Seneca, Moral Letters 27.1

Letter 27: On the good which abides 

 

"What," say you, "are you giving me advice? Indeed, have you already advised yourself, already corrected your own faults? Is this the reason why you have leisure to reform other men?" 

 

No, I am not so shameless as to undertake to cure my fellow men when I am ill myself. I am, however, discussing with you troubles which concern us both, and sharing the remedy with you, just as if we were lying ill in the same hospital. 

 

Listen to me, therefore, as you would if I were talking to myself. I am admitting you to my inmost thoughts, and am having it out with myself, merely making use of you as my pretext. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 27 

 

Though I am by disposition deeply private, what many would call an introvert, I nevertheless find myself drawn to impassioned discussions about the meaning and value of this life. While I can usually go it alone with the little things, I somehow instinctively know how deeply we need to support one another when it comes to the big things.

 

As both Aristotle and Marcus Aurelius remind us, a rational nature must also be a social nature. 

 

But then I may find myself in trouble, for I have too often abandoned a love of cooperation in favor of a lust for bickering. Wherever a shared commitment to a universal truth is replaced by an angry confrontation aimed at winning dominance over another, we are no longer engaged in a discussion. Let me walk away before I get wrapped up in all the bitterness. 

 

I seek the sort of argument where we join forces to arrive at a conclusion from the premises, not the sort of argument where there is yelling and outrage. 

 

In such a violent climate, friendly advice is easily confused with dismissive reproach, and the act of reaching out is mistaken for an invasion of space. Once I catch myself placing my own benefit in opposition to that of anyone else, it’s time to stop pointing fingers and to start offering a helping hand. I can call it justice all I want, yet it will only be justice when my victory no longer demands his defeat. 

 

Just because he offers a suggestion, it does not necessarily mean he is diminishing me or elevating himself. We all have our flaws, and none of us will improve without admitting how we are in it together. Pride is always at the root of taking a correction as a recrimination. 

 

I am especially moved by Seneca’s image of two sick people recovering side by side, for however different the symptoms may be, the common road back to health unites them in their purpose. 

 

I still have a hazy memory of being about four or five, and my mother and I were terribly sick at the same time. Many years later, only a few months after we were married, my wife and I were bedridden together for over a week, her with the chicken pox and me with the nastiest case of the stomach flu I have ever known. In both cases, going through it jointly made the burden so much more bearable. 

 

When they have been wounded in battle, soldiers can finally stop worrying about the killing and get back to the task of living. 

 

Whatever is thought or said between friends should be taken as a blessing for both and as a bane for neither. Where a man is not yet my friend, I should attend to that deficiency before I lay my cards on the table. If he doesn’t know that I am on his side, he will likely take my proposals as accusations. 

—Reflection written in 10/2012 

IMAGE: Erich Heckel, Two Wounded Soldiers (1914)