While it is put off, life runs past.
Genuine
Yes. In a letter I (‘On Saving Time’), sections 2–3 (Ep. 1.3).
Found word for word by program in the Latin original.
The English is our own translation, not yet reviewed: there is no public-domain translation of this text in our sources.
- Work
- Moral Letters to Lucilius (Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium)
- Where
- Letter I (‘On Saving Time’), sections 2–3 (Ep. 1.3)
- Found at
- Paragraph 4 of the Latin text
- Translation
- Our own, not yet reviewed (no public-domain translation in our sources)
Researched by AI; checked by program against the full text on 31 October 2026. Editorial review: pending. How we check
On the page
I. SENECA LUCILIO SUO SALUTEM
[…] Et si volueris attendere, magna pars vitae elabitur male agentibus, maxima nihil agentibus, tota vita aliud agentibus. [2] Quem mihi dabis qui aliquod pretium tempori ponat, qui diem aestimet, qui intellegat se cotidie mori? In hoc enim fallimur, quod mortem prospicimus: magna pars eius iam praeterit; quidquid aetatis retro est mors tenet. Fac ergo, mi Lucili, quod facere te scribis, omnes horas complectere; sic fiet ut minus ex crastino pendeas, si hodierno manum inieceris. [3] Dum differtur vita transcurrit. Omnia, Lucili, aliena sunt, tempus tantum nostrum est; in huius rei unius fugacis ac lubricae possessionem natura nos misit, ex qua expellit quicumque vult. […]
[4] Interrogabis fortasse quid ego faciam qui tibi ista praecipio. Fatebor ingenue: quod apud luxuriosum sed diligentem evenit, ratio mihi constat impensae. […]
So do, my Lucilius, what you write that you are doing: embrace every hour; you will depend less on tomorrow if you lay your hand on today. … While it is put off, life runs past. All things, Lucilius, belong to others; only time is ours.
Where it comes from
The English usually shared for ‘Dum differtur vita transcurrit’ is a free rendering whose translator wasn’t identified, and Richard M. Gummere’s translation is in copyright in the UK and the EU (he died in 1969). Neither is stored here. The translation here is our own, from the Latin.
The scene
The first of the Letters. Seneca urges Lucilius to claim himself back and to gather and save his time, which is taken from us, stolen or let slip, and observes that we are dying daily, since the years behind us already belong to death. He tells him to hold every hour and seize today’s task so as to depend less on tomorrow; then come these words, and the claim that time is the only thing truly ours. He then admits that he too wastes time, though he can at least account for the loss.
What it means
Putting life off until later is how it is lost: the time we postpone living is already gone.
Topics
Related quotes
- We do not have a very short time assigned to us, but we lose a great deal of it
- Do not act as if thou wert going to live ten thousand years. Death hangs over thee. While thou livest, while it is in thy power, be good. Marcus Aurelius
- No longer talk at all about the kind of man that a good man ought to be, but be such. Marcus Aurelius
- Simplify, simplify. Henry David Thoreau
- It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live. (paraphrase) Marcus Aurelius
Sources
Cite it
Seneca the Younger, Moral Letters to Lucilius (64), Letter I (‘On Saving Time’), sections 2–3 (Ep. 1.3), our own translation. Checked at Quotogeny, https://quotogeny.com/q/while-we-wait-for-life-life-passes/ (31 October 2026).
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Checked by people
People who checked this entry against its source, under their own names. Their checks do not change the verdict: an editor reviews every entry.
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