Letter 49: On the shortness of life
A man is indeed lazy and careless, my dear Lucilius, if he is reminded of a friend only by seeing some landscape which stirs the memory; and yet there are times when the old familiar haunts stir up a sense of loss that has been stored away in the soul, not bringing back dead memories, but rousing them from their dormant state, just as the sight of a lost friend's favorite slave, or his cloak, or his house, renews the mourner's grief, even though it has been softened by time.
Now, lo and behold, Campania, and especially Naples and your beloved Pompeii, struck me, when I viewed them, with a wonderfully fresh sense of longing for you. You stand in full view before my eyes. I am on the point of parting from you. I see you choking down your tears and resisting without success the emotions that well up at the very moment when you try to check them. I seem to have lost you but a moment ago. For what is not "but a moment ago" when one begins to use the memory?
It was but a moment ago that I sat, as a lad, in the school of the philosopher Sotion, but a moment ago that I began to plead in the courts, but a moment ago that I lost the desire to plead, but a moment ago that I lost the ability.
Infinitely swift is the flight of time, as those see more clearly who are looking backwards. For when we are intent on the present, we do not notice it, so gentle is the passage of time's headlong flight.
A man is indeed lazy and careless, my dear Lucilius, if he is reminded of a friend only by seeing some landscape which stirs the memory; and yet there are times when the old familiar haunts stir up a sense of loss that has been stored away in the soul, not bringing back dead memories, but rousing them from their dormant state, just as the sight of a lost friend's favorite slave, or his cloak, or his house, renews the mourner's grief, even though it has been softened by time.
Now, lo and behold, Campania, and especially Naples and your beloved Pompeii, struck me, when I viewed them, with a wonderfully fresh sense of longing for you. You stand in full view before my eyes. I am on the point of parting from you. I see you choking down your tears and resisting without success the emotions that well up at the very moment when you try to check them. I seem to have lost you but a moment ago. For what is not "but a moment ago" when one begins to use the memory?
It was but a moment ago that I sat, as a lad, in the school of the philosopher Sotion, but a moment ago that I began to plead in the courts, but a moment ago that I lost the desire to plead, but a moment ago that I lost the ability.
Infinitely swift is the flight of time, as those see more clearly who are looking backwards. For when we are intent on the present, we do not notice it, so gentle is the passage of time's headlong flight.
—from Seneca, Moral Letters 49
I am blessed, or perhaps cursed, with an extremely vivid memory; whether it does me benefit or harm will depend upon how I choose to make use of it. I could employ those intense impressions from yesterday to learn about becoming a better man today, or I could get lost in a nostalgic melancholy about my many lost opportunities.
This remains a work in progress. When recollections are just as striking as current experiences, and are often only amplified with the passage of time, it can be frustrating to get my priorities in order. What appears as “real” to me has an uncanny way of increasing or decreasing according to the quality of my intentions.
People often tell me that something has drifted so far into the past that it has lost its significance to them, though I suspect that is not so much an inevitable function of age as it is of deliberate attention.
It is remarkable how the degree to which I consciously choose to care will determine its distance from my awareness, such that an event from decades ago can remain as powerful as what I am seeing right now. I may claim it is time playing tricks, when I am actually the one pulling the strings.
I could firmly decide upon this or that no longer being important to me, and so I could simply toss out those memories like yesterday’s trash, but there is a grave danger in then denying myself the very virtues I must nourish in order to remain truly human.
Does it feel like it was just a moment ago? If I measure it by a clock or a calendar, I become acutely aware of how swiftly time passes, yet if I dwell upon the bundle of images that is currently in my mind, I can easily lose track of the temporary nature to all things.
Let me remember, while not permitting the power of memory to blind me to the urgency of seizing the day. What can I build for this fleeting present from the worn stones of the past?
I am blessed, or perhaps cursed, with an extremely vivid memory; whether it does me benefit or harm will depend upon how I choose to make use of it. I could employ those intense impressions from yesterday to learn about becoming a better man today, or I could get lost in a nostalgic melancholy about my many lost opportunities.
This remains a work in progress. When recollections are just as striking as current experiences, and are often only amplified with the passage of time, it can be frustrating to get my priorities in order. What appears as “real” to me has an uncanny way of increasing or decreasing according to the quality of my intentions.
People often tell me that something has drifted so far into the past that it has lost its significance to them, though I suspect that is not so much an inevitable function of age as it is of deliberate attention.
It is remarkable how the degree to which I consciously choose to care will determine its distance from my awareness, such that an event from decades ago can remain as powerful as what I am seeing right now. I may claim it is time playing tricks, when I am actually the one pulling the strings.
I could firmly decide upon this or that no longer being important to me, and so I could simply toss out those memories like yesterday’s trash, but there is a grave danger in then denying myself the very virtues I must nourish in order to remain truly human.
Does it feel like it was just a moment ago? If I measure it by a clock or a calendar, I become acutely aware of how swiftly time passes, yet if I dwell upon the bundle of images that is currently in my mind, I can easily lose track of the temporary nature to all things.
Let me remember, while not permitting the power of memory to blind me to the urgency of seizing the day. What can I build for this fleeting present from the worn stones of the past?
—Reflection written in 3/2013
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