Moral Letters to Lucilius

​You may count Bassus among these, who did not wish us to be deceived. He says that one who fears death is just as foolish as one who fears old age. For just as old age follows youth, so death follows old age. He has been unwilling to live, who does not wish to die. For life was given with the exception of death; we travel toward this. To fear it is therefore the part of a madman, because certain things are expected, while doubtful things are feared!

​Death has an equal and invincible necessity. Who can complain that he is in that condition, in which there is no one who is not? Now, the first part of equity is equality. But now it is superfluous to plead the cause of Nature, who did not wish our law to be other than her own; whatever she has put together, she dissolves, and whatever she dissolves, she puts together again.

​But now, if it has fallen to someone’s lot that old age lets him out gently, not suddenly torn away from life, but withdrawn little by little; oh, surely it behoves him to give thanks to all the gods, because, satisfied, he has been led to the rest necessary for man and welcome to the weary. You see some wishing for death, and indeed more than life is wont to be asked for. I know not which of the two I should think give us greater courage: those who demand death, or those who wait for it cheerfully and calmly; since the former sometimes arises from madness and sudden indignation, while the latter is a tranquility arising from a certain judgment. Someone comes to death angry; but no one receives coming death cheerfully, except him who has long composed himself for it.

​Therefore I confess that I came more frequently to a man dear to me for several reasons, so that I might know whether I should find him always the same, and whether the vigor of his mind was diminished along with the strength of his body. And this vigor was increasing for him in the same way as the joy of charioteers is wont to be noted more clearly when they approach the palm-branch in the seventh lap.

​Indeed, he said, complying with the precepts of Epicurus, first that he hoped there would be no pain in that last breath; yet if there were, that he would have a considerable amount of solace in its very brevity. For no pain is long which is great. Furthermore, that it would help him even in that very separation of soul and body, if it should happen with torture, that after that pain he could not feel pain. And that he did not doubt that the aged soul was on the very edge of the lips, and would not be torn from the body with great force. “A fire which has seized nourishing matter must be extinguished by water and sometimes by collapse; but that which is deprived of fuel subsides of its own accord.”

​I gladly hear these things, my Lucilius, not as if they were new, but as if I were brought face to face with reality. What then? Have I not watched many breaking off their lives? Indeed, I have seen them, but those have more weight with me who come to death without hatred of life, and admit it, rather than drag it to themselves.

​Indeed, he said that we feel that torment through our own doing, because we tremble then, when we believe death is near to us. For from whom is she not near, prepared in all places and at all moments? “But let us consider,” he said, “then, when some cause of dying seems to approach, how much nearer other causes are, which are not feared.” An enemy was threatening someone with death; indigestion anticipated this.

​If we wish to distinguish the causes of our fear, we shall find that some are real, others only seem to be. We do not fear death, but the thought of death. For we are always at the same distance from death itself. Thus if death is to be feared, it must always be feared. For what time is exempted from death?

​But I ought to fear lest you hate such long letters worse than death. Therefore I will make an end. You, however, that you may never fear death, think of it always. FAREWELL.