with the pursuits that have occupied the whole of your life – death is going to deliver the verdict in your case. Yes, all your debates and learned conferences, your scholarly talk and collection of maxims from the teachings of philosophers, are in no way indicative of genuine spiritual strength. Bold words come even from the timidest. It’s only when you’re breathing your last that the way you’ve spent your time will become apparent. I accept the terms, and feel no dread of the coming judgement.’ That’s what I say to myself, but assume that I’ve said it to you as well. You’re younger than I am, but what difference does that make? No count is taken of years. Just where death is expecting you is something we cannot know; so, for your part, expect him everywhere.
I was just intending to stop, my hand considering its closing sentence, but the accounts have still to be made outand this letter issued with its travelling expenses! You may assume that I won’t be announcing the source I intend borrowing from – you know whose funds I’m drawing on! Give me a fraction more time and payment will be made out of my own pocket. In the meantime Epicurus will oblige me, with the following saying: ‘Rehearse death’, or – the idea may come across to us rather more satisfactorily if put in this form – ‘It is a very good thing to familiarize oneself with death.’ You may possibly think it unnecessary to learn something which you will only have to put into practice once. That is the very reason why we ought to be practising it. We must needs continually study a thing if we are not in a position to test whether we know it. ‘Rehearse death.’ To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. He is above, or at any rate beyond the reach of, all political powers. What are prisons, warders, bars to him? He has an open door. There is but one chain holding us in fetters, and that is our love of life. There is no need to cast this love out altogether, but it does need to be lessened somewhat so that, in the event of circumstances ever demanding this, nothing may stand in the way of our being prepared to do at once what we must do at some time or other.
LETTER XXVII
‘S O you’re giving me advice, are you?’ you say. ‘Have you already given yourself advice, then? Have you already put yourself straight? Is that how you come to have time for reforming other people?’ No, I’m not so shameless as to set about treating people when I’m sick myself. I’m talking to you as if I were lying in the same hospital ward, about theillness we’re both suffering from, and passing on some remedies. So listen to me as if I were speaking to myself. I’m allowing you access to my inmost self, calling you in to advise me as I have things out with myself. I proclaim to my own self: ‘Count your years and you’ll be ashamed to be wanting and working for exactly the same things as you wanted when you were a boy. Of this one thing make sure against your dying day – that your faults die before you do. Have done with those unsettled pleasures, which cost one dear – they do one harm after they’re past and gone, not merely when they’re in prospect. Even when they’re over, pleasures of a depraved nature are apt to carry feelings of dissatisfaction, in the same way as a criminal’s anxiety doesn’t end with the commission of the crime, even if it’s undetected at the time. Such pleasures are insubstantial and unreliable; even if they don’t do one any harm, they’re fleeting in character. Look around for some enduring good instead. And nothing answers this description except what the spirit discovers for itself within itself. A good character is the only guarantee of everlasting, carefree happiness. Even if some obstacle to this comes on the scene, its appearance is only to be compared to that of clouds which drift in front of the sun without ever
I was just intending to stop, my hand considering its closing sentence, but the accounts have still to be made outand this letter issued with its travelling expenses! You may assume that I won’t be announcing the source I intend borrowing from – you know whose funds I’m drawing on! Give me a fraction more time and payment will be made out of my own pocket. In the meantime Epicurus will oblige me, with the following saying: ‘Rehearse death’, or – the idea may come across to us rather more satisfactorily if put in this form – ‘It is a very good thing to familiarize oneself with death.’ You may possibly think it unnecessary to learn something which you will only have to put into practice once. That is the very reason why we ought to be practising it. We must needs continually study a thing if we are not in a position to test whether we know it. ‘Rehearse death.’ To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. He is above, or at any rate beyond the reach of, all political powers. What are prisons, warders, bars to him? He has an open door. There is but one chain holding us in fetters, and that is our love of life. There is no need to cast this love out altogether, but it does need to be lessened somewhat so that, in the event of circumstances ever demanding this, nothing may stand in the way of our being prepared to do at once what we must do at some time or other.
LETTER XXVII
‘S O you’re giving me advice, are you?’ you say. ‘Have you already given yourself advice, then? Have you already put yourself straight? Is that how you come to have time for reforming other people?’ No, I’m not so shameless as to set about treating people when I’m sick myself. I’m talking to you as if I were lying in the same hospital ward, about theillness we’re both suffering from, and passing on some remedies. So listen to me as if I were speaking to myself. I’m allowing you access to my inmost self, calling you in to advise me as I have things out with myself. I proclaim to my own self: ‘Count your years and you’ll be ashamed to be wanting and working for exactly the same things as you wanted when you were a boy. Of this one thing make sure against your dying day – that your faults die before you do. Have done with those unsettled pleasures, which cost one dear – they do one harm after they’re past and gone, not merely when they’re in prospect. Even when they’re over, pleasures of a depraved nature are apt to carry feelings of dissatisfaction, in the same way as a criminal’s anxiety doesn’t end with the commission of the crime, even if it’s undetected at the time. Such pleasures are insubstantial and unreliable; even if they don’t do one any harm, they’re fleeting in character. Look around for some enduring good instead. And nothing answers this description except what the spirit discovers for itself within itself. A good character is the only guarantee of everlasting, carefree happiness. Even if some obstacle to this comes on the scene, its appearance is only to be compared to that of clouds which drift in front of the sun without ever
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