CLARENDON LATER ANCIENT PHILOSOPHERS Series editors: Jonathan Barnes, Universite´ de Paris IV—Sorbonne and A. A. Long, University of California, Berkeley SENECA SELECTED PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS Seneca’s Letters to Lucilius are a rich source of information about ancient Stoicism, an influential work for early modern philosophers, and a fascinating philosophical document in their own right. This selection of the letters aims to include those which are of greatest philosophical interest, especially those which highlight the debates between Stoics and Platonists or Aristotelians in the first century AD, and the issue, still important today, of how technical philosophical enquiry is related to the various purposes for which philosophy is practised. In addition to examining the philosophical content of each letter, Brad Inwood’s commentary discusses the literary and historical background of the letters and to their relationship with other prose works by Seneca. Seneca is the earliest Stoic author for whom we have access to a large number of complete works, and these works were highly influential in later centuries. He was also a politically influential advisor to the Roman emperor Nero and a celebrated author of prose and verse. His philosophical acuity and independence of mind make his works exciting and challenging for the modern reader. Brad Inwood is Professor of Classics and Philosophy at the University of Toronto. PUBLISHEDINTHESERIES Alcinous: The Handbook of Platonism John Dillon Epictetus: Discourses, Book Robert Dobbin Galen: On the Therapeutic Method, Books I and II R. J. Hankinson Porphyry: Introduction Jonathan Barnes Seneca: Selected Philosophical Letters Brad Inwood Sextus Empiricus: Against the Ethicists Richard Bett Sextus Empiricus: Against the Grammarians David Blank SENECA SELECTED PHILOSOPHICAL LETTERS Translated with an Introduction and Commentary by BRAD INWOOD 1 1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York Brad Inwood The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published First published in paperback All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available Typeset by Laserwords Private Limited, Chennai, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham, Wiltshire ISBN –––– (hbk) –––– (pbk) For my parents PREFACE In the course of my work on this book I have incurred more debts than I can fully recall, let alone acknowledge here. It is a genuine pleasure to thank, first and foremost, the Centre for Advanced Study in the Behavioural Sciences for their support during a sabbatical leave in –. Without the respite and stimulus provided by that unique institution this book would never have been completed. I am also very grateful to the Canada Research Chair program of the Canadian government and to my friends and colleagues at the University of Toronto for invaluable and unstinting support. I owe a great deal to the generous and careful work of my research assistants in the Department of Classics, Vicki Ciocani and Emily Fletcher. My initial work on Seneca’s letters was encouraged by an invitation from the ancient philosophy group at Cambridge University to a workshop on Seneca’s letters in May . The discussion at that workshop contributed a great deal to several of the commentaries in this book. Later, students in two of my graduate seminars (in and ) at the University of Toronto served as willing guinea pigs and ingenious collaborators. A keen group of graduate students at New York University provided helpful feedback on several letters during a series of visits in ; I am grateful to Phillip Mitsis for the invitation to NYU and for his encouragement and advice on Seneca over many years. Tony Long has been both supportive of and patient about this project for a very long time. His acute comments and those of his fellow series editor Jonathan Barnes have improved the commentary and translation at many points; no doubt I should have taken their advice more consistently. David Sedley’s work on the relationship between Stoic physics and ethics in Seneca’s work (especially in his article ‘Stoic Metaphysics at Rome’, Sedley ) has been a valuable source of stimulus. The need to respond to John Cooper’s challenging discussion ‘Moral Theory and Moral Improvement: Seneca’ (Cooper ) provoked many fruitful lines of enquiry. The ancient philosophy group at the University of Chicago has done a great deal for the study of Seneca during the time when this book was under construction (not least by organizing a key conference in April ) and their confidence in the value of Senecan studies in a contemporary philosophical setting has fostered a great deal of work by many people from which I have been able to benefit. viii Some commentaries have benefitted from work on papers originally written for oral presentation and since published separately. The com- mentary on Letter is intimately connected to a paper given at the Universities of Buffalo, British Columbia, and Alberta, ‘Reason, Ration- alization and Happiness’; it now appears as chapter of Reading Seneca (Inwood ). The commentary on Letter began as a sketch for ‘Getting to Goodness’, delivered to the Princeton Ancient Philosophy Colloquium and at the University of Pittsburgh and now published as chapter of Reading Seneca. The commentary on Letter has been enriched by discussion of an unpublished paper presented at Cornell University, the University of Arizona, and UC Santa Barbara. I owe a particularly concrete debt of gratitude to Margaret Graver, who subjected the penultimate draft of my translation to an exacting scrutiny. Her influence has saved me from many errors and infelicities and I have often accepted her suggestions for better wording; the remaining blunders are my own fault. Margaret also read an early version of the commentaries with a critical eye; her comments and suggestions have improved my comment on almost every letter. It is no mere cliche´ to say that without the encouragement, advice, and loving support of my wife, Niko Scharer, I would not have been able to write this book. An even older debt is owed to my parents, Marg and Bill Inwood. For many decades they have provided a wonderful education, both moral and intellectual. My brothers and I had the privilege of growing up in a household where critical enquiry, teaching, intellectual challenge, and a passion for fairness were in the fabric of daily life. It has taken me a long time to see how precious a gift our parents gave us. Humbly, I dedicate this book to them. CONTENTS Introduction xi Abbreviations and Conventions xxv TRANSLATIONS 1 Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter COMMENTARY 105 Group (Letters , , ) Letter Letter Letter x Group (Letters and ) Letter Letter Group (Letters and ) Letter Letter Group (Letters , and ) Letter Letter Letter Group (Letters –) Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Letter Bibliography Index Locorum General Index INTRODUCTION Seneca’s Life and Works Lucius Annaeus Seneca, better known as Seneca the Younger, was a complex figure. At some point between and at Corduba in Roman Spain, he was born into a prosperous and prominent provin- cial Roman family. His father, Seneca the Elder, was an important literary figure in Rome itself, famous as the author of the Controversi- ae and Suasoriae, compilations of rhetorical declamations by the most famous speakers of the day. Seneca the Younger was the middle of three sons; while his older brother had a successful if convention- al political career leading to a provincial governorship, the youngest son lived a private life and did not achieve senatorial rank. Seneca the Younger took an early interest in philosophy, oratory, and liter- ature and over the course of a long career rose to become a seni- or adviser to the emperor Nero and the most prominent literary figure of his generation, publishing extensively in both prose and verse. Seneca’s early life is difficult to document, although his career becomes easier to track after he was forced into exile in owing to some sort of court intrigue.¹ He was recalled to Rome and political influence in . For readers of this volume, the most important facts are his early interest in philosophy, his lifelong commitment to philosophical study and writing, and his determination to combine those interests with a long and active political career as well as a major role as a prominent literary figure. He was the author of many tragedies (whose relationship to philosophy is a controversial issue) and a famous orator; his satirical work on the emperor Claudius, the Apocolocyntosis, is yet another demonstration of his virtuosity.