Ad Marciam, de Consolatione
- Language:
- Latin
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~13,900 words · 66 passages
Cite this work
- APALucius Annaeus Seneca. (n.d.). Ad Marciam, de Consolatione. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/seneca/ad-marciam-de-consolatione
- MLALucius Annaeus Seneca. Ad Marciam, de Consolatione. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/seneca/ad-marciam-de-consolatione.
- ChicagoLucius Annaeus Seneca. Ad Marciam, de Consolatione. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/seneca/ad-marciam-de-consolatione.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
A consolation to a woman who has mourned a dead son for three years and cannot rise from it. Seneca does not ask her to stop feeling it: he asks her to look at grief straight on.
Context and history
The earliest of the three surviving consolations. The genre was a Roman rhetorical convention, but the harshness here is real: he tells her that whoever weeps for the dead is pitying himself, and that death took nothing that was not on loan from the start. This entry is the Latin original; the catalogue also carries the English translation as a separate work. Cite the original.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
'At enim naturale desiderium suorum est.' Quis negat, quam diu modicum est? Nam discessu, non solum amissione carissimorum necessarius morsus est et firmissimorum quoque animorum contractio. Sed plus est quod opinio adicit quam quod natura imperauit. Aspice mutorum animalium quam concitata sint desideria et tamen quam breuia: uaccarum uno die alteroue mugitus auditur, nec diutius equarum uagus ille amensque discursus est; ferae cum uestigia catulorum consectatae sunt et siluas peruagatae, cum saepe ad cubilia expilata redierunt, rabiem intra exiguum tempus extinguunt; aues cum stridore magno inanes nidos circumfremuerunt, intra momentum tamen quietae uolatus suos repetunt; nec ulli animali longum fetus sui desiderium est nisi homini, qui adest dolori suo nec tantum quantum sentit sed quantum constituit adficitur. Vt scias autem non esse hoc naturale, luctibus frangi, primum magis feminas quam uiros, magis barbaros quam placidae eruditaeque gentis homines, magis indoctos quam doctos eadem orbitas uulnerat. Atqui quae a natura uim acceperunt eandem in omnibus seruant: apparet non esse naturale quod uarium est. Ignis omnes aetates omniumque urbium ciues, tam uiros quam feminas uret; ferrum in omni corpore exhibebit secandi potentiam. Quare? quia uires illis a natura datae sunt, quae nihil in personam constituit. Paupertatem luctum ambitionem alius aliter sentit prout illum consuetudo infecit, et inbecillum inpatientemque reddit praesumpta opinio de non timendis terribilis. VIII. Deinde quod naturale est non decrescit mora: dolorem dies longa consumit. Licet contumacissimum, cotidie insurgentem et contra remedia efferuescentem, tamen illum efficacissimum mitigandae ferociae tempus eneruat. Manet quidem tibi, Marcia, etiamnunc ingens tristitia et iam uidetur duxisse callum, non illa concitata qualis initio fuit, sed pertinax et obstinata; tamen hanc quoque tibi aetas minutatim eximet: quotiens aliud egeris, animus relaxabitur.…