Lucilius is thinking about stepping back from public life, and Seneca approves, with a twist: retire quietly, and don’t make a show of it. Advertising your withdrawal only draws a crowd. Use the quiet to talk honestly with yourself, and work on your weakest spot the way you’d nurse an old injury. Seneca, writing near the end of his life, calls himself “not a physician, but a sick man,” and argues that later life may be the best time of all to grow wise.
From Seneca to Lucilius
I agree with your plan: retire and hide yourself away in rest. But at the same time, hide your retirement too. In doing this, you can be sure you’ll be following the example of the Stoics, if not their teaching. But you’ll be following their teaching as well; that way you’ll satisfy both yourself and any Stoic you like.
The Wise Person’s Larger Public
We Stoics don’t urge people to take up public life in every case, or at all times, or without any conditions. Besides, once we’ve given our wise person the field of public life that is worthy of him, namely, the universe, he isn’t cut off from public life even when he withdraws. In fact, perhaps he has left only one small corner of it and moved into greater and wider regions; and once he has been set among the heavens, he understands how low a seat he sat on when he climbed into the official’s chair or the judge’s bench. Take this to heart: the wise person is never more active than when things divine as well as things human have come into view.
Don’t Hang Out a Sign
Now I return to the advice I set out to give you: keep your retirement in the background. There’s no need to pin a sign on yourself that says “Philosopher and Seeker of Quiet.” Give your purpose some other name; call it poor health and physical weakness, or plain laziness. To boast about our retirement is just idle self-promotion.
Some animals hide from discovery by confusing their tracks near their dens. You should do the same; otherwise someone will always be on your trail. Many people walk past what’s in plain view and peer after what’s hidden and concealed; a locked room invites the thief. Things lying in the open look cheap; the burglar passes by what’s exposed to view. This is the way of the world, and of all foolish people: they long to break in on hidden things. So it’s best not to brag about your retirement.
But making too much of your seclusion and your withdrawal from people’s sight is also a kind of bragging. So-and-so has retreated to Tarentum; that other one has shut himself up in Naples; this third person hasn’t crossed his own threshold in years. To advertise your retirement is to gather a crowd.
Talk to Yourself, Not About Yourself
When you withdraw from the world, your business is to talk with yourself, not to have people talk about you. But what will you talk about? Do just what people love to do when they talk about their neighbors: speak ill of yourself when you’re alone; then you’ll get used to both speaking and hearing the truth. Above all, though, think hard about what you come to feel is your greatest weakness.
Everyone knows best the weak points of his own body. So one person relieves his stomach by vomiting, another props it up by eating often, another drains and purges his body by fasting from time to time. People troubled by pain in their feet give up either wine or the baths. In general, people who are careless in other ways go out of their way to treat the illness that often afflicts them. It’s the same with our souls: there are certain parts that are, so to speak, on the sick list, and the cure must be applied to them.
Not a Physician, but a Patient
So what am I doing with my own leisure? I’m trying to heal my own sores. If I showed you a swollen foot, or an inflamed hand, or some shriveled sinews in a withered leg, you’d let me lie quietly in one place and put ointment on the injured limb. But my trouble is greater than any of these, and I can’t show it to you. The abscess, the ulcer, is deep inside my chest. Please, please don’t praise me; don’t say, “What a great man! He has learned to look down on everything; he has condemned the madness of human life and escaped it!” I have condemned nothing except myself.
There’s no reason for you to want to come to me to make progress. You’re mistaken if you think you’ll get any help from this direction: it isn’t a physician who lives here, but a sick man. I’d rather you said as you left me: “I used to think he was a happy and learned man, and I pricked up my ears to hear him; but I’ve been cheated. I saw nothing and heard nothing of what I wanted and came back to hear.” If you feel that and say that, some progress has been made. I’d rather you pardoned my retirement than envied it.
Retirement for Something Better
Then you say: “Is it retirement, Seneca, that you’re recommending to me? You’ll soon be falling back on the sayings of Epicurus!” I do recommend retirement to you, but only so that you can use it for greater and more beautiful work than what you’ve given up. Knocking at the proud doors of the powerful, making alphabetical lists of childless old men to flatter for their wills, wielding the highest authority in public life: this kind of power exposes you to hatred, doesn’t last, and, if you rate it at its true value, is cheap and gaudy.
One person will be far ahead of me in public influence, another in his pay as an army officer and the status that comes with it, another in the crowd of his clients. But it’s worth being outdone by all of them, as long as I can outdo Fortune. And I’m no match for her in a crowd; she has more supporters.
