Letter 55: On Vatia’s villa
I have just returned from a ride in my litter; and I am as weary as if I had walked the distance, instead of being seated. Even to be carried for any length of time is hard work, perhaps all the more so because it is an unnatural exercise; for Nature gave us legs with which to do our own walking, and eyes with which to do our own seeing. Our luxuries have condemned us to weakness; we have ceased to be able to do that which we have long declined to do.
Nevertheless, I found it necessary to give my body a shaking up, in order that the bile which had gathered in my throat, if that was my trouble, might be shaken out, or, if the very breath within me had become, for some reason, too thick, that the jolting, which I have felt was a good thing for me, might make it thinner.
So I insisted on being carried longer than usual, along an attractive beach, which bends between Cumae and Servilius Vatia's country house, shut in by the sea on one side and the lake on the other, just like a narrow path. It was packed firm under foot, because of a recent storm; since, as you know, the waves, when they beat upon the beach hard and fast, level it out; but a continuous period of fair weather loosens it, when the sand, which is kept firm by the water, loses its moisture.
As my habit is, I began to look about for something there that might be of service to me, when my eyes fell upon the villa which had once belonged to Vatia.
So this was the place where that famous praetorian millionaire passed his old age! He was famed for nothing else than his life of leisure, and he was regarded as lucky only for that reason. For whenever men were ruined by their friendship with Asinius Gallus whenever others were ruined by their hatred of Sejanus, and later by their intimacy with him—for it was no more dangerous to have offended him than to have loved him—people used to cry out: "O Vatia, you alone know how to live!"
But what he knew was how to hide, not how to live; and it makes a great deal of difference whether your life be one of leisure or one of idleness. So I never drove past his country-place during Vatia's lifetime without saying to myself: "Here lies Vatia!"
I have just returned from a ride in my litter; and I am as weary as if I had walked the distance, instead of being seated. Even to be carried for any length of time is hard work, perhaps all the more so because it is an unnatural exercise; for Nature gave us legs with which to do our own walking, and eyes with which to do our own seeing. Our luxuries have condemned us to weakness; we have ceased to be able to do that which we have long declined to do.
Nevertheless, I found it necessary to give my body a shaking up, in order that the bile which had gathered in my throat, if that was my trouble, might be shaken out, or, if the very breath within me had become, for some reason, too thick, that the jolting, which I have felt was a good thing for me, might make it thinner.
So I insisted on being carried longer than usual, along an attractive beach, which bends between Cumae and Servilius Vatia's country house, shut in by the sea on one side and the lake on the other, just like a narrow path. It was packed firm under foot, because of a recent storm; since, as you know, the waves, when they beat upon the beach hard and fast, level it out; but a continuous period of fair weather loosens it, when the sand, which is kept firm by the water, loses its moisture.
As my habit is, I began to look about for something there that might be of service to me, when my eyes fell upon the villa which had once belonged to Vatia.
So this was the place where that famous praetorian millionaire passed his old age! He was famed for nothing else than his life of leisure, and he was regarded as lucky only for that reason. For whenever men were ruined by their friendship with Asinius Gallus whenever others were ruined by their hatred of Sejanus, and later by their intimacy with him—for it was no more dangerous to have offended him than to have loved him—people used to cry out: "O Vatia, you alone know how to live!"
But what he knew was how to hide, not how to live; and it makes a great deal of difference whether your life be one of leisure or one of idleness. So I never drove past his country-place during Vatia's lifetime without saying to myself: "Here lies Vatia!"
—from Seneca, Moral Letters 55
I once had a student who adamantly refused to read any more from Seneca after he saw this reference to riding in a litter.
I reminded him how often he surely hailed a taxi whenever he went into the city. “That’s totally different! It’s not like I’m making some poor slaves carry me around!”
His friend nudged him, and further observed how the fellow’s own father regularly took advantage of a company limousine. “Yeah, but he earned that!”
