Example cards:

“Do you really want to know what philosophy offers humanity? Philosophy offers wisdom.” – Marcus Aurelius

The Stoics saw philosophy rather differently from how the discipline is conceived today. For them, it wasn’t merely an intellectual framework or a dispassionate collection of ideas, but a whole way of life (askêsis), something closer to what we would now think of as a religion, yet without the superstition: a guide to how one should think, act and behave. Stoicism wasn’t meant to be confined to the classroom, it was to be put to use during the most challenging moments of our lives. Montaigne, a profound follower of the Stoics, neatly summarised the scale of the Stoic ambition: “To philosophise is to learn to die.” “Friendship is always helpful, yet too often love causes harm.” – Seneca

The Stoics far preferred friendship to romantic love, for they felt that it is in friendship that we properly honour the ambitions that our societies falsely associate with relationships. With our friends, we can be calm, nonpossessive, reasonable, generous and empathetic; in other words, properly kind and giving, whereas love finds us agitated, frequently mean and too often self-righteous. Being asked to be someone’s friend should be deemed the greatest honour; by contrast, an invitation to be someone’s lover should – given what too often happens in couples – be the very poor consolation prize.

53 cards | 70mm x 100m x 25mm

By The School of Life