Seneca

c. 4 BC – AD 65 · Roman Stoic philosopher, tutor to Nero

Lucius Annaeus Seneca (“Seneca the Younger”) was a Roman Stoic philosopher, dramatist, and statesman who served as tutor and later adviser to the emperor Nero. His Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium — 124 letters on Stoic ethics and everyday living — rank among the most widely read works of ancient philosophy. Ordered by Nero to take his own life in AD 65, he died much as he had counselled others to live.

Traced to source

2 quotes we’ve traced to Seneca

“Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life”

Verified

“We suffer more often in imagination than in reality”

Verified

Not actually Seneca

Often misattributed to Seneca

Famous lines widely pinned on Seneca that we’ve traced to someone else.

“Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it's stored than to anything on which it's poured”

actually Unknown (an anonymous American saying)

“I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened”

actually Anonymous saying (later pinned on Mark Twain)

“Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful”

actually Edward Gibbon

“There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self”

actually Walter L. Sheldon

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Thought Seneca said something else?

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