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Moral Letters Vol III

Seneca

§ Section 42

On the usefulness of basic principles

95:42

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.

43.

But when people do this for the purpose of attaining a legacy, they are like vultures waiting for carrion.

The same act may be either shameful or honourable: the purpose and the manner make all the difference.

Now each of our acts will be honourable if we declare allegiance to honour and judge honour and its results to be the only good that can fall to man’s lot; for other things are only temporarily good.