【每日斯多葛】10月31日

October 31st 

YOU WERE BORN GOOD

“The human being is born with an inclination toward virtue.”

—MUSONIUS RUFUS, LECTURES, 2.7.1–2

The notion of original sin has weighed down humankind for centuries. In reality, we’re made to help each other and be good to each other. We wouldn’t have survived as a species otherwise.

There is hardly an idea in Stoic philosophy that wouldn’t be immediately agreeable to a child or that doesn’t jibe with common sense. The ideas within it go to the core of who we are and what we know to be true. The only things they conflict with are the various inventions of society—which usually serve some selfish interest more than they benefit the common good.

You were born good. “All of us have been made by nature,” Rufus said, “so that we can live free from error and nobly—not that one can and another can’t, but all.” You were born with an attraction to virtue and self-mastery. If you’ve gotten far from that, it’s not out of some inborn corruption but from a nurturing of the wrong things and the wrong ideas. As Seneca has pointed out, philosophy is a tool to strip it all away—to get back to our true nature.

10月31日 

你生来就是善良的

“人生来就具有趋向美德的倾向。”

——穆索尼乌斯·鲁弗斯，《讲演录》，2.7.1–2

几个世纪以来，“原罪”的观念一直给人类带来沉重的精神负担。但事实上，我们生来就是为了相互帮助、彼此善待。否则，人类作为一个物种根本不可能存续至今。

斯多葛哲学中几乎没有哪一种理念是孩子无法自然接受的，也几乎没有哪一种理念与常识相悖。这些思想触及我们人性的核心，也契合我们内心深处所认同的真理。它们所抵触的，只是社会人为创造出来的种种观念和制度——而这些东西往往更多地服务于某些人的私利，而非促进公共福祉。

你生来就是善良的。鲁弗斯曾说：“大自然造就了我们所有人，使我们都能够摆脱谬误，高尚地生活——并不是有些人能够做到而另一些人做不到，而是所有人都能做到。”你天生就具有向往美德和自我约束的倾向。如果如今的你已经远离了这些品质，那并不是因为你生来就有某种邪恶或堕落的本性，而是因为你在成长过程中受到了错误事物和错误观念的熏陶。正如塞涅卡所指出的，哲学就是一种工具，能够帮助我们剥去这些后天附加的东西，重新找回自己真正的本性。