Quote·Ancient Rome·Imperial Rome
Musonius Rufus on Hardship
"No man is tested in happiness." — Musonius Rufus, banished and battered, made suffering a Stoic apprenticeship.
Unknown — "Bronze shallow bowl" (ca. 2nd century BCE–2nd century CE), public domain
Suffering as a furnace.
Musonius Rufus, as preserved in Stobaeus (Florilegium, 3.19.18), insists: «οὐδεὶς ἐν εὐτυχίᾳ δοκιμάζεται.» — «No man is tested in happiness.» Driven from Rome again and again, he saw hardship as the only true classroom.
Why the Stoics cherish trouble.
For Musonius, comfort dulls the soul. Trials reveal substance—cracks and strengths both. Pain isn’t to be feared, but used, like heat forging steel.
Musonius Rufus wanted his students to stop dodging pain. Only through difficulty, he argued, is real character hammered out. The easy road? That’s someone else’s journey.
