Hero Worship. Seneca, Epistles 1.11.8-10

Seneca recommends hero worship. Make your life an offering to people you respect. Note that this kind of worship does not involve relinquishing responsibility for your actions.

Iam clausulam epistula poscit. Accipe, et quidem utilem ac salutarem, quam te affigere animo volo: aliquis vir bonus nobis diligendus est ac semper ante oculos habendus, ut sic tamquam illo spectante vivamus et omnia tamquam illo vidente faciamus. Hoc, mi Lucili, Epicurus praecepit; custodem nobis et paedagogum dedit, nec immerito: magna pars peccatorum tollitur, si peccaturis testis assistit. Aliquem habeat animus quem vereatur, cuius auctoritate etiam secretum suum sanctius faciat. O felicem illum qui non praesens tantum sed etiam cogitatus emendat! O felicem qui sic aliquem vereri potest ut ad memoriam quoque eius se componat atque ordinet! Qui sic aliquem vereri potest cito erit verendus. Elige itaque Catonem; si hic tibi videtur nimis rigidus, elige remissioris animi virum Laelium. Elige eum cuius tibi placuit et vita et oratio et ipse animum ante se ferens vultus; illum tibi semper ostende vel custodem vel exemplum. Opus est, inquam, aliquo ad quem mores nostri se ipsi exigant: nisi ad regulam prava non corriges. Vale.

Now this letter demands a conclusion. Accept this instruction then, something useful and healthy that I invite you to plant in your mind: “We should take a good man into our affections and hold him ever before our eyes, that we may live as though he watched us, doing all things as for his inspection.” Epicurus provides this precept, dear Lucilius, offering himself to us as no mean protector and teacher. Most sins are forgiven to the one who warns others about to sin. The mind really should have someone to worship, someone whose authority it can invoke to make its hidden life more holy. Happy the man who provides assistance not merely by his presence, but even by his memory! Happy the man whose respect for the memory of another is so potent that he transforms his own life, putting it in good order! The one capable of such worship will swiftly deserve veneration himself. Choose Cato (†), then, for the object of your devotion. Or if he seems too unyielding, choose Laelius (‡), a man whose mind was more relaxed. Choose the man whose life and speech please you best, and don't overlook his face, which carries the mind in its visage. Show him to yourself always as a guardian, and an example. We each need someone, I say, whose habits we can use to judge our own, unless we decide to forego correcting our mistakes by reference to any standard. Farewell.

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(†) Marcius Porcius Cato, called Cato the Younger to distinguish him from his great-grandfather. His stern dedication to principle made him famous among the Romans of the late Republic (cf. Sallust, Catiline's War 54). After the Caesarians defeated the troops of his ally Metellus Scipio at the battle of Thapsus (46 BCE), he committed suicide in Utica rather than surrender.

(‡) Gaius Laelius Sapiens, whom Seneca mentioned already in his seventh epistle.