Chapter 8 - On the Shortness of Life, by Seneca the Younger

It always amazes me to see men demanding time from others and those from whom they ask it indulging them.

Both parties focus on the matter of the request for time, neither of them on the time itself; as if what is asked for were nothing, what is given, nothing.

Men are frivolous with the most valuable thing in the world, blind to its value because it is intangible, because it can not be seen, and for this reason it is considered a very cheap thing – even of almost no value at all.

Men put a lot of worth in stocks and bonds, and for these they hire out their labor or service.

But no one places as much value on time; all spend it grandly as if it cost nothing.

Observe how these same people with nothing but time on their hands run in haste to the doctor if they get sick and the threat of death suddenly appears on the horizon. See how ready they are, when facing death, to sell all they own in order to keep living! Such is the paradox of human nature.

But if each man could see the number of years he has left ahead, just as he can see the years he has behind him, how disturbed those would be who saw only a few left, how careful they would be with them!

And yet it is easy to spend something that is a known quantity, no matter how small it may be; but this must be done sparingly before it is all gone.

Yet there is no reason for you to assume that such people are aware of how precious a thing time is, because many of them are prepared to surrender a portion of their own years to those whom they love.

And they do this without realizing it; but the result of their sacrifice is that they suffer a loss of time without adding to the years of those whom they hold dear.

But one thing they definitely do not know is that they are losing something. Dispensing of something that is lost without being noticed is an act they can live with.

But no one will bring back those years; no one can reboot your existence.

Life will keep marching on and never reverse course; it will be silent, it will not remind you of its swiftness.

Noiselessly it will pass; it will not be slowed by government decree, or by the roar of an entire population. With the same speed that it began, it will continue; never slowing or reversing. And what does this tell us? You have been occupied while life hurtled past you. Meanwhile the grim reaper is knocking on your door, and, like it or not, you must let him in.