Moral Letters to Lucilius

​Two things give the most strength to the mind: faith in truth and confidence; admonition produces both. For it is believed, and when it is believed, the mind conceives great spirits and is filled with confidence. Therefore, admonition is not superfluous. Marcus Agrippa, a man of huge mind, who alone of those whom civil wars made famous and powerful was prosperous for the public, used to say that he owed much to this maxim: “For by concord small things grow, by discord the greatest fall apart.” By this he said that he had been made both a very good brother and a very good friend.

​If maxims of this kind, familiarly received into the mind, form it, why should not this part of philosophy, which consists of such maxims, be able to do the same? Part of virtue consists in instruction, part in practice; you must both learn and confirm what you have learned by doing. If this is so, not only the decrees of wisdom benefit, but also the precepts, which restrain and banish our passions as if by an edict.

”Philosophy,” he says, “is divided into these: knowledge and the habit of the mind. For he who has learned and perceived what is to be done and avoided is not yet wise, unless his mind has been transfigured into what he has learned. That third part of giving precepts is from both, from decrees and from habit. Therefore, it is superfluous for completing virtue, for which those two are sufficient.”

​In that way, then, consolation also is superfluous, for this too is from both, as are exhortation, persuasion, and argument itself. For these too proceed from the habit of a well-ordered and strong mind. But although those come from the best habit of the mind, the best habit of the mind comes from these; it produces them, and from them it is itself made.

​Next, that which you say belongs already to the perfect man and one who has attained the summit of human happiness. But these are reached slowly; in the meantime, even to the imperfect but progressing person, the way must be shown in things to be done. Wisdom itself, which has already led the mind to the point where it cannot be moved except to the right, will perhaps give this way to itself even without admonition. For weaker minds indeed, it is necessary for someone to go before: “this you will avoid, this you will do.”

​Furthermore, if he waits for the time when he knows by himself what is best to do, in the meantime he will err and by erring be hindered from arriving at that state in which he can be content with himself. He must, therefore, be ruled while he begins to be able to rule himself. Boys learn by a copy-text. Their fingers are held and guided by another’s hand through the outlines of letters, then they are ordered to imitate what is set before them and to reform their handwriting to it. So our mind, while it is instructed by a copy-text, is helped.

​These are the things by which it is proved that this part of philosophy is not superfluous. It is asked next whether it alone suffices to make a wise man. To this question we will give its own day; in the meantime, setting aside arguments, does it not appear that we need some advocate who may give precepts contrary to the precepts of the people?

​No voice reaches our ears with impunity; those who wish us well harm us, those who curse us harm us. For the curse of the latter implants false fears in us, and the love of the former teaches us badly by wishing us well. For it sends us to distant, uncertain, and wandering goods, when we can produce happiness from home.

​It is not allowed, I say, to go by the straight path. Parents drag us into evil, slaves drag us. No one errs for himself alone, but scatters his madness among his neighbors and receives it in turn. And therefore the vices of peoples are in individual men, because the people gave them. While each makes someone worse, he is made worse himself; he learned worse things, then taught them, and that huge wickedness has been produced by piling into one what is known to be worst in each. Let there be, therefore, some guardian, and let him twitch our ear from time to time, drive away rumors, and protest against the praising peoples.

​For you err if you think that vices are born with us; they have come upon us, they have been poured in. Therefore, let the opinions that sound around us be repelled by frequent admonitions.