Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.
Seneca Letters from a Stoic, Letter CI (65 CE) Translated by Robin Campbell
Source checked by an editor
When and why it was written
- When
- Around 64 CE, written after the sudden death of an acquaintance, Cornelius Senecio.
- Why
- A man Seneca knew had died mid-plan, with arrangements half made. The letter is about what that reveals.
What it means
Seneca is attacking deferral. The habit he names is treating the present as a corridor to some later stretch where life properly begins.
Counting each day as a separate life is a scheduling instruction. If today is complete in itself, it cannot be spent as a down payment on a year you may not get.
Our reading of the passage cited above, not a quotation from a commentary.
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Letters from a Stoic, 65 CE
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