Seneca,

“But in the [philosopher’s hall], where the question discussed is: “What is a good man?” and the lesson which we learn is “How to be a good man,” very few are in attendance, and the majority think that even these few are engaged in no good business; they have the name of being empty-headed idler. I hope I may be blessed with that kind of mockery; for one should listen in an unruffled spirit to the railings of the ignorant; when one is marching toward the goal of honour, one should scorn scorn itself.”

The world is a funny place.  Commonly, we admire (at least) two types of people based on differing sets of virtues.  For regular folks, let’s call them householders for ease, we admire a strong work ethic, monetary and property-based success, family orientation, forthrightness, and politeness.  For marginal persons, (and by this I mean holy people, philosophers, etc) we admire the very opposite.  We admire their denial of worldly things, oftentimes a celibate (or at least chaste) lifestyle, community focus, and wisdom.  We often except these folks from the decorm of politeness, we allow for behaviors and eccentricities which we do not allow in householders.

What’s funny about this, is that we expect a 100% choice.  A person living in the world, but no doing the monetary or property success game is seen as odd.  Take for instance, the modern Tiny House movement.  The folks often have families, usually work in normal jobs, but they’re set apart.

For the average person, someone dedicating a significant portion of their life to these “non-worldly” pursuits is an outlier.  As your letter notes, dear Seneca, they are seen as lazy, or (worse yet!) … poor.  It’s a strange thing that what we admire in the most extreme sort: monks, nuns, sadhus, priests, etc., becomes a thing of scorn in lesser amounts.

And with this extra time, we’re asking questions about what it means to be good, the bonds and obligations of social and rational creatures, how we can fulfill our place in the cosmos.  No small things, these.  Lazy, indeed.

Anyway, thank you for the letter, I look forward to the rest of this one.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

I realize I actually read a bit ahead yesterday.  Mea culpa.

“There await us, if ever we escape from these low dregs to that sublime and lofty height, peace of mind and, when all error has been driven out, perfect liberty. You ask what this freedom is? It means not fearing either men or gods; it means not craving wickedness or excess; it means possessing supreme power over oneself And it is a priceless good to be master of oneself.”

I set about trying look more into the classification of the προκόπτωντες.  I wasn’t quite able to hunt down the reference in Epictetus, other than the general fool/sage distinction.  Of course, what the vicissitudes of Fate have given us of Chrysippus is scanty at best.

I did find this work by Geert Roskam, “On the Path to Virtue: The Stoic Doctrine of Moral Progress and Its Reception in (Middle-) Platonism.”  Maybe I’ll save my pennies and see if I can secure a copy.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

“[I]t is not sufficient merely to commit these things [of our philosophy] to memory, like other matters; they must be practically tested. He is not happy who only knows them, but he who does them.”

— Seneca, Moral Letters, Letter LXXV On the Diseases of the Soul

In your letter, you make a classification of the types of the προκόπτωντες:

Type 1: Not yet wise, but close to. Will not backslide. Unaware of their state. Escaped the disease of the mind, but not the passions.

Type 2: Escaped diseases of the mind, and passions.

Type 3: Beyond the reach of many vices, but not all; namely the most serious ones are left behind.

It seems that the binary between virtue and vice was seen as problematic anciently as well.  Or at least more complicated than it might first seem.  In this volume, there are footnotes stating that Epictetus and Chrysippus allowed for only Types 1 and 2.  I’ll need to look more into that.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

At first, I found this portion of Stoic virtue confusing, until I realized something.  It seems to me that once one becomes a Sage, there’s no more backsliding.  Before I realized that, the idea that virtue for a day is equal to a lifetime confused me.

“Scale down the honorable life as much as you like from the full hundred years, and reduce it to a single day; it is equally honourable.”

How could that be?  If there’s no backsliding, then this idea becomes a beacon of hope.  If one person becomes Wise instantly, and lives many decades in that state before dying, and another person trains and makes progress for decades, only becoming Wise on the last day of their life, the “goodness” is equivalent.

It’s the inverse of the “drowning by an inch or a mile” issue of vice.  Only when I framed it in the context not of the Sage losing something, but as our end result, did this make sense.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

The Stoic position of the loss of family, city, country as not an evil is often hard to grok.  It’s one which I understand intellectually, but is still experientially outside of my understanding.

I did see a comment on Reddit the other day, where someone was taking as granted (erroneously I think) that all ideas or conceptions are based on feelings.  This person’s position was that any intellectual faculty rides on the tails of an emotion.

Of course, we Stoics see Emotions as (either) judgments or the results of judgments.  It’s a non-starter for us to put it the other way ’round.

However, on the issue of family, country, etc. it seems that this horse and cart are much more difficult to flip around.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

I think this is the first time we’ve had a clear discussion about the προηγμένα, or “preferred indifferents.”  I lean more and more to Aristo’s position.

The προηγμένα are the crux of the issue with modern Stoicism, it’s tiny edge of the two ton wedge cleaving open the doctrine.  For instance, I saw a post this week where someone said they were well acquainted with Stoic practice, “I apply the trichotomy!”

This ‘trichotomy,’ the weakening of virtue, and blatant ignoring of the gestalt whole that was the school, and the (frankly) strange revisionist white-washing of the ancients to fit modern biases hinges I believe on this start of preferred indifferents.

There is no more a confused topic than this one.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Seneca,

The shorthand of ‘what is honorable is good’ seems a good place to start for a more thorough understanding of virtue.  The Stoic sense of virtue is a bit hard to grok for most westerners these days.

Your statement’s about calm have me thinking on ἀταραξία, which is generally sorted as part of the Epicurean school.  Epictetus uses the word quite a bit, however.  Serenity, imperturbability, calm:  these are characteristics of the Sage, but it seems like we should explicitly point out that they are not the goal of progress.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Dear Seneca,

There is a conflict in your letter.  The second half speaks of the things which the philosopher enjoys:  namely prohairetic things.  But the first half is rather focused on aprohairetic things, externals.

The focus of goodness is right and just, but was Diogenes of Sinope not good?  Does not Epictetus hold him up as a possible Sage? Indeed he does:  he does this without property, without the civil citizenship.  He shuns the state, tries to teach Alexander as a man, not a King.  He is a citizen in the cosmic city of the gods, of the wise, of πήρα.

I think, sir, with all due respect that your wealth and position have clouded your judgement on this issue.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.

Dear Seneca,

I suspect we’re set about to disagree, here.  It strikes me that one who himself fled (and rightly) from public life would turn about and extol beyond measure the machinations of the state.

“No, not unless you think that the wise man is so unfair as to believe that as an individual he owes nothing in return for the advantages which he enjoys with all the rest.”

Should the slave be thankful for his master, who despite the taking of all of the fruits of his labor, gives him a meager pallet on which to sleep, just enough food to work, and none of the freedom and liberty which is the birthright of all mankind?

It seems, but the argument that he philosopher owes a debt for the provisions of the State, you would agree with the above.  The kidnapper who feeds the kidnapped is not virtuous because he keeps his prey fed.

“These goods, however, are indivisible, – l mean peace and liberty, – and they belong in their entirety to all men just as much as they belong to each individual.”

Yet the men behind the levers of the state are freer, at greater liberty, and protected from the harshness of wars and crime.  Their position is built on the reduction of the citizens’ power.  Every state power is a theft of the popular power.

The philosopher, instead, should turn a critical eye to those things which are ingrained through society and schooling as necessary for life.  The state as it is, is one of those.

Farewell.

Part of Michel Daw’s Reading Plan of Seneca’s Letters.