M. I have now said enough about the effects of exercise, custom, and careful meditation. Proceed we now to consider the force of reason, unless you have something to reply to what has been said.
A. That I should interrupt you! By no means; for your discourse has brought me over to your opinion.
M. Let the Stoics, then, think it their business to determine whether pain be an evil or not, while they endeavor to show by some strained and trifling conclusions, which are nothing to the purpose, that pain is no evil.
My opinion is, that whatever it is, it is not so great as it appears; and I say, that men are influenced to a great extent by some false representations and appearance of it, and that all which is really felt is capable of being endured.
Where shall I begin, then? Shall I superficially go over what I said before, that my discourse may have a greater scope?
This, then, is agreed upon by all, and not only by learned men, but also by the unlearned, that it becomes the brave and magnanimous—those that have patience and a spirit above this world—not to give way to pain. Nor has there ever been anyone who did not commend a man who bore it in this manner.
That, then, which is expected from a brave man, and is commended when it is seen, it must surely be base in anyone to be afraid of at its approach, or not to bear when it comes.
But I would have you consider whether, as all the right affections of the soul are classed under the name of virtues, the truth is that this is not properly the name of them all, but that they all have their name from that leading virtue which is superior to all the rest: for the name “virtue” comes from vir, a man, and courage is the peculiar distinction of a man: and this virtue has two principal duties, to despise death and pain.
We must, then, exert these, if we would be men of virtue, or, rather, if we would be men, because virtue (virtus) takes its very name from vir, man.
A. That I should interrupt you! By no means; for your discourse has brought me over to your opinion.
M. Let the Stoics, then, think it their business to determine whether pain be an evil or not, while they endeavor to show by some strained and trifling conclusions, which are nothing to the purpose, that pain is no evil.
My opinion is, that whatever it is, it is not so great as it appears; and I say, that men are influenced to a great extent by some false representations and appearance of it, and that all which is really felt is capable of being endured.
Where shall I begin, then? Shall I superficially go over what I said before, that my discourse may have a greater scope?
This, then, is agreed upon by all, and not only by learned men, but also by the unlearned, that it becomes the brave and magnanimous—those that have patience and a spirit above this world—not to give way to pain. Nor has there ever been anyone who did not commend a man who bore it in this manner.
That, then, which is expected from a brave man, and is commended when it is seen, it must surely be base in anyone to be afraid of at its approach, or not to bear when it comes.
But I would have you consider whether, as all the right affections of the soul are classed under the name of virtues, the truth is that this is not properly the name of them all, but that they all have their name from that leading virtue which is superior to all the rest: for the name “virtue” comes from vir, a man, and courage is the peculiar distinction of a man: and this virtue has two principal duties, to despise death and pain.
We must, then, exert these, if we would be men of virtue, or, rather, if we would be men, because virtue (virtus) takes its very name from vir, man.
—from Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 2.18
One of the many reasons I am drawn to the writings of Cicero is that while I admire him as a man of great virtues, one who had the deeds to back up his words, he also challenges me to think outside of my comfort zone.
Without always being completely conscious of its gradual influence, Stoicism has steadily become my default point of view. It took what I call the “Stoic Turn” to start rebuilding my life, and so I am now deeply committed to its core principles:
A logic that makes it possible for me to comprehend something of the universal Nature, an ethics that embraces virtue as the fulfillment of my particular nature, and a physics that reveres the guiding hand of Providence in it all.
As one part of this, I have grown accustomed to no longer treating pain as an evil. This did not come easily to me, and while I still catch myself complaining about my suffering as much as the next fellow, I can, when my head is on straight, consider how it is a means to making myself better, and thereby happier. I cringe, but I now look at the pain in a new light.
So when Cicero is hesitant to accept the Stoic claim that pain, in and of itself, can do us no harm, I get a little defensive. Yet I wouldn’t be a very good student of philosophy if I merely followed my whims, now would I? Cicero dismisses their abstractions as being removed from a stark reality, the simple fact that pain hurts, and I can hardly blame him.
I end up standing so defiantly with the Stoics because I know the danger of half measures, of cushioning the blow, of wanting to have it both ways. Is virtue truly our only good, or will I add further conditions, like demanding even a bare minimum of comfort, or expecting certain circumstances to be handed to me?
My own experience has taught that once a foot is in the door, I can no longer say that I’m secure in my home.
Once I say the hurt is “bad”, I am opening myself to a definition of self that, to whatever degree, includes the presence of the pleasure and the absence of the pain as conditions for happiness.
Do I prefer to feel gratification, and prefer to avoid suffering? Of course I do, and yet I would argue that the deepest pleasures are not conditions for happiness at all, but are rather the consequences of living well for its own sake. I happen to call it joy, which flows from the awareness of having done something rightly.
Cicero’s answer is to accept the reality of pain, which I believe the Stoic will also do, and then to argue that the evil of pain is so paltry in relation to the rewards of virtue as to make it insignificant, to which the Stoic will object. Don’t call it an evil at all, the Stoic says, and you then avoid any ambiguity.
