VI

Seneca to his Lucilius, greeting. I understand, Lucilius, that I am not merely being corrected but transformed; yet I do not now promise, or even hope, that nothing remains in me that needs changing. Why should I not have many things that must be gathered together, thinned out, and lifted up? And this very fact is proof of a mind changed for the better: it sees the faults of its own that until now it did not recognize; with some sick people, congratulations are in order when they themselves have realized that they are sick.

And so I would like to share with you so sudden a change in myself; then I would have begun to have a surer confidence in our friendship, that true friendship which neither hope, nor fear, nor concern for its own advantage tears apart, the friendship with which people die and for which they die.

I will give you many people who have lacked not a friend but friendship: this cannot happen when an equal will draws minds into partnership in desiring honorable things. Why should it not be impossible? For they know that they themselves have everything in common, and especially their hardships.

You cannot imagine how much benefit I see being brought to me day by day. 'Send,' you say, 'to us too those things that you have found so effective.' I truly wish to pour everything into you, and I rejoice in learning something for this very reason, that I may teach it; nor will anything delight me, however excellent and beneficial it may be, if I am to know it for myself alone. If wisdom were offered on this condition, that I should keep it shut away and not proclaim it, I would reject it: the possession of no good thing is pleasant without a companion.

I shall therefore send you the books themselves, and, so that you do not spend much effort hunting here and there for what may prove useful, I shall add marks for you, so that you may go straight to the very passages that I approve and admire. Yet the living voice and shared life will help you more than written discourse; you ought to come into the presence of the thing itself, first because people trust their eyes more than their ears, and then because the road through precepts is long, but through examples short and effective.

Cleanthes would not have reproduced Zeno if he had merely heard him: he took part in his life, looked into his private ways, and observed whether he lived according to his own rule. Plato and Aristotle and the whole company of wise men destined to go in different directions drew more from Socrates' character than from his words; it was not the school of Epicurus but his companionship that made Metrodorus, Hermarchus, and Polyaenus great men. Nor do I summon you only so that you may make progress, but also so that you may be useful; for we shall contribute very much to one another.

Meanwhile, since I owe you your little daily payment, I shall tell you what pleased me today in Hecato. 'You ask,' he says, 'what progress I have made? I have begun to be a friend to myself.' He has made great progress: he will never be alone. Know that this friend is available to everyone. Farewell.