In the morning when you rise unwillingly, let this thought be present: I am rising to the work of a human being.
Coming to iPhone
Swap the doomscroll for the Stoics
Stoic Scroll is a vertical feed of passages from Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus. Every card shows the book and chapter it comes from.
There are more things, Lucilius, likely to frighten us than there are to crush us; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality.
There are things which are within our power, and there are things which are beyond our power.
And that which is an obstacle on the road helps us on this road.
Hold every hour in your grasp. Lay hold of to-day’s task, and you will not need to depend so much upon to-morrow’s. While we are postponing, life speeds by.
The best way of avenging yourself is not to become like the wrong-doer.
The same thumb, a different feed
You pick up the phone to check one thing, and an hour later you’re still swiping. Stoic Scroll uses the same swipe, but every card is a passage from books people have kept reading for almost two thousand years.
An hour of the usual feed
Forty short videos, a dozen ads and an argument between strangers you’ll have forgotten by dinner.
An hour of Stoic Scroll
Book 5 of the Meditations, which opens with Marcus Aurelius talking himself out of bed, and two of Seneca’s letters to Lucilius.
The texts
Three complete books, with chapter numbers
Many Stoic quotes online are loose paraphrases, and some were never written by a Stoic at all. Stoic Scroll is built from full public-domain translations, so you can check any passage against the book.
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Meditations
Notes Marcus Aurelius wrote to himself while he ruled Rome, some of them in army camps on the Danube. Twelve books.
Translated by George Long -
Letters to Lucilius
The 124 letters Seneca wrote to his friend Lucilius in the last years of his life, about how to live well.
Translated by Richard Mott Gummere, 1917–25 -
Enchiridion
Epictetus was born a slave and became a teacher of philosophy. His student Arrian collected his teaching in this short handbook.
Translated by Thomas Wentworth Higginson
What we’re building
Stoic Scroll, the app
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One passage per swipe
Each card fills the screen with a single passage, short enough to read before you swipe again.
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The book and chapter on every card
Every card shows where the passage comes from, like Meditations 5.1 or Letter 13, so you can look it up and quote it correctly.
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Listen instead of reading
A narrator reads each passage out loud, so you can keep going on a walk or with the lights off.
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Read the whole book
When a passage stops you, open the full text at that spot and keep reading in order.
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Save and share
Save the passages you want to come back to, and share them as cards with the source printed on them.
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A passage on your lock screen
A widget puts a new passage on your home or lock screen every day.
Questions
Is Stoic Scroll out?
Not yet. It’s coming to iPhone first. Join the waitlist and we’ll email you the day it’s out.
Are the quotes real?
Yes. Every passage is taken from a complete public-domain translation and shows its book and chapter, so you can check it against the source.
Which translations do you use?
Meditations in George Long’s translation, the Letters to Lucilius in Richard Mott Gummere’s and the Enchiridion in Thomas Wentworth Higginson’s. We change old pronouns like “thou” to “you” and leave the rest of the wording alone.
How much will it cost?
We’ll publish the price at launch. People on the waitlist hear it first.
Is there an Android version?
Not at launch. Stoic Scroll starts on iPhone.
“Nothing, Lucilius, is ours, except time.”
Seneca, Letters 1
Leave your email and we’ll write to you once, on the day Stoic Scroll comes out.