Spur the Horse
I wish you had wanted to follow this path earlier! I wish we weren’t discussing the happy life within sight of death! But even now, let’s not delay. Now we can take the word of experience, which tells us that many things are useless and even harmful; we should have taken the word of reason on this long ago.
Let’s do what people do when they’ve set out late and want to make up for lost time by going faster: let’s use the spur. Our time of life is the best possible for these pursuits, because the age of boiling and foaming is behind us. The faults that ran wild in the first fierce heat of youth are weaker now, and little more effort is needed to put them out.
Wisdom That Comes With the Years
“And when,” you ask, “will what you learn only as you’re leaving do you any good, and how?” In exactly this way: I’ll leave a better man. But don’t think any time of life is better suited to gaining a sound mind than the one that has won the victory over itself through many trials and long, often repeated regret for past mistakes, and, its passions calmed, has reached a state of health. This is the very time to have gained this good. Whoever has reached wisdom in old age has reached it through his years.
Farewell.
Breaking It Down: A Modern Take on Letter 68
Letter 68 is about stepping back, whether from a career, a busy social life, or the pressure to be seen. Seneca supports Lucilius’s retirement but warns against turning it into a performance. The real point of quiet is inner work: honest self-examination and patient care of our weakest places. Seneca is strikingly humble here, calling himself a patient rather than a doctor, and he ends with an encouraging thought for anyone who feels they started late: the years themselves can make us wise.
1. Step back quietly
“Hide your retirement too.” Rest doesn’t need an announcement. The quieter the change, the more room it leaves for real work.
2. A larger stage
“The wise person is never more active than when things divine as well as things human have come into view.” Leaving a job or role doesn’t mean leaving the world. It can mean seeing more of it.
3. Don’t brand your withdrawal
“To boast about our retirement is just idle self-promotion.” The modern version might be the dramatic post about quitting social media. Just quietly do it.
4. Hidden things attract attention
“A locked room invites the thief.” Making a mystery of yourself makes people curious. Ordinary is the best camouflage.
5. Use solitude for honest conversation
“When you withdraw from the world, your business is to talk with yourself, not to have people talk about you.” Quiet time is wasted if we spend it wondering what others think.
6. Be your own honest critic
“Speak ill of yourself when you’re alone.” Seneca doesn’t mean harsh self-loathing; he means getting used to hearing the truth. Kind honesty with ourselves is how we grow.
7. Treat your weakest spot first
Just as people with gout skip wine, “there are certain parts that are, so to speak, on the sick list, and the cure must be applied to them.” Know your recurring trouble, whether temper, worry, or envy, and give it steady care.
8. Humility about our progress
“It isn’t a physician who lives here, but a sick man.” Seneca refuses praise. The best teachers often see themselves as fellow patients.
9. Look inward before judging others
“I have condemned nothing except myself.” It’s tempting to step back and look down on the world. Seneca turns the critique on himself first.
10. Rest for something better
Retirement is worthwhile only if “you can use it for greater and more beautiful work than what you’ve given up.” Free time is a chance to do what matters, not just to stop.
11. Let others win the status race
“It’s worth being outdone by all of them, as long as I can outdo Fortune.” Someone will always have more money, influence, or followers. Let them.
12. Starting late? Speed up
“Let’s use the spur.” Regret about lost time is best answered with renewed effort today.
13. Later life is a fine time for wisdom
“Whoever has reached wisdom in old age has reached it through his years.” Experience, calmer passions, and lessons from past mistakes make later life fertile ground for growth.
Key Takeaways from Letter 68
- Retire quietly. No announcement needed.
- Think bigger than your job. The world is your larger stage.
- Skip the performance. Boasting about withdrawal defeats it.
- Don’t make yourself a mystery. It only draws attention.
- Talk to yourself honestly. Solitude is for self-examination.
- Get used to the truth. Hear it first from yourself.
- Care for your weakest spot. Treat it like a chronic condition.
- Stay humble. We’re all patients, not doctors.
- Use free time well. Rest for something better.
- Let others win the status race. Outdo Fortune instead.
- Make up for lost time. Use the spur.
- Trust the wisdom of the years. It’s never too late to grow.
“When you withdraw from the world, your business is to talk with yourself, not to have people talk about you.”
— Seneca, Letter 68
Keep Seneca With You
If this letter spoke to you
Marcus Aurelius’s private notebook, in Gregory Hays’s readable translation.
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. It costs you nothing and helps keep these translations free.
Next up: Letter 69 — On Rest and Restlessness
