On Benefits (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca)

Such wisdom and practical application in the best translation I have encountered

I have found the works of Seneca important for several reasons. As history, he lived in incredibly turbulent times. As a personal story, he found a way to stay alive and continue to teach with his world caving in on him. As philosophy, I believe the stoics provide good medicine in the age of narcissism. Certainly some of the principles of the stoics wouldn't be able to fly with our modern sensibility but Seneca's teachings and advice are as usable and current as tomorrow.

This title has not been prepared for Kindle. Apparently it was just automatically converted to Kindle format, without making the slight additional effort required to make it actually a Kindle book. The table of contents is not linked with Kindle. The notes are not linked. Chapter titles and other passages are images rather than text, and so cannot be searched for or highlighted.

Seneca's seven books of De Beneficiis discuss at some considerable length the giving and receiving of benefits, how we should give them and how we should receive them. The single English word 'benefit' does not really cover the meaning of 'beneficium' as the latter rather more covers the notion of 'favour', 'kindness' and so on. Like all of Seneca's letters and essays, this remains practical advice even today.For the complete text you have the choice of this, or the Loeb edition with Latin and English facing page translation. The translation of that Loeb edition dates from 1935 so feels a little bit dated. This current translation is more recent which is certainly better to have if you do not care about having the Latin text, however the hardback Loeb is around the same price if not less expensive than this paperback.This has a general introduction on Seneca (duplicated in all the volumes in this series), an introduction specific to "De Beneficiis" and end notes, whereas the Loeb only has a couple of pages by way of introduction and minimal footnotes.

Unlike some of the other editions in this series this is a quality bound hardcover.

it is a very book on his philosophy and gives an understanding of roman culture. it i.s worthy book to read