[Stoicism] - Dịch Seneca (77): Về tự sát

Lời tựa:
                      
Như đã giới thiệu trong series, Seneca thực sự là nguồn cảm hứng Stoicism của mình. Đọc Seneca không chỉ là về triết học mà còn là một trải nghiệm nghệ thuật, khi những bài học, triết lý quan trọng được phản ánh qua những hình ảnh quen thuộc, bình dị và đời thường, thể hiện cái tinh tế trong quan sát của một thiên tài với sự từng trải của cuộc đời.
                                          
Với hy vọng giới thiệu Stoicism đến với các bạn trẻ Việt Nam, xin gửi tới các bạn bản dịch những bức thư quan trọng nhất trong cuốn "Moral Letters to Lucilius", tác phẩm đã làm nên tên tuổi của Seneca và là một trong bộ ba cuốn sách nền tảng của Stoicism.    
                                                        
Do không phải anh dịch thuật, nên bản dịch này hoàn toàn tập trung vào việc truyền tải thông điệp và hy vọng có thể giúp bạn cảm thấy dễ dàng hơn trong việc tiếp cận với bản tiếng Anh, để có thể thấy cái hay cái đẹp trong việc sử dụng ngôn từ của Seneca (dù thực ra bản tiếng Anh cũng chỉ là một bản dịch). Một anh bạn người Ý của mình đã chia sẻ Seneca được đưa vào chương trình giảng dạy tại Ý như một bậc thầy về việc sử dụng ngôn từ. Vì vậy, xin cam đoan tất cả những gì khiến bạn cảm thấy trúc trắc từ bản dịch là bởi khả năng hạn chế của mình, và rất mong nhận được đóng góp của các cao nhân để bản dịch được hoàn thiện hơn. 

Bức thư số 77

Athena từ đỉnh bão tố canh gác những thế lực thiêng liêng

"Đừng tự hành hạ mình, Marcellinus, như thể vấn đề mà ông đang cân nhắc là một điều quan trọng lắm. Việc tồn tại đơn thuần thực chất đâu có gì quan trọng lớn lao; tất cả nô lệ của ông cũng tồn tại, và tất cả vật nuôi cũng vậy. 

Điều quan trọng thực sự là có thể chết một cách anh dũng, khẳng khái và hiên ngang. Hãy nghĩ xem, bao lâu rồi ông cứ lặp đi lặp lại cái vòng tròn đơn điệu ấy mỗi ngày: ăn, ngủ, ái ân. Mong muốn được chết có thể đến với bất cứ ai, không chỉ những người biết phải trái hay dũng cảm, hay những người không hạnh phúc, mà thậm chí đến cả những kẻ chỉ vì ăn nhiều đến chán ngấy"

Hãy chấm dứt hy vọng rằng những lời cầu xin

Sẽ có thể thay đổi được sự sắp đặt của Chúa (trích thơ Virgil)

Cuộc đời cũng như một vở kịch: điều quan trọng không phải là show diễn dài đến đâu, mà là nó được diễn hay đến thế nào. 

Đâu có gì quan trọng khi nào bạn dừng. Dừng bất cứ chỗ nào bạn muốn, chỉ cần nhớ hãy tạo nên một kết thúc tốt đẹp.

