Seneca · Letters to Lucilius
Letter 15: On brawn and brains
Letter 15 puts the health of the mind before that of the body and mocks the labour spent on broad shoulders, since no man will outweigh a bull.
Seneca allows short exercises, walking and reading aloud, and closes with a Greek saying on the fool’s life spent entirely in the future.
From the letter
Without philosophy the mind is sickly, and the body, too, though it may be very powerful, is strong only as that of a madman or a lunatic is strong.
Accordingly, limit the flesh as much as possible, and allow free play to the spirit.
The mind must be exercised both day and night, for it is nourished by moderate labour; and this form of exercise need not be hampered by cold or hot weather, or even by old age.
Here is the proverb; it is an excellent one: “The fool’s life is empty of gratitude and full of fears; its course lies wholly toward the future.”
As to what the future’s uncertain lot has in store, why should I demand of Fortune that she give, rather than demand of myself that I should not crave?
Coverage
Our editions hold 30 letters of 124 in Richard Mott Gummere’s translation (1917–1925); 29 of them have a page here, those that Joseph Baillard’s French translation (1861) also contains.
Seneca and Epictetus are in Stoic+ — 1 passage of this letter, with its reference; Marcus Aurelius is free in the app.