I often detect a sneaking sort of conflict in our thinking, for we live in a society largely built around the accumulation of wealth and influence, and yet we simultaneously wish to give the appearance of condemning riches and luxuries as the worst of moral failings. It is as if we are capitalists on the inside and socialists on the outside, and I fear it betrays an unhealthy tendency toward both greed and dishonesty.
I have already wasted far too much time seeking worldly comforts and putting on radical airs, so I wish to find a better way. Thankfully, a Stoic attitude rises above the whole tension, by reminding me that neither being rich nor being poor are the real problems, and what is really getting in the way is my confusion between my circumstances and my character.
No, Seneca was not a good man or a bad man because he was born into privilege, any more than Epictetus was a good man or a bad man because he was born into slavery. And this Vatia is to be pitied for running away from life, not hated for his money.
The value to this life is defined not by what a man does or does not have, but instead by what he chooses to do with what he does or does not have. If we were to place moral convictions ahead of financial security, the rest would take care of itself. Trade in virtues, not in dollars, and then there is no need to bicker about who “owns” anything.
Perhaps I’m not looking in the right places, but I can’t find any references to a Servilius Vatia who was a rough contemporary of Seneca’s. I suppose it isn’t necessary to know any further details, since we have all observed his type, the man who uses his prosperity to cushion him from taking on any responsibilities, and who believes that indulgence will somehow allow him to escape from the burden of commitment.
To be fair, I have also known those who use poverty as a crutch for indolence, but that just goes to show how it’s all about the quality of the man, not the quantity of the money.
Yes, my sense of humor is probably too dry, so you will excuse me for chuckling at Seneca’s joke about Vatia already being dead while he was still alive. I sadly see it far too often, the replacement of leisure with idleness, when a creature made for active engagement slips into a passive stupor..
I once had a student who adamantly refused to read any more from Seneca after he saw this reference to riding in a litter.
I reminded him how often he surely hailed a taxi whenever he went into the city. “That’s totally different! It’s not like I’m making some poor slaves carry me around!”
His friend nudged him, and further observed how the fellow’s own father regularly took advantage of a company limousine. “Yeah, but he earned that!”
I often detect a sneaking sort of conflict in our thinking, for we live in a society largely built around the accumulation of wealth and influence, and yet we simultaneously wish to give the appearance of condemning riches and luxuries as the worst of moral failings. It is as if we are capitalists on the inside and socialists on the outside, and I fear it betrays an unhealthy tendency toward both greed and dishonesty.
I have already wasted far too much time seeking worldly comforts and putting on radical airs, so I wish to find a better way. Thankfully, a Stoic attitude rises above the whole tension, by reminding me that neither being rich nor being poor are the real problems, and what is really getting in the way is my confusion between my circumstances and my character.
No, Seneca was not a good man or a bad man because he was born into privilege, any more than Epictetus was a good man or a bad man because he was born into slavery. And this Vatia is to be pitied for running away from life, not hated for his money.
The value to this life is defined not by what a man does or does not have, but instead by what he chooses to do with what he does or does not have. If we were to place moral convictions ahead of financial security, the rest would take care of itself. Trade in virtues, not in dollars, and then there is no need to bicker about who “owns” anything.
Perhaps I’m not looking in the right places, but I can’t find any references to a Servilius Vatia who was a rough contemporary of Seneca’s. I suppose it isn’t necessary to know any further details, since we have all observed his type, the man who uses his prosperity to cushion him from taking on any responsibilities, and who believes that indulgence will somehow allow him to escape from the burden of commitment.
To be fair, I have also known those who use poverty as a crutch for indolence, but that just goes to show how it’s all about the quality of the man, not the quantity of the money.
Yes, my sense of humor is probably too dry, so you will excuse me for chuckling at Seneca’s joke about Vatia already being dead while he was still alive. I sadly see it far too often, the replacement of leisure with idleness, when a creature made for active engagement slips into a passive stupor..
—Reflection written in 4/2013
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