Cast away everything of that sort, if you are wise; no, rather that you may be wise; strive toward a sound mind at top speed and with your whole strength. If any bond holds you back, untie it, or sever it.
"But," you say, "my estate delays me; I wish to make such disposition of it that it may suffice for me when I have nothing to do, lest either poverty be a burden to me, or I myself a burden to others."
You do not seem, when you say this, to know the strength and power of that good which you are considering. You do indeed grasp the all-important thing, the great benefit which philosophy confers, but you do not yet discern accurately its various functions, nor do you yet know how great is the help we receive from philosophy in everything, everywhere—how (to use Cicero's language) it not only succors us in the greatest matters but also descends to the smallest.
Take my advice; call wisdom into consultation; she will advise you not to sit forever at your ledger.
If we were to judge only by what people say, we might feel comfortably assured that our society isn’t being corrupted by a desire for wealth. After all, we confidently insist that being rich won’t make us happy, that money can’t buy love, and that the best things in life are free. The bigwigs further encourage this by preaching about building communities, putting people first, and working for social justice. “This isn’t just about a paycheck,” they tell us. “It’s about being part of a family.”
But words can easily become empty, and talk is cheap. What matters more are the values to which we sincerely commit ourselves, and the actions that must follow from them. Show me, don’t tell me. Paying lip service to virtue will be quite meaningless, for our hearts and minds aren’t really in it, and we are merely interested in putting on a pleasant show.
It is easy to “be” a Stoic, or a follower of any of the world’s great wisdom traditions, if it simply requires keeping up appearances. Behind the disguise, one can then go on with the acquiring and the consuming. All the philosophy, the search for deeper meaning and purpose, is amusing, of course, but it will hardly buy security and comfort, will it?
Now where do we come off thinking that the conveniences of the body are the greatest goals? Did we arrive at this conclusion by any reasoning, or was it just a blind assumption? How ironic that we would need philosophy to draw the very conclusion that we don’t need philosophy.
I recently heard a celebrity explain how being a teacher or a philosopher is all nice and well, but you need to get rich first. “Money is really important, you know?” Yet in and of itself, money is nothing at all, and only acquires value in how it is used. Nor should I assume that any such use is helpful to me, as it can also be used for harm. It becomes clear that being famous won’t make you immune from putting the cart before the horse.
Absolutely everything good in life, whatever it might be, proceeds from wisdom and virtue, and we still believe that the money must come first. It’s gone topsy turvy, where the soul is now subject to the body, and the means are suddenly more important than the ends.
Like so many of us, from any time or place, Lucilius must be worrying about his career before his character. What good will the learning do him, if he doesn’t first have an estate? The better question, however, would be what good will an estate do him, if he doesn’t first have the learning?
Perhaps he hesitates, and wants to cover all his bases, by getting the money problems out of the way before he faces the life problems. Like the old ad jingle said, that way he can double his pleasure and double his fun.
What he forgets, and what we all quickly forget, is that no man can serve two masters, and that money can give him nothing of its own accord. Rather, wisdom and virtue don’t just provide some of the good things in life, but are the wellspring of all the good things in life. What is relative can only be measured by what is absolute.
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