20.
How far will you extend the boundaries of your estates?
An estate which held a nation is too narrow for a single lord.
How far will you push forward your ploughed fields—you who are not content to confine the measure of your farms even within the amplitude of provinces?
You have noble rivers flowing down through your private grounds; you have mighty streams—boundaries of mighty nations—under your dominion from source to outlet.
This also is too little for you unless you also surround whole seas with your estates, unless your steward holds sway on the other side of the Adriatic, the Ionian, and the Aegean seas, unless the islands, homes of famous chieftains, are reckoned by you as the most paltry of possessions!
Spread them as widely as you will, if only you may have as a “farm” what was once called a kingdom; make whatever you can your own, provided only that it is more than your neighbour’s!
Book: Moral Letters Vol II
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On the parts of philosophy
Location: Chapter 89, Section 20
Content:
20.
How far will you extend the boundaries of your estates?
An estate which held a nation is too narrow for a single lord.
How far will you push forward your ploughed fields—you who are not content to confine the measure of your farms even within the amplitude of provinces?
You have noble rivers flowing down through your private grounds; you have mighty streams—boundaries of mighty nations—under your dominion from source to outlet.
This also is too little for you unless you also surround whole seas with your estates, unless your steward holds sway on the other side of the Adriatic, the Ionian, and the Aegean seas, unless the islands, homes of famous chieftains, are reckoned by you as the most paltry of possessions!
Spread them as widely as you will, if only you may have as a “farm” what was once called a kingdom; make whatever you can your own, provided only that it is more than your neighbour’s!