Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter XXX: On conquering the conqueror
“In this faith I wish to live and die.”
En ceste foy je vueil vivre et mourir.
Source: Le Grand Testament (The Great Testament) (1461), Line 882; "Ballade pour Prier Nostre Dame (Ballade as a Prayer to Our Lady)".
“Further, as there is no one who does not wish to be happy, so there is no one who does not wish”
XI, 26, Parts of this passage has been heavily compared with later statements of René Descartes; in Latin and with a variant translations:
The City of God (early 400s)
Context: We both are, and know that we are, and delight in our being, and our knowledge of it. Moreover, in these three things no true-seeming illusion disturbs us; for we do not come into contact with these by some bodily sense, as we perceive the things outside of us of all which sensible objects it is the images resembling them, but not themselves which we perceive in the mind and hold in the memory, and which excite us to desire the objects. But, without any delusive representation of images or phantasms, I am most certain that I am, and that I know and delight in this. In respect of these truths, I am not at all afraid of the arguments of the Academicians, who say, What if you are deceived? For if I am deceived, I am. For he who is not, cannot be deceived; and if I am deceived, by this same token I am. And since I am if I am deceived, how am I deceived in believing that I am? for it is certain that I am if I am deceived. Since, therefore, I, the person deceived, should be, even if I were deceived, certainly I am not deceived in this knowledge that I am. And, consequently, neither am I deceived in knowing that I know. For, as I know that I am, so I know this also, that I know. And when I love these two things, I add to them a certain third thing, namely, my love, which is of equal moment. For neither am I deceived in this, that I love, since in those things which I love I am not deceived; though even if these were false, it would still be true that I loved false things. For how could I justly be blamed and prohibited from loving false things, if it were false that I loved them? But, since they are true and real, who doubts that when they are loved, the love of them is itself true and real? Further, as there is no one who does not wish to be happy, so there is no one who does not wish [themself] to be [into being]. For how can he be happy, if he is nothing?
“I was born poor, I have lived poor, I wish to die poor.”
His last will, as quoted in an obituary in The Maine Catholic Historical Magazine (1914) Volumes 3-6, p. 17
“People are strange, they neither wish to live nor die.”
“Death is not the worst evil, but rather when we wish to die and cannot.”
Electra, 1007.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“A man who does not have something for which he is willing to die is not fit to live.”
Tel homme qui dans un excès de mélancolie se tue aujourd’hui aimerait à vivre s’il attendait huit jours.
"Cato" http://www.voltaire-integral.com/Html/18/caton.htm (1764)
Citas, Dictionnaire philosophique (1764)
"Writing", p. 14
The Dyer's Hand, and Other Essays (1962)
