Seneca · Letters to Lucilius
Letter 90: On the part played by philosophy in the progress of man
Letter 90 credits the gods with life and philosophy with living well, then disputes Posidonius on one point: the crafts of daily life, houses, tools, bread and weaving, were invented by men, not by wise men.
Wisdom trains minds rather than hands, and the innocent men of the first age were not yet virtuous, only ignorant of vice.
From the letter
Who can doubt, my dear Lucilius, that life is the gift of the immortal gods, but that living well is the gift of philosophy?
For men cease to possess all things the moment they desire all things for their own.
Up to this point I agree with Posidonius; but that philosophy discovered the arts of which life makes use in its daily round I refuse to admit, nor will I ascribe to it an artisan’s glory.
All things were ready for us at our birth; it is we that have made everything difficult for ourselves, through our disdain for what is easy.
Wisdom’s seat is higher; she trains not the hands, but is mistress of our minds.
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.