What they wish to have heaped upon you are not really good things; there is only one good, the cause and the support of a happy life—trust in oneself. But this cannot be attained, unless one has learned to despise toil and to reckon it among the things which are neither good nor bad.
For it is not possible that a single thing should be bad at one time and good at another, at times light and to be endured, and at times a cause of dread.
Work is not a good. Then what is a good? I say, the scorning of work. That is why I should rebuke men who toil to no purpose.
But when, on the other hand, a man is struggling towards honorable things, in proportion as he applies himself more and more, and allows himself less and less to be beaten or to halt, I shall recommend his conduct and shout my encouragement, saying: "By so much you are better! Rise, draw a fresh breath, and surmount that hill, if possible, at a single spurt!"
For it is not possible that a single thing should be bad at one time and good at another, at times light and to be endured, and at times a cause of dread.
Work is not a good. Then what is a good? I say, the scorning of work. That is why I should rebuke men who toil to no purpose.
But when, on the other hand, a man is struggling towards honorable things, in proportion as he applies himself more and more, and allows himself less and less to be beaten or to halt, I shall recommend his conduct and shout my encouragement, saying: "By so much you are better! Rise, draw a fresh breath, and surmount that hill, if possible, at a single spurt!"
—from Seneca, Moral Letters 31
If you strive to become a teacher of conviction, not one who puts on airs, you will likely never receive any earthly rewards, but you will manage to cleanse your soul, and you will earn all sorts of delightful perks, like the joy that comes from observing a frown of confusion being transformed into a grin of insight.
I once asked a small group of students to read this passage, and I then sat back to enjoy the show.
One fellow clearly wasn’t reading to begin with, and he stared blindly at the page. The rest were scanning along, and then, one by one, at different paces, they would stop and furrow their brows. Some looked around in search of some clue. Another stared up at me and shook her head. They would try again from the beginning, only to fall back into frustration.
The sequence of expressions was priceless.
What was tripping them up? They weren’t sure what it meant to “despise” toil, and then they were appalled, in one case even offended, by the claim that work was not a good. Here they had been told, for their entire lives by most everyone they knew, that hard work was the key to success, and now a dead Roman asks them to cast aside this obsession with industry.
A Stoic Turn, as but one expression of recovering the substance of the natural from the diversions of the artificial, demands rebuilding the whole house, not just rearranging the furniture. If the task at hand is, first and foremost, to be human, then all other circumstances must be considered as relative to our happiness, and so can never be treated as good or bad in themselves.
Is it being directed toward the exercise of wisdom and virtue? Then it serves what is good in me. Is it being employed to support ignorance and vice? Then it is abused for what is bad in me. The means are always proportionate to the ends.
And so a pile of gold or a pile of manure take on their meaning and value through an awareness of purpose. It is no different with work: what am I working toward? The labor itself is neutral, so to speak, and should neither be sought nor avoided for its own sake. Working more at being a crook does immense harm, just as working less at being covetous offers profound benefits.
Now Seneca didn’t say that work was an evil, only that we must be indifferent to it, unattached to either its presence or its absence. But that’s not what we heard, is it? Having grown so accustomed to the idea that greater effort leads to greater merit, we blindly admire the image of constantly being employed, while neglecting to ask about the reason for the exertion.
After much arguing back and forth, I noticed how one student after another had a little epiphany about this point. I don’t know if any of it stuck with them after they left the room, but perhaps a seed had been planted for a later date, when the daily grind of mindlessly producing and consuming finally becomes too much for them.
If you strive to become a teacher of conviction, not one who puts on airs, you will likely never receive any earthly rewards, but you will manage to cleanse your soul, and you will earn all sorts of delightful perks, like the joy that comes from observing a frown of confusion being transformed into a grin of insight.
I once asked a small group of students to read this passage, and I then sat back to enjoy the show.
One fellow clearly wasn’t reading to begin with, and he stared blindly at the page. The rest were scanning along, and then, one by one, at different paces, they would stop and furrow their brows. Some looked around in search of some clue. Another stared up at me and shook her head. They would try again from the beginning, only to fall back into frustration.
The sequence of expressions was priceless.
What was tripping them up? They weren’t sure what it meant to “despise” toil, and then they were appalled, in one case even offended, by the claim that work was not a good. Here they had been told, for their entire lives by most everyone they knew, that hard work was the key to success, and now a dead Roman asks them to cast aside this obsession with industry.
A Stoic Turn, as but one expression of recovering the substance of the natural from the diversions of the artificial, demands rebuilding the whole house, not just rearranging the furniture. If the task at hand is, first and foremost, to be human, then all other circumstances must be considered as relative to our happiness, and so can never be treated as good or bad in themselves.
Is it being directed toward the exercise of wisdom and virtue? Then it serves what is good in me. Is it being employed to support ignorance and vice? Then it is abused for what is bad in me. The means are always proportionate to the ends.
And so a pile of gold or a pile of manure take on their meaning and value through an awareness of purpose. It is no different with work: what am I working toward? The labor itself is neutral, so to speak, and should neither be sought nor avoided for its own sake. Working more at being a crook does immense harm, just as working less at being covetous offers profound benefits.
Now Seneca didn’t say that work was an evil, only that we must be indifferent to it, unattached to either its presence or its absence. But that’s not what we heard, is it? Having grown so accustomed to the idea that greater effort leads to greater merit, we blindly admire the image of constantly being employed, while neglecting to ask about the reason for the exertion.
After much arguing back and forth, I noticed how one student after another had a little epiphany about this point. I don’t know if any of it stuck with them after they left the room, but perhaps a seed had been planted for a later date, when the daily grind of mindlessly producing and consuming finally becomes too much for them.
Most of our work is really busywork, and so should be scorned. When, however, our actions are in harmony with Nature, and not against her, we become worthy of praise and support. Just as the Stoic admires toughness in the context of character, so he reveres enterprise for the sake of righteousness.
—Reflection written in 12/2012
IMAGE: Ilya Repin, Barge Haulers on the Volga (1873)
_-_Volga_Boatmen_(1870-1873).jpg)
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