sided: How Positive Thinking Is Undermining America. Barbara is an atheist, a third generation atheist in fact. Moreover, she was educated as a scientist. Nevertheless, she had an unnerving experience in her mid-teens that she ignored for most of her adult life because it defied the materialist conception of reality she adhered...
Stoic ethics is interdependent with a specific model of the cosmos. The Stoics rejected and argued stridently against the random, meaningless universe of the Epicureans. In contrast, the Stoics built their philosophy around a rational, intelligent, and providentially ordered cosmos. They considered this worldview essential to their systematic philosophy because it provides the necessary framework for Stoic ethical theory and practice. There are numerous outstanding expositions of Stoic ethical theory. Since I am not defending Stoic ethical theory, I will...
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