11.
None of these things is intrinsically glorious; but nothing can be glorious apart from them.
For it is not poverty that we praise, it is the man whom poverty cannot humble or bend.
Nor is it exile that we praise, it is the man who withdraws into exile in the spirit in which he would have sent another into exile.
It is not pain that we praise, it is the man whom pain has not coerced.
One praises not death, but the man whose soul death takes away before it can confound it.
Book: Moral Letters Vol II
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On the natural fear of death
Location: Chapter 82, Section 11
Content:
11.
None of these things is intrinsically glorious; but nothing can be glorious apart from them.
For it is not poverty that we praise, it is the man whom poverty cannot humble or bend.
Nor is it exile that we praise, it is the man who withdraws into exile in the spirit in which he would have sent another into exile.
It is not pain that we praise, it is the man whom pain has not coerced.
One praises not death, but the man whose soul death takes away before it can confound it.