On darkness as a veil for wickedness
122:18
Book Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Book Description: The final volume of Seneca's moral letters. Common Stoic themes emerge again and again: the unreliability of fortune, the ability to form Stoic resolve, and the importance of virtue.
18.
The chief cause, however, of this disease seems to me to be a squeamish revolt from the normal existence.
Just as such persons mark themselves off from others in their dress, or in the elaborate arrangement of their dinners, or in the elegance of their carriages; even so they desire to make themselves peculiar by their way of dividing up the hours of their day.
They are unwilling to be wicked in the conventional way, because notoriety is the reward of their sort of wickedness.
Notoriety is what all such men seek—men who are, so to speak, living backwards.
Book: Moral Letters Vol III
Subtitle: Seneca's timeless letters of advice and wisdom.
Author: Seneca
Chapter: On darkness as a veil for wickedness
Location: Chapter 122, Section 18
Content:
18.
The chief cause, however, of this disease seems to me to be a squeamish revolt from the normal existence.
Just as such persons mark themselves off from others in their dress, or in the elaborate arrangement of their dinners, or in the elegance of their carriages; even so they desire to make themselves peculiar by their way of dividing up the hours of their day.
They are unwilling to be wicked in the conventional way, because notoriety is the reward of their sort of wickedness.
Notoriety is what all such men seek—men who are, so to speak, living backwards.