Seneca, On the Happy Life 36: Does It Suffice?

. . . "What? Does virtue alone suffice to make you happy?" Why, of course, consummate and god-like virtue such as this not only suffices, but more than suffices, for when a man is placed beyond the reach of any desire, what can he possibly lack? If all that he needs is centered in himself, how can he require anything from without?

He, however, who is only on the road to virtue, although he may have made great progress along it, nevertheless needs some favor from fortune while he is still struggling among mere human interests, while he is untying that knot, and all the bonds which bind him to mortality.

What, then, is the difference between them? It is that some are tied more or less tightly by these bonds, and some have even tied themselves with them as well; whereas he who has made progress towards the upper regions and raised himself upwards drags a looser chain, and though not yet free, is yet as good as free.

—Seneca the Younger, On the happy life, Chapter 16 (tr Stewart)

A good business sense, the same one that tells us the buyer should beware, reminds us that if something seems to good to be true, it probably is. Whenever the media says that the government is going to make things easier for me, or a Nigerian prince tells me he will share his millions of dollars, I should rightly be suspicious.

Now why should I believe these Stoics, who are insisting that happiness is so simple? It may actually be simple, but it isn’t always easy. It is simple, because all higher truths admit of simplicity, of being one, and not being divided. It is also difficult, however, because the weight of my habits and the pull of social custom tells me it can’t possibly be right. It only seems too good to be true because we are so out of touch with what is good and true.

In the world of business, full of liars and crooks, I can never assume that another person is reliable. In the world of happiness, which depends entirely upon myself, I am only as reliable as I let myself be. It was when we started being convinced that happiness was a commodity to buy and sell that it all became a confusing game. Life sadly ends up being more about the art of playing than the art of living.

My only opposition to the simplicity of happiness proceeds from the complexity of dependence, when I believe I need so many things I don’t really need at all. Those ties of dependence are easy to bind, but hard to break. I was already convinced of them as a child, and I still struggle with them as I slouch toward the end of things. For someone who has made the Stoic Turn, the goal may be completely clear, but it may also take some effort to get there.

Like Plato’s philosopher returning into the Cave, or some heretical Rabbi telling us that we need not worry about what we eat or wear, we will be deemed insane as soon as we try to strip away the illusions. I know I have begun to free myself from the ties that bind when I no longer care about being thought insane, and when I no longer worry about playing the game.

I can’t count the times I have made a sincere commitment to the fullness of life in the evening, and I then immediately begin to make excuses for myself the next morning. That only happens because I haven’t removed all the chains.

Yes, Nature will suffice. Whatever circumstances may befall me, I need only my own power of judgment and choice to live with excellence. It may, however, take me some time to untie the knots, and I will doubt and grumble as I wean myself from the habits of dependence. One day at a time. 

Written in 1/2012

Image: William Blake, Christian Reading in His Book, from the Pilgrim's Progress (c. 1825)