Seneca, Epistles 99.5

ID: 9BB16D62-D18F-4B38-8C30-D669DB4CBC5D
TRANSLATOR: Long
CATEGORY: [[id:3B91B13C-0961-49E0-AF8F-0786A3170346][Valuation]]
AUTHOR: Seneca
TEXT: Epistles

Our hopes for the future make us ungrateful for what we have already received, forgetting that even if that hoped-for-future ever comes, it too will swiftly become the past. He who takes pleasure only in the present moment puts too tight a restriction on his enjoyment of life. Both the future and the past have pleasure to give, the one in expectation, the other in memory; but the future is contingent and may never be, while the past canot fail to have been. What madness it is, then to allow the most secure of all your posessions to slip from your grasp!