It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.
Seneca On the Shortness of Life, §1 (49 CE)
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When and why it was written
- When
- Around 49 CE, addressed to Paulinus, Rome's superintendent of the grain supply.
- Why
- Paulinus was a busy administrator. Seneca is arguing that busyness is the mechanism by which a life gets spent without being lived.
What it means
The complaint Seneca refuses is the common one: there is not enough time. His correction is that the supply is adequate and the spending is careless.
What follows in the essay is an audit rather than a lecture. He walks through the ways a day leaks: obligations accepted for no reason, ambition serviced, other people's business carried. The point of the audit is that leakage is invisible until you total it.
Read the source
On the Shortness of Life, 49 CE
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