Sublime

Seneca wanted to be the most popular, most powerful man in Rome, and also to live in perfect calm, at peace with himself, away from the gnawings of fear and guilt that were also constant features of his adult life. Seneca was exceptional in his intelligence and in his literary and political prominence, but his apparently contradictory desires were

is uncannily reminiscent of Seneca’s philosophical ideal, the Stoic Sage (Fig. 3.7). The ideal of virtue, as of vice, is for absolute autonomy, absolute power over circumstance and fortune—a desire that the tragic heroes try to achieve not by a life in conformity with nature, but by actions and passions that run counter to every natural law.

il est l’adversaire et l’ennemi mortel du possédant et du sédentaire qui le hait, le méprise et le redoute, car il est tant de choses qu’il ne veut pas qu’on lui rappelle : l’instabilité de toute existence, l’incessante décomposition de toute vie, la mort glacée et inexorable dans laquelle baigne l’univers.

As we have already seen, in the early stages of Greek philosophy there is little if any evidence to be found of the concept of an evil daimon: the daimon was considered an undifferentiated occult force that struck from the darkness and which had the power to alter a person’s fate in all manner of directions. This force was beyond human control: eve

Non importa quanto talento abbiate, quanto diffusi siano i vostri contatti, quanti soldi possediate. Quando volete fare qualcosa di importante e significativo, sarete sottoposti a trattamenti che vanno dall’indifferenza al sabotaggio vero e proprio. Potete contarci. In questo scenario, l’ego è l’esatto opposto di quello che vi serve. Chi può permet

Seneca defines anger, following an older philosophical tradition, as “the desire to avenge an injury,” including injuries which the person believes has been, or will be, imposed: “anger is aroused by the direct impression of an injury”