Seneca · c. 4 BCE – 65 CE
On Benefits 6.10 — Seneca
Translation by Aubrey Stewart (1887)
Seneca, On Benefits 6.10
Let us turn our attention to the first of these. Can you desire me to do anything to express my gratitude to a man who did nothing in order to confer a benefit upon me? Passing on to the next, do you wish me to show my gratitude to such a man, and of my own will to return to him what I received from him against his will? What am I to say of the third, he who, meaning to do an injury, blunders into bestowing a benefit? That you should have wished to confer a benefit upon me is not sufficient to render me grateful; but that you should have wished not to do so is enough to set me free from any obligation to you. A mere wish does not constitute a benefit; and just as the best and heartiest wish is not a benefit when fortune prevents its being carried into effect, neither is what fortune bestows upon us a benefit, unless good wishes preceded it. In order to lay me under an obligation, you must not merely do me a service, but you must do so intentionally.
Cite this passage
Seneca, On Benefits 6.10, tr. Aubrey Stewart (1887)
https://whatwouldstoicsdo.com/passage/on-benefits/6.10
Seneca, Dialogues, tr. Aubrey Stewart (1887–1889). Text: Standard Ebooks (CC0). Sources and licences
In plain English
AI-written notesYou owe thanks only when someone helped you on purpose. A lucky outcome, or a good wish that never turned into action, does not create a debt, because a real favour needs both the deed and the intention behind it.
Themes and situations
- Gratitude
- Judgements and impressions
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