Séminaire GREDEG : Enrico BALDASSARRE

Title: DE VITA BEATA: THE INTERPLAY BETWEEN WEALTH AND HAPPINESS IN THE SENECA’S ENVIRONMENT

Abstract:
That of happiness is an ever-present topic, also debated today in the our consumerist society, but already dealt with in the philosophical schools of post-Christian Athens and then in the Roman environment, where Cicero first and then even more Seneca face it in a clear and univocal way. The De vita beata, in fact, is Seneca’s answer to the most common questions on what gives us true happiness, shedding light on the right path to take to achieve it, dispelling the opinions of ordinary people of whom he demonstrates foolishness and fallacy. Happiness does not consist in pleasures, as the Epicureans argued by misinterpreting the teachings of their Master, indeed those who abandon themselves to pleasures are dominated by them, thereby becoming their slaves. This is the case, for example, of those who mistakenly believe that wealth bring happiness and they do not realize instead that it conditions life. Why doesn’t Seneca, who lives in luxury, content with what is necessary? Why does he speak in one way and he live in another one? In this regard, Seneca responds to his many detractors by admitting the usefulness of wealth as a means to be able to act with liberalitas and humanitas: the wise must not reject the generosity of fortune, which allows him to act pro-socially towards those less lucky than him. However, Seneca honestly confesses that he still lives shrouded in a thousand faults, not having yet reached wisdom, an ideal to which he aspires, freeing his soul every day from the vices that oppress him, in a path that requires much effort. A human confession – not common in ancient philosophers — that makes him feel very close to us.