23.
Therefore, as regards your own virtue also, you will not praise it any more, if fortune has favoured it by granting you a sound body, than if fortune has endowed you with a body that is crippled in some member, since that would mean rating a master low because he is dressed like a slave.
For all those things over which Chance holds sway are chattels,—money, person, position; they are weak, shifting, prone to perish, and of uncertain tenure.
On the other hand, the works of virtue are free and unsubdued, neither more worthy to be sought when fortune treats them kindly, nor less worthy when any adversity weighs upon them.
Book: Moral Letters Vol II
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On various aspects of virtue
Location: Chapter 66, Section 23
Content:
23.
Therefore, as regards your own virtue also, you will not praise it any more, if fortune has favoured it by granting you a sound body, than if fortune has endowed you with a body that is crippled in some member, since that would mean rating a master low because he is dressed like a slave.
For all those things over which Chance holds sway are chattels,—money, person, position; they are weak, shifting, prone to perish, and of uncertain tenure.
On the other hand, the works of virtue are free and unsubdued, neither more worthy to be sought when fortune treats them kindly, nor less worthy when any adversity weighs upon them.