The beauty of Cicero’s position is that he ends up living in exactly the same way as the Stoic, even as he diverges on the details of the reasoning behind it. Are we just splitting hairs here, caught up on technicalities? My own life tells me otherwise, but I will leave it at that, and I will admit that I am probably being too stubborn.
Whether the agony that comes with pain is indeed an evil, or simply something indifferent, is not a hill I will die on. I will pick my battles.
In practice, what matters is that I am made with the capacity to conquer pain, and to recognize why the big things matter far more than the little things; a sense of scale puts all things into a proper perspective. I succumb to my suffering when I make it more than it is, and I make my humanity less than it was meant to be.
I will be hard pressed to find a man who does not admit to the nobility of courage; he might just be mouthing the words, but he still senses why a cowering man is no man at all. He feels shame at his weakness because his conscience, however poorly formed, tells him that pain is to be weathered for a greater good, not to be grounds for surrender.
Ovid had it right:
Perfer et obdura; dolor hic tibi proderit olim.
“Endure and persist; this pain will one day do good for you.”
A virtue is not something added onto a man; it is the very act of suitably being a man.
In case you are being politically correct today, and prone to feeling offended, know that I, like any other classically minded soul, understand a “man” to broadly mean a human being, not simply a male. The sexes express themselves in very different ways, not in better or worse ways.
It takes some courage for me to say that in this day and age, and it likewise takes some courage for you to permit me the language of my tradition.
One of the many reasons I am drawn to the writings of Cicero is that while I admire him as a man of great virtues, one who had the deeds to back up his words, he also challenges me to think outside of my comfort zone.
Without always being completely conscious of its gradual influence, Stoicism has steadily become my default point of view. It took what I call the “Stoic Turn” to start rebuilding my life, and so I am now deeply committed to its core principles:
A logic that makes it possible for me to comprehend something of the universal Nature, an ethics that embraces virtue as the fulfillment of my particular nature, and a physics that reveres the guiding hand of Providence in it all.
As one part of this, I have grown accustomed to no longer treating pain as an evil. This did not come easily to me, and while I still catch myself complaining about my suffering as much as the next fellow, I can, when my head is on straight, consider how it is a means to making myself better, and thereby happier. I cringe, but I now look at the pain in a new light.
So when Cicero is hesitant to accept the Stoic claim that pain, in and of itself, can do us no harm, I get a little defensive. Yet I wouldn’t be a very good student of philosophy if I merely followed my whims, now would I? Cicero dismisses their abstractions as being removed from a stark reality, the simple fact that pain hurts, and I can hardly blame him.
I end up standing so defiantly with the Stoics because I know the danger of half measures, of cushioning the blow, of wanting to have it both ways. Is virtue truly our only good, or will I add further conditions, like demanding even a bare minimum of comfort, or expecting certain circumstances to be handed to me?
My own experience has taught that once a foot is in the door, I can no longer say that I’m secure in my home.
Once I say the hurt is “bad”, I am opening myself to a definition of self that, to whatever degree, includes the presence of the pleasure and the absence of the pain as conditions for happiness.
Do I prefer to feel gratification, and prefer to avoid suffering? Of course I do, and yet I would argue that the deepest pleasures are not conditions for happiness at all, but are rather the consequences of living well for its own sake. I happen to call it joy, which flows from the awareness of having done something rightly.
Cicero’s answer is to accept the reality of pain, which I believe the Stoic will also do, and then to argue that the evil of pain is so paltry in relation to the rewards of virtue as to make it insignificant, to which the Stoic will object. Don’t call it an evil at all, the Stoic says, and you then avoid any ambiguity.
The beauty of Cicero’s position is that he ends up living in exactly the same way as the Stoic, even as he diverges on the details of the reasoning behind it. Are we just splitting hairs here, caught up on technicalities? My own life tells me otherwise, but I will leave it at that, and I will admit that I am probably being too stubborn.
Whether the agony that comes with pain is indeed an evil, or simply something indifferent, is not a hill I will die on. I will pick my battles.
In practice, what matters is that I am made with the capacity to conquer pain, and to recognize why the big things matter far more than the little things; a sense of scale puts all things into a proper perspective. I succumb to my suffering when I make it more than it is, and I make my humanity less than it was meant to be.
I will be hard pressed to find a man who does not admit to the nobility of courage; he might just be mouthing the words, but he still senses why a cowering man is no man at all. He feels shame at his weakness because his conscience, however poorly formed, tells him that pain is to be weathered for a greater good, not to be grounds for surrender.
Ovid had it right:
Perfer et obdura; dolor hic tibi proderit olim.
“Endure and persist; this pain will one day do good for you.”
A virtue is not something added onto a man; it is the very act of suitably being a man.
In case you are being politically correct today, and prone to feeling offended, know that I, like any other classically minded soul, understand a “man” to broadly mean a human being, not simply a male. The sexes express themselves in very different ways, not in better or worse ways.
It takes some courage for me to say that in this day and age, and it likewise takes some courage for you to permit me the language of my tradition.
—Reflection written in 8/1996
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