From Seneca to Lucilius
Greetings
1 Today all of a sudden the “ships of Alexandria” came into view.
Th ese are the ones that are customarily sent on ahead to announce
the arrival of a fl eet. People call them “mail-boats,” and the sight of
them is welcome in Campania. Th e whole populace stands on the docks of Puteoli and can pick out the Alexandrians amid the great
traffi c of shipping just by the design of their sails. For these boats
alone are allowed to carry their topsails. 2 All vessels have topsails
when out at sea, for nothing aids their progress as well as the upper
portion of the canvas; that is what gives them their greatest speed.
For this reason the yard is lowered when the wind becomes gusty and
stronger than necessary, for the breeze lower down is not as forceful.
Once they come in past Capri and the promontory from which
Athena from the stormy heights
stands guard supreme,*
the other boats are told to content themselves with their mainsails.
Th us the topsail is the distinguishing mark of the Alexandrians.
3 Amid this rush of people hurrying toward the shore, I took considerable
pleasure in my own idleness, that is, in the fact that I did not
hurry down to pick up letters from friends and family or to fi nd out
how my business was doing overseas and what profi t it would yield. It
has been a long time since I either lost or gained anything. Th is would
have been the right attitude for me to take even if I were not old; it is
even more right now. No matter how little I have, my travel money is
still more than the road I have left to travel, especially as there is no
need to fi nish this journey we are on. 4 A journey is unfi nished if you
stop in the middle, or anywhere short of your destination; but life is
never cut short as long as one lives honorably. It is complete no matter
where you end it, as long as you end it in a good way.
But it often happens that a person has to make a brave end for
reasons that are not particularly weighty. For the reasons that keep
us here are not weighty either. 5 Consider Tullius Marcellinus, whom
you knew quite well.* He was a quiet young man, then quickly past
his prime; then, beset by an illness that was not untreatable, but was
lengthy, troublesome, and demanding, he began to make plans for his
death. He called together a number of his friends. One after another
they either advised the course they themselves would have adopted
out of timidity, or turned to fl attery and gave the advice they thought
the one consulting them wanted to hear. 6 But our Stoic friend, who
is an extraordinary person and—to speak the praises he deserves—a
brave man and a man of action—gave him what I consider the best
form of encouragement.* He began by speaking as follows: 

“Don’t torment yourself, Marcellinus, as though you were debating
some momentous question. Being alive is not, in fact, of any
great moment. Your slaves are alive; your animals also. What is
great is to die honorably, sensibly, bravely. Th ink how long you
have been doing the same thing over and over: food, sleep, sex,
round and round in a circle. It is not only the sensible person, the
brave person, and the miserable person who can conceive a wish
to die: sheer disgust may wish for it as well.”
7 What Marcellinus needed, though, was not encouragement so
much as assistance, for his slaves would not obey him. Th e fi rst thing
the Stoic did was to allay their fear by explaining that household
slaves would be at risk only if there were some doubt as to whether
the master died of his own volition. If there were no such doubt, then
thwarting his demise would be as bad an example as murdering him.
8 Next, he advised Marcellinus himself that just as when dinner is
over one shares out the leftovers among the serving people, so when
his life was over it would be natural for him to give something to
those who had been his lifelong servants. Marcellinus was of a compliant
disposition, and generous even when giving made a diff erence
to him. He therefore distributed some small sums to his weeping
slaves and actually spoke words of consolation to them.
9 He had no need of the knife or of any bloodshed. For three days
he abstained from food, and he directed that a tent be set up right in
his bedroom.* Th en a tub was brought in. He lay in it for a long time,
and by slipping repeatedly under the hot water he gradually gave way.
From what he said, there was a kind of pleasure in it; a not infrequent
occurrence when one is expiring without violence. Th ose of us who
have had fainting spells have also experienced this.*
10 I have gone off on a tangent with this little story; but you will
not mind learning that your friend’s demise was neither diffi cult nor
uncomfortable. For although he did commit suicide, his passing was
exceedingly gentle; life just slipped away. But the anecdote will also
be of use, for necessity often requires such things from us. Th ere are
times when we ought to die and do not want to, or when we are actually
dying and do not want to. 11 No matter how naïve a person is,
he knows he must die sometime, and yet when the time draws near
he pulls back; he trembles; he begs to be excused.

