(독서) Daily Stoic 12월 22일 STAKE YOUR OWN CLAIM

"Many times an old man has no other evidence besides his age to prove he has lived a long time."-SENECA, ON TRANQUILITY OF MIND, 3.8b (“많은 경우에, 나이 든 사람이 자신이 오래 살았다는 증거로 제시할 수 있는 것은 나이밖에 없다.”- 세네카, 《마음의 평정에 관하여》, 3.8b) How long have you been alive? Take the years, multiply them by 365, and then by 24. How many hours have you lived? What do you have to show for all of them? The answer for many people is: not enough. We had so many hours that we took them for granted. All we have to show for our time on this planet are rounds of golf, years spent at the office, time spent watching mediocre movies, a stack of mindless books we hardly remember reading, and maybe a garage full of toys. We're like the character in Ray- mond Chandler's The Long Goodbye: "Mostly, I just kill time," he says, "and it dies hard." One day, our hours will begin to run out. It would be nice ...

"Do you then ponder how the supreme of human evils, the surest mark of the base and cowardly, is not death, but the fear of death? I urge you to discipline yourself against such fear, direct all your thinking, exercises, and reading this way-and you will know the only path to human freedom."-EPICTETUS, DISCOURSES, 3.26.38-39 (“그러면 인간의 악 중 가장 극악무도하고, 비열하고 비겁한 자의 가장 확실한 표식은 죽음이 아니라 죽음에 대한 두려움이라는 것을 깊이 생각해 보셨나요? 나는 당신이 이런 두려움에 맞서 자신을 훈련하도록 권합니다. 당신의 모든 사고, 연습, 독서를 이 방향으로 이끌어가십시오. 그러면 인간의 자유로 가는 유일한 길을 알게 될 것입니다.” - 에픽테토스, 《담화》, 3.26.38-39)     To steel himself before he committed suicide rather than submit to Julius Caesar's destruction of the Roman Republic, the great Stoic philosopher Cato read a bit of Plato's Phaedo. In it, Plato writes, "It is the child within us that trembles before death." Death is scary because it is such an unknown. No one can come back and ...

"Think of the whole universe of matter and how small your share. Think about the expanse of time and how brief-almost momentary-the part marked for you. Think of the workings of fate and how infinitesimal your role."-MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 5.24 ("우주의 모든 물질을 생각해 보십시오. 그 중 당신의 몫이 얼마나 작은지요. 시간의 광대한 범위를 생각해 보십시오. 그리고 그 중에서 당신에게 주어진 시간이 얼마나 짧고, 거의 순간적인지 떠올려 보십시오. 운명의 작용을 생각해 보십시오. 그리고 그 안에서 당신의 역할이 얼마나 미미한지요." - 마르쿠스 아우렐리우스, 《명상록》 5.24) The amount of ...

"Both Alexander the Great and his mule-keeper were both brought to the same place by death-they were either received into the all-generative reason, or scattered among the atoms." -Marcus AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 6.24 ("알렉산더 대왕과 그의 노새지기 모두 죽음을 통해 같은 장소로 가게 되었다. 그들은 모두 생성의 이성 안에서 받아들여졌거나, 원자들 사이로 흩어졌을 것이다." - 마르쿠스 아우렐리우스, 명상록 6.24)   In a world that is in many ways becoming more and more unequal, there aren't many truly equalitarian experiences left. When Benjamin Franklin observed that "in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes," he couldn't have known how good some people would get at ...

"Death lies heavy upon one who, known exceedingly well by all, dies unknown to himself."-SENECA, THYESTES, 400 ("모든 사람이 너무나 잘 알고 있지만, 자신도 모르는 채 죽는 자에게 죽음은 무겁다."- 세네카, 티에스테스 400)   Some of the most powerful and important people in the world seem to have almost no self-awareness. Although total strangers know endless amounts of trivia about them, celebrities-because they are too busy or because it hurts too much-appear to know very little about themselves.   We can be guilty of the same sin. We ignore Socrates's dictum to "know thyself"-often realizing we have done so at our peril, years later, when we wake up one day and ...