16.
You have often been cupped in order to relieve headaches.
You have had veins cut for the purpose of reducing your weight.
If you would pierce your heart, a gaping wound is not necessary; a lancet will open the way to that great freedom, and tranquillity can be purchased at the cost of a pin-prick.
What, then, is it which makes us lazy and sluggish?
None of us reflects that some day he must depart from this house of life; just so old tenants are kept from moving by fondness for a particular place and by custom, even in spite of ill-treatment.
Book: Moral Letters Vol II
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On the proper time to slip the cable
Location: Chapter 70, Section 16
Content:
16.
You have often been cupped in order to relieve headaches.
You have had veins cut for the purpose of reducing your weight.
If you would pierce your heart, a gaping wound is not necessary; a lancet will open the way to that great freedom, and tranquillity can be purchased at the cost of a pin-prick.
What, then, is it which makes us lazy and sluggish?
None of us reflects that some day he must depart from this house of life; just so old tenants are kept from moving by fondness for a particular place and by custom, even in spite of ill-treatment.