Whatever act of thine then has no reference either immediately or remotely to a social end, this tears asunder thy life, and does not allow it to be one, and it is of the nature of a mutiny, just as when in a popular assembly a man acting by himself stands apart from the general agreement.
Marcus Aurelius warns that actions lacking a social purpose fragment one's life and disrupt the harmony of the community.
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How small a part of the boundless and unfathomable time is assigned to every man, for it is very soon swallowed up in the eternal!
But it is inconsistent with honoring reason and God to be troubled because by death a man will be deprived of the other things.
But if it is easy to set little value on all these things, turn to that which remains, which is to follow reason and God.
The safety of life is this, to examine everything all through, what it is itself, that is its material, what the formal part; with all thy soul to do justice and to say the truth.
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