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Seneca · Letter XCII.1

Disasters, losses, and wrongs touch virtue only as a cloud touches the sun. The sun continues to shine; virtue continues to be virtue. The cloud cannot reach what lies above it.
Seneca, Letters from a Stoic (Letter XCII.1)

What this means

Losses and wrongs, Seneca says, pass over virtue the way a cloud passes over the sun: they obscure nothing essential and reach nothing above them. The sun keeps shining; character keeps being character. Misfortune can darken your circumstances without touching what makes you good.

On fate, judgment, change.

Read the source

Letters from a Stoic

Seneca · trans. Robin Campbell · Penguin Classics

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