Suppose someone were to burst into tears because he was not
born a thousand years earlier; would you not think that ridiculously
foolish? It is just as foolish for someone to weep that he will not be
alive a thousand years in the future. Th e two are equal: your future
nonexistence and your past. Both times are beyond our ken. 12 You
have been cast into this moment of time; you might extend it, but for
how long? Why are you crying? What is it you want? You’re wasting
your eff orts.
Stop hoping that your prayers will ever change
what gods ordain.*
Your fate is fi xed, determined by a vast, eternal necessity. You will go
where all things go. Why is this news to you? It is the law to which you
were born. It is what happened to your father, to your mother, to your
ancestors, to all who came before you and to all who will come after
you. A sequence that no power has ever defeated or changed constrains
and compels all events.* 13 What multitudes will follow you, to die in
their turn! What multitudes accompany you! You would be braver,
no doubt, if many thousands would die along with you. But in fact,
there are many thousands, people and animals alike, who do, yielding
up their spirits in one way or another in this very moment when you
hesitate to die. Did you think you would never reach the goal to which
you have been headed all along? Th ere is no journey without an ending.
14 Do you expect me now to tell you exemplary tales about great
men? I will tell you some about mere children. Th ere is one about a
Spartan who was captured when still very young. He kept shouting
in his own Doric tongue, “I will not be a slave!” And he proved it,
too: the fi rst time he was ordered to do a slave’s insulting task—for
they told him to fetch the chamber pot—he dashed his head against
a wall and burst his skull. 15 With freedom so near at hand, how is
anyone a slave? Would you not wish for your own son to die in this
way rather than grow old through fecklessness? Why, then, are you
upset on your own behalf, when even a boy can die bravely? You may
refuse to follow his lead and then be led there all the same. Let it be
at your behest and not another’s. Why not take on the spirit of that
boy and say, “I am no slave”? Poor thing, you are a slave: a slave to
others, a slave to property, a slave to life. For life itself is slavery when
one lacks the courage to die.

16 Do you in fact have anything worth waiting for? You linger,
you tarry over your pleasures, but you have exhausted even those. Not
one of them is new to you; not one is anything but loathsome to you
from sheer surfeit. You know what wine tastes like, both with honey
and without. It makes no diff erence whether a hundred gallons pass
through your bladder or a thousand; either way you are nothing but
a conduit. You know exactly what an oyster tastes like, and a mullet
as well.* Self-indulgence has sampled everything; nothing remains
for future years to try. And this is what you cannot tear yourself
away from! 17 What else are you moping over? Can you not bear to
let go of your friends? Do you even know how to be a friend? Your
country? Do you value it even enough to allow dinner to be delayed
for its sake? Th e sun? You would put it out like a lamp if you could;
for what have you ever done that was worthy of its light? Be honest:
it is not any longing for the Senate House or the Forum, or even
for the world as a whole, that makes you reluctant to die. What you
cannot part from is only your butcher shop—and thanks to you,
there is nothing left in it. 18 You fear death, and yet when a platter
of mushrooms is before you, how little you care!
You wish to live; do you know how? You fear to die; what of it?
Isn’t the life you are living a kind of death? Once when Gaius Caesar
was traveling the Latium road, he was accosted by a prisoner on
a chain gang, an aged fellow with a beard down to his chest, who
begged for death.* “Are you alive now?” he said. Th at is the answer
to give to those people who would be better off dead: “You fear to
die; are you alive now?”
19 “But what about me?” says another. “I want to live, and I am
doing many honorable actions. I am reluctant to abandon the responsibilities
of life, which I am working hard and faithfully to perform.”
Ah, but don’t you know that dying is also one of life’s responsibilities?
You are not abandoning any responsibilities, for there is no set
number you have to fulfi ll.
20 Th ere is no life that is not short. On a universal scale, even the
lifespan of Nestor was short, and that of Sattia too, who ordered a
tombstone saying she lived to ninety-nine.* You see how one person
boasted of a long old age. Who could have put up with her if she had
made it to a hundred?
Life is like a play: what matters is not how long the show goes on but how well it is acted. It makes no diff erence where you stop. Stop
wherever you please; just make the ending a good one.

Farewell.

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