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Railing against the past will not heal us. History has happened, it's over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love, instead of destroying what we don't - Arundhati Roy
In this second of four episodes on the Stoics, we introduce Lucius Annaeus Seneca. Seneca, like Marcus Aurelius as we will learn in later episodes, had a life that an outsider may view as incredibly privileged, but was very restrained and difficult for someone trying to live a Stoic life. Later in his life, Seneca came out of exile to be appointed as advisor to the newly crowed Roman Emperor Nero. It is a telling story of not only what the Roman Empire political life was like, but a foreshadowing of what was to come. Rome rose quickly, became excessive, and eventually was untenable.
We discuss Seneca's life, the state of the Roman Empire, and how he was able to fully implement his own brand of Stoicism as a guiding light in his otherwise difficult times. We each chose a few excerpts from Seneca's most well-known work, Letters on Ethics or Letters from a Stoic. In them, Seneca addresses topics such as life, time, being of good character, and so on with his dear friend Lucilius, who had his own struggles to be a Stoic as procurator of Sicily. In our next episode we will continue with Seneca and introduce Marcus Aurelius to examine how a Roman Emperor relied to Stoicism to navigate his desires, power, and search for spiritual freedom.
Always feel free to let us know what you think, or if you have any episode requests. We would love to hear from you in the comments or on Twitter! Thank you for listening and as always we’ll see you next time as we search for truth on the road that never ends!
