Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, where each day we read a passage of ancient wisdom

designed to help you in your everyday life.

But on Fridays, we not only read this daily meditation, but I try to answer some questions

from listeners and fellow stoics who are trying to apply this philosophy, whatever it is they

happen to do.

Sometimes these are from talks.

Sometimes these are people who come up to talk to me on the street.

Sometimes these are written in or emailed from listeners, but I hope in answering their

questions, I can answer your questions, give a little more guidance on this philosophy

we're all trying to follow.

You're listening ad-free on Wondering Plus.

Don't disgrace yourself.

Francis Bacon was a brilliant philosopher whose breakthroughs reverberate through our world

today.

He was also a human being and a politician.

Less glorious than his intellectual achievements were his travails in the public sphere, which

ultimately ended in his conviction for accepting bribes.

No one was more disappointed in this than Bacon, who lamented at the end of his life that

he had wasted himself, in quote for things for which I was least fit.

So as I may truly say, my soul have been a stranger in the course of my pilgrimage.

It's an arc that should sound familiar to any student of the stoics because it is in

many ways also the arc of the great Seneca.

...