Comparing Seneca's On The Shortness Of Life And Tao Te Ching
1483 Words6 Pages
When people have questions about their lives they can turn to a number of things for guidance. People can turn to religion, philosophy, books, music, or art; they can even find someone specialized in the art of telling people how to live their lives (psychologists). With all of these ways to discover just how to make life meaningful, it is easy to run into differing opinions. When both opinions come from viable sources but disagree on key lessons, who, therefore, is to say which better. In the circumstance of Seneca’s On the Shortness of Life and Lau-tzu’s Tao Te Ching someone can find examples of very similar advice from both philosophers, as well as items towards which the two philosophers stand at a stark contrast. Seneca gives his friend Paulinus advice in the form of a letter: On the Shortness of Life. This letter starts out by saying “Most human beings, Paulinus, complain about the meanness of nature, because we are born for a brief span of life, and because this spell of time that…show more content… Seneca speaks largely on the fact that time is valuable and should not be disregarded and given away, he says “Believe me, it is the sign of a great man, and one who is above human error, not to allow his time to be fritted away: he has the longest possible life simply because whatever time was available he devoted entirely to himself” (10). The difference between these two sets of ideas lies in the concept of self. The Tao does not place much value on the self, rather encouraging one to “[care] about nothing but the Tao” (64). The Tao is also much more abstract than the teachings of Seneca, it is filled with paradoxes that can be interpreted in a number of different ways. Seneca’s clear instructions guide his audience to make decisions for themselves and to not postpone living their lives, while the Tao encourages its audience to learn and search and always keep a curious