I feel, my dear Lucilius, that I am being not only reformed, but transformed.
Seneca Moral Letters to Lucilius, Letter 6, On Sharing Knowledge (65 CE) Translated by Richard Mott Gummere
Source checked by an editor
When and why it was written
- When
- From Seneca's sixth letter to Lucilius, around 64 CE, written in his last years.
- Why
- Seneca is describing his own change honestly, while admitting how much is still unfinished in him.
What it means
Seneca, in his sixties, still speaks of himself as someone in progress. Reform adjusts a life; transformation changes the person living it.
He adds at once that much in him still needs changing, which is what makes the claim believable.
Our reading of the passage cited above, not a quotation from a commentary.
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Moral Letters to Lucilius, 65 CE
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